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Smart Growth Audits

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Smart Growth Audits Jerry Weitz, AICP, received his doctorate in urban studies from Portland State University and a master’s degree in city planning from the Georgia Institute of Technology. Weitz is author of Sprawl Busting: State Programs to Guide Growth (Chicago: Planners Press, 1999) and the User Manual for the Growing Smart Legislative Guidebook (Chicago: American Planning Association, 2002). He is president-elect of the Georgia Chapter of APA and heads his own planning and development consulting firm, Jerry Weitz & Associates, Inc., in Alpharetta, Georgia. He was employed formerly by Oregon’s Transportation and Growth Management Program Leora Susan Waldner is a doctoral candidate in the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of California, Berkeley, and a planner with Jerry Weitz & Associates, Inc. Her work has included research on suburban revitalization strategies, drafting local land-use ordinances, and preparing smart growth tool descriptions. She holds masters degrees in city and re- gional planning and landscape architecture from the University of California at Berkeley and received her B.A. in urban studies from the University of California at San Diego. There are three entities acknowledged here for their funding support for work leading to this PAS Report: the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC), the Georgia Department of Community Affairs (DCA), and the Regional Business Coalition of Metropolitan Atlanta, Inc.(RBC). As a part of its Community Choices program and in connection with its lead- ership role in the Georgia Quality Growth Partnership, the ARC in 2001 hired Jordan, Jones & Goulding (JJG) to prepare tool descriptions for its Quality Growth Toolkit. One of these work products, prepared by Jerry Weitz & As- sociates, Inc., under subcontract with JJG, focused on a smart growth audit. Jerry Weitz, AICP, was the principal author of the ARC-sponsored work, and Leora Waldner conducted interviews, wrote portions of the report, and conducted Internet research. Gary Cornell, AICP, Manager of Comprehensive Planning at JJG, was the project manager for the consulting team. Several members of ARC’s staff reviewed and commented on the smart growth audit tool description, including Dan Reuter, AICP, Robert LeBeau, AICP, Jennifer Fine, AICP, and Kellie McDonough. APA and the authors acknowledge ARC’s financial sponsorship of the smart growth audit toolkit description, which is published here in an enhanced and expanded version. Cover design by Lisa Barton; this report is printed on recyclable paper. The Planning Advisory Service is a subscription service offered by the Research Department of the American Planning Association. Eight reports are produced each year. Subscribers also receive the PAS Memo each month and have use of the Inquiry Answering Service. W. Paul Farmer, Executive Director; Sylvia Lewis, Publications Director; William Klein, Director of Research. Planning Advisory Service Reports are produced in the Research Department of APA. James Hecimovich, Editor; Megan Lewis, Assistant Editor; Lisa Barton, Design Associate; J.E. Lu- ebering, Editorial Assistant. © November 2002 by the American Planning Association. APA’s publications office is at 122 S. Michigan Ave., Suite 1600, Chicago, IL 60603. E-mail: [email protected] APA headquarters office is at 1776 Massachusetts Ave., N.W., Washington, DC 20036. Smart Growth Audits JERRY WEITZ AND LEORA SUSAN WALDNER TABLE OF CONTENTS What Is Smart Growth? ..................................................................... 2 What Is a Smart Growth Audit? ....................................................... 2 Things to Consider Before Conducting an Audit .......................... 5 Lessons Learned From Existing Audits .......................................... 9 What Are the Alternatives for Conducting an Audit? ................ 15 Implementation Guidelines/Steps ................................................ 19 Issues of Effectiveness and a List of Do’s and Dont’s ................. 