Stanford University

Single-Family Zoning and Spatial Inequality

Prepared for Silicon Valley @ Home

Matthew Jumamoy, A.J. Nadel, Jordy Portillo, and Olivia Shields

URBANST 141

Professor Michael Kahan

June 11, 2020

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1. Introduction

As a plane prepares its final approach to San Jose’s Norman Y. Mineta International

Airport, peeking out of the clouds, passengers get a breathtaking look at the City of San Jose

from high above. It’s early on a Monday evening, and looking towards the city below, the

skyscrapers of the central business district are eclipsed by a sea of streets embellished by green

trees. From this dense core, large freeways radiate from this center, carrying countless cars in all

directions, from those moving swiftly on State Route 87 to the endless line of red lights crawling

on Interstate 280. Extending far beyond the urban core, miles of neatly aligned homes radiate in

all directions until they start to climb both sides of the Santa Clara Valley, from the far east of

Alum Rock to the far west of Cupertino. In this grandeur overview of the city, the suburbs seem

to be unified in their dominance of the landscape, reflecting their origin as an all-American

commoditized product (Rose, 1984). However, instead of the manifestation of the capitalist

vision of the democratization of homeownership, these communities face divides and inequality,

reflecting scars of institutionalized racism and bias that have pervaded their landscape since their

inception.

These scars, more formally identified as spatial inequality, pervade all American cities,

tracing their roots collectively to deeply segregated neighborhoods with racist housing policies,

discriminatory lending by the federal government in the wake of the Great Depression,

exclusionary housing contracts, and countless other actions pitting socioeconomically

disadvantaged people and people of color against privileged, often white communities of

political clout and economic strength. As sharply defined as these initial forms of spatial

inequality were with streets, physical features, or paper contracts serving as the clear definitions

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of division, other drivers of spatial inequality are being identified. More recently, the zoning

designation of single-family housing has come under scrutiny as being a driving force in spatial

inequality. By applying this zoning designation in an area of limited space, such as that of the

Santa Clara Valley, the processes of gentrification and displacement gradually occur with limited

creation of accessible and affordable housing units. From these market forces reacting to

single-family zoning, spatial inequality grows worse with people of color being pushed out

further from urban cores into suburbs and exurbs.

In this paper, we have three primary focuses. First, through a literature review, we will

analyze recent academic developments in which scholars hold single-family zoning responsible,

in coordination with redlining and restrictive covenants, for perpetuating demographic patterns

behind spatial inequality. Then, we will explore contemporary attitudes toward and responses to

single-family zoning from the perspectives of city governments and grassroots advocacy groups.

Finally, we will analyze statistics regarding persistent inequality arising from single-family

zoning to explore the extent to which racial and socioeconomic divides have changed over the

course of San Jose’s history.

2. Literature Review

When trying to identify spatial inequality, it is most intuitive to look at a racial dot map.

When viewing San Jose, the persistence of racialized divides within the city is evident. Although

there are areas that are becoming more diverse with a mix of various races, it is quite clear that

there is still a divide between Latinx communities and white communities in San Jose. East San

Jose and South San Jose, areas with large proportions of low socioeconomic status residents,

have a large majority of the city’s Latinx residents, while western suburbs lining the Santa Cruz

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Mountains and Silicon Valley suburbs are primarily white and of higher socioeconomic class

(Cable, 2013). This distinction, which divides the city socioeconomically and racially along

California State Route 87 and Almaden Expressway, paints the modern picture of spatial

inequality and segregation. To help explore the depth of these divides, it is useful to examine the

local origin of the name of that dividing expressway: Almaden.

When mercury deposits were found in what is now East San Jose in 1845, Spanish land

grant owner Andres Castillero decided to name the new mercury mine New Almaden, in honor

of Almaden, a famous Spanish mercury mine (Gudde and Bright, 2010). The New Almaden

Mine, the origin of all uses of “Almaden” in Santa Clara Valley, was from the start, an operation

that relied on “racial hierarchies” (Johnston, 2013). “Mexican and Chilean workers” were tasked

with exploring mercury deposits with uncoordinated, dangerous mining techniques, while

“Cornish and European miners” were tasked with exploring “‘advanced’ mining methods” that

used “theory” rather than “empirical” methods of finding mercury (Johnston, 2013).

This disparity of working conditions between white and Spanish-speaking workers

highlights one story within a fabric of racism and inequality that permeates into today’s physical

spatial inequality manifested across the City of San Jose. In the following literature review, we

will explore scholars’ diverging perspectives on how spatial inequality has presented itself from

the time of the New Almaden Mine to contemporary San Jose, and all across the United States.

We will first explore how authors suggest that modern spatial inequality owes its roots to racial

covenants and redlining implemented in the 1920s and 1930s. Then, we will analyze arguments

pointing out that in addition to racial covenants and redlining, zoning and specifically,

single-family zoning, plays an equally, if not greater, role in creating the modern expression of

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spatial inequality. Finally, we will examine the extent to which these two viewpoints intersect

upon the common ground of persistent systemic racism being a driving force of spatial

inequality.

2.2 Redlining and Racial Covenants

Historian Richard Rothstein, author of The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How

Our Government Segregated America and David Freund, author of Colored Property: State

Policy and White Racial Politics in Suburban America elucidate the conception and

implementation of racially restrictive practices, specifically restrictive covenants and redlining

that intentionally segregated neighborhoods on the basis of race and class. Freund likens racially

restrictive covenants to racially restrictive zoning, grounding both practices in the idea that black

occupants of lands and homes threatened the value of private property as well as the health and

welfare of white property owners. Rather than admit to prejudice, white officials rationalized

restrictive covenants and zoning as sound land-use practices. Restrictive covenants, as Freund

defines, are legal instruments written into property deeds or established through an additional

agreement that dictates how a parcel of land can be used by current and future owners (Freund,

2007). Covenants were binding, often demanding membership in “homeowners’ associations” so

that residents could sue those who violated covenant terms. By the 1910s, restrictive covenants

were common in middle-class residential areas, defining rules regarding new construction,

changing current structures, and controlling the types of buildings that could be erected on the

land. Concurrently, race-specific restrictive covenants became increasingly popular, even before

economists and realtors factored in racial integration as a risk to land value. Racially restrictive

covenants frequently listed specific racial groups that could not buy or rent the designated land

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parcel or stated that only Caucasian or white people could occupy the land. After the 1917

Buchanan v. Warley ruling struck down racial zoning, a type of zoning that involved specifically

citing race as grounds for zoning regulations, racially restrictive covenants became even more

attractive to whites seeking to maintain racial homogeneity in their neighborhoods. In fact,

racially restrictive covenants provided a tool of racial exclusion that lasted until the 1948

Supreme Court case Shelley v. Kraemer deemed them to be “non-enforceable” (Freund, 2007).

