Zoning Rules Can Keep People in Bad Neighborhoods 

Inclusionary zoning is the reason I have my home. My council required that 6 out of the 27 new flats, built by the housing association, had to be disabled housing. The whole block is for low income residents to have a permanent home. :)

While a great idea, inclusionary housing doesn't take into account that house building is disincentivized in our economy due to natural market functions and terrible zoning laws, which were in themselves created as a means of enforcing segregation in many cases. There has been a conscious effort by city planners to ensure that there are alotted spaces that serve specific purposes, such as areas only for housing, areas only for commercial buildings, as well as areas for general shops. This division, as well as some restrictions on minimum single-family residence size and height maximum make the spaces we use really inefficient, driving up costs and maximizing the negative effects of gentrification. Countries like Japan have already solved this problem. They use a "mixed-use" planning approach discussed by Jane Jacobs to better integrate spaces so that there is a much larger supply of spaces for which to build houses, greater proximity to the workplace and other conveniences without the use of a car, as well as a positive effect on the reported community satisfaction and lowering of the crime rate. The most inclusionary city planning system must first begin with a city that the majority of the population can afford to live in, otherwise you are just manufacturing second class citizenry with every affordable house you build.

We are having this argument right now in Newark, NJ. Apparently, the City has not figured out how to enforce this plan adopted in 2015. In Newark, the Arts community, at least the part that worked "downtown" was signal to increasing the price per sq in downtown buildings. Now, the artists are getting pushed out. A recent proposal to build 250 market rate units in the Northern Central ward has a developer that simply plans to ignore the "rules" for the 20% set aside. My personal project for the next two years is to attend every City council and Planning Board meeting and spend my allotted 5 minutes asking the city Fathers to stay the course.

Thanks for talking about important issues, Aaron.

Inclusionary zoning is what makes my part of Montgomery County, Maryland so livable. We have a large variety of housing in all income levels from apartment buildings that can accommodate young singles but also others that can accommodate families with multiple children (3 & 4 bedrooms). There are townhouse communities right next to developments with moderate to multi-million dollar stand-alone houses. It means that workers can live reasonably close to their jobs but also have access to our pretty decent public transportation Metro system. The young and upwardly mobile attract trendy retail and grocery stores, which benefit everyone. Aspirational parents from all over the world come here to get their kids into our excellent schools. Magnet schools attract kids into less immediately desirable neighborhoods. The proximity to Washington DC means that many neighborhoods are transitioning to more expensive housing which boosts our tax base.

Central NJ up through NYC is one of those places where rent/mortgage over $1000 is not uncommon. Affordable housing is anything below that where you can still be saving 1/2 of your paycheck to pay your rent. That's what I did in the 90s and I felt thankful.

As a long-time New Jersey resident (all of my adult life), we still have a long way to go here. There are way too many loopholes in the way things are set up. Most of the affordable housing (admittedly not sure what program it's under) is made for seniors or "active adults," i.e. 65 & up or 55 & up communities, sometimes (yes, only sometimes) with exceptions granted to people with disabilities (and usually you have to be on SSD, that is found disabled by Social Security, so good luck with that). Why? It's the NIMBY problem. In the more well-off counties and townships, residents get upset about "low income people" moving in, and fuss about property values and crime (even though most of this is overblown or unfounded, and it's not uncommon that these complaints are actually rooted in racism). If it's the elderly, they're ok with it--it could even be their own mom & dad. Additionally, townships (and maybe counties as well) can buy and sell affordable housing allotments (although I do think there is a limitation on that). So, well-to-do Cherry Hill Township (near where I attended college) may decide they'd rather pay the City of Camden to pick up some of their affordable housing burden, and Camden has so many budget troubles, it's glad for the funding. Cherry Hill may even come out ahead because high end retail or upper-class housing goes in, instead of affordable housing, giving the township more tax revenue than what they spend in reducing their affordable housing requirement, and the residents are happy because they don't have to let in any "poor people" (although I'm sure they phrase it in a more polite way). In the past few years however, I have seen some legit low-income housing developments in areas that I think normally would have opposed them. These are not the housing projects of the past--these are nice looking places with some community ammenities, and rents typically determined as a percentage of income with concessions to family size. Nicer looking than a lot of the senior housing, in fact. I'm hopeful that this model will be successful and take off.

Trying to force builders to include "affordable housing....which is questionable" only drives them away unless there is a huge bribe involved.

The best low cost housing program is a good freeway. This effectively increases supply, thus dropping price.

💚

I think I'd rather look at de-NIMBYfication before I looked at expensive tax credits.

