Tony Soprano Bumps Westside Stabbing
The last couple of days have seen The Soprano's fade-to-black finale receive two front page mentions in the News-Press in recent days while The Daily Sound tells us that Another Stabbing Rocks Westside today. I guess the News-Press didn't see how someone letting the daylight in was important news. Fictional TV characters bumps a local stabbing off the front page? Ouch.
posted by Sara De la Guerra | 6/12/2007 12:18:00 PM
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Or when 24-hour TV coverage on all major news networks of Paris Hilton going back to jail bumps any news on this little war going on across the Atlantic to the ticker-tape at the bottom of the screen. Double ouch.
FREE PARIS !!
You can incarcerate at my house...
"Hey sa1, That's Hot!"
The Soprano's is American History and Culture it deserves coverage.
Stabbings happen all the time. There will probably be another one next week, the NP can cover that one. But why waste the ink or encourage gang bangers with the attention?
KEYT had the story...
http://www.keyt.com/news/local/7948227.html
And just a couple of month's ago, Mr. Armstrong was taking the local clergy to task for "not doing enough about the gang problem." Now his "news" organization isn't even reporting gang activity.
But hey, maybe that proves there really IS a wall between the Editorial desk and the newsroom!
What would one expect from the new news-lite News-Press?
Nip Nip for Now and his Baroness LOVE Hollywood; they probably don't get out to the Westside much, if at all -- the bubbly just isn't that good.
Sooooooooooo, at the Wendy-Lite-Press these days, there's not enough room on Page One for both Tony and a local stabbing?
"Who are those kids, anyway, Nipperpooh?"
"Let's have Travis make up for missing the story by scorching Marty again!"
With all due respect, The Soprano's is not by any discerning estimation either history or culture. When the drivel that drips out of TV is mistaken for art and history we are truly lost in a wasteland of aesthetic mediocrity. Idealizing criminal behavior is of questionable civic or cultural value. Not to mention that TV is fake, fake, fake. Children on the West Side stabbing each other is sadly real. We would all be well advised to raise ourselves out of our cocoons where we interact with the world only through the video screen and engage the real world. The Sopranos as art, please spare me.
Maybe you sarcasm detector wasn't working? :)
Still, you are right about the idealization of criminal behavior. Sopranos is for Scene, Life, etc...I like that term "aesthetic mediocrity" -- much better than my "illucidate"!
Dahling -- I hope you are stringing these together for a screenplay or at least Kids in the Hall.
Blight and crime go together. City has refused to clean up the Westside -- they want to keep the housing prices low there by keeping it blighted. Housing, housing, housing matters more than anything, at any price.
A few more stabbings and the rents will drop and the city can count creating even more affordable housing units.
And so it goes with our darling, progressive city council - they could care less about the human cost if they can keep squeezing more cheaper housing units. It is not their backyard.
There was a wonderful, large dinner party last weekend in Montecito. Exceptional wines and perfectly cooked food. A memorable late spring evening with close friends.
Table conversation turned to Wendy McCaw. Arthur von Wiesenberger received only a passing mention about his notorious past. Most in attendance admitted they had stopped reading the paper because of lack of anything interesting.
A long and entertaining discussion about what's going on in Wendy's head ended with a simple consensus: she's wacked.
OK so maybe this is a stretch. And yes, it is my favorite topic of the moment. I only ask you to indulge me for a moment.
The bumping of local news for "cultural" news is happening at the expense of our ability to get vital information about what is happening right here...right now and it's happening all across America.
I talked to someone today who was on the air during the Painted Cave Fire (as was I on K-lite). She reminded me that the first calls from Painted Cave to KIST came in at about 5:55 PM. By 6:20 PM the fire was jumping all 6 lanes of the 101 - headed for Hope Ranch.
Local radio and KEYT provided essential information about evacuation orders, fire location, animal rescue and personal communication for people who were
separated by the fire. Emergency officials monitored commercial radio and TV for current information from reporters and citizen callers. We lost 440 homes. One woman died.
I beleive that local broadcast may not be able to respond to the next emergency with the same real time information. Yes I am banging that drum again. Maybe I'm just an old coyote howling in the wind.
Well keep reading because this old coyote does have a positive suggestion that may help you.
