- Auto fuel economy standards: “The indirect CAFE program costs the economy at least six times as much as a carbon tax that reduces emissions equivalently.” [Peter Van Doren and Randal O’Toole, Cato]
- Whether grounded in official discretion or legislation, cash exactions levied on land development should still need to meet constitutional standards [Ilya Shapiro and Reilly Stephens on Cato Institute certiorari amicus brief in Dabbs v. Anne Arundel County]
- A stumbling block for Boulder: “With Two High-Profile Losses, When Do Climate Plaintiffs Start Worrying About Sanctions?” [Daniel Fisher; John O’Brien (views of former Colorado AG Gale Norton and current Colorado AG Cynthia Coffman); Adam Morey, New York Post] Issue isn’t whether climate change should be addressed, but what the Constitution and prudence tell us about whose job that is [Donald Kochan, L.A. Times] And a Federalist Society podcast with Kochan on municipal climate lawsuits;
- “Contract Dispute Cracks the ‘Thin Green Line’ Activists Are Drawing to Stop U.S. Fossil Fuel Exports” [Greg Herbers, Washington Legal Foundation, earlier]
- Neigh-ligence: latest effort to get courts to create standing for non-human plaintiffs is suit on behalf of neglected horse [Karin Brulliard, Washington Post/SFGate, earlier on animal rights]
- EPA announces intention to make regulatory science more transparent by making scientific work on which it relies open to public. Pressure groups erupt with outrage [Adam J. White, City Journal]
Posts Tagged ‘land use and zoning’
Environment roundup
- End of the road at last for Steven Donziger, impresario of Chevron/Ecuador litigation? [Joe Nocera, Bloomberg]
- Building expensive housing improves housing availability at every income level [Sonja Trauss, Market Urbanism Report]
- “Ms. Durst did what any law-abiding citizen would do: She demolished the structure and tossed the twigs, moss and shells into the woods…. The fairy house wasn’t up to code.” [Ellen Byron, WSJ, courtesy Regulatory Transparency Project]
- Last month’s judicial rejection of NYC climate suit came after plenty of foreshadowing [Daniel Fisher (“persuasive authorities” were two overturned court decisions); New York Daily News and New York Post editorials]
- Ban on smoking in public housing reflects truism that unless you own property, your home isn’t really your castle [Shane Ferro, Above the Law]
- Obama-era Waters of the U.S. regulations are a power grab asserting EPA control over farmers’ ditches, seasonal moist depressions, and watering holes; one federal court has now reinstated the rules, but the issue is headed to SCOTUS and Congress in any case ought to kill them [Jonathan Adler; Ariel Wittenberg, E&E News; earlier]
HUD’s Carson to localities: stop throttling housing availability
Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson is pressing local governments to ease barriers to housing construction, which might turn out to be a genuinely progressive stance in a period in which housing costs are soaring in many in-demand cities, led by the West Coast. One reason for HUD to take notice of these local barriers to building is that by artificially driving up rents and construction costs, they drive up the cost of HUD’s own programs: “the most-restrictively zoned states receive nearly twice the federal dollars per capita compared to the least-restrictively zoned states…Determining whether attaching requirements to grants is a constitutionally-sound strategy is best decided by a legal expert. However, Carson’s new focus on educating policy makers on the damaging consequences of local policy, while acknowledging HUD cannot overcome local problems by spending money, is a welcome change.” [Vanessa Brown Calder, Cato]
More/related: Tyler Cowen (on New York Times coverage), Elijah Chiland, Curbed L.A., and Ilya Somin on introduction of bill by Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., to discourage exclusionary zoning by attaching strings to the (itself highly dubious) $3.3 billion federal Community Development Block Grant program.
