Reply to MOCO - County Wide Upzoning, Everywhere

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Arlington resident here. There's so much pure, uncut NIMBYism on display in this thread that it's actually kind of refreshing. NIMBYs in Arlington eventually got wise and stopped saying toxic things like 'People who can't afford a million dollar house don't deserve to live in my neighborhood.' Instead they went on the attack and threw everything but the kitchen sink at the missing middle plan.

That shift is happening in this thread in real time. Posts have gone from "I don't want to live near lower-income people" to bad faith arguments like "It won't be affordable" (they like homes in their neighborhood being expensive) and "SFH prices will go up" (they like their own SFHs being expensive too). Plus heaps of insults too.

[b]To all the MoCo YIMBYs in this thread -- brawling with NIMBYs can help you think through the issues, [/b]but but as the public debate goes on, it's less useful for understanding what they really want. Those first reactions will tell you a lot of what you'd want to know. Keep that in mind as you start to hear calls for additional study and delay.[/quote]

I mean, yes, that's why I'm still in this thread - to find out specifically what some of the opposers are saying, beyond: [b]change bad, multi-unit housing bad, density bad, renters bad, developers bad, Planning Department bad, county council bad, voters bad.[/b]

But also yes, anonymous on-line typing isn't effective advocacy, even for NIMBYs. Of course, [b]standing up in person at meetings to compare renters to pernicious infectious diseases[/b] also isn't effective advocacy. I was at a Planning Board hearing once where several neighbors stood up and asked for the townhouses in the development to be moved back behind the dumpsters, to protect the SFHs.[/quote]

Given the many, many posts in this thread that explain opposing or cautionary viewpoints without such boorishness (and without then being addressed with fulsome/non-rhetorical debate, in most cases), yours is the kind of misrepresentation that pegs you as [i]anything but[/i] someone who's just here to find out what others think. [/quote]

+1. I’m still waiting for any of the advocates to explain why compact growth has failed to bring houses down, why housing production is so low, and why the county’s fiscal situation is worse. YIMBYism has been promising to fix all of these things. [/quote]

Are you the poster who thinks county housing policy should favor building more SFHs? Where do you think those SFHs should be built?[/quote]

The County's fiscal situation will not get better with upzoning.  Reducing the quantity of SFHs is not the answer.  Families in SFHs are a net-tax benefit to MC. [b] 3 families living in triplex are likely to be a net-tax loss to MC.[/b]  They will cost MC more in services than in income and property taxes being paid by them.    [/quote]

Why do you say that?[/quote]

Very simple.  Income taxes are largely paid by top income families.  In 2021, at the Federal level, top 1% paid 45% of all Federal income taxes, top 10% paid 75%, top 50% paid 97%, and bottom 50% paid 3%.  Maryland may be different but only by degree.  MC may be different but only by degree.  In essence, income tax revenues, whether Federal, state, or county, are heavily reliant on upper income taxpayers.  CA and NY are well aware of this fact.  Being generous, we can estimate that 30-40% of MC residents pay almost no income taxes, whether Federal, state, or county.  MC no doubt would receive property tax revenues from residents in triplexes but those property tax revenues will not likely cover the MC services, including schools. That one family in a SFH is far more likely to be a net tax benefit to MC than those 3 families in a triplex.  Simple economic fact.  Of course, those 3 families need housing and whatever services they might need.  But reducing the quantity of SFHs is not the answer, especially given the vast quantities of underutilized commercial land in MC.  MC arguably needs more rich families not fewer as social services are in reality paid by those families. No argument or criticism there but it is a fact that CA and NY recognize. [/quote]

First: We aren't trading 1:1.  If you put a triplex where a SFH was you get *roughly* the same in property tax and each property only needs to generate 1/3 of what the SFH generated in income tax

Second:  You seem to be assuming that we are swapping largely mansions for hovels, and that SFH equates to wealthy and multifamily equates to poor.  That isn't even currently true.  And it is more likely that the SFHs that convert into triplexes at least in the first wave are NOT the mansions in Potomac.  It will be the older smaller homes on larger lots, with owners who are not in the top 1% to begin with.[/quote]

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