Where's The Money?

Land use planning is an idea whose time came yesterday, but don't look for it tomorrow in Michigan, because powerful interests are lined up against it.

After years of study, public hearings, and legislative debate, a mild bill which would have made the first tentative steps toward identifying Michigan's land use problems failed to get out of the House Appropriations Committee this April for the third time in three years.

The bill, which enjoyed wide bipartisan support and the hearty endorsement of Governor Milliken, was once again bottled up in committee through the efforts of the Michigan Association of Home Builders, a lobby representing over 2,000 builders in the state; a handful of northern Michigan legislators, led by Senator Joseph S. Mack (D-lronwood); and some large corporations-including Chrysler-from the heart of Detroit.

In the meantime, in the absence of any comprehensive land use law, unrestrained developers continue to gobble up valuable farm land further and further out from urban centers- necessitating new sewers, roads, schools, and other services and attracting mortgage money from Detroit banks. And the city and older suburbs, with their highly developed services, are left to decay- even those who want to hang in there can't get any loan money in such a "risky" area.

Parents who wanted to raise their kids in the wholesome clean air of the suburbs have ended up imprisoning them in a cultural desert called suburban sprawl - homogenous in race and class, if not always in ethnic background or religion.

And since the Detroit region hasn't had a decent transportation system serving even the near suburbs like Dearborn - let alone Farmington or Wyandotte - hundreds of thousands of kids have grown up and graduated from suburban high schools without once setting foot in the Institute of Arts, Greektown, Ford Auditorium, or Tiger Stadium. Many seldom see, let alone speak to, a black person.

While the kids have been missing out on America, their parents- alone with city, township, and county governments - have been paying the price for poorly planned and unplanned development in areas lacking adequate sewage and storm drains, sidewalks, paved roads, adequate fire protection, and other urban services - which are even more expensive in sprawling suburbia than in the more concentrated urban centers.

When residents turn around to ask the developer why the sewer drain is at the highest point in the street, or why all the sump pumps burn out and recirculate the same water whenever it rains, he's already gone to greener pastures, eating away at limited farm land and open space in the name of free enterprise - like a Caterpillar stripping a plant of all its leaves and moving on to the next.

At the same time, Michigan's best farm land is dwindling at the rate of 35,000 acres each year, and rural open land even at 50,000 acres a year. In 1945, the state had 18 million acres of agricultural land. Today there are less than 12 million acres.

If we keep losing farm land at that rate, we'll be down to only 2.5 million acres in less than 25 years. Yet state officials figure that if Michigan is to continue to raise 50 per cent of its own food, as it does at present, we will need at least 7 to 8 million acres of land under cultivation. If we don't hold our own in food production, it will mean importing more food from other land-starved states at ever-higher prices.

"Seventeen of our 23 most productive agricultural counties are located in southern Michigan, which is also the home of 75 per cent of our population," explains Karl R. Hosford, Chief of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Division of Land Resource Programs. "And many of those people would like to move to the suburbs."

In the northern part of the state, valuable forestry resources are being divided into lots of ten acres or less and sold to persons looking for summer recreation land, and the shores of almost every lake, including the Great Lakes, are lined with small private cottages. Lakeshore population densities in the summer months are as great, or greater than, those of the cities the vacationers leave behind.

SAVING THE LAND

It began to become clear in the 1950's and '60's that the competing demands for Michigan's land resources - urban growth, agriculture, recreation, forestry, and mining - were on a collision course. The state officially took notice in 1970, when a subcomrnittee of Governor Milliken's Environmental Quality Council recognized unplanned land use as a major problem requiring quick corrective action. That report was followed by a special commission, which offered alternative land use policies, drafted legislative proposals, and held public hearings late in 1972.

That same year, State Rep. Philip O. Mastin (D-Hazel Park) introduced a bill calling for the formation of a state Land Use Commission and held public hearings.

After extensive consultations with representatives of local governments, planners, and legislative and state officials, a revised bill was introduced in 1973. This bill, and two substantially like it, failed to make it out of the House Appropriations Committee in 1973, 1974, and April 1976. The Committee is chaired by Representative Dominic J. Jacobetti (D-Negaunee), who had lobbied against the bill and allowed no time for discussion or presentation of amendments.

