OH, No
John Kramer of the Institute for Justice writes to say that IJ clients Carl and Joy Gamble will indeed be forced out of their home of 35 years to make way for a Crate & Barrel. They're expecting the moving van tomorrow. The town of Norwood, Ohio, handed their property over to developers after designating their area "blighted," which makes it subject to eminent domain seizure. Here are some photographs of said "blight." At least once they've moved they'll have somewhere to buy new furniture.
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This is a terrible mistake the city will come to regret. They seem to have forgotten the PURPOSE of economic development.
This should insert more bitter taste into the mouths of the anti-corporate types. For some will see it as corporate bullying and not government stealing. Some will see it as both. Others won’t give a damn.
Joe, they won’t regret it. You know how much tax revenue they’ll clean up from this? That’s all they care about.
Could this be prosecuted as organized crime?
sage, it’s a longterm fiscal loser. Cities succeed or fail by being attractive places to be. Trading a quality neighborhood for a souless office park will make Norwood a little bit less of a quality city, and reduce property values across the board.
Maximizing what you get out of a single site, rather than considering the impact of a proposal on the community as a whole, is the opposite of responsible planning.
You gotta break a few eggs to make a well planned mixed use higher density omelette.
“sage, it’s a longterm fiscal loser. Cities succeed or fail by being attractive places to be.”
Really. Detroit is a relative shitbox, yet it’s population over the years does little more than increase. In the end, lawmakers want revenue now. They don’t care about the long term. That will be someone else’s problem.
“Crate and Barrel” is beginning to sound more like an private property acquisition strategy than inventory, at least if you reverse the terms.
Yeah, urban planning out in the ‘burbs. Escape the crowded city. Come out to spacious Norwood, when you can live right the fuck on top of your neighbor and a stone’s throw from your boss’ window.
That’ll fly.
Detroit is a relative shitbox, yet it’s population over the years does little more than increase.
That’s because it’s citizens do little more than fuck.
joe,
You just don’t get it, do you? Even if the industrial park had been a “winner” for the city, it would still have been wrong to take the land. Period. Making property rights flexible in the name of platitudes like “responsible planning” shows what an evil, ugly statist you really are, and how little respect you have for a man’s home and property rights.
woah. bulldoze that hellhole! for the greater good! happy birthday, ayn.
Two-thirds of Greater Cincinnati’s 1.4 million residents live within 10 miles of Norwood.
rst, I was hoping your link would show something that proves your assertion. Like for example, the number of live births compared to other cities of comparable size. However, I don’t disagree with you. In that city, what else is there really to do?
If this practice continues, I wonder how long it will be till someone of the, ahem, nuttier side of the fruitcake who lost property in this manner shows up after the fact either to firebomb the “economic development” in question, or simply shoot up the place and all of its occupants.
JMJ
Geographically small, landlocked suburbs do this all the time. The only way to “expand the property tax base” is to increase the number of “homes”. Knocking down 5 homes to create 1 office building with a commercial bottom floor and 1 condo building with 48 units does exactly that. Since the condos are usually lower cost than one of the houses being torn down (say 25% cheaper), they can claim “affordable housing” exists and get 49 property taxpayers instead of 5. And they can tout the walkability of the neighborhood, etc. Throw in a little strip of parkland and it’s a planner’s orgasm – increased density, public green space, walkable…
I wish my neighborhood was blighted like that. I especially liked the neo-Tudor blight, and the landscaped Mediterranean villa blight.
It may increase the Grand List, but, unless the housing in question is age-restricted, the population of kiddies living there (and, more’s the point, the cost of educating the li’l darlings) will WELL more than chew up any revenue gains received. That, or it had better be one helluva office building.
JMJ
Ahh yes, urban & town planning at its finest.
In that city, what else is there really to do?
Get high.
The only way to “expand the property tax base” is to increase the number of “homes”.
I forget the exact wording of the constitution, but isn’t public use supposed to be for some tangible public owned use; i.e. a railroad, airport etc?
I don’t know this issue in depth.
How did we get to the point that increasing tax income is a public use? Has this sort of thing ever gone to the SCOTUS?
