Leon Phat           

It's alarming. San Francisco has the lowest ratio of families compared with its total population amongst big American cities.

It's too expensive. There's concern about the schools and the Districts' school placement process. And the Park and Recreation Dept. has taken some mighty big budgetary hits of late.

Here's what Leon will do. As soon as his Community Benefit District (CBD) land value recapture program goes into effect, the sale price of land will go down. That's because the sale price of land is a function of its potential rent income stream for the land owner, and the CBD model will reduce the potential rent stream of land.

When the sales price of land goes down, that means the loan (debt) which families have to contract for goes down. And what's more, there's no interest to pay on debt that no longer exists.

Of course families will have to pay the land rent of where they live, but they have to do that now if they're renters. And if they're home owners, today they are paying lots of mortgage interest for the debt they owe for their land value By contrast, under Leon's Community Benefit District plan there will cease to be interest payments on land value debt! Families won't have to become land value indebted to the bank!

What's more, when home owners no longer invest in land ownership for income or future resale, that's the end of land speculation. That means that those who are currently withholding land from full use will have to build more housing.

Housing will be more affordable in San Francisco. And many more families--and ones with average incomes--will be able to stay!

Land values are

COMMUNITY

Leon attended a recent program at SPUR, the Bay Area's premiere citizen's urban planning organization.

The program addressed the benefits and beautiful design possibilities that could come with higher density in San Francisco. The presentations were impressive . . . but the question remained, "How is desirable greater density to come about?"

No one really addressed the point. Some audience members talked like Maoists, calling for coercive legislation. Others talked about massive public spending to encourage density.

All this is harmful, counter to liberty, and unnecessary.

Leon's CBD program would recapture 50% of potential annual land rent for the city. That would create a huge incentive for land owners to add density in order to pay for their "lost" unearned land rent. They would have to earn their income by providing housing, rather than as now, "not earning their income" by collecting land rent which community has created.