Letters: Housing policy | Sheriff oversight | Passover celebration | Call for lawlessness | Loan forgiveness
East Bay Times Letters to the Editor for April 24, 2024
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State’s housing policy
is a bad solution
Re: “Housing could fill in open spaces” (Page A1, April 21).
We hear a lot about the “housing crisis” but less about the traffic crisis, the water crisis, and the education funding crisis — all of which will be exacerbated by the state’s mandate to build 440,000 new housing units in the Bay Area.
And to ensure that the real estate and building industries can profit from this mandate, we have the “builder’s remedy,” which promotes urban sprawl and prohibits local communities from controlling their own environment.
The rationale for the “must build” mandate and the builder’s remedy is that, currently, housing is too expensive for many Californians. Yet the mandate and remedy only require that 20% of the new construction be affordable. The other 80% can be McMansions, providing a windfall for the developers, while our environment suffers.
Jim Hogan
El Sobrante
Sheriff oversight
proposals are too weak
On April 30, the Alameda County Board of Supervisors is set to pass sheriff oversight legislation so weak it will require the sheriff to consent to any investigation. They will consider two draft ordinances to govern sheriff oversight, but both drafts prevent an oversight body from investigating unless “requested by, or with the authorization of, the sheriff.”
County Counsel Donna Ziegler maintains that her office must represent both sides in any litigation. Now she won’t have to explain this conflict to a judge because there will never be an investigation unless the sheriff agrees. The county continues to bleed multimillion-dollar payouts for deputy misconduct. We need independent sheriff oversight now.
The Interfaith Coalition for Justice in our Jails (ICJJ) joins with the county League of Women Voters and others to advocate for truly independent oversight, as provided for in state law.
Bob Britton
Castro Valley
Passover celebration
renews sense of hope
My daughter, a recent UC Berkeley graduate, is an intern at Archbold Biological Station in Florida and attended a vegetarian Passover on Saturday night as these researchers study animals — they don’t eat them.
Yes, it was celebrated before Passover. In our family we move Jewish holidays around all the time so we can do them on weekends. Imagine doing Christmas on a workday, with all of the time and preparation needed to have a full celebration. What made this Passover really special is that it was organized and hosted by a non-Jewish staff member of Archbold to celebrate the heritage of the two Jewish interns. Non-Jewish researchers attended along with these two interns to celebrate the story of Passover together.
What a bright spot in light of all of the antisemitism and vitriol directed at American Jews. There are indeed righteous gentiles who give me hope.
Andrea Bloom
Pleasanton
Cotton’s call nothing
short of lawless
Some advice for U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., who has called for commuters to take matters into their own hands regarding protesters.
Given that the Republicans have not yet taken the White House (at least not legally), you may want to keep your authoritarian leanings under wraps, at least until a more favorable climate for such views presents itself.
Mark Gabin
Concord
Student loan plan
is another sham
Re: “Administration says it will be canceling $7.4 billion more in student loans” (Page A1, April 13).
The latest round of President Biden’s “student loan forgiveness” is another sham. First, nothing is being forgiven — the debt is simply being transferred onto the shoulders of the American taxpayers. This is an obvious attempt to buy votes by shifting the payment burden to taxpayers and from certain citizens he thinks might vote for him. If this is not illegal, it should be.
The Wharton School of Business says the $84 billion cost of this brings the total for these student loan bailouts to almost $560 billion.
Even worse is who benefits most from this latest round, namely it will include those with household incomes above $312,000. (These former students were excluded on the basis of their high income from previous student loan giveaways, but not this time.) The burden here gets added to those who did not go to college and those whose parents saved to send their kids to school.
Mike Heller
Walnut Creek