In Davis, we often pride ourselves on progressive values: sustainability, equity, inclusion. But the data is telling a different story. Beneath the surface, Davis is quietly exporting its workforce, worsening regional traffic and pollution, and deepening inequality—all while refusing to build enough housing to support its own largest employer, UC Davis.
Recent analysis of UC Davis transportation and employment data, the City of Davis’ 2017 State of the City report, and UC travel surveys paint a sobering picture: Davis has become increasingly dependent on a vast commuting ecosystem. Meanwhile, its own workforce—and their families—are being forced to live elsewhere.
The numbers are striking. Only 16% of all UC Davis employees live in Davis. Even among those based directly at the Davis campus, just 31% live in the city. In other words, the majority of people who make UC Davis run—professors, medical staff, researchers, service workers—must commute from places like Sacramento, Woodland, Dixon, and West Sacramento. Davis reaps the benefits of their labor but refuses to house them.
Davis refuses to build enough housing to support its own largest employer, UC Davis.
The city’s unwillingness to permit enough new housing isn’t an isolated local preference—it has wide-ranging consequences. Every day, thousands of commuters pour into Davis and the Sacramento region to work. This commuting pattern has cascading costs: increased carbon emissions, regional traffic congestion, road wear, and strained public infrastructure. And, critically, these are costs Davis largely externalizes onto its neighbors.
A 2021 research brief from the UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies, Transit Blues in the Golden State, offers critical context. The UCLA researchers found that California’s growing housing shortage is pushing lower-wage workers farther from job centers, increasing commuting distances and undermining public transit systems.
Historically, lower-income workers lived closer to their jobs, but today, soaring housing costs have severed that connection. As UCLA’s Evelyn Blumenberg and Hannah King explain, “Workers are less likely to both live and work in cities with expensive housing.”
Davis is a textbook case. It is a high-opportunity, job-rich city refusing to build sufficient housing for its own workforce, forcing workers into long commutes that harm both the environment and public transit systems.
We see this reflected in data on student enrollment at DJUSD.
School enrollment in Davis Joint Unified School District is in decline—a trend the district attributes not to a lack of children, but to a lack of affordable housing for families. This is no coincidence. When employees and families are priced out of living near their workplaces, they enroll their children elsewhere. That starts a vicious cycle: fewer students means less state funding for schools, which in turn threatens school closures and diminishes Davis’ ability to attract new families.
If Davis continues on its current path, the consequences will ripple beyond individual households. A shrinking school district hurts the city’s long-term vitality. An overreliance on commuters undermines environmental sustainability goals. And pushing the workforce outward, while hoarding the benefits inward, erodes any claim Davis has to progressive leadership.
Perhaps the most damaging aspect of Davis’ housing stagnation is its impact on equity.
It is overwhelmingly lower-income workers, early-career academics, service staff, and marginalized groups who bear the heaviest burden. They are the ones forced into the longest, most expensive commutes—spending more of their time, wages, and energy simply getting to work.
Meanwhile, those who can afford Davis’ limited and expensive housing stock enjoy the benefits of living near UC Davis’ economic engine, subsidized by the labor of others.
As the YIMBY movement and UCLA researchers both argue, land-use and housing policies are not neutral. They shape access to jobs, education, transportation, and opportunity. Cities that restrict housing growth near jobs and schools exacerbate inequality, entrench privilege, and push working-class families farther and farther to the margins.
Davis is no exception.
The impact of Davis’ housing policy is not confined to the city limits. It is regional.
By refusing to build, Davis increases the housing burden on surrounding cities like Woodland, Dixon, and Sacramento—places now struggling to absorb workers and their families without proportionate tax bases or infrastructure planning. Housing pressure spreads outward, fueling sprawl, increasing vehicle miles traveled, and straining public transit systems designed to serve denser, job-rich cores.
The Transit Blues report starkly highlights this trend: as commutes lengthen, transit ridership declines, greenhouse gas emissions rise, and transportation equity erodes. Cities like Davis that externalize their housing needs contribute directly to these systemic failures.
