CARTOON/VERONICA ELDREDGE
SAN JOSE, CA — Google’s investment in Bay Area housing only benefits Google.
At first glance, the announcement that Google is investing one billion dollars towards housing might sound like a great idea. Wow! This corporation really cares about its displacement of thousands of longtime residents in the Bay. WRONG! When you look closer, you see that nothing is really happening.
Deception #1: The money is not really new investment in housing
$750 million of the Google money is for 15,000 market-rate housing units, to be permitted by rezoning commercial land it already owns. Google would lease out its land, and become a Corporate Landlord, mainly for its own employees. 5,700 of the proposed 15,000 homes were already promised to Mountain View in 2017.
However, 15,000 homes are not enough to house projected new Google employees in San Jose alone, much less the other thousands of new employees Google is planning around the Bay.
What about the $250 million supposed to be used to “incentivize” developers to build 5,000 affordable housing units? Most so-called “affordable housing” is not affordable for many. Allowing tech giants and developers to determine what housing is built, for whom, and where housing is built and when, only intensifies inequality and exclusion.
Deception #2: The money doesn’t help those facing housing insecurity now
Waiting ten years for a minimal number of housing units is not worth the descriptor of bold. Only someone not in housing distress could agree that waiting ten years is something to applaud.
Bold are the most impacted folks who are defending their homes, fighting for rent control, tenant protections, and safe spaces and housing for the unhoused. Bold would be public officials standing up for the public good, curbing real estate interests, and prioritizing new housing models that come from the community itself.
Deception #3: The Billion dollars IS NOT a solution, it is a publicity stunt
Google can’t just throw money at the problem they create and expect it to solve itself. That doesn’t change an unjust system. People who are directly impacted need to be at the forefront of finding solutions. How many unhoused people and renters were in the conversations when Google was coming up with its Billion dollar plan?
A complete shift is required in the way we look at housing, in how we talk about it, how we build it. We all deserve a dignified home. Housing is a human right.
Housing should guarantee stability not profits. We must shift into permanently affordable housing models, like the recently incorporated South Bay Community Land Trust in San Jose.
End housing speculation – buying a home to make a profit should be prohibited.
Community members should lead and determine development, especially in areas undergoing and at risk of displacement.
Enact policies that allow tenants to transition into ownership and stewardship of their homes like a Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act (TOPA).
Freeze rents! The people are the caretakers not only of this land, but of each other. Profiteers deserve no part in the fundamental building block that is home.
