Measure W is just plain bad for Nevada City, and here’s why:
1. Creating land use policy through a voter initiative is a bad idea; it can only be changed by another vote of the people, which keeps future City Council members’ hands tied when times change. The moratorium on bed and breakfasts is an excellent example. Many of our town’s B&B’s have closed never to open again and we’ve lost valuable TOT revenue because of it! Similarly, the airBnB ordinance has major issues that we can’t address because it was passed by voter initiative. Let’s not make the same mistake with Measure W.
2. A mob of developers isn’t going to take over our town. Out of town developers aren’t interested in signing State affidavits requiring them to live at one of the properties being split for three years, and even if they were they’d be restricted to a single property and wouldn’t buy up lot after lot. There are much better ways for them to spend their time… and their money.
3. Hundreds of homeowners aren’t going to become developers overnight and split every parcel in Nevada City. As a contractor myself I can tell you that even with the State’s streamlining, the process to split and build a new house is difficult… and expensive.
4. While yes, it’s no longer required to be affordable housing, Nevada City needs housing. Period. The City has repeatedly, cycle after cycle, failed to meet its RHNA (Regional Housing Needs Assessment) as determined by the Housing Element. There’s also some logic behind their reasoning; the cost of building is so outrageously high in California that keeping this condition in place would, unfortunately, have zero effect.
5. The cartoonish structures depicted on the proponents website will never happen. The City has an Objective Residential Design Ordinance to keep new buildings coherent with the look and feel of its neighborhoods.
6. Proponents like to talk about the lack of fiscal, infrastructure, open space, traffic and other impacts provided by the Goldfarb and Lipman Report Findings, but it lacks these impacts because the doomsday scenario pointed out by proponents of SB9 will never happen. As the report points out, even if SB9 went into effect it’s only likely that 31 properties might apply… so whether Measure W passes or not there will be virtually no impact.
7. Referencing Pasadena’s case is comparing apples to oranges. Pasadena, like many other cities trying to circumnavigate SB9, was threatened by a lawsuit from the State Attorney General’s office. Lucky for them, they were able to avoid litigation by working with the AG’s office and individually identifying properties that narrowly qualify for the requirements of the National Register of Historic Places. You may recall that Grass Valley previously did this work. Proponents of Measure W, however, did NOT. If Measure W is voted in, Nevada City Council members’ hands will be tied and, unlike in Pasadena, they won’t have the flexibility to change anything if the AG’s office requires it, which makes this extremely vulnerable to litigation. I think it’s worth repeating… Creating land use policy through a voter initiative is a BAD idea.
8. Am I the only person wondering why there are 23 pages of initiative language to affirm architectural review when that architectural review is supposedly specifically aimed solely at SB9 lot splits? They claim Measure W won’t create new design rules, but what stops them from changing them in the future after the Districts have been established? The Goldfarb and Lipman report points out that the “Initiative emphasizing the discretionary nature of architectural review is inconsistent with the Housing Element’s description of architectural review as ministerial.” 23 pages of initiative is a LOT of policy to only affect what’s built on the 31 possible lots that SB9 will apply to.
I know we want to trust our elected leaders to look after our community’s best interests, but when it comes to Measure W, Nevada City Council members and City staff have improperly vetted this initiative and let Nevada City Residents down. Proponents have also further fueled an already existing fire of division, which has decreased our chances of collectively solving our local housing shortage.
SB 9 isn’t as scary as the fear tactics make it out to be and if there are legitimate concerns City Council can pass restrictions to the Objective Design Standards to mitigate those concerns without having to cement them in place with a voter initiative.
Please, vote “NO” on W.
Submitted by Michael Taylor, a Nevada County resident and prior resident of Nevada City since 1979