The Abuse of Land Use Planning
Pasour, E.C. Jr.
E.C. Pasour, Jr. The Abuse of Land Use Planning • • In June 1974, the U.S. House of Representatives defeated a national land use planning bill. The bill would have provided $100 million a year...
...The self-interest motive is a good predictor of individual behavior in the citizen's role as bureaucrat as well as in the private sphere of activity...
...First, planning commissions and zoning boards are often captured by the regulated...
...He looks as if he doesn't know whether to flee or to crush her against him...
...As indicated later, however, there is little reason to expect that the political process will improve the efficiency of land use through comprehensive land use controls...
...As the relationship between costs of housing (and other land uses) and the preservation of "green belts" (or other open spaces) around urban areas becomes more widely recognized, there will probably be less public support for environmental amenities...
...Senator Jackson and many others, however, favor the use of sanctions against states which fail to adopt state land use programs...
...A beautiful young girl dances in the arms of a frightened and repressed middle-aged man...
...In view of these considerations and the uncertainties of time, there is little likelihood that comprehensive land use controls on a county or state basis will yield results more consistent with the desires of the people than will competitive markets...
...What are the implications for local control of land...
...Will such legislation, in fact, improve the efficiency of land use...
...When Faye comes to find her father, she runs into Homer, and Homer is simply knocked into outer space by her...
...The bill would have provided $100 million a year over the next eight years to encourage states to plan the use of land—for shopping centers and large housing developments, around airports and highway interchanges, and in areas of "critical environmental concern...
...The provisions of this legislation are quite different in the various states, but the results have been similar: special tax treatment alone is not effective in preventing the conversion of open land to urban uses...
...He is naive but hungry...
...It is a blockbuster...
...Most important of all, the character whom I had difficulty visualizing, the central character, Faye Greener, was brought to life in an eerily perfect way...
...That is, the use of land by one individual often imposes costs or confers benefits on other people...
...Instead, the test is provided through the political process...
...A central planning body is almost certain to have less knowledge and information about the value of particular par-cels of land in various uses than the individual owners or potential owners of the land...
...He creeps into the house of a visiting Midwestern hotel clerk, Homer Simpson (played by Donald Sutherland...
...Thus, there is a built-in safeguard to make present market prices reflect expected future conditions...
...This suggests a problem in providing for beneficial side effects associated with land through the public acquisition of land or land rights...
...California, for example, adopted an "open land" program in 1965...
...If anyone has not read the book, I will spare him the pain of learning the ending...
...The owner would be compensated for the rights he gives up...
...Future discoveries and new ways of viewing facts cannot be predicted...
...and conservation and preservation—and would employ legal means to restrict the use of land to its designated category...
...I think he would have been extremely happy with the movie...
...The assumption underlying the above view of the need for comprehensive land use controls is that land allocation currently is not planned but is haphazard and inefficient...
...Consequently, preferential tax policies designed to increase aesthetic and environmental benefits such as open space, scenic beauty, fresh air (hereafter referred to as "environmental amenities") cannot be expected to improve on the market allocation of land...
...What can one say about the potential effects of legislation of this kind...
...He waits on her hand and foot, and she despises him for it...
...Similar land use planning legislation has surfaced again this year...
...Since landowners want to preserve the option to sell their land at a high price, voluntary use value laws have little effect in holding land in agricultural and other open uses...
...Both are lonely and despairing...
...There are persuasive objections to imposing the costs of open space amenities on the owners of open space (as by zoning...
...A great deal more happens, leading to ruin for all who were not already ruined...
...On his face is a look of terror at being so close to the temptations he has avoided all his life...
...Atherton was Tod Hackett, Meredith was Harry Greener...
...When the action does become dominant, it is the externalization of a seething fury which we had seen long before and could have told was coming...
...That is, there is no way that a planning body can determine the optimal policy with respect to land use independently of the electorate...
...In some cases, the cost of land in a particular use should be increased to cover undesirable side effects (or increased costs for public services) associated with land in that particular use...
