Edward Alan Clark Ed is a Professor of Immunology at the UW. Among his intersts he has been a Mahayana Buddhist for some time and an eager teacher of both Immunology and Buddhism. He lives in an ethnically mixed,vibrant single family neighborhood in District 3. ·
We are afraid that the quality of life of Seattle single-family neighborhoods will be destroyed.
I just heard the most asinine comment in a KUOW discussion about why single-family home owners don’t want duplexes and triplexes built next to them: ‘they think it will reduce their property values’. NO, we are afraid that the quality of life of Seattle single-family neighborhoods will be destroyed. The quiet pace, the sharing of stories and vegetables and pea patches, the having time to talk and get to know ones neighbors and look out for them could be eroded and destroyed by high density zoning, that is the very things that make living in Seattle special and meaningful for so many people. HALA must be resisted and challenged. It is not simply about accommodating more people who want to come and live in Seattle. It is also about fighting for what makes Seattle special, and that in large part means preserving the great single-family neighborhoods, the gardens, the ambience, the caring and sharing between good neighbors.
Friend of Ed
I listened to the same program and agree with Edward Alan Clark. I
We do not need dialectical materialism as a basis for zoning policy!
The thinking in HALA is simplistic, its proponents divide their world in into the good and the bad. (The Marxist term when I was a college kid was “dialectical materialism.*” ) That simple idea was why the leaked draft of the HALA report described the neighborhoods as being the result of racism and classism.
Of course their is more than a bit of truth in their point of view. Our school system in Seattle still suffers terribly from classism and racism. But, the simplistic thinking that says Laurelhurst needs to have triplexes on every block is far more likely to finish the destruction of ethnic neighborhoods like the Rainier valley or the CD than it is to integrate Broadmoor. Anyone who likes such simple ideas ought to ask themselves how successful forces busing was in improving our schools.
My own neighborhood shows the effects of this sort of thinking. When we moved here, North Capital Hill was a mix of nuns, Jews, Rajnishis, millionaires, UW faculty, gays, Greeks, etc. Of course Seattle Apartheid (as I call it ) has driven most of that diversity out. This was not because we had an influx of wealthier folks … though that has happened. Ironically most of those better off folks, like my wiofe and I, moved here because we wanted to live and raise kids in an ethnically and economically divers community. Sadly, we have been disappointed.
The schools took the brunt of the blow. Forced busing successfully segregated what were racially integrated neighborhood schools. Why would anyone think an attack on neighborhoods would be better today?
Rod Hearne, one of the candidates for City Council in our District and a gay activist, has addressed this issue. He has suggested that the City focus on working with neighborhoods to develop housing and other resources that encourage existing neighborhoods to maintain their own strengths. He uses as an example the development of new construction that enables artists to find studio space on Capital Hill and encourages the development of retail space that is friendly to art galleries.
I like Rod’s idea. It is far better than the HALA concept of righting some historic wrong by attacking neighborhoods. In my own neighborhood many people have moved on, as they got older, because we do not have local senior housing. The same is true of the older African American community served by Mt. Zion Baptists Church. Our once vibrant community of working class Catholics has been affected as well. The nuns have moved out because there is no longer nun friendly housing. The folks who are now grandparents moved away and their homes are now owned by über wealthy newbies rather than by now adult children who might have chosen to stay here and buld the community if gramps and gramma (or zada and bubbi) could have found a place to live. I can imagine a developer enthusiastically developing such housing given the appropriate changes in our zoning laws.
We do not need dialectical materialism as a basis for zoning policy!
*di·a·lec·ti·cal ma·te·ri·al·ism
noun
the Marxist theory (adopted as the official philosophy of the Soviet communists) that political and historical events result from the conflict of social forces and are interpretable as a series of contradictions and their solutions. The conflict is believed to be caused by material needs.