Mostly Hispanic?

JohnnyWalker123 says:
Palo Alto has a population of about 66,000. So 400/66,000 = 0.6% of Palo Alto’s population.

It’s like a token black at country club. A cute little trailer park with maybe 30 Hispanic males 18-32.

JohnnyWalker123 says:
…
Here’s a more cynical reason why affluent residents may have opposed new apartment developments. Putting in new apartments would tend to increase the housing supply, which would bring down the real estate values of existing residents. The trailer park, however, was the equivalent of undeveloped land because, realistically, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs don’t live in trailer parks.

I’ve now added that story to the Forum, allowing our angry commenters a fresh opportunity to denounce Palo Alto, Hispanic immigration, and myself

I’d like to take a moment to denounce Palo Alto.

It should be ashamed of it’s lack of diversity. I will now compare it’s demographics with Brigham City Utah:

White & Asian, Palo Alto: 88%
White & Asian, Brigham City: 86%

Hispanic, Palo Alto: 6%
Hispanic, Brigham City: 11%

Black, Palo Alto: 2%
Black, Brigham City: 1%

It has too few Hispanics, which are necessary for the economy.
It is located in California which is 38% Hispanic. Palo Alto is 6% Hispanic.
That is one-sixth the California rate.

It has the lowest Hispanic percent in it’s region.
Let’s take a drive up Silicon Valley and visit each city and list its Hispanic percentage:
1. San Jose, 33%
2. Santa Clara, 19%
3. Sunny Vale, 19%
4. Mountain View, 46%
5. [***] Palo Alto, 6% [***]
6. East Palo, Alto 65%
7. Menlo Park, 18%
8. North Fair Oaks, 38%
9. Redwood City, 39%
10. San Carlos, 10%
11. Belmont, 12%
12. San Mateo, 27%
13. Burlingame, 14%
14. Millbrae, 12%
15. San Bruno, 29%
16. South San Francisco, 34%
17. San Francisco, 15%

Now lets return to San Jose and drive up on the other side of the bay:
1. San Jose, 33%
2. Campell, 18%
3. Los Gatos, 18%
4. Milipetas, 17%
5. Fremont, 15%
6. Union City, 23%
7. Hayward, 41%
8. San Leandro, 27%
9. Oakland, 25%

Palo Alto sticks out like a sore thumb at a mere 6%.

That is a lot of money to pay for a trailer park.

I wonder if Palo Alto gov’t would mind if I brokered a few more trailer park deals on their behalf?

Aren’t cities over a certain size required by law to provide a certain number of affordable housing units? Is Palo Alto somehow exempt from this requirement? Is my understanding incorrect?

21st century equivalent of a servants’ quarters. Oh, the greatness of the affluent Palo Alto residents!

Grumpy:

I think that depends on the municipality accepting particular federal or state largess. Take HUD $$$, dance to HUD’s tune and build some low income housing in addition to the gentrification project the city fathers really want to build.

“They say they won’t be able to stay in Palo Alto, let alone the Bay Area.”

The San Jose Mercury News is the newspaper I used to read, so it really irks me, to see how far the writing standards have fallen (a problem I was already well aware of a decade ago, alas). Seriously, the way that sentence should read, is as follows:

They say they won’t be able to stay in the Bay Area, let alone Palo Alto.

The Murky News version, is the sort of mistake I’d expect from someone if they were in the bottom half of a collegiate remedial English course, intended for incoming freshmen.

So that is 72500 dollars a person for a trailer home. A family of four is costing 290k. Wouldnt it be better to just buy them a house somewhere else? They could move somewhere else with that kind of money have a house free and clear plus 150k in the bank.

And by the way, median house in Palo Alto is $2,407,100. Meaning that just property tax on it is >$24,000. In comparison, the heroic act of paying for the trailer park is on average $220 per capita. With ~ 2.5 persons per household, it means that the cost of keeping their servants nearby amounts to about 0.5% increase Palo Altans’ property taxes. LOL! True American heroes.

Thanks, roo_ster. That makes sense.

Looking at the Buena Vista Trailer Park using Google Maps, you can see that it’s a pretty tiny trailer park, tucked behind a Jamba Juice. I was hoping that Zillow would reveal the prices of individual trailer properties, but it doesn’t. What Zillow does show is that 1450 sq. ft. (3-bedroom, 2-bath) houses (with no yards) next to the trailer park are worth $1.6 million apiece.