David Vatz
davidvatz.bsky.social
David Vatz
@davidvatz.bsky.social
Housing Advocate @prohousingpgh.org. YIMBY. Urbanist. World Traveler.
Governor @governor.ca.gov needs to sign SB79 to help save our democracy! Blue states refusal to build housing is killing our country and ceding our future. Gov Newsom can help stop this by signing SB79.
September 30, 2025 at 4:34 PM
Renters are much poorer than homeowners. By a pretty wide margin. If you're going to implement yet another program intended to help homeowners, it ought to be very tightly targeted at people who have the greatest need. Otherwise your just soaking poor renters to benefit wealthier homeowners.
March 10, 2025 at 9:52 PM
Our mayor wants to pass citywide IZ, which will massively impact employment for our tradespeople. We're already doing worse on pandemic recovery than any similar metro, and Gainey wants it to get worse. We're losing to Columbus, Cincinnati, Cleveland.
January 18, 2025 at 12:55 AM
Austin, TX has somehow managed to see 7% year over year rent drops. And they did all of this without IZ mandates, and somehow convinced RealPage to not raise their rents! Anyone know what their secret is?
January 5, 2025 at 3:59 PM
It's wild to me that this administration hates people from outside of the city so much that they now accuse them of causing the housing crisis here. I would love to have a mayor who actively encourages folks to move to our great city.
December 27, 2024 at 9:37 PM
Originally a 30-townhome development, now planned as a 19-townhome development in Polish Hill (downsized to avoid IZ). Now the neighborhood is trying to kill it all together with a bad-faith historic designation for this building. Link in 🧵
December 17, 2024 at 4:07 PM
Build more, prices go down - Atlanta edition
December 12, 2024 at 7:00 PM
One of the most expensive markets in the country (San Jose) has reduced it's IZ from 15% to 5%. And yet, Mayor Gainey is still proposing 10% in Pittsburgh. IZ has really been so thoroughly discredited at this point, it's becoming laughable. (H/T @jake-wil.de)
December 10, 2024 at 4:06 AM
Yep, it is him
December 9, 2024 at 6:59 PM
YIMBYs - let's build more housing to fix the housing shortage.

Anti-YIMBY leftist - but what if we just murdered developers instead?
December 5, 2024 at 5:36 PM
Sad about your favorite local business closing? Help solve the problem by fighting for more housing and more neighbors in your area! Say no to NIMBYs and yes to more housing. www.reddit.com/r/pittsburgh...
November 26, 2024 at 10:43 PM
City Planning: We held a public engagement meeting at 7pm last Tuesday night and 80% of the people who came to the meeting told us they didn't want these new apartments in their neighborhood! Therefore, we have blocked the project.
November 26, 2024 at 4:30 PM
This is so painful
November 23, 2024 at 8:37 PM
Gameday with Pitt Volleyball in Winston-Salem #H2P
November 23, 2024 at 12:08 AM
I was proud to represent @prohousingpgh.org today at the groundbreaking for 27 new homes in Mt. Washington. Here's the statement I gave about why Pittsburgh must build more housing. bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/n...
November 21, 2024 at 3:49 AM
I strongly urge City Council to not support the passage of Ordinance 701, which would require council approval for any group homes of 8 or more disabled individuals. Statement below in conjunction with @prohousingpgh.org
November 16, 2024 at 2:09 AM