Monday Morning Bullpen: The City Gets Letters

Not a lot coming out of the City Council this week.

The resolution to continue meeting remotely will be interesting, the question here is will any councilmember ask when the council plans to meet in person.

If so, that should make for interesting watching.

As we’ve seen across the country, it’s real easy to get comfortable doing your job at home.

I’m not sure all of the electeds are anxious to get back to council chambers.

Time will tell.

The city received two important letters last week. The first was from state’s Attorney General Rob Bonta who went in on the city’s emergency ordinance on SB 9.

According to Bonta, the ordinance does not exclude Landmark Districts.

A quick Google search shows a lot of organizations and some other cities seemed to have other impressions of the law.

Of course at this point, each side is interpreting the law and it would probably take a court of law to get to the bottom of it all.

And that’s the big question is how far will the city push back?

It may not be this one, but at some point one of these laws is going to get a serious challenge in court.

No. Not the cases we have seen so far. I’m talking about something a little deeper.

It may not be a case involving Pasadena, but it’s coming.

Yeah, I know all about the housing crisis.

But SB 9 doesn’t provide any answers to that issue.

Building more houses does not lead to wage increases.

The big issue is many people have simply been priced out of housing, renting and owning, across the state.

Affordable or not.

And if you have not been priced out it’s catching up on you unless you are making a grip of cash.

No answers coming soon I fear, probably a lot more housing, affordable and otherwise, that poor people making $15 an hour simply cannot afford.

Some people are paying more in market rate rent than they would on a mortgage.

That’s ridiculous.

If you favor rent control or not, the initiatives at least take a shot at keeping rent increases down instead of pontificating over ADUs and granny flats.

City officials exchanged letters with District Attorney George Gascón last week.

I wrote about the city’s letter last week.

Gascón’s March 16 response laid out the procedure and process. The only revelation in his letter is that he has hired a grip of attorneys to help with the probes.

But what he does not address is why the investigations continue to take up to 2.5 years, according to city officials, if he has more help.

You would think more help would increase things, not slow them down.

Could be a case of too many cooks in the kitchen I guess.

Who knows?