[Editor's note, March 15: Extreme polarization, a factor contributing to our democratic impasse, results in partisans adopting views based on allegiance to their side, rather than on thoughtful consideration of an issue. Klein, in the first four paragraphs of his op-ed, relies on the Blue team falling prey to this phenomenon.]
The opening paragraphs of Ezra Klein’s current op-ed in the New York Times ("The Past and Future Are at Odds in Berkeley") are willfully spurious. In fairness to Klein (if it's 'fair' to excuse him), that beginning is clearly designed as a hook to keep his liberal readers in tow for the actual subject of the piece -- the clash between environmental policies put into place since the 1970s and the urgency of acting to combat climate change today -- which he covers more evenhandedly. (I’ll note that Jonathan Chait highlighted the same issue -- “Will Local Politics Cook the Planet” -- in New York magazine in January.)
I’m on board with Klein (and Chait) regarding climate change, but not regarding the controversy that Klein uses as an intro. Here’s how Klein begins:
There’s a strange story unfolding in Berkeley, Calif., right now. That may present as a tautology, but bear with me. This one provides a window into a problem that endangers us all.
An organization called Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods, led by a former investment banker, sued the University of California, Berkeley for adding too many students, too quickly, without careful enough consideration of how bad students are for the environment.
If the number of students at U.C. Berkeley seems of questionable environmental relevance, well, I’d say you’re right. If this sounds to you like a bunch of homeowners who don’t want more college kids partying nearby, I’d probably agree. But the courts sided with Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods and froze the university’s enrollment at last year’s levels, forcing it to potentially rescind admission to thousands of students and ordering it to conduct a deeper assessment of the harm students could inflict (more trash, more noise, more homelessness and more traffic were all mentioned in the court case, if you’re curious about the specifics).
This kind of NIMBYISM is noxious. The way to ease homelessness in Berkeley is to build more homes for everyone, not keep out a bunch of kids looking to better their lives. And if there’s too much trash, maybe nearby homeowners, who’ve seen their property values rise to astonishing levels in large part because of U.C. Berkeley’s gleam, should pay higher property taxes for more frequent pickup. But on its own, it’s hard to get too exercised about this suit. The world has bigger problems than the size of Cal’s incoming class.
Note first that in his later discussion of climate change, Klein doesn’t reveal the professions of the worthy residents of Cape Cod, Amherst, the Hamptons, or the state of Vermont, all of whom could be reviled as NIMBYs. Instead of an ad hominem argument, he focuses on the structural issues that find local residents (and even environmental organizations) employing environmental laws to oppose meaningful actions to alleviate the threat to our planet.
In the second paragraph (quoted above), though, he makes sure to inform us that the leader of Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods is a former investment banker. (Editor’s note: I’ll cheerfully agree that we have a bloated financial sector, which is a drag on our economy, but the structural framework of the Berkeley story wouldn’t change one whit if a retired professor led the neighborhood group.) And behold Klein’s sarcastic denigration of an environmental report to assess the impact of population growth as “consideration of how bad students are for the environment.”
Despite the disdain he expresses, Klein doesn't come close to justifying his conclusion that “This kind of NIMBYISM is noxious.”
Contra Klein, any fair minded policy wonk would regard the number of residents (students or not) as unquestionably relevant to the environment of a crowded urban community. Berkeley residents of all stripes need not oppose “college kids partying” to be concerned with the state of their city.
I lived in Berkeley from 1972 to 1991. The population when I left was just over 100,000; there were roughly 30,000 students on campus. Demand for affordable housing far outstripped supply. I don’t know the numbers, but there was a highly visible group of unhoused people. The student population obviously had a significant impact on city services, city streets (many of which were sorely in need of repair), traffic, and – notoriously – parking. The city, during my stay in Berkeley, actively negotiated with the university regarding enrollment to alleviate the impact of university students, faculty, and staff.
Today the city has 124,000 residents and the student population is 45,000. While I no longer live in Berkeley, I’m confident that there is still a dire housing shortage in the community and that many people still live outside and in their cars. I’m betting that many of the streets are still in poor shape.
The quality of life for everyone is affected by high numbers of people and by the lack of affordable housing. That much should be obvious. Add that the University of California is a jewel, that UC Berkeley provides a superb education at an affordable price, and that there are far more well-qualified applicants than spaces available. That’s a problem.
The NYT article that Klein links to in his first sentence notes what has attracted the most attention, and the most powerful political pushback: the thousands of smart California high school students who can’t get admitted to the UC campus of their choice. The piece names Berkeley, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and San Diego as the “marquee campuses” of the UC system.
Prospective students (who are highly qualified) and their parents are outraged! They are angry at being redirected to another of the campuses (there are 5 other UC campuses offering undergraduate degrees), angry that enrollments at the marquee sites aren’t more plentiful, and angry that international and out-of-state students are admitted.
The latter has a special sting for many, in part because the campuses reap out-of-state tuition (roughly $30,000/year) for every non-Californian who attends. Because of budget limitations -- as state support has waned dramatically since the 1970s -- UC campuses have increasingly relied on out-of-state tuition to make ends meet. One letter writer to the Los Angeles Times referenced “the university’s greed in enrolling foreign and out-of-state students.” The president of Save Berkeley’s Neighborhoods pointed in the same direction, suggesting that “nonresident enrollment has displaced large numbers of qualified California residents.”
The debate in Sacramento has reflected this viewpoint without much evidence of a broader perspective or more nuance. As increasing numbers of California college-bound graduates have been turned away from their first-choice campuses, “legislators have exerted relentless political pressure on the university to add in-state students.” If it has occurred to anyone in the state legislature or the governor’s office that students from other states and countries represent an economic boom in California’s future, they’ve held their tongues or been drowned out. Roughly two-thirds of Californians are native-born. California has prospered in part because millions of folks have moved here in decades past -- often to get an education at our superb universities -- and have stayed.
This is a success story, though ironically many of the applicants who can’t get into the UC campus of their choice are the children of these earlier (foreign and domestic) immigrants. But no one in Sacramento was elected by appealing to California’s long-term future, not while tens of thousands of high school graduates are clamoring to get into their first-choice UC campus.
There are nine University of California campuses, 8 of which have undergraduate programs (and 23 campuses in the California State University system). Everyone wants their first choice, but demand is high and space is limited. International students and students from other states and jurisdictions add to diversity and benefit the state economically and culturally. But that’s no consolation for a high school student facing disappointment.
The push from the state legislature to increase enrollment at the ‘marquee campuses,’ while understandable, clearly has a deleterious impact on the quality of life for campus communities. The former investment banker leading Save Berkeley Neighborhoods observed, "Since 2005, UC Berkeley has added about 13,000 students but only 1,600 beds. This has created a massive housing shortage in Berkeley."
A knee-jerk reaction to this controversy -- based on casual dismissal of the concerns of investment bankers and sympathetic feelings toward the highly diverse group of young people about to begin college -- may draw liberals into Klein's piece. But (the sketch of an) argument Klein offers is specious. The neighborhood opposition to more students without more student housing is not in the least unreasonable.