Sprawl Busting: State Programs to Guide Growth

As sprawl threatens ever-larger chunks of the American landscape, planners and public officials nationwide are talking about the potential benefits of smart growth. Several states are on the verge of legislating new programs that mandate growth management planning at the regional and local levels. A few states already have a long history of state sponsored land-use programs, but until now their experiences have not been analyzed or documented. Just in time, Jerry Weitz has written this thorough review of three decades of growth management efforts in the pioneering states of Florida, Georgia, Washington, and Oregon. Their experiences teach valuable lessons on how to craft legislation, set up administrative structures, and encourage local and regional governments to participate in mandated land-use planning. Weitz identifies three principal components of state sponsored land-use planning: intergovernmental (local, regional, and state) structures; state requirements for local planning; and state support functions (for example, grants, technical assistance, and data). He documents and analyzes the various programsi minimum standards for local land-use plans. Because he compares the structure of programs independent of politics and policy processes, his analyses and observations are applicable elsewhere. Exhaustively researched and well-illustrated with maps, charts, and tables, this book will be an invaluable resource for planning historians, students, and especially for planners and elected officials who devise and carry out state programs to guide growth in the next century.