Op-Ed: Facts, Not Emotions, Are What Has Angered Novato

Novato resident Harry Lehmann, a former attorney, was a volunteer member of the City Managers Housing Ad Hoc Working Group that spent about nine months studying and debating state-mandated affordable housing quotas before the Novato City Council made its final recommendations on sites suitable for new housing complexes.

In a front-page Sunday article in the — from the headline “City of Rage” to the photo highlighting an un-representative and foolish citizen through the 60 column inches of story — the theme was that Novato residents were emotional reactionaries. No text was given to the facts upon which the vast super-majority of Novato citizens have based their opposition to high-density subsidized housing.

Those facts include that the high-density project style of subsidized facilities pay no property taxes, severely impact already over-burdened schools and already over-burdened public safety resources, and have a demographic history of bringing crime to Novato and other communities, which we don’t want.  

Also not covered was the extent to which these facilities serve as unusually efficient profit centers for specialty developers and incredibly helpful tax avoidance mechanisms for the super-rich.

The article did not cover the efforts of many citizens, including those affiliated with Citizens For Balanced Housing, to find a middle road in which new neighbors were welcomed but higher densities were rejected — our concerns not being about people, but about densities, as it is high density that inhibits integration.

Not mentioned was the extent to which Novato’s plight was foisted upon our community by the cynical posturing of communities in southern Marin, such as Tiburon’s fulfillment of progressively increasing housing quotas through au pair housing, or, most glaringly, Ross’ action in choosing the Marin Art & Garden Center as the all-inclusive site for its so-called “affordable housing element,” with the full knowledge that the site would never see a stick of such housing built.

Never covered were more complex issues recognized through study by many Novato citizens, including that when distance traveled is taken into account, the communities in southern Marin are, in terms of staffing importation, making the greater carbon contribution and should make commensurate contributions to housing.

Scantily covered was the extent to which Novato as been the companionate leader for Marin County in the area of housing, an honor that is now being used against the very community that has been a leader in this regard.

From the banner to the end the article showed an attitudinal de-select and non-report of facts that would, if fairly reported, show that Novato residents have had fact-based analytical concerns. Factual analysis rather than emotion has been the primary framework that led to rejection of the legally questionable quotas which ABAG et al seek to impose.