You can use your St. Louis County Library card to borrow titles from these partner libraries:
Golden Gates
Fighting for Housing—and Democracy—in America's Most Prosperous Cities
1 of 1 copy available
“Tells the story of housing in all its complexity.” —NPR
Spacious and affordable homes used to be the hallmark of American prosperity. Today, however, punishing rents and the increasingly prohibitive cost of ownership have turned housing into the foremost symbol of inequality and an economy gone wrong. Nowhere is this more visible than in the San Francisco Bay Area, where fleets of private buses ferry software engineers past the tarp-and-plywood shanties of the homeless. The adage that California is a glimpse of the nation’s future has become a cautionary tale.
With propulsive storytelling and ground-level reporting, New York Times journalist Conor Dougherty chronicles America’s housing crisis from its West Coast epicenter, peeling back the decades of history and economic forces that brought us here and taking readers inside the activist movements that have risen in tandem with housing costs.
-
Creators
-
Publisher
-
Release date
February 18, 2020 -
Formats
-
OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9780593165324
- File size: 237918 KB
- Duration: 08:15:39
-
-
Languages
- English
-
Reviews
-
December 16, 2019
New York Times economics reporter Dougherty dissects the San Francisco Bay Area’s housing shortage crisis and the “antigrowth politics” that caused it in this incisive, character-driven debut. Focusing on Sonja Trauss, who founded the San Francisco Bay Area Renters’ Federation in 2014 (when the region was creating only one new housing unit per eight new jobs), Dougherty charts the rise of the YIMBY (Yes in My Backyard) movement as it seeks to reform zoning laws and push for high density housing development in the Bay Area and other communities. He notes that affluent suburbanites, who fear a decline in property values, and low-income tenants of color, who risk losing their neighborhoods to gentrification, both view YIMBY activism skeptically. He also profiles others involved in housing affordability issues, including Sister Christina Heltsley, whose Catholic nonprofit battles real estate speculators in her working-class, Silicon Valley-adjacent community, and Lafayette, Calif., city manager Steve Falk, who quit his job rather than continue to support restrictive zoning measures. Dougherty expertly weaves these individual stories into his overarching assessment of urban policy, and makes a convincing case for “mixed” housing solutions that balance affordability, availability, and profit. Readers who assume there’s no solution to sky-high rents in America’s big cities should consult this detailed and optimistic counter-narrative. Agent: Melissa Flashman, Janklow & Nesbit.
-