Luke Rosiak Investigative Reporter
December 23, 2019 3:52 PM ET
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- Virginia House Del. Ibraheem Samirah introduced a bill that would override local zoning officials to permit multi-family housing in every neighborhood, changing the character of quiet suburbs.
- Oregon passed a similar bill, following moves by cities such as Minneapolis; Austin, Texas; and Seattle.
- Proponents say urban lifestyles are better for the environment and that suburbs are bastions of racial segregation.
Democrats in Virginia may override local zoning to bring high-density housing, including public housing, to every neighborhood statewide — whether residents want it or not.
The measure could quickly transform the suburban lifestyle enjoyed by millions, permitting duplexes to be built on suburban lots in neighborhoods previously consisting of quiet streets and open green spaces. Proponents of “upzoning” say the changes are necessary because suburbs are bastions of segregation and elitism, as well as bad for the environment.
The move, which aims to provide “affordable housing,” might be fiercely opposed by local officials throughout the state, who have deliberately created and preserved neighborhoods with particular character — some dense and walkable, others semi-rural and private — to accommodate people’s various preferences.
But Democrats tout a state-level law’s ability to replace “not in my backyard” with “yes, in your backyard.”
House Delegate Ibraheem Samirah, a Democrat, introduced six housing measures Dec. 19, coinciding with Democrats’ takeover of the state legislature in November.
“Single-family housing zones would become two-zoned,” Samirah told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Areas that would be impacted most would be the suburbs that have not done their part in helping out.”
“The real issues are the areas in between very dense areas which are single-family zoned. Those are the areas that the state is having significant trouble dealing with. They’re living in a bubble,” he said.
He said suburbs were “mostly white and wealthy” and that their local officials — who have historically been in charge of zoning — were ignoring the desires of poor people, who did not have time to lobby them to increase suburban density.
In response to a question about whether people who bought homes in spacious suburbs have valid reasons, not based on discrimination, for preferring to live that way — including a love for nature and desire to preserve woods and streams — he said: “Caring about nature is very important, but the more dense a neighborhood is, the more energy efficient it is.”
He said if local officials seek to change requirements like setbacks to make it impossible to build dense housing in areas zoned to preserve a nature feel, “if they make setbacks to block duplexes, there’d have to be a lawsuit to resolve whether those zoning provisions were necessary.”
He wrote on Facebook, “Because middle housing is what’s most affordable for low-income people and people of color, banning that housing in well-off neighborhoods chalks up to modern-day redlining, locking folks out of areas with better access to schools, jobs, transit, and other services and amenities.”
“I will certainly get pushback for this. Some will call it ‘state overreach.’ Some will express anxiety about neighborhood change. Some may even say that the supply issue doesn’t exist. But the research is clear: zoning is a barrier to more housing and integrated communities,” he continued.
He tweeted Sunday that that would include public housing. “Important Q about new social/public housing programs: where are we going to put the units? Under current zoning, new low-income housing is relegated to underinvested neighborhoods, concentrating poverty more. Ending exclusionary zoning has to be part of broader housing reform,” he said.
Tim Hannigan, chairman of the Fairfax County Republican Committee — in one of the areas Samirah represents — said that urban Democrats were waging war on the suburbs. (RELATED: As School District Implements Busing Over Near-Unanimous Opposition, Immigrants From Communist Countries Fear Socialism Has Followed Them)
“This could completely change the character of suburban residential life, because of the urbanization that would develop,” he told the DCNF. “So much of the American dream is built upon this idea of finding a nice quiet place to raise your family, and that is under assault.”
“This is a power-grab to take away the ability of local communities to establish their own zoning practices … literally trying to change the character of our communities,” he said.
He said suburbs were not equipped to handle the increased traffic, and “inevitably it will just push people to places where they feel they’ll get away from that, they may move to West Virginia to get their little plot of land.”
Minneapolis became the first city to eliminated single family zoning in December 2018, after a push by progressive advocacy groups promoting “equity.” Austin, Texas, and Seattle soon followed suit.
But those cities were amending zoning codes that have always been the domain of local governments. Oregon passed state legislation blocking local governments’ single-family zoning in July, CityLab reported.
It quoted Alex Baca, a Washington, D.C., urbanist with the site Greater Greater Washington, saying that single-family zoning is a tool for wealthy whites to maintain segregated neighborhoods and that the abolition of low-density neighborhoods is necessary for equity.
CityLab acknowledged that “residents might reasonably desire to keep the neighborhoods they love the way they are,” but said that implementing the law at the state level makes sure that those concerns can be more easily ignored.