By this time, estimates showed that approximately 85% of the nation’s newest large residential

developments were racially restricted; for example, all of Detroit’s new subdivisions included

racially restrictive covenants that banned anyone considered to be a “Negro,” or an individual

with “1/8 or more Negro blood” (Freund, 2007). Like exclusionary zoning practices, racially

restrictive covenant use tied racial integration with the reduction of value, health and safety of a

neighborhood.

Moreover, the federal practice of redlining, expounded by Rothstein and Freund, further

illustrates the role of government in designing a housing market that favored white

homeownership, encouraging white families to exclusively occupy single-family homes. In the

wake of the Great Depression, the federal government urgently promoted homeownership

through creating several organizations, including the Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC)

in 1933 and the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) in 1934. Rothstein explains that the role

of HOLC was to purchase existing mortgages that were about to be foreclosed upon and issue

new mortgages with long-term repayment schedules. The new mortgages would be amortized,

meaning each month’s payment included principal and interest; as a result, renters could gain

equity while their house was mortgaged, and paying off their loan meant the renter could own

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the home. Within the agency’s appraisal and lending procedures was a new means of fostering

and justifying racial segregation—redlining. Working with realtors and lending bodies, the

HOLC created maps that ranked neighborhoods based on their value, with “A” denoting the most

desirable and valuable areas and “D” representing “decline,” or the least valuable neighborhoods

(Freund, 2007). Race and ethnicity were explicitly calculated into the rating process, so

regardless if it was a solidly middle-class neighborhood with single-family homes, an area with

significant racial/ethnic minorities almost always received a C or D rating. In 1940, a wealthy

residential neighborhood in St. Louis received an “A” rating, praised explicitly for its widespread

use of racially restrictive covenants and the absence of African Americans (Freund, 2007). “A”

ranked neighborhoods, the safest to lend in were coded in green, while the riskiest “D”

neighborhoods were drawn in red, hence the term redlining.

The Federal Housing Administration employed tactics of racial segregation analogous to

the HOLC, using its own conditions for property appraisals to bar African American families

from receiving federally backed mortgages from banks and hindered black homeownership. The

1934 National Housing Act (NHA) transformed the way housing credit was created and issued in

the United States, giving government approval for long-term, low-interest, self-amortizing

mortgages; to insure banks and lenders using these types of loans, the NHA created the Federal

Housing Administration (FHA) (Freund, 2007). Rothstein delves into the insurance policies of

the FHA, demonstrating how their appraisal strategies specifically confined African Americans

to live in neighborhoods with slum-like conditions. The FHA insisted on doing its own property

appraisals to ensure the bank mortgages it insured were low risk, producing an Underwriting

Manual to guide the appraisers it hired. Within the manual, FHA stated that black, racially

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mixed, or white neighborhoods near black ones were too risky to insure, encouraging banks to

avoid locations like these that represented an “infiltration of…lower-class occupancy, and

inharmonious racial groups (Rothstein, 2017). The FHA additionally discouraged banks from

loaning to people in urban neighborhoods, encouraging loans in newly built suburbs instead.

Areas with highways or other artificially built barriers were especially favorable if they divided

African American neighborhoods from whites. The manual even discouraged racial integration

of schools, stating that white children forcibly mixing with members of “a far lower level of

society or an incompatible racial element” would eventually cause a neighborhood to become

unstable and undesirable for lending (Rothstein, 2017). The presence of nearby commercial

development or industry was characteristic of many black neighborhoods, but the FHA declared

that these types of developments posed a risk to the property value of single-family areas.

African Americans were thus rendered ineligible for FHA-backed bank loans, effectively

elevating the cost of black housing compared to similar housing in white neighborhoods. Black

owners struggled to upkeep their homes without the federal support, resulting in nearly inevitable

deterioration that reinforced African American neighborhoods as ghettos. Like the HOLC, the

FHA practiced redlining, drawing color-coded maps and refusing to approve mortgages in areas

they deemed too risky.

By the 1940s, Freund argues that a new mortgage market arose which not only allowed

lenders to give out mortgage loans more comfortably but also promoted the building of detached,

single-family homes. Federal programs insured suburban properties often primarily composed of

single-family homes while denying urban properties, and appraisal guidelines of government

programs required lenders and realtors to segregate neighborhoods, denying loans to people of

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color. As Rothstein and Freund prove, we can largely blame racially restrictive covenants and

redlining, like zoning practices of the early twentieth century, for the exclusion of communities

of color from white, suburban neighborhoods.

2.2.3 Parallels in San Jose and the Bay Area

Concurring with Rothstein and Freuds’ assessments of redlining and racial covenants

being primary drivers of spatial inequality and exclusion, Stephen Pitti in his book The Devil in

Silicon Valley describes the history of San Jose as being shaped by racial divides, specifically

between the Latinx of the region and the white Anglo-Saxon Americans. To understand this

long-standing division, it is important to look back to the conditions forcing ethnic Mexican

families into highly impoverished barrios of East San Jose.

While the size of the Mexican community grew rapidly throughout the 1950s and 1960s

after World War II, Mexican residents of the Santa Clara Valley “struggled to escape field and

cannery work in favor of other types of more remunerative employment” due to lack of high

school education, limited English skills, and racial discrimination (Pitti, 2003). These laborers

were pushed into “seasonal, low-wage” jobs typically in agriculture, and would be concentrated

in “the poverty of East Side neighborhoods” because of the neighborhoods’ unique affordability

and proximity to jobs (Pitti, 2003). Residents often tied their intimate connection to agricultural

employment, which consisted of low pay and harsh working conditions, to the tendency for

government officials to ignore East Side residents, which produced a lack of social services and

allowed intense poverty to perpetuate. Mexican migrants, while attracted to the vibrant Mexican

culture and the opportunity to “still settle near friends, family members, and the local canneries,”

widely sought better living conditions (Pitti, 2003). Unfortunately, moving to most other areas

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besides East San Jose was nearly impossible, given that the housing market was systematically

operated to tailor towards those who were the white middle class, excluding working-class

Mexicans.

