The right attacks smart growth and New Urbanism

Libertarian and free-market ideologues mobilize for a mean campaign.

Watch out. A national attack on smart growth and New Urbanism is under way — organized by libertarian and free-market ideologues and led by economist Randal O’Toole.

O’Toole, director of the Thoreau Institute in Bandon, Oregon, called together 125 opponents of smart growth for a Feb. 23-25 conference in Washington, DC, on “Preserving the American Dream of Mobility and Homeownership.” In a pre-conference solicitation, he portrayed smart growth as a worrisome threat — a grim combination of “rail transit boondoggles, neighborhood densification, urban-growth boundaries, traffic ‘calming,’ and other intrusive planning policies.”

The conference offered one opportunity for advocacy of New Urbanism: an opening-night “Great Debate” between Miami architect-planner Andres Duany and consultant Wendell Cox on whether New Urbanism and smart growth are “compatible with the American Dream.”

Once that event was out of the way, representatives of the Buckeye Institute, Cascade Policy Institute, Heartland Institute, Heritage Foundation, Reason Foundation, and other libertarian and free-market organizations devoted two days to laying the groundwork for a campaign aimed at stopping smart growth and New Urbanism.

The conference’s tone — heavy on distrust of government — was set when O’Toole declared in his introduction, “We are against coercive measures and social engineering and [government programs] that don’t do anything. We are for free choice.”

Duany gamely tried to win the audience over — or at least lessen antagonism — by emphasizing points on which he agrees with critics of existing government regulation. He stressed that the birth of New Urbanism “was market-driven,” in developer-created settlements like Seaside, Florida — not foisted on an unwilling populace by bureaucrats. New urbanists, said Duany, have spent much of their time “fighting government” because “this country is coded to the hilt” in ways that make communities and daily life worse.

“We consider ourselves to be reformers,” Duany declared. “Insofar as New Urbanism is actually providing choice, you should be on our side.” He received a friendly reception. But the libertarian/free-market contingent was not about to call off its negative crusade.

Cox, a specialist in transportation, cast smart growth and New Urbanism as an enemy of Americans’ ability to live where and how they choose. His voice at times nearly quavering, Cox asserted, “If people want to live in sprawl, they should be able to.” He depicted New Urbanism and smart growth as movements that raise density, and he warned, “There are some real problems with forcing densities higher.”

Among the problems he cited:
• “Where mandatory, smart growth and New Urbanism increase traffic congestion and travel time.” Slower commuting, in turn, reduces the number of jobs within a person’s reach.
• “Air pollution is higher where density is higher.”
• The curbing of outlying development “raises prices and drives people out of the homeownership market.” Cox said, “Homeownership is greatest where sprawl is the greatest.”

An Attack Mentality

Especially disturbing were signs that libertarians and free-market exponents are prepared to smear smart growth and New Urbanism, employing the same tactics that political candidates use to destroy opponents’ reputations.

David Strom of the Taxpayers League of Minnesota, who helped lead a campaign against a rail transit proposal in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, said opponents of smart growth must “be relentless in undermining the credibility of your opponents.” Strom advised, “Question their motives — without looking like a conspiracy theorist.”

“We often make the mistake of assuming this is a battle over who has the better facts,” Strom said. Quite the contrary, he explained, policies aimed at shaping development are more likely to be defeated if voters get the impression that the typical smart growth leader is “a pointy-headed intellectual fascist” trying to ruin people’s lives.

In Minnesota, Strom’s organization depicted pro-transit leaders as practitioners of “social engineering.” “No one knew what ‘social engineering’ was,” Strom said, “but it sounded bad. We made it sound like they were a bunch of commies.”
Another tactic of opponents of government regulation and planning involves putting a minority and low-income face on the campaign against smart growth. For this purpose, Joseph H. Neal, an African-American Democratic state senator from a rural district near Columbia, South Carolina, proved perfect in the Washington conference.

A powerful speaker, Neal said that after the state government pushed counties to do more planning, Richland County devised a “Vision 2020” land-use plan that called for severely limiting development in the territory he represents, where much land is owned by black families of modest means. The downzoning of some areas to one house per 60 acres (later changed to one house per 25 acres) effectively stripped some families of much of their net worth, he said.

Participants proposed making Neal chairman or honorary chairman of the nascent American Dream Coalition. Jon Caldara, president of the Independence Institute, a free-market think tank in Golden, CO, said the anti-smart growth movement should avoid appearing to consist mainly of “cranky white men.”

By the end of the conference, there were discussions of where money for an anti-smart growth effort might come from. Suggested as possible contributors were the Scaife Foundations in Pittsburgh, other conservative foundations, developers, homebuilders, auto dealers, and road contractors. Kemper Freeman, a developer in Bellevue, Washington, recommended approaching Wal-Mart, Home Depot, and other big-box retailers, which he said are “getting beaten up.”

Most states have at least one libertarian or free-market foundation. Those organizations will be asked to support campaigns against smart growth policies. Caldara said the goal at the grassroots level should be to build a coalition ranging from “soccer moms who demand mobility” to “inner-city blacks who are being priced out.”

Clearly, the opponents of smart growth and New Urbanism know how to conduct mean, manipulative campaigns — all the while claiming they are fighting for the public good. Someone should give them a mirror.