EDITORIAL FOOLISH FINANCING PRIVATE HOUSING IS NOT APPROPRIATE FOR BOND PROJECT.

SEVERAL California mayors gathered last week for a joint news conference in which they called on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to include money for housing in his $222 billion infrastructure bond proposal.

The group, which included Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, is just the latest effort by the state's Democrats to pressure the governor to include inappropriate pork-barrel projects in the massive public-works bond issue he proposed in his State of State address in January.

While affordable housing is certainly a worthy topic of public discussion, it's not - nor should it be - part of the governor's program to invest in the state's long-neglected infrastructure.

The reasoning behind his bond project, besides getting Schwarzenegger some points as he goes into a re-election campaign, is that California hasn't invested substantially in its infrastructure in decades. Even as its population has exploded in every corner of the state, its roads, levees, schools, jails, courts and other infrastructure have lagged terribly far behind.

During the press conference, Villaraigosa called the lack of affordable housing ``a crisis of epidemic proportions.'' That might be true under his definitions, but it's not for lack of housing construction. One thing the state has been building plenty of over the past three decades is housing. The affordability level might be a different matter, but it's something that's shaped by many more forces than sheer volume.

Besides, this is a state that has made many developers very wealthy just by opening the doors for opportunity. And the truth is Villaraigosa, or San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom or San Jose's Ron Gonzales, could do more individually to change the affordable-housing gap through municipal policies and building incentives around public transportation hubs than by squeezing a piece out of the bond project.

But regardless of any other reason, it's simply not appropriate to put public bond money to subsidize rich developers to do what they're already inclined to do - build housing.

And tacking on amendments - for affordable housing, or health insurance for kids or any other feel-good thing that has nothing to do with infrastructure - is a good way to doom the entire public-works project from the state.

Or, maybe, that's exactly the point.