Land Use Law Commons^™

Unpermitted Urban Agriculture: Transgressive Actions, Changing Norms And The Local Food Movement, Sarah B. Schindler

Faculty Publications

Roberta keeps four chickens in her backyard. Bob snuck onto the vacant lot next door, which the bank foreclosed upon and now owns, and planted a vegetable garden. Vien operates an occasional underground restaurant from his friends’ microbrewery after beer-making operations cease for the day. The common thread tying these actions together is that they are unauthorized; they are being undertaken in violation of existing laws and often norms. In this Article, I explore ideas surrounding the overlap between food policy and land use law, specifically the transgressive1 actions that people living in urban and suburban communities are undertaking to …

Panorama - London Olympics Site Redevelopment, James Hagy, Dmitriy Ishimbayev

Rooftops Project

The 2012 London Olympics are over, yet the work is just beginning. Solicitor Linda Fletcher of the London office of the law firm Pinsent Masons talked with Dmitriy Ishimbeyev and Professor James Hagy about the 18-year project to redevelop and repurpose the Olympics venue for the longer term as a major, sustainable, mixed-use community in east London.

Profile - The Noguchi Museum, James Hagy

Rooftops Project

Few not-for-profit cultural or historic sites can be traced through a single thread, from heritage in an unlikely industrial setting in Queens; its conversion to workspace for the creation, staging and deployment of art throughout the world; its rededication by the living artist as a museum space while still a working gallery; and ultimately its preservation as a permanent cultural destination. At the Noguchi Museum, members and visitors can appreciate artist Isamu Noguchi’s full body of work in many media, enjoy the tranquility of galleries and gardens in a profoundly close-by urban setting, and understand the context in which that …

Profile - Not-For-Profit As Urban Neighbor: Groundswell, James Hagy, Scott Haggmark

Rooftops Project

Few not-for-profit organizations can claim to have made a dramatic, permanent, outdoor visual impact on more than 450 city blocks through the five boroughs of New York City. Groundswell has done just that. As part of a continuing series looking at not-for-profits as urban neighbors, The Rooftop Project’s Scott Haggmark and Professor James Hagy visit with Amy Sananman and Sharon Polli at Groundswell’s Brooklyn headquarters.

Profile - Not-For-Profit As Urban Neighbor: The Bowery Residents’ Committee, James Hagy, Tamara Salzman

Rooftops Project

From the very beginning of its new headquarters project, The Bowery Residents’ Committee set out not only to serve its mission but to be the very best neighbor. Seriously, how many of us freeze our garbage before putting it out for collection? Muzzy Rosenblatt, Christine Lalor-Chisholm, and John Johnson of The Bowery Residents’ Committee, and Charles Thanhauser and Sarah Corcoran of its architectural firm, TEK Architects, talk with the Rooftops Project’s Tamara Salzman an Professor James Hagy about their approach to this unique project in the heart of Manhattan.

Utilizing Michigan Brownfield Policies To Incentivize Community-Based Urban Agriculture In Detroit, Nicholas Leonard

Michigan Journal of Environmental & Administrative Law

As residents have increasingly moved from urban centers to suburbs, several cities have not been able to create effective solutions to the problems that such population loss has presented. Abandoned properties have proven to be the primary problem, and nowhere is that problem more pronounced than in Detroit. Urban agriculture has been widely embraced on a grassroots level as a potential solution to the pervasive problems that abandoned properties present and that cities have been unable to solve. While urban agriculture networks have largely arisen outside of municipal control, several cities are beginning to recognize urban agriculture as a potential …

Probabilistic Modeling Of Lava Flows: A Hazard Assessment For The San Francisco Volcanic Field, Arizona, Aleeza Harburger

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study serves as a first step towards a comprehensive hazard assessment for the San Francisco volcanic field in northern Arizona, which can be applied to local response plans and educational initiatives. The primary goal of this thesis is to resolve the conditional probability that, given a lava flow effusing from a new vent in the San Francisco volcanic field, it will inundate the city limits of Flagstaff. The spatial distribution of vents within the San Francisco volcanic field was analyzed in order to execute a lava flow simulation to determine the inundation hazard to Flagstaff. The Gaussian kernel function …

A Framework To Approach Shared-Use Of Mining Related Infrastructure, Perrine Toledano, Sophie Thomashausen, Nicolas Maennling, Alpa Shah

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

In April 2013, CCSI was awarded a grant from the Australian Government to develop an economically, legally and operationally rational framework to enable shared use of mining-related infrastructure, including rail, ports, power, water, internet and telecommunications. The framework was obtained by distilling best practice principles from infrastructure developments around the world, guided by expert opinion. It has most recently been refined through in-depth case studies in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Mozambique, although its principles aim to be of general relevance to all resource rich African countries. The report was finalized in March 2014.

