Tag: zoning

Zoning vs. Families

By
David Boaz

Back in 1996 George Liebmann wrote in Regulation about how “Zoning makes it more difficult to keep aged parents close by and care for them.” He recommended that “Duplex homes and accessory apartments should be permitted in all new residential construction. Housing options such as these allow elderly persons to live near their adult children without intruding on their children’s privacy.” (“Modernization of Zoning,” pp. 71, 75)

Now the Washington Post reports

The Rev. Kenneth Dupin, who leads a small Methodist church [in Salem, Virginia], has a vision: As America grows older, its aging adults could avoid a jarring move to the nursing home by living in small, specially equipped, temporary shelters close to relatives.So he invented the MEDcottage, a portable high-tech dwelling that could be trucked to a family’s back yard and used to shelter a loved one in need of special care.

Skeptics, however, have a different name for Dupin’s product: the granny pod.

Protective of zoning laws, some local officials warn that Dupin’s dwellings – which have been authorized by Virginia’s state government – will spring up in subdivisions all over the state, creating not-in-my-back-yard tensions with neighbors and perhaps being misused….

the nation’s elderly population is set to double in just 10 years as more and more baby boomers hit retirement age. Surveys by AARP and others also show that large majorities prefer to live in their own homes or with loved ones rather than in retirement communities.

But local officials think their zoning rules are more important than keeping families together.  They fume that allowing such small structures for grandma would “turn our zoning ordinance upside down.” And what’s more important, saving money and keeping grandma near her family or strict adherence to zoning regulations? Local officials think the choice is clear.

In this case, though, state officials disagreed. Virginia just passed a law “that supersedes local zoning laws in the state and allows families to install such a dwelling on their property” – but only “with a doctor’s order.” They couldn’t just allow families to choose a living arrangement that suits them. No, a doctor has to authorize it.

It’s sort of like medical marijuana – a slight increase in freedom, but also an increase in the medicalization of normal individual decisions.

Topics: 
Government and Politics, Health Care, Regulatory Studies

Doubling Down on Failed Policies

By
Mark A. Calabria

Today in Las Vegas, President Obama will take another $1.5 billion in taxpayer money and let it ride another spin on the roulette wheel otherwise known as foreclosure assistance.  This time, however, he’s not even bothering to send the money to homeowners; its all going to state governments.  

That’s correct, he’s sending a huge check to select state governments to use in almost any manner they choose, as long as it offers some pretense at propping up the housing market.  

The assistance will be targeted at those states that have seen at least a 20% decline in home prices.  Subsidizing states because their housing markets are getting more affordable almost makes one yearn for the days when we subsidized states because their housing markets were too expensive.  What we are really subsidizing is those states whose destructive land-use policies contributed to the magnitude of the housing bubble.  Basic economics tells us that as supply becomes more inelastic (think growth boundaries), prices become more volatile.  It’s bad enough that most of our housing subsidies, both homeowner and renter, have ended up going to states that have crippled their housing markets, but now we are sending them a big check to reward such behavior.

Washington needs to end its constant attempts to prop up the housing market.  The only viable solution to an over-supply of housing is a further decline in prices.  Most of the worst-hit areas, such as California, do not lack for families wanting to buy homes.  They lack a supply of homes at affordable prices, which would be solved by letting prices fall.

Topics: 
Finance, Banking & Monetary Policy