“By preempting the ability of local governments to set their own restrictive zoning policies, the state policy would circumnavigate the complaints of local NIMBY homeowners who want to block denser housing,” it wrote. (RELATED: Dem Prosecutors Fear For Suburbs’ Safety As Radical District Attorneys, Fueled By Soros Cash, Take Control)
While he implied that suburbs are prejudiced, Samirah himself has a history of anti-Semitic comments, including saying sending money to Israel is worse than funding the Klu Klux Klan.
“I am so sorry that my ill-chosen words added to the pain of the Jewish community, and I seek your understanding and compassion as I prove to you our common humanity,” he said in February.
He interrupted a speech in July by President Donald Trump in Jamestown, Virginia, and said, “You can’t send us back! Virginia is our home.”
His father is Jordanian refugee Sabri Samirah, who authorities banned from the U.S. for a decade after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, in part because of his membership in the Muslim Brotherhood, the Chicago Tribune reported in 2014.
This post was updated with comments from Ibraheem Samirah.
“My home us my castle” was s.th. I learned in
school about England, has that any value for the USA ?
Most of these Democrat nuts can’t even control their own lives. But they’re darned sure they should be in control of our lives.
Guaranteed vote loser for the Dems. The inhabitants of these new dwellings don’t exist or if they do, they don’t know that they are beneficiaries. Meanwhile yer average detached yard-owning string development suburbanite will be spooked irrespective of the facts.
Reminds me of China, where every city is ringed with tall concrete apartment blocks into which all the farmers and people from small villages have been herded. It doesn’t look pleasant.
Love the way our progressive comrades are taking off the mask.
They hate the Suburbs,for these are inner city residents who voted with their feet.
Escaping the suffocating corrosive “help” of these politicians.
The mantra of the Demon Rats is clear'”We will manage your lives,regardless of how you feel about it”
“We are superior ”
As I have taken to repeating,our current “Liberals” are power mad incompetents,who could not grow,build or successfully manage any operation.
But they KNOW BEST,for all.
From the article: “Democrats in Virginia may override local zoning to bring high-density housing, including public housing, to every neighborhood statewide — whether residents want it or not.”
If you don’t like it then vote the authoritarian Democrats out of office at the next opportunity.
“If you don’t like it then vote the authoritarian Democrats out of office at the next opportunity.”
1. The places the Democrats want to wreck don’t vote Democrat.
2. The votes of those places are outweighed by the urban vote and electoral fraud.
In many places, ‘voting the bastards out’ is no longer possible.
A year of ineffective climate madness looms (my latest)
By David Wojick
https://www.cfact.org/2019/12/26/a-year-of-ineffective-climate-madness-looms/
The year 2019 saw the rapid rise of climate hysteria, but as the saying goes: “You ain’t seen nothin yet.” Now that the hysteria is firmly established and well organized, it is sure to get bigger and louder. But I see very little coming from it except the noise, as long as skeptics keep up the good fight.
This is especially true in the U.S. Presidential race, which is climate policy-wise by far the biggest thing going on in the world. Many of the Democrat candidates are going to try to ride the hysterical wave to victory. Their winning is not likely.
My take is the further left you go the fewer votes you get, and these folks are going far left on climate. In my view the only viable candidate in the pack is Biden and he may not be crazy enough to get the nod. Nor can he beat Trump, so things are looking good on that front.
Another big unknown is what the hysterical demonstrators are going to do. Bigger marches? More disruption? (The police now have glue remover.) Or maybe something we have not seen before, hopefully not more violent. I am sure the advocacy insider email traffic is buzzing over this. (Maybe some new wacky signs. “I don’t want to die!” seems to be catching on.)
For that matter, will the hysterics endorse specific candidates for the Democrat nomination? Or perhaps get active in specific Congressional races? They might even form their own party (but Greta Thunberg cannot run, more’s the pity). Political action seems like the logical next step for the extremists, which could further destabilize the green movement, given that most of the political action groups are moderates.
There are lots of other climate crunch points in progress as well. In a recent meeting the EU failed to come up with a more ambitious emission reduction goal for 2030, despite its hysterical leadership calling for one.
The next meeting on this proposal will be in June. No doubt we will see lots of “Action Now!” marches and demonstrations then, but ambition may well be lacking at the EU national member level, which is all that counts. Several countries are already missing their 2020 target and there are anti-action demonstrations too boot, from yellow vests to farmers and coal miners. The political leaders are running a bit scared of this stuff.
