Why does Baltimore need a Yes in My Backyard movement?

The Yes In My Backyard movement arose in cities like San Francisco, New York, and Washington D.C., where decades-long failures to allow housing construction to keep up with demand has created urban enclaves that are unaffordable for millions of Americans who might otherwise choose to live there. And rising rents doesn't just price out prospective residents--in neighborhood after neighborhood, families and communities are pushed out due to housing costs they can no longer meet.

The YIMBY Action Core Four

The YIMBY movement is a nationwide movement to promote equitable and inclusive housing policies.

Our support for more housing is impossible to separate from our desire to alleviate poverty, grow the economy, end homelessness, eliminate racial segregation, and stop climate change. The damage caused by our current housing underinvestment spreads inexorably into every aspect of our lives; it is an almost universal problem in American communities. Ending housing underinvestment is necessary to address the racial wealth gap, stop climate change, and many other problems society faces.

When we fail to construct enough houses, working class families lose the ability to own a home, while renters are similarly cost-burdened. This constant upward pressure on prices means that lower-income individuals and families find it ever more difficult to juggle their financial obligations. This exacerbates the homelessness crisis, as more people are priced out of their homes.

Housing disinvestment in Baltimore is rooted in a long history of racist practices (books we especially recommend include Not in My Neighborhood and The Black Butterfly). Systemic racism, both the legacy of explicitly racist policies and an ongoing system of implicitly racist ones, hurts people of color and makes our communities more segregated. Federal, state, and local governments have used housing policy to exclude people of color. People of color are also especially vulnerable to the soaring costs caused by the housing shortage. Deliberate policies have denied people of color and especially Black families access to wealth and opportunity. These policies continue to this day in the form of modern exclusionary housing policies.

Recognizing this shameful history is critical; the policies we advocate for must intentionally address historical wrongs as we create a housing abundant future. We endeavor to enact thoughtful policies that build more housing while simultaneously protecting existing vulnerable populations.

The housing crisis is a result of harmful laws passed at all levels of government across many decades. YIMBY Action advocates for many policy changes which we bucket into “The Core Four.” These are the inclusive housing policies that will help shrink the racial wealth gap, reduce displacement, reduce carbon emissions, and give more people access to jobs and high quality schools.

Legalize Housing

Upzone to allow more housing in every neighborhood

American neighborhoods are defined by exclusion. Our system of exclusionary zoning bans duplexes, apartments, subsidized affordable housing, student housing and more in most “residential” areas. Excluding these types of residencies keeps neighborhoods homogenous and makes housing more expensive. YIMBYs advocate for the end of this ban on apartments and other kinds of housing; we want to end exclusionary zoning.

Upzoning is especially important in wealthy, high-opportunity neighborhoods where current zoning laws perpetuate racial and class segregation.

Streamline Permitting

Make housing permits fast and fair

Even where housing is technically allowed, complex and arbitrary permitting can stall, scale back, or prevent its development in practice. Complex permitting creates an arbitrary system where opportunities for corruption flourish while the length of development drags on for years. This drives up the cost of new housing, further stressing an already overburdened and too expensive system. This byzantine permitting process is often wielded by wealthy homeowners looking to block new developments in their neighborhoods.

Improving permitting is especially important in exclusionary neighborhoods where more privileged residents have better ability to exert political influence and file frivolous lawsuits.

Fund Affordable Housing

Increase funding for low-income housing

It is unlikely that the private market will ever provide sufficient housing for the lowest income populations. YIMBYs believe that a critical part of achieving housing justice is to increase public funding for income-qualified housing at the federal, state and local levels.

There are many kinds of subsidized affordable, social, and public housing, and many ways to fund this critical housing. While the financing can get complicated, the need for more subsidized affordable housing is obvious.

Fix Broken Incentives

Reform laws that incentivize communities to say no to new homes

Poorly designed tax structures have a multitude of negative effects. From the way we tax land to the distribution of revenue between federal, state, and local governments, cities face powerful incentives to add jobs while limiting housing. Cities and towns are often able to grow their tax base while limiting costly services that would otherwise drain their municipal coffers. As local governments struggle with insufficient budgets, they often intentionally add excessive requirements for housing developers to fund local needs. This further discourages home building and can make middle income housing infeasible.

States need to offer more help to our municipalities and re-align these broken incentives so that it makes financial sense to build.

h/t YIMBY Action