Zoning is but one powerful tool in the land use planning arena, and an
often misused one. Upzoning in carefully targeted areas of the city might be
something to consider, but might have dire consequences in many other areas. The
limited city control over property values includes zoning in that it can affect
the perceived quality of life in the city, i.e., a few more floors on a sky
scraper might add some taxes, but demolition of smaller housing units to
provide greater density in residential areas for construction of more units per lot
might stifle a real estate market or deflate prices. Increasing the density of
a residential area has other consequences such as an increased demand for
services and a profound NIMBY effect on other developments, e.g., Crown Hydro. In
other words, development or growth has costs that if not paid for by the
increased tax revenue, means we gain little by it and may even mean a net loss.
Trying to gain revenue though zoning is sort of like the constant tweaking
necessary to keep an old British motorcycle running right; unless you really enjoy
it, it is hardly worth the effort. The only thing zoning is really good for is
controlling what goes on where.
Now I had a notion that someone I respect and admire thinks has absolutely
zero chance of happening that has little to do with zoning. The City of
Minneapolis has a whole bunch of real estate on which no tax revenue is recovered
and what service or revenue it does provide is sometimes questionable. The land
is controlled by the various fiefdoms of our fair city such as MPS, the Park
Board, the Library Board, and the various departments of city hall; each
entity controls land in a way to maximize something that might not help the city as
a whole. (They get together sometimes, but not much comes of it, I think.) I
was not thinking of selling this land off or privatizing in any way to
increase the tax base, but of taking some of the control away from fiefdoms in favor
of using land in the most efficient or profitable way. I gave it a name: a
municipal land trust. To establish the trust, we would have to remove some
political power from the now disparate boards that control city owned land. It is
essentially a power grab in a system of city government that sometimes seems to
work like the world superpowers in the Cold War; that's why my friend thinks
it has no chance of happening, I think. Cities have a great deal of corporate
and police power over the private sector, but when it comes to regulating
themselves, they flop around a bit like a fish out of water; we must look to the
state and feds (like that would do any good now with who's in charge) for
greater control as well as the citizenry to change the rules (charter amendments) to
provide more efficientcy or greater revenue streams.
Minneapolis planning in its various incarnations has always recognized
that certain land uses bring in more revenue for the limited city services they
require. We don't really need all that many expensive condos in the North
Loop; they are nice and certainly bother the residents less than the industrial
uses that brought in the bacon at one time, but they really aren't the sort of
housing we need now. And I suspect that when you factor in the increased
services that the increased tax revenue doesn't go that far; the only ones to profit
are usually the developers and that's fine if they are meeting a real demand.
I would certainly be interested in seeing some of Nick Frank's "more in
depth recommendations" though. I can't agree with him that avoiding reduced
services depends on an increased tax base; what it depends on is having our proper
share of what we pay in, i.e., aid to local government. We won't get that
until we have state government that believes that cities are not superfluous and
we don't have anything close to that now with possible exception of the
present Senate majority.
Bill Kahn
Prospect Park
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