The Green New Deal in Housing - Upgrading Public Housing

[lpetrich]

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "Today is a very big day!
We’re unveiling our FIRST-ever Green New Deal infrastructure bill!*
The GND for Public Housing Act will:
🏙 Decarbonize the entire US public housing stock
*** Improve quality of life for residents
Create 100s of thousands of jobs in the process" / Twitter
noting
Waleed Shahid on Twitter: "“The Green New Deal for Public Housing Act [by @AOC and @BernieSanders], would use seven grant programs to upgrade housing units into carbon-neutral communities with organic grocery stores, on-site child care and community gardens.” https://t.co/3V3Um2Y6TA" / Twitter
noting
Ocasio-Cortez, Sanders to introduce Green New Deal for public housing - The Washington Post - "The $100 billion plan would overhaul 1 million public housing units, making them energy-independent within 10 years."

“I think it’s very exemplary of what we try to do with the Green New Deal, where we have a front-line community that has historically gotten the short end of the stick with environmental justice,” Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said in an interview.

...
That would provide a boost to the economy “showing how the climate crisis is not a jobs versus environment paradigm,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “We need electrical workers. We need construction workers. And it doesn’t have to just be fossil fuel pipelines that create these kinds of jobs. ... We can create millions of jobs in this country by actually rising to the challenge of addressing what this crisis is going to represent."

Data for Progress estimates its cost at $119 B - $172 B and create up to 240,723 jobs per year.

 

[Trausti]

What? No unicorns? Meh.

 

[lpetrich]

A big problem: PAYGO, meaning that every bit of new spending must be offset with a cut elsewhere. Nancy Pelosi supports it.

“PAYGO is not an economically sound policy. I think it’s a political point and it’s a political point that doesn’t even decide elections,” Ocasio-Cortez said.

Repealing the Republican 2017 tax cut would pay for this legislation and other progressive priorities, she said, adding that Democrats did themselves no favors by proposing small, deficit-neutral plans. “I refuse to allow Republicans to set a progressive policy to fail because they decided to run up a credit card to tax to give freebies to their friends,” Ocasio-Cortez said.

The US has 1 million public-housing units, but most of them are some decades old, and many of them have not had much by maintenance or upgrades.

“Public housing is one area of our infrastructure that’s in immediate crisis that is actually threatening people’s lives,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “It’s a perfect place for us to reimagine what a progressive economic agenda can do, particularly with a Green New Deal context.”

Since the Federal Government is responsible for that housing, it's a good place to start for efforts to upgrade buildings. It's something like her proposal for scoring Federal contractors by how worker-friendly they are. Something like the LEED energy/environmental standard, and it only applies to businesses doing business with the Federal Government.

She has a page on her bill at her Congressional site:
Green New Deal for Public Housing | Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

She also has
A Just Society | Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

• The Recognizing Poverty Act - reassess the poverty line
• The Place to Prosper Act - rent control, landlord-tenant dispute arbitration
• The Embrace Act - make Federal-benefit eligibility independent of citizenship and immigration status
• The Mercy In Re-entry Act - make ex-cons eligible for Federal benefits
• The Uplift Workers Act - score Federal contractors on how worker-friendly they are
• Endorsement of the UN Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights

 

[lpetrich]

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "Our team has been working on the Green New Deal for Public Housing for months, engaging residents & experts.
It takes principles of the GND & creates economic stimulus for working people to decarbonize & center frontline communities.
Read about it: https://t.co/kuhG7dwjVV" / Twitter

Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez Unveil $172 Billion ‘Green New Deal For Public Housing’ | HuffPost

The bill, set to be introduced Thursday afternoon, calls for retrofitting the federally owned homes, improving energy efficiency, converting oil-burning furnaces and gas-fired stoves to renewable-energy electric alternatives, and replacing the lead-leaching pipes causing public health crises in cities across the country.

...
The bill is unlikely to become law because it would face fierce opposition from mainstream Democrats and virtually all Republicans, whose party’s ideological project of the past half-century has focused on dismantling the public sector the New Deal expanded rapidly after the Great Depression. Just one other lawmaker, Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), co-sponsored the Senate version of the bill.

 

[Derec]

Decarbonize the entire US public housing stock

What exactly do they mean by "decarbonize"?

