Housing requirement creates schism

A split occurred in Palo Alto Monday night over whether the city can support its sizable share of a regional affordable housing plan.

[Irvin Dawid]

The article lays out very well the "schism" the community faces. Bern's declaration,. "This community will never support these numbers" is the real challenge.

Do we lead, or do we "resist changing" for fear of changing our community character?

But how do OTHERS view this schism?

Try, "Affluent Community Torn By Housing Allocation Numbers"
http://planetizen.com/node/27743

[Jesse]

Palo Alto can easily accommodate these 2,860 units and more by building upwards with condo and apartment towers. These buildings can be a mix of low-income and high-income units. Think of teachers, firefighters, police officers, and other public service providers. Where are they living now? Wouldn't it be nice if they could live in Palo Alto and support the local economy with their hard-earned dollars.

[What schism]

The council was overwhelmingly opposed to going along with ABAG's ridiculous request. Two council members who always vote for developers want to overbuild. What else is new, but now they wrap themselves in green. They rarely are unanimous. Those who don't like the outcome are calling it a schism.

[aml]

the heated arguments against the allocation are just silly. simply looking at a google earth sattelite shows a tremendous amount of avialable land that is currently dedicated to the almighty automobile. simply converting these sprawling parking lots to housing and parking garages would provide a huge amount of land and wouldn't involve bulldozing any neighborhoods. and if you want to be even more thoughtful about climate impacts you just forgo the parking lots altogether and build more housing.

sometimes rich people are just so silly