You can use this link to find out what's happening:
http://www.thewayofthegun.net/scanner/index.htm
You'll be linked to a scanner covering SB county fire and law enforcement channels.
It is also recommended that you get a battery operated scanner at your home.
In 1964 was the Coyote Fire. I was evacuated. In 1978 I watched the Sycamore Canyon Fire burn the Riviera. In 1991 I covered the Painted Cave Fire.
The math suggests we're due for the next one. Think about that and then do what you can to be ready.
Thanks for your indulgence. And now back to our regular programming...
You need stories that sell papers. Paris Hilton and Sopranos do that, not stories about gangs. Besides I like cultural stories.
Craig Smith's blog today mentions that TKA threatened to ruin someone if they did not renew their subscription (?!?!).
How low can they go. Apparently quite low. It all sounds very Soprano like to me.
"I guess the News-Press didn't see how someone letting the daylight in was important news."
Oh c'mon Sara, what's more shocking is that The Sound believes someone getting an owwie from a scuffle rises to front page news. As in who gives a crap? This town really needs to grow a pair.
If people were really concerned about gangs and violence, they should be parading in the streets just like the effective "Take Back the Night Crusade". How about a "Cold Shoulder Campaign" by retailers? Show up at the store, movies, bars, parking lots, in groups sporting gang attire and flashing signs, you don't get served. Hand out free beige spray paint to the public and encourage them to paint over graffetti ASAP. When you see cruisers on state street flip them the bird and yell "Get out of Town!". How about a vigilante group like the Guardian Angels hanging out on the street corners. Anon 9:18 probably's not to far off the mark. Lot of job security and budget available to fix problems that are never solved?
When the youngen's see that being in a gang in S.B. (and God Save us from Goleta 13) ain't so cool, maybe they'll make better choices.
Just my two cents, 'course if I was a county employee, it'd be my nickle.
Who's Tony Soprano?
Rusty's Pizza had a stabbing last night. Anyone keeping tabs? Could all of this be related to the cost of housing?
Some one ludicrously asks if gang violence is caused by the cost of housing. How did we get to the place where providing free housing for everyone solves all social ills. This certainly is a developer driven agenda, but where are any facts to support this?
If the police know there are hundreds of gang members in Santa Barbara, then someone needs to do a survey to find more about who their parents are before selling out the city for more dense housing.
It is the dense housing areas that are the most crime riddled. And the most ignored for city support services. The provide no social amenities while they continue to cram in more socialized housing, ignore slum lords and now the gang issues which festered there for years within their borders are spilling out into the more affluent areas. And only now is "Santa Barbara" recognizing there is/we/will always have a gang problem.
The city actively chose to ignore this problem. And when all the future annointed candidate for mayor Iya Falcone can say in the NP today is" the issue of gangs has been ever-present. What we can do is try to give people a different option, and hopefully people will choose to go down a different path". At least Iya admits we can't just keep throwing money (or free housing) at this.
Does anyone know what proactive leadership is down there on the city council - Grant House is emerging as the only one in the pack with the moral authority and pragmatic experience to give leadership on this issue -- as long as he too does not just throw more money at this.
Voters need to ask serious questions this upcoming election cycle for city council and get public commitments from these neer-do-wells.
No, you can not keep giving away more housing to stop this problem because it is all being bred right in the midst of the biggest housing give away areas of this city. You created a farm club for violence by opening the door and not asking anyhing in return for your city's generosity.
It is time if people are asked to change to demand responsibility and consequences from those to whom the city has already given so much in the way of free housing and created concentrated ghettos of crime and social malaise, while the rest of "Santa Barbara" brags about their "quality of life" and don't dare change a thing in MY neighborhood.
Courtesy of sbnewsroom.com:
MAN STABBED AT BEACH-SIDE
PIZZA PARLOR
SANTA BARBARA, June 13, 2007 — An alleged gang fight broke out at Rusty’s Pizza on Cabrillo Boulevard Tuesday night, sending one man to the hospital with stab wounds to his upper left arm and chest, police said.
Shortly after the melee, Robert Joseph Martinez, 20, walked into Cottage Hospital, where he was treated for his injuries and then released, authorities said.