I wish my neighborhood was blighted like that. I especially liked the neo-Tudor blight, and the landscaped Mediterranean villa blight.
To me it looks like quite a nice neighborhood.
I’ll never shop at Crate & Barrell again so long as I live.
I wish my neighborhood was blighted like that. I especially liked the neo-Tudor blight, and the landscaped Mediterranean villa blight.
Comment by: R C Dean at February 2, 2005 11:22 AM
Yes, I do really like the “landscaped Mediterranean villa blight”, also. If you want to see blight…oh brother, I can direct you to many a U.S. city, but probably none of the houses in the photos..
In that city, what else is there really to do?
Get high.
And gamble! 😀
And litter.
Correct about the fiscal impacts, John M.
Randian, I’m actually a very handsome statist, and one who works to help other people. Oh, wait, that last bit makes me evil, doesn’t it? Anyway, I actually agree that it would be wrong to take these homes to build an industrial park, even if it wouldn’t harm the city’s character. I’m just criticising it from another pov.
Twba, “You gotta break a few eggs to make a well planned mixed use higher density omelette.” Actually, no. The neighborhood is already well planned, fairly dense and walkable. To make it more so, all they would need to do is rezone for commercial or higher density residential, and allow those owners who want to sell to developers to do so. The “mixed use” new urbanist pitch appears to be so much window dressing, latching onto a popular movement the way corporate welfare recipients latch onto the language of markets, or anyone with a new weapons system latches onto the language of “transformation” and “RMA.”
RC, I’m glad you like the look of the neighborhood, though your appreciation poses a bit of a problem for your worldview. You know those unpopular, oppressive, new urbanist hellholes you’re so certain no one with a free chose would move to? The streets you see in those photos are the archetype of a New Urbanist neighborhood.
rst, did you look at the pictures? They’re already living on top of their neighbors – and fighting for the right to continue doing so, because they enjoy the quality of life that neigbhorhood provides.
sage, a boom in low-income population, coupled with a reduction in middle and high income residents, is not the hallmark of a successful city.
“Ahh yes, urban & town planning at its finest.”
If you’re talking about the “Before” photos, I agree.
[I]If this practice continues, I wonder how long it will be till someone of the, ahem, nuttier side of the fruitcake who lost property in this manner shows up after the fact either to firebomb the “economic development” in question, or simply shoot up the place and all of its occupants.[/I}
JMJ
JMJ-The Roark approach, in honor of Rand’s birthday, right? I wouldn’t vote to convict, anyway.
Is this one of those rare times as a Libertarian when I should be opposed to the arrival of new local businesses?
Fucking tags.
SPD,
You can be opposed to any new business you want to.
They’re already living on top of their neighbors
Figuratively, perhaps. But the pictures all looked like single-family homes to me.
Hey Joe,when do you find time to help others?Most of your time seems to be spent expounding your irritating opinions here and lord knows where else.
To recap:
City steals property from rightful owners. Hit and Run posts story. joe comments that city planning is a good thing, it’s just that these particular planners are evil or don’t understand “good” planning or something.
Fitting for Groundhog’s Day as we experience this thread over and over….
“sage, a boom in low-income population, coupled with a reduction in middle and high income residents, is not the hallmark of a successful city.”
Fair enough. What, then, is the ‘hallmark of a successful city?’ Is it one where the low-income folks are “removed,” making room for the middle and high income residents? Or are you thinking of an equal balance between the three? For that matter, what are the standards of “success?” I would think that if you ask ten people that question, you could easily get ten answers, none of them being necessarily wrong.
The Supreme Court is to hear an eminent-domain-abuse case later this month. I hope they make the right decision.
Those first two homes pictured were absolutely gorgeous.
“I would think that if you ask ten people that question, you could easily get ten answers, none of them being necessarily wrong.’
There are both subjective and objective conditions to consider. A successful city offers the quality of live, infrastructure, and services that make it attractive and accessible to a broad range of people of and business. A successful city maintains and advances its market share.
Dog, if there was no purpose in distinguishing between different types of takings, why bother linking to pictures of the houses and putting (wholly appropriate) scare quotes around “blighted?”
