Today we are supposed to remember the men and women who gave their lives to protect America’s freedoms. But I would also like to remember some of the freedoms that we have lost thanks to planning.
Freedom of Property Ownership
Who should get to decide how this land is used — the owner or the government?
Flickr photo by Kacey97007
First among these is the freedom to own property without fear that it will be taken without compensation. Though this freedom is enshrined in the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution, it has largely disappeared thanks to the Supreme Court.
The court has made many decisions chipping away at this freedom, but one of the most important ones was Penn Central v. New York City in 1978. As I explained in more detail on the twenty-fifth anniversary of the case, the Supreme Court ruled that government regulators could take part of the value of people’s property without compensation so long as some value was left behind.
This was not a case of a police action protecting public health or safety or preventing nuisances, but simply a government that wanted to preserve a historic building without having to pay for the cost of such preservation. This opened the door to further regulation largely on aesthetic grounds.
Prior to Penn Central, no state (with the possible exception of Hawaii) had ever allowed counties to permanently downzone rural land with the goal of keeping landowners from ever developing their land. Within a year after the Penn Central decision, Oregon’s legislature passed a law doing just that.
Today, government regulation that takes away people’s property rights is routine and is often justified by planners based on a warped theory of “evolving rights.” According to this theory, people once had a right to do anything they wanted with their land, but now society has evolved so that first one right, then another, disappears for the greater social good. This is a huge misrepresentation of land history.
The idea that regulation that reduces property values without compensation complies with the Fifth Amendment is exactly equal to a notion that censorship is compatible with the First Amendment provided the censors leave at least some of the words in the newspaper or other publication. No American would stand for that, and no American should stand for regulatory takings.
Freedom of Mobility
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Why should our mobility depend on the whims of urban planners?
Flickr photo by chefranden
Mobility is not explicitly listed in the Constitution, but some Supreme Court decisions have suggested that laws or rules that limit mobility (such as a law preventing certain people from moving to certain cities or neighborhoods) are implicitly unconstitutional. Constitutional or not, mobility is a part of being American and Americans have benefited greatly from their mobility.
For more than two decades, planners have been slowly reducing our mobility by increasing traffic congestion. Some increase in congestion is due to a shortage of funds for new roads caused by fixed gas taxes (as opposed to user fees that would vary according to the number of miles people drive). But much of this shortage is due to planners diverting highway user fees into expensive transit projects and other non-highway programs.
In 1983, Congress first authorized the diversion of federal gas taxes to mass transit. Since then, according to the Texas Transportation Institute, urban congestion has increased by about five times. Urban planners in Florida, Minnesota, Oregon, and other states have stated that they want to create more congestion in order to reduce driving and increase transit ridership. Such planners should be dismissed from government jobs for reducing our freedom and wasting our time.
Freedom of Choice
How many Americans would really choose to live in 5-story apartments if they could afford single-family homes?
Flickr photo by InfoMofo
Under the guise of “giving people choices,” planners are taking away choices by driving up the cost of single-family housing in order to force more people to live in apartments, condos, rowhouses, or, at best, single-family homes on tiny lots. The same “choice” rhetoric is used to support plans to build expensive rail transit systems while choking off funds to programs that can actually reduce traffic congestion.
The planners’ code of ethics requires planners to “provide timely, adequate, clear, and accurate information on planning issues to all affected persons and to governmental decision makers.” Government planners who use such choice rhetoric should be dismissed for violating this code and deceiving the public.
So here we have three freedoms that we have lost in just the past few decades: freedom to own property, freedom of mobility, and freedom of choice. Let’s remember these freedoms this Memorial Day and resolve to take them back.
All laws restrict freedom. If libertarians are actually anarchists who oppose all regulations, that’s one thing. But to single out “planning” laws for vilification seems arbitrary. If I own a car, shouldn’t I get to drive it as fast as I want? Why should Government be able to decide how fast I drive? If I own a stereo, shouldn’t I get to play it whenever I want and as loudly as I want? Why should my neighbors have any input into how loudly I play it?