The present bill, H.B. 4234, provides for the creation of a nine-member state Land Use Commission, appointed by the Governor to overlapping four-year terms. At least two members must come from the Upper Peninsula, two from the northem Lower Peninsula, and two from the southern Lower Peninsula. The commission would be part of the Department of Natural Resources and have access to the technical and field personnel of that department.

The Commission's duties would include: Making a statewide survey of current land uses and identifying current and future problem areas. Designating certain lands as "essential" because of their agricultural, mineral, ecological, or historical significance. Developing a land use program to protect land resources and submitting proposals for implementation of that program to the legislature. Working with counties and municipalities in the state to develop local plans which will be incorporated into the state's overall plan. Developing a land use classification system and educational programs. Making interim rules governing land designated "essential."

This last point is the most controversial, since it's the last tooth left in the original legislation. Originally, several strong implementation measures were written into the bill, but through compromises, it was decided that the Land Use Commission would simply recommend enforcement powers necessary to realize its program, leaving it to the Legislature to allocate such powers in separate legislation.

Under the bill, the Commission would approve or disapprove of plans to string power lines or build pipelines or other Utilities on lands it had designated "essential" for agriculture, mineral development, or ecological or historical considerations. It could also veto any public construction project using state or federal funds on essential lands - including schools, highways, sewers, airports, and so on. The Commission would have this power until the Governor and Legislature approved a land use program and the powers to implement it.

Senator Mack calls this last remaining tooth in the bill "perhaps the most dangerous section . . . Even if a State plan is never approved, this new bureaucracy will retain this awesome power," he States in his analysis of the bill.

H.B. 4234 would give one area of the Commission's proposed jurisdiction immediate effect, in a limited way, until a permanent structure is approved by the Governor and Legislature. That is what bothers those who hope that no such program will ever be approved. The interim rules would have to be approved by a Joint Legislative Committee on Administrative Rules, and the bill provides for appeal to the state Court of Appeals for those unhappy with a Commission ruling.

DEVELOPERS VS. PEOPLE

Chrysler argues that the legislation will "depress the housing industry, create unemployment, increase consumer costs, increase the cost of state government, and discourage business and industrial expansion in Michigan." They continue in their statement on the bill: "We find nothing in the substitute measure that assures better planning and land use than that now being accomplished through local governing bodies."

Rep. Mastin disagrees: "Half of this state is unzoned, and the developers have a field day," he maintains. "Even where zoning exists, developers come in with a battery of high-priced lawyers and take the townships to court, where they often win."

Nor does he agree with the economie argument against land use planning. "There are sound economie reasons for supporting land use legislation," Mastin emphasizes. "The tourist recreational base is the second largest source of jobs in the state. The third largest is agriculture. To the extent that we allow recreational and agricultural resources to erode, we allow our job base to erode.

"But further," he adds, "the cost of protecting our land resources is cheaper than exploiting them without adequate controls."

The DNR's Hosford also rejects the claim that land use planning will cost the state jobs: "Our first concern is providing jobs," he asserts, "but we can create them properly without poisoning the Detroit River - like we did during World War II and after - and without destroying our land resources.

"What we need all over is a new land ethic. We are obligated to leave it better than when we found it."

Hosford points out that under the proposed legislation, the state plan would be the product of the many county and municipal plans, approved at the local level. The Land Use Commission would not be telling communities what to put into their plan, but only that they must develop one.

But at this point, the question of land use planning in Michigan seems to be moot. The prospects are dim for H.B. 4234.

"A year ago, I thought the bill's chances were excellent," says Mastin, who is currently running for Oakland County Executive. "But at this point, they don't look terribly good.

"Will the future of the state, in terms of its development, be determined by 2,000 developers?" he asks. "Or will the people have a voice in shaping that future? If you think the people should have a voice, you have to support this bill."

Hugh Grambau is an Ann Arbor-based free-lance writer who specializes in environmental issues.