We bring you ... order!

One phrase that keeps coming up at planning meetings and council meetings and board of supervisor meetings, and in propaganda from the various ministries is "orderly growth." The way it's usually used is "the purpose of the ordinance (or zoning or the commission) is to encourage 'orderly growth' in the community." Every time I hear that, I want to jump up and ask them what in the hell that is.

Well, now at least we have a clue. Here's a story about "orderly growth's" evil and opposite twin, "haphazard growth!"

In fact, the reporter tells us this is an "object lesson" in haphazard growth. Theme alert: notice the words 20th century and growth patterns mentioned? The narrative of that theme goes something like this: All these GI's came home from WWII and they "needed a place to live" so crafty fellows like Levitt built these terrible little cheap boxes scattered hither and yon and thus condemned a generation to an existence in suburban banality and sprawling isolation. A lot of newspaper editors repeat this tale a lot. Perhaps to convince us of something. Personally, I don't buy it but that's another story. For more reading about 'the burbs' and how "sprawl" might actually improve our lives, read David Brook's On Paradise Drive.

Far from condemning past haphazard "building out" of Sacramento, this story is an object lesson in how poorly these planning commission make decisions. Or, at least how much worse the decisions made by commissions is than the choices freely made by individuals.

Notice another theme: Sacramento "build out?" Does Sacramento build things? Or do people build things?

We're being told that this little strip of land has been "blighted" and unused because "no one ever bothered to change the zoning..." Well, who exactly was responsible to decide what should be there? Doesn't someone own this land? Is the owner happy with it? Does the owner want to sell it? We'll get back to that.

The rest of this article is the same song and dance about "housing prices" and some ad copy from the house builder. (1,350 to 1,765 square feet!... priced from the low $200,000s to the mid-$300,000s!)

We are told, eleven of the "units" will be "sold below market rates?" Doesn't anyone notice that's technically impossible? Whatever you sell something for is the market. What they mean, but don't want to say is they are going to use money taken from you (taxes) to purchase the "units." It makes the developer sound a lot nicer, like they are giving something away to the poor -- like a charity, to phrase it they way they did. But what they are really doing is taking from you to enrich themselves. In other words, they sell the house for full market price except that the poor person pays some of it, and you the taxpayer pays the rest of the cost. Either way, the developer gets his full profit. That sounds a lot different than the way it's presented in The Bee story, doesn't it? The Bee reporter makes it sound like the developer is some kind of humanitarian who's giving away houses to the poor at lower cost. Interesting how propaganda works, isn't it?

Let me get back to the main idea here, and I don't think I've explained it too well. What is wrong with this idea of "haphazard growth" vs. "orderly growth." The Bee article implies the assumed party line, that "haphazard growth" is bad and what causes "haphazard growth" is that old post-war idea that you should just be free to build where you want. In other words, see how bad things were before there was a planning commission to tell you where to build a house and what you can do with your own land? You see, we are told, back in the olden days, evil or dumb people would just selfishly build things on their land where they wanted. And see what problems this causes?

Except that all this "haphazardness" was caused by government regulation, not choices in the free market. The article admits it's the "zoning regulation" that was the problem. But they never ask the obvious question, why do we even need a zoning regulation? What would happen if there was no such thing? Heresy you say? Do you know there are places, including some major cities in the U.S. that don't have any "zoning?" And, surprisingly, the "patterns of build out" turn out to be just about the same, or better than the "planned and orderly" growth dictated by a commission. (Example, Dallas/Ft. Worth Texas). Still don't believe it? Then how was just about the entire nation built without zoning boards? The first zoning laws didn't appear until the early 20th century and weren't widespread till just a few decades ago.

The answer is that the free market, i.e. choices made by individual people looking out for their best interests results paradoxically in what is best for the entire community. (See "Adam Smith")

I'll just leave you with this to think about. In all the words in that article, why isn't one simple question answered? Who owns this land?

Why isn't that even worth mentioning? You'd think that was the single most important fact of the entire story. What does this tell us about land use policy and political influence for fun and profit?