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Utah Senator and public lands opponent Mike Lee thinks selling off federal public lands can help solve the West's housing affordability crisis. He filed legislation on Friday to allow state and local governments to buy parcels of federal land at a reduced price to address housing supply and affordability in their areas. The bill includes stipulations regarding housing density and barring the development of second homes.
But it's unclear whether Lee's bill would actually help address housing shortages, even if it passes. Lee says that federal land ownership in the West is driving the affordability crisis, but land availability is not the main factor driving up home prices in the West. Rather, it's a lack of housing stock caused by a sustained decline in home building following the Great Recession.
This is not Lee's first attempt to liquidate federal public land. He's long railed against federal public lands as a drain on Western states, despite clear evidence to the opposite. In 2018, he put forth a similar proposal to his current legislation. And in 2019, he suggested transferring control of federal public lands to states, so that they could be sold off or managed in order to fund public education.
While some Western lawmakers have supported Lee's radical ideas—Utah Senator Mitt Romney and Wyoming Senator John Barrasso are co-sponsors of his new bill—they haven't gained much traction in the past. Perhaps that's because Congress doesn't understand Western issues, as Lee likes to say, or perhaps it's because they see his legislation for what it is: a thinly-veiled attack on public lands.
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We often hear about environmental justice, social injustice... Flat-out racism is what the local perception is about these long-standing issues, almost 80 years in some areas. Lack of cleanup, lack of funding, lack of emphasis to prioritize cleanup.”
