Don’t piss George Lucas off:
When George Lucas tried to expand his production company studios in California’s wealthy Marin County, the community pushed back. Then the “Star Wars” creator wanted to sell the land to a developer who would build affordable housing.
“It’s inciting class warfare,” Carolyn Lenert, then head of the North San Rafael Coalition of Residents, told The New York Times at the time.
Now, two years after that project stalled, Lucas has decided to build the affordable housing and pay for it all himself.
“We’ve got enough millionaires here. What we need is some houses for regular working people,” Lucas said through his lawyer Gary Giacomini, CBS affiliate KCBS reported.
[George Lucas chooses Chicago for ‘Star Wars’ museum]The 224-unit affordable housing complex would go on Grady Ranch, where his once-planned studio expansion would have been, according to a plan being submitted to the Marin County Development Agency this week, the Contra Costa Times reported. The plan, which would allow development on 52 acres, includes workforce and senior residences, as well as a community center, pool and an orchard.
At least he is turning his spite into a good thing, I guess. If the neighbors manage to put the kibosh on this, I imagine he’ll just say to hell with it and erect a 300 foot statue of Jar Jar Binks giving the middle finger.
Joseph Nobles
Unless it’s just a tactic to get Marin County to accept his studio expansion. Maybe not.
Frankensteinbeck
I may forgive him for being a creatively, ethically bankrupt writer. Having morals is much more important.
Brachiator
I hope that the deal that Lucas made with Disney will give him some profit participation, If the reaction to the Star Wars trailer is any hint, the upcoming movie will be a box office juggernaut. This would give George more loot to use as he slaps the dopes in Marin around.
David Koch
The force is strong in this one.
SWMBO
a 300 foot statue of Jar Jar Binks giving the middle finger.
A TALKING statue of Jar Jar Binks. Don’t make him go Jar Jar on your ass…
Mary G
We brag about Cali being a blue state paradise, but really we are just as nutso as everyone. Ed Kilgore in the WaMo was talking about it yesterday (central coast, but really true all over the rich people’s parts of the state):
BillinGlendaleCA
I’d travel up there and PAY to see that.
RepubAnon
“Is the planning commission gonna approve?”
I can think of no greater threat than a 300′ talking Jar Jar Binks statue.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
Ha ha, good for him. I like how the asshole was moaning about how giving people who can’t afford a house somewhere they can afford to live is now “class warfare”…
msdc
I never thought I would say this again, but good job, George Lucas!
scav
I suppose (in theory) I should feel somewhat bad about taking second-hand pleasure in some Gated Greenbelt Ghetto whingers getting smacked around publicly. but, nah. The “inciting class warfare!” tantrum about allowing a mix of housing nearby is beyond the moral pale. Another round of second hand glee please.
Howard Beale IV
He’s trying to buy back some of the good karma that he lost when Lucasfilms was accused of engaging in a massive wage fixing scheme with the rest of the Silicon Valley libertards.
Goblue72
These people aren’t wingers. Marin County is solidly Democratic – of the limousine liberal variety.
California is ground zero for Democratic-voting NIMBYs. Homeowners in California have destroyed housing affordability in our state and state government has entitled them with multiple veto points over even the most modest of real estate development proposals.
It’s a complete disaster and for once, de-regulation is actually the correct answer.
Mike G
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.):
The Dead Kennedys lampooned Marin’s snotty NIMBYism in “Forest Fire” in 1982 —
There’s a forest fire climbing the hill
Burning wealthy California homes
Better run run run run run run
From the fire
But some of us stay and watch
And we think of your insurance costs
And we laugh laugh laugh laugh laugh laugh
At your lives
Windows covered with bars
Security guards
Is that a house or a fortress?
Against the rest of the world
Electric bull and your tennis courts
Pink sports cars and your boats
Getting fried fried fried fried fried fried
By the fire
But hey!
What about the cocaine
Stockpiled in the basement
Be a hero and save it
You know you’re gonna need it
scav
@Goblue72: Not all whingers are wingers. And these lot are walking the quack.
Suzanne
Good for him. Real estate in CA is freaking insane. I increasingly hate the Bay Area.
