L.A. Story

This week, after a stay of just over a year, my fiancé and I are packing up and leaving Los Angeles. Based on many factors that work themselves into such an equation, we have decided to move back to our place of origin – New York City. We turn back towards the east, knowing that New York is where we want to be. But as we tape up the final box, I look back at our time here with great affection. I came out here to try my hand at writing for television and film. Although I see it as a success, meeting a number of wonderful people, and I intend to continue my pursuit in New York, I did not “make a sale” while here. But the other learning experience I had while living in Los Angeles was the ability to enjoy a first hand experience of one of the most intriguing metropolitan regions on earth from a land use perspective. Los Angeles has always been the model of what not to do when it came to land use planning. Smoggy, sprawly and just plain ugly, pundits, politicians and professors have relegated it to one of the most ill-conceived settlements on earth.

Having driven the freeways, breathed the air, walked the beaches and explored its canyons, I leave this place better educated about why people continue to move here and grow this behemoth of a metropolitan area. Sure, the driving is terrible. The drivers, in fact, are even worse. There are days when it’s difficult to breathe (especially if you’re sensitive to bad air like I am). When it rains around here, the television meteorologists declare a state of emergency. Not having seasons does make you got nuts. The Los Angeles Times devotes a week’s worth of front page space to a celebrity (oh, let’s say Mel Gibson for instance) who gets stopped for having a few too many drinks. And yes, there is more silicone here than the Sahara Desert. But underneath the lunacy that defines Los Angeles is an environment that adds up to an oddly, but extremely, livable place.

Any observer of the urban condition will tell you that the key to a successful community is creating pedestrian-scale neighborhoods patched together by a collective sense of ownership. The very old joke in L.A. is that no one walks. For the most part, this is true. But nonetheless, “Los Angeles,” as constituted, is a patchwork of neighborhoods, one that blends into the next. If you travel down Sunset Boulevard, moving from the water inland, you weave through a multiplicity of different and distinct areas. Pacific Palisades leads to Brentwood. Cross over the 405 freeway and enter Westwood, which passes along the entrance to Bel Air, which evolves to Beverly Hills, which morphs into West Hollywood, which changes over to Hollywood, and so on, and so forth. You can take any path across the gigantic Los Angeles basin and find yourself traversing through a constant turnover in neighborhood after neighborhood, each with its own character and collection of denizens. The beach is very different from the Valley, the Hills provide a vast departure from Pasadena. The list and comparisons are like an old Love Connection episode, where each pair discusses how far apart the two of them live, all in the interest of dinner and a movie.

Depending on which numbers you believe, the Los Angeles metropolitan region is the densest area in the United States. The sprawl has morphed into really dense sprawl. In the process, the inhabitants have forged for themselves a place to live comfortably, for the most part. Los Angeles offers the wonderful escapes of beaches and forest, winter and summer sports all at the same time. And the places where people spend most of their time in a given year, although clogged with traffic, still provides a spot on an individual level, even to walk around once in awhile. Therefore, even though it’s time to leave, our time in L.A. was extremely well spent.

Let's Give Thanks

During the week of this most gluttonous of holidays, we should reflect on the meaning of the event in the context of land use. Most conversations on land use assume the modern-day axiom that there is no further question as to the legitimacy of “Americans” on the soil they call home. The question isn’t so much who owns the property but rather, what will be done to said tract. Yes, the well-worn story of European aggression leading to the wresting of the North American continent from native peoples underlies this query. But where does this narrative stand today?

An intriguing story comes from upstate New York, the home of the Oneida Indian Nation. The Nation has grown in stature, with the aid of profits generated by its Turning Stone Casino and Resort complex just off the New York Thruway, about an hour’s drive east of Syracuse. Its economic strength has also increased its political clout in the region, something that is not always welcomed by the other inhabitants of the area, who make up about 99% of the population. In March, 2005, the United States Supreme Court, in City of Sherill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York, held that the Nation, which attempted to reacquire ancestral lands and reintegrate these new purchases into the autonomous lands of their tribe, still had to pay property taxes on these new tracts. The Court reasoned because the Oneidas had waited so long to reassert authority over these lands, they could not use the tax exemption that would typically apply. Moreover, the Court was concerned that if the Oneidas were allowed to reassert control over their recent purchases, the Nation could also claim that it was not subject to local zoning requirements that the non-Nation properties still face.

