I don't write much about public policy on my blog, because it's something I devote a lot of thought to in my professional writing and it's nice to have a blog where I don't have to fret about buses and homelessness and downtown zones.

But this is important.

There's a group of businesspeople in San Francisco who've figured out something very clever: if they spend enough money on lies, they can trick the government into forcing developers to give them a lot of money for projects that are in everyone else's worst interests.

Outside of the Safeway near my work, there's a person collecting signatures for a parking-related ballot proposition. She has two signs: "MAKE OUR STREETS SAFER" and "OUR NEIGHBORHOODS NEED MORE PARKING." Nobody can argue with safer streets, right? Everyone's in favor of that! But if you ask her how more parking would make streets safer, she'll admit, "actually, the safer-streets sign is from a different petition." Oh.

That's typical of the trickiness that's necessary to sell this proposition. Here's what it'll actually do:

- The city will require that every new apartment has at least one parking spot.
- Reduce housing and raise rents in order to subsidize parking spaces.
- Landowners will be allowed to remove bike lanes near their property.
- It'll mean more strip malls, more parking garages, slower traffic, slower buses, more air pollution, and fewer parks.

Ick. Who would be in favor of that? In fact, the in-the-know busybodies who make it their business to follow what's going on in the city are overwhelmingly opposed.

One of the only people not opposed: Andy Ball, the owner of Webcor, a company that pours concrete and builds parking garages. Well, of course.

In order to sell this measure, its few supporters are having to be very misleading. It doesn't stop of mismatched signs: supporters claim that it doesn't change anything, and just reaffirms the measures that are already in place. If that was true, then I doubt very much that Webcor would have taken such an interest in pushing it.

My big objection to this stupid idea is that it's so weirdly socialist; but instead of giving everyone equal access to medicine, it's giving everyone equal access to blight. All citizens pay the price of parking: less housing/higher rent, less public space, longer commutes, worse air. And only a few people actually benefit: car owners. Socialized risk; privatized benefit. Sure, go ahead, park your cars -- but don't try to make the whole city pay for your spot.