Anyone who hears Randal O'Toole's presentation this Monday (and many who
don't) might be interested in a very different presentation the following
Monday. It will cover some of the societal (i.e., ultimately taxpayer)
costs of the land use patterns and transportation infrastructure that Mr.
O'Toole advocates.
Oh, and apparently Dr. Howard Frumkin has actually earned the degrees that
give him the titles he uses, unlike other speakers. Publishing one's work
in peer-reviewed journals is just one of the things that makes some
researchers more credible than others, regardless of one's political views.
I can forward the presentation flyer as a Word doc if anyone is interested.
Chuck Strawser
The Department of Population Health Sciences and the UW
Population Health Institute are pleased to announce our seminar on
Monday, April 3, will be presented by Dr. Howard Frumkin, Director
of the National Center for Environmental Health/Agency for Toxic
Substances and Disease Registry at the US Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention. He will be speaking on "Urban Sprawl and
Public Health." The seminar will be held in Room 1335 Health
Sciences Learning Center from 12:00 noon to 1:00 pm.
To view the live webcast or access the archive after the event,
please go to: http://www.cme.wisc.edu/pgm/pophealth.
Patty Grubb
Assistant to Javier Nieto, MD, PhD, Chair
Department of Population Health Sciences
707 WARF
UW School of Medicine and Public Health
Madison, WI 53726-2397
608-265-0516
608-263-2820 (fax)
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: "Eileen Bruskewitz" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Comprehensive Plan Discussion" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Randal O'Toole presentation
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2006 08:40:49 -0600
Interesting presentation coming up:
Randal O'Toole, economist with the Thoreau Institute, will be speaking
about Inclusionary Zoning in Madison on Monday, March 27, 2006 at noon in
Room 260 of the Madison Municipal Building for a taping for Madison City
Cable, Channel 12. A reception for Mr. O'Toole will be held at 5:30 PM at
Sweet Sophie's 1008 Quinn Drive in Waunakee where he will discuss Transfer
of Development Rights.
Restrictive Land-Use Rules Add Billions to Housing Costs
Housing shortages caused by restrictive land-use laws have added tens of
thousands of dollars to the cost of buying homes in Wisconsin, says a new
report from the American Dream Coalition. The report estimates that
planning added $18,000 to $22,000 to the cost of median homes in Madison,
Milwaukee, and Kenosha. The report notes that these estimates are
conservative and the real numbers could be 25 percent more.
Housing was affordable throughout Wisconsin in 1999, observes the report.
But so-called "smart-growth" programs introduced by cities and counties
created a land and housing shortage that has driven up housing prices in
the last six years. This forces homebuyers to pay a penalty for living in
or near these cities.
The penalties of planning are far greater than the so-called costs of
sprawl, says the report. The most widely cited study of the costs of sprawl
estimates that urban-service costs to low-density homes are about $11,000
more per home than to compact neighborhoods.
"How smart is 'smart growth' if it makes every home in the city cost
$20,000 more so the city can save $11,000 on a few new homes?" asks the
report's author, Randal O'Toole. O'Toole recommends that cities set user
fees and taxes to make sure new development covers its costs and let people
make their own choices about where they want to live.
High housing costs can hurt local economies by causing employers to locate
elsewhere and forcing workers to make long commutes to other areas with
more affordable housing. Land-use restrictions are also regressive because
they impose especially large burdens on low-income families while providing
windfall profits for wealthy homeowners.
"It is sadly ironic that the communities that consider themselves most
progressive, such as Madison, have the most regressive land-use rules,"
says O'Toole. The 2000 census found that homeownership rates for white
families in Madison are three times as high as for black families, while
white rates are more than double rates for blacks in Milwaukee.
Nor is restrictive land-use planning needed to protect farms and open
space. The U.S. Department of Agriculture says that less than 5 percent of
Wisconsin has been urbanized, adding that urbanization is "not considered a
threat to the nation's food production." When housing is scarce and open
space is abundant, government efforts to preserve the latter at the expense
of the former is a tragic misplacement of priorities.
The report recommends that cities and counties leave open space protection
to private conservation organizations and repeal smart-growth plans so that
homebuilders can meet the demand for new housing. The 48-page report is
available for download from americandreamcoalition.org/housing.html. Also
available is a spreadsheet with all of the data and calculations for more
than 300 metropolitan areas.
---
This is the Dane County Comprehensive Plan List Serv
You are currently subscribed to comprehensive_plan.
To unsubscribe please visit http://list.co.dane.wi.us/read/login/
_______________________________________________
Bikies mailing list
[email protected]
http://www.danenet.org/mailman/listinfo/bikies