By the way, according to this story in today’s New York Times, Detroit’s population has done nothing but DECREASE over the last few decades.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/02/national/02detroit.html?8hpib
“By the way, according to this story in today’s New York Times, Detroit’s population has done nothing but DECREASE over the last few decades.”
Now that’s a quagmire. Do I believe the Times, or the Beaurau of the Census? Sigh.
Sage-
Did you read the story?
sage,
I think you mean conundrum. 🙂
An excerpt from the story, which is about how Detroit is having to slash its budgets for lack of tax revenues:
Having lost one million residents in a half century, Detroit is expected to see its population drop by 50,000 more in the next five years; 15,168 business have departed since 1972. New loft developments credited with revitalizing downtown are mainly filled with empty-nesters, not the building blocks of a healthy community; white flight has become bright flight, with families and people earning more than $50,000 a year leading the way out of town.
Those first two homes pictured were absolutely gorgeous.
I respectfully disagree, but I do agree that these properties are far from what I’d describe as “blighted.”
one who works to help other people
More accurately in this context, joe works to make somebody else help other people. He confuses his intent with the mechanism and considers that intent an absolution for the the suffering caused.
Now, if beautiful joe volunteers at the shelter or in a literacy program, I will accept that he works to help other people, without qualification. We don’t know much about joe’s own charity as he spends so much time proclaiming his wise ability to give away somebody else’s money, while taking a nice cut for himself.
Sage-
Is the Census Beaurau different from the Census Bureau? I ask because a quick Google search suggests that the Census Bureau seems to think Detroit’s population has been in decline for decades, too, but maybe the Census Beaurau has access to data the Census Bureau can’t find.
“sage, a boom in low-income population, coupled with a reduction in middle and high income residents, is not the hallmark of a successful city.”
joe, with all due respect, I will argue that reduction in total residential population is the goal of fascist planners. Residents consume tremendous resources (hospitals, schools, trash collection, water, etc..), compared to businesses/commuters. I live in the DC suburbs, and the property values are through the fucking roof because of zoning. The fascists don’t “allow” for much residential development, therefor what is left is heavily in demand. It’s really, really fucking discouraging that two people very comfortably in the professional, white collar ranks can barely afford to rent a townhouse. It’s simply impossible for lower income people to live in this area, unless they are heavily subsidized.
SPD,
The second home is OK. The first home needs some serious landscaping work.
Well put, Mr. Nice Guy – zoning people out has been the hallmark of suburban zoning for decades, and it has succeeded to the point that there are serious housing shortages in many areas of the country. Zoning too much land commercial is one way this occurs. Forbidding any residential uses in these commercial zones is another. Mandating extremely low densities, and expensive housing types, in the residential zones a third.
Though I have to disagree with the statement that “reduction in total residential population” is the goal of this zoning. I’d amend that “reduction in the low and moderate income population” plays a much larger role.
This Cincinnati resident — who shopped at the Rookwood mall a dozen times a year for five years — will never spend a penny there again, let alone anywhere else in Norwood.
I’ll never shop at Crate & Barrell again so long as I live.
Do a large portion of your shopping there now, do ya?
😉
So, assuming “blight” still means “blight,” as well as meaning “blight” as OH has defined it, the whole city of Spokane, WA, ought to be seized and re-developed.
I was curious, GG — should a property owner’s rights be respected if he or she neglects their property to the detriment of their neighbors’ property values (assuming property values are determined that way)?
I don’t have anywhere else to mention this, but it poses a different angle on the property takings debate. Last week’s cover story in the Philadelphia Weekly addressed local citizens researching tax delinquency and initiating sheriff’s sales on nuisance properties (specifically drug houses).
http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/view.php?id=8844
It’s my initial reaction that this sort of activity passes the libertarian sniff-tests, which surprises me since it represents a possible private-property taking as well as a creative tool in fighting against drugs.