The alleged gang fight is another in a flurry of ongoing violent disputes between Westside and Eastside gang members that began months ago with the fatal stabbing of a 15-year-old boy on State Street.
The lastest brawl started around 8:25 p.m. outside the restaurant, located at 15 E. Cabrillo Blvd., before moving inside, authorities said. In the restaurant, witnesses reported seeing at least two people brandishing knives, and others throwing chairs, authorities said.
The suspects fled the restaurant after a couple of minutes, but the fight resumed minutes later near 200 Castillo St., Santa Barbara Police Lt. Paul McCaffrey said in a statement.
Police responded but did not make any arrests, he said. However, 15 minutes after the initial fight, Martinez arrived at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital with three stab wounds to his upper left arm and chest, McCaffrey said, adding that Martinez was stitched up and released.
"The wounds were described as 'slashing' type, and are not life threatening," he said. “Martinez is a known gang member. Martinez did not cooperate with the investigation; however, police believe his injuries were sustained in the fight.”
- Rob Kuznia
"Could all of this be related to the cost of housing?"
Maybe.
Or maybe it's related to protesting questionable journalistic ethics at DLG Plaza rather than 50 folks singing "Ave Maria" on the sidewalk in front of the Gang Leaders abode while a couple of SBs Finest lean on the butt of their shotguns across the street.
Grant House's "moral authority" leads him to call for more patience on the part of the community...right. We're all feeling pretty patient right now, while the streets get ever more violent. And where is Mayor Marty right now; busy writing another letter about her hurt feelings? The Council is showing no leadership on this ever-worsening issue whatsoever. And throwing money into so-called programs,thus rewarding gangland behavior, is no way to make these thugs stop. When the tourists get wind of stabbings in tourist-land, SB may become a far different place--without the bed tax gravy train it's been riding.
It must be the high cost of housing that is making people stab each other. Just yesterday I spotted a real estate agent setting up a sandwich board on the corner next to my street. I got the sudden urge to swerve into him with my car.
I think the housing situation is causing crime. If we had more affordable housing maybe people wouldn't think about joining gangs. They could use their free time to volunteer with community projects and spread the word about sustainability and global warming. That's what I want our leaders for focus on.
OK everybody. Time to ask Dr. Laura how to handle this gang stuff.
Nobody wants to get 'dissed' out there. And if you do get get 'dissed,' your sense of honor demands its defense. It's a ethical cultural problem. Somehow these kids believe this stuff. What's next M13? What happened to the parents?
Is it better in Montecito because the parents buy the beer?
The kids themselves feel threatened, and they react to the slightest provocation. It's chips on their shoulders, and "don't mess with me, man."
Reminds me of the 'code duello' circa 1805 in Washington DC and the South. "Get out your pistols and who's your second?" It's Burr and Hamilton in bars all over town.
It's getting wild out there. Just thought I'd let you know that my son, back from Iraq and Afghanistan, has had some awful experiences in Montecito. First there was the stabbing at the apartments behind Pelican's that he witnessed. He ran over, called the cops, and gave first aid to a wild cocaine heavy hitter who had just got stabbed in some deal that went on in the apartments. The stabber never got caught and the story never reported. The guys stabbed died of his wounds. Heavy experience for my son the warrior.
Then there was the night at Von's in the parking lot when a couple of guys with bats took on an older fellow getting out of his car to rob him. My son ran to the rescue and chased them off. That did wonders for his PTSD.
Great place Santa Barbara. Reminded him of Iraq.
When the gangs start using guns, and they will, maybe people will wake up.
Anyone have a mash up showing where all this gang activity is taking place?
The housing situation is not causing crime - the failure to crack down on slum lords, blight and over-crowding is the crime. Stop letting people think they can come here when there is no room. The inn is closed - No Vacancy sign is up.
Move on and go someplace you can afford, where you can give your family a life that is within your means. And let the lazy rich in this town do their own cleaning up.
Working poor in this town, no matter what their ethnic background taught children rules and consequences. If you stay, you play by the rules and accept the consequences. Now, was that so hard to say?
Remove these kids from polite society and put them somewhere where they can learn impulse control, if their families are incapable of doing this themselves.
We don't need more slum housing in Santa Barbara as a reward for bad behavior. We need boot camps or else a boot if you want to play by your own rules that offend the rest of the population who does honor them.