“How many Americans would really choose to live in 5-story apartments if they could afford single-family homes?”
Marcia, Marcia, Marcia! It’s just not fair! If not for those meddling planners, every American would be willing and able to buy a large house on a large lot for around 50 bucks.
It’s interesting how often I hear property owners complain about Government reducing their property value relative to how often I hear property owners acknowledging that Government is largely the reason their property has value in the first place. Most property in the United States wouldn’t be nearly as valuable as it is without huge Government investments in infrastructure, police protection, etc. Maybe everyone should be responsible for building their own roads, acquiring their own water and electricity, disposing of their own wastes, etc. THEN we’ll see who complains about Government. THEN we’ll see how valuable “your” property is. Good luck.
BTW: On one hand, planners are blamed for increasing property values (and thus, housing costs). On the other hand, planners are blamed for reducing property values. Which is it? Do planners increase or reduce property values?
D4P – you make some points, not particularly good, but points nonetheless. Your position is that planning is generally good. Perhaps a reasonable position. The opposite position is that planning is generally bad. Another reasonable position, perhaps with more historical justification. Planning, and especially comprehensive, centralized planning has historically been a failure: see WWI Germany’s experiments with war socialism, any communist country in the past 80 years, the fascist experiments in the 30’s and 40’s, and the moribund economies of democratic socialism that are the current schemes in much of Europe today.
So, bearing that in mind here are a few arguments against your examples: 1) if I own a car shouldn’t I get to drive as fast as I want – Yes and No. – Do you own the road on which you are driving? Are you insured, both for your own negligence and for damage to your vehicle? Government doesn’t need to decide – different owners could place different speed limits on their roads based upon your insurance and vehicle. That way there could be specialized road systems for freight trucks and for passenger vehicles. There are many cases in US history in which roads were private and paid for by tolls, or were free to all – roads and transportation systems increase property values by virtue of connectivity (see Christaller, or Losch, or Taafe, et al). Thus, in the 19th century in places like Ohio, Indiana and Pennsylvania, local merchants and other commercial interests built roads as a means of improving commerce.
Another example is the rail system. Many of the early railroads were purely private ventures. However, with the Central Pacific and Union Pacific government became involved by granting land to the rail companies. Most (if not all) of these companies repeatedly went into bankruptcy. The only continuously profitable railroad in the US was the Great Northern – which purchased all of its land, made their own private acquisitions and did it all without government intervention. It was only after the Great Northern began to acquire the failed government backed roads such as the Northern Pacific that the company became involved to a great extent with government transportation planning.
2)Now, the government itself is largely to blame for variations in land values, especially in the West. This is due to the government removing from the market vast tracts of land, which if they had been made available might have provided many people with large homes on large lots, but what you’re really missing are the economic and technological reasons people have lived in high-density development and are not uniformly spread across the countryside, and these are the spatial spillover and agglomeration effects outlined by Marshall and later by Jacobs (and I would also argue for Christaller and Losch, again). Another good view on how this has played out over the last 800 to 1,000 years are essays by MRG Conzen who describes the changes in town structures and densities as responses to economic stimuli and resulting population pressures. We think dense urban developments are always necessary, but they aren’t, they were a response to the economic and technological constraints of the time. We then compound our mistakes, by assuming that these naturally arising densities were created by planning.
3) In so much as government planning restricts or attempts to artificially constrain the separate plans and land use choices of individuals it creates distortions in the pricing of property. These distortions can lead to artificial increases in values or decreases. If a particular property is restricted from the development of high-value land use then the value of that land is diminished; those parcels of land that are not restricted from this sort of development then have a concomitant increase in value, if there is demand (which may be “real” or “speculative”) for this type of land use. This is simple supply and demand under price levels. A non-land property example is the case of oranges. Oranges that are of a certain size or color are restricted from sale by a government planning board. As a result, those fruits become essentially worthless, while the remaining fruit commands a higher price by the artificial reduction in total supply.