Waleed Shahid on Twitter: "“The Green New Deal for Public Housing Act [by @AOC and @BernieSanders], would use seven grant programs to upgrade housing units into carbon-neutral communities with organic grocery stores, on-site child care and community gardens.” https://t.co/3V3Um2Y6TA" / Twitter

Is there much demand among denizens of public housing for "organic" produce when that is significantly more expensive than the regular ("inorganic"?) produce?
This seems like a pipe dream of epic proportions.

Ocasio-Cortez, Sanders to introduce Green New Deal for public housing - The Washington Post - "The $100 billion plan would overhaul 1 million public housing units, making them energy-independent within 10 years."

Let's see. $100G for 1M housing units, that's $100k per unit. That's really expensive for public housing. And energy independent? So put enough solar panels on the roof to cover all energy needs of the dwellings including heating and cooling? Note that solar is not a good option everywhere as insolation varies widely by geography. Besides, if you have mid- or high rise buildings, you will likely not have enough roof area.

That would provide a boost to the economy “showing how the climate crisis is not a jobs versus environment paradigm,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “We need electrical workers. We need construction workers.

If you want to rebuild a million housing units with federal money of course you will need workers for that. But is that a very efficient use of federal funds?

And it doesn’t have to just be fossil fuel pipelines that create these kinds of jobs.

No, it doesn't have to JUST be fossil fuel pipelines, but since we will need fossil fuels for several more decades, we do need fossil fuel pipelines AS WELL. The problem with GND fantasies is that they want to stop any fossil fuel projects outright.
Another difference is that the pipelines are built with private money for profit and generate tax revenues while public housing is built with public taxpayer money.

Data for Progress estimates its cost at $119 B - $172 B and create up to 240,723 jobs per year.

So that's "merely" ~$500k-$700k per job. No wonder even most Dems oppose the bill.

 

[Derec]

The US has 1 million public-housing units, but most of them are some decades old,

"Some decades" is not really that old for housing. Most housing in US is "some decades" old, not just public housing. My condo building was built in the early 90s. My parents' house in the 70s. Neither are public housing or in need of getting replaced. Plenty of houses/apartment buildings in the US are decades older than these, built in first half of 20th century or even in the 19th century.

 

[Derec]

What? No unicorns? Meh.

Of course there is unicorns. How else do you think these units will be "energy independent"? It's "a unicorn in every utility room and a tofurkey in every pot" (because we mustn't upset the vegans).

 

[lpetrich]

What exactly do they mean by "decarbonize"?

Reduce carbon-containing emissions.

Groundwork Collaborative on Twitter: "THREAD Today, we released a paper with Christopher Wimer & Sophie Collyer at @CpspPoverty, and Xavier Jaravel at @LSEnews.
Key takeaway: 3 million more ppl would have been considered in #poverty in 2018 if we account for inflation inequality. 1/ https://t.co/ecpna3jZwT" / Twitter
then
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "This is why I introduced the Eradicating Poverty Act as part of my Just Society package. We haven't changed the way we calculate poverty since the 60s, and millions are being left behind as a result." / Twitter

 

[Derec]

Reduce carbon-containing emissions.

So just reduce, not eliminate entirely (carbon neutrality)?

Groundwork Collaborative on Twitter: "??????THREAD?????? Today, we released a paper with Christopher Wimer & Sophie Collyer at @CpspPoverty, and Xavier Jaravel at @LSEnews.
Key takeaway: 3 million more ppl would have been considered in #poverty in 2018 if we account for inflation inequality. 1/ https://t.co/ecpna3jZwT" / Twitter
then
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "This is why I introduced the Eradicating Poverty Act as part of my Just Society package. We haven't changed the way we calculate poverty since the 60s, and millions are being left behind as a result." / Twitter

These seem to be about a different topic - poverty and "inflation inequality". This is a big problem with the GND. Too many disparate issues are crammed into what is supposedly a climate plan.

