Portland Takes A Major Step in Deciding Its Future

In “How The West Was Lost”, Daniel Brook argues that the Portland anti-sprawl movement is over or will soon be with the recent passage of Ballot Measure 37 in Portland. Under Measure 37 local governments, such as Portland, must compensate those landowners whose property value was decreased due to zoning restrictions. Even more detrimental to the anti-sprawl movement is that this compensation is retroactive, meaning that “if a property owner feels that any zoning change made during his tenure as owner has devalued his property, he can file a claim for compensation.” Under this system the anti-sprawl movement will almost assuredly collapse b/c it will have to pay for all of its regulations that affected property values.

The writer reports that he doesn’t believe that this measure was fully understood by the public b/c support for the anti-sprawl movement was held by the majority of the public. But Brook contends, it was the effective use of framing the issue as liberal tree-huggers vs. traditional property rights owners that allowed the measure to pass handily. According to Brook this is the end of Oregon being Oregon.

The biggest problem I have with the anti-sprawl movement is that it ignores the economic axiom that individuals are self-interested. By adopting restrictive zoning laws Portland argues that it knows what is best for the community rather than relying on market based transactions and an individual’s profit motive to allocate scarce resources to there most efficient locations. With the passage of Measure 37, Portland and the rest of Oregon have the ability to make Oregon Oregon, rather than letting some planner decide how Oregonians should live.