Apologies for the long post.
“A bum was lying on the grass outside of a southern mansion. The land owner came down out of the big house and told him to get off his property. The bum said, “What makes it your property?”
The land owner said, “My Great Grandfather fought the Indians for this land 200 years ago.” The bum responded, “I’ll fight you for it right now.'” from Guy Avenell at http://raven.utc.edu/cgi-bin/WA.EXE?A2=ind0303A&L=HP3000-L&P=17314.
The above quote is a modified version of the original from John Steinbeck.
My own world view is that God created the universe and us and it all belongs to Him. Part of our assignment is to be gardeners and take care of it and part of our assignment is to be scientists and study it so we can appreciate it and take care of it better. See Genesis 2.
I agree with D4P that government is largely responsible for increasing property values, both by restricting uses and providing services.
The denser the population the more rules are needed to keep the peace. The most oppressive governments are often the most local – condominium and homeowners associations. Gated communities create barriers to transport and increase congestion.
The worst examples of loss of freedom in the USA recently are the Patriot Act and President Bush’s use of signing statements to say that the laws Congress passes mean whatever he wants them to mean.
We should remember what our Declaration of Independence says, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable [inalienable] Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
“Your position is that planning is generally good”
I’m not sure that’s necessarily my position. In the current context, my position is more along the lines that, if “society” is a goal, placing restrictions on the use of property is perfectly reasonable. Hardin’s “tragedy of the commons” provides a powerful theoretical framework for understanding how self-interested individuals pursuing their own interests with no concern for others’ interests, externalities, etc. can lead to ruin for all. If land were abundant and externalities did not exist, it might be reasonable to argue that property owners “should be able to do whatever they want with their land.” However, neither of those conditions are met in the real world. Land is scarce (from the standpoint of current and future generations), and externalities do exist, in various forms.
In economics, it is common to distinguish 3 types of costs and benefits: private, external, and social, where social = private + external. The significance of external costs and benefits is that they suggest that the private sector will underproduce certain types of goods and overproduce certain other types. Antiplanner folks appear to deny the existence of external costs and benefits when they argue that property owners should be able to do whatever they want, with no consideration for anyone else but themselves. The justification for unconstrained private property rights is ultimately that some dead white guys said so. That’s not a particularly compelling justification in my view.
What we call “planning” is partly an effort to make decisions in a coordinated fashion, where individuals are given significant leeway to decide how their property will be used, but are also required to make some consideration for other (current and future) organisms and the “long run”, when we might be dead, but our children won’t be.
Antiplanner,
I understand your frustration with over-planning, and your opposition to “the government knows better than the people or the free market” approach to planning, but are you really against all land use planning? For example, are you against basic zoning to separate residential and industrial uses, assuming that enough land is set aside for both to not skew the free market?
D4P, you’re post leaves me completely flabberghastted. Your description and use of the Tragedy of the Commons is perhaps the most twisted bit of logic I’ve ever witnessed. The tragedy of the commons is that when nobody owns a piece of property but everybody may use it as they see fit, the property is destroyed. In other words, if everybody in a village may chop firewood from the commonly owned woods, eventually all of the trees will be chopped down. The moral of the story is not that the government should step in to keep people from chopping down wood; it’s actually that the property shoud be privatized because a self-interested owner will not let the long-term value of the woods be sacrificed for a short-term gain. Instead, the owner will tend to the woods to maximize their value. You completely missed the point of the whole darn story — and twisted it in a horribly ironic way to justify what the story is warning against. I must have stared at the screen for 5 minutes in total consternation before I could even think of how to react. At least you finally compelled me to register at this blog. I’ve read it since it’s inception, but never felt compelled to respond until now.
Suffice it to say that people do make decisions regarding their own property that are in their own best interests. You are effectively saying that the government needs to step in to save people from themselves, and planners know what it is that people need to be saved from. None of this has anything to do with public lands and negative consequences from overuse and lack of ownership or stewardship. We’e talking about people who own their land and then are stripped of is use without remuneration.