Ethnic Mexicans in the Valley yearned for economic advancement, yet factors such as

difficulty purchasing property blocked their attainment of a higher socioeconomic status. Racism

pervaded interactions with realtors and lenders, as “many ethnic Mexicans who discussed the

purchase of a home encountered suspicious creditors who ‘investigate[d] Mexican loan prospects

a little more thoroughly than someone else… because so many are transients’” and considered

barrios such as Sal Si Puedes “‘special risks’” (Pitti, 2003). Despite the fact that the U.S.

Supreme Court declared racially restrictive covenants illegal in 1948, discriminatory lending and

refusal to sell property to people of color maintained the strict demographic layout of San Jose.

Other communities of color, especially black and Latinx communities in the East Bay

experienced a similar plight to those in San Jose of being barred from integrating into white

suburban neighborhoods for decades, as Alex Schafran exemplifies with a historical analysis of

the Oakland-San Leandro divide in his work, “The Road to Resegregation: Northern California

and the Failure of Politics.” By the 1970s, racially restrictive housing practices created a distinct

border between Oakland and San Leandro, which became labeled by black residents of East

Oakland as the “invisible wall,” dividing the high rates of violence, lack of school funding, and

overall poverty in East Oakland from the nearly all-white suburb of San Leandro (Schafran,

2018). The barrier between a majority-white city and the racialized poverty of East Oakland

accentuated the sharp distinction that characterized black-white and black-brown residential

separation throughout the Bay Area.

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2.3 Zoning

Having covered the rise and fall of prominent strategies of segregation like racially

restrictive covenants and redlining, we must consider what other tools are in play. Although

those particular practices may have been outlawed, the symptoms of systemic

discrimination—residential segregation, differential access to public goods, and social

stratification, to name a few—remain prominent characteristics of the urban environment. This

leads us to examine a relatively recent academic development of zoning being characterized as a

tool exploited to accentuate spatial inequality. While the 1917 Buchanan v. Warley decision laid

explicitly racialized zoning to rest among policies of the past, eventually joined by racially

restrictive covenants and redlining, the institution of zoning itself survived this decision. By

examining the history of zoning, we will assess the ways in which policymakers were able to use

zoning to perpetuate segregation similar in nature to those earlier mechanisms of discrimination,

but not so explicitly racist as to attract court scrutiny.

2.3.1 The Origin of Zoning

Zoning, introduced in the early 1900s, revolutionized how city officials regulated and

planned land use. Before zoning was created in the United States, cities mostly relied on

nuisance laws to regulate the types of buildings being erected (Erickson, 2012). If individuals

took issue with their neighbor’s use of property, they would frequently settle their dispute in

court. However, by the 20th century, New York City recognized that the continuing growth of

buildings in areas like Manhattan rendered nuisance laws insufficient in dealing with

neighborhood complaints. Skyscrapers like the 42-story Equitable Building blocked

neighborhood views, and factories and warehouses encroached on homes (Erickson, 2012).

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Finally, in 1916, the city created its first comprehensive zoning code. This set of laws started by

regulating buildings’ height, addressing the main frustrations with lack of light and air that

residents expressed. Moreover, the law regulated where residential and business districts would

be established, mirroring Los Angeles’ 1901 city-wide regulation that separated industry and

commerce from certain neighborhoods (Erickson, 2012). Throughout the first two decades of the

20th century, state legislatures around the country granted cities the power to utilize zoning in

order to control the height, area, location and use of buildings based on where the buildings were

constructed (Silver, 1997).

2.3.2 National Examples

Although much of the credit towards the original implementation of zoning is given to

cities like New York and Los Angeles, one of the earliest instances of zoning can notably be

found in the Bay Area itself. In 1916, the City of Berkeley passed its first zoning ordinance,

offering a look into the ways early zoning was harnessed to segregate cities. The ordinance

created eight designations of land use that assigned parcels first as either commercial or

residential, and then graded the density of units allowed in residential areas. Class I zoning,

under this plan, permitted no structure other than “a single-family dwelling,” which Sonia Hirt,

author of Zoned in the USA: The Origins and Implications of American Land-Use Regulation

speculates to be the first codification of single-family zoning in the country (Hirt, 2014). The

ordinance had passed through the city legislature with the lobbying help of J. Bither, Charles

Cheney, and Duncan McDuffie, among others. Cheney, who claimed that an apartment would

“condemn the whole tract... of fine residences,” shared his viewpoint with McDuffie who

advocated for residential zoning in order to “prevent deterioration and assist in stabilizing

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values” (Hirt, 2014). Their opposition to mixed housing types for economic reasons stands on its

own—introducing apartments could decrease property values and bring in poorer people who

otherwise couldn’t afford a single-family home. However, it must be considered in context.

Trounstine writes that by this time, race and income correlated to such an extent that banning

apartment buildings effectively excluded black and immigrant residents from settling there

(Trounstine, 2018). J. Bither, aforementioned for his advocacy for Berkeley’s zoning ordinance,

described the adoption of zoning in California as motivated by the “persistent proclivity of the

‘heathen Chinese’ to clean our garments in our midst” (Hirt, 187). This perspective illustrates

how the idea of zoning as a guard against nuisance, combined with the subjective and often racist

nature of “nuisance” itself, yielded a tool that lends itself with ease to be weaponized for

segregation.

The city of St. Louis, MO provides another example of how economic zoning marked

with thinly veiled racism played an important role in shaping racial segregation and the rise of

single-family housing. In the early 1900s, planning engineer Harland Bartholomew categorized

every building in the city as single-family residential, multifamily residential, commercial, or

industrial (Rothstein, 2017). Simultaneously, he surveyed the race of each building’s occupants

to anticipate where black people might intrude on white neighborhoods, drawing up stricter

restrictions and specifications for housing in those areas. Satisfied with the plans’ ability to

prevent the movement of African Americans into upscale residential neighborhoods, St. Louis

adopted his zoning ordinance in 1919. Significantly, the ordinance made no explicit reference to

race, thus complying at surface level with the Buchanan precedent only two years before.

Stipulations within the ordinance designated land with large African American populations for

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industrial development; in subsequent years, planning officials would continue to change

neighborhoods with increasing black population from residential to industrial zoning.

