https://www.siliconvalley.com/2024/12/31/developers-affordable-housing-lobbied-lawmakers/ > Developers who have reaped millions of dollars from an affordable housing program for middle-income renters with sometimes little-to-no discounts from market rents have spent hundreds of thousands on lobbying and campaign donations in recent years in a bid to keep lawmakers from imposing regulations. > The expenditures represent a fraction of the $32 million the California real estate industry as a whole spent on lobbying the state legislature and the executive branch in the past three years. But they helped the industry stop a bill seen as a threat to their business model, in which state-established finance authorities issue bonds to buy property to turn into income-restricted housing, and private developers collect fees from brokering the deals. Because they’re owned by a public agency, the buildings are exempt from property taxes, the savings from which are, theoretically, used to set rents at lower levels.