Borealis,
Yes, the Antiplanner really is against all government land-use planning. Houston works just fine without zoning, and so do many other cities.
Zoning is not needed to keep residential and industrial separate as neither particularly wants to be near the other (industrial users don’t want to be bothered by residentc complaining about noise etc.) Zoning worked for many years before planners began using it as a tool for social engineering, but now it is out of control. We are safest if we simply end planning.
mattbrown006:
I understand what you’re saying, but I don’t think my use of the Tragedy of the Commons is inappropriate.
1. You say “The tragedy of the commons is that when nobody owns a piece of property but everybody may use it as they see fit, the property is destroyedâ€Â. This seems to suggest that if property is “owned†it won’t be “destroyedâ€Â. I disagree.
2. You say “if everybody in a village may chop firewood from the commonly owned woods, eventually all of the trees will be chopped downâ€Â. This seems to suggest that if someone owns the trees, they won’t chop them all down. I disagree.
3. You say “a self-interested owner will not let the long-term value of the woods be sacrificed for a short-term gainâ€Â. I disagree. People down live that long. People who buy property to develop it generally want to make money now, not 100 years from now. In your example, it is not at all unreasonable to think that someone would buy the property, cut down all the trees, then move on and buy another property with more trees to cut down.
4. You say “Suffice it to say that people do make decisions regarding their own property that are in their own best interestsâ€Â. There are at least two problems with this. First, people can be wrong about their own interests, such as if they were to build in a floodway. Sure, it might be pretty, but it’s also very dangerous. People can and do underestimate those kinds of risks. Second, even if they are correct about their own interests, they are not the only interests that matter. The interests of other people, wildlife, etc. (both current and future) also matter (to some of us, at least), and it’s not unreasonable in my view for those interests to be considered in the decision-making process as well.
5. You say “You are effectively saying that the government needs to step in to save people from themselves, and planners know what it is that people need to be saved fromâ€Â. I’m not necessarily saying that “government†needs to step in, only that “someone†should do so. If you can identify a non-governmental entity (with “teethâ€Â) responsible for promoting a more comprehensive, long-term perspective than is represented by myopic, self-interested land users, I’m open to other alternatives.
6.You say “We’e talking about people who own their land and then are stripped of is use without remunerationâ€Â. Like I’ve said before, much of the value from property comes from government in the first place. Property owners have no metaphysical right to maximizing the value of the land. Plus, if property owners truly want to receive the kind of compensation you envision, it would only be fair if property owners also compensated the government in like fashion when government actions increase property values.
“If I own a car, shouldn’t I get to drive it as fast as I want? Why should Government be able to decide how fast I drive? ”
I drive my car as fast as I want when I go to a race track and obey their rules that are different from the rules on government owned roads. ie. I have to wear a helmet, I have to have a fire extinguishe, I have to signal with my arm, etc. I also own a small farm where I drive as fast as I want and even drive vehicles without headlights, fenders and other things that make them “street legal”. Should government be able to tell me that I need to have a maximum speed on the private racetrack or on my dirt roads?
I also own a stereo and play it as loud as I want wherever I want. I, like most people, don’t want to bother other people with my acivities though.
How many Americans would really choose to live in 5-story apartments if they could afford single-family homes?
Instead of spreading fear, Randal, you could inform your readers.
For instance, we already have evidence that reveals the answer to this question, which is: many do, given good design and choice; if one generously interprets certain surveys, a majority may prefer denser development than a typical suburb. Not all people like suburbs. Get over it.
This fact interferes with the reason for blogs such as Antiplanner and Murrican Dream Coalition, so we don’t read about it here.
DS
First among these is the freedom to own property without fear that it will be taken without compensation…
The court has made many decisions chipping away at this freedom, but one of the most important ones was Penn Central v. New York City in 1968…the Supreme Court ruled that government regulators could take part of the value of people’s property without compensation so long as some value was left behind.