And contrary to popular perception, adding jobs without adding housing is not an environmentally sustainable path. Sprawling, car-dependent commuting patterns are among the most significant contributors to climate change in California today. True sustainability requires building housing where the jobs are—not exporting the problem elsewhere.
There is no silver bullet for housing and transportation challenges. But there are clear, evidence-based steps Davis can take.
First, the city must update its housing policies to align with its jobs base. That means permitting more multi-family housing, student housing, and family-oriented developments in Davis—not simply pushing new residents out to neighboring towns.
Second, land-use reform must be paired with equitable transportation planning. Improving local public transit options, building walkable neighborhoods, and encouraging housing near job centers are all critical to reducing commutes and emissions.
Finally, Davis must recognize its regional responsibility. UC Davis is not a remote outpost—it is the heart of the city. A truly sustainable Davis will plan not just for the privileged few who can afford to live here today, but for the workforce, families, and communities who make the city function.
Davis cannot indefinitely maintain its reputation as a progressive, sustainable city while refusing to share in the responsibilities it generates. We can either build a community that matches our values—or continue exporting our workforce, our pollution, and our inequities.
The choice is ours. And time is running out.
David says: “Even among those based directly at the Davis campus, just 31% live in the city.”
As I recall, Matt pointed out that this percentage is actually an increase from prior years. Also, whatever happened to UCD’s plan to build housing for its staff on campus?
Is UCD’s Davis campus currently increasing the number of its employees in any substantial manner?
Do all Davis-resident workers simply “walk” or “bike” to work on campus? Is that the assumption being made, here?
Do UCD employees who live outside of Davis have partners who work elsewhere?
But perhaps the biggest question is why any current or future worker would move to Davis, when they can get so much more for their money by living “near” UCD, with an extremely-easy and low-impact commute down Highway 113, for example? Thereby avoiding driving “through” Davis entirely? While also sending their kids to DJUSD schools if they desire, and without paying DJUSD parcel taxes?
And what’s to prevent, for example, Sacramento-based workers from moving to new housing in Davis? Especially if one or more of in the household work in Sacramento or elsewhere? How many Davis residents ALREADY WORK in Sacramento or somewhere else outside of the city (but not on UCD’s Davis campus)? (I understand that some of UCD’s “Sacramento-based” workers live in Davis, for example. But the majority probably work for state agencies.)
Ron O
First, I’ll point out again that as resident in Woodland with no discernable connections to Davis, you are not a valid stakeholder in the discussion about Davis policies.
Where did Matt ever say that the percentage living in the city was an increase? I’ve been working with the data from the Census and UCD over the last 20 years and it has been a constant decline. The problem is that the vast majority of current UCD employees commute into town. It doesn’t matter where their partner (if they have one) lives, especially if BOTH of them are commuting from where they live. We’re giving them the OPTION of living in Davis by making housing more affordable.
Again and again, you seem to claim that you believe in markets, but when confronted with the fact that Davis housing commands a significant price premium due to the higher demand by home buyers to live here, you go silent. This singular fact refutes your point that people may want to live somewhere cheaper. Fundamental economics says that you are absolutely wrong. Most people want to live in the community where they have their children in school. There’s much more than just sitting a classroom-there’s extracurricular activities, school and nonschool based, and just being with other parents and students. (I’m wondering if you ever had children and maybe you missed this missed this important experience.)
And the important part of building new housing is to design specifically to hit a lower price point. That housing is less likely to be desirable to wealthier commuters to Sacramento. If Village Farms is built in it current configuration, it will appeal to commuters. We need to change that.
“Beneath the surface, Davis is quietly exporting its workforce, worsening regional traffic and pollution, and deepening inequality—”
The totality of the transportation of the entire state is the issue. Like, this is all on Davis? That’s how we end up with D-CAN thinking: well-off guilt, it’s all our town’s fault, and it’s on our town to fix it. All while the developers smile.
I mean, how about Elk Grove, or any other f-ing suburb. They export everyone and create VMTs. Should Elk Grove ‘create enough jobs to support its residents’ ? That argument makes as little sense as yours.
