🚨 A bill has been pre-filed in #waleg that would require the state building code council to legalize scissor stairs for more residential buildings. 🚨 #HB2228 is sponsored by Reps. Zahn and Duerr. More info: app.leg.wa.gov/billsummary/...

They gentrified the tinfoil hat

A reminder that out of the 41 states which charge income taxes, California actually taxes low and middle income families the second least (only North Dakota is lower). tax.hawaii.gov/blog/blog16-...

1 - the exec branch can't decline to spend $ Congress appropriated 2- the fed govt can't use federal $ to extort states over policy/political disagreements 3-the fed govt can't use federal $ to impose conditions unrelated to the funding program 4-the fed govt can't use federal $ to coerce states

This is a hit job. The "conflict of interest" is that Jesse's day job aligns with the values that got him elected.

Places with greater population & density give people with non-traditional, weird, frowned upon, or otherwise "unusual" (non-derogatory) lifestyles a place to exist relatively free from persecution. Probably some people hate cities *because* monitoring & controlling others is more difficult in them.

The UCLA Housing Voice podcast now has a Substack! ✍🏻 It'll be a place for listeners to share comments and questions for book club and mailbag episodes, and to discuss regular episodes in a venue less ephemeral than social media. Be a pal, subscribe + say hi! uclahousingvoice.substack.com

This week UCLA Housing Voice is joined by @muhammadspeaks.bsky.social to talk about construction defect liability, a consumer protection law that can create big barriers to condo development, taking one of the most affordable ownership options off the market. www.lewis.ucla.edu/2025/12/17/1...

We have one of the worst city attorneys in California

I don't think Trump even mentions drugs here, which is supposedly one of the reasons for American aggression toward Venezuela

NEPA is like

Consultants contracted by Minnesota found that an eight-story single-stair building with 6,000 sq. ft. per floor (building 4) has dramatically lower fire risk than a same-height code-compliant two-stair building with a larger floor plate (building 1) www.dli.mn.gov/sites/defaul...

This study was funded by the legislature after advocacy by @moreneighbors.org, @net0builder.bsky.social, and my org. It's a bombshell finding, and it shows that small amounts of government funding for code research – this one cost just $225k, same as one mid-rise stairway! – yields big results.

Highly recommend this episode and the UCLA Housing Voice podcast generally.

The decline of democracy in the US means you can’t visit the US if you commented on the decline of democracy in the US

This is basically an effort to extend thought-policing beyond our national borders. "If people have to worry about being able to vacation here in the future, maybe they'll think twice about badmouthing the US." I'm sure that's gonna go really well for us.

I'm excited to share this big report, a few years in the making, which contemplates how policy and financial reforms could make it possible for tenants to build wealth through renting. I call it Shared Prosperity Rental (SPR) Housing.

This is a really important thing about speed cameras. They actually do change driver behavior and force people to slow down. They should be an important tool in creating safer streets *along with* design changes.

I'm excited to share this big report, a few years in the making, which contemplates how policy and financial reforms could make it possible for tenants to build wealth through renting. I call it Shared Prosperity Rental (SPR) Housing.

*youth pastor voice* Let me tell you kids about another carpenter who wasn’t very popular with the authorities

1: Trump slaps tariffs on Australia, despite U.S. having a trade surplus with the country. 2: Countries get scared away from US assets, buy gold. 3: Australia is one of the top gold exporters. 4: U.S. trade surplus with Australia sinks to lowest level in 20 years because gold sales to U.S. grow 10x

The USPS posting a NINE BILLION DOLLAR LOSS!!! sounds terrible. Certainly worse than if you said "USPS costs thirty dollars per person per year" even though that means the same thing and more accurately describes a government service

If you have four runners and three medals, the slowest runner won't get a medal. Even if you train them up, there will always be a slowest runner. Housing shouldn't be a race. We need enough housing for everyone, or else there will always be someone left out.

Very interesting discussion about fire safety

I've read the full report. It's compelling. I'm looking forward to the podcast. America's fire code has become one of the biggest obstacles to reducing traffic deaths in the U.S. (which, as any good safety researcher knows, are more than 10 times as common as fire deaths).

