Oakland Assembly Member Buffy Wicks has fought to build more housing across California for nearly a decade. Now there’s a NIMBY — “not in my backyard” — showdown in her own backyard.
The burgeoning battle over a proposal to build 415 units on the site of a popular Trader Joe’s in Oakland’s Rockridge neighborhood is a cautionary tale about what Gov. Gavin Newsom has called California’s “original sin” — its failure for decades to build enough housing, which has created a crippling affordability crisis.
Rockridge, the North Oakland neighborhood where the average home price is $1.8 million, was long a poster child for NIMBYism. Even though 89% of Wicks’ district voted for Kamala Harris in 2024, and signs in front of many homes virtue-signal that “In this house, we believe in science” and “Black Lives Matter,” there is almost no affordable housing, and neighbors have long swatted away anything that violates the height limits along its College Avenue commercial corridor…