Corner Stone
@Mary G:
And they’ve been doing their damndest to ruin Austin, TX as well:
Howard Beale IV
And for the record: Lucas never provided the original theatrical release of Star Wars or the Empire Strikes Back to the National Film Registry.
opiejeanne
@BillinGlendaleCA: I would too, and I’d almost like to live in the planned low-cost housing, because of the area but we wouldn’t qualify. Marin County is an odd mix of wealth and poverty, if you know where to look.
opiejeanne
@Goblue72: “Homeowners in California have destroyed housing affordability in our state”
That is the dumbest thing I’ve read in a while.
MazeDancer
It’s wonderful when insanely artesian money does delicious things.
If only all the people with stratospheric bucks decided to figure out ways they could help humanity. Or even just the local populace.
opiejeanne
@Suzanne: We lived in the East Bay for 9 years. I swear, when we went house hunting there we thought we were going to end up living in a garage because everything was so expensive. We were moving from a large old house in Riverside, CA so the price tags were even more of a shock than if we’d been moving from somewhere in LA or Orange Counties. We ended up in Castro Valley, a stingy unincorporated part of Alameda County that wouldn’t approve an increase of 32 cents a year to support a new library, and forget about replacing the boiler at the HS after it blew up mid-winter. It was so cold that the kids missed a week of school that year. They didn’t replace it for another two years, when we held the third special election just for that issue. I think the grand total cost for that boiler was $10,000, about 17 cents a year on their property tax. You’d have thought we were asking for their firstborn.
Suzanne
@opiejeanne: Mr. Suzanne is from the South Bay, and his grandmother has lived there since the 50’s in a little house in Cupertino, bought back when it was all orange groves out there. Fast-forward sixty years, and she’s less than an quarter-mile from the new Apple campus. Her house is worth a staggering amount. Mr. Suzanne would love to move back to be near his extended family, and because Arizona is full of crazy people, but we couldn’t even afford the garage. No thank you.
JaneE
@Goblue72: I live in a red part of the state. NIMBY doesn’t stand a chance here. It doesn’t matter how many citizens protest or how many people tell the Supervisors what they do or don’t want, if a developer wants it, they will do their best to make it so. It isn’t often than anyone here will have a good word for the EPA or the feds in general, but sometimes they are needed to save us from our elected officials’ “development at any cost” philosophy.
ruemara
Property owners have destroyed affordable housing. Sorry if you disagree. Every affordable housing proposal meets intense opposition. It’s never the right look. It’s never green enough. “Those people” have enough housing. They’re bringing down property values. The noise. Too much traffic. After 8 years of watching planning commission, I think I’m sick of it. When there’s a waiting list of 5-7 years even in a small town, there is not enough affordable housing. You can’t leave because you can’t make enough to move to places like SF or LA without a massive nest egg to secure housing. The working poor in this country are trapped like rats and much of it is the tremendous disparity between wages and housing costs.
Goblue72
@scav: Thx. I missed the “h”.
Goblue72
@JaneE: I’m glad housing is getting built in at least some parts of CA. We could of use more red-state style pro-development on the coast.
Goblue72
@opiejeanne: You know nothing of land use policy and history in our state.
I’m a professional in the real estate development industry. NIMBY homeowners have most certainly destroyed housing affordability in CA by preventing the housing market from coming anywhere close to meeting demand.
trollhattan
Geography is what keeps Bay Area house prices high, and it will be ever thus. Lucas is a Modesto boy, I once worked with a guy who went to school with him–there are stories, and I can believe he never totally bought into the Uberclass paradigm in the way, say, Larry Ellison has.
Good on George.
Tree With Water
I’d be interested to know what dollar amount will qualify as “affordable housing” in that neighborhood of Marin County; that is, what George Lucas will deem “affordable”. The price of real estate everywhere in the San Francisco Bay Area is insane, much less in some of the last of the “old Bay Area” that still exists in Marin and Sonoma counties today (especially the western parts of the counties). It seems to me that Lucas would need be somewhere in the ballpark, comparative pricing-wise, even if he’s prepared to forsake the enormous profit he could otherwise reap. In other words, “affordable” is a very malleable term where north bay real estate is concerned.
Goblue72
@ruemara: You are 100% correct. And it’s not just low income housing – NIMBY homeowners fight any kind of housing development – whether affordable or market rate. NIMBYs in SF literally got a measure on the ballot opposing one specific high rise project because the high rise condo nearby didn’t want their views interfered with. And they got the left in town to go along with it because “rich people suck”.