The decision is not the end of the story. The Nation responded to the adverse decision by filing with the United States Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) an application for the territory at issue to be taken into trust, which would have the same effect as being declared sovereign territory. Senator Charles Schumer has voiced his alignment with the impacted localities against the Nation. “Simply put, where no legitimate land claim exists, the BIA should be very hesitant to reward tribes – and harm counties and municipalities – by placing non-contiguous land into federal trust.”

From a land use perspective, having the localities remain sovereign over the new Oneida lands on its face appears to make sense. Consistency of application is a rule common to the American experience. But doesn’t it seem a little disingenuous to have the Supreme Court and Senator Schumer side with the municipalities on the bases of fair play and other equitable justifications? Who has been harmed more over the course of the last five hundred years? As always, the issue is less about history and more about the almighty dollar. Jealous of the Oneida’s successes, both the local and state governments cringe over the potential tax revenues that would be lost if all of the Nation’s earnings were free from levy. Tax revenues are always a factor in the land use calculus. Municipalities are always on the prowl for the all-important “ratables.”

But in this case, there is more at play than a question of money. Sovereignty and home rule are precepts that municipalities continue to fight to preserve in the face of regionalization. This very same fundamental right is what the Oneidas are seeking. The land use process is part of the self governance equation, and would not be ignored by the Nation, as it has not been on the property that currently falls within the tribe’s control. At this time of year, when we can reflect on the origins of our ritual of turkey and football, isn’t it worthwhile to think about the importance of thanks, and sharing, after all that has come before?

The Future!

This Friday, after a four-year hiatus, the James Bond franchise returns to the silver screen with Casino Royale, the original story from Bond’s creator, Ian Fleming, and a new fellow filling the tuxedo, Daniel Craig. I look forward to it with great anticipation. But what does this have to do with land use, you ask? Well, aside from the commercials depicting a fight scene atop a half-completed skyscraper, the return of Bond got me to thinking about the role of film and television in portraying the land use process, and if, along with the high profile of Kelo, has the mass media portrayed it accurately, or with sufficient care? Professionals, and those in “the know” often complain how Hollywood distorts the “truth” of their vocation. Surgeons look for egregious mistakes in operating room scenes, psychologists scoff at laughable therapy sessions, and police officers cringe at shoddy techniques employed by those who only “play them on T.V.”

The crooked land developer is a common villain, from the shady fellow who built on old Indian burial grounds in Poltergeist, to just about every bad guy who uttered the line “if it wasn’t for those pesky kids” on Scooby-Doo. In a more recent example, John Sayles, a respected independent film director, made Sunshine State, an ensemble piece analyzing the personal and political dynamics of a proposed development in a coastal Florida town. The film even throws in a few board hearing scenes to provide a pretty solid picture of the process. Finding examples of land use-themed fiction is not hard. Finding memorable ones is more of a challenge.

Luckily, one of the greatest villains of all time, in one of the greatest movies of all time happens to be a land baron: Noah Cross in Chinatown. Loosely based on the real-life water grab from the Owens Valley to usher in modern Los Angeles, Chinatown is the greatest portrayal of land use to date because it captures the personality and politics behind the process. Early in the film, Jack Nicholson, as smarmy private investigator J.J. Gittes, begins his investigation of a suspected philandering husband at a City Council meeting. He eyes his prey while the drama of the meeting occurs around him. The talk is of water, and how the city needs it to grow. Unhappy ranchers from the region’s outskirts make their point for a new aqueduct from the Owens Valley by running a herd of sheep down the council chambers’ aisles, demanding water for their livestock. Gittes yawns, but we see the messy process at work.