So many things wrong, so little time.
Just compensation. Just. The Constitution did not define just, society does. Not a small ideological minority.
And the way Randal tries to spin the Penn Central case at TI flies in the analysis of all legal scholarship. Perhaps this Newton-like analysis will find you a new career, Randal.
=====
Today, government regulation that takes away people’s property rights is routine and is often justified by planners based on a warped theory of “evolving rights.†According to this theory, people once had a right to do anything they wanted with their land, but now society has evolved so that first one right, then another, disappears for the greater social good. This is a huge misrepresentation of land history.
No it’s not. It’s exactly what has happened, as our Constitution did not define “property” or “just” (which you conveniently fail to mention).
The wails of a small ideological minority won’t change that.
And the wails of a small ideological minority that wants to take away the majority’s property rights so the small minority will stop whining is a joke. You agree to pay equal compensation for your givings and maybe the majority will listen. Otherwise, you are not going to be heard.
=====
The idea that regulation that reduces property values without compensation complies with the Fifth Amendment is exactly equal to a notion that censorship is compatible with the First Amendment provided the censors leave at least some of the words in the newspaper or other publication. No American would stand for that, and no American should stand for regulatory takings.
There you go leaving out just compensation again. Just. Just compensation.
And you left out all the reaffirming decisions since Penn Central since then, without the majority rising up with pitchforks and torches. There’s a clue for the small ideological minority: the majority likes the system.
DS
Dan – I agree that some people do want to live in urban spaces (I live in a loft across from a DART station in Dallas), and I have no problem with not hindering construction of 5-story apartments. I do have a problem with subsidizing their construction. If there really are enough young professionals/urban empty-nesters/etc who wnat to live in these styles of communities, then there should be some developer who will be willing to build them their 5-story apartment building without incentives. The rental or sales profits they earn will be incentive enough. I don’t think we need to scarce resources to give developers additional incentive. I certainly don’t think we should spend gobs of capital and recurring operating expenses to build this small group of people their own train lines. And I have a problem with the governement telling people who own their land that they can no longer use it in ways that were possible when they made the purchase decision.
I guess growing up in and then returning to Houston for several years has jaded my view of planning. Houston is the City of Opportunity because the local government doesn’t portend to know what’s best for the community. Instead it lets the free market work, and then it fits its infrastructure spending to what develops.
Like Matt, I too perfer to live in a dense enviornment and I can afford a house and lawn.
I wonder who Dan is talking about when he says the majority belive it is just to take property rights away without compensation. Here in Blue State Oregon Measure 37 passed with over 60% of the vote.
I get it. The only way to have an argument is to leave out just in the just compensation phrase and to assume no one will go back and read what I actually wrote. Nonetheless:
The reason the private property movement can’t get play in this country is that it wants to take away the private property rights of the majority.
Land use laws are just fine for the majority. The majority actually likes it that their neighbor can’t do as they please, as there is a real danger that it will negatively affect surrounding property values. Sorry to break it to the small ideological minority.
And OR may have voted for M37, but it’s not going to stay in that form, and the Blue State has buyer’s remorse over it, to the tune of that same ~60% wanting to fix it or repeal it.
DS
Actually, it is more a vocal minority that is against 37 and they are helped along by the “progressive” media.
That’s not what the survey said.
DS
matbrown006’s response to the communal firewood analogy is really a bit naive. Your theory “a self-interested owner will not let the long-term value of the woods be sacrificed for a short-term gain. Instead, the owner will tend to the woods to maximize their value” works only if implemented. A case in point is the Columbia River salmon runs. In the early 1800’s the salmon population was over 10 million fish per year. Then came the salmon canning industry. Harvesting fish indiscriminately without regulation. Today the runs number less than 100,000 salmon. Most of which are hatchery raised fish. If your theory were true, our salmon runs would be thriving and healthy. The land use laws are put in place to protect the land and other property owners from unscrupulous land owners. This “its my land and I can do anything I want with it” mentality has no place in modern socity.
noserider,
Thank you for posting. However, there is a big difference between forests and salmon. You can own a forest. No one (in the U.S.) can own wild salmon. Thus, no one who catches salmon has an incentive to protect them because if they do, someone else will just overfish them. This is a classic example of the tragedy of the commons.
