DATE: March 12, 2001
TO: Members of the State Planning Commission
FROM: Dianne Brake, The Regional Planning Partnership
RE: SPC Priorities
We are now in the time we used to refer to as "After the Plan is adopted . . ." I feel the need to answer the question "Now what?" If you do, too, please read the following. I am interested to know to what extent each of you shares my planning priorities.
I. Centers/Map Amendments: I know we must complete these ASAP. To be fair to those who submitted requests for Centers and Map Amendments, we should complete them as quickly as possible, using the same process we used in the past. For continuity's sake, I think that the Plan Implementation Committee should do this, then retire in favor of an Endorsement Committee (see below).
II. Endorsement: At the same time, we must finish our deliberations on Endorsement, giving it as much urgency and time commitment that we gave to the Plan over the last month. A target date to be finished should initially be set for the end of the comment period for the Rules. For continuity's sake again, the Plan Development Committee should do this, then retire till next time.
Our endorsement discussion must answer the following:
1) What standards are we going to ask regions/towns to meet to demonstrate
that their plans will result in the State Plan goals being achieved?
Key Indicators/Targets could be useful here.
2) What can we do to make sure they get a yes/no answer in a short timeframe?
3) What will we do when many applicants get a quick "no" because,
based on the plans and zoning that most towns have in place, they will
not be able to demonstrate that the State Plan's goals will be achieved?
As we deliberate, it would be helpful for SPC members to be involved with
the review of drafts of Planning New Jersey, which is intended, isn't it,
to tell the reader how to plan in such a way as to achieve both endorsement
and the State Plan's goals.
III. New Initiatives: Meanwhile, the Strategic Direction Committee must be convened to agree on "What's next?" for both staff and SPC. The work program must ensure that we are prepared for the next time we review the Plan (gasp!) to address both the problems we had with Cross-acceptance and the remaining obstacles to Plan implementation.
This means, in my view, considering at least four major projects that are
all about growth (It's the Way to Grow!). The projects make sure we understand
trend and target growth, our capacity to grow, our reasons to grow, and
explore our ability to direct growth to areas that are already developed
and conserve open land. Making these high visibility planning projects
will help us build support, prepare us for another Cross-acceptance,
and facilitate implementation.
I know that some of these ideas incorporated into the work plan that the Strategic Direction Committee reviewed last year. Let's have another Committee meeting ASAP with the intention of reviewing our priorities, and perhaps influencing the State budget for OSP resources. The following is my list:
- Growth Targets: We should use the new Census data
to review the Plan's projections for 2020. We must decide whether or
not the Impact Assessment numbers are the ones we want to use. We need
to understand both Trend Projections and Plan Projections and their significance
to Plan implementation. They must make sense for our Key Indicators/Targets
and be cross-accepted (small "c" not capital "C")
with State agencies, counties and municipalities. The projections (Trend
and Plan) must be attributed to each municipality and to each Planning
Area (we must get around the technical problems and do this).
Growth Targets is an important project because, right now, almost everyone is planning for Trend and no one has focused on what Bob Burchell put into Plan numbers. Unless we have some handle on Trend versus Plan, we will be planning for Trend by default.
Unless we have some handle on the numbers, we will have no handle on growth patterns, which is, in my view, the heart of the Plan. It will also give us some idea of how much redevelopment we expect to happen, as opposed to "green field." In addition, we need these numbers to undertake a capacity analysis on a regional basis. Which brings me to:
- Capacity Analysis: The Builders Association and environmentalists
have pointed out that we have no good idea of the capacity of New Jersey
to grow. Although I know there are technical obstacles to carrying out
a statewide capacity analysis, we must do the best we can with the data
we have.
At the very least, a capacity analysis would show others that the State is practicing what it is preaching, and serve as the basis for regional considerations of capacity. At best, it could provide the basis for decisions on where investments should and should not be made to achieve the goals of the State Plan. This would lead to information to aid in the Endorsement process, as the basis for considering the capacity of regional systems.
Although discussions are bound to be tricky as to determining when the capacity of a particular system should be considered a limit and when it should be considered ripe for expansion, such discussions would reveal the strengths and weaknesses of pro-growth and anti-growth factions. A capacity analysis would also force us to consider what we mean by "encourage growth" in PA 1 and 2, and "accommodate growth" in PA 3, 4, and 5.
- The "Big Idea" Project: To give credit where
credit is due, the idea for a "big idea" was Herb's. Although
we have the eight goals in the Plan, a "big idea" answers the
question, Why Have a State Plan? A "big idea" project could
attract interest and resources to Plan implementation.
Last year, after the Port Authority presentation at one of our meetings, I wrote the Governor with my own concept of a project leading to a "big idea". The project would:
1) Conduct a statewide analysis of the five major industrial sectors moving New Jersey's economy;
2) Review strategies through which these economic "engines" could be hooked to the State Plan, e.g., to urban (and town, Charlie!) revitalization and natural resource conservation;
3) Demonstrate how connecting these engines to the State Plan goals will benefit every region of the State.
The example I used was the Port (logistics is one of the five sectors). If the Port is dredged, it will receive trillions more containers per year making their way through many of New Jersey's towns on roads and rails. Although this could be good for our economy, it could also be devastating to our quality of life and result in distribution "nodes" popping up in many of the wrong locations.
If, on the other hand, the Port is not dredged and we are no longer capitalizing on two of our New Jersey's strengths (location and transportation infrastructure), then our economy could sour and be just as devastating to our quality of life. How do we avoid these lose/lose options and ensure instead that the State Plan goals are achieved? How does the logistics sector relate to our cities? To our rural areas? How can we expand this sector and still protect the landscape?