Furthermore, zoning in black neighborhoods not only allowed polluting industrial buildings but

also liquor stores, nightclubs, buildings for prostitution, and other unsightly establishments that

were considered zoning violations in white, single-family zoned neighborhoods. Legally

justifiable yet surreptitiously racist zoning practices such as those in St. Louis proliferated

throughout the nation in the early 20th century, with the vociferous support of Herbert Hoover.

As Secretary of Commerce under President Warren G. Harding, Hoover organized an Advisory

Committee on Zoning composed of open segregationists who spoke publicly about maintaining

racial divisions in housing. As long as they skirted around explicit reference to race, Hoover

assured city planners that zoning practices would be legally sustainable—and he was correct.

These examples touch on a national pattern, a connection between zoning and

segregation by race and class. In addition to these individual case studies, Trounstine finds that

cities that were early adopters of zoning (between 1900 and 1930) became significantly more

racially segregated than cities that took longer to implement zoning. She also found a significant

increase in renter segregation and the stratification (inequality) of home values, two likely

proxies for socioeconomic class (Trounstine, 2018). Complementarily, cities that were already

heavily segregated (but not necessarily ones that had large ethnic/racial minority populations)

were more likely to adopt zoning, suggesting that zoning was applied in many of the same

contexts. Understanding the outcomes of the historical application of zoning thus helps to

explain its role in developing spatial inequality in American cities.

2.4 The Common Ground: Racism

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Evidently, numerous examples of cities manipulating zoning regulations to forge and

perpetuate spatial inequality highlight the common thread of racism behind zoning decision

making. In the historical context of housing, the insidious “Devil” of racism, which Pitti

describes as having assumed many guises over hundreds of years, takes form in the overt tactics

of redlining and racially restrictive covenants; both practices unabashedly cited race as a reason

for segregating neighborhoods, ensuring African Americans and low-income residents lacked the

opportunity to access white, middle-class neighborhoods. When legal precedents began to nullify

blatantly racist housing practices, Pitti’s racist “Devil” morphed: zoning became a powerful tool

for city officials to devise legally defensible ways to continue to racially and socioeconomically

segregate neighborhoods (Pitti, 2003).

In the following sections, we will explore how these divides affect San Jose today

through “facades” of density-focused developments, persistent inequality shadowing historical

HOLC tracts, and how overall, zoning actively became “a loophole for discrimination” in the

Bay Area (Lopez, 2019; Nelson, Winling et al. 2020; Neighbors for More Neighbors, 2017).

3. Single-Family Zoning’s Impact

It is important to remember that zoning is a tool that can be used for various ends. Its

application can serve legitimate, constructive goals—preventing hazardous environmental

conditions from affecting residences—but just as easily can be harnessed to produce segregation

and perpetuate spatial inequality. While many of the specific mechanics of institutional housing

discrimination of the past—including restrictive covenants and redlining—are now outlawed,

zoning is used to perpetuate residential segregation. Segregation that was explicitly enforced in

the past has now translated into inequality in property values and housing types. Explicit and

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implicit racism in planning is compounded by homeowners’ inherent fiscal incentive to protect

their property value—the homeowner’s version of the redlining practiced by lending institutions.

For this reason, Trounstine argues, many white homeowners who live in neighborhoods

inscribed with a legacy of segregation are “willing to perpetuate inequalities that far exceed their

individual expressed racism” (Trounstine, 2018).

Understanding the interdependence of racial and class segregation in urban spaces is

necessary to talk about the role zoning plays in perpetuating them. At the time that

comprehensive zoning was first conceived, race and income so closely corresponded that

banning apartment buildings with single-family zoning effectively banned black and immigrant

residents from settling there (Trounstine, 2018). While much has changed in the urban

environment since that time, people with lower incomes still tend to be disproportionately people

of color. Exclusionary zoning is the practice of keeping affordable housing—and thus the people

who would inhabit it—out of wealthier and whiter neighborhoods (Rigsby, 2016). Single-family

zoning, like zoning as a whole, may be useful for other reasons than solely to exclude poor

people and people of color. Advocates of zoning reform (upzoning advocates

included) acknowledge the way that these structures manifest a certain philosophy of life and

family—to some, the American Dream (Neighbors for More Neighbors, 2017). However,

single-family zoning is included in the catalog of exclusionary zoning practices alongside

minimum lot sizes, minimum square footage, parking requirements, and others (Rigsby, 2016).

Unlike the racialized zoning, which was declared unconstitutional early on, courts have long

refused to rule similarly on exclusionary zoning as class is not offered the same equal protection

under the law as race. In fact, the legal legitimacy of exclusionary zoning was affirmed by

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Village of Arlington Heights v. Metropolitan Housing Development Corp. in 1977. Due to the

association between race and socioeconomic class, local authorities continued ability to keep

affordable housing and poor people out of neighborhoods allows for de facto racial segregation

via zoning.

3.1 How Cities Are Responding to Single-Family Zoning

As San Jose, like other cities, assesses the future of single-family zoning in its recurring

general plan review, task force members are looking to prominent efforts to take on the

designation often thought to be untouchable. When exploring an “opportunity housing” policy

(addressed later), task force members alluded to historic legislation in Minneapolis and the State

of Oregon—both case studies of zoning reform. In both cases, governments took up the mantle

of upzoning, mandating that multiple units—three or four, depending—be allowed on all parcels

currently zoned for single-family homes. As we explore new legislation in Portland (as Oregon’s

largest city) and Minneapolis, we will identify similarities in rationale and processes for reform,

both of which offer background for the broader rezoning movement that the San Jose city

planners are beginning to acknowledge.

Far away from the California coast, the city of Minneapolis (population 425,000) took on

a dramatic zoning reform project in 2019. What makes this effort stand out is how the city

council spent years building a broad coalition to support upzoning, finally taking action

throughout the whole city at once. The Minneapolis 2040 plan promised to allow triplex zoning

in all parcels citywide, as well as even higher density in proximity to transit (Kahlenberg, 2019).

The ordinance also targets other aspects of exclusionary zoning, eliminating, for example,

off-street parking minimums. In addition to reforming the single-family tracts in the city, the

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plan adds a minimum inclusionary zoning requirement of 10% moderate-income units and

increases the city’s affordable housing fund from $15M to $40M to provide immediate relief. It

is important to note that this bill ostensibly targeting single-family zoning is really an omnibus

housing plan. The circumstances, however, were relatively dramatic. The city has been

experiencing a housing crisis: the apartment vacancy rate was down almost to 2%, and the speed

of home construction was outpaced by the increasing number of households in the city.