Good point: How much "white/Anglo" crime gets hidden and how much brown/Hispanic crime gets headlines?
I can't afford a house and that is why I joined a gang. My gang is called the Whiny Tunes.
Rusty's Pizza had a stabbing last night. Anyone keeping tabs? Could all of this be related to the cost of housing?
Maybe it's related to the cost of pizza.
A.J. Soprano heroically started to question everything in the last few episodes. Depressed to the point of suicide AJ realized that not only our occupation in Iraq, our hypocritical American family norms...but also the celbrated everyday American lifestyle was the cause of so much pain and suffering globally. It was justifiably futile for AJ. The local gangs are reacting in violence because of futility. In the Soprano finale A.J. Soprano was won over by the same corruption scheme his "American" family could buy...a job offer as an executive and a brand new BMW ...AJ Soprano bought into the corrupt system.
The moral of the story...The rich gangs survive adversity and kill because of their greed for high-end survival...the poor die because futility of their lack of hope...and no-one will ever offer them an executive position and a BMW.
These killings have been going on for a long time in SB, but not reported because that would keep the tourists away & the home buyers from purchasing.
I'm so glad I no longer live in SB.
Fiddle Dee Dee!
Haven't I enough to worry about without the children of my servants behaving so badly!
...and I'm so embarrassed that I still do. My out of town family members refuse to visit here anymore--they can't afford the hotels or restaurants, and feel unsafe and too crowded in my neighborhood where they can never find a place to park and get scared by the homeless people and shady characters they see everywhere downtown. They always remind me that they don't live like this, and didn't raise me to live like this either. It causes a lot of friction and makes all of us uncomfortable, especially when they get on me about how we could live very well somewhere else.
Gang violence is first and formost a failure in personal impulse control. Stop looking for unproven secondary justifications and deal with the first, first and foremost.
How can there not be a direct connection between housing prices and gangs? We have seen more gang activity as home prices have increased. That alone should support the need for more affordable housing. We need to reduce crime!
"and no-one will ever offer them an executive position and a BMW."
The perpetuation of this myth is what kills dreams and ambition at a young age. Our inattention and lack of funding to primary/secondary education is a crime in our society, particularly in Cali.
There is a culural problem with a large segment of new immigrants. Has to do with the Patron-Peon relationship on the Hacienda the Mexican economy is only a couple of generations removed from.
"Maybe it's related to the cost of pizza."
Maybe it's related to the cost of Tortillas.
The American Agri-nazis have crippled the Latin agriculture communities which is why they have come to America to work for the modern day conquistadors. The lagacy family wealth of the Haciendados is complicit in the continuation of this system. Better and easier to export the social unrest than risk investing in the peon-campaniones society. The "hidden hand" is why we will not close the border. Bush knows this so the congressional Republicans pander to the base while the top dog carries out the needs of the hidden hand.
The Catholic church (one of the wealtiest entities on earth)with its emphasis on things spiritual rather than corporeal has served to maintain the hacienda mind set. More children=more parishioners tithing=more hands to work the fields=a non gov't based social security for the elderly= haciendados keeping the wealth.
There...I said it.
How can there not be a direct connection between housing prices and gangs? We have seen more gang activity as home prices have increased. That alone should support the need for more affordable housing. We need to reduce crime!
We have seen more ipods as well. By your logic, the dramatic increase in ipods is the direct result of increased housing prices.
How about we find every gang member who is an illegal alien and deport them? And make Mexico pay for the deportation fees. We could also deport every family member who is immediately related to a gang member. That could reduce the need for more affordable housing, or any new housing, for that matter.
The only groups that lose are the developers, gang members and their families. Yeah! Problem solved.
We saw an increase in gang violence when they stopped the police bike patrols. That is the heart of the matter.
How do you know these kids do not live in city housing projects? You don't. So stop cherry-picking excuses for your own agenda to destroy this town.
Increase in illegals, increase in crime. The solution is not housing everyone who wants to come here. Get real. It is enforcing the laws of the country they come to.
Put the police to work and let them do their job. And get out of their hair.
That is another major issue and City Council needs to start working on it NOW. The one kid or less family. Global Warming is a crisis we can't ignore. Stopping it comes before anything else!