Although there are many other possible "big ideas", It's The Economy, Stupid. The economy is what fuels growth, and growth, with its assets and liabilities, is what the State Plan is all about. If we can demonstrate how the Plan relates to our economic future, and how that economic future is expected to deliver both urban revitalization and open space and natural resources conservation, we could expect more support from sectors who have found nothing so far in the Plan for them.
In addition, articulating an economic plan that is expected to deliver the State Plan goals, could serve as the basis for focusing State agency plans, permits and investments, e.g., like a geographically specific transportation plan or a State Plan-infused watershed rule, supporting the economy and the environment.
And finally, such a project could be the first of other State initiatives which re-tool traditional analyses from a single goal orientation (growing the economy) to a multiple goal orientation (achieve all the State Plan goals, while growing the economy).
- Redevelopment Implementation Agenda: You all know
I feel strongly about this one. We must join forces with our advocacy
network to create a Redevelopment Implementation Agenda. It is only with
substantial redevelopment that we will be able to meet the major goals
of the State Plan. This project needs research, an advocacy agenda, and
an implementation program.
One major initiative under this heading is to use our Special Resource Area category to designate the eight Urban Centers. In so doing, we could explore the capacity and desire of the cities to absorb growth and recommend strategies for directing regional growth to fuel revitalization efforts. I suggested this back when we were considering the Highlands, and this idea need not replace Joe's idea to use this category to designate the Port area. We should do both.
Another way to support redevelopment, is to have the State fund an Infrastructure Bank to provide what is needed in endorsed growth centers. Such a Bank would be an excellent follow-up to the Smart Growth Planning Grants, and demonstrate our commitment to implementation.
We could spearhead some regional plans in various key locations around the State to demonstrate how growth can be targeted on a regional basis and directed away from open land into appropriate growth centers. There may be some specific Counties (Somerset, Burlington? RPP is beginning such a project in Mercer) where they have received Smart Growth grants and we can partner with them to create regional growth plans, focusing on redevelopment. Through this work we can conduct the research needed, develop an action agenda for the Legislative Committee, and a program to facilitate redevelopment efforts in all parts of the State.
- Legislative Agenda: There are three policy areas that
need new legislation that should be considered by the Legislation
Committee. They are certainly necessary to achieve our goals: affordable
housing, property tax reform, TDR, and regional planning.
Affordable housing and property tax reform: To the extent that we are successful in restraining development on green fields and making our State more desirable, housing prices will go up and the opportunity for ratables will go down. An analysis of zoning in the State will demonstrate that we zone to provide lots of opportunities for non-residential development and limit the opportunities for housing. A build-out of RPP's region according to zoning, would add a jobs-to-housing ratio of 13:1!
The ratable chase thwarts our efforts to reshape land use patterns, and creates increasing housing costs and traffic congestion as people live further and further away to find affordable housing. This also affects our available labor force, something, which has always been one of New Jersey's strongest assets.
For these reasons, SPC must be more pro-active in stopping the ratable chase and ensuring that there is plentiful affordable housing. The Coalition of Affordable Housing and the Environment has developed a Growth Share methodology to replace COAH's complicated formula for setting a municipal Fair Share number. It is also working on a regional tax sharing plan, as well as other ideas for reforming the property tax system.
TDR and Regional Planning: Of course, TDR, or other density programs, and various regional planning bills have been around for some time. We must come up with our positions on these and be more active in seeing them implemented.
- Fragmentation of Decision-making: The Land Use Infrastructure
and the Environment (LUIE) report was handed over to the SPC back in
late 1997. We never did anything with it (accept get the Smart Growth
Planning Grants - an important LUIE recommendation!), because of Cross-Acceptance
and Plan adoption. Now's the time. The LUIE Report contained a number
of recommendations on how to make planning, regulating and infrastructure
spending consistent at all levels of government and consistent internally,
horizontally (across jurisdictional boundaries) and vertically (across
various levels of government).
Although there was considerable controversy over a few of LUIE's recommendations, there was consensus on many. It is time to review where we stand and develop a strategy for weeding out those recommendations which cannot be supported by most of our stakeholders, and moving ahead with those that can.
Most of LUIE's recommendations do not need new legislation, but a review of the report could extract a list that would be more effective with legislation and that list could go to the Legislative Committee.
Committee Structure: To address Joe's interest in committee re-organization, I offer the following structure to carry out my proposed agenda.
1) An Endorsement Committee to review applications and make recommendations. The Endorsement Committee can also be responsible for establishing draft Growth Targets, overseeing the capacity analysis, and reviewing the Trend and Plan projections accordingly.
2) Besides its role in reviewing the work program, the Strategic Direction Committee can review and select the "Big Idea" proposal and get this off the ground. An advisory committee to the project, comprised of both SPC members and non-members could be established to report to the SPC.
3) Establishing the Port and the eight Urban Centers as a Special Resource Areas should be the first task of a new Redevelopment Implementation Committee. Other tasks for this committee will be to oversee the research, advocacy, and implementation program outlined above under Redevelopment Implementation Project.
4) The Legislative Committee needs to develop proposals for new legislation as well as respond to bills already introduced. As I have proposed, I hope they will look at affordable housing and property tax reform as well as LUIE recommendations.
I have not touched on State Agency Implementation, which is in the capable hands of Marty Bierbaum and his staff. To the extent that Marty comes up with an agenda for us as to how to reform what we do to make implementation easier, we can develop a Committee to work with him.
I have also not touched on Marketing, which is also on-going, but in need of SPC support and involvement.
For those of you who have struggled through this lengthy memo, thanks. I look forward to hearing your response.