Agenda - Planning Commission - 04/05/2007

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men'tstothe constitutions in several states, essentiaUy setting aside the U.5. Supreme Court's approval of the eminent domain action in New london, Connecticut. Again, be mindful in family definition cases that there are 51 con- stitutions. Similarly, states may take the initiative to amend their statutes to limit what local gov. emments can do. We often forget that the power to regulate and zone is fundamentally a state power, some of which is handed down to localgovemmetlttl1rougl1chartersandthe enabling laws to let them regulate local mat- ters locally. Abuse oftl1at grant could result in thelocalgovemmentbeingforcedtorelin. ql.lish some of that power back to the state. For example, New]erseyandConnecticut amended their enabling statutes decades ago to prohibit local govemments from zoning Ol.lt group homes for developmentally disabled adults. Ukepolitics, all zoning is local. Localgov. emments can and do regularly change the defi. nitionoffamily. Last year, in what is a most unusual consideration of the definltionalprob- lem, MowerCounty,Minnesota,debated chang. ingthedefinitionoffamilyasitaffecteddistanc. ingreqLlirementsfromfeedlotoperationsto aUow extended families oftl1e livestock opera- tion owners to live closer to the feedlots than other types of families. Presumably, the family income is more important than avoidingtl1e olfactory nuisance. Similarly, the City of Knoxville and Knox County,inTennessee, last year kicked the tires on proposals to reduce the numberofunre- latedpeoplefromfiveto!wo,whilenotlimit- lngrelated persons. And around the same time, the city council in Albion, Michigan, unanimously amended its definition offamity to limit unrelated persons to four (previously unlimited) and require proofoftraditionalor functional family relationship. THE FAIR HOUSING AMENDMENTS ACT (FHAA) AND STATE LAW The FHAA basically allows protecteo classes of people-physicallydisabledorintellectuall~ chaUenged,forexample-to live in most placeswilhasingle-famityuseaesignation. , , ; ~ About half of the federal circuits support a "ruleofeight,~limitingthehomestoeight people. The FHAAtrumps local zoning, and is used most often to permit the ,location of sober houses for recovering alcoholics and substance abusers. State statutes often mimic the federal law and provide their own level of protection. THE 'FUNCTIONAl fAMILY' State decisions that are contrary to Belle Terre only appear to create an untenable confUct. One theme common to them is the similarity between the otherwise excluded households and the old-s,tyle195os family. Where a group ofumelatedpersonsisthefunctionalequiva- lent ofa family, a court is likely to strike down a traditional definition as applied to the group. However, when the household does not resemble a family-consider a group of college students-the restrictive ordinance is typically upheld. In 1989, New York's highest court rec. ognized functional families in a rent control c.sse where two gay men had lived together for more than 10 years as "permanent life partners," allowing the surviving man to take over the apartment when his partner died. Definitionalandproceduraltoolscsn protect the character of single-family resi. dential districts and yet still allow greater numbers of unrelated peoplewho share common bonds (i.e., a "functionalfamily~l to\ivetl1ere. For example, Ames, Iowa, home of iowa StateUniversity,amendeditsdefinitionof family to protect single-family neighborhoods, allow group homes underfederal and state ZONING PRACTICE 2.(17 AMERlCAN PLAN~I~G ASSOClAll0~ Ig~s