In Canada, people can own salmon fisheries in rivers and they have an incentive to protect them and keep their productivity high. New Zealand and Iceland have both extended this to ocean fisheries. Such ownership rights are one of the best tools we have to protect our remaining fisheries. But don’t blame past fishery depredations on property rights when there weren’t any.
Dan, the survey results show that only 23% want the measure repealed. It is also noteable that the survey was commissioned by the 1000 Friend of Oregon (an anti-37 group) and the questions were pretty lopsided.
johng,
I don’t know where you obtain your information from, but about the survey:
1. It doesn’t matter who commissions a survey if the questions are written properly.
2. 20% want M37 repealed entirely and 49% want the significant flaws fixed PDQ (69% total).
3. 52% would vote against it if voting at time of survey.
4. Only ~25% thinks M37 has been very or somewhat positive.
5. 28% thinks it’s been very negative and 17% says somewhat negative (twice the positives).
6. The more voters know about M37, the more unfavorably they view it.
Ah, well.
And, no one knows what you mean by “lopsided”. This wasn’t a push poll, despite Gilroy’s attempts at Reason to spin it that way. Perhaps you can explain how the questions were lopsided and what would be a non-lopsided question.
DS
I got my information from the survey results.
If they had asked the second question before asking the first the results would have been very different. The “answers” to the first question tell a false story of doom about 37 that most respondents probably had not heard. Then to follow up with a “now that you know” question is bogus.
Dan–
While I do not agree with your thinking and the generally ideologies of planning, I appreciate your comments.
Since planning is for the “better of society” would you support a state making land-use planning, among other types of planning, unconstitutional? The fundamental issue with planning is that it takes away from one group and gives to another (as most government practices do). The people who lose out oppose the system and those who gain support it. Why not offer a location where government was limited and planning eliminated for these rebuffed invididuals to go? It would clearly be a “living” experiement and may fail, but if it succeeded and succeeded beyond everyone’s expectations, would that serve as sufficient proof that perhaps there is a better structure for planning and government than our nation and states currently employ?
Please explain your thinking on this option for our society to truely show what they want. Antiplanner?
“Why not offer a location where government was limited and planning eliminated for these rebuffed invididuals to go?”
See: The United States in the early 1900s, where landowners did pretty much whatever they wanted and huge health problems were created because of pollution. Land use planning was largely a reaction to things that “weren’t working” very well. Whether zoning is as important now as it was then is a different question, but people around here seem to act as if we have no idea what communities would look like without planning, when in fact that’s not really the case.
I believe it is called Houston. Despite a rather ugly location and miserable weather it is booming.
“Despite a rather ugly location and miserable weather it is booming”
“Booming” largely misses the point. Land use planning attempts (whether successfully or not) to achieve multiple (difficult) goals simultaneously, to a greater extent than might be the case without land use planning. “Booming” presumably refers to economic development, which is one goals. Unfettered economic development may very well be inimical to achieving other goals, such as environmental protection. They don’t have to be mutually exclusive, but if there is no one around to require the latter, it’s not unreasonable to think that it won’t be represented.
Antiplanner,
Alaska has a very regulated salmon industry and is doing very well. And, its not privately owned. My point is that if regulations are not in place someone will exploit resorces, private or pubilc, to the detriment of all. It’s the way humans are. Again, regulations are in place to to prevent the few unscrupulous individuals from making life miserable for the rest of us. It takes only one selfish person or company to ruin it for everyone. I am not an advocate for government control in the majority of cases. But, it is necessary in some. Some land use regulations are necessary.
22:
Gosh, johng, giving the full range of views in a question is a story of doom and makes the survey lopsided?