But it also represents property owners failing to meet their propery tax obligations, and either allowing or consenting to some illegal use of the property. (Just by failing to meet the tax obligation, I’m sure Georgists would have them moved off long ago!) And it’s not a “drug war” type of command and control policy; it represents interested neighbors taking ownership of the problem (of direct locally-imposed negative externalities as a result of drug activity) and initiating a long-term solution. It strikes me as more economic, more permanent, and less violent than calling for a police raid.
And according to the anecdotes in the story, the process spawns redevelopment within legitimately blighted or near-blighted neighborhoods; or at the very least gets revenue flowing again on the specific properties.
So I apologize because it’s not eminent domain, but I didn’t have anywhere else to post it, and I can’t come up with what I’d consider a libertarian reason to oppose it.
I don’t understand why these discussions keep breaking out here. I _really_ don’t understand why people keep arguing with joe about this, as he’s made it his life’s work to coerce others. Like you’re going to convince him that he’s in the wrong?
Are we Libertarians or what around here?
All right, Jennifer, thanks for the ration of crap. I didn’t read the article because I did not want to register with the NYT. I trust you, though, that the article says what you say it does. The link I provided above shows decade by decade head counts since 1900. In all but two census years, there was a net gain in population. And as for my spelling…*shrug*…I try to do my bessed.
SPD –
We seem to have posted across one another. The story I mentioned in my post addresses properties that both impact the neighbor’s experience as well as are delinquent on property taxes. Is that a solid-enough basis for a property taking?
joe, Mr. NG,
I’ve only noticed this type of zoning in suburbs with developable lots. In suburbs with no developable lots, in order to cover increasing costs one of three things has to happen: 1) The existing property values must rise high enough to make the revenue at the existing tax rate cover the rise in costs, 2) The existing property tax rates must rise in order to increase the revenue at the exsiting property values high enough to cover the rise in costs, 3) additional taxable properties must be created to increase the revenues. Or some combination of these three.
There are several towns that are zoned 90% industrial/commercial that are “successful”, not from a resident’s standpoint, but certainly from the standpoint of how much money the mayor’s making. Rosemont, IL for example.
SPD,
I guess I’d have to know what you mean by neglect.
Of course in the owner literally abandons the property, the adjacent homeowner could seize it and after a numbers (seven is what springs to mind from my property course) own the property himself.
If I am going to go to a place like Crate & Barrel I go to Ikea. 🙂
Russ, the fiscal status of a community is important, but it seems inadequate as a definition of whether or a not a city is successful as a city.
A city is not a just a budget and a set of services. It is a place where people live, work, and relate to.
Interesting, GG. I didn’t know that.
Keith: Yes, I think we may have touched on similar topics.
What I wondered was: If Owner A chooses not to paint his house, fix the broken windows, remove the rusted-out Camaro from his front lawn and pick up large mounds of dog poop, can his neighbors do anything about without infringing on his rights as a property owner?
SPD,
Well, first he might live in a community that – as part of the contract to buy a home in that community – would require one not to allow such to happen. In that instance, he’d be in breach; though, if they sat on their rights for a long time (as would seem possible in this situation), the owner could just argue that latches applies (you sat on your rights too long for the court to deal with your shit – tough shit).
Second, some city ordinances do cover things like this. Every so often one does hear about some guy with 10,000 goats on 2 acres or 8,000 rusted cars on six acres being forced to remove them, etc.
A city is not a just a budget and a set of services. It is a place where people live, work, and relate to.
To some people, that’s true. To others that’s not the case. Every city has carpetbaggers; some of them are on the city payroll.
Out of town city employees, like out of town rental property owners, shouldn’t be condemned wholesale. (I live in the town where I work, but I didn’t always). And some resident-employee and resident-owners are bums.
keith,
It is essential to determine who is decided which property is a nuisance. There are common-law remedies to demonstrated nuisance, so the affected neighbors may not be taking so much as they are collecting damages in the form of a property title.
Failure to pay property tax may be a breach of contract with the municipality, if those taxes are seen as paying for fire protection or other city-monopolized services. Again, then, it is possibly more a compensation of title rather than a taking.