Behind the push for water is Noah Cross, played by the renowned director John Huston. From Cross, Gittes, and the audience, learn the true importance of the water scheme. As Cross explains, “Either you bring the water to L.A. or you bring L.A. to the water.” Gittes probes deeper, wonders why a fabulously rich man like Cross would want to get involved in something as mundane as water. “The future, Mr. Gittes. The future!” In that one line, the film captures what it is that makes land use such a critical part of our democratic system. What we want to be, and how we want ourselves to look, largely depends on the decisions we make in land use meetings across the nation. The power of Chinatown, as the quintessential land use film, resides in the simplicity of Noah Cross’s words.

Of course there are other examples out there, and I invite comment on your favorite depictions of land use in fiction. At the bottom of it all, I’m just thankful that Bond is back. Speaking of being thankful, next week is a holiday designed to do just that. We’ll take a look at the celebration, in the context of land use.

War Stories

A few months ago, my apartment building manager knocked on our door, looking for help. In her Eastern European accent that I still haven’t been able to pinpoint, she asked if I could attend a land use board meeting to tout the virtues of our apartment building. “Tell them that you enjoy living in the building. Also say that you have no problem parking, and that everyone has a spot that wants one.” As a land use lawyer on sabbatical, this peaked my interest. I decided to probe for what was really going on under the surface. “The city is giving us a hard time,” she replied. To me, this meant she wasn’t quite sure what was happening.

On the day of the meeting, the manager collected me, and led me to a silver luxury SUV, and introduced me to the owners of my building, a pleasant couple in their sixties, clearly New York transplants who left for the sun of Los Angeles long ago. As they told the story on the way to the meeting, in between their bickering as to what was “the real story,” I learned that back in the seventies they had decided to subdivide a few of the larger units in the building, something they, of course inadvertently, neglected to tell the city. The added units created additional parking requirements that they could not supply with the spaces they had originally allocated for the building. A city building inspector, during his periodic investigation, had discovered the oversight. “What they really want is an affordable housing set-aside, which is what they can demand whenever an older apartment building is improved,” the husband informed me. “They can do whatever they want,” the wife added.

When we reached the meeting room that morning, we found a single planner stationed at the head of the space. The owners’ lawyer was there, and he filled me in on some of the nuances of practicing land use law in Los Angeles. The multiplicity of boards across fragmented Los Angeles County, the politics of working with city officials, and the other day-to-day hurdles that I remembered fondly from my days in New Jersey. The hearing was a straightforward affair, and the owners gained their approvals (yes, approvals, since they did the same thing at another building they owned), subject to their affordable housing concessions – the pound of flesh that the city was after. I like to think I played a small role, confirming that parking was not really an issue (despite an angry neighbor who voiced his view to the contrary – there’s always one). With a triumphant air, I congratulated the attorney, idly suggesting, “I wish they were all that easy.” The attorney responded, “Easy? Well, not if you count the year of work it took to get to this point.”

At then it hit me: the memories of the real work it takes to navigate through the process. The back and forth, give and take procedure behind the scenes is critical in putting on a good show at the public hearing. If this initial ground work is not there, then you face the wrath of an ornery board. Of course, this luxury of setting the foundation, and getting a board behind a development, is not always possible. Pubic hearing requirements often forbid board members from discussing pending projects out of the earshot of the general citizenry. I have distinct memories of applications that dragged for over a year because of the stops and starts of the approval process. Board chairs wielding power to stall applications at a particular meeting if they don’t meet their very specific requirements.

But my indoctrination in Los Angeles land use reminded me of the beauty of the system, and the personalities and politics that drive it. Sure, it’s a maddening process. Yes, it suffers from the need for a more regional oversight. But is there a better way to do it? Does it have to be a little “messy” for it to work at all? I vacillate on this question, especially when things go south on an application for seemingly silly reasons. But this is the nature of land use, especially since it can often be a very emotional affair. The owners of my apartment building lived and breathed every day with their applications for nearly two years. This emotion, oddly enough, has been a great source of drama in fiction, particularly the movies and television. This is where we turn next time.

