State of CaliforniaCandidate for GovernorNewsom Replacement

Secure housing is a basic social right necessary for someone to fully function in society. First, we must extend the eviction moratorium until the pandemic is contained. The longer-term issue with affordable housing is that there has been a massive shift of wealth from the working class to ultra-rich in this state and nationally. Wages have not increased with productivity. During the pandemic and 2008 crisis massive bailouts were given to banks while ordinary people were evicted. This has helped reinflate the housing bubble and put rents and mortgages beyond the ability of many families to pay.

To solve the housing crisis we need to reverse the trend across the board, including higher taxes on the ultra-rich; public housing to guarantee basic accomodation and prevent homelessness and extortionate rents; and an end to sweetheart deals for developers that let them get rich by foisting the costs of traffic and increased utilities on the public.

Long-term solutions to homelessness require a housing first approach. A safe and clean home environment greatly improves anyone's ability to get a job and receive medical treatment or social services.

There are 5 vacant houses in California for every homeless person in the state. Many of those are owned by banks after foreclosures or simply for speculation. We will not be able to solve homelessness until we accept that a person's right to safe and secure housing is stronger than a corporation's right to profit. One way or another, through taxes on vacant homes, eminent domain or other expropriation, that wealth must be turned over form the banks' ledgers and put to the public's need for housing.

The savings in public expenditure from improved public health and trash management, not to mention reduced law enforcement costs could easily fund the social services to address the current homeless population's mental, physical, and professional needs.

Roughly 80% of the water use in the state is irrigation for agriculture, yet barely a third of farm acreage is equipped with modern micro-irrigation systems which vastly improve water use efficiency. With so much of the state's water going to irrigation every gain in this field will have a big impact. Effective use of modern technologies will require additional equipment and farm workers effectively trained to monitor soil and weather conditions to minimize wasted water. These costs will be more than made up by improving our farms' resistance to drought while simultaneously reducing overall water use. The alternative of pumping the state's aquifers dry or letting the farms wither would cost far more to society.