Billionaire backers of new California city reveal map and details of proposed development

By JANIE HAR
Associated Press

RIO VISTA, Calif. (AP) — The company backed by Silicon Valley billionaires that for years stealthily snapped up more than $800 million worth of rural land for a new walkable, affordable and green city between San Francisco and Sacramento now needs voters to embrace the idea.

Jan Sramek, the former Goldman Sachs trader spearheading the effort, spoke Wednesday to journalists and supporters about his vision for building a community on what’s now mostly farmland.

His California Forever company needs approval from Solano County voters in November to bypass protections put in place in 1984 to keep agricultural land from being turned into urban space.

“We think Solano County has the potential to be an amazing success story in California at a time when California badly needs a win, to stick it to all of the other states,” said Sramek, who was born in the Czech Republic and now lives in Solano County.

The campaign plans to post the ballot initiative on its website later Wednesday. County elections officials must prepare a ballot title and summary before the campaign can begin collecting signatures. They need signatures from 13,000 county voters to place the measure before voters in November.

Wednesday’s presentation was the most detailed look yet at the community envisioned by Sramek and his billionaire backers — philanthropist Laurene Powell Jobs, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen and others.

They picture 20,000 homes for 50,000 residents between Travis Air Force Base and the tiny city of Rio Vista, with rowhouses and apartment buildings between three and six stories high within walking distance to jobs, schools, bars, restaurants and grocery stores.

Eventually the city could grow to 400,000 people, the group says, but only if it can create at least 15,000 jobs that pay above-average wages. The plan calls for $400 million to help Solano County residents and air force base families buy homes in the proposed community, among other investments.

Veteran Democratic consultant Bill Carrick said the group faces a tough challenge winning over local residents at a time of high voter cynicism, hostility between political parties and inevitable doubts about wealthy outsiders coming into the community.

“People are wary of the unknown,” Carrick said. The proponents “have to make Solano County voters believe this is better for them than the current status quo. People are suspicious about ballot measures – otherwise, more of them would pass.”

Spending money to promote their ballot measure won’t be a challenge for the group. Carrick guessed it could cost at least $10 million. Sramek declined to state how much he is prepared to spend. He said the campaign was not about money, but about tapping into a genuine desire from local officials and residents to build a sustainable community.

“I’m going to make this happen no matter what,” he told reporters after the presentation.

Created in 2017, California Forever has purchased more than 78 square miles (202 square kilometers) of farmland in Solano County. Sramek made his pitch at town halls around the county last month. But the new wave of transparency has not quieted critics who have been skeptical of the project since the mysterious land-buying spree began years ago.

On Wednesday, critics of the project held signs outside a veterans memorial building indicating they had been shut out. They spoke to reporters about their fears that Solano County does not have the roads and other infrastructure to accommodate growth.

“I do feel that they’re marketing to the younger generation, and they’re throwing out a bunch of financial incentives to make it look bright and shiny to those people,” said Rio Vista resident Roxanne Stiles-Donnelly, who is retired from nursing.

But inside, artist and musician Radhika Lynette admired the drawings displayed by the campaign. The Vallejo resident left San Francisco 17 years ago in search of cheaper rent and Victorians. She loves the passion behind the project.

“Who hasn’t dreamed of a place where it’s more sustainable? We’re kind of behind on that in America, I feel like. The walkable element is really a big deal,” she said.

Beyond its agricultural use, the land California Forever is targeting is in the heart of the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, a sensitive estuary home to many fish and wildlife species. The Delta is also the center of California’s already over-taxed water supply system. Critics of the project worry adding more development will further harm the already threatened ecosystem.

Sramek said he decided to build from scratch because the needs are too great to simply build within existing cities, as some critics have suggested. He said construction costs are too high to make affordable housing work and there’s not enough land to meet the demand for jobs and homes.

Solano County is the smart location to build in a region desperate for more housing, especially affordable homes for teachers, firefighters, police and other municipal workers who make a city run, said proponents.

The region is also attractive to military contractors, agriculture technology and construction tech companies seeking to innovate, said Gabriel Metcalf, head of planning for California Forever.

Metcalf said if “we can provide companies with a pathway to growth, we think we’ll get some major employers creating jobs here that would otherwise go out of state, to places like Texas.”

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Associated Press staffers Terry Chea in Rio Vista and Michael R. Blood in Los Angeles contributed to this report.