Sort of odd to frame lower home prices in Oakland - a city with more renters than homeowners - as an automatically bad thing. This story also ignores how the boom in apartment construction in downtown Oakland might be impacting sale prices, and/or whether there are composition effects

Our statement on the horrible traffic violence near Emerson Elementary

AB 645, which allows Oakland to install speed cameras and fine speeding drivers, was signed by the Governor in October 2023. It took until June 2025 for enabling legislation to pass the Oakland City Council. Speed cameras still not installed yet. www.oaklandca.gov/Public-Safet...

Hello from some of America’s first public housing: the United States Housing Corporation’s development at the Mare Island shipyard in Vallejo, CA.

Last year we sent a letter to Walnut Creek encouraging them to modify their Objective Design Standards to remove a "multiple materials" requirement for building façades and also to reduce required driveway widths, which are wider than the fire code.

Thank you @votealexlee.bsky.social for your YES vote on SB 79!

Thank you @buffywicks.bsky.social and Asm Ávila Farías for your vote and your leadership on SB 79!

[BILL ALERT] SB 79, which broadly legalizes more homes near high quality transit stops, has passed the Assembly floor! The bill now goes to the Senate for concurrence, then the Governor’s desk. cayimby.org/legislation/...

Oakland has developed a great Slow Streets network proposal, but they need your input to hone the segments & make sure they’re on the right track. Comments are due by this Friday 9/11. Check out the map at the link below then email [email protected]. www.oaklandca.gov/Government/O...

A great time to discuss this report with fellow policy advocates would be at our MONTHLY MEETING, which is TONIGHT on Zoom. zoom.us/meeting/regi...

Terner Center released a new report today entitled “The Financial Impacts of Construction Defect Liability on Housing Development in California.” It finds condo developers pay 3-4x for CGL insurance policies for similarly designed & built rental projects. ternercenter.berkeley.edu/blog/the-fin...

I have identified every Mills Act contract in Berkeley. Nothing in the public record suggests this has been done by city officials. I sense a certain geographic bias to this tax abatement.

It's an important moment to speak out for transit funding

Seems unlikely that Hayward and Newark drivers are so different that red light cameras would benefit one place and detract from the other. www.mercurynews.com/2025/09/04/d...

Contra Costa County has been engaged in a twenty year battle with a property owner in rural Livermore over entry gates that are eight feet tall when the code requires a maximum of seven feet. contra-costa.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=...

Salute the troops

Good story that would be much better if it included this bar chart from the print edition showing how much the East Bay counties contribute to BART service compared to San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. www.mercurynews.com/2025/09/03/t...

These would be the first multifamily homes built in Alamo in probably 30-40 years sfyimby.com/2025/08/apar...

Increasingly mad about the activities of the Landmarks people. This month they are going to hear a petition from an obscenely wealthy person, the kind of person whose wedding was in the NYT fashion section, to nearly zero out their $55k annual tax bill.

Thank you!!!

Please call your CA Assemblymember today and ask them to vote for SB 79, which faces a critical vote. The reason we ask you to do this is because it works. findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov

Whatever happens at the state level, Oakland has a chance to remedy this in its General Plan update - please write to the project team and take the survey here. www.oaklandca.gov/Planning-Bui...

Great to see this from @barbaraleeformayor.bsky.social

In California you can get a 20% density bonus (and unlimited waivers) with a 55-and-over project, and avoid the need to provide any low-income units at all. Project like this going up in Danville right now

Our comments on @cityofoakland.bsky.social's "Oakland for All" vision plan. Oakland needs a concrete plan, and responsible team, for delivering improvements to avoid repeating its past failures to develop housing and infrastructure throughout the city eastbayforeveryone.org/2025/08/20/o...

In tiny El Cerrito (25k population) we should be able to add homes for ~5000 people within a 15 minute of BART within the next decade, and more in the future. Let’s pass SB 79 so all cities with BART stations build much more housing near transit.

Very concerning allegations in this article that are going to discourage honest bidders from competing for projects, demoralize staff and cost the City money in the long run. oaklandside.org/2025/08/19/d...

Utility clearance is such a hot topic these days

Only one council member voted against the R-1 reclassification: Wilmont Sweeney, Berkeley's first and only (at that time) Black council member. Neighborhood home owners lined up at the November 12, 1963 public hearing to complain that they had paid premium prices for R-3 parcels for development.

When Prop 13 capped property taxes at 1% there was a big fight over how much each local jurisdiction should get, since many of them had their own local property tax. The result was something like, every city got the share of total property tax that was collected in its borders before 1978

Amazing exchange between North Americans on a Vienna junket and Viennese housers.

Playing touch rugby at Crown Beach with friends and family and there’s no where to get a coffee or bite to eat within a mile of this East Bay Regional Park.

Very real concerns about growing energy demand in world of constrained supply but Silicon Valley Power residential ratepayers make up about 4% of their demand and pay 19 cents per kWh, less than half of what PG&E customers pay.

Tonight is our in person monthly meeting. Where: Oakland Main Library community room (12th St/Lake Merritt BART) When: 6pm What: @adinalevin.bsky.social of Seamless Bay Area talking transit and SB 63 Oakland General Plan Governor’s race and housing/mobility issues

Just looking at the RHNA numbers only tells a small part of the story about Walnut Creek. www.sfchronicle.com/realestate/a...

Hello Berkeley Housekeeters! We’re hosting an info session / discussion with the City planners working on the commercial corridor upzoning. This Thursday, 5 pm! Zoom link here: us06web.zoom.us/j/8749574950...

In most parts of the world, condos are the most common type of home in cities. California is an exception. To change this, state law needs to be updated so there's a way where if there's a construction related problem in a condo, homeowners can get money to fix it without having to file a lawsuit.

Oakland is gearing up to update its General Plan. Now is a great time to get involved - read documents, draft letters, participate in meetings. This is a fantastic, incredibly high leverage way to get involved in your local community. Join us: eastbayforeveryone.org/join/

@adinalevin.bsky.social @seamlessbayareaca.bsky.social

Our next in person meeting is in one week. August 13 6pm at Oakland Main Library. Special guest Adina Levin of Seamless Bay Area to talk about SB 63 and regional transit funding.

Lots of important transit projects in the Bay Area and lots of notes in this report that could be applied to build more of them, more quickly, for less money bsky.app/profile/coli...

Contra Costa County is soliciting updates to its Countywide Transportation Plan, please fill out... www.surveymonkey.com/r/cctasummer...

This is legit embarrassing for the E. Bay. Sorry bout that Santa Monica.

Hard to understand how SF Chronicle can run an explainer about why PG&E bills are so high, without bothering to ask why SMUD, Santa Clara, Palo Alto, (every other US state) ratepayers pay half as much per kWh as PG&E ratepayers. www.sfchronicle.com/projects/202...

As part of the general plan update process, @cityofoakland.bsky.social has released the report Oakland for All: Options for How We Stabilize and Grow. Can check it out here: www.oaklandca.gov/Planning-Bui...

“Mr. Butler is the second building official in succession to resign after a truncated tenure.” files.constantcontact.com/1026a5ab001/...

This family has been doing the work to make this happen. And they know we must put all traffic deaths on the same level of tragedy, and we must move as a city to build safety in to our streets across the entire city, focusing on the most dangerous first. Let’s get to it! 🤜🏼🤛🏼

Please take this @ternerhousing.bsky.social study on what social housing means to you and should mean to California berkeley.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...