The UN will have several semi-summits, leading up to the grand COP 26 in Glasgow, beginning in November. Given what happened in Madrid’s COP 25 we are likely to witness the progressive collapse of the entire UN climate action process.
The UN’s Paris Accord process is entirely too slow and compromising for the Action Now! hysterics to tolerate. This will be especially certain if the Action Now! hysteria builds during 2020, which is very likely. That the mythical $100 billion a year promised to the developing countries does not show up in Glasgow will compound the collapse.
Then too there is a lot going on at national levels around the world. Especially promising is the rapid rise of new populist parties that oppose the drastic actions demanded by the Action Now! radicals. Left wing hysteria typically generates a conservative reaction. How could it not? Angry mobs are dangerous.
Mind you I expect to see a lot of meaninglessly symbolic green action in response to the hysterical noise-making. This includes toothless declarations of “climate emergency” and pointless promises of zero emissions by far off 2050. Politicians promising the impossible, to be delivered in the far distant future, do no harm. Hence their popularity.
My definition of winning the great climate change debate is that no serious harm is done by the alarmists. While I expect an escalating crescendo of hysterical shrieking during the course of 2020, the reason will be that my side is winning and the loud side is losing.
As things stand now, skeptics have a chance to win big in 2020, but we must keep the pressure on. Hold your nose, plug your ears, and hit them hard. You ain’t seen nothin yet.
Please share this strategic analysis.
David
David,
What concerns me is that a misinterpreted tweet becomes a bogus October surprise that sways enough people to flip the election. The gullibility of the public to inflammatory rhetoric is clear based on polling data that shows Trump loosing support from independents after each lie told by the left, only to regain that support when the lie is exposed. There may not be sufficient time to expose lies that drive an October surprise and how the election will unfold depends on a relatively small number of fungible voters.
Most of us know that any politician running on a promise to change the weather through taxation is either a cynically sneering useful idiot, or a TRUE idiot if he actually believes the alarmist hysteria for which there is ZERO real-world evidence.
I think by now most of us realize the Green Emperor has no clothes and is damned ugly without them.
There are alot of useful-idiots out there (from generations of indoctrination) that do indeed believe taxes would change weather.
One rapid-effect action politicians in the EU might take, especially in the Netherlands where the supreme court has mandated a 25% emissions cut in a year, is to highly tax ICE vehicles. But this might lead to yellow-vest type pushback.
I think (hope) they are too late for this.
As I stated in an earlier post, I live in an affluent, multi-cultural, multi-racial neighborhood (in the deep South, no less). Many have worked their way up from poorer neighborhoods; many are refugees, economic and otherwise, from other countries. They have fled from the conditions these politicians want to impose on them, and will fight the hardest to keep it from happening.
Ok, I’m going to ramble on a bit here, so skip if you wish.
RE: zoning is a barrier to more housing and integrated communities. Two issues; One, it is intended to be a barrier to more housing. It is intended to keep the houses in a community dimension so that; the cost of services (water, sewer, electricity, policing, roads, parks) is kept to a smaller manageable level. Two, integrated communities; probably true, but is that a problem?
RE: “saying that single-family zoning is a tool for wealthy whites to maintain segregated neighborhoods and that the abolition of low-density neighborhoods is necessary for equity.”
They’re just making stuff up. Why didn’t they ask the administering zoning authority WHY they imposed zoning?
Necessary for equity? They need to identify what equity is. This is a throw-away nebulous-nothing line which has no meaning. But this is the reason for trashing zoning?
The article thankfully explains some of the reason. “He said suburbs were not equipped to handle the increased traffic.” Yes, and the services as identified above. As density goes up, the need for more services also goes up. Food outlets, drive throughs, services stations ect.
If the jobs remain zoned where they are, traffic will increase going from the suburb to the industry. So buses, bus stops, taxis, and increased traffic. This increases the need to upgrade the roads and intersections. More traffic lights, larger highways and major roads.
Larger parks, and community services; food, medical, play, animals, schools, street lights, and underground services.
The zoning of an area allows control of all these issues and the cost to provide them; the consequence of having them; and how many people they are catering to.
Ignorance truly is bliss!
Yes, all true. What will actually happen is that the people who invested their life’s savings into a home intended as a long-term investment will have the value of that investment indirectly confiscated. First by the direct lowering of the market value of a home in a now less-attractive neighborhood with likely lower performing schools and worse services to attract potential buyers. Then because the original residents actually contribute to society and have jobs, they will be the only ones who are left to pay the bill for doubling the size of schools and all the other costs associated with a higher population. So taxes will go up on their property that is now worth less, maybe less than they owe on the mortgage. But of course “My bill does not mandate anyone do anything with their housing”. We welcome them staying around to get fleeced. The parasite needs its host.
