Solar panels OK for home, legal battle over for Canton couple

The push for alternative and renewable energy production in Michigan received a small but important boost recently when a Canton, Michigan homeowners’ association (HOA) backed down from its initial decision to deny the installation of solar cells on the roof of a home.  Here is an excerpt from the Detroit Free Press article: (more…)

Earlier this year President Obama’s federal “stimulus program” swept across the country offering federal funding to jump start “shovel-ready” capital improvement projects.

This highlighted the ongoing need for local governments to be more nimble and able to respond without delay to new economic development and community building opportunities. For long-term success, local governments must do more than simply respond and react.

An up-to-date capital improvements program (CIP) is a tool local governments can use to plan for major expenditures, to ensure that public funds are used wisely and as efficiently as possible, and most importantly - to be prepared with “shovel-ready” projects when unexpected sources of funding appear!

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The Zoning Guru frequently receives suggestions on new community planning and urban design related websites to check out.  Dwell.com and Inhabitat.com are two of the latest.

Intriguing e-magazine sites covering architecture, urban design, and sustainability topics, these two websites recently co-sponsored the “Reburbia” design competition, which was intended to “to come up with some radical new ideas as to how turn the bleak future of the suburbs around.”

One of those “radical” ideas is entitled, “Entrepreneurbia,” which takes the concepts of “home occupation” and “home-based business” out to and far beyond their logical extreme…

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Contact Building Place today to arrange for Mr. Nanney to speak to your group on this or other planning and economic development topics.

“What’s all the fuss about alternative energy production these days?”

That’s a question heard far less often now that we have experienced gasoline prices above $4 per gallon (and creeping up again), and huge increases in home heating and electricity costs this past winter.

Alternative and renewable energy facilities are “in” these days, especially in the halls of state government in Lansing.  Governor Granholm has put the spotlight on new, Michigan-based wind turbine and solar energy manufacturing plants, and the state and federal governments are pushing for more “green” energy production through incentives and mandates.

Today’s renewable energy technology is a vast improvement over 1970s Do-It-Yourself passive solar installations and high-maintenance windmills.  Most importantly, the cost of solar cells, wind turbines, and geo-thermal heating/cooling systems have come down significantly as technology improves and production increases.

PLANNING FOR OUR ENERGY FUTURE:

Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholn recently signed into law the Clean, Renewable, and Efficient Energy Act (see below after the break for more information), which is intended to make Michigan a far more attractive place for investments into alternative and renewable energy projects and manufacturing operations.  Coupled with the state’s economic development efforts to move beyond an automobile manufacturing economic base, it is important for local communities to “plan for our energy future.”

Here are five things local communities can do to be ready for an alternative and renewable energy future in Michigan:

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The Zoning Guru follows a number of planning-related blogs across the U.S. One of my favorites is Urban Review STL, a blog authored by Steve Patterson that covers St. Louis, Missouri architecture, planning, design, and re-development topics.  Steve’s writing style is engaging, he has a photographer’s eye, and his posts often cover topics that apply equally well to other urban communities.

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The enclosed shopping mall, an uniquely American retail innovation, was the “future of retail” in the 1950s and 60s.  Shopping centers became an icon of suburban living in the 1970s and 80s, before beginning their slowly accelerating decline in the 1990s.  Today, the growing number of dead or dying shopping malls and centers are seen as symbols of the downside of “suburban sprawl.”

One example of this pattern is the Plaza Pasadena shopping center, an enclosed mall established originally as the cornerstone of an urban revitalization effort in Pasadena, California.  See “A Case Study in Successful Failure” for more on the birth, life, death, and future of this mall.

From a planning perspective, local communities can no longer assume that shopping centers will…
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Making the numbers work to finance rehabilitation and adaptive re-use of a historic building is often a struggle for property owners in Michigan.  For this reason, federal and state historic rehabilitation tax credits have played a large part in the revitalization of many historic downtowns and neighborhoods across the state.

Historic rehabs can cost significantly more than building a similar size new building on a vacant “greenfield” site.  Such tax credits have been used by property owners and developers to ‘bridge the gap,’ and have often meant the difference between a vibrant streetscape and a long-vacant eyesore.

These credits can be used to offset the added costs, or to improve return on investment.  Such credits are also transferrable, so a project involving historic rehabilitation may be able to attract additional investment from banks or other institutions looking for tax credits to offset against other income.

More information on specific state historic preservation programs and incentives can be found on the state website (click here).

The State of Michigan has long recognized that rehabbing a historic building for new businesses and residents can provide significant benefits to a community.  Recently, in the midst of a very difficult budget year, the state legislature managed to…
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To some in local government, the economic downturn and reduced tax revenues may raise the question of whether it’s worthwhile to fund local economic development initiatives.  The best answer is that providing for local economic development is an important way of ensuring that your community is friendly to businesses and can quickly respond on a local company’s behalf at critical times.

For example, Building Place recently read about a high technology company that experienced catastrophic damage to one of its clean rooms when the town’s water line burst.  The flood damage threatened the company’s ability to stay in operation, and therefore threatened job losses and reduced tax revenues for the town.  Fortunately, the local economic development office responded quickly and…

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What makes your downtown an indispensable place?

This is the essential question that should drive local economic development planning and project implementation in downtown areas:

• Potential residents ask this question when looking for “just the right home.”
• Potential business owners ask this question when looking for the perfect location for their new retail store, service business, office, or research and development center.
• Potential visitors ask this question while deciding where to go on Friday night.

Years ago, “downtown” served as the indispensable community and commercial hub for surrounding agricultural areas - the place to be for all ages.

Many small town centers provided a market for farm products, a source of products and services for farmers, and railroad access to other markets.

“County seats” and the downtown areas of larger cities served as the central gathering place for the surrounding region, complete with government offices, schools, and a variety of entertainment venues and “watering holes.”

Today, technology, transportation improvements, and market changes have vastly increased the available choices for people to spend their time and money.  Residents now commute to work and shopping across the metropolitan region.  Business is conducted on the Internet, and most historic downtowns have been relegated to a niche market.

We know what once made downtown indispensable, but that old model will not work today.  What we need to know is…

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“Communities are facing new challenges in attaining economic growth, increasing wealth, and improving quality of life for residents.”

As part of our bedtime reading, we at Building Place have been reading the International Economic Development Council (IEDC) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency publication entitled, ‘Economic Development and Smart Growth: 8 Case Studies on the Connections between Smart Growth Development and Jobs, Wealth, and Quality of Life in Communities.’

Here are some excerpts from the report, along with a few thoughts of our own (emphasis added)…

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Too often local elected and appointed officials feel overrun by the fast-moving flames of budgeting, personnel issues, and other public management challenges – to the point that they can do little more than react to the most urgent crisis confronting them.

Action on the “worthy” but not necessarily urgent things that need doing in a community (those that contribute most to achieving their community’s goals and priorities) get set aside or postponed for “another day.”

Economic development was one of those worthy but not urgent things a community needs to do, at least until Michigan’s current recession took hold.  For more officials, economic development has now also been added to “urgent” list, with good reason.

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