A recent guest contribution in The Register-Guard from Bill Moshfsky of “Oregonians in Action” was hard for me to read. All through his essay I searched for some mention of
Oregon’s beauty: our diverse wildlife, our mountains’ slopes, our wild flowers. I looked for some reference to the quality of life so many of us treasure: a walk around the block, the view from Mt. Pisgah, the great music around town. I couldn’t find any.
Instead I saw the objective to preserve open space described as being “under the guise of preserving farm and forest land.” It’s not a guise, it’s what the land use laws do. And what is wrong with people wanting to preserve open farm and forest land? I want to be able to go out of town. And so do most of the people in Oregon. We want to say, “Those woods are the same woods I played in as a kid, back in ’03.” That has real value to very many of us.
And part of that is keeping the city in the city. It gives the city value, too. I live in a house in back of another house. This house was “infill.” It’s quiet back here. Things are close, my partner rides her bike to work downtown, we shop close by, we’re part of a neighborhood. And sometimes we can go to the country.
Higher urban densities help create a lot of things — more concentrated markets for retailers and restaurateurs, exciting environments for work and play, tight-knit neighborhoods and better mass transit that reduces traffic. It’s all the cars coming in from far-flung development that create much of the congestion. Remember all the studies done about West Eugene’s proposed new wetlands highway? All of them said the new road would not reduce traffic, but increase it.
Throughout his essay Mr. Moshofsky addresses only one value: economic value. Perhaps some people lose control over their land’s development resulting in economic loss. I’m sorry. I hope the survey his group is preparing asks how much economic gain people have realized due to planning rules, as well. After all, innovative business people play by the rules and learn how to win with them, instead of opposing them.
There are a lot of us humans. We need regulations so we aren’t getting in each other’s way all the time. I don’t want my neighbor to turn his yard into a feed lot, for example. So zoning laws say he can’t — my home is safe. I want my representatives in government to help keep the things I value safe from people who don’t value them. When another’s desire for “economic gain” or “productivity” tries to trample the things I value, I call out to my friends, to representatives and to those people themselves. Even in hard economic times, there are still values beyond money.
All of us — rich, poor, in-between — value the great view from our car window on Highway 58, the smell of the ocean, the taste of fresh corn grown down the road. There really are things more important than economic value. And I bet Mr. Moshofsky knows it, too.