An affluent California suburb resorted to some pretty extreme measures in an effort
to prevent the construction of affordable housing in their neighborhoods.
Now, the leaders of this wealthy Silicon Valley town had met to basically
discuss what they could do to mitigate, something known as Senate Bill Nine.
Senate Bill Nine, important State Law that would essentially allow for
the rezoning of areas that are for single family residents.
So they can build duplexes or even fourplex to increase inventory of housing,
so we can finally deal with this ongoing housing crisis in the state.
Well, leaders of the town, Woodside California declared the entire
town a mountain lion habitat, blocking such development.
Two weeks after the announcement though, they drew so
much outrage from affordable housing supporters, ridicule on social media.
And the threat of legal action from the state attorney general,
that the Town Council abandoned its approach.
But we do have some funny statements from the town's leaders on this issue.
So first, let's go to the California Attorney General.
His name is Rob Bonta.
He says, there's no valid basis to claim that the entire town of
Woodside is a habitat for mountain lions.
Land that is already developed with, for example,
a single family home is not by definition a habitat.
>> Yeah, how about your houses that are on there?
How are they part of the lines of, you know what,
I would allow this town to do this rule.
As long as everyone who owns a single family home in that town adopts a line.
Okay, if you put a mountain lion inside your house,
then I'll say that's totally fine.
>> That's okay.
That's a crazy standard [LAUGH].
>> Okay, good luck, see how it turns out for you.
>> Yeah, no, I mean look, obviously there was enough attention paid to this
story by the right people, including affordable housing advocates,
that they had no choice but to backtrack on this.
And wow, would you look at that?
There's actually a California official who's actually doing something in his
position of power.
The Attorney General here.
Now the Department of Fish and
Wildlife advised that the entire town of Woodside cannot be considered a habitat.
Which obviously right, but here's the statements that were
being thrown around by the leaders of this town, right?
So you have Dick Brown apt name, the mayor of Woodside, a town of about 5500
people near the billionaire homes and tech hubs of Redwood City and Palo Alto.
He said that allowing construction of duplexes was quote, not the Woodside way.
We love animals.
>> Yeah, animals are innocent.
>> Where are they going to go?
Pretty soon we'll have nothing but asphalt and no animals or birds.
Okay, so look, the idea of freaking out and panicking this much over a lot that
used to have a single family home turning into a lot that has a duplex instead.
Like it blows my mind that that's what they're freaking out about.
I actually, am understanding toward people who live in these neighborhoods and all
of a sudden there's like a massive condo building next to your single family home.
I do sympathize with that, I get it.
That is not what's happening here.
This is totally reasonable and
it would definitely help in the housing crisis that we're experiencing.
>> So this is an MB, right?
Not in my backyard.
And here the conservatives do have a point that a lot of times wealthy liberals
aren't really any better when it comes to issues regarding both race and poverty.
So when it comes to building affordable housing next to a billionaire's home,
all of a sudden, even if that billionaire is theoretically on the left.
They will say no, I didn't say mean in my backyard,
I got mountain lions in my backyard.
Okay, so no you have to go build this somewhere else near poor people or
something like that, right?
Well that's what everybody says and
then there's no place to build affordable housing, so no, not acceptable.
And then the other issue that this happens with all the time is schools.
So people are like, no, I'm on the left, etc.
And then you say, okay, great, now let's do, back in the day,
desegregation and let's move people around and they go,
whoa, no, I don't want black kids in my buses.
>> But yeah, like the busing program.
>> By the way, biden was fervently against as a so
called liberal back in the day, right, so.
>> So really valued bipartisanship.
>> Yeah, he valued when he was trying to keep black people out of this town.
And now there's different versions of that, hey, don't touch my private school.
And no, I don't want to fund your public school because my rich kids are already in
that private school.
And I don't give a damn what happens to your kids in the public school,
has got a racial component, a poverty component, etc.
So here we are in California and wealthy Californians all of a sudden
are pretending to have mountain lion habitats to make sure,
they'd rather live next to lions than poor people.