How about the Governor forcing telework employees back to commutes? More VMTs. Why is it all on Davis? Because the developers get to build, and the net effect on north-state VMTs will be miniscule at best. Even if you build from here to Woodland you are still going to have people commuting, you’re just going to have more people. During the pandemic we actually saw a dip in air pollutants, because people weren’t moving around. Maximizing home offices and telework is a significant solution. But our Governor is more concerned with downtown Sacramento and his Presidential run.
“And, critically, these are costs Davis largely externalizes onto its neighbors.” Bad bad Davis. But Davis CAN! . . . feel guilty! And loosen up it’s bad bad rules. So we can Build . . . well you know the drill.
“The UCLA researchers found that California’s growing housing shortage is pushing lower-wage workers farther from job centers, increasing commuting distances and undermining public transit systems.”
So much wrong here. Those people in the far-away suburbs the developers built aren’t going to go away, and are still going to commute. And increasing commuting distances doesn’t ‘undermine public transit’, it increases the demand. The problem is a pathetic lack of investment in high-capacity commuter lines that reach from where dense pockets of people live to where they want to go. But those who want to live in a house far away can do so more than ever with telecommuting, but this increases their VMT when they travel for any other reason. My point is, making this all about Davis is insane, and making one point about commute patterns in Davis can’t control all the other factors due to the freedom that people have to live where they want within their means to do so.
“And pushing the workforce outward, while hoarding the benefits inward, erodes any claim Davis has to progressive leadership.”
A better solution is to let the claim erode and then not sweat it.
“Perhaps the most damaging aspect of Davis’ housing stagnation is its impact on equity.”
Perhaps . . .
” . . . those who can afford Davis’ limited and expensive housing stock enjoy the benefits of living near UC Davis’ economic engine, subsidized by the labor of others.”
Do other cities have an annoying local blogger who tries to make people feel guilty for living in their town and taking on the burden of collective economics/politics/land-use?
“Cities that restrict housing growth near jobs and schools exacerbate inequality, entrench privilege, and push working-class families farther and farther to the margins. Davis is no exception.”
So let’s pave paradise and put up a parking lot. Oh that’s right, we have parking MAX-imus now, so let’s just fill the parking lots we have, along with all the street parking.
“The impact of Davis’ housing policy is not confined to the city limits. It is regional. By refusing to build, Davis increases the housing burden on surrounding cities like Woodland, Dixon, and Sacramento—places now struggling to absorb workers and their families without proportionate tax bases or infrastructure planning.”
And the impact of the region on Davis is also regional.
“By refusing to build, Davis increases the housing burden on surrounding cities like Woodland, Dixon, and Sacramento—places now struggling to absorb workers and their families without proportionate tax bases or infrastructure planning.”
Maybe they should fix their tax bases and infrastructure planning. And again I love :-| the implication that these cities are ‘struggling’ because of Davis ‘having jobs’. Centralized planning (communism) could help with all of this! Just ask the Revolutionary Student Union! :-|
“Housing pressure spreads outward, fueling sprawl, increasing vehicle miles traveled, and straining public transit systems designed to serve denser, job-rich cores.”
More people increases VMT, as do stupid projects like destroying oaken hills south of Folsom, or destroying open ranch lands east of Fairfield, or destroying Lagoon Valley. And nice try on public transit, but our public transit may ‘serve cores’, but it’s anemic.
“The Transit Blues report starkly highlights this trend: as commutes lengthen, transit ridership declines, greenhouse gas emissions rise, and transportation equity erodes.”
“Cities like Davis that externalize their housing needs contribute directly to these systemic failures.” This is so bizarre. How about those cities that externalize their jobs needs? Again, support the RSU! :-| Perfect housing/jobs balance in every city through revolution! And if not, a full jobs program for progressive bloggers :-|
And no, longer commutes does not make transit ridership decline. On, new, longer commutes, to areas further out and less dense, if the person can’t telecommute, then there will be on average lesser tendency to use public transit, already anemically low.
“There is no silver bullet for housing and transportation challenges.”