23 Appendices ..............................................................................................27 Appendix A. A Recommended Comprehensive Smart Growth Audit Checklist with Commentary .....................27 Appendix B. List of References and Additional Resources ......................................................................37 Appendix C. APA Policy Statement on Smart Growth ..............39 Appendix D. Growth Quality Programs in Georgia ..................55 Smart Growth Audits ane Q. Developer dreams of creating a highly livable “smart growth” development, a mixed-use com- munity that is walkable, close to transit, with plenty of open Jspace and urban amenities. Sounds pleasant? Indeed it does. However, the comprehen- sive plans and land-use regulations adopted in most commu- nities do not allow this kind of development. A community’s comprehensive plan, policies, zoning ordinance, and other implementation devices serve, in Randall Arendt’s terms, as the “ DNA” that programs a city or county for a certain type of growth in the future. Many local jurisdictions are surprised to discover that their DNA code, their growth policies and regulations, contain the genetic building blocks for sprawl rather than smart growth. What is your city or county’s DNA made up of—“smart” or “sprawl”? A smart growth audit can help local governments answer this question by reviewing their growth policies and implementation measures in a systematic manner. This report describes the concept of a smart growth audit and provides considerations and methods on how to implement one in your community. Although references are made to state-level and regional applications of smart growth audits, this report focuses on how to conduct these audits for local governments. WHAT IS SMART GROWTH? The toolkit offered by the Georgia Quality Growth Partnership (2002) de- scribes “smart growth” as building “neighborhoods and communities that widen opportunities for pleasant, hospitable, and economically beneficial conditions for living, working, and recreating.” The Urban Land Institute also provides a simple definition of smart growth: “an evolving approach to development, the goal of which is to balance economic progress with environmental protection and quality of life.” The American Planning As- sociation’s 2002 policy guide on smart growth (the entire text is in Appendix C of this report and on line for free download at www.planning.org) defines it as follows: Smart Growth means using comprehensive planning to guide, design, develop, revitalize, and build communities for all that: • have a unique sense of community and place; • preserve and enhance valuable natural and cultural resources; • equitably distribute the costs and benefits of development; • expand the range of transportation, employment, and housing choices in a fiscally responsible manner; A smart growth audit is similar • value long-range, regional considerations of sustainability over short-term, to a financial audit, except that incremental, geographically isolated actions; and • promote public health and healthy communities. the subject matter investigated Compact, transit accessible, pedestrian-oriented, mixed-use development and the principles applied are patterns and land reuse epitomize the application of the principles of Smart Growth. different. In contrast to prevalent development practices, Smart Growth refocuses a larger share of regional growth within central cities, urbanized areas, inner suburbs, and areas that are already served by infrastructure. Smart Growth reduces the share of growth that occurs on newly urbanizing land, existing farmlands, and in environmentally sensitive areas. In areas with intense growth pressure, development in newly urbanizing areas should be planned and developed according to Smart Growth principles. There is some consensus on the breadth and scope of smart growth, but there is less agreement on the basic principles of smart growth. Table 1 pro- vides a comparison of smart growth and sprawl that further illuminates the principles of smart growth. WHAT IS A SMART GROWTH AUDIT? An audit, as typically used in a financial setting, is a formal examination of an organization’s accounts or financial situation. A smart growth audit is similar to a financial audit, except that the subject matter investigated and the principles applied are different. The term “smart growth audit” appears to have been first coined by LDR International and Freilich, Leitner & Carlisle (1999) in their work for Charlotte-Mecklenberg County, North Carolina (for a summary, see Avin and Holden 2000). Principles of smart development were espoused as early as 1998 (Oregon Transportation and Growth Management Program 1998). Where the financial auditor focuses on accounts and finances, the smart growth auditor focuses first on plans and policies, and second on the pro- grams, regulations, and budgets that relate to development and community building (see Figure 1). Where the financial auditor uses generally accepted accounting principles as benchmarks for evaluation, the smart growth auditor uses generally (or locally) accepted principles of smart growth (see gener- ally Table 1). Both types of auditors produce a final report with findings and 2 TABLE 1. SMART GROWTH VS. CONVENTIONAL DEVELOPMENT: COMPARISON OF OUTCOMES Comparison Smart Growth Specific Topic Consideration Smart Growth Convention (“Sprawl”) Land consumption Efficient use of land as a Inefficient and excessive limited resource land consumption In: Infill and
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