Give people carbon credits for not having kids, tax those who have more than on child.
"And throwing money into so-called programs,thus rewarding gangland behavior, is no way to make these thugs stop. "
Actually it is, as piles of sociological evidence indicates. If you actually want less crime and violence, then provide attractive alternatives to kids. Also provide better birth control, abortion access, and prenatal care to their parents, assure them higher wages, and anything else that results in more time for parents to supervise their kids. Also spend more on teacher salaries and school supplies and facilities.
But right wingers everywhere thrive on violence and fear; it's their bread and butter. They wouldn't know what to do without it, and right wing politicians would have no issues to run on. And so they oppose any social policy that would reduce crime and violence, and favor those that increase it.
"Gang violence is first and formost a failure in personal impulse control."
Aside from having absolutely no factual basis, that claim is ridiculous on its face -- gang violence is a /group/ activity, and it's usually planned.
"shady characters they see everywhere downtown"
I know what you mean: I saw Brooks Firestone walking down State St. the other day. And then there's that creep Travis Armstrong sneaking in the back door at the SBNP, and Scott Steepleton coming in the front. And Barry Cappello ... I could go on and on about the shady characters in this town.
Well, this could be not only a solution for the gang problem, but perhaps provide entertainment as well.
What if all gang members are required to have computerized chips imbedded beneath their skin so they can be tracked! These gangsters would appear as dots on a map of Santa Barbara in live time, with different color-coded dots for various gangs.
Viewers would be able to access 24/7 on their computer monitors this live tracking of gangsters. This, combined with mobile cameras installed in all neighborhoods, would allow viewers to switch screens and zoom in on a particular area where perhaps a bunch of different-colored dots were gathering at the same time. They could then view live action at that scene.
This could be the first Gang Reality Show to hit the airwaves, albeit via the Internet. Sort of life imitating art, after that movie "The Condemned," starring former WWE wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin, in which a group of death row inmates are dropped on an island. The lone survivor wins the contest.
In "Gang Realty Show -- Santa Barbara," there could be a similar theme. The lone surviving gang member from each gang wins a house, bought and paid for by the City Council. That would reduce four gangs to merely four lone individuals who no longer belong to any gang.
And then similar Gang Reality Shows could be broadcast from Montecito, Carpinteria, Lompoc, Santa Maria, etc. until each town has former gang members living as individuals in houses.
As much as I appreciate and agree with our progressive Mayor and council members it seems there is really little they can do about gangs and the economics that result in the violent behaviors.
The status quo or the council's constiuents, seem to consider themselves as autocrats voting in authroitarians who will enact their own wishes regardless of the complexity of issues of the day.
The best the council can do is approve developement and that is why we have any quality affordable housing at all.
We have a narrowminded, chamber of commerce driven community. Too many well-to-dos expect too much from the government while simultaneously underfunding it and strangely participating as victims and acting out as mobsters.
Impulse control? Overcrowding and high rents? This isn't just a SB problem! How about looking at how this country allows kids to emmulate gangs in dress mannerisms, speech and music. All types of kids and young adults wear the oversize pants, jerseys and backwards hats and listen to violent rap music. Then you add in graphic violence in movies, television and video games. As a society we continue to sell this crap to kids of all ethnic cultures and economic status as being cool. Parents also allow their kids to purchase this stuff or worse purchase it for them. Now we are upset because we have convinced the kids that gangs and gang activities are cool and they are acting out. Gang activity has exploded and the lines between right and wrong have been blurred beyond recognition. Life has been cheapened. Until these issues are firmly dealt with, gang violence will continue to escalate.
Ok, For all our pieces of mind, and for the good of Fess et al and their resorts, I believe, we as a community, and with TKA's help and forebearance, we should now always refer to "gang violence" as... "Alternate Tribal Lifestyle Activity".
Certain areas around the flatlands will be refered to as "historically low maintenance, highly affordable environs with exemplary high urban density efficiency attributes. The real estate folks can then market the areas as a diverse collective of pied a terre's.
See, no problems. It's all about perception.
Anonymoose 4:54 AM (getting up earlier than me,
you early bird, worm catcher you!).
Let me take this occasion to annonce my complete agreement with your observation and reasoning regarding the matter of this post.
