CityLab: How Portland’s Landmark Zoning Reform Could Work

 That letter helped start a movement, and on Wednesday that movement achieved one major goal. With a 3-1 vote, the Portland city council approved the “Residential Infill Project” (RIP), a package of amendments to the city’s zoning code that legalizes up to four homes on nearly any residential lot and sharply limits building sizes. The changes pave the way for duplexes, triplexes, cottage clusters, backyard accessory dwelling units, basement apartments, and other types of affordable “missing middle” housing that have been banned in Portland since the adoption of the city’s first zoning code in 1924.

Developers will also now have the option to build as many as six homes on any lot if at least half of the resulting sixplex is available to low-income households at regulated, below-market prices — a so-called “deeper affordability option” that advocates estimate is the equivalent of a free subsidy of $100,000 or more per unit to nonprofit developers. Parking mandates that required builders to provide space for cars along with people are also now a thing of the past on most of the city’s residentially zoned land. [...]

But Portland’s project is unique and potentially more effective, experts say. RIP increases the allowable floor-to-area ratio (FAR) for multi-unit buildings, while reducing FAR for new single-family homes — a devilish detail that may be key for accelerating production, according to Michael Andersen, a senior researcher at the Sightline Institute, a research center focused on sustainability and urban policy. This sliding size cap will allow multi-unit buildings to take up more of their lots than single-unit buildings. The changes are also by-right, which means developers will be able to utilize them without neighborhood design reviews and appeals processes that can stymie new plans, as vividly seen in drawn-out local zoning battles in neighboring California. On Tuesday, Andersen wrote that Portland’s changes are “the most pro-housing reform to low-density zones in U.S. history.” [...]

But many environmental groups, including the local chapter of the Sunrise Movement, support the changes, as do anti-displacement activists who helped shape the sixplex amendment, which was added in 2019. Along with detailed changes to FAR that incentivize more low-income housing, the reforms are expected to “change the economics of displacement,” said David Sweet, a co-founder of Portland For Everyone, a coalition of housing nonprofits, residents and businesses that advocated for the infill change.

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Esquire: The Insanity in Oregon Is a Glimpse of Our Very Dark Future

Now this is not an unusual tactic. Not long ago, Democratic lawmakers in Texas and in Wisconsin blew town for the same purpose—to throw sand in the gears of a legislative act of which they did not approve and could not stop by conventional means. In Wisconsin, it was to slow down an anti-union measure. In Texas, it was about a redistricting map that gerrymandered the Texas legislature into a farce. The legislative lamsters all had a good time, taking goofy videos in what appeared to be Holiday Inn lobbies while Republicans back home fumed. (The Texans, it should be noted, won a temporary victory.) What makes Oregon different is what the fugitive Republican senators did.

The Republican senators—with the full support of the Oregon Republican Party—made common cause with armed domestic terror groups. (Calling them a militia is a misnomer, regardless of what they may think of themselves.) When a Republican state senator named Brian Boquist heard that Brown was sending the Oregon state police after them, he told a local television station: Send bachelors and come heavily armed. I’m not going to be a political prisoner in the state of Oregon. It’s just that simple. [...]

People with guns have involved themselves in a legislative dispute while the officials of one of the political parties was rooting them on, and one session of a state legislature was cancelled because of it. Roll that around in your head for a while and see where you end up. Something is building in our politics and now I wish I hadn't watched that series about Chernobyl. We may be exceeding the tolerances of all our systems.

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Vox: The real reason streetcars are making a comeback (Aug 9, 2017)

 Starting in the late 20th century, modern streetcar proposals started rippling across municipalities in the United States. They’re touted as infrastructure carrying benefits ranging from the social to economic and the environmental. But these projects often make appearances in the news as costly, blunder-filled experiments in public policy.

Cities are willing to bet big on this technology for its potential to develop the local economy. But there is some disagreement as to whether the streetcar is driving this progress, or if it is simply the result of planning *around* the streetcar.

Axios: Marijuana legalization, daylight savings and other notable measures passed in the midterm elections

Marijuana legalization: Michigan became the 10th state to legalize marijuana — including the District of Columbia — and first midwestern state to do so for recreational use. North Dakota rejected a similar measure, but voters in Missouri approved the legalization of medical marijuana.

Abortion: The matter was on the ballot in three states. In Oregon, voters defeated a measure that would have banned the use of public funds to pay for abortion coverage. Alabama and West Virginia approved sweeping anti-abortion language to the states’ constitution, proclaiming that women have no right to perform the procedure.[...]

Daylight saving: Californians decided they no longer want to reset clocks twice a year. A measure they approved would implement a permanent year-round daylight saving time. But, it requires a two-thirds vote from the state legislature and a change in federal law to go into effect.

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99 Percent Invisible: Bundyville

By his own account, Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy never wanted to start a war with the federal government. To hear him tell the story, he is a folksy, rural Nevada rancher trying to eke out a living on a piece of land near Bunkerville. But in 2014, on the same piece of land Bundy claims is so peaceful, armed militias showed up and pointed guns at Bureau of Land Management agents who had come to round up his cattle because of Bundy’s unpaid grazing fees.

During the chaotic events that were broadcast on national television, Bundy took to the stage and gave a list of demands. He wanted federal parks officers to turn over their weapons to the crowd. He wanted federal buildings demolished. He wanted all public lands in Clark County, Nevada, turned over to local control. It was a stark contrast to the image Bundy paints of himself. Far from peaceful, Bundy was calling for an armed rebellion if he didn’t get his way.

And that’s essentially what happened. Militia members pointed their guns at BLM agents, and those agents backed off after being surrounded in a river wash near the ranch. Bundy got his cattle back and for years faced no consequences for his actions. He had, it seemed, beaten the federal government.

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