How Can California’s Builders Win Back the State?

In the postwar era, California's leaders didn't just talk about building. They built. Under leaders like Governor Pat Brown, a coalition of united labor unions, business leaders, and developers united behind an audacious vision that led to the world's greatest public university system, a water project spanning 700 miles, and new cities in the fastest-growing state in the nation.

Today, California politicians still invoke the state’s legacy of bold building, but without any of the results. In response to concerns about unaffordable living new Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas promised to "renew the California Dream" and "focus on building more housing" to kick off the current legislative session. He’s not alone. Remember Newsom's bold campaign promise to build 3.5 million new homes as governor? That was 2018. Five years later, we're still building the same number of homes as when he took office.

California politicians have perfected a peculiar art: grand promises of progress that somehow always preserve the present. Our leaders give lip service to change but lack the conviction to make it happen. They've mastered a playbook of bold, progressive gestures that satisfy their base while preserving the status quo. Like a tech company that only ships press releases, they excel at announcements but never deliver products. Breaking this cycle won't require better ideas or stronger arguments. It requires building a coalition with enough political muscle to make inaction more costly than action.

Politics is About Power

My old boss Bradley Tusk taught me a brutal truth about politics. Politicians will do whatever keeps them in office. Nothing else matters. Not data. Not white papers. Not moral arguments. Only threats to their reelection break through.

The status quo isn't maintained by accident. Every housing restriction, every permit requirement, every environmental review exists because organized interests made it politically dangerous to remove them. As John Collison says, "the world is a museum of passion projects." He was talking about the built environment, but it applies here. Our legal code is a museum of political victories. Each regulation a trophy from some group's successful pressure campaign.

This is why complaining gets us nowhere. California has plenty of solutions. We know the types of policies required to solve our housing crisis. But ideas without power are like wind without a turbine, raw energy that dissipates without impact.

This is my biggest concern about the Abundance Movement, the hottest movement in moderate Democratic circles laying out a policy vision for material abundance. The movement will have a mainstream moment when Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson's new book drops this month, offering Democrats a compelling vision of progress through building. I hope it becomes the left's new gospel of growth. But without organized political muscle behind it, the Abundance Agenda will become just another set of talking points co-opted by a Democratic majority that prefers talking about change to delivering it.

California is Ripe for Political Reform

California's political parties enable the status quo. Aside from the Arnold years, Democrats have dominated the state for over 25 years, creating a political monopoly with no accountability. Even Democratic leaders admit the problem. When the former speaker was asked about Democrats supermajority, he confessed "it's easy to become complacent and not do thoughtful legislating."

Meanwhile, the California Republican Party has shriveled into irrelevance, more focused on MAGA talking points and congressional ambitions than offering a serious alternative vision for the state's future.

This political vacuum creates an opportunity. Right now, 60% of Californians believe the state is heading in the wrong direction. They don't need convincing that things are broken, they need an alternative.

It wasn’t always like this. California's reputation for dysfunction is relatively recent. Pat Brown proved what a pro-growth movement could achieve. We can build one again.

Today's builders need to create a similar coalition. This means building grassroots support, funding candidates who champion growth, and creating real political costs for those who obstruct progress. The tools and tactics might be different than in Pat Brown's era, but the fundamental challenge remains the same: translating pro-growth ideas into political power.

GrowSF as a Model for a Statewide Reform Coalition

We don’t need to look to the 1950’s to see that reform coalitions can work. In San Francisco, the poster child of California’s political mismanagement, GrowSF has quickly proved a pragmatic coalition focused on quality of life issues can win, even in a progressive stronghold.

GrowSF was founded in 2020 and quickly transforming San Francisco politics by uniting moderate voters around practical basics like public safety, housing affordability, and good schools. They’ve achieved remarkable success in a short amount of time, revealing voter’s appetite for a common sense movement amid political dysfunction.

In 2024 alone, they helped elect a moderate mayor, flipped key supervisor seats, and passed crucial ballot measures for housing and public safety. San Francisco now has a moderate majority on the County Board of Supervisors and Board of Education. More importantly, they have now built a political operation to continue fighting for common sense policy in the future.

GrowSF offers a Blueprint on how to push for reform statewide. Their strategy is straightforward but powerful:

1. Unite around “kitchen table” issues: Housing costs, public safety, quality education, and good governance

2. Build a moderate majority: Appeal to working families and suburban voters tired of high taxes and poor public services

3. Create political consequences: Use recalls and ballot measures when politicians ignore voters

4. Control the narrative: Center the story on the failed status quo

This model can work statewide. California's suburbs and inland communities also face the same cost-of-living crisis as San Francisco. Voters statewide are watching their children move to Nevada and Texas and feeling the squeeze of housing costs and failing infrastructure. A similar political message could resonate across the state.

Building for California's Future

The window for change won’t stay open forever. Working families, the natural constituency for change, are fleeing to low-cost states. Every U-Haul that crosses the border carries a potential vote for change.

The state is also aging rapidly. By 2030, we'll have fewer than 3 working-age adults per senior, down from 4 in 2020. We risk sinking deeper into dysfunction with a voter base too old or too wealthy to care about cost-of-living reforms.

This isn't just about housing or infrastructure, it's about whether California will remain a place where ordinary families can build a future.

The path forward is clear:

• Build coalitions focused on pragmatic governance

• Support and elect representatives who will champion growth

• Create real political consequences for maintaining the status quo

• Unite diverse groups around shared goals for California's future

The next chapter of California's story won't be written by politicians making empty promises. It will be written by citizens willing to organize, fight, and build the political power needed for real change.

California can build again. But first, we need to build the coalition to make it happen.