BTMFBA is "pathbreaking" only in that community-initiated retail ownership programs are rare, almost nonexistent in the US. Arts-focused community development corporations aren't completely rare, but the kind of city or county wide program of space preservation that I propose through BTMFBA seems to be unheard of.
-- "BTMFBA: the best way to ward off artist or retail displacement is to buy the building," 2016
-- "The SEMAEST Vital Quartier program remains the best model for helping independent retail," 2018
-- "A wrinkle on BTMFBA: let the city/county own the cultural facility, while you operate it (San Francisco and the Fillmore Heritage Center)," 2021
-- "Saving urban corner stores needs public assistance: Mott's Market on Capitol Hill, Washington, DC," 2022
But land trusts, focused originally on open space and farmland preservation, and more recently, on maintaining urban affordability, have been around for decades.
-- Origins and Evolution of the Community Land Trust in the United States
-- Smart Growth and Open Space Conservation, EPA
-- Farmland Preservation and Farm Transition, USDA
PBS stations are running a documentary "Forever Wild," about how citizens of Telluride, Colorado organized to preserve their "Valley Floor," formerly mining property, which had been purchased by a billionaire who intended to develop it ("PBS picks up ‘Forever Wild’ Valley Floor documentary airing in April," Telluride Daily Planet).
We watched it the other night, on the Utah state education television channel (separate from PBS).
-- Forever Wild videoInstead of agreeing to a partial preservation program, citizens agreed through a referendum to go forward, condemn the property, and purchase it for permanent preservation. This was controversial in part because the land is outside of the city proper, located in San Miguel County, and lobbyists for the property owner successfully got legislation passed to make the condemnation illegal, retroactively.
-- Valley Floor Preservation Partners
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Their fight, and the documentary definitely illustrate the lengths that people have to go to in order to initiate and succeed in community-related property purchases.
The city had in the 1990s passed a law putting funds towards land preservation. So they set the stage to go forward.
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(I don't know how it happened, but Ann Arbor has a similar program, which to reduce the possibility of sprawl, buys land in the townships around the city, in order to preserve open space.
-- Land Preservation Programs, Washtenaw County
-- Greenbelt Program, Ann Arbor
Note that there is a documentary on the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative in Roxbury, Boston, based on the book Streets of Hope, which was published in the early 1990s.
-- "Holding Ground: The Rebirth of Dudley Street," New Day Films
It's inspiring, although I hesitated to show it in DC, because it championed eminent domain authority for community development corporations, and DC's CDCs hadn't proven they were trustworthy enough to have that kind of power ("The community development approach and the revitalization of DC's H Street corridor: congruent or oppositional approaches?," 2013, ""Falling up -- Accountability and DC Community Development Corporations," 2005).
Surprisingly though, in 30+ years, DSNI has amassed only about 200 units of housing, which doesn't seem like all that much.
WTNH.com: Nonprofit officially bids on Deer Lake, awaits approval.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.wtnh.com/news/connecticut/middlesex/nonprofit-makes-offer-to-buy-deer-lake-to-keep-it-from-development/
https://www.wsj.com/articles/darien-connecticut-in-contract-to-buy-great-island-11653399763
ReplyDelete"Sixty Acres for $100 Million: A Small Connecticut Town Moves to Buy Private Island"
The affluent New York City suburb of Darien, Conn., is in contract to purchase a private island for more than $100 million, according to a person with knowledge of the transaction.
Great Island, which spans about 60 acres, is owned by descendants of baking powder entrepreneur William Ziegler. They first listed the island for $175 million in 2016. Most recently, it was asking $100 million.
Town officials in Darien have said the island is one of the largest remaining undeveloped pieces of land in the area.
“There will never be another opportunity for the town to control this property’s destiny, or to add an asset to benefit all of us like this,” said Monica McNally, the town’s First Selectman, at a meeting of the Darien Board of Selectmen in April. “I believe 200 years from now, when people look at this property, they will look favorably on this transaction.”
The contract signing is the “first step” in a process that includes several layers of approval from other town officials, Ms. McNally said in an email, in which she declined to comment further.
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It helps to have money.
A comparable effort for Oswit Canyon in Palm Springs, California.
ReplyDeleteThis Land Is Our Land
Palm Springs resident Jane Garrison rallied local hikers, city officials, and conservation agencies to save a canyon from destruction.
https://www.palmspringslife.com/oswit-canyon-palm-springs/
1/2021
Her conservation campaign: Oswit Land Trust's Jane Garrison eyes expansion across Coachella Valley and beyond.
https://www.desertsun.com/story/news/environment/2022/12/09/oswit-land-trust-eyes-expansion-across-coachella-valley-and-beyond/69682553007/
How Oswit ― and Garrison ― choose target properties depends on several factors, including whether the property faces potential development. But for the past decade, conservation and development in the Coachella Valley have been largely guided by the Coachella Valley Multi-Species Habitat Conservation Plan, which became effective in 2008 and identified target Conservation Areas. These Conservation Areas are generally hillsides and open desert. The Coachella Valley Conservation Commission ― a joint powers authority of local governments ― is tasked with overseeing and managing the plan, including purchasing land from willing sellers within the conservation areas and then managing that land. As a nonprofit, Oswit Land Trust can acquire parcels outside of these conservation areas.
“I think the Multi-Species Habitat Conservation Plan was passed as a balance between conservation and development, and the conservancy doesn’t want to interrupt that… From my perspective, what the conservancy tries to do is seek a balance,” said Coachella Valley Mountains Conservancy Executive Director Jim Karpiak.
But Karpiak added that “there’s a lot of very important habitat or land that’s good for recreation that was left out of the plan for various legal reasons or political reasons at the time,” including places that were left out because there was a plan to develop them. According to Karpiak, some plans have faded due to changes in the economy or a lack of interest from the owner.