javacat | Neighborhood

I wander in and out of being involved in neighborhood stuff. I used to be on the board of the local neighborhood association, (more behind cut) but then became reviled for saying that yes, there ought to be housing for people in my county, and yes, landlords shouldn't gouge tenants just because they can. It's still shocking to me that so many people who live in my county - hell, people I *know*, people who live in my neighborhood - really believe that there ought to be a moat and a drawbridge, and that the drawbridge should've been taken up right after they moved there. I've heard some really creative analogies about why this a good idea. It makes me nuts. The Bay Area is a region. My county is not an island. Millions of people move to the Bay Area in a decade! They are as likely to be from Texas or Illinois or Massachusetts or somewhere else in the US as from China or India or Mexico and ANYWAY - we all benefit from all our immigrants! Look at how much good has come from our diversity, look how incredibly desirable it is to live here BECAUSE of it. You ask any gathering of Californians how many of them were born here and a good chunk are from somewhere else. Everyone needs to live somewhere, and not in substandard housing that's dangerous and dirty. Grrr. It's hard for me to understand why they're not ashamed of themselves, but they aren't.

I think they don't get out enough. Out of their older, retired, affluent paid-off homes and just out in the world to see that the Bay Area isn't all like this. Also, they're selfish.

There was a meeting last night. It was okay. I've been trying to get this one area that is not represented to send someone to the meetings and got some encouragement to keep on trying.

There's another meeting tonight about the regional mandate to provide fair-share housing. The guy giving the talk is kind of a pal o' mine and he works in this office building. I half-way expect a bloodbath. I'm going, for moral support and also to see how he handles it. I get SO mad when I talk to the neighborhood people and start frothing at the mouth and get more and more incoherent. It doesn't help.