I have been wondering where the line should be drawn between the new Northern Virginia and the new Southern Virginia. Now I wonder where to draw the line between Southern Virginia and Eastern California. The new idiots (my mother would not let me use that word) in control are hopefully going to get a rude awakening from the vast majority of true Virginians.
Weirdly, I haven’t seen any defense of private property rights. As in, I own it, I’ll build any damn thing I want. Instead, a lot of “conservatives” defending their “right” to tell other people what to do with their property. Zoning is about as far-left Socialist as it gets. The irony of lefties attacking something so… lefty is hilarious. Add to that the howls of protest from the so-called right, and it gets hard to breathe. Starting to wonder if this is an Onion article.
You’re thinking libertarian, but more likely anarchist (i.e. far-right). There is no Constitutional provision to force conflation of urban, suburban, farmland, and landfill zones.
There are far-left anarchists, e.g., Antifa, and far-right anarchists. Labeling them one or the othet is misleading.
Far-left is totalitarian. Far-right is anarchist. And a left-right nexus, where they feed into each other.
Wrong, Dan. Zoning laws protect property owners against externalities that cannot be avoided otherwise. If your neighbors decide to set up a junkyard on one side and dig a trench to dump septic tank contents on the other side of you, why should they not be allowed to do any damn thing they want with their property? Of course we know from the fact that you’re ridiculing private property rights that you don’t believe in private property rights. You likely want the government to make all the decisions for us, right? And give you your piece of my pie.
Ouch! No, I actually believe that respecting private property rights results in far better outcomes than trusting politicians and bureaucrats, i.e. wanting government Planning Commissions and Zoning Authorities to make all the decisions for us. Hmmm, “planning”…., where have I heard that word? It’ll come to me.
Your example bad neighbor would easily be dealt with under common law nuisance tort back in the old days. Somehow, people managed all throughout history, right up until the late 20th century, to get along with their neighbors without depending on government edicts. A few years ago, a friend spent 6 months and several thousand dollars just to get a SUP to build a garage on his acre. That’s America?
Some of the most extreme land-use authorities were (and are) in the Communist paradises. East Germany had planning up the yin-yang, yet you don’t see a lot of people trying to move there now that you can. Contrast that with Houston, where there is essentially no zoning to speak of (at least back when I used to be there fairly frequently). Absolutely gorgeous and no open septic systems that I saw!
George Washington would have been outraged if the government told him they would be building a shelter for junkies next door to him, but his reaction wouldn’t be to call for a zoning commission to fix things. Instead, he’d argue that it’s not the government’s function EVER to decide what is going where. We’ve got so far away from first principles, that now people resort to lefty arguments to try to fight the latest lefty assault on their lives. That sounds like giving up to me.
Ok my mistake Dan. You’re just a libertarian. I sympathize with some of your viewpoint but I still prefer to have reasonable ground rules that allow everyone to know what is reasonable to the community standards. Zoning laws definitely are abused in a lot of places. It should be a given that you can put up a garage or an addition where you know in advance that your plan conforms and will certainly be approved promptly and at minimum cost. But if your neighbor wants to put up a straw bale house that’s an eyesore, you shouldn’t need to waste a lot of your time and money with lawyers fighting it, or just passively watch the value of your home drop.
Obama said, “You didn’t build that.” Yeah, that was popular.
At Lexington they said, “Don’t fire unless fired upon, but if they mean to have a war, let it begin here!”
The USA has no cultural tradition (such as Confucianism) of collective thought, ownership, cooperation with the needs of the collective overriding the property and liberty of the individual.
We DO have one helluva rep. as rugged individualists who’ve watered the Liberty Tree as needed.
If the Dems push this in VA, along with their 2A shenanigans, they may bring on the next watering.
Beware the man who is slow to anger . . . when he finally goes off, it’s often a doozy!
The dems want to end private property rights.
Their world says the collective owns everything and private property
discriminates against the poor. The dems of course decide who has better claims.
Wonder how many refugees it takes to create a housing crisis that can only be fixed through Big Government?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Somalis_in_Minneapolis%E2%80%93Saint_Paul
Nothing new here. This is the normal liberal agenda, adopted from the Communist Manifesto. Liberals want to control education and government. They want to control where and how you live, what you drive, what you eat, etc.
Sure hope we have a civil war I’m my lifetime. America is in desperate need to rid ourselves of these weeds.
