Archived Alturas Analysis (long)

[Greg Brown <gregb@alaskapacific.edu>]

Visionaries:

    I've been going through my archives.
Below is my analysis written in 1995
where the City Council erred in their
rush to development.  The analysis
is long and technical.  Some of you
will prefer to wait for the archived
newspaper stories (forthcoming).


*****
The Moscow City recently passed Resolution No. 95-08
which designated Moscow as a "competitively disadvantaged
border community" and which created a 5 member Urban
Renewal Agency using the provisions of the Urban Renewal Act
(Idaho State Code 50-2001 through 50-2027). The necessity for
the City Council resolution was stated in part as, "The City of
Moscow requires a means by which it may promote
development of properties suitable for permanent location of
locally originated companies...Revenue allocation financing is
the only tool available to the City for the promotion of such
development."
     In layperson's term's, the City intends to use 2
provisions of Idaho State Code, the Urban Renewal Act and the
Local Economic Development Act, to sanction, and possibly
back financially (as allowed in I.C. 50-2015(d)(4)), the
development of a business park on farm land east of Tidymans.
To do this, the resolution created a 'urban renewal agency'
which can do most of the things that the City Council can
do...but with (arguably) less oversight and red-tape.  The urban
renewal agency would then issue bonds to pay for construction
of the business park infrastructure.  The bonds would be paid
back with proceeds from property taxes associated with the
business park.  No voter approval is required for the issuance of
the bonds.
     The City Council is using the Idaho Urban Renewal
Law, a law specifically intended to renew, rehabilitate, and
redevelop deteriorated and blighted areas to promote the
development of agricultural land near Tidyman's into a business
park.  The Urban Renewal Law specifically defines a
deteriorated area as:

     "an area in which there is a predominance of
     buildings or improvements, whether residential or
     non-residential, which by reason of dilapidation,
     deterioration, age or obsolescence, inadequate
     provision for ventilation, light, air, sanitation, or
     open spaces, high density of population and
     overcrowding, or the existence of conditions
     which endanger life or property by fire and other
     causes, or any combination of such factors is
     conducive to ill health, transmission of disease,
     infant mortality, juvenile delinquency, or crime,
     and is detrimental to the public health, safety,
     morals, or welfare. I.C. 50-2018(h).

     The definition for "deteriorating area" is similar to the
above definition but includes such things as defective or
inadequate street layout, faulty lot layout in relation to size,
diversity of ownership, tax or special assessment delinquency
exceeding the fair value of the land, defective or unusual
conditions of title...and so on.
     Reason would dictate that few, if any, areas in Moscow
would actually meet the above definition, let alone the
undeveloped (and productive) farm land east of Tidayman's--the
def facto reason for the above "urban renewal" resolution in the
first place.  The Urban Renewal Act was not intended to foster
new development in undeveloped areas, but rather to rejuvenate
and rebuild dilapidated areas in cities.  In fact, the only
reference to undeveloped land that occurs in the Urban Renewal
Law is in the section which discusses the preparation and
approval of plan for urban renewal (I.C. 50-2008).  An urban
renewal plan will have to be prepared for the business park
area.  Section (d) states that if the urban renewal area consists
of an area of open land to be developed for non-residential uses,
the:

     "local governing body shall determine that such
     nonresidential uses are necessary and appropriate to
     facilitate the proper growth and development of the
     community in accordance with sound planning standards
     and local community objectives, which acquisition [by
     the Urban Renewal Agency] may require the exercise of
     governmental action, as provided in this act, because of
     defective or unusual conditions of title, diversity of
     ownership, tax delinquency, improper subdivisions,
     outmoded street patterns, deterioration of site, economic
     disuse, unsuitable topography or faulty lot layouts, the
     need for correlation of the area with other areas of a
     municipality by streets and modern traffic requirements,
     or any combination of such factors...

     When the City Council passed resolution number 95-08,
it acted unlawfully (in my opinion).  How can this be? Because
the Council failed to follow the prescriptions for creating the
Urban Renewal Agency as provided in the Urban Renewal Act.
Idaho Code 50-2005 specifically states:

     No urban renewal agency and no municipality shall
     exercise the authority hereafter conferred by this act until
     after the local governing body shall have adopted a
     resolution finding that: (1) one or more deteriorated or
     deteriorating areas as defined in this act exist in such
     municipality; (2) the rehabilitation, conservation,
     redevelopment,  or a combination thereof, of such area
     or areas is necessary in the interest of the public health,
     safety, morals or welfare of the residents of such
     municipality; and (3) there is a need for an urban
     renewal agency to function in the municipality.
     [Emphasis added]

     The resolution, as passed by the Council, fails to meet
condition number 1 stated above.  The City Council, in its
resolution, cited and based their findings on the definition of
"deteriorated area" from the Local Economic Development Act
(LEDA), not from the Urban Renewal Act.  The definition of
"deteriorated" as defined in the Urban Renewal Law was not
met and supported by the City Council in its findings.  The
Council erroneously looked outside the Urban Renewal Act for a
definition of "deteriorated" and found it in the LEDA.  The
LEDA definition does allow for the equating of a "deteriorated
area" with a "disadvantaged border area" but this definition
clearly lies outside the Urban Renewal Act.
     The reasonable and expected course of events for cities
would be to use the Urban Renewal Act to identify problem
areas (truly deteriorated areas) in their cities, set up an urban
renewal agency to oversee the renewal project, and then use the
tax increment financing provisions of LEDA to encourage
development in these deteriorated areas.  (Tax increment
financing is a way in which local governments can segment
property taxes associated with a specific project, such as an
urban renewal project, to retire bonds).
     In a rather perverse and backward interpretation and
integration of the two laws, the City Council stepped outside the
prescriptions and definitions of the Urban Renewal Act to use
the definition of "deteriorated area" found in the LEDA to
designate Moscow as "deteriorated" so that it could then create
an Urban Renewal Agency to promote the project.  But
unfortunately for the Council, the Urban Renewal Act
specifically forbids the creation of an Urban Renewal Agency
unless the definition of "deteriorated"  as defined in the Urban
Renewal Act is met.  While I have not actually heard the
transcript of the Council meeting where the resolution was
passed,  I suspect there to be little if no discussion, let alone
findings, of "deteriorated" sufficient to meet the definitional
requirements of the Urban Renewal Act.



--
Greg Brown (gregb@alaskapacific.edu)
Associate Professor
Environmental Science Department
Alaska Pacific University
(907) 564-8267
http://polar.alaskapacific.edu/gregb