Ballot Initative Update

The big news from Election Day, aside from the party shift in Congress, is the

“Response to Kelo,” i.e., the ballot initiatives seeking to curb eminent domain. According to the Castle Coalition, a property rights group, the results are as follows:

YES:

Arizona: 65% to 35%

Florida: 70% to 30%

Georgia: 80% to 20%

Louisiana: Passed in September

Michigan: 80% to 20%

Nevada: 65% to 35%

New Hampshire: 85% to 15%

North Dakota: 65% to 35%

Oregon: 65% to 35%

South Carolina: 85% to 15%
__________________________________

NO:

California: 45% to 55%

Idaho: 25% to 75%


The impact of these initiatives will take months, and probably years, to sort out. But for the moment, it is clear that the “Rage of Kelo” remains burning in the minds of many Americans.

Regionalization, Part Do?

Despite the history of municipal control over its own land use decisions, the pall of county and state interference has always hung over cities and towns. As the Supreme Court confirmed in the seminal Euclid zoning case back in 1926, localities are “creatures of the state.” Yet, as land use planning has become more intricate, scientific and exact, taking the long and wide views of metropolitan growth has meant that each site plan and subdivision application considered by local land use boards receive increasing scrutiny from higher governmental powers. As mentioned in my last post, the scarring effects of sprawl contributed greatly to the movement towards a more regional outlook of land use decision making. Beginning in the 1990’s, and into the current decade, this crusade fell under the umbrella of the “smart growth” movement, which undertook various approaches around the country to wrestle control from municipal land use boards.

For instance, in Maryland, Governor Parris Glendening pushed through the Smart Growth and Neighborhood Conservation initiative in 1997, an attempt to discourage development on the urban fringe by cutting off state service money for these projects. Yet, the program has since wallowed under the tutelage of current governor Robert L. Ehrlich. Nonetheless, private groups such as 1000 Friends of Maryland are attempting to breathe new life into the program. In New Jersey, then Governor James McGreevey, before his “confession” (it should have been “confessions,” considering the accusations of graft carefully swept under the rug with his other bombshell – but that’s another story), attempted to carve up the state into areas, from urban to rural, and assign levels of preferences the state would provide when new developments were proposed within each. Although this proposal died, another regional body sprung to life, the Highlands Commission. Assigned to oversee the northwest quadrant of the state, the Commission has been granted powers to review all applications for new projects in the region. Its companion organization, the Pinelands Commission, which has similar regional power in a portion of the southern part of the state, has been in operation for over two decades.

But when it comes to a metropolitan region that has embraced the concept of a regional approach to land use, look no further than Portland, Oregon. Aided by a state land use framework, Portland created a regional structure of review back in the 1970’s, with the Metro Council overseeing its growth needs. The Metro Council is the only regional government in the United States with a home-rule charter and directly elected representatives. The Portland area also adopted an urban growth boundary, a line beyond which development cannot occur, to keep projects on the fringe within a defined area set aside for new construction on previously green land. And yet despite its successes, Portland is a model that largely stands alone, rather than an example setter for other metropolitan areas that have followed in its path. There are other states that have comprehensive approaches, such as Hawaii. But regionalization inches along in piecemeal advances. For instance, see the advocacy group Smart Growth Network’s pamphlet “This is Smart Growth,” which charts victories on a development by development basis.

With all the talk of more unified, far-reaching land use planning, America still resists the urge to regionalize. Municipalities enjoy their relative autonomy to plan based on their own selfish needs. This is not to say there aren’t good things in this arrangement. The highly democratic system solicits everyone’s voice. But there is a need for a system of even greater inclusion in today’s highly mobile society, where people find themselves using the services of many different municipalities over the course of a day (to live in, to work in, to shop in, to play in, etc.). Why not open up the worldview when it comes to the next big project coming to town? Sure, this approach invites the probability of additional bureaucracy, and added time and expense, but isn’t the land use approval process pretty costly and expensive already? Isn’t the perception that it’s getting worse? Why not get better planning decisions out of a process for which that is the purpose? Next time, we’ll look at the current state of affairs on the board level, and discuss how “bad” it really is.