EDITOR’S NOTE: Letters and Op-Ed pieces submitted by readers do not express the opinions or views of the Clovis Roundup and should not be interpreted as endorsements.
This is in response to the opinion–editorial in the Nov. 14 edition that insists that Clovis must follow Fresno’s rent control plan which gives complete control of our property to some group of nameless, faceless, unaccountable bureaucrats. The author, Ashley Norton, writes very well and is obviously well schooled, but is seriously miseducated on socialism, free market capitalism and the way the real world works.
His/her attitude is that anyone that owns more property than they personally need – and will share some of it with others – is an “evil landlord” who oppressed someone to gain the property, and intends to oppress poor and unfortunate others by providing substandard living conditions at too high prices. They need to be controlled by government to be “fair,” according to some bureaucrat’s personal definition of “standard” and whatever the renter can afford to pay.
The real value of anything is completely determined by the natural process of “supply and demand.” The nicer the property, the higher the rent. It is a free agreement between renter and owner. The only thing that governmental action does is decide that places are substandard, and demand that the owner make cited improvements without charging for their cost. The owner has only two choices: pay the extra cost and lose money, or take the property off the market. People are forced to live on the streets like in San Francisco. It is amusing that the fact given to prove that Fresno’s action was justified was that all, 100 percent, of the properties inspected by the Fresno code department in the first year were found “unsatisfactory.”
What did you expect them to find to justify their existence?
To conclude, the author uses the terms “proactive” (good) and “reactive” (bad). May I suggest that they have it backward. A “proactive” (bad) action is where government decides that we ordinary citizens are too stupid or greedy to do what they want us to do and so they do it for us, (for our own good) whether we want it or not. A “reactive” (good) action is where government reacts to an actual problem and is asked to do so by the citizens who are willing to pay for the cost.
-Chuck Stersic
Resident of Auberry and Clovis