SB TO 'STREAMLINE' HOUSING DEVELOPMENT? ONLY IF IT FUNDS GREEN SHENANIGANS!

It seems the progressive politicos on the Santa Barbara City Council have discovered that their endless bureaucratic hurdles and 'environmental review' theater have made building a simple shed nearly impossible, let alone actual homes. Noozhawk, ever the diligent stenographer, reports that the city is now 'considering programs' to 'incentivize and streamline' housing development. Cue the collective eye-roll from anyone who's ever tried to build anything within city limits.

Let's be clear: 'streamlining' in Santa Barbara usually means finding new ways to impose fees for 'consultants' to study 'equitable community impact' or mandating solar panels on doghouses. This isn't about letting the free market build; it's about making sure developers jump through even more progressive hoops, likely involving affordable housing mandates so onerous they'll require federal subsidies — or, better yet, a new local bond measure that we taxpayers get to foot. It's a classic progressive bait-and-switch: pretend to fix a problem they created, then find a way to grow government and extract more money.

The real story, as always, isn't in the promises of 'incentives,' but in the fine print. We predict these 'streamlining' efforts will merely reallocate the cost of progressive pet projects, disguised as housing solutions, onto new construction. The cycle continues: the city's left-leaning officials make housing unaffordable, then propose 'solutions' that only make it more expensive while expanding their own influence. Maybe if they just stopped interfering in the first place, homes might actually get built without needing another dozen committees and a multi-million-dollar 'incentive program' paid for by the very people they claim to help.