Free Cities

Although democratic socialism is a fringe position at one extreme of the political spectrum, voters in the country’s two largest cities have been open to electing its proponents. Zohran Mamdani won the Democratic primary for mayor of New York City in July and Los Angeles has four democratic socialists on ...

SACRAMENTO – The Free Cities Center at the Pacific Research Institute – the California-based, nonpartisan, free market think tank – today released a new booklet examining the failures in state and local wildfire prevention and response policies during this year’s devastating Southern California wildfires, offering practical reforms to make California ...

NEW BOOK EXCERPT: ‘PROTECTING CITIES FROM WILDFIRES’ Rethinking land use, housing and rebuilding regulations by Steven Greenhut | August 15, 2025 This is an excerpt from Greenhut’s new Free Cities Center booklet, “Protecting Cities from Wildfires: Improving California’s Land-Use, Water and Brush-Clearance Strategies.” After the Los Angeles wildfires began their ...

When Gov. Leland Stanford was inaugurated on Jan. 10, 1862, he didn’t walk to the state Capitol, nor did he take a carriage. Instead, he got into a small boat and rowed from the governor’s mansion to the Capitol steps. The Great Flood of 1862 is something that anyone interested ...

Free Cities Center director Steven Greenhut joins us to discuss his latest booklet focusing on the lessons learned from January’s destructive Southern California wildfires. They talk about policy-created problems on brush clearing, water, and land use policy that created a perfect storm and made fighting the fires more difficult, and ...

Cities should forget sport-subsidy hype and focus on basics By D. Dowd Muska   |  August 8, 2025 Three years to go. The opening ceremony for the Games of the XXXIV Olympiad is scheduled for July 14, 2028. And the men and women of the organizing committee are working feverishly ...

Cities including Spokane, Tulsa and Memphis support pre-approved designs to streamline small-scale builds, similar to what California has sought to promote with its Pro-housing Designation Program (PDP). But many question why California’s land entitlement process—getting the zoning, use and building design approval from local governments to comply with state mandates—often ...

The well-worn stereotypes of urban sophisticates versus country bumpkins took a hit in July when an up-and-coming French economist explained her latest findings in The Economist, a publication with more than 1.2 million subscribers globally and significant influence with policymakers in the English-speaking world. “Some groups are more likely than others to see the world ...

Teacher shortages, layoffs hit big cities and rural areas hardest​ by John Seiler | July 31, 2025 Even $24,764 average spending per student can’t stop the shortage of teachers in California. The number comes from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s budget proposal for fiscal year 2025-26, which began on July 1. For ...

Watch as Free Cities Center director Steven Greenhut sits down for a wide-ranging discussion with legendary San Francisco Mayor and former Assembly Speaker Willie Brown. In this candid interview, they discuss the challenges facing the West Coast’s urban centers including crime, housing, homelessness, education, and transportation. Brown also offers his ...