The same amount of effort as when lobbying for something they actually want. As I said above. See eg twitter for tax breaks, or the $16m google spent lobbying the US alone in 2013 [1]. Or the ceo going to council meetings and being actively involved. Or any of a dozen things you could think of yourself that would demonstrate google actually investing some effort into housing. Or transport.
But no -- your links show they sent a letter. You even found a second article mentioning what appears to be the same letter from David Radcliffe. You've searched the local mountain view papers and there's three whole mentions of google "working" for more housing dating all the way back to 2008... but they sent a letter. (Note they couldn't even be bothered to send someone representing the company to show up to testify at the meeting regarding their letter.)
Just to be clear, your position is that Google should invest many millions into things that aren't business concerns at all for them. At a time when they get massive amounts of blowback for any attempt to be involved in local politics.
Just to be clear, you're now moving the goalposts -- I demonstrated your claim that google is involved is patent bullshit. Your claim about blowback is similar.
And yes, companies -- and the larger they are, the more so -- should be involved in the communities in which they and their employees are located. This is true for many, perhaps most, firms that aren't tech firms. And they often are! Go to eg council meetings or zoning board meetings or other local government meetings in eg nyc. For many people in the communities in which these large tech firms are located, they've had bad effects. Google has a responsibility to these communities that they are currently ducking. The tech community as a whole has a responsibility to the bay area the community is almost entirely skipping out on. Being proactive about housing and transport would be helpful to both the employees and other residents of the communities.
I'd say the tech community is obliged to return that care which is shown for them. At a time when "Die techie scum" is a rallying cry, be thankful apathy is all you get.
But no -- your links show they sent a letter. You even found a second article mentioning what appears to be the same letter from David Radcliffe. You've searched the local mountain view papers and there's three whole mentions of google "working" for more housing dating all the way back to 2008... but they sent a letter. (Note they couldn't even be bothered to send someone representing the company to show up to testify at the meeting regarding their letter.)
They're working overtime on this.
[1] https://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D00002200...