California’s housing prices started detaching themselves from the national market in the 1970s – precisely when anti-growth laws like CEQA went into effect while Prop 13 shifted the property tax burden onto new development.
Flash forward 40 years and the entire state has a housing crisis. The most rapidly gentrifying – and unaffordable – city in the country right now is Los Angeles.
Goblue72
@trollhattan: Land use laws are what keeps housing in CA expensive.
The state’s nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office recently published a report confirming the same. Something academic economists and land use policy wonks in California have been noting for decades.
Smiling Mortician
@MazeDancer: Well, there’s this guy.
Goblue72
@Tree With Water: see rents on this list for Marin County – http://www.treasurer.ca.gov/ctcac/rentincome/15/rent/post20150306.pdf
60% AMI rents are considered affordable for low income households in Marin. 80% – 100% AMI rents for moderate income.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Goblue72:
The Gold Rush destroyed affordable housing in Cal and the property values have never come down since then, East Coaster. It took my dad an my mom working two good jobs to barely afford a house back in 1973 in what was the sticks.
Tree With Water
@Goblue72: Thanks, but I couldn’t make hide or hair of the numbers cited. Neither am I familiar with the acronym AMI. Is the upshot the fact that the “affordable housing” pricing will be determined by a governmental formula? Or is that way off?
If that’s the worst “revenge” Lucas can dream up, he’s definitely not a hater type guy. He’s more like a big, grumpy marshmallow… housing for people is his idea of revenge? Hitler he’s not.
rikyrah
Orphan Black is back!!
Gin & Tonic
@Goblue72: I read a few weeks ago in The Economist that you could double the population density of San Francisco and it would then be half as dense as NYC.
Corner Stone
@Goblue72:
Sounds like you have an incentive, then.
Tree With Water
@Gin & Tonic: Yeah, but San Francisco would just be another borough were it part of NYC. New York City is huge, in size equivalent to a big chunk of the cities and counties that comprise the entire Bay Area. I’m not sure if that distinction makes any sense relative to the statistics you cite, but having typed it, I’ll stick.
Gin & Tonic
I’m talking about population density, not size. I’ve been to San Francisco many times; I know lately a lot of residents have been complaining about density. I have also lived in New York. San Francisco is not dense.
For comparison: SF is ~17k people per square mile; NYC *in total* is ~26k; Manhattan is ~67k. If you take out Staten Island and the uninhabited wilderness areas of southern Queens, I’m willing to bet that NYC is well over double SF’s population density.
Ruckus
Lived in Marin county for 6 yrs. That’s where I had my retail store. It’s not all rich, pompous, IGMFY, assholes. And it reliably votes democrat by huge margins. But it’s also the place I saw an 8 ft stars and bars being flown from the back of a jacked up pickup. And a middle aged black man wearing a McCain sweatshirt walking down the street in 08. There are some houses that are affordable, at least in CA terms in the county. There are cities that are insanely expensive. And there is a huge, NIMBY effect in most areas. But that isn’t unique to Marin, not at all. And there is low cost housing in Marin City. Not much of it, but it is there.
In other words, it’s like a lot of middle/upper class CA. Or probably most any middle/upper class area in the country.
Ruckus
@Gin & Tonic:
NYC has a lot more and taller vertical that SF. Yes it is much more dense but in CA density is when it takes you longer to drive somewhere than what you want it to, not how many neighbors you have.
Tree With Water
@Corner Stone: Indeed. California’s small housing movement has just started rolling, and incentives certainly do abound. I’m involved in one such venture at the moment, one that’s laughably modest in scale, but might one day serve to further the righteous goal of creating truly affordable housing.
Tree With Water
@Gin & Tonic: 17K people per square mile in San Francisco vs. 67K in Manhattan? OK, you just blew my mind. I didn’t have a clue, did I?
Ruckus
@Smiling Mortician:
I haven’t finished listening to your link but I am about 1/2 way through. At least some do get it. Certainly not enough but there are some.
Hope I’m not disappointed in the second 1/2.
