Recall that residential construction costs us
In Exploding the Big Myth, we began to see that growth through residential development does not offer the economic boost claimed by its advocates. Indeed, we showed that such development nearly always costs more in services than it generates in new tax dollars. Let’s be totally clear on this: Ongoing residential development will raise your taxes. ( “Taxes” in this case include primarily state income tax, property taxes, bond issues, a variety of possible special tax levies, and potentially certain sales taxes.) To the extent possible, the surplus revenues from farmland, open land, and commercial property make up for the deficit created by residential development. But they can’t work miracles. Tax increases seem inevitabley to come along, and to a large extent you can blame the growing deficit created by ongoing residential development. More importantly, without it, those revenues from other land uses could be put toward needed community projects! We looked at a bit of the extensive “cost of community services” data to support this, and we’ll examine other supporting data in future articles.

Things to come in the Novak development outside Lisbon Signs of things to come in the Novak development outside Lisbon.

In our area, we’ve already seen some of these increased tax levies. In MV, for example, the growing population has caused over-crowded schools, and the $8.9 million bond issue for the new high school was the result. Thankfully, one of our great strengths here is our passion for education, and we enthusiastically passed the bond issue. It’s not hard to see, though, that had the schools not been bursting at the seams, it might not have been necessary to begin with.

What has driven our population growth? These are desirable towns People want to live here. By building more subdivisions developers have simply absorbed that demand, causing the population to swell. Clearly, we could hold the population within a given desirable range simply by ceasing the construction of new subdivisions. People would then have to wait for an existing home to become available before moving here.

One wonders, as well, if the $8.9 million bond issue could have been a few million dollars less had the cost of serving residential development not prevented us from accumulating greater reserves which might have gone toward education.

It’s not just taxes
In discussion here, we’ve touched on how ongoing subdivision development may have already hurt existing local businesses, and will certainly do so in the future. For home owners in the older parts of our towns, there is also concern over the impact newer developments are having on their home values.

These are complex issues, but under-discussed topics, and ones we’ll examine in more depth in future articles. For now, simply consider that the negative impacts of continued residential development are far reaching, extending to tax consequences, the business climate and economy as a whole, as well as environmental degradation.

If not residential development, then what?
Given then, that further residential development only costs us, both in our tax rates and with regard to local business and environmental losses, what should we pursue instead?

Downtown Lisbon. Sustainable development will promote the health of our downtowns.

What will help our local economy and our community while mitigating higher tax rates and avoiding environmental damage? The first item is, at this point, almost too obvious to mention: We need to stop the construction of new subdivisions. The second item is where this article has been leading: We must pursue “sustainable development.”

Our sustainable future
“Sustainability” has become a key word in the vocabularies of those concerned with how we are to progress into the future on both local and global levels. Though its origins probably date to prehistory, the concept of sustainable development first pressed strongly into public consciousness as a result of a 1987 report from the United Nations titled, Our Common Future, also known as the Brundtland Report. The Brundtland Report’s definition of sustainable development is still in wide use:

Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.

The concept of sustainable development has its roots in environmentalism, in areas such as energy conservation and production and environmental preservation. It is more broadly applicable than that though, and more recently experts have extended it successfully to community development. In many ways it’s simply common sense.

South of Mount Vernon. Sustainable development saves not only the local economy, but the environment as well.

In large part it says that if we want our grandchildren and their grandchildren to enjoy the same (or better) quality of life we have, we’d better not waste resources or harm our surroundings just to gratify our own wants at their future expense. Unfortunately, we’ve already done so for many years. It’s time now to stop, reassess, and change course.

Sustainable development is today the subject of international conferences and individual blogs. You’ll be hearing much more about it, as more of us recognize its importance for our future.

Though it emerged from environmental studies, in the realm of economic development a sustainable approach often leads to surprisingly practical and innovative tools to apply to a local economy. On a general level, it means doing business in ways which can continue indefinitely into the future without destroying or wasting finite resources, be they environmental or economic. These methods boost the resiliency of a local economy.

I’ve spoken in general, theoretical terms so far. In our next installment we’ll get specific in describing some of the tools of sustainable development, and how people have applied them successfully in towns across the country, including here in MV and Lisbon! After that, the myth debunking continues. Expect an ongoing balance between exploring the pitfalls of ongoing residential development and examining the superior alternative of sustainable development.