Much of the advocacy for Minneapolis 2040 was run by a campaign called “Neighbors

for More Neighbors,” a powerful umbrella coalition for the upzoning movement. Since 70% of

residential land was zoned for single-family dwellings, mostly in the wealthier and whiter south

side of the city, their campaign framed their reform as a leveling of the playing field

(Kahlenberg, 2019). Out of the plan’s fourteen goals, they stated that the foremost need was to

undo racial and economic disparities. The upzoning campaign was thus an acknowledgment of

the harmful effect of single-family zoning on the city, and a tangible plan to undo its

exclusionary effect on affordable housing. The campaign also pointed explicitly to the way

renters were excluded from land use discussions and made renters’ rights a key point in the plan

(Neighbors for More Neighbors, 2017). In order to effectively focus the plan itself, campaign

organizers and city planners solicited community input in public spaces, at events like festivals

and street fairs. With these wide-reaching goals and the participation of community members,

Neighbors for More Neighbors was able to ally itself with key local organizing groups like the

tenants’ organization Inquilinxs Unidxs Por Justicia, unions like local SEIU, and non-profits like

the Housing Justice Center. Importantly, the campaign also clearly articulated their commitment

to preventing accelerated displacement as a result of the ordinance.

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One relevant forerunner to this landmark legislation was the legalization of Accessory

Dwelling Units (ADUs) citywide (Kahlenberg, 2019). In 2014, four years before the upzoning

ordinance came into being, councilmember Lisa Bender saw through a plan to allow ADUs in

Minneapolis (Lee, 2019). The results from that step had been gradual—only around 140 ADUs

were built in the following 5 years. Nevertheless, Bender envisioned the 2040 Plan as a natural

sequel to the ADU ordinance. Rather than expecting a quick and easy fix, she described the new

plan as a “holistic” patch for the broad issue of affordability, a problem deeply intertwined with

the zoning imposed on the landscape of Minneapolis.

On a slightly earlier timeline, the legislature of the State of Oregon has undertaken a

similar plan to rid its cities of single-family zoning. House Bill 2001 allows duplexes in cities

with more than 10,000 residents, and up to quad (fourplex) zoning in those with more than

25,000 residents. For a big city like Portland, these minimums are almost irrelevant; within the

city limits, the effect is universal like in Minneapolis. 77% of existing residential land in

Portland is zoned for single-family homes, and like San Jose, all cities in Oregon have

urban-growth boundaries that combat sprawl (Grabar, 2019; Bliss, 2019). Anderson and Fahey

of the Sightline Institute argue that a “years of careful work by a robust coalition” ultimately led

to the success of the legislation (Anderson and Fahey, 2019). The local NAACP chapter

supported the bill as a step to rectify the historical segregation imposed by single-family zoning

in Oregon, mirroring the similar racial justice focus of the Minneapolis legislation (Grabar).

Portland Public Schools supported it as well, due to its implications for reducing school

segregation. With the support of many community groups and organizations, the state legislature

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moved ahead in undoing single-family zoning as a step toward housing justice among other

causes.

Oregon’s upzoning push also began with an ADU ordinance in 2017. That legislation,

however, included several restrictions that have since been amended by HB2001. The original

ADU bill allowed individual municipalities to impose occupancy requirements

(owner-occupation) and off-street parking allotments (Peterson, 2019). Parking minimums in

particular represent the same kind of exclusionary zoning practices that single-family zoning is

well known for. In simplifying the requirements for ADUs alongside its general upzoning, the

2019 law both built on the 2017 legislation as a stepping stone while further dismantling the

exclusionary zoning practices statewide. Like in Minneapolis, previous ADU legislation played a

role in the way the government would later confront single-family zoning.

3.3 San Jose’s Response to Single-Family Zoning

Even as task force members examined the policies of Minneapolis and Oregon, it is clear

from our research that San Jose’s leaders are set on implementing less stringent reforms towards

the single-family zoning designation. This position is most evident in the words of San Jose’s

Citywide Planning Manager, Jared Hart, who described the approach towards “gentle density” in

the future of San Jose. In this section, we will first examine the jobs to housing ratio frequently

cited by civic leaders as being the primary measure of success or deficiency in providing suitable

housing for the future. Then, we will analyze the application of “opportunity housing” within

San Jose in comparison to similar programs previously described in Portland and Minneapolis.

Finally, we will outline discrepancies in attitudes on opportunity housing and touch upon how

San Jose is addressing spatial inequality through affordable housing programs.

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 21

3.3.1 Jobs to Housing Ratio

Across many interviews and reviews of government documents, one statistic comes up

time and time again - the ratio of jobs to housing units. This statistical measure, which is “the

simplest indicator of the relationship between jobs and housing,” seems to be a common gauge at

determining how successful San Jose is in handling the housing crisis (Association of Bay Area

Governments, 2015). The 2015 San Francisco Bay Area State of the Region report, which has

data available from 2002 to 2011 on this specific statistic, has Santa Clara County as second only

to the City and County of San Francisco in having a great imbalance towards more jobs than

residential units. In this figure, Santa Clara County as a whole is noted to have a 1.404 ratio of

jobs to homes, suggesting a large number of workers commuting from beyond the borders of the

county. Zooming into the situation within the municipalities of Santa Clara County, a 2017

report by Silicon Valley at Home notes how San Jose does have a lower Jobs to Housing

imbalance than its neighboring cities. At a 1.25 ratio, the city seems to fare much better than the

neighboring City of Santa Clara with a 2.58 ratio, and significantly better than Palo Alto with a

3.54 ratio (Silicon Valley at Home, 2017). However, with San Jose taking a much larger amount

of land area than the other cities studied, the problem of single-family zoning comes back into

play. San Jose simply has an incredible amount of physical area zoned to single-family zoning,

and with a large city boundary, the jobs ratio is bound to be set back by the plentitude of homes

that are simply possible to be built within the city’s comparably much larger city limits.

3.4.2 Accessory Dwelling Units

This idea leads back to the focus on densifying the city, which was both stressed by

Kerrie Romanow, the Director of Environmental Services at the City of San Jose, and Jared Hart,

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 22

the Citywide Planning Manager for the City of San Jose. In both interviews, both city leaders

acknowledged that the implementation of accessory dwelling units (ADUs), referred to as

“opportunity housing” in city planning documents, serves as a major part of the drive to densify

the city. With 96 percent of the city being zoned towards single-family zoning, accessory

dwelling units seem like the obvious choice in increasing housing stock and density without

radically transforming neighborhoods (Lopez, 2019a). This rationale, which Jared Hart describes

as “gentle dens[ification],” is used to “preserve the character of the neighborhood, while still

allowing for some intensification and density.”

