“Not everybody gets to live here. You earn it. I worked hard at it. We don’t owe anybody anything.” This quote is Sonoma Mayor Pro Tem Gary Edwards commenting on the future of housing in Sonoma at the recent city council planning retreat.
This apparent statement of values by an elected member of the Sonoma City Council who has made pro housing statements in the past was rather shocking. A lot of people that work hard in this town and cannot afford to live here. Teachers, for example, cannot afford to live here. Do they not work hard enough? Field workers cannot afford to live here. Do they not work hard enough? Winery workers cannot afford to live here. Do they not work hard enough? The same is true for firemen, for police officers, for restaurant workers, for construction workers, and for those who chose professions of community value rather than market valuation.
According to those who would agree with a statement like this, these sorts of “work” do not rise to the level of what is valued enough by society in order to raise a family, to have a home, and to build a community. These comments are representative of how different kinds of work are valued in modern day America. If you work as a Wall Street trader, you not only deserve to live in Sonoma, you are valuable. You deserve the right to a good life. You have “earned” it.
However, if you work 12 hour days in the hot sun pruning grapes vines, or 50 hours a week in a tasting room providing customer service, or as a third grade teacher molding the minds of the next generation, you don’t deserve a home in the town you work in. Your children (if you can somehow afford them) don’t deserve to go to college without accumulating massive amounts of debt, and you sure don’t deserve the right to take a day off, to go on vacation, or to get sick without the risk of bankruptcy.
Sonoma has become an epicenter of these maladjusted values and ideals. As home after home is bought up to save for a few weekends a year, as rents skyrocket, as citizens are forced move further and further away from the city they work in, we’re choosing what we, as a town, value. The next city council meetings are June 5 and June 22. Hope to see you there.
Logan Harvey, Sonoma
I agree with all in your article except government employes, especially when a fire chief can retire @ 53yrs old with full benefits & $265,000 per year pension. He/she may be able to afford a house in Sonoma? Private sector, no pension unless completely funded by self, no medical benefits, no 3 months off, many times no vacation. Hard work should be rewarded, but of course not on the backs of the hard working less fortunate!
I admired my father’s generation which was the greatest. My father had much privation during the depression and then was in the Navy when the attack at Pearl Harbor happened. He spent his youth at war. He and his generation understood that a society to be successful must look after all including its weakest members. They gave generously to our Society. Their values have given way t o the age of selfishness and me first. Me me me! It reeks of privilege. A real community caters to all regardless of income level. The worker bees in and around Sonoma make for a better community. Some one has to work so the privileged few can enjoy their exalted positions. Once we valued work and people no matter how humble.
In its best days, Sonoma was a solid middle class community. Those days have long since passed. It is now populated by the well-to-do who bring their self-important and self-aggrandizing beliefs and values with them. Too bad.
In the past council member Edwards has brought up the issue of affordable housing as the most important thing. This was done when something else, such as banning gas powered leaf blowers was on the table. Each time we were told how we were wasting time, that could be spent working on affordable housing. I have waited for him to introduce some creative ideas to provide housing. One such plan could have been to spread some of the wealth around, using TOT to provides subsidies to lower income workers for market rate housing. We spend money to attract more tourists, why not just stop the growth that requires more lower income workers and use what we have to house the people working here right now. It was never considered. With the current statement he made, it reinforces my belief that affordable housing is just a talking point and not a core belief for him. And last sadly, maladjusted values are everywhere, not just here in Sonoma.