A Georgist urges the value of ground rent be used for public purposes. The titling is not a necessary aspect. The value of the buildings, and the rent they generate is left to the owners. In this sense, the transfer of ground rent is not a tax, but the payment of value to the only valid landholder, the public. Withholding ground rent from the public would merit eviction, but the Georgist doesn’t have the desire to take the value of the improvements. If the tenant could not make the land sufficiently productive to pay the rent, he is free under Georgist theory to move to less valuable land, all the way out to where market rent is zero.
“A successful city offers the quality of live(sic), infrastructure, and services that make it attractive and accessible to a broad range of people of and business.”
I’ll buy that. How about one that allows people and businesses to succeed on their own or fail?
“A successful city maintains and advances its market share.”
Share of what/whom? Could you please expand on this one for me?
But the pictures all looked like single-family homes to me.
Some of them are top-bottom duplexes — you’ll find them in pretty much all Ohio suburbs. They look a lot like the one I used to rent in Lakewood.
Mr Nice Guy, did you read the article in yesterday’s WaPo about home prices in the metro area doubling since 2000? It seems to be less a function of zoning (well, not completely, anyway) than a constant influx of high-paid government workers and immigrants driving the demand for housing up. From where I sit in my office in Arlington, there’s a mixed use condo going up a block away where studio apartments are starting at $300K. There are more condos a mile down Lee Hwy. starting in the $600s. And down in Shirlington, there are 3-bedroom condos going up for $1.3 million.
It’s absolutely ludicrous. My wife and I rented a 3-bedroom single-family home in Cleveland with a finished attic and basement for $635 a month in 1999. Here, we pay $1400 for an 1100 sq ft, 2br apartment.
Dynamist,
Thanks for your comments. I think that in the situation I found, the sheriff’s sales are certainly compensating the city for services (including fire protection as well as any bills outstanding for water, sewer and natural gas services). The concerned neigbors who start the process aren’t necessarily the ones who will get any direct profit for damages, but will benefit by a change in the use of the property.
Thanks for the Georgist elaboration as well. Georgist theory is a recent hobby of mine, and I’m still working on it.
Quod?: We argue with joe because it’s fun. The more time he spends here, the more likely he’ll suffer from creeping libertarianism.
The streets you see in those photos are the archetype of a New Urbanist neighborhood. It is a place where people live, work, and relate to.
The TND planner seeks to replicate the products of years of individual decisions. Facade design and block platting is frequently a substitute for the patience and trust required for organic development. It is “Yesterday’s neighborhoods now!”, attempting to force a preferred future. We might save some salary expense if we trust the descendants of people who evolved Norwood to do the same for wherever they choose to live. Tomorrows neighborhoods tomorrow!
I imagine that to RC, discovering that a house he likes, or a street he likes, contains rental housing and 10+ units/acre must be akin to a frat guy reaching unawares up the skirt of…
I’ll stop there.
Phil, without the zoning regime, the housing supply in greater DC might stand a chance of meeting demand.
Dynamist, there were a lot of dreadful neighborhoods built in the past as well. The successful design elements that TND seeks to replicate represent the best of what came about. Left to their own devices, builders in the market-driven economy of the industrial era built godawful tenements, flood prone neighborhoods, and noxious tanneries cheek by jowl with people’s homes.
The argument “people left alone built the neighborhoods you like” ignores the fact that they built miserables atrocities as well. It also ignores the fact that they weren’t as “left alone” as you might imagine, but let’s stick to one variable at a time.
Similarly, planners as confident as joe constructed a range of atrocities. If joe can learn to avoid mistakes the past, isn’t it hubris to assume that individual actors are not equally endowed?
The “left alone” idea will poison any debate until there are no more states. To say “they weren’t free neither” does not excuse or justify continuing the oppression. Every action from the ancient rise of kings was made under some scheme of coercion. I champion an end to coercion, while joe wants to control it.
The problem is, Dynamist, the “mistakes” weren’t always mistakes for the people making them. They were rational, often effective, attempts to maximize their profit.
A builder doesn’t lose any money if his development turns into a shithole ten years down the line.
