Protecting Zoning Reform Gains
Zoning Practice — August 2024
By Brian Connolly
Not a member but want to buy a copy? You'll need to create a free My APA account to purchase.
Create account
By 2023, advocates for relaxing zoning rules to encourage more housing production — including planners, the "Yes In My Backyard" (YIMBY) movement, and others — had plenty to crow about. Nearly two dozen cities and several states had followed the lead of places like Minneapolis and Oregon, adopting legislation that included allowing by-right development of multiple dwelling units on lots previously restricted to single-family detached housing, permitting accessory dwelling units (ADUs) throughout residential districts, reducing onerous parking and dimensional standards, and employing inclusionary zoning and density bonuses to allow new income-restricted affordable housing. Even places that planners never imagined would join the housing affordability bandwagon did so. Given the 100-plus-year history of exclusionary zoning, these legislative victories were hard-fought and merited celebration. Moreover, it seemed as if this wave of pro-housing legislation would continue to spread across the country as even more states and cities took up efforts to adopt zoning reforms.
In retrospect, however, these early zoning reform victory celebrations were premature. Legal challenges have thwarted many attention-grabbing reforms. Local referendum petitions and elections have stopped pro-housing zoning code updates, while some local city councils have repealed them to appease their anti-development constituents. As striking as the recent wave of zoning reforms has been, the backlash against them has been fierce. As a result, planners, lawyers, housing advocates, and other supporters of zoning reforms must now defend those reforms in courts of law and public opinion. And those working on additional reforms must now consider how they might justify and defend them should future legal challenges surface.
This issue of Zoning Practice reviews recent legal challenges to state and local zoning reform legislation and offers strategies for planners and their allies who must defend against them. It first considers four case studies of reforms that faced legal challenges, reviewing how opponents have used legal tools and procedures to stop or delay them. It then offers tips and strategies for planners and advocates seeking to implement and defend zoning reforms.
Details
About the Author
Brian Connolly
Brian J. Connolly is an Assistant Professor of Business Law at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan. His research and teaching centers in the areas of real estate, land use, and development law. His primary research interests include issues of public and private regulation of land use and their relationship to housing affordability and urban redevelopment. Professor Connolly has also written on First Amendment issues related to local government regulation – including signs and outdoor advertising and other free speech issues – as well as fair housing matters in local planning and zoning. Professor Connolly’s work on these topics has included filing multiple U.S. Supreme Court amicus curiae briefs and serving as an expert witness in cases involving these and other land use topics.
Prior to entering academia, Professor Connolly spent over a decade in private law practice in Denver, Colorado, where he represented public- and private-sector clients in zoning, planning, development entitlements, and other complex regulatory matters. Before his legal career, Professor Connolly served as an urban planner in local government.