I grew up in Silicon Valley — San Jose, to be exact. Being a child in the 90s, I couldn't grasp the socioeconomic consequences of tech growth and its appetite for talented workers and real estate. The amount of disruption and gentrification this has ushered in over the decades is hard to overstate. That's why I'm a bit cynical about Google's forthcoming San Jose megacampus. The project, called "Downtown West," involves Google developing 80 acres of downtown San Jose. There will be 7.3 million square feet of office space to accommodate about 20,000 workers and thousands of housing units. Google says it'll be more like a neighborhood than a corporate campus, but we'll only know once it's complete — in about a decade. "Not including office space, Google will pay more than $1 billion for infrastructure features such as parks, walkways, and preservation of historic sites," Jennifer Elias wrote for CNBC, "It'll also pay approximately $265.8 million in land and infrastructure fees as well as $200 million in 'community benefits,' which includes anti-displacement and job readiness programs." A quarter of the 4,000 housing units will be designated as "affordable housing." My parents couldn't afford a home in the Bay Area when they were raising me, and that is only more true now. One of the biggest challenges for this development is not simply to offset the high earners it attracts for Google (which may displace the existing community), but to actively undo the gentrification that has occurred over the last two or three decades. Companies exist within communities and help to shape them, for better or worse and whether they want to admit it or not. I hope Google gets it right. | 