 

[lpetrich]

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "I am honored to introduce the Green New Deal for Public Housing Act with @SenSanders today. It is time for our government to invest in our infrastructure, our people, and our future.
You can read more about the legislation here: https://t.co/2FNarOa8Uu" / Twitter
(a link to the Washington Post article)

Data for Progress on Twitter: "Our new research with @Sc2_Collab and @McHargCenter shows that the @AOC + @BernieSanders Green New Deal for Public Housing Act would:
- create 240,000 jobs per year across the United States
- slash carbon emissions by 5.6 million tons per year. https://t.co/eoETn2txAi" / Twitter
May not be much, but its main value may be to indicate what could be done to improve bulldings. Like go electric all the way, since electricity is the easiest way to deliver energy from most renewable-energy technologies.


Then this Twitter conversation.

Bernie Sanders on Twitter: "Let us be clear: A Green New Deal for Public Housing is not a radical idea. Here’s why:
40% of all U.S. energy consumption comes from buildings. Our government owns 1 million homes. If we are to defeat climate change, we must transform this housing to produce zero emissions." / Twitter

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "A Green New Deal for public housing means hundreds of thousands of jobs. **🛠
Our bill shows that the climate crisis is not about jobs vs. the environment. We need electrical workers. We need construction workers. Retrofitting this housing creates the green jobs of the future." / Twitter

Bernie Sanders on Twitter: "How many jobs are we talking about?
Nearly 250,000 good-paying, family-sustaining, union jobs per year across the country if this goes through.
At the same time, we reduce carbon pollution on the scale of taking 1.2 million cars off the road over 10 years." / Twitter

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "The issue of housing is the perfect place for us to reimagine what a progressive economic agenda can do, particularly with a Green New Deal context. It means taking on the climate crisis, the lack of well-paying jobs, and housing conditions all at once. " / Twitter

Bernie Sanders on Twitter: "You’re right, @RepAOC. We will ensure a dignified life, with parks, gardens, and community centers, for our public housing residents. We invest $172 billion in retrofits that improve health, safety and comfort—while eliminating all carbon emissions in our public housing." / Twitter

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "When we transform our public housing, we create an economy of scale for weatherization, retrofitting, and renewable businesses. That economic impact ripples across the industry, making energy efficiency, solar, and wind even more affordable and attractive for everyone else. 🏗" / Twitter

Bernie Sanders on Twitter: "Let us not forget: Climate change is the existential crisis of our time. This is the moment for bold action to empower the frontline communities who are most affected as we transform our energy system. This is how we prevent irreparable harm to our planet." / Twitter

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "I agree. This is not the time for half-measures. Half-measures threaten the fate of our planet and the future of our kids and grandchildren. The Green New Deal for Public Housing Act is not radical. Radical is keeping us on track to climate catastrophe. Let's pass this bill!" / Twitter

Sen. Sanders and Rep. Ocasio-Cortez Unveil Green New Deal for Public Housing Act / Twitter

Bernie Sanders on Twitter: "Sen. Sanders, Rep. Ocasio-Cortez, and climate and housing activists lay out how we will transform public housing to create hundreds of thousands of green jobs. https://t.co/YqqEF5e0lA" / Twitter

 

[Derec]

May not be much, but its main value may be to indicate what could be done to improve bulldings. Like go electric all the way, since electricity is the easiest way to deliver energy from most renewable-energy technologies.

The "may not be much" may be crucial, because the goal should be to have an efficient use of limited resources. GND as AOC et al are approaching seems to me like throwing money at the problem more or less haphazardly. As far as going all electric, in warm climates electric heat pumps for heating are a good idea as efficiency can be >100%. In colder climates you can have issues with freezing on the external evaporator which may be alleviated by burrying it deep enough to take advantage of warmer temperatures in the ground. Focus should be on new construction though, before we tackle retrofits.

 

[lpetrich]

Sen. Sanders and Rep. Ocasio-Cortez Unveil Green New Deal for Public Housing Act / Twitter - I watched it, and BS claimed that the the upgrades would pay for themselves with 30% less maintenance expense and 70% less energy expense. It will require something like $180 billion over 10 years - $18 billion/year. Some 2 million Americans live in public housing, meaning spending $100,000 on each one. Doing the work will involve 250,000 jobs, and public-housing inhabitants are to be given preference.

