Re: NIMBY-ism & Opposition to Cohousing
From: John Gear (catalystpacifier.com)
Date: Sun, 19 Mar 95 20:05 CST
Steve wrote:

>Our project will be a clustered infill development on part of one of the last
>farms in an upper middle-scale suburban community of single family homes.  We
>will seek rezoning from "Agricultural" to "Planned Unit Development" at an
>overall density roughly equivalent to the upper range of the surrounding
>community.  We will seek to permanently transfer the development rights of
>the undeveloped farmland in order to get the desired number of units in our
>cluster.
>
>We want to anticipate all of the possible objections to our project and
>address them at the start.  We want to know:
>
>1) What are the possible objections to our development from the community?
>2) What "solutions" can we build into our project so that these objections
>will be effectively defused?
>
>Please feel free to brainstorm to your hearts content and post or sent to us
>what you come up with.  Thanks, in advance for the help!

ARE MORE HOUSES THE BEST USE FOR THE ONE OF THE LAST FARMS?

Boy!  That's a toughie--because while my heart is in cohousing (my body is
not yet), I'm convinced that we need more farmland, not less . . .a lot more
than we need PUDs, especially "upper middle scale" developments.

So an obvious objection might be that your group is contributing to the
destruction of farmland and the further separation of the urban/suburban
environment from the natural, leading to further dependence on agribusiness
and an unsustainable transportation structure.

WHY NOT PRESERVE THE FARM?

One solution to this is to *not* develop the farmland as a housing unit but
to either purchase it outright or investigate a land trust arrangement
whereby a small farmer can continue to farm the land with an agreement to
supply your group with produce.  In other words, locate your group elsewhere
and help preserve the farmland that your current plan might destroy.

If you approach it right you might be able to get support from groups trying
to help independent farmers stay functional.  Since it seems that there are
lots of other houses nearby already, there's a built in market for the
produce a cooperatively run farm/garden would produce.

You might be able to get support for this plan as well:  cut a small piece
out of the farmland and put real high density housing on it (well above the
high end of the nearby suburbs) and keep the remaining land in production
and as a preserve for the wildlife that is being driven out by sprawl.  In
return for accepting the use of the land at something below its "highest
economic use" level (farming instead of houses) you get to preserve a very
important part of the system, have secure access to fresh food without
reliance on the SuperGiant and the highways and oil use that food from the
supermarket represents.

MAYBE THE COHO GROUP SHOULD LEASE?

Another thing that occurs to me is that perhaps instead of buying the land
and trying to keep some farming still going that you run it the other way --
why not rent a corner of the farm in perpetuity (or 99-year lease type
arrangements) and put that same high-density village in that corner.  This
means that instead of going into the coho with big mortgages for land (and
this has got to be prime land we're talking about), you go in with small
rent payments--and the farmer gets to keep farming.

If the current farmer doesn't *want* to farm there are many, many others
that do and would probably be thrilled for the chance to do so.  There are
small farm conservation groups that know more than I do about this.

NOT ALL OPPOSITION IS NIMBY-ISM         

One more point.  From a standpoint of living in harmony with your surroundings--
including your human neighbors--it is probably unwise to characterize
opposition to your plans as "Nimby-ism."  I more often see that term used by
developers and businesses out here as a derogatory term applied to anyone
who objects to any aspect of a proposal for development.

Placing a higher value on farmland than on more houses in a PUD is not
necessarily nimby-ism.  And from your point of view, it doesn't get easier
to negotiate with people if you discount their objections from the start as
being based on reflexive opposition to anything in their back yards.

WHAT ARE YOUR ATTITUDES?

Maybe you should be open to the idea that there might be valid objections to
your plan that could cause you to change them, leading to a long term better
solution for everyone.  Because for every builder-to-be who claims that
someone is stopping progress because of nimby-ism, there's at least fifty
more who demonstrate an attitude of MMR ... might makes right (or is that
"money makes right?").  I know that when someone runs around claiming
"nimby" that I give their opponents the benefit of the doubt when the case
is unclear.

PERHAPS ALL MOOT.

Perhaps these aren't the objections you will face; maybe you just anticipate
problems because you're talking cohousing instead of straight PUD.  From
what I can tell after reading this list for a while is that that's not much
of an issue.  If you've got the money and the lawyer, you'll have no problem
incorporating as a PUD--no one needs to know that you (*gasp*) share meals
and watch each other's kids (just don't let 'em think you don't love the
automobile--*that*'ll getcha).

You've already said that this is one of the last farms--clearly someone will
have to go out of their way to fight you on a legal basis because they think
you eat granola or something (although, this is VA--could happen I suppose).

But I just still can't get past whether or not what you propose is the right
solution for the land itself, regardless of what the neighbors think.

Good luck,


John Gear (catalyst [at] pacifier.com)

"If you assume that there's no hope, you guarantee that there will be no
hope.  If you assume that there is an instinct for freedom, there are
opportunities to change things--there's a chance you may contribute to
making a better world.  That's your choice."                   -- Noam Chomsky

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