“Greenmailing” drives up construction costs and wait times, making the state’s already expensive housing even less affordable.
The state of California has made it shockingly easy for construction unions to delay new construction under the guise of environmental protection, through a practice known as "greenmailing." And time after time, they have. Consider Newport Crossings, a 350-unit apartment complex complete with 7,500 square feet of commercial space, and a half-acre public park proposed by developer Starboard Realty Partners. Starboard's planned development would replace a blighted, 1970s-era shopping center where some 70 percent of the shopfronts sit vacant. Newport Crossings would add new housing to an area currently dominated by office blocks, shops, and restaurants. Normally, this sort of project would meet stiff resistance in California, where approval times for a comparable development can range from two to three years. But Starboard worked with community groups to iron out issues over parking and landscaping, and agreed to reserve 78 of its new units for lower-income renters. "These Newport Crossings guys really went the extra mile and met with environmentalists, met with some of these slow growth guys. Met with a whole host of community types," says Erik Weigand, the vice chair of the Newport Beach Planning Commission. (Weigand also serves as the treasurer of the Orange County Republican Party.) "They met with everyone, and came up with a project that everyone would like." By law, projects like Newport Crossings must make plans available for 45 days of public comment. And in January of this year, on the very last day of the mandatory comment period, the Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters (SWRCC)—a union representing 50,000 carpenters throughout the Southwest—submitted a letter detailing a number of supposed deficiencies in the city's environmental study of Newport Crossings...MORE
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