I hope you write this up and get it published somewhere.
Sara: How many "hits" to you get on this blog? Got a graph for us from the time you started until now? (Can't resist asking these marketing questions either.) How about a Google ad for a little cash? You must have expenses.
When there's no hope for the future, gangs are the only place to turn to. Baby Boomers have made a mess of the world and now they have to live with the gangs they created!
Uncle DJ: Google Ads require a name, address and checking account which would threaten my anonymity...couldn't do it.
Hits? This week we ran at about to 6,000 visits and 8,000 page views. Not bad for a little blog but not like the Indie. That is, though, about 4,000 more than right before the News-Press Mess began.
My little niece Sara: Thanks for the info. That's very good. I enjoy your work. Too bad there's a scary monster out there threatening long studies of tort law. Better things to do than that, that's for sure.
But let me take this occasion to offer you my sincere eloge for your dedicated service to the community.
El Gran Capitain.
Why does everyone deserve "affordable housing" in Santa Barbara? Why don't they go where they can afford the housing?
I don't understand this position that anyone who wants to come to Santa Barbara "deserves" a cheap place to live.
Go to Tehachapi if you want "affordable" housing. But NO ONE has a right to come here and demend they get it in Santa Barbara. NO ONE.
If we put affordable housing on the ballot and had the city and county building it, it would pass by a landslide.
Maybe that's the solution!
The fine print on so-called "affordable housing" can be personally and financially devastating, especially when it is tied to employment. When you no longer work there, you're out and on your own, taking your pittance of equity with you to find another place to live--and it won't be in SB. The company towns and subsidized housing that everyone is calling for are short-term solutions that benefit the employer with workers, not the individual who might want to build a bit of financial security. But it sounds so great, a cheap place to live in SB, that no one wants to look a little deeper, or longer term.
Somebody must be letting the police do their jobs. The gangs are quiet.
No, "affordable" housing would not pass by a landslide at all. You don't realize how much this issue, particularly "work force" housing subsidies ticks off those already here who have had to sacrifice to get here and stay here.
They have no interest whatsoever in giving away freebies to anyone. And they vote. The only ones crying for more "affordable" housing are commuters and small but noisy claque of developers.
Ain't no resident voters or any single neighborhood in this entire city that would vote for more free housing in this city. You need to get around more and talk to the people who don't show up for the city's fake dog and pony show going on right now.
Just a bunch of slackers show up for those meetings demanding more and more free stuff, and the city dares call it meeting the "public".
The city really does not want to hear what the public actually has to say. And it is certainly not to support more freebie housing ..... for anyone.
Besides being a total financial disaster, have you seen the "affordable" units in the two large Chapala projects?
Every project has undesirable units and these are the one called "affordable" - bad side of the building, small, dark, spartan, and Chapala One has views of the parking lot of the Salvation Army homeless shelter.
They are little undesirable rat holes that the developer gets to give away in return for building more expensive units to go for higher than market -- if people actually want to buy into a project with a built in low cost potential slum. This remains to be seen.
This is a social experiment gone totally awry. There are still plenty of market rate condos that far surpass any of the "affordable" units I have seen so far, and you get to keep your equity.
"Affordable" units make no financial sense and are not even competitive with what is on the market.
Whose crazy idea was this any way - run 'em out of office come next election. We don't need any more whacko schemes like this.
Could it be that the very nature of jammed up affordable housing actually contributes to alienation and gang type activity? Stuffing way more people in a building that fit comfortably, adding stress of noise from that close living, taking away green space, open space, trees and anything that might give a bit of respite from the day may just have some adverse affect on human beings and their behavior. Just a crazy thought. I just don't know when the American Dream, or even the Santa Barbara dream became a subsized unit in a condo complex.
I would love a subsidized condo. Where do you apply?
Where do the parents of the kids involved in all the recent stabbings live? What can we learn from that? Both the victims and the perpetrators. So before you conclude giving everyone an affordable house, crammed into smaller and smaller segregated parts of town, let's learn a little more about what is exactly happening here.
Sounds more like we need to give the parents more family leave time so they can pick up their kids when they are reported high on drugs when they show up at school.
Maybe it is onerous bosses who won't let parents take care of their kids in emergencies that is behind all of this.
