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bpt3

The author needs to rename their organization to YIYBY (yes in your backyard).

The nationalization of every policy on earth needs to stop.

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Are they appropriating other people's land and building in their backyard? That would be called eminent domain.

They just want everyone to build what they want in their own backyard.

NIMBYs might more accurately be called NIYBYs.

They are telling communities that they have no part of how to manage themselves.

Rancho Palos Verdes should not be required to comply with the request of some random activist who probably has never even stepped foot in the town.

That's a euphemism for NIYBY.

US cities are under the jurisdiction of their states. States hold the power to abolish or establish cities. Cities are required to follow state law. Whether residents or non-residents remind cities of their legal obligations is utterly irrelevant.

If a city was allowing racial discrimination and no one within the city sued, would that make it ok?

Communities are fully in control how they manage themselves, as long as they do it within the law of the state.

Rancho Palos Verdes should comply with the law, or face the consequences of not being able continue that control of their land management.

A great value of democracy is that a "random activist" can petition the government to enforce the law, that's how we keep the whole thing in check. The idea that random activists could not be a check on illegal behavior of the government is a very, well, authoritarian idea that is not compatible with any of the values embodied in the US or California constitutions, our legal system, or the very character and culture of the US.

> Communities are fully in control how they manage themselves, as long as they do it within the law of the state.

Yes, and my point is that continued trend of state and national laws overriding local jurisdiction over things like land use is not a positive one for residents of desirable areas (and arguably any land owner) and not something I agree with philosophically, not the litany of things you decided to rail about that have nothing to do with my comment.

Presumably you think it's not good for land owners of "desirable areas" because local laws create a monopoly that allows the landowners to extract wealth from others, through restriction of land use?

Can you see why there might be laws against that?

It is pretty well established that zoning was invented and is justified merely to enforce economic segregation. That economic segregation is perhaps the interest of landowners in these "desirable areas"?

I think by surfacing the true motivations of what's going on, it will become very clear why municipalities must be subjected to laws to enforce better behavior.

> Presumably you think it's not good for land owners of "desirable areas" because local laws create a monopoly that allows the landowners to extract wealth from others, through restriction of land use?

I think individuals should reap the rewards or suffer the losses from their individual decisions. If a community generates value, they are entitled to the rewards. If they run things into the ground (see Detroit as a notorious example), they're left holding the bag.

> Can you see why there might be laws against that?

Can I see why people would want to force themselves into a desirable situation that they had no part in creating? Sure. That doesn't make it right.

> It is pretty well established that zoning was invented and is justified merely to enforce economic segregation. That economic segregation is perhaps the interest of landowners in these "desirable areas"?

Citation needed on the first claim, but yes economic segregation is desirable to most people. That's not news.

> I think by surfacing the true motivations of what's going on, it will become very clear why municipalities must be subjected to laws to enforce better behavior.

The true motivations aren't hidden. Have nots are trying to get a piece of something desirable, and the people who already have it want to keep it.

The use of "back yard" refers to the local area, not the literal extent of one's property. This usage is not unique to NIMBY and it's derivatives. YIMBY sentiment also clearly extends beyond developers themselves and simple libertine principles. Many people want development to occur around them, in their back-yard so to speak, because they prefer it occurs. The semantic change you're arguing for erases this concept just to sidestep the notion of local community. It's a needlessly aggravating approach when the simple answer is just that both NIMBY and YIMBY advocates can support their cause beyond their own area because they believe their cohort is right and deserves it.

> simple libertine principles

Lol

State law recently increased my neighborhood’s density. It’s obliging these towns to do the same. I’m happy about both, which makes me YIMBY like the people in this organization

Let’s remember, CA is in a housing CRISIS. I feel an immediate urgency to build as many houses as possible in this state so that my young children can feasibly afford to live here without being an AI engineer when they are adults

There is an abundance of houses in the US, just in less desirable areas than Rancho Palos Verdes.

Your young children have no right to live in any specific location, and your usage of CRISIS to describe a lack of access to highly desirable housing is not compelling.

but time and again the opportunity is created in places where there's not enough housing which enriches the "landed gentry".

> Your young children have no right to live in any specific location

Strawman. I have a right to influence housing policy with my vote, which I’ve done and I’m pleased with the outcome.

Now, you nor any commenter nor any city official have the right to resist implementing this law, and the arguments against are not compelling.

not your back yard if you don't own the land.

I mean, also not in my back yard if the people who don't own the land vote for a bunch of micro managerial laws that make it illegal to do things without jumping through hoops that are so expensive as to be a non-starter.

Nobody is gonna go through the "everything else" approval process that strip clubs and heavy industry have to go through just to expand their business parking or do $10k of environmental impact assessment to drop off a $1k garden shed. (literal examples from my town).

These evil people can't make things illegal outright so they make the process so expensive almost nobody can do it and it takes decades for someone to come along with a lucrative enough development that's worth expensively challenging it inn court over.

People who do own the land aren't able to collectively agree on how to manage it because of state law. That's the issue. The source of the "NIMBY pressure" mentioned in the article is local residents, who should have much more say over local zoning code than someone who lives hundreds of miles away.

More housing in region X will result in lower housing prices in region Y. The interests of people from region Y are valid.

You can accuse them of being hypocrites if they don't also support more housing in region Y but that's a pretty big if you have to prove there.

But you can't say their interests are invalid.

That's a very theoretical argument, and there's nothing stopping people in region Y from building all the housing they could possibly need in region Y. If it's such a great idea, region Y will thrive and reap the rewards of this policy.

And my point is that there are limits on the impact region X has on region Y based on their proximity. Should someone in downtown LA be able to compel someone in Palo Alto to upzone based on this "impact"? What about someone in Kansas or Florida?

So region Y should shoulder all the costs while X benefits?

Wait, I thought upzoning and increased density increased quality of living? Are you saying that's not the case?

Putting that aside, no one is forcing region Y to upzone or not upzone in this scenario. They can make the choice they prefer, just like region X.

The state of California is forcing Rancho Palos Verde to upzone. Because it's good for California even though whether it's good for Rancho Palos Verde is debatable.

1. Yes, and the people who are in favor of this specific law will be completely and utterly shocked when the state government uses their power to enact and enforce a different law that takes away local decision making which they don't agree with.

2. I take it you're done discussing the theoretical merits of this law?

I can say their interests don't meet a threshold of significance.

As an extreme example, I can say that hurricane victims have an interest in butterfly wing flaps across the world because there is some indirect causation.

Housing expansion advocates consistently describe the simplest of supply-demand mechanisms, whereas housing demand is heavily driven by local and national economic conditions as well. Gary IN doesn't have a housing shortage.

> More housing in region X will result in lower housing prices in region Y.

Or higher prices in Y, because X will be both more crowded and with on average poorer people than before the supply increase, and people who prefer a less crowded area and less poor people (either directly because they are poor, or because of other demographic traits that correlate with wealth in the broader society, like race in the USA) around them will have an even higher relative preference for living in Y than before.

> The interests of people from region Y are valid.

They exist, validity is...at best, not a case you have made. Existence of a material interest does not imply validitym

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