...The advantage of easements over zoning as a way of providing environmental amenities is that the cost of maintaining land in a particular use is apparent and the costs are largely borne by the people who presum20 The Alternative: An American Spectator August/ September 1975 ably benefit from the policy, viz., the general public...
...The land might be held in a particular use for a specified period of time through a restrictive agreement...
...There is a great deal of evidence which suggests that the market is much more flexible and responsive to changing conditions...
...They worry about the use of prime agricultural land and other open land for roads, houses, and other urban uses, and they say that more efficient land use requires a "comprehensive" land use plan...
...More sophisticated critics realize that the market allocates land just as it does potatoes or autos...
...Demon-strating that comprehensive land use controls could improve land use is not the same as demonstrating that actual comprehensive land use controls would do so...
...That's just the way I am...
...Public acquisition has no similar safeguards, because public officials do not bear the costs of a bad decision—at least not to the same extent as private entrepreneurs...
...The zoning of a major share of land for one use reduces the supply and increases the price of land for other uses...
...It is the story of life among the powerless and dispossessed in Hollywood in the 1930s and it is a fine little book, but the movie has taken that book and raised its visions to the cosmic level...
...Sorry...
...And thus, to restrict property rights on zoned land is quite often to confer windfall gains and losses...
...these critics refer instead to the failure of the market to take account of various beneficial or undesirable side effects associated with land use...
...A major difference is that zoning costs are borne mainly by private property owners and are not highly visible, whereas costs of land acquired publicly are reflected in the public budget...
...Any land use legislation will, of necessity, be a compromise effort to accommodate politically powerful forces...
...The legislation defeated by the House (but passed by the Senate in 1973) did not provide for sanctions against "The Alternative has richly fulfilled its early promise...
...Although land use plans may be developed which would appear more efficient than present market allocation, such plans are likely to become quickly obsolete in a society characterized by rapid changes in science and technology...
...Tod Hackett (played by William Atherton) is a young artist fresh out of Yale who is working for a big Hollywood studio...
...A Critique of Pure Altruism There are two fundamental problems which limit the efficiency of results produced by regulatory or planning bodies...
...Such changes to improve the efficiency of the land market, however, are fundamentally different from proposals to substitute centralized planning for the market in allocating land for various uses...
...In view of our recent experiences with government regulatory agencies (FAA, ICC, etc...
...The impersonal nature of freely formed market decisions stands in marked contrast...
...I could never let myself be loved by anyone who wasn't rich, and I could never love anyone who wasn't criminally handsome," she says...
...The legislation is usually in the form of "use value" taxation which enables qualifying property tobe taxed on the basis of its value in its current use instead of its market value...
...He loses when he incorrectly anticipates the future...
...It should be pointed out, however, that the social cost of land acquisition is no higher than the social cost of zoning...
...They dance in the kitchen of a Hollywood cottage, in the dark, and as the scene fades, we see that both are crying silently—so that the other will not know...
...See back cover for a convenient order form...
...Land use control proposals often lead to the imposition of their proponents' aesthetic and environmental values rather than a demonstrated improvement in the current pattern of land use...
...This result is not an accident but is innate in the political process...
...It is a tool commonly used in implementing planning decisions to protect amenities associated with particular uses of land...
...Robert Nisbet Join Robert Nisbet, Milton Friedman, and other readers who enjoy exciting—and intelligent—writing about ideas...
...Current proposals to institute comprehensive land use controls coordinated at the federal level, if enacted, are likely to have far-reaching unanticipated consequences...
...The comments of this paper do not suggest that institutional arrangements affecting land use cannot be made to increase the efficiency of land use...
...Since there is seldom a "common interest" but instead a multitude of competing special interests, the members have no way of unilaterally determining the public interest...
...This approach is often criticized for being expensive both in terms of the tax revenue necessary to purchase the land and in terms of the effect on the tax base...
...there is little reason to expect that the political process would work better than the market...
