I am a resident of D4 and a board member of the Sacramento Community Land Trust.
Please enact a Community Benefit Agreement ordinance that requires CBAs for projects which receive public investment of $3 million or greater in total public subsidies. To ensure community direction in the selection of priorities funded by each CBA, the ordinance should require a committee(s) formed of the city manager and/or city CBA staff AND community members from the impacted neighborhoods/zip codes to work together to host community engagement meetings and establish priorities in excess of minimum benefits for CBA investments with community at the negotiation table each time.
This testimony is delivered on behalf of the Greater Sacramento Economic Council in opposition to the proposed Community Benefits Agreement Ordinance. Please see the attached letter detailing the reasons for our opposition.
I am a resident of North Oak Park where perhaps the anticipated consequences of the current CBA are most apparent. I am writing to you today to encourage you to ask the hard questions and consider the impact of the Community Benefits Agreement CBA ordinance in its current form. While I am highly supportive of the intended outcome of the CBA ordinance and the edits that Sacramento Investment Without Displacement have made to protect current and long-established residents and ensure that the benefits of any economic and infrastructure investments are shared and experienced by communities rather than displaced and further harmed by them, the current CBA ordinance language significantly fails to do so.
The CBA ordinance as it stands fails in two significant ways that will only perpetuate the conditions I have outlined above. First, the proposed threshold amount of $10,000,000 is significantly too high. Triggering the benefits at such an amount will omit too many projects that will still be of size and consequence to result in the negative consequences of displacement, increased home and rent prices, loss of cultural identity, and barriers to obtaining livable wage jobs near where one lives. Second, the CBA ordinance, which begins with “Community” and is designed to protect the existing communities, does not require community representatives to be a part of the negotiations process for the terms of the CBA. The historical harms this CBA is designed to rectify are a direct result of omitting any sense of agency or decision-making power to community members and yet, with the opportunity at hand to correct this, those with power are continuing to exacerbate the very outcomes the CBA was intended to avoid.
You must let go of the fear that a CBA ordinance that adequately protects and provides for residents will significantly stifle economic development. Sacramento is a growing and thriving city that will continue to attract businesses and economic interest. To continue enacting economic policies that advance private and quasi-public entities without adequately protecting and sharing the positive outcomes of those investments with residents of historically underinvested communities will forever change the diversity and character of this City which is a cornerstone of what makes it such a desirable place to live.
It is with great immediacy that the consequences of historic underinvestment are apparent. Sidewalk gaps, no city-maintained trees, intersections that lack curb-ramps, vacant lots, and buildings themselves that can’t escape repeated collisions with vehicles such as the Arbors at Oak Park building on Martin Luther King Jr. and Broadway Boulevard. However, this area has seen significant economic and resource investment in the past decade-plus including improvements to the Oak Park Triangle District where small independent businesses now line the street frontage. Pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure has or is planned to be installed creating greater connectivity to surrounding amenities such as jobs at UC Davis Hospital or the Central City. The consequence of these hyperpaced investments however have left many residents unable to afford the rent or purchase a home due to skyrocketing prices, omitted from protections ensuring their participation in the workforce to implement these investments or development trainings to ensure they are positioned to take advantage of the jobs that are arriving due to investment such as those resulting from UC Davis’ Aggie Square expansion or entrepreneurship from localized interest in business development.
In the several years that I’ve been here I have lost track of the number of homes in my immediate surrounding that have gone up for sale, been bought by investors and flipped into rentals that cost as much or more than what the mortgage would be. These are opportunities for the historically BIPOC and lower income resident’s to become first time homebuyers and capitalize on the intergenerational wealth that homeownership can afford. Opportunities for residents that have not only called this community home, but who have thrived here and created a culture and sense of community despite the lack of resources and opportunities afforded to them. These are opportunities for those who would otherwise be able to afford to rent a place to live if not for investors capitalizing on the lack of protections associated with recent economic interest.
I am strongly recommending that you request the CBA ordinance to return to the negotiating stage until a draft can be developed that was created with good faith and adequately protects and supports resident’s as they deserve.
Dear mayor and council members,
I am a resident of D4 and a board member of the Sacramento Community Land Trust.
