NC Reconsidering “Downzoning"

NC Republicans about to do Something Stupid

In a past post, here, I noted that Republicans did a smart thing. Downzoning is essentially this:

The law defines downzoning as any decrease in the allowable density of development, any reduction in permitted uses, or any creation of a "nonconforming" use, lot, or structure.

In effect, if you have a right to do something or build something on your land right now—whether that's operate a gas station or build an apartment complex—S.B. 382 says you'll always be allowed to do that unless you give express written consent to the local government to take that right away from you.

So, what this means is that a local government could not take away your land by changing zoning on it, or around it, thus making your property essentially meaningless. This meant a town, like Leland, could change zoning of even your land and you could not do crap about it. This is, a taking.

Even the NC Realtors supported this measure, as I also noted:

Here is what he said:

But Steven Webb, the legislative affairs director of The North Carolina Home Builders Association, has called the downzoning provision a “huge victory for property rights.”

“In general, we do not support the (downzoning) practice because oftentimes, the local government is making an effort to extract concessions from the landowner that can severely harm housing affordability,” Webb said in an emailed statement Wednesday. “We believe it is only reasonable to ask a property owner for consent prior to downzoning and potentially devaluing their property. If we are going to address the housing affordability crisis, practices like this must be curtailed.”

Now what Leland is doing is rezoning certain areas, and historically flooded areas, and saying, “hey developer, you petition to rezone, and we will kick back money as a bribe land grant, so you can ‘develop’ some dumb thing we should be developing so this does not look like a bribe.”

Enter dumb NC Republicans in a new session. PCD has the story, and I saved it for you all here. The bill is brief, here.

How does a ban on Downzoning protect you? Well, let’s say you want to do something with your land, and the city after you bought your land decides…nah, you can’t do that. You have the option to say, Nah, I am going to stick to the old rules, and do what was legal THEN on my land.

Downzoning also means this:

In land use law generally, “down-zoning” refers to rezoning a property to a new zoning district that is less intense or less dense than the prior district. Rezoning property from an industrial zoning district to a residential zoning district, for example, is a down-zoning.

So, for example, if someone wants to come in and zone an area next to your house and put in coffin apartments, that’s a downzone.

This helps homeowners who move into a house and where the adjoining property was zoned in a way you approve. So, you buy the house. Then the town comes in and says, let’s rezone to coffin apartments. Under the NC law before the NCGA forbid downzoning, there was nothing you could do about it. What the NCGA did last session was simply to BAN downzoning by towns without consent of the property owner or all affected property owners of the change in zoning. That can still happen under the new law, but it makes it more difficult for bribery the rezoning to take place.

For most of us, this means we keep our specific property rights that we originally bought on the deed when it was originally zoned. This is huge for property owners. It protects them immensely.

But the law goes further. Let’s say Leland wants to remove something from one of their existing uses—say they want to remove something from a commercial zoning. Under the recent law passed, the entire land use of those effected (in this case those in the commercial zoning) would all have to approve of the change. Pretty fabulous really, but it also makes it nearly impossible for any zoning to be changed in this case.

I will give those who reject the new law a bit of understanding on this. The problem is, and where I cannot support them, is, cities are abusing their power, and hence, they need to be reigned in—because they are violating property rights of owners on a frequent basis. If we had principled representatives who respect their own voters, I might think differently on this topic.

For example as the law sits now, let’s entertain a fantasy. Let’s say Leland wanted to rezone all of Waterford to AG2—agricultural residential. Under the present law, they could not do that; but under the law proposed, they could. Of course that would never happen for logistical and greedy (corrupt politician) reasons.

But let’s say, under the present law, that Leland wants to run a road and split your property as a corridor running through many property single family homes—they would have to get every single homeowner to consent to it, Now that sounds pretty bitchin’ to me because it protects you, my neighbor, from government tyranny. This is what Leland Council essentially wants to do in some instances by the way. And Her Great Rotundity, Sluggo, PBUH, wants to do it for DEI reasons, of course.

What some NC Republicans are proposing, is to take away your property rights and hand it over to your local government to determine.

Not good.

I could be missing something on all this, so chime in if you have a correction or more refined info.

As it sits now, the bill is really only being supported by a few Republicans—it has been sent to multiple committees. Let’s hope it dies there.