A New Generation of Politicians Is Showing That When It Comes to Housing, the Personal Is Political

A little over 20 years ago, Cesar Zepeda was a newly minted graduate of California’s Contra Costa College and looking for a place to live somewhere around Richmond, the East Bay community he’d called home since emigrating from Mexico as a child. In what seems—today at least—like an unusual move for a 22-year-old, Zepeda decided he wanted to buy rather than rent a home and set out looking for one, the epitome of the American dream. "It’s pretty funny," says Zepeda. "I didn’t know what I was doing." What ensued—the difficult search; the travails of setting up house; the experience of living in a newly developed corner of one of America’s most housing-challenged metropolitan areas—would eventually lead Zepeda into political life as a Richmond city council member.