Everyday socialist democrats attempt to move us closer to revolution. First they are trying to disarm the people in Virginia. The spark that started the Revolution was a mission who’s primary goal was confiscation of arms stored near Concord. Now they want to dictate where and how they live. What’s next? An equivalent to the Quartering Act of 1765? Another act which was part of the tinder for the revolutionary fire.
The title is incorrect. No talk of outlaw anything.
Makes sense, I mean public housing high rises like Cabrini Green in Chicago did so well for so long in lower crime, and bringing peace and integration!
Because I am a profound sexist I say this.
Liberals have liked to say that the oil companies created the suburbs by deep-sixing wonderful interurban rail after WWII. But I have another idea.
People starting families and raising children like the suburbs because women like leafy green suburbs. Women like to strut their stuff in the city when they are looking for a partner, but once they get married they want to get out of the male gaze, and put a little greenery between themselves and the cold hard world.
E.g., you don’t see nesting Mallard ducks sitting on their eggs. You only get to see them once the eggs are hatched and their ducklings are ready for swimmin’. I wonder why?
So if liberals start banning suburbs they may find they have a problem with educated suburban women.
Just sayin’.
The bigots (i.e. sanctimonious hypocrites) should not receive a pass. Allegations of diversity (e.g. racism) require extraordinary proof. They may… try to infer the future, but to infer character is deplorable. #HateLovesAbortion
They have this ass backwards. Cramming more people into less area creates grid lock and over use of local resources.
Bloomberg, Soros and Steyer heavily funded democrats and just recently taken majority position in Virginia.
Their collective first attempts this upcoming year is a full assault against the USA Constitution, Bill of Rights and the rest of the Amendments.
Sadly, they’ve failed to read Virginia’s own Constitution and Bill of Rights. That these democrats will pass laws against the America’s Constitution is not a surprise. That they pass laws against Virginia’s Constitution is surprising, as the State Supreme Court is likely to dismiss.
e.g.: From Virginia’s Bill of Rights.
Virginia considers government, NGOs, groups, etc. that come between a person and their property had better be prepared to pay very well for the action or be denied. The state incurring millions of dollars in charges for devaluing property will not go over very well with the voters.
Due process is also very well guarded.
Democrats are showing their Authoritarianism right out in public more often these days.
There is something new going on…they never used to voice their CRAZY desires. Why start telling the truth all the sudden?
And it doesn’t seem as though any of it would be that popular:
• They want Open borders AND free Health Care for those illegals (4 -6 million more people competing for your jobs while you help pay the “up to” $200 Billion healthcare costs annually compounded @ur momisugly 100% rate annually (from the 4-6 million new every year) = $10 Trillion over 5 years.
• There’s more than 2 sexes…AND the actual 2 sexes are not real…only social constructs. Biology is wrong about the 2 sexes. Trans athletes are allowed to dominate women’s athletics…and share their facilities. A guy can choose to enter the rest room that your daughter or granddaughter is using.
• Wipe out Fracking killing millions of jobs and driving up energy costs and creating shortages. Close down Nuclear plants while ramping up costly renewable energy. Adding several $Hundreds to every family’s monthly energy bills (heating, gasoline, electric).
• Pay off ALL school loans.
• Confiscating guns (Virginia)
• Abortion @ur momisugly 9 months and even after birth (Virginia Gov.)
• Advocating censorship…for hate speech, and THEY tell you what is and isn’t hate speech.
• Eliminate internal combustion engines by 2030…when over 300 million of those vehicles will have a decade of service left in them. Agriculture done with batteries is NUTZ and could never happen in 10 years…tractors often last 30 years and up to 50.
• Tax wealth…and all the wealth flees to China.
• Zero CO2 Emissions by 2050 While China triples their levels…and India doubles. Costing us $5 Trillion annually.
What’s going on? This stuff could only win elections in a few whacko Counties around the country. Why are they saying these crazy things out loud…in public all the sudden?
“Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsiblity to bring that about?” – Maurice Strong, founder of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
“Current lifestyles and consumption patterns of the affluent middle class – involving high meat intake, use of fossil fuels, appliances, air-conditioning, and suburban housing – are not sustainable.” – Maurice Strong, Rio Earth Summit
Thanks Maurice
It should be upto a local community what type of housing they choose to allow in their community. Its that simple. Idealogues in central government telling folks who they must have as neighbours is wrong. That way lies tyranny.
Race baiting to promote totalitarianism, and destroy our way of life.
Progressives are the enemy of anything good in life.
In San Francisco single-family neighborhoods are mainly non-White. The City is around 40% White non-Hispanic. On average single-family neighborhoods are around 20% White.