Opinion: More on the “housing crisis” and what Coloradans think

My thanks to both the Daily Camera and the Denver Post for publishing my opinion piece in last Sunday’s editions. It was quite long; their indulgence was much appreciated. Also, apologies to former Denver Mayor Hancock; I misspelled his name.

I received many emails on this, almost all in support of limiting growth in Colorado. One raised the concern that the “buy-down” program (exchanging down payment assistance for limiting future price increases) would add more housing units. I should have made it clear that this program targets existing units, so it won’t add more.

 

I thought I’d expand on what the 1,024 Coloradans said in the survey I discussed. The full survey is at https://coloradosprawl.com/polls/ and the article on it is at www.snowbrains.com entitled “Survey finds majority of Coloradans are unhappy with the state’s rapid population growth.”

 

Here are some of the survey’s questions:

 

“The U.S. Department of Agriculture calculates that Colorado, over the last four decades, has turned more than 1,250 square miles of Open Space, natural habitat, and agricultural land into housing, shopping malls, streets and other urban development. On balance, has this made Colorado a better place to live, a worse place to live or did it not have much effect?” 61% said “Worse.”


“If recent trends continue, Colorado demographers project that the state's human population of 5.8 million will grow by another 1.8 million by 2050, joining Colorado Springs, Denver and Fort Collins together into a single "mega-city." Do you find this prospect to be more positive or more negative?” 76% said “More negative.”

“If Colorado adds another 1.8 million residents, do you expect traffic to become much worse or would the government be able to build enough extra transportation capacity to accommodate the extra residents without more congestion?” 81% said “Traffic will become much worse.”


“Colorado is a mostly arid state with limited water in its streams and rivers. Is it more important for the remaining level of water in streams and rivers to be used to support wildlife habitat, fish, and birds, or is it more important to use the remaining water in Colorado streams to support the projected increase of residents in the state?” 76% said, “Water should be kept in streams to support wildlife.”


“A study of government data found that 86% or more of the depletion of Colorado’s Open Space, natural habitat, and farmland in recent decades was related to Colorado's rapid population growth. Would continuing this level of population growth into the future make Colorado better, worse or not much different?” 75% said “Worse.”


Relative to this, there was a citizen vote on Tuesday in Steamboat Springs on development of recently annexed land to build 2,264 affordable units for workers. The voters rejected the project, even though the project did not densify existing areas inside Steamboat Springs. Apparently, it was too big, the voters didn’t like subsidizing it with taxes rather than extracting developers’ profits, and, no doubt, other issues. So, this election loss again raises the issues of whether citizens support more overall growth, and of growth not paying its own way. (Note that a lot of Steamboat’s existing housing has become short-term vacation rentals; over time, worker housing is even less available/affordable.)

 

Our legislators and governor seem to be totally ignoring Coloradans’ concerns about excessive growth. It seems like every housing bill is based on adding as much market-rate housing as anyone can come up with an argument for. The perfect example is the proposed massive densification within a half mile of transit corridors, irrespective of the data which shows that only a small fraction will use transit, that transit requires huge (and potentially increased) subsidies, and that our quality of life will be significantly negatively impacted by all this growth. And, of course, given the very high demand, prices won’t be materially affected and so the housing will still be relatively unaffordable.

 

Also, at least in the version of the bill I saw, there was zero attention paid to the obvious point that transit users need destinations to go to. So displacing jobs, shopping, public facilities, etc., with more market rate housing makes no sense. 

 

One email I got summarized it all with the suggestion that we should put up “NO VACANCY” signs at Colorado’s borders. Maybe we should add “No more housing bills” until the proposed policies are based on a sophisticated evaluation of all the costs, benefits, and impacts. And, critically, that Coloradans are given a say in how many people we really want here.

Popular Posts

Opinion: Opportunity for the new Boulder City Council

Congratulations to the four new Boulder City Council members! You have a great opportunity to make a contribution to the Boulder community, but it will take a lot of work to do it responsibly; the learning curve is pretty steep. Here are some suggestions for you (and other Council members) that may help improve the process. Read the Charter. It is the document that governs how you, city staff, and board and commission members operate, and how you relate to each other. It defines the limits of your and their power, and can only be amended by a citizen vote. You don’t have to remember every word. But just knowing what’s there makes you more self reliant and less at the mercy of others’ opinions. For example, relative to the recent meeting discussion over diversity, the council does  not  have the power to suspend the rules as to when the mayor is selected. Charter Section 14 specifies, “The mayor shall be chosen by the council from its own number, upon the convening of t...
Read more

Opinion: Is this the end of Boulder as we know it?

Much of what has made Boulder such a great place to live has been the work of people half a century ago. These people recognized what I call the “ ratchet effect ,” that bad development decisions cannot be undone, so policies needed to be put in place to prevent, or at least limit, the damage that a growth-at-all-costs majority of the council could do. These policies include charter limits, like the Blue Line that prevents city water for development from being supplied above a certain altitude, the 55-foot height limit that has prevented high-rise development from cutting off our views, and the open space referendum process that allows a 60-day window for citizens to challenge disposals of open space. Other constraints include the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan’s requirement for Planning Board agreement for land-use changes in the area inside the city limits (Area I) and additional agreement by the county commissioners and county Planning Commission for urban development further...
Read more

Policy Documents: Impact Fees and Adequate Public Facilities

I am writing this to correct some of the apparent inaccuracies put forward at the 10/14 CC/PB study session about charging growth for its costs. I do not claim to be an expert in the field, but I have studied it long enough and consulted with enough supposed experts and legal types to understand most of the basics. In addition, I have found that the experts don’t necessarily know everything and won’t necessarily put forward the most appropriate solutions. The fundamental rule, both legal and equitable, is that growth should pay to address its impacts so as to maintain existing levels of service (LOS) for existing residents and businesses. But growth cannot be required to improve levels of service. LOS is measured in all sorts of ways depending on the facility and/or service being measured. For transportation, it could be total VMT, travel time, intersection waits, access to transit, etc. For schools, it might be square footage per pupil, etc. For water, it could be water righ...
Read more