As a result of this mindset, San Jose has a markedly different implementation plan for

accessory dwelling units than those of Portland and Minneapolis, both cities that have embraced

more laissez-faire policies. As opposed to Minneapolis’ complete abolishment of the category of

single-family zoning and Portland’s minor regulations outside minor building requirements, San

Jose has a variety of specific restrictions (Esau, 2019). According to progress made towards

revisions of the San Jose General Plan as of February 27, 2020, in addition to limiting ADU

construction in historic areas and enforcing certain design standards (which are implemented in

Portland as well), San Jose has an explicit limit of “up to four units per parcel” with an

allowance of “parcels within 0.5 mile[s] of Regional or Local Transit Urban Village

boundar[ies]” (Esau, 2019; City of San Jose Planning, 2020). Although the first limitation may

not be truly damaging to the goal of densification, the second leaves much to be desired. With

this geographic limitation, it is touted in the report that still, “25% of all ‘Residential

Neighborhood’ [areas] citywide” are eligible for accessory dwelling units. Although this seems

like a large proportion of the city, in reality, it only covers a small subset of households and isn’t

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 23

enough to improve access to affordable housing or truly increase density. Additionally, given the

high upfront costs of building an ADU, even with the city’s touted “ministerial,” or

“over-the-counter” approach to providing permits, there is simply no compelling market

incentive for residents to build ADUs at a rate that truly allows for greater access to housing or

major changes in density (City of San Jose Planning, 2020).

This disconnect leads to the oblique truth that needs to be acknowledged: Although

ADUs are the beginning of a push towards following broader movements nationwide towards

densification, ADUs are not an efficient, nor sufficient method of providing affordable housing.

This point seems to be one of contention between various groups we interviewed. Jared

Hart, as a part of planning, echoed sentiments expressed in government documents highlighting

that ADUs are a part of the housing equation, however never explicitly touting their

affordability. Jacki Joanino as a part of the city’s housing department noted that ADUs are “not

really deeply affordable” and are “maybe a little bit less [in price] than what you would get

from… a new apartment.” Bluntly, Kerrie Romanow from Environmental Services noted that the

city is not focusing on increasing affordable housing, citing the city’s progress in the repeatedly

cited jobs to housing ratio. She also notes that surrounding cities should be the main drivers in

increasing affordable housing in the area, as the city has mostly done its part.

Between these three departments, there is a clear divide on what constitutes affordable

housing, and to some ADUs aren’t a significant part of that picture. According to the 2019

Quarter 4 Housing Market Update, 419 permits [were] issued in 2019” for ADUs, which was an

increase of “190 permits issued in the calendar year 2018” (City of San Jose Housing, 2019). In

total that year, “2,411 permits” were issued for housing in San Jose, with “853… for affordable

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 24

housing.” In the given statistics, ADUs and affordable housing are categorized differently. This

representation suggests that although ADUs are, indeed, not a major part of the push for

affordable housing, backing both Kerrie and Jackie’s claims. So, if ADUs are just a small part of

the push for more affordable, equitable housing, it’s useful to explore the other major program

being piloted by the city: urban villages.

3.3.3 If Not ADUs, then What?

Described as “walkable, bicycle-friendly, transit-oriented, mixed use settings that provide

both housing and jobs,” Urban Villages are spread out around San Jose centered around areas

with “good access to transit and other existing infrastructure facilities” (City of San Jose

Planning, Building, and Code Enforcement, 2020). These projects as noted by Sam Liccardo,

who would later become mayor of San Jose, in a YouTube video on urban villages, centers

around the idea of “retrofitting” San Jose to be centered around “people” not “cars” (Beasley,

Calderon, et al. 2013). These projects, which allow for higher density housing and developments

to be built in areas that are filled with traditionally low-density developments certainly increases

density, nevertheless fall short of truly bolstering the city’s efforts to reach RHNA goals. Beyond

this common problem shared by ADUs, urban villages have another problem: being

disconnected from community involvement.

A notable recent example of this fault is the development of an urban village at the corner

of “14th and Santa Clara Streets” (Lopez, 2019b). Although the described urban village brings

“space for retail use with 550 to 800 units of housing,... community leaders… [feel] the project

fails to provide ...amenities,” like “retail and commercial space[s]” that are “walkable” (Lopez,

2019b). Instead of being an addition to the community, as Terry Christensen, a political science

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 25

professor at San Jose State University in the article notes, the project could end up being another

“deadened facade” (Lopez, 2019b).

This specific phrase brings up a problematic feature of urban villages. Even with all of

the assistance these projects bring to the housing stock of the city, they are markedly

disconnected from the neighborhoods they are set back against. This is most evident with the

imagery of the urban village in the article, which consists of tall, modern structures set back

against the background uniformity of endless suburbs. In effect, the buildings serve as a “facade”

for density, sewing physical and social divides in communities and hiding the fact that there is

still a large legacy of single-family urban sprawl beyond the immediate parcels set against major

thoroughfares.

Another telling story of this property of urban villages being a “facade” of equitable

affordable housing access and density is the story of the development of urban villages in

Mayfair, a section of East San Jose. As Matthew Gustafson of Somos Mayfair noted in our

interview, areas in Mayfair that are currently being treated as a sort of unofficial urban village

plan have a “form-based code” that allows for “projects [to be] approved with less oversight,

[therefore being] harmful to the community.” In connection to this point, Gustafson notes that

even if there is a “great urban village [at the end of development],” it’s powerful to think about

“who gets to be there when it’s done in twenty years-- probably not the people who are living

there now.”

3.3.4 Affordable Housing and Spatial Inequality

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 26

Both urban villages and ADUs are woefully inadequate in increasing density and

addressing affordable housing needs. However, there is hope that these projects are simply the

beginning of the process of truly pursuing a density-focused development plan for San Jose.