Actually there is. Massive investment in our regional rail corridor. With frequency, high-speeds and connections, the housing density around stations will naturally follow, and having these farcical ‘balances’ with jobs and housing as a solution, will become unimportant. Instead, you advocated for housing without transportation solutions, more sprawl (cuz that’s what’s actually gonna happen) and parking maximums which make cars difficult to use and provide no alternative to the auto.
“But there are clear, evidence-based steps Davis can take.”
Well, as long as the evidence is evidence-based :-|
“First, the city must update its housing policies to align with its jobs base.”
Nope.
“That means permitting more multi-family housing, student housing, and family-oriented developments in Davis—not simply pushing new residents out to neighboring towns.”
All as infill, too! Ha what a joke! Sprawl, by any other name.
“Second, land-use reform must be paired with equitable transportation planning. Improving local public transit options, building walkable neighborhoods, and encouraging housing near job centers are all critical to reducing commutes and emissions.”
I’ll agree with that, but you’re putting the cart before the horse, and I believe your cart is carrying contraband.
“Davis will plan not just for the privileged few who can afford to live here today, but for the workforce, families, and communities who make the city function.”
Good luck with that.
“Davis cannot indefinitely maintain its reputation as a progressive, sustainable city while refusing to share in the responsibilities it generates.”
But it continue to clown itself that way.
“We can either build a community that matches our values—or continue exporting our workforce, our pollution, and our inequities.”
I hate to break it to you, but all the other cities are exporting their workforce, their pollution, and their inequities on us. We have our own demographics, but we aren’t some pillar of awfulness and no need to hang our heads in shame for being the #1 most awful city in the Central Valley. There’s still Fresno to look down upon.
“The choice is ours. And time is running out.”
And in 40 years, the choice will still be ours, and time will still be running out.
Unless someone drops a nuke :-|
“And in 40 years, the choice will still be ours, and time will still be running out.”
And it will still be called a “crisis”.
Alan
I don’t know what you’re proposing. Continuing to muck along isn’t working so we need a change of direction. You are at the center of one of those efforts to increase rail use. In Davis, we have an opportunity, like we did in the 1960s and 70s to influence the debate. The state’s building code is based on what Davis created and has had an even global impact. I’ve done that led to closing a nuclear power plant and decommissioning 4 dams on a major river along with other efforts that others said couldn’t happen. This is another one of those.
This article continues the misconception that the City of Davis and the University of Davis are part of the same economic (and political) system. They’re related but not the same and have their own self interests.
I don’t really agree on that Keith
LOL…well when you put it that way with so many facts….how can I disagree with you?
On the other hand:
Politically: there’s these things called city limits. In them the city of Davis dictates policy. On campus? UCD dictates.
Economically: UCD is mostly locally tax exempt….even UCD offices in city limits are mostly tax exempt. How’s the city of Davis’ economy doing? That medical center UCD opened up sure is helping out the city isn’t it? Oh wait…it was a bunch of dorms on their campus that’s impacting the city…..undergrad students….not science/medical professionals.
They are heavily intertwined. UC brings billions of dollars into the local economy each year. Sure there are differences in governance that reflect self interests but they are not in separate silos.
LOL…yeah….BILLIONS OF DOLLARS into the local economy. Man inflation must be worse than I thought if the city’s current state of decay is what BILLIONS OF DOLLARS into the local economy is worth.
But since you’re the one that stated BILLIONS OF DOLLARS to the local economy. Please show me these BILLIOINS OF DOLLARS. Show me how they get into the local economy (the city of Davis). Show me specifically. I’m willing to listen to reason if you can reasonably explain your answer.
Last I heard UCD had a $2 billion/year budget. Much of that money goes to employee compensation that flows through the local economy.
And UCD’s $2B budget doesn’t magically flow into the city of Davis. Simplistically listing UCD’s budget is poor economic analysis.
LOL….HOW does it flow into Davis’ economy? Davis’ decaying retail sector? It’s decaying entertainment sector?
