Mar 6, 2025 | Housing
By Emily Hoeven
March 6, 2025
A new Rorschach test for NIMBY California cities and counties has been unlocked: How big of a hole are you willing to blow in your budget to block new housing?
This question confronted La Cañada Flintridge last week when a judge issued the wealthy Los Angeles County community a stark ultimatum: It could stop fighting a proposal for an 80-unit mixed-income development with hotel and office space, or it could post a $14 million bond and continue its yearslong legal battle.
Mar 5, 2025 | Legislation, Housing
By Ben Christopher | CalMatters
March 5, 2025
A California legislator wants to solve the state’s housing crisis, juice its economy, fight climate change and save the Democratic Party with one “excruciatingly non-sexy” idea.
Oakland Democratic Assembly member Buffy Wicks sees the slow, occasionally redundant, often litigious process of getting construction projects okayed by federal, state and local governments as a chief roadblock to fixing California’s most pressing problems, from housing to water to public transportation to climate change.
Feb 28, 2025 | Housing, Legislation, Opinion
Eric Filseth
February 28, 2025
The coterie of housing pundits is addicted to the politically convenient but false narrative that zoning is the broad obstacle, when research shows that the true limitation has long been the rapidly escalating construction, materials and engineering costs that dominate dense housing projects in high-demand, high-inequality cities.
Feb 26, 2025 | Housing, Legislation
By TIM REDMOND
FEBRUARY 26, 2025
Thanks to state Sen. Scott Wiener and his Yimby allies, San Francisco is under a mandate not just to zone for and approve but to issue permits for 82,000 new housing units in the next six year. The market-rate housing never going to happen, and not because of neighborhood opposition; private developers aren’t building because the projects don’t work at current interest rates and rents.
Feb 25, 2025 | Housing, Safety
By Megan Fan Munce
Feb 25, 2025
State Farm General, California’s largest home insurer by far, estimates it will pay $7.6 billion to survivors of the Los Angeles wildfires. The staggering figure is the highest loss estimate of any insurer so far, which makes sense due to the size of the company and its exposure: A Chronicle analysis of policy data found that State Farm insured more households in and around the fire perimeters than any other company. It’s already paid $1.75 billion to policyholders.
Feb 22, 2025 | Housing
By Kristian Fors
Feb 22, 2025
The horrific wildfires that devastated the Los Angeles area — and necessitated a $1 billion bailout of the FAIR Plan, California’s insurer of last resort — have many people asking why so few homeowners harden their homes against wildfires. Home hardening is how homeowners reduce their wildfire risk by retrofitting their homes with fire-resistant materials and removing excess vegetation. A report by Guidewire found that home hardening consistently reduced wildfire risk, in terms of likelihood and damage severity.
