- “The Rent is Too High and the Commute is Too Long: We Need Market Urbanism” [Andrew Criscione, Market Urbanism] Is excessive regulation making it costly to build starter homes? Ask the New York Times [Ira Stoll]
- Good: Sen. Mike Lee and Rep. Paul Gosar have introduced a bill to eliminate outright the Obama administration’s meddlesome AFFH (Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing) rule [Vanessa Brown Calder, earlier]
- “Dollar home” programs show mostly sparse results in urban revitalization, especially when regulatory strings come attached [Jared Alves, Greater Greater Washington]
- Too radical to pass? Bill 827 in California would impose upzoning on transit corridors [Ilya Somin] California wildfires will worsen Bay Area housing shortage, but where’d that shortage come from? [Enrico Moretti, NYT] “Why Does Land-Use Regulation (Still) Matter in Oregon?” [Calder, Cato]
- New from NBER: “Rent Control Raises Housing Costs” [Charles Hughes, Economics21] Study “provides strong evidence of rent control’s damaging effects” [Calder]
- “Blockchain technology can empower public and private efforts to register property rights on a single computer platform,” with particular benefits for poorer societies in which property rights remain ill-defined [Phil Gramm and Hernando de Soto, WSJ/AEI, Arnold Kling] “The U.S. property title system is a disgrace. It could be fixed with blockchain. But it also could be fixed without blockchain.” [Kling]
Posts Tagged ‘land use and zoning’
Environment roundup
- New regulations on international movement of rosewood create major hassles and risks for musicians, instrument makers [Robert Benincasa, NPR, earlier on exotic woods]
- “Argentinian geoscientist faces criminal charges over glacier survey” [Jeff Tollefson and Emiliano Rodríguez Mega, Nature]
- “The Progressive Roots of Zoning” [Samuel Staley, Market Urbanism]
- “Water Rights, Water Fights in the American West” [Reed Watson and Caleb Brown, Cato podcast]
- “Los Angeles Wants to Make Housing Affordable by Making it More Expensive” [Christian Britschgi, Reason]
- “Private Property Rights Collide With Invisible Frog” [Chris Bennett, Farm Journal, on cert petition in Markle Interests v. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Chamber, earlier]
Environment roundup
- Getting deserved attention: blog post on hundred little regulatory obstacles that can block piecemeal redevelopment of commercial space [Johnny at Granola Shotgun via John Cochrane and Tyler Cowen]
- Suit that asserted legal personhood for Colorado River: a good case for sanctions? [Greg Herbers/WLF, Marianne Goodland, Colorado Springs Gazette]
- Large U.S. farm study finds no cancer link to Monsanto glyphosate (Roundup) weedkiller, state of California take note [Kate Kelland, Reuters, earlier here, here]
- Federalist Society video of address by EPA administrator Scott Pruitt at last month’s convention;
- Prince George’s County, Md., in the Washington suburbs, is considering a return to the practice of letting county council second-guess development approvals. Bad policy and corruption risk alike [David Whitehead and Bradley Heard, Greater Greater Washington]
- “Claims for unconstitutional takings of property against state actors should not be treated differently than other fundamental rights claims and relegated to second-class status.” [Ilya Shapiro, Trevor Burrus, and Meggan DeWitt, Cato on Knick v. Township of Scott, Pennsylvania]
Environment roundup
- Texans tangle over municipal ordinances requiring preservation of trees on private land [Mindy Fetterman, Huffington Post]
- WOTUS, SCOTUS, and POTUS: “The Supreme Court wrestles again with the Clean Water Act’s due process deficit” [Jonathan Wood, earlier]
- Florida turned land into bird sanctuary without owners’ consent. As compensation it gave them “points.” Takings review needed [Ilya Shapiro and Meggan DeWitt, Cato on Ganson v. City of Marathon and Trevor Burrus’s first official brief] Alas, SCOTUS has denied certiorari on two other property rights cases, 616 Croft Ave. v. City of West Hollywood and Wayside Church v. Van Buren County;
- “How Suburban Parking Requirements Hold Back Downtown” [Nolan Gray, Market Urbanism]
- “Does the Constitution Provide a Substantive Due-Process Right to a Stable Climate System?” [Andrew R. Varcoe, WLF]
- Short Circuit: “Does Texas’ delegation of its eminent domain power to private pipeline companies violate the Due Process Clause? Probably not, according to this Fifth Circuit panel.” [John Ross, Short Circuit, on Boerschig v. Trans-Pecos Pipeline]
“Zoning, Land-Use Planning, and Housing Affordability”
New Cato Policy Analysis by Vanessa Brown Calder, here is the executive summary:
Local zoning and land-use regulations have increased substantially over the decades. These constraints on land development within cities and suburbs aim to achieve various safety, environmental, and aesthetic goals. But the regulations have also tended to reduce the supply of housing, including multifamily and low-income housing. With reduced supply, many U.S. cities suffer from housing affordability problems.
This study uses regression analysis to examine the link between housing prices and zoning and land-use controls. State and local governments across the country impose substantially different amounts of regulation on land development. The study uses a data set of court decisions on land use and zoning that captures the growth in regulation over time and the large variability between the states. The statistical results show that rising land-use regulation is associated with rising real average home prices in 44 states and that rising zoning regulation is associated with rising real average home prices in 36 states. In general, the states that have increased the amount of rules and restrictions on land use the most have higher housing prices.