Please enact a Community Benefit Agreement ordinance that requires CBAs for projects which receive public investment of $3 million or greater in total public subsidies. To ensure community direction in the selection of priorities funded by each CBA, the ordinance should require a committee(s) formed of the city manager and/or city CBA staff AND community members from the impacted neighborhoods/zip codes to work together to host community engagement meetings and establish priorities in excess of minimum benefits for CBA investments with community at the negotiation table each time.
Thank you,
Dillon Miner
Secretary
This testimony is delivered on behalf of the Greater Sacramento Economic Council in opposition to the proposed Community Benefits Agreement Ordinance. Please see the attached letter detailing the reasons for our opposition.
Troels Adrian
Executive Vice President
GSEC
Correspondence received by the City Clerk's Office
I am a resident of North Oak Park where perhaps the anticipated consequences of the current CBA are most apparent. I am writing to you today to encourage you to ask the hard questions and consider the impact of the Community Benefits Agreement CBA ordinance in its current form. While I am highly supportive of the intended outcome of the CBA ordinance and the edits that Sacramento Investment Without Displacement have made to protect current and long-established residents and ensure that the benefits of any economic and infrastructure investments are shared and experienced by communities rather than displaced and further harmed by them, the current CBA ordinance language significantly fails to do so.
The CBA ordinance as it stands fails in two significant ways that will only perpetuate the conditions I have outlined above. First, the proposed threshold amount of $10,000,000 is significantly too high. Triggering the benefits at such an amount will omit too many projects that will still be of size and consequence to result in the negative consequences of displacement, increased home and rent prices, loss of cultural identity, and barriers to obtaining livable wage jobs near where one lives. Second, the CBA ordinance, which begins with “Community” and is designed to protect the existing communities, does not require community representatives to be a part of the negotiations process for the terms of the CBA. The historical harms this CBA is designed to rectify are a direct result of omitting any sense of agency or decision-making power to community members and yet, with the opportunity at hand to correct this, those with power are continuing to exacerbate the very outcomes the CBA was intended to avoid.
You must let go of the fear that a CBA ordinance that adequately protects and provides for residents will significantly stifle economic development. Sacramento is a growing and thriving city that will continue to attract businesses and economic interest. To continue enacting economic policies that advance private and quasi-public entities without adequately protecting and sharing the positive outcomes of those investments with residents of historically underinvested communities will forever change the diversity and character of this City which is a cornerstone of what makes it such a desirable place to live.
It is with great immediacy that the consequences of historic underinvestment are apparent. Sidewalk gaps, no city-maintained trees, intersections that lack curb-ramps, vacant lots, and buildings themselves that can’t escape repeated collisions with vehicles such as the Arbors at Oak Park building on Martin Luther King Jr. and Broadway Boulevard. However, this area has seen significant economic and resource investment in the past decade-plus including improvements to the Oak Park Triangle District where small independent businesses now line the street frontage. Pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure has or is planned to be installed creating greater connectivity to surrounding amenities such as jobs at UC Davis Hospital or the Central City. The consequence of these hyperpaced investments however have left many residents unable to afford the rent or purchase a home due to skyrocketing prices, omitted from protections ensuring their participation in the workforce to implement these investments or development trainings to ensure they are positioned to take advantage of the jobs that are arriving due to investment such as those resulting from UC Davis’ Aggie Square expansion or entrepreneurship from localized interest in business development.
In the several years that I’ve been here I have lost track of the number of homes in my immediate surrounding that have gone up for sale, been bought by investors and flipped into rentals that cost as much or more than what the mortgage would be. These are opportunities for the historically BIPOC and lower income resident’s to become first time homebuyers and capitalize on the intergenerational wealth that homeownership can afford. Opportunities for residents that have not only called this community home, but who have thrived here and created a culture and sense of community despite the lack of resources and opportunities afforded to them. These are opportunities for those who would otherwise be able to afford to rent a place to live if not for investors capitalizing on the lack of protections associated with recent economic interest.
I am strongly recommending that you request the CBA ordinance to return to the negotiating stage until a draft can be developed that was created with good faith and adequately protects and supports resident’s as they deserve.
Thank you,
David Moore
Oak Park Resident