GPA 2006 Fall Conference

Register NOW for the GPA 2006 Fall Conference on St Simons Island from October 11th to 13th. The conference planning committee has put together a great line-up of sessions, mobile workshops, and special events to ensure this will be one of our best conferences yet. Sea Palms Golf & Tennis Resort is the conference hotel where the sessions will be held and a block of rooms is available starting at $139/night (only guaranteed until September 11th). Contact the hotel directly at 1.800.841.6268 to reserve your room. Visit the GPA Conference webpage for more information and download the conference registration form or – preferably – register online at www.regonline.com/GPAFall06.

Highlights of the conference include excellent educational sessions including an opening plenary panel of local officials discussing planning practice and innovations on the coast, and 36 breakout sessions in 5 tracts covering Transportation, Comprehensive Planning & Quality Growth, Planning Practice, Communication & Public Involvement, and Professional Development. There is also a special Planning Officials track on Thursday focusing on training local appointed and elected officials in the practice of making planning decisions. To enhance your local experience, several mobile workshops and local events are offered from a Downtown Brunswick Tour, Island Bike Ride, Golf, an Island Trolley Tour, and more.

Other highlights include an Opening Reception, the annual GPA Membership Meeting, and the Awards Lunch featuring a keynote address from Paul Farmer, FAICP, Executive Director and CEO of the American Planning Association and the presentation of the 2006 GPA Planning Awards.

Do not miss this event! Reserve your room and register for the conference now. There are also sponsorship opportunities available to display your company logo and/or exhibit information during the conference. For more information visit the GPA website or contact Rob LeBeau, Vice President for Programs, at rlebeau@atlantaregional.com.

Download the Conference Registration Form

Download the Sponsorhip/Exhibitor Registration Form

Download the Hotel Reservation Form

Sustainability and Property Rights

by Edward T. McMahon

This issue of Urban Land is about the sustainable use of land, so let me begin with two simple ideas: First, without sensible land use controls, there can be no sustainability; and second, sensible land use regulations almost always increase property values. However, whenever or wherever land use is discussed, so is the issue of property rights.

“Don’t take away my property rights” has become the standard refrain wherever local government proposes land use regulations of any kind. In November 2004, for example, Oregon voters passed Measure 37 requiring cities, counties, and the state of Oregon to waive land use restrictions and safeguards or to pay owners to obey the law. Embolded by the Oregon initiative, property rights advocates in many other states are now proposing similar measures.

Collectively known as “takings” legislation, these measures would require government to pay landowners for any diminishment of value brought about by land use regulations. If government cannot afford to pay, it will have to waive or forgo the regulation.

Property rights advocacy is rooted in the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which states that private property shall not be taken for public use without just compensation. The language of the takings clause is pretty straightforward. In general, the only instance in which government must pay a property owner is when private land is physically seized or “taken” for public purposes such as building new roads or other public facilities. In addition, there is an established body of law that protects landowners from overly burdensome regulation. Generally, the courts have limited compensation to those exceptional cases where a regulation has the effect of denying a landowner all or nearly all beneficial use of his or her property.

In recent years, however, some antigovernment activists have advocated for an extreme view of property rights that would require government to pay landowners anytime regulation limits the use of private property.

These so-called takings measures are unfair, unwise, and based on a fundamentally flawed assumption—namely, that land use regulations, per se, reduce property values. On the contrary, sensible land use regulations almost always increase property values.

read complete article...

August 28, 2006
Planners Book Club meeting to discuss the book club selection Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington. Meeting time is 7:00 pm at the Caffe Centrale Bar located at 1210 Howell Mill Rd, Atlanta, GA.  please contact: Kristen Wescott at 678-808-8830 or email kristen_wescott@urscorp.com

August 31, 2006
Quarterly Newsletter Deadline
please contact Bill Ross

September 12, 2006
IAP2 Georgia Chapter – Brown Bag Lunch Talks, Atlanta, GA
please contact sallison@jjg.com

September 20 – 22, 2006
GEDA Annual Conference, Savannah, GA
please visit the website at www.geda.org

October 6, 2006
Southface – Sustainable Atlanta Roundtable, Atlanta, GA
please visit the website at www.southface.org

October 10, 2006
IAP2 Georgia Chapter – Brown Bag Lunch Talks, Atlanta, GA
please contact sallison@jjg.com

October 11 – 13, 2006
GPA Fall Conference, St. Simons, GA
please contact Rob LeBeau

October 19-20, 2006
First Annual Upper Altamaha Stakeholder Conference, UGA, Athens, GA
read more info HERE

Visit the GPA Calendar of Events website page for a full listing...

District 4 – Sun City Peachtree Retirement Development

by Frederick Gardiner, AICP

Spalding County officials recently attended the July 11, 2006, groundbreaking ceremony for Sun City Peachtree, a Del Web-branded Development and Georgia’s largest retirement community. Aimed at residents 55 years and older, Sun City Peachtree encompasses over 1,726 acres and will have roughly 3,400 homes surrounded by an 18-hole championship golf course. This is the first of six (6) village nodes approved by the Spalding County Board of Commissioners as part of its 2025 Comprehensive Plan.

The number of residents 60 and older in the 13-county metro-Atlanta area is expected to triple by 2030 when 1.3 million residents will be in that age group, according to the Atlanta Regional Commissioner (ARC). It is estimated that Georgia has the fastest growing active adult population by percentage of any state east of Colorado at 43 percent. Planning for this age group in Spalding County is seen as a win-win by local officials as Sun City Peachtree is estimated to generate greater than $100 million in local sales and property taxes over a 15 year period for Spalding County with little impact on services.