Sure.
23:
Do you mean somewhere other than Darfur or Somalia in general, personal? No? Then I don’t know of a state in the U.S. where a majority of people would have to be forcibly extricated from their land so a minority can move there to live, nor do I know how to pay for it Anyway, Ursula K. LeGuin explored this idea in The Dispossessed, where a small minority moved off-planet to live a different life than the majority.
DS
johng,
Measure 37 in OR was passed by the majority because it was sold to the public emotionally rather than realistically. Now that the state has been flooded with hundreds if not thousands of claims, many of which are ridiculous, the truth is rearing its ugly head. Just because the law didn’t prohibit you from doing something with your land when you bought it doesn’t mean you can do whatever you want to now. M37 is a poorly written law and a good portion of the people that voted for it are in favor of making changes so it fits the profile that was sold to the public when it was voted in.
DS
**http://tinyurl.com/3bzwp9
Who on earth would “respond” that felt it was no big deal or a good thing there were so many claims? If even a small percentage of the population thought “wow, I am shocked” and a small percentage of those called in to “respond” it would still be a lot of people and make the planning division thing that “most people” thought that way.
Also, I often think “shock-and-awe” when I realize all the billion of dollars that land use regulations have cost land owners since only a small fraction of the losses are subject to M37 remedy. The theves and the blatent taking of value is truely shocking.
What is this ‘billions’ that LU regs have cost landowners?
Please present some evidence, esp. empirical evidence to back this claim.
DS
Antiplanner,
Your statement is well received “But don’t blame past fishery depredations on property rights when there weren’t any.” However, privatization still is not the problem. Lack of regulation is. I was raised in the Redwood country of Northern California. Humboldt County’s main industry was lumber. Each town had several lumber mills. It didn’t matter how small the town was, a lumber mill was always close by. Providing many well paying jobs. These mills ran 6 days a week, many with 2 and sometimes 3 shifts per day. Redwood trees were cut down as fast as possible to fill the mills demands. In the late 1960’s these mills began closing one by one due timber shortages. Today, the number of mills in Humboldt County can be counted on one hand. The lumber industry lasted less than 100 years. To the people that started the industry in the 1800’s the size of the trees and the huge tracts of land they grew on seemed inexhaustible. But, as technology advanced, allowing for more efficient logging, and the numbers of mills increased the forest began to dwindle at an ever increasing rate to what it is today. The land was privately owned and the owners felled the harvestable Redwood trees almost to extinction. Taking all the mill and logging jobs with them. The few remaining stands of Redwood trees are mostly Federally owned and the harvesting of these trees is regulated. If regulations were in place 80 years ago a sustainable yield would have been possible. Should they have been allowed to harvest the trees on their land? Absolutly!!If they had been smart about it they would still be in business today. But, they weren’t smart. They should have had harvest quotas in place (regulations).
Portland Metropolitan Studies (PSU), http://www.pdx.edu/ims/m37.html which independently tracks Measure 37 claims, estimates that the total value of all claims exceeds $10 billion. Measure 37 claims are only made by a fraction of those entitled to them and no land that happend to change hands after the laws were passed can make claims. I would surmise that we could be taliking about 100’s of billions of dollars.
These aren’t losses. They are claims.
There is no correlation as there is no work being done to verify that the claim amount equals loss.
You asserted there were losses due to LU regs. Surely this comes from a study that someone has done. Surely there is one in OR. I know there are studies in other areas.
Please provide that study that forms the basis of your claim and the information contained therein.
Thank you in advance for providing this evidence that LU regs result in losses. Anyone else can chime in too.
DS
johng,
Every M37 claim I have read or heard about is just that, a claim. I have yet to see an actual audit to substantiate any of these “losses”. I’m sure some are valid. I’ll bet most are not. Some may even show an increase in value. What happens then? Is that claimant obligated to pay the increase in value to the state? Every single claim must be required to prove loss in value. Gut feelings don’t cut it.