The Ancient Randonneur
While on the subject of affordable, how about a little bit of economic justice on the side? Just Capital is an interesting organization with a noteworthy purpose. It piggybacks on the Nick Hanauer talk and is encouraging to see that at least some of the people in top ranks of wealth we do indeed have a crisis in the making. That video is less than ten minutes long and worth a listen. The chart he puts up at roughly two minutes in is staggering.
TriassicSands
Or is this just a pissed off 1 percenter getting even with snobby 10 percenter’s for not granting him his every wish? I wonder who will be able to afford the “affordable” housing — the 11 to 15 percenter’s?
Goblue72
@Tree With Water: short answer – a HUD derived formula based on Area Median Income, adjust for household size. Rent should be no more than 30% of gross monthly income.
So in Marin, $1500 or so in monthly rent for a 2 bedroom apartment, to be affordable to a household at 60% area median income for Marin County.
Lucas has partnered with a local housing nonprofit – PEP Housing – who I believe will develop and manage the project.
So yes – truly affordable housing well within the four corners of housing industry standards for affordability.
Goblue72
@Gin & Tonic: Yup. And double that again and I think you get to Parisian levels of population density. The horror.
And SF is the densest city West of the Mississippi. We have PLENTY of room here to build. The homeowner NIMBYs won’t let us.
This literally happened a few years ago for a measly 60 unit apartment project for old people in Palo Alto – http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_24462926/early-tally-shows-measure-d-senior-housing-project
Tree With Water
@Goblue72: $1,500 for a brand new 2 bedroom apartment in Marin? God bless the people that make that formula work. They will be swamped with applications, of course. Which leads me to wonder who will qualify to bid? Just Marinites? What criteria will need be met in order to apply? Anyway, it’s good news, and Marin County certainly isn’t going to bleed to death because a few more people will soon have a decent place to live. It’s a beautiful neighborhood that will stay beautiful (although I do wonder about worsening traffic congestion along the old main boulevard that connects the neighborhood to highway 101).
Tree With Water
@Goblue72: Plenty of room to build in San Francisco? Name the neighborhoods.
Thor Heyerdahl
@Goblue72: Per Wiki – Paris is approx 56K people per square mile.
Ruckus
@Tree With Water:
There was a complex in San Rafael that started as condos but with the recession couldn’t sell a unit. They converted to low income housing and 4 yrs ago the cost of a single was $900-950. The place was nice with decent amenities. There are places in Marin that are nice places to live without a mid/upper 6 figure income.
On the other hand $1500 is $1000 less than we pay in old town Pasadena for a 2 bedroom apt. Very nice, walking distance to a lot of stuff, Norton Simon museum, 4 grocery stores, restaurants of all sorts, and not even close to the upper end price wise in the area. One could even walk to the Huntington Library if you were a bit adventurous.
Aleta
Re affordable housing: There are villages bought up by affluent summer colonists near where I work in August. Amazingly, there is no acknowledgement by these folks of their codependent existence with the local workers who keep their homes roofed and standing (homes built by the great-grandparents of the locals). The best carpenter in the area died of cancer, though it would have been treatable with health insurance? It’s no concern of theirs. Just on to complain that the guy who took over all the jobs still hasn’t finished their barn remodel. Prices at the general store seem high, so avoid shopping there? Now the store’s gone under and it’s at least a two hour trip each way to buy milk and hardware. These are not bad people, but why don’t they see that the survival of a local working class is in their self-interest?
Joel
@ruemara: honestly, though. The Bay Area is overrated. Plenty of great cities in this country with a lot of work available and a need for people to do those jobs. Yes, they tend to be colder.
Joel
@Gin & Tonic: Seoul. That’s a dense city. Shanghai, too, at least the urban part of it.
jl
Yeah, well, that damn Lucas is still a snot nosed Downey High punk in my book, and his inability to outgrow his adolescent worldview messed up too many potentially very good movies.
But…. good on George Lucas for proposing this. Hope he can get it done.
