Agenda - Planning Commission - 12/05/2002

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requiring a variance or zoning amendment raises the same issues of excessive discretion, due process =arbitrary and capricious" challenges, and citizen and landowner uncertainty that were mentioned previously in the context of special uses and variances. Similarly, height, floor area ratio (EA.R.), and density limits higher than what is actually intended for an area, or even what the infrastructure of that area can bear, can lead to .false expectations for landowners and developers. Also, the individual standards (height, setback, EA.R., etc.) for a particular district should be consistent with one another in shaping development to the desired pattern. When the regulations giverh with high LA. tLs or density limits but then raketh away with the height and setback standards, confusion and challenges result. Basic parking provisions should be established in'a clear table, as with use districts. The parking robie should use the same use categories as the use district tables, and care should be taken when use categories axe created, eliminated, or modified that the parking requirements are amended appropriately. More substantively, parking regulations should be fle.,dble, allowing for shared parking and z. he provision of required parking off site where appropriate. Parking requirements for bicycles and other nonauromotive modes of transportation should also be considered. Administrative procedures should be spelled out in the ordinance. It should be clear For each kind of permit or approval who receives notice of an application, how, and when, who may contribute information or testimony, when hearings are required and when written submissions may be used~ which officials or bodies make recommendations and which make decisions, when a supermajoriU, vote (for example, ceo-thirds or three-Fourths) is required, how recommendations or a decision are announced and to whom, and how and when a decision may be appealed. Even where it is nor expressly required by stature or judicial precedent (as it is in many states), zoning decisions should be required in writing and state the leg-al a. nd factual bases for the decision. Conflict of interest provisions with teeth are an excellent idea to give the administrative process both the perception and the reality o£ fairness. All these requirements must be consistent with any express requirements of the enabling statutes. But where the stature has few specific requirements, ir must serve as a beginning point for local governments to establish the necessary details of administrative procedure rather than as encouragement for local governments to make their own procedural provisions vague and general. -- NEWS BRIEFS "Vasectomy" Zoning Cities across Massachusetts have initiated zoning strategies to limit the number of incoming children, viewing them as a financial strain on local school districts. Specifically, they are making ir mote difficult for a family with children ro afford buying a home: Many of the commtmiries see the burden placed on the local schools by an excessive number of children as a fiscal problem rhar can be addressed with zoning. The zoning ordinance amendments ro limit families with children have been labeled "vasectomy zoning." Essentially, communities are reducing the number of new children by targeting young families because young families with children usually require lower-cost housing, which does not generate significant property taxes, Cities in Massachusetts have adopted such zoning initiatives as refusing mu/tifamily housing developments, increasing the minimum tot size in residential zoning districts to three acres, and limiting the number of housing permits issued per year. By requiring a large minimum residential lot size, they force developers to build larger, more expensive, houses to compensate for the higher land value. Empty nesters or married couples without children are usually more likely to be able to afford homes above the median price. City officials in P{ymouth, Massachusetts, a city of 52,000, estimate that a home would need to be valued at $475,000 to garner the necessary' tax revenue to educate a child in. the local school system. On the other hand, communities nationwide traditionally have relied on commercial and industrial property taxes to make up much of the difference. John Lenox, director of Planning and Development in Plymouth, describes the result of the zoning measures taken there az not excluding families, but attempting to balance the housing opportunities available. The primary measures taken are phased residential development, a cap on building permits issued; and a building permit cap exemption for age-restticted housing. "We welcome family housing," says Lenox, although he also says that the community realizes it must pay its bills. Lenox adds that Plymouth has just as many young families as it did in the 1980s. The zoning changes that some would classify as vasectomy zoning took place in the late 1980s and, to a greater extent, since 1995. Another method of accomplishing the same objectives, in addition to amending the zoning code, has been to interpret certain zoning language differendy to accomplish attracting empty nesters, For example, ~senior citizen housing" can be interpreted exclusively as a retirement home or as a housing development with a minimum age restriction of 55. Such 55+ housing developments fall into the category of age-restricted housing. Lenox says these zoning measures may not be as appropriate in every community. The context in Massachusetts is important. Massachusetts already has typical home prices more than twice the national average. The cost of homeownership in much of the stare is already so high that the intent of vasectomy zoning is'largely accomplished without such provisions. According to the Citizens' Housing and Planning Association, almost ceo-thir~ of Massachusetts residents live in commtmides where a family earning the local median income could not afford their community's median-priced home. In the Boston metropolitan area, only 19 of 127 communities have homes that the typical family ~n the area can afford with 90 percent financing. Nonetheless, many school districts in Massachusetts See a significant problem in the fiscal cost of school overcrowding. Several communities have chosen vasectomy zoning measures as a primary solution to 'this problem, triggering criticism from numerous punic policy analysts, wi'to see such zoning as Foolish because it runs the risk of driving young professionals and young families' to other, stares, fosh Edwards Zoning ~lew] is a monthly newsletter publk~hcd by thc American Planning Association. Subscriptions are available for'g60 (U.S.) and $82 (foreign). W. 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