Prevent Displacement In SF And Oakland By Increasing Housing Capacity

Model and Strategy

The purpose of the SF Bay Area Renters' Federation is to fix the jobs-housing imbalance that is plaguing the San Francisco Bay Area. In order to achieve this goal, SFBARF works to change the perceived political climate in SF from anti-building to pro-building. SFBARF is about 200 renters affected by the shortage and looking for a way to do something about it. Renters share information about neighborhood meetings, hearings and proposed legislation. They testify in front of the SF planning commission, and go to pre-application meetings in their neighborhoods. They speak out in favor of specific developments, and in favor of density in general. Local meetings are where decisions about specific projects are made. SF didn't come upon a housing shortage suddenly. It is the result of years of obstructionism on the hyper-local level. SFBARF is empowering local renters to speak up on their own behalf, in favor of new building, at the local level.

Impact

Building housing is a classic problem of diffuse benefit, concentrated harm. Currently there are about 500,000 renters in SF and 230,000 renters in Oakland, all of these people are harmed by underbuilding.

SFBARF targets an active membership of 1000s of Bay Area residents seeking an easier building climate. However to be successful, SFBARF only needs 50 active members and 200 casual members. (Current membership is 20 active members and about 130 casual members).

The project seeks to build enough housing units to accommodate the anticipated population growth (measured by the number of units built each year); and to lower, or at least stabilize, rents (measured by the percent change in rents year over year, and the distribution of rents).

San Francisco Bay Renters' Federation