Tree With Water
@Ruckus: The 2008-2009 economic meltdown played hell with everything. Seven years later, and it’s inconceivable that condo’s could remain unsold in San Rafael. I’m mentioned upthread I’m involved in a ridiculously small project aimed at putting small roofs over people’s heads, and feel reasonably confident it will (at least) get off the ground. As to what direction the project would then take… is under discussion. Multiply that by imaginations of thousands with their own ideas- that’s how California’s housing squeeze is going to be solved. In alliance with our government agencies, creative people will come to the fore, and when they do, things will begin to happen. Or so I hope…
jl
Though the nimbys in Marin will have some valid gripes. Transportation in southern Marin County sucks, and the traffic is horrible. Partly that is due to 60s and 70s nimbyism, when Marin turned down BART. Not sue this is true, since do not remember where I read it, but I think that was due to the Marin people not wanting the wrong kind (if you know what I mean) BARTing in. So, what they gained in keeping out the low class people, they have lost by making it a car hell.
Big new residential developments will make that worse. Maybe George can spring a few mill (or billion if he has them) to help with that too.
Marin does have a very nice bus system, but not nearly enough capacity or coverage for the local commutes. Though for excursions it is great. You never need to drive to go to cool places in Marin, just check out the Marin Stage system. You’re a fool if you drive.
Marin is finally getting some commuter and inter-city rail, and I need to check out what the routes will be.
Also, a lot of Marin people are not millionaires at all. There is a sizeable working class community there, just not in the high tone cities and towns you have heard of. And since the housing prices in San Francisco, San Mateo county and better parts of Alameda County have gotten so outrageous, there are place in Marin that are actually much more affordable, if you can stand the horrible commute. I’ve met several people recently who ended up in Marin because that is only place they could afford housing (and if you leave out the commute, that is not a bad deal, since so many wonderful places there).
Tree With Water
@Joel: Your critique would be widely applauded throughout the Bay Area. Beginning in the late 1960’s, in fact, hippies in the small town of Bolinas in Marin County gained great renown with Bay Area natives by tearing down traffic signs directing people to the town, and their spirit survives hereabouts today (their campaign was waged for years). Not with me, though. I genuinely like seeing tourists around, and always have in whatever part of the Bay Area I happened to live in at the time.
Keith G
Well I am glad that housing affordability is finally being brought up. This is going to be the new “civil rights” issue moving forward as we seem to be getting a handle (though not quite) on access to affordable health care.
Lurking Canadian
@Tree With Water: the obvious answer is “up”. That’s how they do it in New York, Shanghai, Moscow…
However, in an earthquake-prone area that might not be feasible.
Mike Mundy
Mr. Lucas has already erected statues in Marin County:
“You Will Go To San Anselmo.
NCSteve
@Tree With Water: 80% of median income. About $70,500. It’s in the article.
NCSteve
The comments on the WaPo story are beyond vile, to the point of inducing utter despair. The sight of extremely wealthy people using the money they earned by their own brilliance to help others just drives the Fox-toxxed fear addicts into apoplectic fits of rage.
opiejeanne
@Goblue72: Perhaps if you’d elaborated on your statement I would have agreed with you, but your short sentence was ridiculous standing by itself.
And don’t be so sure you know what I do or don’t know about California land use policies.
opiejeanne
@Corner Stone: Yeah, my first thought too.
And why would you not expect people with a nice view, that they paid for, to protest anything that would block said view? When we bought that house in Castro Valley in 1992 the appraiser told us the view of the San Mateo Bridge and the bay added $5000-$10,000 to the value of the house. Take the view away and you’re taking purchased value away.
opiejeanne
@Tree With Water: Oh, any place with a bunch of old buildings that can be torn down, like some of those apartment buildings from the 20s and 30s. Beautiful, yes, but certainly not using the vertical space efficiently. So we lose a bit of beauty so a developer can make a few bucks. /snark off.
Tree With Water
@opiejeanne: The team would still be the San Francisco 49ers if football could be played on the sides of skyscrapers, that’s for sure.
Goblue72
@opiejeanne: your statements have been indicative of not knowing anything.
Goblue72
@Tree With Water: the entire west side of SF can accommodate a lot more housing if upzoned to a measly 6 stories. There are huge sections of SF that are zoned to basically single family housing.
Tree With Water
@Goblue72: “There are huge sections of SF that are zoned to basically single family housing”. Well, yeah.. the districts you refer to are the Richmond and Sunset. But your point is silly. Any neighborhood on the planet can be zoned for six stories, with the same effect. Quite aside from the fact that were it done, San Francisco would no longer be San Francisco.
Gex
Proving, once again that trickle down economics only works when we don’t give the filthy rich everything they want.