The federal government spent almost $200 billion to subsidize renting and buying homes in 2015. These subsidies treat a symptom of the underlying problem. But the results of this study indicate that state and local governments can tackle housing affordability problems directly by overhauling their development rules. For example, housing is much more expensive in the Northeast than in the Southeast, and that difference is partly explained by more regulation in the former region. Interestingly, the data show that relatively more federal housing aid flows to states with more restrictive zoning and land-use rules, perhaps because those states have higher housing costs. Federal aid thus creates a disincentive for the states to solve their own housing affordability problems by reducing regulation.
Related: finding common ground between Cato and the Urban Institute on land use regulation [Vanessa Brown Calder and Rolf Pendall; Calder; James Rogers] “California Tries To Fix Housing Affordability Crisis By Making Housing More Expensive” [Christian Britschgi, Reason]
“How Washington Made Harvey Worse”
“A federal insurance program made Harvey far more costly—and Congress could have known it was coming.” [Michael Grunwald, Politico, more] And from July, “Reforming the National Flood Insurance Program: Toward Private Flood Insurance” [Ike Brannon and Ari Blask, Cato Policy Analysis]
More: “Lack of Zoning Is Not Houston’s Problem” [Vanessa Brown Calder, Cato; Nolan Gray, CityLab]
In Philadelphia, sue thy neighbor
Dozens of Registered Community Organizations (RCOs) across Philadelphia “have to provide their own liability insurance to protect their volunteer staffers, and all it takes is one or two lawsuits for premiums to reach untenable heights.” The lawsuits are readily forthcoming since a common role of RCOs is to submit comments on land use development proposals, high-stakes issue often leading to litigation. The Bella Vista Neighbors Association, involved in a lawsuit three years ago, was set to shut down just the other day when “a Utah-based carrier specializing in tough-to-insure entities — think fireworks, helicopter bungee jumps, and trampoline companies — stepped in, finalizing a plan hours before the meeting, which coincided with the last day of the association’s coverage.” [Julia Terruso, Philadelphia Daily News]
Land use and development roundup
- “Expanding housing and job opportunities by cutting back on zoning” [Ilya Somin on Ed Glaeser Brookings essay]
- Always hold back and let the government do it. That way the $550 stairs can be built for $65,000-$150,000 [CTV, CBC, sequel: city of Toronto tears down stairs] Some reasons why even without NIMBY or funding constraints, government infrastructure projects can be hard to get done [Coyote]
- Cities dressed up retail malls as “public use” to justify land takings. Many courts went along. Not looking so good now [Gideon Kanner]
- “Is inclusionary zoning legal?” [Emily Hamilton, Market Urbanism] Rejoinder: constitutional attacks on this type of zoning modification will make libertarians sorry if localities just go back to strict zoning [Rick Hills, PrawfsBlawg]
- House Natural Resources Committee hears testimony on package of reforms to Endangered Species Act [Michael Sandoval, Western Wire]
- Are takings claimants entitled to have suits heard in an Article III court? [Robert Thomas, Inverse Condemnation]
Land use and environment roundup
- “Trump promises ‘massive permit reform’ in infrastructure bill” [Melanie Zanona, The Hill]
- Murr v. Wisconsin: landowner subjected to forced multi-parcel grouping loses regulatory takings case 5-3, Kennedy writing [opinion, Cato brief, Roger Pilon (Penn Central takings case was a train wreck, and SCOTUS should stop trying to build on it) and more, Ilya Somin (multi-factorial test proffered by Kennedy “a recipe for confusion, uncertainty, and constant litigation”), Gideon Kanner, Robert H. Thomas/Inverse Condemnation]
- Congressional Delegation: ‘Our Home State Of Utah Has Repeatedly Fallen Victim To Overreaching Use Of The Antiquities Act’ [Aileen Yeung, Western Wire]
- “Towards a Private Flood Insurance Market” [Ike Brannon, Cato]
- Attorneys general of 21 states hail EPA move to rescind overreaching WOTUS (Waters of the United States) power grab [West Virginia Record, earlier]
- More research on how urban building restrictions drive up housing prices, harm younger and poorer residents and newcomers, misallocate labor geographically, widen inequality [Tyler Cowen on work by Andrii Parkhomenko, Chang-Tai Hsieh and Enrico Moretti, Lyman Stone]
Environment roundup
- Clean Water Act’s citizen-suit procedure can “be a huge money maker” for private groups: “Policing for profit in private environmental enforcement” [Jonathan Wood]
- “Chicago Alderman Tells Property Owners to ‘Come Back to Me on Your Knees’ or Face Zoning Changes” [Eric Boehm, Reason]
- Wetlands: “Farmer faces $2.8 million fine after plowing field” [Damon Arthur, Redding Record-Searchlight]
- Urban bike lanes are green religious monuments, writes Arnold Kling, a biker himself;
- Climate change shareholder disclosure: “Class action lawyers have become very clever at developing these cases for profit.” [Nina Chestney, Reuters]
- “Why full compensation for property owners might lead to more unlawful takings” [Ilya Somin]