In this episode of UCLA Housing Voice, we talked with Alex Horowitz about Pew's important research — possibly the first of its kind in the U.S.? — evaluating fire safety outcomes for multifamily housing, measured as the risk of dying in a building fire. www.lewis.ucla.edu/2025/12/03/1...

Once again completely let down by @metrolosangeles.bsky.social. Waited at Lincoln/Cypress station until we had to order a Lyft to not be late to our movie, and with no real-time info or anything else to tell us when the train might be arriving. Enjoy our fares I guess.

A note on SaneWashing: I read part of this post to family (all liberal Democrats who consume a lot of news, but not social media), and it blew their mind. They all thought it was parody: if Corporate Media did not SaneWash, it would shock US, his approval would plummet from low (30s) to lower(20s).

The legal, media, and academic institutions capitulating to an authoritarian ordering payments for favorable treatment are damning themselves to irrelevance. They are destroying their institutions. They will be — and should be — shunned for failing in their most basic purposes for existing.

You have to be so far up your own ass to think that this autopen stuff means anything to anyone. I follow US politics closer than 90% of Americans and I have only the slightest understanding of what it's about. (And no I'm not interested in learning, because it's clearly an asinine waste of time.)

The true journalism scandal is a pathological liar can’t ask for better propaganda than a headline that’s just what he said as if it’s true and the entirety of the story is just his quote with zero context or explanation or skepticism, all published under the name of an established news brand

Exclusive: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave an order to “kill everybody” in the first strike on suspected drug boats in the Caribbean. After two men survived, the mission commander ordered a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s instructions, according to two sources.

Happy Thanksgiving [the original abundance holiday]! This year, we are thankful for Los Angeles's original, full-fat version of ED1, which enabled the development of 11418 Missouri Ave, a 44-unit, 100% affordable project developed with zero public money - no LIHTC, no subsidy. 1/4

“When the men did not believe Miles’ tribal ID, she pointed to a phone number for the Umatilla Tribal enrollment office on the back of the card. “Call it,” she said. When they didn’t, she took out her phone to call the office herself, but the agents tried unsuccessfully to take her phone...”

Since October, Measure ULA advocates have been sharing this data showing a 60% increase in permitted units in Q3 2025 compared to Q3 2024. It's intended as evidence that the tax's impact on production, documented in our Taxing Tomorrow report, is transitory. A thread on why this is misleading. 🧵

Great piece on how density restrictions in zoning are essentially BS.

The Scooby Doo Theory of Housing states that we can arrest housing price inflation if we only some clever kids are able to unmask the evil villain responsible for making rent go up.

My line on this kind of thing is that we need policy, programs, and infrastructure that allow cities to function *better* as they grow. Public transit does that. When more people drive, cities get worse for everyone, including drivers.

Love this study. Amazing.

We spent a year investigating billionaires for @washingtonpost.com. We found: the wealthiest 100 Americans gave $1.1 billion to influence the 2024 elections — 140x more than they did in 2000. And almost all of that giving boosted Republicans. washingtonpost.com/politics/int...

Insane but true fact: making US roads as safe as Canadian, Australian, or European roads would save more lives than eliminating murder from the US.

Absolutely incredible; after shooting Marimar Martinez 5 times and arresting her on claims that she rammed them and pulled a gun, prosecutors have now moved to dismiss ALL criminal charges against her and her codefendant.

In this episode of UCLA Housing Voice we talk with @benschneider.bsky.social about progressive era housing reformers, strengthening building standards, and unintended consequences for housing affordability www.lewis.ucla.edu/2025/11/19/1...

In this episode of UCLA Housing Voice we talk with @benschneider.bsky.social about progressive era housing reformers, strengthening building standards, and unintended consequences for housing affordability www.lewis.ucla.edu/2025/11/19/1...

For when you need to drop the mother of all bombs

Nearly two dozen arrested as faith leaders protest outside Chicago-area ICE facility reut.rs/49lQnWS

It will do all those things, and we know it will because that's what happened in every other city and state that moved its elections to November.

This is both comically ignorant economically and, on the immigrant count, empirically wrong by a factor of 2-3.

I feel like a journalist could just ask Trump at a press event, "Epstein...?" and watch him go on a deranged rant.