Inclusionary zoning does nothing to increase accessibility to services if it’s kept in low income areas. This is the issue we have in Toronto (I’m in Urban Planning). It’s better to reduce regulations and encourage greater supply overall especially creating density around transit stations. Ideally you spread co-ops and rental stock throughout a city not in a few neighbourhoods

Inclusionary zoning.....leads to lack of zoning enforcement....leads to decreased home value.

John got a haircut!

I thought it was a healthcare channel

Dallas Texas does it right. There are almost no zoning laws there. If you're neighbor puts an ugly building up you have to move.

I will add, that I'm not buyin' this line of bratwurst. Racine, Wisconsin, is the cheapest place to live in *the world,* not just the US. Pack up and move to Wisconsin if you want affordable housing. Otherwise, you are blowing smoke.

The home owners in the neighborhood should be the ones to determine whether it to be inclusionary or exclusionary.

As someone who is fortunate enough to live in a high-income area, I understand the need for inclusionary zoning, but I also see the opposite side of the issue. Low income housing brings one thing me and my neighbors do NOT want: noise. So, so much noise! From the tub-thumping boom-boom music that makes your ears want to bleed to screaming, inconsiderate, poorly-supervised kids and from loud "arguments"/fights/guns to jalopy cars that backfire and/or lack mufflers (because, apparently, around here it's cool, if you're poor, to have a really, REALLY loud truck). These issues are very prevalent on the south side of town (the poorer area), and people on the north side of town paid up to FIVE times what it costs to buy a house on the south side just to avoid these issues (as well as drug-dealing, public drunkeness, and ridiculous populations of stray animals, mainly caused by irresponcible pet ownership). On the one hand, I want to see more people have the priviledges of living in a quiet up-scale neighborhood, but old habits tend to die hard and these neighbors overwhelmingly seem to bring trouble and noise with them, which none of us appreciate. (Furthermore, it's very difficult for low-income families to afford to keep up the larger lawns on this side of town, as even the most basic of landscaping can easily cost over $1,000 a year, and city codes reguarding weeds, which tend to only be enforced on the north side of town, would heavily penalize a family up here who couldn't afford to do their lawn. We don't mind the selective enforcement, though, as our side of town looks like a gorgeous park dotted with lovely houses, which we appreciate, and that can only happen when people are required to keep their lawns up.) Now, if they zoned the town by noise levels and prohibited noise levels above a certain amount at ANY time of day, then we'd be talking. However, doing so would effectively ban children (especially the low-income children around here who tend to be used to less stringent noise requirements) from certain neighborhoods, anyway. In short, I think there'd be a lot less NIMBY-ism is the concerns of residents were better addressed, but those of us who have seen the failed attempts in the past to make inclusive zoning have seen the dissmissive attitude people in charge adopt toward terrible noise-polluting neighbors, and not all of us have the health to deal with being woke up all day long by rowdy kids and noisy neighbors. That said, I'm sure there are low-income people who don't have noisy kids and loud, inconsiderate boyfriends. It's just that those of us who live on the "peaceful" side of town have no way to know who those people are and ensure that only they move into our 'hood.

Why should developers be required to build a type of housing that they don't want to build? Why don't we focus on the regulations that make housing expensive to build in the first place?

Our we could provide free housing. For gods sake

OK so apparently the only way to fix poverty is more government. Here I thought maybe, just maybe, you would discuss how overarching zoning practices have restricted the housing supply and kept certain racial and economic groups from affording housing. NOPE. "Government needs to mess with the economy even more!! When government creates a problem, the only solution is more government!" As I said in a previous video, I'm glad you largely are not partisan in your message, but it would be nice if just once you would explore how smaller government has been a benefit to literally anything.

bad neighbors make bad neighborhoods. bad neighbors dont become good neighbors if you put them in a good neighborhood. you just get all the good neighbors to stay inside more and to buy better locks. if having lots of poor people together makes a bad neighborhood why would they suddenly behave differently just because their neighbor has a Swimmingpool? also school funding does not impact student performance beyond a very basic amount do you know what does? the iq of the students a 115 iq kid will do good weather his books cost 5 dollars or a hundred or nothing at all and he just uses what he can find online on his 20$ laptop a 85 iq kid wont do well in certain subjects, no matter how much money you spend on him.

Sounds great until you realize that this will be expensive and all that money comes straight from taxes, which the average American will have to pay.

I hate the way that you slide text to the left. You get a down vote. What's the matter with you all? I assume that you are trying to distract us, so that we think or something? It only distracts me, and makes me crabby. Maybe slide right, and use numbered bullet points, or what ever they are called?