Builders seeking approval for proposed real estate developments must in almost all American localities navigate a complex series of required procedural steps, but for those who persevere and succeed in obtaining a permit, one eleventh-hour device can bring all those efforts to naught: the objector … [Read more...]
Ruminating on Sheetz
As anticipated by the “radical agreement” among the parties and justices at oral argument, the Supreme Court’s recently released decision in Sheetz v. County of El Dorado put to rest the question of whether legislatively-imposed land use permit conditions are outside the scope of the takings … [Read more...]
Court: Arlington “Missing Middle” Lawsuit May Proceed to Trial
By Andrew Crouch and Charles Gardner In March 2023, Arlington County, Virginia passed an amendment to its zoning ordinance which legalized so-called “missing middle” housing typologies in several residential districts, including many which had been zoned for single-family homes. Ten local … [Read more...]
Tell It to the Judge: New Lawsuits Take Exclusionary Zoning to Court
As various housing reform bills work their way through the lawmaking process in American state legislatures, several new legal challenges to local land use and zoning ordinances are simultaneously underway in state and federal courts. Among these courtroom efforts are challenges to occupancy … [Read more...]
Cataloguing California’s Cornucopia of Land Use Legislation
The Terner Center for Housing Innovation at the University of California, Berkeley has released a policy brief summarizing the effect on housing production of the bewildering array of new housing laws California has enacted since 2016. A preliminary analysis of market effects of the new laws, … [Read more...]