In the Sierra Nevada, California, a transformation is underway. Real estate values have created a new gold rush, fueled by retiring baby boomers, second home seekers and those simply looking for a life closer to the land.
Unfortunately, the land use decision-making structures in most Sierra communities are not equipped to deal with this growth. Outdated plans and zoning codes, budget and staffing shortages, and a lack of leadership and understanding all contribute to an atmosphere where growth is profit-driven and reactionary, rather than community-based and deliberate.
Some growth is inevitable, and many Sierra communities desire or need new housing, retail and jobs. Proactive, community-driven planning can identify these needs and the best places to accommodate them. In the absence of such community-driven planning, however, it is left to developers and individual landowners to do the planning, resulting in development that may or may not be the right thing for the communities.
Leapfrog subdivisions, an overabundance of high-end housing, a shortage of affordable housing, corporate chain stores replacing locally-owned and operated businesses, the fragmentation of working landscapes, pollution, traffic – all of these are the consequences of developer-driven, reactionary growth decisions.
Who has the right to decide how communities grow? Is it developers, private property owners, community members, elected officials, business interests or others? State and federal laws delegate land use decisions to local governments, where democratically-elected officials are entrusted with the duty to safeguard communities’ future.
When it comes to growth, some local governments seem too quick to bend to the wishes of a few influential landowners. However, is it truly democratic to make one landowner happy while other landowners and the rest of the community must deal with the impacts to traffic, schools, the environment and local economy, forever?
There is a better way for growth decisions to happen: by bringing together a truly-representative cross-section of the community to develop and put forth a proactive vision for where and how growth should occur – and where it shouldn’t. Some visionary city and county leaders are beginning to make these processes happen on their own. But in most places, it falls to community activists to reframe the discussion and catalyse a new way of thinking about growth.
This guidebook is designed to help transform how growth decisions are made in the community, to take back the power to control growth and put it where it belongs – in the hands of the community.
