Notasulga - Smart Growth and Zoning
Update: Though the scene during March 2012 Town Council meeting was not pretty and resulted in the three SmartGrowthAmerica women being pretty much run out of town and the cancellation of the the town's full day workshop scheduled for the following day this page will help others to understand some of Agenda 21's silent reach into the smallest of our communities. The mentality to reach out for federal money from multiple trees without fully understanding the trade-off or worse yet, not caring, created an embarrassing situation for the town.
Don't take this lightly. If you hear or read of someone in YOUR community whispering Smart Growth immediately do your homework and engage others of the prospect of losing property rights.
We have all heard of redistribution of wealth. Property is also on the block of redistribution for the social good; to equitably distribute the costs and benefits of development, provides Wikipedia.
Here is a woman's story of living in East Germany during and after WWII. This is not a stretch to Agenda 21 but reality.
Our founders wanted to ensure Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness while basing their position upon the Laws of Nature and Nature's God as an unalienable right, not a privilege from any layer of government.
Regulations of our land, regardless of size, are coming at us from municipality, county, and federal governments in the form of laws, codes, easements, and restrictions while having two things in common; more complex restrictions and all of the attacks are from one play maker.
The play maker is the United Nations who has successfully implemented Agenda 21, a treaty signed by then-President George Bush at the UN's Earth Summit in 1992, and International Building Codes along with attempts of world-wide gun restrictions playbook reads Land...cannot be treated as an ordinary asset, controlled by individuals and subject to the pressures and inefficiencies of the market. Private land ownership is also a principal instrument of accumulation and concentration of wealth and therefore contributes to social injustice; if unchecked, it may become a major obstacle in the planning and implementation of development schemes. The provision of decent dwellings and healthy conditions for the people can only be achieved if land is used in the interests of society as a whole. Public control of land use is therefore indispensable..... The UN Biodiversity treaty 1992: The land policy of the United Nations was first officially articulated at the United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat I), held in Vancouver, May 31 - June 11, 1976. Agenda Item 10 of the Conference Report sets forth the UN's official policy on land.
Rural Notasulga is not immune to these thoughts and plans for our community with a long stringed carrot from the United Nations.
Using colorful words, the description of Smart Growth and Sustainable Development is warm and fuzzy.
However, as stated on smartgrowthamerica.org,
Smart Growth includes Providing quality housing for people of
all income levels.. and.... The diverse mix of housing options in smart growth neighborhoods including
single-family homes of all sizes, duplexes, small and large apartments, studios above garages or shops,
condominiums, and lofts - means people with different housing needs can all live in the same neighborhood, and
that residents can remain in a neighborhood even if their housing needs change. This strategy also helps homes
better retain their value.
Yes, homes, land, and business within the approved development area, Urban Growth Boundaries (UBG), will increase in value solely because competition of the extremely limited resources. Soaring land and house prices certainly represent the biggest single failure of smart growth, which has contributed to an increase in prices that is unprecedented in history, 1 and supported with this chart2, though this chart shows home value for major municipalities.
The below image is a slide from the Volusia County Smart Growth committee showing their solution to sprawl, or county living as I like to call it. All of the residences and property in the upper left image are redesigned and clustered into development and reclassifying land for crops, pasture, permanent trees, and a wider flood plain. Personally, I deliberately left clustered developments for land and open space having grown up in Levittown, NY and lived in many military base housing complexes.
Smart Growth, Sustainable Development, and the practices of Agenda 21 are all one of the same.
Tom DeWeese and Don Casey, on radio, have stated many times, the references to these concepts change over time to add more confusion to accomplish their means of more human-free land. Such names include, but not limited to, New Ubranism, Sustainable Development, Preventing urban sprawl, Triple Bottom Line (People, Planet, Profit).
The concept of Smart Growth can be demonstrated by two different sized rings super imposed over each other. The inner and smaller ring, UGB, will be designated for controlled development of high density housing and be a utility service area. For economy's of scale these UGB's will provide housing and vital services of fire, police, utilities, education and recreation. The area between the rings constitute a buffer zone for limited human activity. The area outside the larger ring will have very little human activity with the purpose of restoring the land to pre-Christopher Columbus conditions, or re-wilding, spoken by DeWeese. In other words DeWeese clarifies elimination of human presence on over 50% of the American landscape.3
Okay, you ask, "If we squeeze everyone into tiny little communities, how do we deal with growing population?" That answer is addressed by Stephanie R. Pasco' research of quotes from many world leaders to depopulate this planet of humans. With limited medical and surgical resources, ObamaCare will help reduce the numbers of the very young and old in need of specialized care. Secretary of House Energy and Commerce Committee, Kathleen Sebelius, recently reinforced this initiative toward birth control with an exchange between Congressman Tim Murphy of Pennsylvania, claimed "The reduction in a number of pregnancies compensates for the cost of contraception." To which responded . "So you;re saying by not having babies born we're going to save money on health care?"
If one is unfortunate to own a home or rural land outside the second ring, the use of the land may be severely restricted to a point of not being able to make a living from the land. There may be restrictions on vital services, if available. Not being able to make a living and not being able to pay the ad valorem taxes, eventually the county will take the land for social good and proclaim the land to human free and ultimately contributing to a broader matrix of connected wildlands.
Outright land purchases and conservation easements can maintain de facto UGBs by protecting continuous greenbelts and corridors or maintaining rural reserves with lands of special agricultural, ecological, or cultural significance. When comprehensive enough, such land purchases and easements provide effective barriers to new development. Conservation easements permanently remove certain development rights from parcels of land, allowing owners to stay on their land while decreasing their property tax. These strategies, unlike zoning laws, result in permanent land protection, but at great cost. Zoning laws have the virtue of being implemented at very little cost through popular vote, but have the corresponding vulnerability of being overturned in the next vote. 4
Other counties and municipalities have considered the planning Notasulga and Macon County may soon experience. Representative Joe Neal from South Carolina speaks of his Richland County experiences with his property rights, we have yet to see. In this hour long video, the diverse community speaks against Richland County's policy while the Commission Chair speaks of her desire and plans to have a movie house and shopping within 10 miles of her rural home.
What is next? Performance Zoning and carbon credits in Macon County? Could be.
I will keep this page updated therefore if you live or own property in Macon County you would be served best by checking back often.
Additional reading:
References:
1. http://www.newgeography.com/content/002324-the-costs-smart-growth-revisited-a-40-year-perspective
2. The Housing Crash and Smart Growth, http://www.ncpa.org/pdfs/st335.pdf
3. DeWeese, Tom; The Dark Side of Globism, September 16, 2004