The New York Times revealed a group of Silicon Valley billionaires are behind the $800 million in land purchases, or about the size of two San Franciscos, around Travis Air Force Base in Solano County, California.
We previously covered the mysterious Flannery Associates, which has quietly amassed a staggering 55,000-acre farmland portfolio encircling three sides of the military base. The landowners weren't previously known until now:
Billionaire venture capitalist Michael Moritz, Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn co-founder, venture capitalist and Democratic donor; Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon, investors at the Andreessen Horowitz venture capital firm; Patrick and John Collison, the sibling co-founders of the payments company Stripe; Laurene Powell Jobs, founder of the Emerson Collective; and Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross, entrepreneurs turned investors. --NYT
Brian Brokaw, a representative of Flannery Associates, stated the investor group is mainly "Californians who believe that Solano County's and California's best days are ahead." He said the group will begin talking with Solano County leaders, residents, and Air Force officials next week.
ABC7 News I-Team learned Flannery Associates has purchased a total of 55,000 acres of dry farmland that have been acquired since 2018.
ABC7's Stephanie Sierra asked a local official: "Have you seen anything like this in your career?"
"No, I definitely haven't," responded Glenn Zook, Solano County's Assessor.
Zook continued, "We see a lot of investors. There's usually a target, a plan, but there doesn't seem to be that in this case, other than targeting the specific area, which happens to be around the Air Force Base."
One local rancher told the San Francisco Chronicle that Flannery Associates' buying spree "was like a hostile takeover ... it was Shakespearian, a 'Game of Thrones' kind of thing."
NYT said in 2017, one of the venture capitalists sent a pitch deck to potential investors, describing: "A chance to invest in the creation of a new California city."
As San Francisco implodes under the weight of crime and Democrat dysfunction, tech billionaires are pivoting, setting their sights on building a new 'smart city' on the outskirts of the Bay Area. Perhaps it's cheaper to build a new metro area rather than salvage the sinking ship that is San Francisco.
