Hi everybody! Welcome to Spud Underground, a weekly, curated jumble of my favorite news stories. Squatters are living rent-free in the news this week, so they make up the bulk of this issue, which got me thinking about apartments.
Landlords might be one of the most hated groups of people in history, going back to when land was literally owned by lords. We’ve all had bad experiences, from lost security deposits to stuff not getting fixed. Then there’s the psychological aspect of living on someone else’s property. The tenant-landlord relationship is most people’s first experience of haves and have-nots. It just isn’t that the landlord gets all that money for doing dick, then with rent going up in every city, it’s very easy to resent your landlord.
I don’t hate landlords, but I get it. What I don’t understand is the hatred of apartments themselves. I’ve experienced this a few times where I’m out with friends and see a building going up- “Yuck, more apartments. I’ll bet they cost $3,000 for a studio.” Why do you care? You don’t have to move in. I’m excited to see apartment buildings, because it means supply is rising to meet the demand. In other words, urban rent is going down.
I’d be bothered if the apartments were being built over bulldozed restaurants and stores, but they aren’t. These are new buildings being put on vacant land. I’d also be upset if they were rushing the development and building soulless concrete blocks, but these buildings actually look pretty cool. Look at these things:
In fact, I wish that there were more apartments going up around Boise. The Boise rent problem comes from people moving in faster than we can build. The city has been very quick to approve cookie-cutter subdivisions to the south but not so keen on apartment buildings in the center. That’s great for a work-from-home family of five, not so much for city-slickers who like to go outside and do stuff. We’re finally getting apartments, the buildings look cool, and rent has gone down a lot since I moved here. I’ll take it.
I’ve got some Spud updates before we get into the news. I’ve decided that I’m just going to call this newsletter Spud Underground. Consider it the third volume of the magazine you know and love. Second, we’re doing this on Wednesdays now, so that I have more time for walking slowly on Tuesdays. Lastly, I got rid of ads on spudmedia.net (I’ve been adblocking my own site so I didn’t even realize they were still up). Ads are gay and stupid and they’ve made me roughly one cent, so fuhgedaboudit. If you want to support this webzine, buy my book. If you already did, leave a review. If you don’t want to do either of those things, go jump off a bridge.
Stay dangerous, my friends.
-RJ
VIPERHAWK: WITNESS PROTECTION
A hilarious sci-fi adventure! Miguel Murillo is a smuggler for the Irish mob, and if these witnesses don’t get to a distant planet on time then there will be war…
SQUATTERS, SQUATTERS EVERYWHERE
Three weeks ago, a woman in New York was arrested for changing the locks on people squatting in her house. She’s not even a landlord, she inherited the house and was trying to sell it when two dudes moved in and replaced the whole front door. They weren’t paying rent and they didn’t have any paperwork, but in New York, squatters become legal tenants after 30 days. That makes it illegal for the owner of the home to change her own damn locks.
Squatting isn’t new in New York. I remember looking into the squatting scene when I was a young punk trying to move there. There’s a whole culture to it, and some of those squats have been active for decades. This mostly takes place in abandoned buildings, where the owners live in Saudi Arabia or something and don’t care what’s going on. Squatting in an active rental property, and then being handed the keys, is a new thing entirely.
One bill on the books in New York seeks to bump that 30-day period up to 45, which is a big help, I guess. ABC7 New York’s take is that this increase will “prevent squatters from having rights!” What? A right to someone else’s house? I didn’t see that one in the Constitution.
Jesus, just look at how whiny this article is! It goes on to praise New York for having tough laws that protect “honest tenants” from “greedy landlords.” Oh, those poor honest squatters, who are just trying to catch a break! Oh, the greedy landlords won’t give them free rent!
These squatters aren’t always good guys, by the way. If you’re so separated from society that you’ll just steal someone’s house, odds are that you’re doing other nefarious things. Squatting usually comes with drug addiction, drug dealing, neighborhood theft and even murder. Take Nadia Vitel for instance. She found some “honest tenants” in one of her apartments, so they bludgeoned her to death, stuffed her in a closet, and stole her car. Is that a fair punishment for owning property?
New York is a shithole, we get it. This is happening everywhere. Florida just passed a law very similar to the one that article was griping about. Here’s an blog post from a property management firm in Texas giving squatters a step-by-step guide to getting a free house. At the end of the article they have some advice for landlords: “We’ve got lawyers, give us a call.” California’s eviction courts are so backed up that people have created private companies to evict squatters for you, because the police either can’t or won’t.
The government is taking property and giving it to someone else. The only way to get it back is through an expensive and long court process. Isn’t this just wealth redistribution? What more evidence do you need that we’re living in a socialist country?
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AIRPORTS IN HELL
Oakland, California is so dead that they can’t even get people to layover at the airport. San Francisco International is right across the bay and far better. Luckily, Oakland has a plan to attract visitors- an easy plan that doesn’t require fixing up the city. They want to change the airport’s name to San Francisco Bay Oakland International Airport and trick travelers into flying there.
Oakland claims that this is about raising public awareness of their proximity to the Golden Gate City. San Francisco says that it’s going to cause confusion for people flying into the area. San Francisco has even threatened to sue Oakland if they go ahead with this identity theft. Here’s the punchline- SFO is located in San Bruno, 13 miles south of San Francisco. The bay cities are just like bickering hobos.
HOT CHICK OF THE WEEK: @hannatesonee
This girl seems like a lot of fun. I want to ride on her plane, even if we’re going to Oakland. Check out her account for more fun flight attendant stuff.
ALBUM OF THE WEEK: DISCOVERY BY ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA
I dipped into this album after hearing Don’t Bring Me Down on the radio. I’ve always loved that song, and it occurred to me that I’d never listened to anything else by ELO, so I pulled up 1979’s Discovery and gave it a spin. It’s awful. It’s extremely discoey, outrageously corny, and just plain boring. The Diary of Horace Wimp is the worst thing I’ve ever heard. Don’t Bring Me Down is the lone gem on this record, and you have seven tracks of crud to get through first. Stay away from this album. ■
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