Bay Area News Group Editorializes: Vote No on 21

The Bay Area News Group, publishers of the San Jose Mercury News, the East Bay Times, and more than a dozen community newspapers and news websites with five million readers weekly, today became the latest editorial board to urge readers to vote no on Proposition 21.

In an editorial headlined “More rent control won’t solve California housing crisis,” the newspapers noted that the measure is “counterproductive” because it will worsen California’s affordable housing shortage, penalize property owners and “is not very effective at protecting poor or vulnerable tenants.”

“The basic principles of economics haven’t changed in two years. That’s when 59% of California voters wisely rejected a measure that would have allowed cities to impose tougher local rent control restrictions,” notes the editorial. “However well-intentioned Prop. 21 might be, it’s counterproductive. Most economists agree that rent control reduces the quality and quantity of housing.”

Read the full editorial here: https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/08/07/editorial-more-rent-control-wont-solve-california-housing-crisis/

In addition to the Mercury News and East Bay Times, the Bay Area News Group includes the Marin Independent Journal, Walnut Creek Journal, Alameda Journal, Los Gatos Weekly Times, The Argus, and The Daily News plus local websites such as bayarea.com.

The editorial comes just days after the Southern California Newspaper Group, publishers of 11 daily newspapers including the Orange County Register, Riverside Press-Enterprise and Los Angeles Daily News, also editorialized against Prop. 21, saying it would make California’s current housing crisis worse.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200810005614/en/