...However, his frustrations have become so much a part of his personality that he makes no attempt to be anything other than a servile and avuncular figure to her...
...Such sanctions, for example, might take the form of a loss of a part of a state's federal aid for highways, airports, etc...
...Atopical example is the granting of a license by the Federal Power Commission to dam the New River in western North Carolina...
...The definitive film on the critical problem of modern life is the new movie The Day of the Locust...
...Benjamin by Stein Powerlessness and frustration, frustration and powerlessness...
...A similar approach involves some form of easement in which the owner transfers some of the rights of the land to a unit of government...
...Someone named Marion Dougherty has cast the movie virtually perfectly...
...When Harry Greener dies, Faye takes up prostitution to pay for the funeral...
...The implications of federal sanctions for local control of land are clear...
...And it is in the individual looks on the individual faces that the movie's power lies...
...The acquisition of land in fee simple (public ownership) is the surest way for the public to retain land for a particular use...
...While Tod is frustrated by Faye and Faye is frustrated by being poor and unknown, Faye's father Harry (played, as if he had written the book, by Burgess Meredith) staggers around Hollywood trying to sell silver polish...
...The House action was greeted by howls of outrage and dismay by, among others, the Sierra Club, the New York Times, and Senator Jackson...
...Regardless of whether federal sanctions are employed against states which fail to adopt land use plans which meet federal guidelines, comprehensive land use controls represent an erosion of private property rights and offer little hope for improving the efficiency of land use...
...Their anger, West believed, was the most destructive force in civilization...
...Where individuals receiving benefits are not the same as those incurring costs, and are more numerous, too much land is likely to be held in open uses...
...First, consider the effect of several tools commonly proposed to implement land use plans...
...It could bring down all order, he believed...
...He lives in a cheap motel across from the beautiful The Day of the Locust Faye Greener (played with genius by Karen Black), star-crazed teenage daughter of a dying former clown turned door-to-door salesman...
...First, it generates an arbitrary income redistribution from some landowners to other landowners...
...Even if it is effective in restricting land to particular uses, however, zoning has major limitations in increasing the efficiency of the land market...
...These measures include zoning, use value property taxation, and land acquisition or the purchase of development rights...
...Second, it precludes the possibility of any market balancing of costs and benefits...
...Such a plan would classify land into various categories—e.g., urban...
...The book was largely a visual book...
...Its commentary on the American political scene reminds me of the old American Mercury in its great days under Mencken and Nathan...
...It authorized open space tax valuation for four classes of property: scenic beauty, natural resources, recreation, and food and fiber production...
...The property tax is not responsible for the conversion of farm and other open land to urban uses...
...What may not be so clear is that use of land under federal dictates may bear little relationship to the desired pattern of land use as determined at the local level...
...Nathanael West wrote the novel between 1936 and 1938, while he was working on "B" pictures in Hollywood...
...In practice, zoning classifications are likely to be modified and changed in response to market forces or to meet desires of vocal interested parties...
...There is no market test for the value of these side effects (amenities) related to various uses of land...
...It seems ironic that a vastly greater degree of involvement in land use decisions by government at all levels is being urged at the same time that public satisfaction with the performance of the public sector is so low...
...Yet as the camera focuses in on them, we see that their arms are tense, holding them apart rather than pulling them together for solace and affection...
...Then she moves in with Homer Simpson...
...Finally, if the social value of open land is greater than its market value for other uses, the community can afford to pay the owner its market value...
...The planning process, once viewed as objective and technical in nature, is increasingly being recognized as involving value judgments and the necessity to make political choices...
...This process is not likely to lead to the best use of land, for efficient land use is likely to have only a tenuous connection with the priorities of political power and politics...
...Pressures for special treatment of agricultural, forestry, and other open land has led to legislative action providing for differential assessment of such lands in about half the states...
...West was not a powerful stylist of despair like Joan Didion...
...Zoning Zoning represents the use of the police power of the state to restrict property rights in land use...
