NIMBY: Not in My Back Yard. Part of an ongoing collection of articles exploring some of the many ways that a worldwide affordable housing crisis is opposed.
It’s been more than a year since we reported a new and intriguing defence with which NIMBY-ites weaponize their community battlements. We thought there were no big guns left that could keep the unwashed out of local neighbourhoods.
Wrong. The toney town of Woodbridge, California has proposed kitty-cat recruits for their vigilant anti-poor-folks militia. Big kitty-cats. Mountain lions, in fact.
We can only assume that these battlement volunteers would not need to be specially trained to avoid mauling the upper-middle and upper classes. Botox averse?
But what about the lean (and presumably mean) lower class folks who arrive as a result of some sordid affordable housing proposal for the town? Presumably they’d be somehow scent-marked on arrival as succulent snacks for prowling pumas.
Anyway, all has been dependent upon Woodside being certified as a Mountain Lion Sanctuary — one welcoming rather than rejecting big cats bused in from other communities (those fed up with providing citizen chew-toys for aggressive, oversized kitties).
Alas, California’s Attorney-General has turned down the certification request. Woodside’s already-existing mountain lion population (occasionally spotted in them thar hills) will have to either bite the dust, or lurk in wait to bite lower and lower-middle class day workers out-and-about cutting grass or cleaning pools.
Meantime, any pesky proposed neighbourhood affordable housing projects will have to be battled using some other approved NIMBY method. Read/watch more at NBC Bay Area: Woodside Reverses Housing Decision After AG Denies Mountain Lion Sanctuary Claim
