Brown, Newsom clash over merits of obstruction

18 January 2017 by Steve Blum
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Zorro drew his sword. Paladin went for his gun. TJ Hooker whipped out his stick. When in peril, Californian heroes find salvation in a sure and deadly weapon. In our finest tradition, lieutenant governor Gavin Newsom faced the looming threat of Donald Trump’s wall, shouted not in my backyard and brandished the ultimate equaliser: the California Environmental Quality Act. According to the Los Angeles Times

“There’s something called CEQA in California — NEPA at the federal level,” Newsom said. “There’s indigenous lands and autonomies relating to governance on those lands. There are all kinds of obstructions as it relates to just getting zoning approval and getting building permits. All those things could be made very, very challenging for the administration.”

I’m not saying the wall is a good idea. Nor am I suggesting opposition to it is a bad thing. If you’re against it, you should oppose it by any legitimate means possible.

The point I’m making has nothing to do with the wall and everything to do with the seductive power of laws and processes that were intended to promote thoughtful stewardship of land and resources, but have instead become tools that allow anyone with a grievance – real or imagined – to block infrastructure development.

Around the same time that Newsom was making his stand, governor Jerry Brown called out for regulatory reform, to solve California’s housing shortage…

What we can do is cut the red tape, cut the delays, cut whatever expenses we can afford to do without to make housing more affordable and therefore increase the stock and therefore hopefully bring down the costs.

You want affordable housing, efficient transportation and fast broadband? Then someone has to grab a shovel and dig. But if the cost of a project is doubled or tripled, or if it is hopelessly tangled in endless challenges, then ground will never be broken.

Newsom’s defiance is no threat to Trump’s wall. Federal preemption is a simple fix that can be baked into any authorising bill. But Newsom’s example legitimises self centered nimbys and rent seekers, and impedes reform of well meaning laws that they have warped into weapons of woe.