BS spoke first, then handed it over to AOC. She spoke a bit, saying that a big problem with the 2008 financial crisis was bailing out big banks but not ordinary people, and saying that an important voice in this issue is public-housing residents. She then turned over the mike to a public-housing resident activist, Lakeesha(?) Taylor. She spoke about some of her efforts, then turned the mike over to Diane Yentel, head of the National Low-Income Housing Coalition, another activist. She spoke about how a lot of NYCHA residents lack building heat, how they have to use room heaters and ovens with doors open.

Then Marcella Mulholland, Sunrise Movement activist. She participated in that sit-in in Nancy Pelosi's office late last year, that sit-in that AOC visited. She spoke of the success of the Green New Deal resolution. Then Kerri Fulton, a Climate Policy Alliance activist. She noted that a lot of public housing is near very polluted sites. She mentioned turning public housing into "community-owned cooperatives". "Clean this place, don't displace!" Then Elsora Cleveland, New York Communities for Change activist. Then Maurice Cook, exec dir of Serve Your City, DC, another activist. When some public-housing development is under attack, the people there chanted "We will fight back" (?), including AOC, though not BS. He was rather passive when he was not speaking. He read off such demands as no demolition of public housing and hiring tenants for renovations, and a "right to return" of any displaced residents.

Toward the end, AOC accepted some questions. One was apparently about what to do about Republicans. She responded that "we can hold the White House accountable and also build our future at the same time." It is not "either-or", and she intends to continue "fighting for our community". A snippet from the end: Bernie Sanders on Twitter: "Trump should be impeached and he will be impeached. But that does not mean we neglect the other crises facing this country, whether it is the housing crisis or climate change. We are mature enough as a nation to walk and chew bubble gum at the same time. https://t.co/dQjSDxdkmy" / Twitter AOC continued with calling Trump "a climate crisis unto himself" and saying that he has put foxes in the henhouse of Federal agencies.

.@kristoncapps on Twitter: "Easy-to-overlook provision in @AOC and @SenSanders's GND for public housing: It would repeal the Faircloth Amendment, which caps the number of public housing units at the level that existed in 1999.
That's right. Building new public housing is illegal. https://t.co/1wd0gXeUz1" / Twitter
Some of the activists at that gathering had mentioned repealing that amendment as something to do.

 

[Derec]

Sen. Sanders and Rep. Ocasio-Cortez Unveil Green New Deal for Public Housing Act / Twitter - I watched it, and BS claimed that the the upgrades would pay for themselves with 30% less maintenance expense and 70% less energy expense.

I very much doubt lower energy costs and supposedly lower maintenance costs would be paid back in a reasonable time frame. Let's do the math (although, math is now apparently oppressive, at least in Seattle). There are ~1 million public housing units, at $180G that's $180k per unit in GND retrofitting costs. If an average public housing apartment uses $2000 in energy and costs $2000 in maintenance (quite generous), the savings would pay off the investment in 90 years even if we accept these numbers. "Pay for itself", my ass!

Doing the work will involve 250,000 jobs, and public-housing inhabitants are to be given preference.

Every time you spend that kind of cash, you need a lot of workers. But do you think people in public housing are qualified to do electric work and the like? Electricians get paid well; they don't live in public housing.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

So, create more crime-ridden projects that are all but no-go areas for the police?

 

[lpetrich]

So, create more crime-ridden projects that are all but no-go areas for the police?

I agree that that's a potential problem with public housing: that it becomes something for people who can't afford anything else.

Successful welfare statism is welfare statism with a broad constituency, like one that extends into the upper middle class. The sort of constituency that shouts "Keep your government hands off my Medicare!"

As to funding GND public-housing upgrades, I think that these upgrades might get viewed as pork barrel for big cities. So it many be necessary to make deals of "I'll vote for your pork if you vote for mine".


Bernie Sanders on Twitter: "The Green New Deal for Public Housing is a win-win-win: we will invest in our public housing, address the climate emergency, and create more than 240,000 good-paying jobs. https://t.co/uOcRWF1GBA" / Twitter
Mostly BS and AOC speaking.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

So, create more crime-ridden projects that are all but no-go areas for the police?

I agree that that's a potential problem with public housing: that it becomes something for people who can't afford anything else.

Which doesn't address the problem. We tried public housing projects, we saw how badly it went. You're trying to resurrect a horribly failed idea.

