Former Santa Barbara City Councilman Brian Barnwell said housing and transportation should be linked in the discussion about the local housing crisis.

“It is not a single word. It’s not housing. It’s housing-transportation,” said Barnwell, in the latest edition of Santa Barbara Talks with Josh Molina “It’s a hyphenated word. Anytime we talk about housing, we need to talk about transportation.”

Barnwell, a commercial real estate appraiser, served four years on the City Council from 2003 to 2007. He previously was a city planning commissioner and was a key player in transforming Peabody elementary into a charter school.

Barnwell said that city needs to do an inventory of its own land, such as parking lots, and build the housing there, for its employees. He said some of the city land is being used “ineffectively.”

Click on the video below to watch the conversation from Barnwell’s Santa Barbara home.

“One of the first moves when we talk about housing is we need to do an inventory, and entire South Coast inventory,” Barnwell said. “You really can’t depend on the private sector.”

A car should not be the driving force in determining where to build housing, Barnwell said. He also urged people to resist their “nimbyism.”

“Everybody started somewhere,” Barnwell said. “Everybody’s family came from somewhere.”

In the podcast, Barnwell also said that he urges people who run for office to first serve on a commission so they can get a grounding in how governance works before sitting on the council.

District elections, in some cases, launch people into the job, but they may not be ready.

“Each one of the council members that we now have needs to actively encourage and support people within their district by appointing them to a commission,” Barnwell said.

The former councilman also talks about the leadership of former mayors Helene Schneider and Harriet Miller, and recalls the styles of some other council members, including Iya Falcone and Dr. Dan Secord.

Joshua Molina is journalist who currently writes for Noozhawk and teaches journalism at Santa Barbara City College and Cal State University, Northridge. He formerly covered politics and land use for the San Jose Mercury News. Santa Barbara Talks is an independently owned podcast where Molina looks to bring together voices from all perspectives to discuss and provide solutions to the challenges related to housing, education, transportation and other community issues. Subscribe to his podcast here and consider a contribution here.