...She not only became a literary figure, but she made the literary figure into flesh and blood so that I can now see Faye as people I have known...
...Once they got there, they realized they had been cheated, and they weren't happy about it...
...In assessing efficiency, the present system of land use should be compared with an attainable alternative...
...Compensation to landowners is not legally required even though the attenuation of property rights through zoning often reduces property values...
...Current holders of nonagricultural (or open) land will benefit from this zoning policy, while owners of land zoned agricultural will bear a cost where the marketvalue of the land is higher in other uses...
...agricultural and forestry...
...Implications The effect on the potential for corruption of public officials is one point overlooked by many people favoring comprehensive land use controls...
...Let us assume, however, that only individuals imbued with the public spirit are appointed to a land use planning board and that they attempt to subordinate self-interest and follow the public interest...
...Senator Jackson would use "crossover sanctions" to force the states to participate...
...Director John Schlesinger has understood perfectly that it is nuance rather than plot which makes the novel a powerhouse...
...There is a difference between the actual and ideal working of the political process just as there is for the market...
...In Hawaii, Vermont, and other areas which have enacted environmental control legislation, it is increasingly becoming clear that there is a conflict between preserving open space and other environmental amenities and providing housing and other services which use land...
...LTERNATITE: .4 A.AN AMERICAN SPECTATOR the Alternative: An American Spectator August/September 1975 21 states which failed to participate...
...Author West tried to convey the look ofpinched bitterness and seething fury on the faces of people in Hollywood...
...The optimal amount of land in any use is likely to change over time...
...Hackett falls madly in love with Faye but she spurns him...
...Originally, in fact, West had titled the novel The Cheated...
...Zoning or planning decisions (if effective) instantly change land values, imposing capital gains or losses on landowners...
...When I read the book after seeing the movie (I had also read it before, just to be safe), I could see the characters fitting perfectly into their roles...
...However, as the following discussion indicates, there are innate difficulties in reflecting public sentiment through the collective choice process via planning bodies...
...I enjoy it and learn from it...
...Zoning a major share of land for agriculture, for example, will increase the value of other land both immediately and in the future—as more and more land is used for housing and other nonfarm purposes...
...It now appears that this action will be taken in spite of widespread opposition by the people in the area and by their elected representatives...
...The land speculator, however, improves the operation of the land market by bearing the burden of the uncertain future...
...Of course, land acquired by condemnation under the government's right of eminent domain represents an erosion of private property rights even though compensation is paid to the landowner...
...They had worked hard all their lives to get enough money to come out to California...
...Their relationship involves no sex but is overpowered by the ever-present sexuality of his smothered volcano of desire and her taunting of him...
...Ecology, pollution, and the "energy crisis" are current examples of issues largely ignored a decade ago which have significantly altered prevailing attitudes toward land use...
...that conversion is caused mainly by the increased demand for land for such uses, and preferential tax treatment does nothing to lessen this demand for other uses...
...The second fundamental problem is that a perfectly altruistic motive does not assure an optimal decision...
...land to become urban...
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...The argument is frequently made that public acquisition of land will improve land use by protecting the public from land speculators...
...On her face is a look of almost complete forlornness, as if she were thinking, "I cannot even get a strong response from this pathetic, lonely man...
...Such windfall gains and losses associated with rezoning or planning decisions increase the incentive to bribe public officials...
...22 The Alternative: An American Spectator August/September 1975...
...Objectives of Land Use Controls Many people view the current "unplanned" use of land as ugly, chaotic, and inefficient...
...The basic question which must be resolved is whether such a process can take account of the diversity of individual interests as efficiently as the market...
...It is a film so good that after seeing it you have to check your memory to be sure that you really saw what you think you saw, and not just what you hoped you would see...
...Use Value Taxation A number of states have enacted property tax legislation designed to preserve agricultural and open land, especially around urban areas...
...But he tried over and over again to draw a portrait in words of the faces he was talking about...
Vol. 8 • August 1975 • No. 10
