Answer to Causa Justa :: Just Cause's housing question.

QUESTION:

“With the number of foreclosures nationally topping 6 million (since 2007), and an Oakland average of 1 in every 156 homes reaching foreclosure in July - what plans do you have, as Mayor, to address this local housing crisis and stem the continuing tide of displacement in Oakland."


Amber,

Here is my answer:

As mayor I would work to put pressure on the note holders to either re-negotiate their loans or to take title of foreclosed homes without evicting the families in default. (the families would become tenants with tenants rights) There are many carrots for the banks, including offsetting the high cost of foreclosure, the high cost of eviction and the high cost of homes sitting empty. An added incentive comes in the form of neighborhood with a low vacancy rate, which is very key in conserving property values. For a stick we can do the opposite. I would raise the cost of foreclosure, the price of eviction and the heavily punish vacancy.

Other cities in the USA have placed heavy fines on landlords with vacant housing with extra penalties for boarding a building up. That policy was usually matched with use of eminent domain where the city was able to seize boarded up housing, refurbish it and rent it out passing the repair bills back to the property owners. These kinds of policies are usually threat enough to cause the owners to put affordable housing back on the market and gives the city a final card to play if they do not. Oakland has some pieces of this that I would enhance into a more compressive housing regulation and rent control.

Our housing crisis is not caused by us, but falls on us to deal with the social pain that it causes.
The federal government fell down on the job and continues to not rise to the occasion.
The state loan and property tax environment is a windfall for some and a disaster for most of us.
The market is not providing housing in a socially useful way, made all the worse by Prop 13.
Both the boom and the bust has been harmful for normal working class people who rent or own.

Housing should be a right, not a high stakes, roulette wheel, investment. This is my view and the view of the Green Party for the same reasons of social solidarity that we believe in universal health care and a right to an education. A healthy society takes care of its own.

As mayor I would hold up the view that housing is a right and providing it is a social responsibility.

Yours,

Don Macleay
candidate@macleay4mayor.org
(510) 866-7488

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Sent to:

Amber McZeal amber@cjjc.org
Communications & Oakland Housing Rights Organizer
Causa Justa :: Just Cause
(the union of St. Peter's Housing Committee and Just Cause Oakland)
Unity is Strength! La Union Hace La Fuerza!
MAILING: PO Box 3596 | Oakland, CA 94609
MAIN OAKLAND OFFICE: 3463 San Pablo Ave., Oakland, CA
PHONE: 510.763.5877 ext. 405 | fax: 510.763.5824