Agenda - 03-21-1990 - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

3.9 [181 [19] LAND USE 163 certain costs associated with marketing the units, such as adver- _:rcep- iarket tising and brokerage commissions), the profits would still be i .nits. over $10,000 per unit. The builders, everyone agreed, would nined make at least an extra $4 million due to this rezoning. raven Several councilmen said that they heard that the owner of 'I with Fairhaven, who lived out of town, was also a builder, and if lance that was the case, the density was too high and that he would make too much money as a result of the inclusionary ordinance. es of One councilman suggested that the density be decreased or the and percentage of low-income units be increased so that the builder would only make between $I million and $2 million on the ;t post- 'I rules rezoning. like the people who owned the other pieces of land :� rules selected for inclusionary zoning. • mu- The professor disagreed strongly and convinced the attorney ■ a but that land should not be zoned because of who owns it. and that fairly the builders' profits should not be impaired. The professor ex- ), irney plained that builders are reasonably intelligent people with orga- 1 a lot nizational skills and capital that they are willing to risk in the g free-market system providing the rewards are adequate. If that ir igors reward is$10,000 per unit, the professor said, there is no guaran- per- tee that the builder will even build in Utopia if his profit is cut to ed to $3,000 per unit when he can make $10.000 per unit by applying 'ould his skills, his organization's efforts, and his capital elsewhere. ut in Also, the professor pointed out, if Utopia only allowed builders here to make $3,000 per unit on the benefit units, this would make the yone land on which these units were to be built worth considerably ego- less, perhaps $7,000 per unit less. If this were so, and the owner ;. e $z of Fairhaven turned out not to be a builder, the landowner would suffer a loss due to the inclusionary zoning ordinance. The city attorney warned the council that if the benefits con- ferred on the land were not arguably more valuable than the obligation imposed (and the market study would certainly help and the landowner here) and assuming that the landowner could get the an appraiser to testify that the extra units would be worth only f $3,000, the city attorney could not be responsible in any court '. pro- action in the defense of the new ordinance. A smart attorney i ities Not could get the ordinance overturned on any number of legal sake theories, such as unconstitutional.taking, discrimination in zon- ■ udy ing, or spot zoning. Why, one could even argue that this ordi- iits, nance was an illegal tax-in-drag requiring certain landowners and _ iuld home builders to support an in-kind redistribution-of-housing • lied scheme for the poor. in effect a redistribution of wealth without � cur statutory authority. The city council could raise taxes to support ' i ■ ''