“I champion an end to coercion, while joe wants to control it.” Well put. We have different priorities in our politics – you want the developers and landowners to be free from regulation, regardless of how the communities they build turn out. I want people to live in quality communities, even if it requires regulating development.
‘The “left alone” idea will poison any debate until there are no more states.’
Then perhaps you shouldn’t have raised it, when you wrote: “The TND planner seeks to replicate the products of years of individual decisions.”
joe, maybe — I don’t know enough about the zoning regs here to say one way or the other. But there’s no shortage of pretty dense housing here — again, just from my office window, I can count seven high-rise apartment buildings, and not one of them has units under $1,200 monthly. Plus, there aren’t a lot of undeveloped blocks here, and what there are aren’t going for single family homes or McMansions, but condos and apartments.
Phil, decades of snob zoning have left the region with quite a bit of catching up to do.
I want people to live in quality communities, even if it requires regulating development.
But who gets to define quality? Norwood seems to think a Crate and Barrel store is of higher quality than a bunch of pretty little homes. I have one friend who won’t consider living in any place less urban than Greenwich Village; another friend thinks one person per square mile is too crowded for his tastes. I’m a cheapskate, so I LOVE the fact that I live in an inexpensive apartment within walking distance of several discount and overstock-outlet stores; others would only like my neighborhood if the cheap stores were replaced by precious little boutiques, and the cheap apartments replaced by ultramodern luxury units.
Who gets to decide–the zoning board? The City Council? Or maybe–here’s a radical idea–the guys who actually own the stores, houses and apartment buildings?
“Similarly, planners as confident as joe constructed a range of atrocities.”
Dynamist, I know the planners of whom you speak (LeCorbusier, for example, or Robert Moses), and believe me, they were far more confident than I. Learning from and shedding such hubris is a large part of a modern urban planning education.
Nevertheless, I’m sure you’ll accuse me of unmitigated arrogance for daring to believe that my years of study and experience help me to understand the likely outcomes of urban design choices better than someone who’s never made any effort to understand the outcomes of design choices. I’m afraid I’ll just have to live with your disapproval.
Jennifer, the neighborhoods of cheap apartments should decide how to be the best cheap apartment neighborhoods they can be. Ditto with the highrise districts, the the SoHos, and the rural counties. Property owners, residents, businessowners, and the public officials they employ need to decide on what the goals and vision are, and how they should be pursued.
Jennifer, the neighborhoods of cheap apartments should decide how to be the best cheap apartment neighborhoods they can be.
Okay. So, as part of My Neighborhood, let me tell you this: me and my neighbors would all be pretty irritated if the nearby job lots and flea markets and cheap restaurants decided to convert themselves to Tiffany’s stores, Bentley dealerships, and other such places where we couldn’t possibly afford to shop. There are a LOT more of us in the neighborhood than there are business owners. And, considering that some folks in this neighborhood don’t have their own transportation, one could argue that the presence of these stores fills an actual NEED for some residents, which luxury boutiques would not.
So suppose the owners of the semiabandoned mall and the surrounding businesses decided to upgrade in a major way. We, the folks who live in the neighborhood, don’t want them to. Furthermore, a lot of us (thought not me, fortunately) truly NEED the services the cheap stores provide.
There are more of us than there are of them. Should we poor folks in the majority have the right to vote to keep out the jewelry sellers and luxury-car dealers?
Make that “THOUGH not me, fortunately.”
Plus, there aren’t a lot of undeveloped blocks here, and what there are aren’t going for single family homes or McMansions, but condos and apartments.
There are a number of undeveloped tracts in Suburban Charlotte that are old family properties. I’m not sure if the family is waiting to capture a higher $/acre, or if they just aren’t going to sell.
Wait until the suburbs start seizing that so that developers can put up housing plans.
Old money has enough $$ to fight that stuff and fight it well.
You know, joe’s ideas, although obviously not acceptable to a purist libertarian, seem to be a vast improvement over a lot of what gets done in the name of urban planning. joe would never completely abdicate his job and let the free market decide all, but it sounds to me like he’d interfere a lot less than most planners.