Public Lands And The Federal Government's Compact-Based "Duty To Dispose": A Case Study Of Utah's H.B.148–The Transfer Of Public Lands Act, Donald J. Kochan

BYU Law Review

Recent legislation passed in March 2012 in the State of Utah—the “Transfer of Public Lands Act and Related Study,” (“TPLA”) also commonly referred to as House Bill 148 (“H.B. 148”)—has demanded that the federal government, by December 31, 2014, “extinguish title” to certain public lands that the federal government currently holds (totaling an estimated more than 20 million acres). It also calls for the transfer of such acreage to the State and establishes procedures for the development of a management regime for this increased state portfolio of land holdings resulting from the transfer. The State of Utah claims that the …

Agenda: Natural Resource Industries And The Sustainability Challenge, University Of Colorado Boulder. Getches-Wilkinson Center For Natural Resources, Energy, And The Environment, University Of Colorado Boulder. The Colorado Law Energy Innovation Initiative

Natural Resource Industries and the Sustainability Challenge (Martz Winter Symposium, February 27-28)

"An International Conference hosted by The Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy, and the Environment and The Colorado Law Energy Innovation Initiative."

For more than two decades, sustainability has gained currency as a broad organizing principle for efforts to develop and use energy, natural resources, and the environment in ways that allow society to meet its needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. More recently, sustainability has been embraced by businesses across multiple sectors as part of a broader movement of corporate social responsibility. Hardly a day goes by without news of another corporate initiative …

The Value Of Conservation Easements: An Analysis Of The Effects Of Conservation Easements On Property Values In Central Vermont., Jonathan Decker

Capstone Collection

This capstone research aims to explore the possibilities of an association between changes in the fair market value of landed properties and their proximity to land parcels containing conservation easements. The study attempts to provide a greater understanding of how conservation easements provide benefits to Vermont municipalities. These benefits are described as ecosystem services, and their value was proxied by increases in the fair market value of transferred real-estate located within two distinct radiuses of the conserved land.

The study focuses on two specific properties located in the towns of Marshfield and East Montpelier. For each town, four separate datasets …

Investment Treaties And Industrial Policy: Select Case Studies On State Liability For Efforts To Encourage, Shape And Regulate Economic Activities In Extractive Industries And Infrastructure, Lise Johnson

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

This paper, prepared in connection with a February 2014 conference organized by the UN Economic Commission for Africa, discusses some of the implications that investment treaties have for investments in infrastructure and the extractive industries. It focuses on liability for government conduct (1) in connection with tenders and negotiations; (2) when responding to questions regarding the legality of the investment; (3) in using performance requirements to leverage benefits and capture spillovers from the investment; (4) changing the legal framework governing an investment in response to evolving needs, circumstances, and interests; (5) administering the investment; and (6) requesting, and responding to …

Reliance In Land Use Law, Kenneth A. Stahl

BYU Law Review

For generations, Americans have tapped their life savings and assumed huge amounts of debt in order to achieve the American dream of owning their own home. Though investing so heavily in a single asset is a rather risky move on its face, buyers have been induced to purchase homes by a slew of public policies, most notably zoning ordinances that buffer single-family neighborhoods against an invasion of unwanted uses. As a result, homeowners have a fairly convincing argument that they possess some sort of vested reliance interest in the existing zoning of their neighborhoods that should prevent municipal authorities from …

Requiem For Regulation, Garrett Power

Faculty Scholarship

This comment reviews U.S. Supreme Court decisions over the past 100 years which have considered the constitutional limitations on governmental powers. It finds that at the three-quarter mark of the 20th century, a remarkable set of Court precedents had swollen the regulatory powers of governments while shrinking private rights to property and contract. But since the Reagan years, a more conservative Court has undertaken to curtail governmental activity in general, and to limit federal, state, and local planning in particular. A number of 5-4 decisions expanded private property rights and contracted the scope of the federal “commerce power.” The comment …

University Of Baltimore Journal Of Land And Development Volume 3 Number 2 (Spring 2014)

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

No abstract provided.