Point is, let's at least learn something concrete about the specifics of the lives gone awry, before we just blindly start pouring more concrete.
Yup... end the free housing subsidies:
1)The Mortgage Interest Tax Deduction
2)Prop 13 whereby homeowners are subsidized by real workers
homeowners aren't real workers? Interesting. Doesn't feel like that around my house, or anyone else I know...
Inclusionary housing benefits only a tiny minorty with no larger social benefit. It is a totally stupid and ineffectual housing scheme - a random shot in the dark "feel-good" bandaid windfall only for the very few who win this lottery. Total window dressing to make a governmental body appear they are doing something; when they are not.
The mortgage tax deduction and Prop 13 apply to everyone and is an appropriate "subsidy" because it is equally applied and direct in its benefit.Healthy societies encourage and incentivize home ownerhsip -- which is earned; not given away.
Real workers own housing because they know the best investment they can make is a secure roof over their heads, and gradually diminishing house payments and taxes as their salaries and efforts increase over time. People with long-term goals become homeowners.
People with short-term sights demand free housing because they choose not to save, or live where they can afford to make the home ownership investment.
Working homeowners are ticked at the city's housing give-away programs. It is like kicking us in the teeth.
If "saving the middle class" means giving them cheap housing at taxpayers expense, then they are not worth saving.
Nor are they the "middle class". They are now a government welfare state. Too many "middle class" already are employed by the government and salaries paid for by taxpayers in the first place.
Time to rethink what the heck the "middle class" actually is - white people on state tax dollar paid welfare.
Let them sink or swim on their own. No more subsidies and free housing at everyone else's expense.
A huge segment of the population dependent on government bailouts is not healhty.
I want to play the housing lotto... Just tell me where.
These last few posts, which make a great deal of sense, hardly square with the bleeding heart response to "workforce housing," such as the outrageous boondoggle Cottage wants to build to increase its monopoly, cleverly framing it instead as an issue between nurses and NIMBY neighbors, instead of a subsidized ripoff of the entire community. Or is it different because it's Cottage?
Cottage got trapped planning when it was the alleged city policy that no project would get approved without "affordable" housing. Thus the travesties of the Chapala projects getting official benedictions because they tacked on "affordable" housing.
The dirty little secret are developers going out to acceptable organizations and dedicating their "affordable units" to them so they don't have to deal with a cattle call riff raff lottery which might bring in the great unwashed, and bring down property values.
Most disturbing is the inability to sell the rest of the market units because if you don't have to buy into one of these cockamamy "affordable -inclusionary" projects, there is no reason on gods green earth to do it. And the city just created the 21th century version of the new urban slum.
These projects are now albatrosses and the "affordable" units are grim, dank and undesirable when they do exist. Who on earth would ever plunk their hard earned housing cash participating in this ludicrous human experiment.
What was the city council thinking when they concocted this untested, untried and unsuccessful rat trap?
And to the poster who keeps asking how to sign up for this housing, how come you don't know? Go to the city website and get in line. A few free units for the lucky and a heck of a lot of angry people on the list who did not get this windfall. How happy of voters will they be when they see how very, very, very few people ever benefit from this crazy scheme.
This is bait-and-switch and should be outlawed when it asks all to come on, and then jerks around all but a very lucky few. Who soon learn they are not so lucky because they are trapped in a lousy financial deal and now have to carry the weight of the homeowners dues while the developers fire sale the rest of the units or go bankrupt and leave those locked into their "affordable" 30 year loans with an unsaleable POS.
Nice going, city council.
City has to show it supports affordable housing in order to keep getting a few million dollars of HUD money that supports some non-functioning non-profits who sole purpose seems to be to exacerbate the affordable housing demands.
It is a vicious cycle and undermines both rational planning and neighborhood integrity. All for a few lousy millions going to some dysfunctional feel-good groups.
NewsPress - get on this because you know the liberal rags won't touch this with a 10 foot renewable resource bamboo pole.
And this is why our city planning process feels so corrupt. Many sense something is very wrong, something is off its wheels but just cannot pin down why.
The why is the city already sold us all out and are only going through a dog and pony show and claiming they are ....listening to the people.
They are not. They are listening only to these self-serving non-profits on HUD grants. And that is what feels so wrong.
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