In addition to these two goals, spatial inequality is simply not a topic that is thoroughly

addressed by these projects. Although they may provide some affordable housing, the quantity is

far from enough to prevent the outflow of low socioeconomic individuals and minorities from

gentrification. With the city failing to reach regional housing needs allocation goals consistently

since 2015, the city’s efforts simply seem to validate Kerrie Romanow’s point that San Jose

simply isn’t focused on affordable housing (City of San Jose Housing, 2019). This disconnect,

combined with the lack of community engagement in the creation of major projects like urban

villages, allows spatial inequality to continue to thrive, therefore preserving historical patterns of

racial segregation. In the next section, we will explore this exact phenomenon on how inaction

over time has led to the unfortunate continuity of spatial inequality.

4. Reality of Spatial Inequality

Today, San Jose is identified as one of the most diverse “among the 100 largest metros,...

with 35% of its population white, 31% Asian, 28% Latinx, 3% two or more races and 2% black”

(Team San Jose, 2020). Despite its diversity among the entirety of the metro, a legacy of spatial

inequality carries on into what San Jose is today. Neighborhoods across the city are split between

race and socioeconomic status, creating sharp divides in civic representation, service quality, and

perceptions of community. Latinx residents who have lived in San Jose for generations are

clustered in rapidly gentrifying neighborhoods in East San Jose facing pressures from the

ever-increasing power of the high socioeconomic status, often white, tech workforce. Black

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 27

residents are often left out of the picture of the history of San Jose, never gaining a foothold in a

city of over a million despite wider representation in other regions of the Bay Area. In this

section, we will explore how historical ties to race and class have had an influence on the

demographics of the population inhabiting the San Jose community today. First, we will analyze

the impact of redlining upon the modern-day distributions of race and income. Then, we will

explore the spatial distribution of San Jose’s affordable housing, ADU, and Urban Villages

programs and how they are mostly within non-white, lower-income neighborhoods. Finally, we

will analyze specific patterns we found within this data, specifically noting the constant

exception of Willow Glen and the racial and socioeconomic divide along State Route 87 and

Almaden Expressway.

4.1 Redlining and Modern Spatial Inequality

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 28

The above graphic shows the HOLC map of San Jose, which shows how redlining was

implemented within the city limits at the time. Among the factors used for determining the

creditworthiness of tracts in HOLC maps was race, which was explicitly highlighted by HOLC

employees filling in the “infiltration” field on their reports when referring to minority

communities (Nelson, Winling et al. 2020). The D11 tract was shaded red and given the grade

“D,” due to a purported “infiltration of Slavs, Portuguese, and Mexican[s],” and the description

of the C4 tract, shaded yellow and given the grade “C”, references “infiltration of inharmonious

races, a threat” (Nelson, Winling et al. 2020). This affected the outcomes of the populations,

mainly Latinx and Black families, who inhabited these tracts as they were unable to get loans

and subsequently own their homes. These “inharmonious” areas represented places with high

concentrations of African Americans, as the HOLC actively targeted this community (Nelson,

Winling et al. 2020). Given the negative classifications of non-white populations in these

communities, it is important to note that most of the HOLC’s red and yellow designations are

concentrated in the impoverished, primarily Latinx neighborhoods of East San Jose, pointing to

the legacy of redlining in San Jose.

Within the HOLC maps, East San Jose in its modern location is not explicitly

represented, yet there were already visible patterns of Latinx communities settling on the east

side of the city. Notably, in the HOLC Maps, notes for tract D10 describe the area as having “the

largest concentration of Mexicans in the community, [with a] lower stratum of Italians &

Portuguese, [making the area]... from a racial standpoint..., extremely undesirable” (Nelson,

Winling et al. 2020).

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 29

Today, Tract D10, which lies centered around 31st Street and San Antonio Street, is still

in a largely Latinx area with an income range that lies far below the incomes of areas

immediately west of this intersection. However, within this tract are no longer the “one or two

acre garden tracts” described in the HOLC report (Nelson, Winling et al. 2020). Instead, there

are countless single-family homes, a golf course, and most notably, the U.S. 101 freeway, cutting

through the area of the tract. This large freeway cutting through the community serves as a

permanent reminder of the spatial inequality produced by racism pervading development in the

1960s. As freeways around the nation were built, communities of color were often selected for

demolition as opposed to white neighborhoods, due to the fact that white communities often had

the power and representation to fight against the destruction of their neighborhoods. The

continuity of the Latinx majority lower socioeconomic demographic of what was once the D10

tract in the HOLC reports, combined with the history of black and brown communities being torn

apart by freeway construction highlights the perpetual struggle of spatial inequality Latinx

communities had to battle in San Jose. Although over eighty years have passed since the HOLC

designation, East San Jose remains hugely disadvantaged compared to the rest of the city.

To further exemplify the persistence of spatial inequality, it is also powerful to look at a

tract that has remained white and higher-income from the times of the HOLC maps. Among the

various tracts of the city, Tract B7, centered around Pine and Lincoln Avenues within what is

now the neighborhood of Willow Glen, serves as a significant example in this parallel story. In

the HOLC remarks, it is noted that Tract B7 has “homogenous development, [is] zoned

single-family residential [with] no social or racial hazards” (Nelson, Winling et al. 2020). As a

result of this glowing description, the area was rated positively by the HOLC employees. Today,

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 30

this area is still overwhelmingly white with an average income of $125,938 for areas north of the

intersection and $166,544 for areas south of the intersection (Kreider, Energy Justice Network et

al. 2020). In addition, the area is still majority white, with it being one of the only areas within

the San Jose city limits with a substantially high concentration of white residents.

The persistence of racial demographics and economic statuses within these HOLC tracts

up to today reveals how spatial inequality from the past still has a strong grasp on determining

modern neighborhoods’ properties and quality of life. In the following sections section, we will

explore in detail how spatial inequality is further perpetuated today through the spatial

distribution of the city’s ADU and Urban Villages programs, which, like the construction of

freeways, avoids majority-white high socioeconomic status neighborhoods in favor of

majority-minority lower socioeconomic status neighborhoods.

4.2 Government Programs

Prospects in the housing market are shrinking for low-income Bay Area residents.

Affordable housing has become so concentrated to certain neighborhoods given that “median

rents in 70% of Bay Area neighborhoods in 2012 [that] were affordable to families making the

equivalent of $100,000 today”, but only “28% of [these] neighborhoods were affordable to the

same families in 2018” (Murphy and Bartley, 2019). This simple statistic of diminishing

affordability highlights the veracity of spatial inequality in the programs that are aimed at

improving access to affordable housing. Specifically in San Jose, general affordable housing

distribution, ADU distribution, and urban village distribution highlight the inaction of the city in

combating patterns of spatial inequality in its quest for improving density and reaching RNHA

goals.