 

[lpetrich]

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "Spent today organizing and hosting a teach-in with our public housing residents at Pelham Parkway Houses.
As we wrapped up the event, I went to admire the art by children in the community hung up on the walls. This one stayed with me: https://t.co/gKGjvoYzZY" / Twitter
Roses are red
Violets are blue
I love the homeless
I hope you do too

David Freedlander on Twitter: "From yesterday, @aoc had a Green New Deal for public housing townhall in the Bronx. “I don’t want to hear the term free stuff ever again...I am already hearing from some of these neoliberal folks who are trying to flip the script on us.” https://t.co/ugxsCTa6r3" / Twitter
with some video of her in action there.

Senator Luis Sepúlveda on Twitter: "Thank you to @AOC for hosting an important & educational teach-in w/ residents from Pelham Parkway Houses about the Green New Deal For Public Housing Act, which will improve the quality of life for millions of Americans, and address the current climate and public housing crisis. https://t.co/7mXgpDn5Zc" / Twitter
A NY State Senator.

 

[lpetrich]

NowThis on Twitter: "‘We have to reclaim our public systems.’ — Rep. @AOC explained how her Green New Deal for Public Housing Act will fix public housing, create jobs, and reduce CO2 https://t.co/2e3XX1dJym" / Twitter
AOC said in it that it does not have to be environment vs. economy, that doing environment-friendly things can create a lot of jobs. The video also showed her posing with some children, and in a march near the property:
What do we do?
Stand up and fight!
She also noted that some 2400 Bronx public-housing residents may be going without heat with the temperature at 22 F at night. Something like $90 billion to repair the existing public-housing stock. Lack of heat, mold, broken intercoms, door locks that won't stay locked, water damage, rats and mice, unpredictable elevators, disgusting staircases, overcrowding, ...

Fixing and upgrading the housing should produce 250K jobs/year.

AOC: free stuff? 30% of income to live in public housing. Teachers, seniors, nurses, single mothers, full families. Nobody in the richest country in the world ought to be sleeping without heating, breathing in mold. Not free stuff but public goods.

 

[lpetrich]

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter: "What does a Green New Deal mean for housing?
How do we center jobs AND justice with ambitious industrial policy to save our planet?
Watch and see.
(Narrated by @TedDanson, produced by @TheLeap_Org) https://t.co/abYKumqA1f" / Twitter

Proposing housing that is well-insulated, comfortable all year round, with zero carbon emissions, and affordable. Building lots of public housing and retrofitting existing housing. Dense residential neighborhoods that have libraries, "care centers", healthy food with a picture of a community garden, and lots of green space and public transit.

Last spring, AOC released this more general video: A Message From the Future With Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez - YouTube

Housing and the Green New Deal

The legacies of colonialism, segregation, redlining and predatory lending have all contributed to abhorrent housing conditions for Black and Indigenous communities.

Home ownership is becoming more and more of a distant dream for working people. Public housing is deteriorating. For far too many, homelessness can be one missed paycheck away. And that’s just part of the story: our planetary home is in trouble too.

A Green New Deal for Housing can keep us safe, and slash inequality and climate pollution at the same time.

 

[lpetrich]

Ross Barkan on Twitter: "The Senate should repeal the Faircloth Amendment, following the lead of @AOC and others. For @nytopinion, I explained why this matters so much. https://t.co/OgsY2QhPqG" / Twitter
noting
Opinion | Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Knows How to Fix Housing - The New York Times - "The first step to addressing the country’s housing affordability problem is to repeal the Faircloth Amendment."

More recently, repeal of Faircloth has been a staple of progressive proposals, including the Green New Deal and the Homes for All Act, Representative Ilhan Omar’s far-reaching housing bill. Last summer, House Democrats passed a repeal, buoyed by the efforts of Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other members of the party’s left flank.

...
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez was able to engineer the repeal by attaching it as an amendment to a $1.5 trillion infrastructure plan that passed the House in July. If Republicans retain control of the Senate, this is probably the most realistic path to repeal. Infrastructure spending has drawn bipartisan support and killing Faircloth in an amendment is easier politically, since it won’t force an up-down vote from conservative Republicans. Still, its easy to imagine conservatives turning the expansion of public housing as a culture war issue, casting it as a giveaway to cities.