Sage Naumann
Voters reward politicians for offering solutions. The grander the better. Whether it’s the Green New Deal or Project 2025., Thousands of words are expended with the goal of convincing voters that their side has the solution to all their problems.
When it comes to progress on Colorado’s housing supply problem, I’d like to see the real answers printed on a sign hanging from a press conference podium.Sorry, but the problem is with us.” This may not make an appealing bumper sticker slogan, but the truth is that it rarely is.
“Affordable housing” used to mean exactly that: private housing for low-income earners. These were typically apartments or condominiums, as they remain today. Today, the term has morphed into a category of socialized, semi-socialized, or highly regulated housing units that are partially or fully subsidized or owned by government agencies. Despite failing to effectively control housing prices through a flood of city inspectors, fines, and penalties, politicians continue to apply pressure.
Johnston Proposal Helps Denver Residents Build More Homes | POINT
In Denver, Mayor Mike Johnston’s recent proposal to raise sales tax by half a cent is a similar, unfortunate move: the government would collect public money to part-fund, or part-own, “affordable housing” units provided to those who need it most. The proposal, called the “Affordable Denver Fund,” is likely to be put to the Denver public’s ballot in November.
While I assess that the current proposal is likely the most pro-market proposal a Democratic mayor could offer given the political realities, Denver (and many other municipalities) have failed to acknowledge, let alone correct, the mistakes of the past, and there has been no effort to fix the regulatory regime that has left them in trouble today.
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Unfortunately, acknowledging the government’s past failures would require angering many of the people who helped build the foundations and walls of our current housing hell. It would require changing course, standing up to an increasingly powerful bureaucracy, and using up every last ounce of political capital from the past. It would require acknowledging that local government has been one of the biggest obstacles to new development.
The answer is not to pour more money into the same bureaucratic organizations that cannot approve building permits without taking core samples from 2x4s to determine the emotional state of the trees when they are cut down and conducting studies on the impacts that new apartment buildings will have on endangered fish in distant waters. I’m exaggerating, of course, but maybe not by much. As far as I know, there are no recent studies of regulatory costs for developers wanting to build in Denver. In most municipalities in the country, those costs range from 20% to 50% of the total construction cost.
Of course, Denver “missed the boat” when it comes to low interest rates. High interest rates mean that even if land use and zoning are addressed, they will be slower to get back on track than they would have been if they had done so just a few years ago. That said, if the Mayor and City Council are asking for more money to address affordable housing, we should first ask them what efforts they have made to reduce bureaucracy, expedite permitting, and address restrictive land use regulations.
Until that’s done, they probably shouldn’t get another cent.
Sage Naumann is a conservative commentator and strategist. He runs Anthem Communications and was previously a spokesperson for the Colorado Republican Senate. Follow him on Twitter: @SageNaumann.
