| Does the Comp Plan impose any limits on
housing growth? |
The short answer: No. If you read The Plan (Chapter 3 of the Comp Plan), you will search in vain for any limit on housing growth. The pro-growth Council members will point to two things they say are limits on growth: (1) The Plan says, "It is the express intent of the Plan that Louisville will have a population of no more than approximately 23,000 residents within the context of this 20 year [sic] time horizon"; (2) the Council adopted a "phasing" rule that purports to limit the number of residential building permits that may be issued each year. Neither constitutes any real limit. For starters, it's important to understand the make-up of this pro-growth Council. Five of the current members, including Michele Van Pelt (the only one running for re-election; two other pro-growth members are term-limited), have said publicly and repeatedly that there could never be any limits on population in Louisville. Beyond that, although the public wanted the Comp Plan to impose limitations on the number of new housing units in Louisville, the City Council and staff repeatedly stressed that the Comp Plan was an advisory, unenforceable and non-binding document. To illustrate just how advisory, unenforceable and non-binding the Comp Plan and its "intent" of 23,000 residents are, you need only see what the City Council did on August 2 and 16: before approving the 23,000 "intent" language, the Council added new housing developments to the Comp Plan that result in a population exceeding the 23,000-resident number. Worse, on August 2, the pro-growth Council members, including Michele Van Pelt, insisted that virtually every part of the Comp Plan must be imbued with "flexibility" for developers' plans, even if those plans included housing that isn't part of the Comp Plan. This insistence on pro-growth "flexibility" led citizens to write a guest opinion in the Camera explaining why "flexibility" is another word for lack of vision. As for "phasing" in housing. On September 20, the Council approved a phasing resolution that purports to "limit" the number of building permits issued each year. But it's a fallacy to suggest that the phasing resolution addresses the issue of growth or even imposes any real limits on the number of building permits that will be issued each year. But even if it addressed either issue, it wouldn't address the critical issue: How many new housing units and how many new residents can a "small town" absorb before it can no longer say it has a small-town "feel"? The City of Aurora once was a small town. Even if phasing could be achieved—on August 16, Council member Van Pelt said nothing can be "guaranteed"—phasing guarantees nothing about the number of housing units or the population growth this Council will allow. |
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