According to the UC-wide economic impact report, UC Davis related spending in Yolo County (I know) is around $1 billion per year factoring in student and employee expenditures, university purchases, and construction projects. UC Davis is by far the largest employer in the city of Davis and that doesn’t include the retirees from the university many living off healthy pensions.
While it is true that UCD is tax exempt, there is still sales tax from student and faculty spending, TOT, and property tax from new housing construction and commercial developments.
“While it is true that UCD is tax exempt, there is still sales tax from student and faculty spending, TOT, and property tax from new housing construction and commercial developments.”
Property tax doesn’t cover ongoing infrastructure and services costs.
SALES TAX??? From what? Boba tea, burgers and burritos? I mean Target is about the only retail game in town? Davis can’t even support a decent movie theater….or an office supply store…
The half cent sales tax increase loan is supposed to generate $11 million per year, so I’m not sure why the wise crack
A fiscal impact analysis estimated that UC Davis-related activities contribute approximately $11.6 million annually in tax revenue to the city, encompassing sales taxes from various transactions
David, you sound like Donald Trump, who says “I have heard …”. You are a journalist. If you have seen that study, then provide a source and (ideally) a link to the report.
I suspect that report is about as real as the City’s 2022 Audited Financial Statement, or the 2023 Audited Financial Statement, or the 2024 audited Financial Ststement.
Keith E
For whatever reason, you refuse to acknowledge the obvious. Davis and UCD are intimately intertwined economically and they are fiscally tied. That more than 20,000 UCD-affiliated people live in Davis is just one fact. UCD is at least as tied economically to Davis as DMG Mori and TechNip. And the 50% housing price premium is driven by the presence of the university and its highly educated staff that enhances the value of the school district. There are differences in self interest, but like DMG and TechNip those interests are not at odds with each other.
Let’s make it simple. Davis didn’t build Covell Village so Woodland built Spring lake. The result is longer commutes for UCD workers who bought in Woodland but would have bought in Davis if Covell Village had been built.
That is factually untrue.
Spring Lake was planned prior to the vote on Covell Village.
But DJUSD’s pursuit of Woodland students is likely impacting WJUSD’s decision to not build a sufficient number of schools to serve Spring Lake and the technology park (with added 1,600 housing units during its “move” from Davis.)
Spring Lake has a new elementary school in the subdivision and a new high school nearby.
I’m aware of that, but the elementary school was not designed to accommodate the entire (4,000-unit?) neighborhood. Originally, there were plans to build at least two new schools. The other site(s) are now covered with housing, instead.
And so far, the school district is (also) declining to build a new school at the planned technology park (which will have 1,600 housing units).
It’s a sore subject among some parents in Spring Lake. There is a local, organized group of parents who have been lobbying the school district for years – unsuccessfully.
In their communications to neighbors, they note that one of the reasons that the school district isn’t building another school is because some of them send their kids to “other districts”.
But WJUSD, like DJUSD, also doesn’t want to close down a school in the older section of town, where enrollment is declining. (That’s another factor.)
As a side note, one of the factors that WJUSD apparently cites in keeping its older, crumbling schools open is “equity”, from what I’ve heard.
In other words, the newer parts of town are probably “whiter” than other parts of town (and therefore less-justified in receiving investment).
I wonder what it does to equity within WJUSD’s system if “whiter” students are primarily the ones leaving town for an education? In other words, consisting of a higher percentage of white students commuting to Davis, vs. those “left behind” in Woodland?
I ask because “equity” seems to be a concern on the Vanguard.
Spring Lake is much expanded from its original concept. Ron G is correct here.
As for Woodland’s problem, wouldn’t the obvious solution be for those who want to live in Davis and send their students to school there to be able to afford to buy in Davis? It’s clear that the price premium created by the excess demand is what is preventing them from moving to Davis.
Guess who doesn’t bear the burden of infrastructure and services support because those people don’t live in Davis?
On the other hand Woodland is smart enough to have enough retail to capture tax revenue from these people to pay for those services. There’s still no realistic or likely economic plan for how the city of Davis will pay for servicing Covell Village or any other housing units added to the city.
