Affordable housing, or free healthcare for illegal aliens? California will have to choose this weekend.

Photo above - the iconic "Spadena" house, now worth $10 million, was used for a location shot in the film Clueless. The owners may be resisting the construction of affordable housing adjacent to their neighborhood. But Cher (Alicia Silverstone) does look safe and carefree, doesn't she?

How can anyone vote against affordable housing? Well, you can if you're a politician who received big money from wealthy voters in your district to keep that sort of stuff from being built near their ritzy homes. (See link below)

By law, California is required to have a balanced state budget. So at the end of the day they can’t afford EVERYTHING and just borrow endlessly like the federal government.

Governor Newsom – currently in 2nd or 3rd place in the race for 2028 democrat presidential nomination – is walking a tightrope. If he bungles California's budget, he can wave goodbye to the votes of moderate democrats in the other 49 states. Hence, his decision to sacrifice free migrant healthcare, and put state money towards efforts to building more affordable housing.

Unsurprisingly, mansion owners in California aren’t wild about this idea. You know, falling property values, crime increases. Because the governor doesn’t hear their lamentations, they’ve enlisted the state legislature. Campaign contributions loom larger for them, than for Newsom. Both sides can’t win, of course. Unless more cuts are made to police, fire, EMT's, schools, reservoirs, trash collection . . .

California’s budget deficit – which needs to be fixed, before a budget can be passed – is $12 billion. At his point, all the socialists who don’t have 12 hundred dollars in the bank should jump up and down and rant that $12 billion is “small potatoes”. They will regale us with their easy answers: rent controls; higher sales tax; higher gasoline tax; higher income tax; higher property tax.

Except California has already been doing most of those things, since forever. And the problem is getting worse, not better.

I’m just sayin’ . . .

California budget comes down to the wire as Newsom, lawmakers face off over housing

This page is a permanent link to the reply below and its nested replies. See all post replies »

Avectoijesuismoi · 36-40 Best Comment

I am not opposed to free or assisted health care for a country's citizens or people that have been legally admitted in anyway at all, but I don't see why it should be available to people who just illegally enter a country that is nothing more than a drain on a country/state/city etc being able to offer those services to their own people.
As for affordable housing it is just not sensible to build it next to high end valued property at all. If the property values drop you are going to end up with less tax being collected for instance if the value of a home drops from $10 million to $ 5 million because of it, any owner with sense will want the tax adjusted accordingly. Equally you cannot intergrate the two groups high and low doesn't work.

independentone · M

@Avectoijesuismoi California voted for exactly that in 1994 under prop 187, to deny illegals medical care, prohibited them from public schools and denied them any welfare assistance, but the courts over ruled the majority who voted for this.

SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F

@Avectoijesuismoi best reply of the thread.

Everyone says the USA should emulate european style medicine. Except they become flustered and speechless when someone points out that the NIH in Britain doesn't cover ANY migrants, legal or otherwise, from any country.

meJess · F

@SusanInFlorida the NHS is free at point of use which leaves it open to being used by those who are not entitled to it. We have significant health tourism for that reason.

Avectoijesuismoi · 36-40

@SusanInFlorida Thank you

jackjjackson · M

Does Canada cover illegal aliens? @SusanInFlorida

SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F

@jackjjackson their government has started making it clear they don't. see link at bottom. evidently because so many migrants to america are self deporting as pedestrians to Canada now.

actually, a bunch of canadians regularly cross the border (michigan, for example) for lower prices (gasoline, tobacco, alcohol, electronics) and also to get "elective/non-critical health care" that would take forever under their system.

https://www.healthcoalition.ca/canada-refuses-to-grant-access-to-health-care-for-irregular-migrants/

jackjjackson · M

Isn’t that Canadian for profit border crossing illegal? @SusanInFlorida