“County compels 91-year-old woman to tear down home wheelchair ramp”
Following the law wherever it leads in Maryland: “Prince George’s County filed a legal case against a Laurel couple in their 90s over a wheelchair ramp in their own home. To avoid legal trouble, the elderly couple’s son tore down the ramp, trapping the woman in her own home. The county permitting department said the family had no permit to build a wheelchair ramp in front of their own home.” [WJLA]
Land use and real estate roundup
- Political fight brewing in California over ballot initiative that would pave way for bringing back rent control [Michael Hendrix, City Journal]
- “Metes and bounds” method of describing legal property boundaries has been much derided, but new archival research from American colonial period suggests its benefits then were greater and costs lower than might appear [Maureen (Molly) Brady, SSRN, forthcoming Yale Law Journal] Just for fun: street grid orientation (or lack thereof) in major cities expressed as polar charts [Geoff Boeing]
- “Alexandria, Virginia Gets Housing Affordability Wrong” [Vanessa Brown Calder, Cato]
- Houston does not zone but it does subsidize deed restrictions. Is that good? [Nolan Gray, Market Urbanism]
- Great moments in historic preservation: “Silver Lake gas station moves toward landmark status” but connoisseurs say it’s not nearly as choice as the three service stations previously landmarked in L.A. [Curbed Los Angeles]
- “America’s Ugly Strip Malls Were Caused By Government Regulation” [Scott Beyer]
Environment roundup
- Cato Daily Podcast on changes in the Endangered Species Act with Jonathan Wood of the Pacific Legal Foundation and Cato’s Caleb Brown;
- In 1971 Judge J. Skelly Wright of the D.C. Circuit let loose the craziness by reading NEPA, passed a year earlier, as giving private parties the right to challenge government actions [Richard Epstein, Hoover “Defining Ideas” via John Cochrane]
- Ambassador Nikki Haley says U.S. will not support U.N. global pact on environment [Ben Evansky, Fox News]
- Recent Federalist Society audio features on Clean Water Act include Jonathan Adler and Timothy Bishop on deference and Peter Prows, Tyler Welti, Jonathan Wood, and Tony Francois on exemptions;
- Tree, tree, go away: some of what’s wrong with the California scheme to mandate solar panels on all new homes [John Cochrane]
- “The Defeat of California Senate Bill 827 and the Future of the Struggle to Curb Zoning” [Ilya Somin]
“Sacramento Wants to Boost Rail Ridership By Banning Drive-Throughs and Gas Stations Near Transit”
It’s almost as if making life inconvenient for drivers is seen as a goal in itself: “City staff [in California’s capital city of Sacramento] are drafting an ordinance that would ban building new gas stations, drive-throughs, and other auto-related businesses within a quarter mile of any of the city’s 23 light rail stations. …Other businesses ‘not considered transit-supportive’ — car lots, auto repair businesses, manufacturing sites, wholesale outlets — would still be allowed, but only if the city grants them a special permit.” [Christian Britschgi, Reason]
Land use and development roundup
- Bay Area, L.A., and D.C. area should take an affordable housing lesson from cities that build: “Houston, Dallas, and NYC: America’s Great 3-Way Housing Supply Race.” [Scott Beyer]
- All things bright and beautiful/All
creatures great and small/All things wise and wonderful/The Commerce Clause reaches ’em all [John-Michael Seibler, Heritage, on Supreme Court’s denial of certiorari in Tenth Circuit decision upholding as constitutional federal rules requiring owners to preserve Utah prairie dog habitat on private land; earlier on PETPO v. U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service here, here, and here] Photo: Wikimedia Commons; - WSJ editorial takes dim view of Louisiana coastal erosion suit against oil firms, earlier here, here, here, here, here, and here;
- “You’re Not a Progressive If You’re Also a NIMBY” [Robert Gammon, East Bay Express] “Density Is How the Working Poor Outbid the Rich for Urban Land” [Nolan Gray, Market Urbanism] “The absence of gentrification causes displacement” [Michael Lewyn, same]
- “Let’s Make America a Mineral Superpower” [Stephen Moore and Ned Mamula, Bakersfield.com/Cato]
- Backing off from a bad law: Washington, D.C. considers ending tenant purchase rights for single-family homes [Carolyn Gallaher, Greater Greater Washington]
Housing roundup
- “One year ago, Portland enacted inclusionary zoning. One year later, “apartment construction in Portland has fallen off a cliff.”” [@michael_hendrix citing Dirk VanderHart, Portland Mercury] Better policy is to focus on building supposedly unaffordable housing [Scott Sumner]
- Intractable problems of residential zoning and of public schooling in the U.S. have a great deal to do with each other [Salim Furth, American Affairs]
- New NBER study “suggests building energy codes hurt the poor, too” [Vanessa Brown Calder, Cato]
- Upzoning of Dumbo helped catalyze Brooklyn’s revival [Ira Stoll] How Henry George and followers influenced NYC property and tax policy, and the tax deal that helped touch off the Manhattan building boom of the 1920s [Daniel Wortel-London, The Metropole]
- How to live in some apartments forever without paying, and more tips for unscrupulous NYC tenants [Jeremiah Budin, Curbed]
- For “but,” read “therefore”: “Marin County has long resisted growth in the name of environmentalism. But high housing costs and segregation persist.” [David Henderson, quoting]
“Detroit just banned Airbnb without anyone knowing it”
Infuriating: Detroit says it will take a pause for legal review before enforcing a new zoning ordinance that would ban homeowners through much of the city from accepting AirBnB rentals. The ordinance would interpret rentals as home-based businesses, which are disallowed in residential zones, and on its face appears to prohibit taking in even friends or relatives to share quarters if the person pays rent. Following a public outcry, the city council put out word that it does not intend to ban AirBnB and will amend the ordinance if necessary to avoid that. [Tom Perkins/Metro Times, Robin Runyan, Curbed Detroit, Deadline Detroit]