The Economy & Governance program focuses on issue areas affecting all Californians—from housing and land use, to transportation and voter resources. Some of the recent key projects from this program include an analysis of how well California jurisdictions are doing in meeting their housing goals, as well as a look at what type of housing we need to build and where in order to meet our housing needs without compromising our climate goals. While housing has become a pressing priority for the state and, likewise, for Next 10—we also continue to produce more broadly relevant economy and governance tools, including the California Choices website. This nonpartisan online platform provides in-depth election information and resources to help voters make informed decisions in the voting booth. Through civic engagement and in-depth analyses of some of the state’s most pressing problems, we hope Californians will become empowered to affect change in their communities.
Rebuilding for a Resilient Recovery: Planning in California's Wildland Urban Interface
California must comprehensively reshape how we rebuild after wildfires—or risk an unthinkable surge in costs and major setbacks to the state’s housing supply amidst a record housing crisis. That’s the finding of Rebuilding for a Resilient Recovery: Planning in California's Wildland Urban Interface, released today from researchers at the UC Berkeley Center for Community Innovation and non-partisan, non-profit think tank Next 10.
The researchers studied three communities recently affected by fires—Santa Rosa (Tubbs Fire, 2017), Ventura (Thomas Fire, 2017) and Paradise (Camp Fire, 2018)—and found that state and local land use policies, coupled with the state's housing shortage, are ratcheting up the economic and human cost of wildfire by incentivizing rebuilding in the high risk-wildland urban interface (WUI), instead of redirecting development away from fire-prone areas. This is intensifying untenable safety, economic, and climate risks as the state prepares for another harrowing wildfire season in the midst of record drought.