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 31

Before analyzing these patterns in detail, it is important to acknowledge that, just as is the

case nationwide, distributions of nonwhite residents tend to correlate greatly with lower incomes

within San Jose. This is most evident in the concentration of lower-income tracts in

Latinx-majority East San Jose. Conversely, this is also evident in the census tracts for Willow

Glen, which are predominantly white and higher-income compared to surrounding areas. The

following two maps show each distribution across the city limits:

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 32

After acknowledging this aspect of the city’s demographic patterns, an analysis of the

distribution of affordable housing yields similar results. Low-income and minority

neighborhoods are often the sites of affordable rental housing units.

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 33

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 34

For the distribution of the city’s accessory dwelling unit and urban villages programs, the

results are also very close to the distribution of low-income and minority residents.

Such clustering of these programs points to the idea of “gentle density” that was

described by Jared Hart, which effectively prioritizes neighborhood and sprawl preservation in

white areas. The purpose of this method is to ease projects into the communities that might be

most opposed to any affordable housing projects. As a result, these projects are barely being

implemented in majority-white neighborhoods, and are instead concentrated in the

neighborhoods with families of low-income backgrounds, thus perpetuating a long-standing

history of spatial inequality. Such concessions accentuate the city leaders' priorities in choosing

between assisting low-income minorities worst affected by the housing crisis and keeping its

wealthy residents that serve as a major tax base appeased.

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 35

An example of this is the disparity of the goals of urban villages and the intentions of the

communities they intend to serve. As Matthew Gustafson of Somos Mayfair noted, “the urban

village plan is meant to cultivate more vibrant, sustainable, walkable, localized neighborhoods,

but in Mayfair, the urban village plan had no community input.” Urban villages in effect are

intended to serve loftier city goals towards increasing density, and by putting these projects

within neighborhoods of lower socioeconomic means and lower representation, there is less

pushback from unrepresented community members. Overall these distributions point towards

white populations continuing to be at the forefront of government officials’ minds when building

new developments in these already highly concentrated low-income neighborhoods.

4.3 Patterns of Spatial Inequality

In corroborating these claims of serving white populations and perpetuating existing

patterns of spatial inequality, two notable patterns are apparent within our analysis: the constant

exception of Willow Glen and the division of the city’s socioeconomic and racial distribution by

State Route 87 and Almaden Expressway.

The marked contrast of the distribution of projects between Alum Rock and Willow Glen

shows the great disparities between the city governments’ attention towards both communities.

Willow Glen, as mentioned before, is an area that has been historically white and to this day

continues to be. This area is barely touched by these affordable housing projects as a way to

“preserve the character” of these neighborhoods, obscuring the fact that it is done to avoid

disrupting the historically white roots of these neighborhoods while expanding this homogeneity

to other neighborhoods where low-income families are at risk of being displaced from their

homes. In Alum Rock there is a large portion of affordable housing, but that seems to be the case

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 36

for East San Jose neighborhoods or east of Route 87. Even when Urban Villages are less

common given the space and time that is necessary to hoist them up, they seem to be more

common in areas like Alum Rock changing the landscape of those neighborhoods.

Another pattern that stood out was the divide of low-income and minority tracts by State

Route 87 and further to the south, by Almaden Expressway (the red line in the map below).

Beyond the Census maps, this division is similarly visible in the distribution of mobile home

parks.

In the above map, the city’s mobile home parks are positioned nearly exclusively east of

State Route 87 and Almaden Expressway, where there are concentrations of low-income

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 37

families. Given that “about three-quarters of San Jose mobile home parks are considered

residential neighborhoods, allowing the development of typical suburban subdivisions with up to

eight homes per acre, according to city documents,” advocates are pushing for protections for

mobile home parks since affordable housing is already difficult to find in San Jose (Hansen,

2020). Certain classifications of neighborhoods like these allow for easier demolition of certain

mobile home parks to accommodate those of higher-income status by implementing “high-rise

apartments, luxury condos and townhomes” in a landscape where they are so few (Hansen,

2020). Overall, the placement of mobile home parks and affordable rental units have worked to

protect and maintain higher-SES majorities in certain areas of San Jose by ensuring the exclusion

of the demographics that inhabit these housing types and thus maintaining historical patterns of

spatial inequality.

5. Looking Forward

After conducting our literature review and research, banning single-family zoning in San

Jose remains an interesting, complex idea. As our interviews with Kerrie Romanow and Jared

Hart exemplified, keeping the “vibe” or “character of the neighborhood” intact remains a strong

qualification for determining future plans within San Jose’s extensively zoned single-family

zoned areas. When we positioned questions relating to abolishing single-family zoning to both

city leaders, a general consensus remained clear within the city government that single-family

zoning is here to stay. Although Jared Hart noted that he “could foresee in the future, [that] it is

possible, that the scope could be expanded depending... [on] direction from city council,” there is

a clear direction from city planning that this “gentle density” approach to single-family zoning is

the predominant path forward. With the urban villages and ADU programs being unable to reach

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 38

RHNA goals consistently and with a lackluster spatial distribution of affordable housing beyond

minority and low socioeconomic status areas in San Jose, spatial inequality remains strong in

San Jose’s landscape.

Although 175 years has passed since the opening of the New Almaden Mine, the “Devil”

of racism that haunted the mineshafts deep below San Jose still lingers, manifesting itself within

modern continuities of segregated neighborhoods, single-family zoned neighborhoods defined by

NIMBY high-SES individuals, and notable instances of discrepancies in gauging community

input (Pitti, 2003).

As San Jose moves into future revisions of its General Plan, as San Jose 2040 turns into

San Jose 2060 and San Jose 2080 and beyond, time will only tell if there will be a marked

difference for someone flying into San Jose. Will San Jose’s permanent landscape be defined by

its comparably minuscule central business district in a sea of trees and single-family zoned

homes? Will there be a true push to densify to change the “character” of San Jose away from the

wide suburban streets, manicured lawns, countless parking spots, and sparse shopping centers

that have defined the area since the 1950s? Even if these changes occur, will the city be able to

directly address its persistent spatial inequality?

Our research shows that these changes won’t be occurring anytime soon, and it won’t

start to happen without addressing the underlying “Devil” of racism within the context of every

major development project in the city’s future.

Jumamoy, Nadel, Portillo, and Shields 39

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