Keeping A Foot In Each Camp: Adequate Public Facilities Ordinances As Both A Concurrency Tool And Means Of Generating Revenue, Andrew Balashov

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

In late 2012 a bitter war was waged in a small Maryland town. Newspapers portrayed it as a David and Goliath type story; rural residents fighting big business developers to keep them from destroying their small town's charm and character. Yet underlying the conflict were commonplace issues of land use and planning, governed by a little known, yet surprisingly ubiquitous law, known as an Adequate Public Facilities Ordinance. To set the scene Frederick County, Maryland is like many other counties across the United States that are coping with the effects of growth and demographic change. In decades past its residents …

The Greening Of Public Private Partnerships: What Design Professionals And Contractors Need To Know For Green Building's Next Legal Frontier, Tracy L. Steedman, Stephen Del Percio, Matthew L. Kimball

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

America is at a pivotal moment in maintaining and modernizing its public infrastructure. Our nation's roads, bridges, water systems and energy networks have long been in poor repair. Much of the country's public infrastructure was put into place over fifty years ago, and many of these systems are simply overwhelmed or worn out. Infrastructure that is in poor condition or disrepair is mostly a hidden problem until it inconveniently stops working or worse, when ghastly consequences ensue from catastrophic failures.

Cashing In On Green: Casino Development And Sustainability, Emily Mikles

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

The development of the Horseshoe Casino in Baltimore, MD has created its fair share of contention and controversy for local residents. The typical residential concerns surrounding casino development- disparate impacts on surrounding businesses, employment concerns, and economic impact-are not raising eyebrows in the Baltimore area; rather, residents are concerned about the environmental impacts of the casino construction and development project. Several lawsuits have been filed attempting to halt casino construction due to the chemical contaminants that are seeping into the soil and into the bay through storm drains. These suits raise an interesting issue that some state legislatures and casino …

University Of Baltimore Journal Of Land And Development Volume 4 Number 1 (Fall 2014) Front Matter

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

No abstract provided.

Comments: An Unnecessary "Solution": High-Performance Market-Rate Rental Housing, David Hornstein

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

On April 11, 2013, new rules and regulations regarding Baltimore City's property tax credits became effective. Similar to the payments in lieu of taxes program (PILOT), Baltimore City has enacted rules and regulations that afford property owners a major tax credit for developing and, or converting current buildings into high-performance market-rate rental housing. Baltimore City Mayor, Stephanie Rawlings- Blake, is optimistic about the tax credit, believing the credit will spur development within Baltimore City. The city believes that development projects will attract new residents to Baltimore City, as well as deter current residents from leaving the city for areas that …

Settlement Equals Another Missed Opportunity For The Supreme Court To Define Disparate Impact Claims Under The Fair Housing Act, Erika Flaschner

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

In 2003, the New Jersey Township of Mount Holly designated a neighborhood known as the Gardens as a blighted, high crime area, and called for its redevelopment. The Township adopted a plan to demolish the Gardens and replace it with new residential units, of which only a fraction were designated for affordable housing. However, the predominately minority population of the Gardens filed suit to overturn the blight designation and stop the redevelopment plan on the grounds that the plan violated the Fair Housing Act (FHA) on a disparate impact theory.

