Land Matters

Climate change can seem like an insurmountable challenge. But many tools and policies to decarbonize the economy and build resilience are readily available, says Billy Fleming, director of The McHarg Center and one of the editors of the new Lincoln Institute book Design with Nature Now. The green and blue infrastructure systems detailed in the book are proven solutions that need only be implemented on a larger scale – in a national mobilization similar to preparing for war or sending a man to the moon.

Minneapolis may seem like an unlikely place for the start of a revolution. But as City Councilor Lisa Bender explains, the Midwestern city has passed some of the most progressive housing policies and zoning reforms in the country. The measures, including banning single-family-only zoning, are based on one important idea: that when local government changes the rules of the game to allow more building, the public should get something back in the form of more affordability.

Slums have been a feature of cities for centuries, and accelerating global urbanization has led to an unprecedented number of people living in substandard conditions. Cities have responded with a range of policies including eviction and relocation. But some suggest that cities should stop thinking of slums as a problem to be solved. In this episode, the Lincoln Institute’s Enrique Silva and Theresa Williamson, who has worked for years in Rio’s favelas, exchange ideas about how to make improvements in existing communities while promoting alternatives for future settlement. More on slums: https://www.lincolninst.edu/publications/articles/sustainable-development Theresa Williamson’s lecture on community land trusts https://www.lincolninst.edu/publications/multimedia/potential-community-land-trusts-rios-favelas

Episode 3: Water Meets Land As the global water crisis intensifies, the Colorado River Basin is poised to become a model for how to bring together stakeholders representing agriculture, urban areas, and the natural environment. In this episode, we’ve put together highlights and takeaways from the 2019 Journalists Forum (#WaterMeetsLand) – including the importance of considering the central role of land use in the management of a dwindling resource. For more: https://www.lincolninst.edu/publications/articles/water-planning

Those in the “Yes in My Backyard” or YIMBY movement have a simple goal: increase the supply of housing in cities across the US, and sky-high prices should come down. But they face a growing backlash from neighborhood activists fearful of gentrification and displacement. In California, a bill to fast-track more height and density near transit stations was derailed, even with a provision to require affordable homes through inclusionary housing, a land value capture mechanism. In this episode, Randy Shaw, a San Francisco-based tenants advocate and author of “Generation Priced Out: Who Gets to Live in Urban America,” talks about the multi-pronged efforts needed to confront the affordable housing crisis in cities nationwide. For further reading, see Backyard Brouhaha in Land Lines magazine.

Tax increment financing is one of the most widely used – and least understood – public finance mechanisms in the U.S. today. David Merriman, author of the Lincoln Institute report Improving TIF for Economic Development, talks about what communities can do to avoid the pitfalls. For further reading, see also The Hidden Costs of TIF in Land Lines.