Tackling Growth Management

Colorado Real Estate Journal, June 20, 2001

The failure of the Colorado legislature to pass comprehensive growth management legislation in the regular session, and then in the special session called for that purpose, has been the subject of much finger-pointing and rhetoric. One might conclude that the legislature has been co-opted by greedy special interest groups. This is the explanation that was offered by Elise Jones, one of the supporters of last year's growth control ballot initiative. While that has the appeal of simplicity, it is not the only conclusion that fits the facts. The issue of growth management is complex and controversial, and our state has found it difficult to reach a consensus on what to do about growth because there is very little agreement about what the problem is, much less how to solve it. To people who have been here a long time, the traffic is horrible, the new housing developments are eyesores, and our quality of life is slipping away. To many newcomers, it is wonderful here compared to where they used to live. One person's "sprawl" is another person's nice house in a quiet neighborhood with a greenbelt out the back door.

To many people, "smart growth" means "no growth" or even going back to the way things were 30 years ago. Just how this could be accomplished in a democratic society that values personal freedom and private property rights has not been articulated coherently, nor is it likely that it can be.

In an article in the November 1, 2000 edition of Society entitled "Suburban Legends," author Thomas J. DiLorenzo says that much of the growth control literature is based on incorrect assumptions. To summarize DiLorenzo's arguments: If suburban development were as inefficient as opponents claim, it wouldn't be happening in a free market economy. Developers build what they are able to sell for a sufficient profit to stay in business. Further, suburban development is far from "unplanned." With their livelihood at stake, private developers plan very carefully. He invites the reader to imagine how efficient and effective a government bureaucracy would be at carrying out the same task. Putting the government in charge of housing is not at all likely to make it more attractive, safe, efficient, or affordable. Look at government housing projects, he says. The legend of lost open space and disastrous loss of farmland is also untrue. According to DiLorenzo (and other sources) only 4.8 percent of the total land in the United States is developed, and cropland has remained virtually constant since 1945, at 24 percent of U.S. land mass. Likewise, he says the fear of environmental damage is unfounded. Suburban development actually creates more biodiversity and better wild life habitat than agriculture does. Another interesting idea from the article is that regional or consolidated government is more expensive and less responsive to the citizenry than decentralized government, because the ability of people and businesses to "vote with their feet" in a decentralized environment imposes "a degree of discipline" on government.

The big issue in the Colorado legislature this year was Urban Growth Boundaries (UGB's). A UGB is a geographic boundary that defines the limits of urbanization for a metropolitan area. Its goal is to spur coordination of local, county, and state policies that promote long-range growth within the boundary and, on the other hand, discourage or prohibit growth outside the UGB. Proponents say it makes sense to plan ahead, and to put new growth in areas that can be readily served with the necessary infrastructure. Critics point out that simply drawing a line on a map, without using other planning and management tools, will not have the desired effects, and will create some adverse consequences, such as creating artificial land economics. UGB's do not necessarily lead to revitalizing urban areas, reducing housing prices, producing efficient land uses, or eliminating sprawl on the one hand or congestion on the other. Also, without strict controls on what can be done outside the boundaries, they don't even preserve open space. Also, even if they were initially intended to be flexible and movable, they tend to become difficult to change over time. This has been the experience in Portland, Oregon.

The Colorado legislature could not agree on a comprehensive, omnibus growth bill, and also could not agree to approach the problem in smaller steps. Governor Owens tried to get legislative action on four areas where, apparently, no one disagreed: prohibiting "flagpole" annexations, mandating master growth plans for larger counties and cities, creating a dispute resolution mechanism, and mandatory regional planning for the Denver metropolitan area. Opponents killed those bills in committee, insisting that without 20-year growth boundaries the other measures would have done little or nothing to address the problem.

The National Association of Home Builders has proposed an alternative to UGBs that encompasses a set of strategies. First of all, they say certain areas should be designated for permanent conservation based on technically justifiable criteria such as significant self-contained or unique ecosystems, habitat for truly endangered species, or areas that are not suited to development due to steep slopes or other physical features. The NAHB also advocates "guiding" development into "corridors and nodes" where infrastructure can best be extended. This idea works with or without transferable development rights. With them, these areas could be allowed to receive credits from areas not as appropriate for development. Without TDR's, planning agencies should allow higher densities in the development corridors. Further, development within these areas should include a variety of housing types and prices, and "a hierarchy of usable public open space, from formal neighborhood squares and village greens to greenway trails that link community recreation areas and perimeter greenbelts connected to the region's 'permanent countryside'." The NAHB advocates "green wedges" between the "corridors and nodes." These green wedges are "pre-mapped" on a parcel by parcel basis by coordinating contiguous open space developments. They also suggest using "conservation subdivisions" where the houses are arranged to preserve views and maximize green areas, and a significant portion of the subdivision is "permanently protected" open space. Another proposal is for local governments to "preplan" new subdivisions, which is what planning departments routinely did in the early part of the century, even before zoning came into being. When a town lays out streets, school sites, parks, and other features it wants ahead of time, it streamlines the planning process and increases the certainty for developers, keeping down costs and preventing haphazard development patterns. The NAHB advocates "careful treatment of the edges" of development, putting houses in "village" configurations on smaller lots and having greenbelts and other open space outside the built portions. These policies could be effected with development criteria that work within existing zoning. The four measures that Governor Owens supported would facilitate this type of strategy, without the necessity for drawing rigid UGB's.

The National Association of Industrial and Office Properties has published the following "Smart Growth/Core Principles." They embody a more realistic assessment of the issues and competing interests in the growth management debate, while they recognize that intelligent growth control is in everyone's best interests:

• Smart Growth recognizes that growth is essential to economic vitality.
• Smart Growth recognizes Americans' right to choose where they live and work.
• Smart Growth is a dynamic, on-going planning process that anticipates and accommodates development needs in response to market demands.
• Smart Growth balances growth and development with natural resource conservation.
• Smart Growth promotes higher densities around transportation hubs.
• Smart Growth supports the revitalization of inner cities and older suburbs through policies that encourage infill development and redevelopment of brownfields sites.
• Smart Growth allows for concentrations of density outside the urban core that provide job centers with residential, commercial, industrial and mixed uses.
• Smart Growth provides for the funding of future infrastructure through policies that fairly assess the cost of new infrastructure between the public sector and the private sector.