Really, I’d see it as a HUGE step in the right direction if every urban planner was like joe. To me, joe is kind of like a tax cut. It sucks that the tax is still there, but I’ll take the lower tax over the higher tax any day.
thoreau,
Its not even an issue of being a purist.
thoreau,
The basic problem is that whatever “good intentions” joe and others like him might have, when they are implemented they turn into nightmares. I merely echo Hayek’s thoughts on the matter of course.
Gary, if joe thinks that a lot of zoning laws are too restrictive, then he’s OK in my book. I might want to go further than he’d like to go (in fact, I’d like to go a lot further), but in the context of the status quo (you know, reality), he’s a natural ally on many issues.
For instance, joe has opposed upper limits on density. As long as he also opposes lower limits on density I would consider him an ally.
He’s also expressed sympathy for performance zoning, where instead of specifying the allowed characteristics of a building you specify the disallowed characteristics. e.g. no height requirement, but you can’t cast more than a certain amount of shadow on your neighbor’s property for more than a certain amount of time each day.
thoreau,
The problem of course is that centralized planning remains his modus operandi. You seem to be confusing some similarity regarding specific options with overall philosophy.
Who determines the aspects describing a “quality community”? Is it the vibrant rabble of Jennifer’s flea market or the refinement of Tiffany? How does joe decide whether he should build projects for rabble or refinement? And when he decides, where is the compassion, or even respect, for those with wishes outside the preferences in his plan?
Hubris is contained within the power to make “urban design choices”. Perhaps joe is a wise and benevolent dictator, and I agree with thoreau that such is better than a cruel idiot, but joe is still commanding behavior. That he may understand the likely outcomes of choices would make him valuable to a private developer, but he prefers to act in the public arena where he has the power to prevent what he believes will be bad choices.
Forcing people away from mistakes is perhaps good parenting, but it deprives mature adults of their essential humanity, to determine their own future with freedom and responsibility. In theory, I see little difference between joe and the Official Haircut Minister commanding us all get a high-and-tight to better serve the public interest. Certainly the Minister with advanced degrees in Cosmetology and years of hygiene experience is better qualified to know what should be on joe’s head than joe himself is.
(Like I said, arguing with joe is fun…)
Gary, joe obviously does favor central planning.
But I don’t care about his inner motivations. I care about the fact that on a lot of urban issues he favors less central planning than we currently have. Pragmatically, a city government run by joe would be less intrusive than most city governments in the US currently are, and that’s a step in the right direction.
Don’t get me wrong: I won’t bestow the title “libertarian” on him or teach him any of the secret handshakes. I won’t give him a secret decoder ring or let him join in our reindeer games. But I’ll still say that he’s a breath of fresh air compared to a lot of what goes in in local governments, and I wish more local officials were more like him.
I’ll give joe a decoder ring if he razes the hideous 70s-era apartments in my neighborhood. Living in a traditional neighborhood, I evidently like the idea of TNDs. It’s just a question of how we bring them about, and if we should be meddling at all.
Now I’m off to listen to sub-joe-quality officials tell me what’s best for the vacant lot a few blocks over.
“Could this be prosecuted as organized crime?”
I thought libertarians were wont to think that government was, by definition, organized crime. (As some of us used to say, “Fight organized crime; smash the state.”)
thoreau,
I think you miss the point. When joe changes his mind there is nothing you can do about. Once you start making deals with the devil, expect undesirable consequences.
Quod: We argue with joe because it’s fun. The more time he spends here, the more likely he’ll suffer from creeping libertarianism.
Not to mention that the more time he spends kibitzing on this board, the less time he can spend regulating. 🙂
Kevin
Kevin,
*high five* 🙂
“It’s absolutely ludicrous. My wife and I rented a 3-bedroom single-family home in Cleveland with a finished attic and basement for $635 a month in 1999. Here, we pay $1400 for an 1100 sq ft, 2br apartment.”
Phil, man, you know my pain. My father supported a family of five in a nice corner single-family home in this area. Now, 30 years later, even though I am at the same employment level he was, I have to rely on a partner to live in a house half the size. I was an Econ major, but I’m still having a really hard time figuring it out. In real dollars, my spending power is total shit compared to my father.