Ezra Klein

But if you do it, that candidate you criticize is going to get a minute to respond and you are not going to get more time.

So strategize accordingly.

And to the audience, please hold your very much merited applause here until the end.

Candidates have not seen the questions here in advance, nor have any of the organizations that are co-hosting the event.

With all of that out of the way, let's get to the reason we're actually here.

Governor Gavin Newsom came into office in 2019 with a promise to build millions more homes.

And in the years since, dozens of pro-housing laws have passed, some of them written by heroic legislators in this very room.

And yet the number of new homes being built in California is basically the same as when Newsom took office.

Housing is a slow and hard problem to solve.

That some of these bills may just take time is true, but we've also seen that they will take leadership and courage, that even good laws that we need encounter resistance and headwinds along the way.

So all of you want to build more homes.

You all have detailed plans to do so.

So the question of tonight is what has to happen to convert these good intentions into homes that people can live in?

And how do we protect those in need or at risk in the meantime?

We're going to begin by taking on something you all identify as a problem, the very high cost of construction in California.

And Mr. Steyer, we're going to begin with you.

A RAND study found that the cost per square foot of constructing an apartment in California is over twice that of constructing it in Texas.

Why do you think that is and what would you do about it?

So we're going to come back to the city and county question, but I want to jump in on modular for a minute.

Modular housing has been promised and hoped for for a long time.