LAT: Renters press officials for affordable housing

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-housing10dec10,0,6537486.story?coll=la-headlines-california

quote:

In another sign of the growing potency of low-income housing as a political issue in Los Angeles, a group of about 100 tenants held a forum Saturday to press elected leaders to create more affordable units and to prosecute slum landlords.

Meeting in a South Los Angeles community center, tenants speaking English and Spanish told stories of utilities cut off for no reason, eviction notices delivered without cause and unabated rats and cockroaches. One man said that his landlord tolerated prostitution on the premises. Another compared Los Angeles to São Paulo, Brazil, and Calcutta.

...

The meeting came a month after Measure H, which would have been the largest municipal housing bond in U.S. history, was narrowly defeated at the polls. The proposed $1-billion package would have created about 10,000 affordable housing units and increased the number of such dwellings in Los Angeles by about 13%. It received 62% of the vote, just short of the required two-thirds majority.

Many activists say they want to keep the pressure on political leaders to find solutions. The average rent in the city, about $1,700 a month, has nearly doubled in the last 12 years. Meanwhile, although nearly 13,000 affordable units have been built using city money in the last six years, more than 10,000 existing rent-controlled units were torn down or converted to condominiums in the same period.

And a big hearty raised middle finger to Jarvis and Gann, authors of proposition 13, that meant a ballot initiative with 62% "yes" votes would still not pass. The requirements for a super-majority for tax increases has terribly deformed California's tax system and destroyed social services and public infrastructure.

and should be praised, not cursed.

If the state of California took direct control over all school districts and set standards, hired teachers, and ensured the functioning of the schools, then there would not have been a major issue of poorer counties having to levy heavy property tax rates to fund schools to achieve the same level of spending that rich counties achieve with lower property tax rates. In the US, county and city governments are the primary funders of public schools in America. State governments kick in some amount usually, and the federal government usually kicks in another amount, but most money for your local public school comes from county or city taxes.

Because of the disparate impact on poor counties, the Supreme Court told California to correct the imbalance.

The state legislature responded by capping the rate of local revenue that a school district could receive and distributing excess amounts among the poorer districts. Although this was more equitable, property owners in affluent districts perceived that the benefits of the taxes they paid were no longer enjoyed exclusively by the local schools.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_13_(1978)

If I had my way, we would have an education system seen in many countries in Western Europe like France. Over in France, the government is the primary funder and administrator of all public schools in the country, not the local government. A uniform standard is present throughout all the regions of that country, and because the government receives tax revenues from people with modest means as well as from rich people, it can ensure all schools are up to standards even in the poorest regions of France.

We should not have to ask poor people to pay for something alone when we could all chip in and help each other.