By Molly Ball | Wall Street Journal
The video call that would host a parade of the Democratic Party’s most prominent officeholders began with a shirtless man in a barren room issuing this clarion call: “Welcome to Yimbychella!”
To the thousands who had tuned in, Armand Domalewski’s words required no explanation. For everyone else, what he meant was that the call was the equivalent of the hip Southern California music festival Coachella for the political movement known as Yimby—“Yes in My Backyard.” (As for the shirtlessness—Domalewski, a San Francisco data analyst, housing activist and former Democratic operative, appeared to be wearing American-flag overalls with nothing underneath—that wasn’t explained.)
The “Yimbys for Harris” convening attracted some 30,000 participants on a recent Wednesday night. It represented a breakthrough moment for the decade-old Yimby movement, which seeks to undo the zoning regulations and procedural requirements that make it difficult to build new housing. As home prices and rents have skyrocketed across the nation, experts have largely concluded that the problem is rooted in basic supply and demand—a lack of available housing at all price points. The Yimbys have spent years trying to force local policymakers to address the situation, battling intense headwinds from entrenched “not in my backyard,” or Nimby, interests.