They will do it with supplemental taxes. They will appear on property tax bills as parcel taxes and CFD’s.
You really think more taxes are going to be the answer…or even accepted…..that’s funny.
The people of Davis won’t be asked to pay these supplemental taxes. They will be levied on the buyers of the new homes. The new construction will be encumbered with a CFD before parcels are subdivided. This is what happened at the Cannery where the owners/developers voted the CFD in before any parcels had been purchased by future home owners. Certainly you must be aware how this works if you were in the industry.
This entire new housing doesn’t pay for it’s services argument is based on a multi decade old study that I question because new owners pay higher property taxes than people with long tenure in their homes, communities have learned how to mitigate the prop 13 shortfalls with CFD’s, HOA’s and parcel taxes. It was probably true when Prop 13 was young but I haven’t seen any recent studies that show it is still true. Maybe you know of one?
Ron, you clearly don’t know the history of the Cannery CFD. The City actually gets no (zero, nada, 没有任何) net revenue from the Cannery CFD. The annual proceeds from the CFD are 100% used to pay the principal and interest due each year from the 30 year loan the City took out in order to give the developers of The Cannery a windfall $10 million supplemental, after the fact, unjustified payment not included in the development agreement.
In addition, when the CFD expires, the City is on the hook for the repair and replacement of the capital infrastructure (roads, parks, etc), with no revenue to cover those costs.
Ron Glick said … “ This entire new housing doesn’t pay for it’s services argument is based on a multi decade old study that I question because new owners pay higher property taxes than people with long tenure in their homes”
Ron, here too you don’t know what you are talking about. The 2009 fiscal study done by CFO Paul Navazio for the Wildhorse Ranch development was indeed the first such study that showed how (A) the recurring expenses of new development exceed the recurring revenues, and (B) the recurring revenues do not have any provision (dollars) for the end-of-useful-life repair/replacement of the project’s capital infrastructure (roads, paths, parks, public structures, etc).
The updated parameters and results of that kind of financial analysis have been completed and made part of the public record numerous times, the most recent being within the last 30 days on April 2, 2025. That analysis found that the only way for the project to get to break even, the City would (1) need to pay for 68% of the new Fire Station included in the project proposal, and (2) have no dollars available to cover the end-of-useful-life repair/replacement of the project’s capital infrastructure (roads, paths, parks, public structures, etc).
Matt
There’s no reason to prepay future replacement of infrastructure at the end of its life. That would be imposing a tax on current residents for the benefit of future residents. In fact, current residents in a new development would have to double pay, both for their current infrastructure and the future infrastructure. That’s why we use debt financing for investments so the costs can be spread to future users in roughly equitable shares of benefits.
And as for the Prop 13 perspective, the subsidy actually runs the other direction from new residents to long time residents who are not paying their fair share of community costs. The underfunding from property taxes is a serious issue that enhanced inequity.
Richard, the whole concept of Impact Fees is to accomplish exactly what you are arguing against. Impact fees are like tolls … you pay for the privilege of using the infrastructure. The developer pays the impact fees and then embeds that cost in the initial purchase price of the home. The City places the impact fees proceeds into a restricted account, only using the restricted funds when repair replacement of the capital infrastructure is needed. When the initial owner sells the home, they recoup what they have paid as impact fees from the new owner. As a result they do not pay for the infrastructure twice. Ideally, when a house sells the seller should have an impact fees proceeds into settlement prorated payment so that the restricted account is replenished by the amount of usage is in number of years from their date of purchase until their date of sale.
That way the municipal jurisdiction will not find themselves with an unfunded balloon expense for which they have no money to cover.
Right now, new single family houses in Davis pay a development fee of over $80K to cover infrastructure costs.
That is correct Richard, but the City does not put its Impact Fees revenues into a restricted account awaiting the expense that the fee is matched to. They treat those dollars as spendable cash in the current period on expenses that don’t relate to the reason/justification for the fee. As a result, when the expense comes due there is no cash available to pay for the expense. It is a Ponzi Scheme pure and simple.