Comments: Baltimore City's Green Building Standards, Building Towards An Uncertain Future, Gregory Franklin

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

In August 2007 the Baltimore City Council passed Council Bill 07-0602 mandating that newly built and "extensively modified" buildings over 10,000 square feet comply with "Green Building Standards." This law is considered among the first and most extensive green building codes to be passed so far in the United States. This law has not surprisingly sparked praise and criticism. While the law has been praised for its potential environmental benefits, it has also been criticized on the grounds that it is stricter than the laws of surrounding jurisdictions and has made building in Baltimore excessively expensive. Moreover, the law has …

Promise Vs. Performance: Why Public Subsidies Of Private Development Are Not Likely To Produce Fair Returns To The Taxpaying Public, Marc Knapp

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

On September 10, 2013, the Baltimore City Council gave final approval to Harbor Point, a $1 billion multi-use project to be built on a vacant, remediated brownfield that juts into Baltimore's Inner Harbor. Like many urban development or redevelopment projects, Harbor Point will be supported by significant taxpayer subsidies. Between a $107 million direct investment in project-related infrastructure largely parks that will surround the to-be-built offices, shops and residences, and a waterfront promenade - along with a mixed bag of real estate and income tax incentives, the visible public support to Harbor Point will exceed $200 million, 20% of projected …

Thank You Sir, May I Have Another: The Issue Of The Unsustainablity Of Low Income Housing Tax Credits And Proposed Solutions, John Baber

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

The Federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program is currently the nation's largest federal subsidy for the development and rehabilitation of affordable housing, having created or preserved over 2.5 million housing units and distributed over $7.5 billion in federal tax credits to developers of and investors in affordable housing from the program's inception in 1986 through 2007. However, despite its monumental size and impact, the program has some potentially fatal flaws that threaten the long-term financial and physical viability of the very affordable housing that it creates, and threatens the health of the neighborhoods that it is created in. Affordable …

Taking On Water: Local Government, Eminent Domain, And The Foreclosure Crisis, Brian Cullin

University of Baltimore Journal of Land and Development

The 2008 Financial Crisis and the ensuing Great Recession sent shockwaves throughout the U.S. and global economy, wreaking havoc from Wall Street to Main Street. The Crisis harkened economic contraction, high unemployment, and elevated rates of home foreclosure. While the financial industry recovered, spelling an end to one crisis, another continues - the Foreclosure Crisis. The rate of home foreclosure, already ominously on the rise before 2008 and growing in intensity and breadth in the aftermath of the Financial Crisis, provides the foundation for this paper. This article examines an innovative public-private partnership between a private firm, Mortgage Resolution Partners …

Still An Issue: The Taking Issue At 40, Patricia E. Salkin

Touro Law Review

In October 2013, with the launch of Touro Law Center’s new Institute on Land Use and Sustainable Development Law, the Touro Law Review held a symposium to commemorate the 40th anniversary of “The Taking Issue: A Study of the Constitutional Limits of Governmental Authority to Regulate the Use of Privately-Owned Land Without Paying Compensation to the Owners” (The Takings Issue), the Council on Environmental Quality’s seminal report by Fred Bosselman, David Callies and John Banta. For this symposium Touro Law Review assembled some of today’s leading luminaries to reflect on how the taking issue has evolved and to assess where …

Banning Lawns, Sarah Schindler

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Recognizing their role in sustainability efforts, many local governments are enacting climate change plans, mandatory green building ordinances, and sustainable procurement policies. But thus far, local governments have largely ignored one of the most pervasive threats to sustainability — lawns. This Article examines the trend toward sustainability mandates by considering the implications of a ban on lawns, the single largest irrigated crop in the United States. Green yards are deeply seated in the American ethos of the sanctity of the single-family home. However, this psychological attachment to lawns results in significant environmental harms: conventional turfgrass is a non-native monocrop that …

Maximizing What We Have—The Challenge To Preserve Open Space With No Dedicated Local Funding Source, Aimee Rutledge

McGeorge Law Review

No abstract provided.

Storm Surges, Disaster Planning, And Vulnerable Populations At The Urban Periphery: Imagining A Resilient New York After Superstorm Sandy, Andrea L. Mcardle

Publications and Research

In the aftermath of Sandy, the destructive superstorm that had a devastating impact in New York City and other parts of the Northeastern U.S. in 2012, ideas and data proliferate about how coastal cities, such as New York, can pursue strategies of resilience to help withstand the next weather-related onslaught. This article argues that whether the city in fact acts resiliently must take into account the extent to which its proposals respond to the needs of vulnerable people housed along its coastline. Superstorm Sandy put a face to vulnerability, including 6,800 evacuees assigned to shelters, 1,800 of whom were residents …

Vehicle Miles Traveled And Sustainable Communities, Dorothy J. Glancy

McGeorge Law Review

No abstract provided.