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Personal Property Rights

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Land ownership has always been seen as a sign of permanence and investment in the community and in the political structures from municipality to county to state and all of the way up to the country as a whole. Article 1 of the Constitution pushed voting determination back to the States, and in the early elections, many States made land ownership a prerequisite to voting. Even now, investment in property is considered a goal. Individually, the dream of home ownership is a goal for most people. Municipalities tend to favor home owners over renters, understanding that investing in a property in their jurisdiction brings community involvement, pride and often other types of investment.

That said, it’s disheartening to see the erosion of personal property rights. Zoning Ordinances by nature apply some of these restrictions for what’s perceived to be the greater good, but they attempt to guide by best practices, and are required by law to have public review, public input and an appeals process. This has been long established, but in the past, has been fairly lenient unless someone is being harmed. That process is becoming more intrusive and is coming after property owners in other ways, imposing taxes, fines and moratoriums.

Case #1 – Locally, there was discussion at a Culver Redevelopment Commission meeting and at the Downtown Strategies meeting about imposing fines on property owners in the commercial districts that do not have operating commercial businesses. (I mentioned this in a previous post, here.) Part of the argument given was, storage is not allowed in the commercial districts and a building just housing boxes without some from of retail offering was a violation of the Zoning Ordinance. I would have to assume, even if the building was purchased on a speculative basis, the owner would be happy to have an income producing business in there if they had that opportunity. The buildings in question are not being rented out as storage, but have the building owner’s own material there.

Case #2 – At the County level, there is an election flier floating around with a couple of lines that seems to be pretty contradictory:

  • Fought to Protect 12,000 Acres of Farm Ground from Industrial Solar.
  • Defended Property Owners from Gov’t Over-reach!

How is telling a farmer/landowner that they can only use their land to harvest corn & beans, in lieu of harvesting solar energy, not government over-reach?

Case #3 – And then there’s the current news headline from New York City, where the Mayor has decided to charge additional tax, gussied up as a pied-a-terre tax, on second homes worth over $5MM. This one and the Culver one seem awfully similar, since in both cases the building is zoned correctly, but the powers-that-be, don’t like the use or lack of use the current owner is pursuing. In NYC, what is that going to do to property values? I would have to assume every property currently valued at $5MM just dropped in value to $4.9MM. But wait, I forgot, the property owner has no control over what value is assessed. They’ll just lose money when the property sells…

In all of these cases, the stated goals are to promote the greater good. And as mentioned above, there is usually a required appeals process. In the cases above, there are no clear paths toward appeal. (What is the appeal process when a moratorium has been declared?) So the harmed individuals would be forced to pursue some form of civil remedy, which will undoubtedly be costly to the landowner and the governing body… but of course, the governing body is making demands and backing them up with other people’s money. The rule makers have no skin in the game…

On a grander scale, this is why our Founding Fathers set up the United States as a Republic and not a Democracy. Despite that, in the local trenches, government tends to lean more towards democracy, where politicians make decisions with their finger in the wind. Democracy tends to allow the majority to run over the minority. The individual property owner is always in the minority when it comes to how they want to use their property. That is very personal. It seems the individual property owner is falling victim to the vocal “majority” more and more.

Veterans Day Celebrations in the Midst of Turmoil – J.R. Gaylor

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J.R. Gaylor

With turmoil foreign and domestic, we pause today to celebrate the living veterans for their service, their patriotism, their love of country and willingness to sacrifice in defense of our country. As important as it is to defend ourselves against foreign threats as our veterans have nobly served, there are some very insidious threats we are facing with America against itself.

Specifically, I am referring to the acceptability—by far too many—of the lawlessness we see happening, as well as the twisted logic behind the lawlessness.

We are seeing the direct contrast of the “broken window” theory versus “progressive criminal justice” model.

The theory of the “Broken Window” holds that addressing minor crimes like vandalism, public intoxication, and minor theft creates an atmosphere of order and lawfulness versus “progressive criminal justice” which promotes reforms such as ending cash bail, not prosecuting misdemeanors, and early release of offenders.

The justification behind this “progressive” thought is ‘because someone told a lie, it doesn’t make them a liar’. Or ‘because someone took a bribe, it doesn’t make them corrupt’. In other words, ‘if a crime is committed and no one is responsible, was there actually a crime at all’?

Famously said, “a great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within.”

Next July 4th, we will celebrate 250 years of the great American experiment of Independence under a Constitutional Republic from which we aspire to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility and provide for the common defense.

Let us aspire to recapture that vision.

J.R. Gaylor President/CEO; ABC IN/KY

Culver – Downtown Redevelopment

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The Culver Redevelopment Commission (CRC) will be having a special meeting this Wednesday at 6:30. (See the notice to the right.) They are really making an effort to get a good turnout, thus the venue move to the School Admin Building.

The presentation will be from a company called Retail Strategies. They are one of three firms that responded to an RFP the town manager put out earlier this year. As you can see from the announcement, they are proposing to provide consultation on downtown revitalization for Culver, particularly looking at the two downtown corridors on Main Street and Lake Shore Drive.

The discussion at the CRC has been to look into what can be done to make our downtown areas more successful as a first step with future expansion to the rest of the town. This is partially a response to The Dunes and how to provide services for the additional full time residents the town hopes to attract.

I have a conflict, so I won’t be there for this presentation. My two thoughts on what I would have liked to hear are:

  1. The concentration on the downtown areas is fine as a first step, but that shouldn’t be done without also looking at the town as a whole and how everything fits together. Too often Culver falls into a one step back before two steps forward pattern. Inefficient at best. Generally costly too. I know we have a rough framework of what should happen in the town as a whole from the Comp Plan, but making sure any sub-plans fit holistically into the master plan is important. How will this concentrated plan fit?
  2. The thing Culver needs more than another analysis (We’ve been analyzed more than Tony Soprano!) is an implementation plan the town can actually do. Culver did great things with Stellar, but has somewhat stalled since then. The impetus to move things forward has to come from the Town Council. I’m not sure that they have the same fire that was there for Stellar. A restating of the problems we already recognize won’t hurt, but it’s that next step towards action that matters. Will the Town Council be at the meeting and will they step up?

This is meant for the downtown merchants, so I hope they step up too. This could be a major benefit to them, but only if they participate and help work the plan. I appreciate the Town Manager and CRC taking this on. They can’t just do it though. They need active participation and help from those affected. The town can assist in this, but the merchants and property owners have to take the reins at some point and make it happen.

Post Frame Housing

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Traditional Pole Barn with vertical steel siding and steel roofing. Image from CMT Components

A few years back, there was an effort to ban post frame (also known as timber frame) housing in Plymouth. A similar ban has been floated a few times in Culver and resurfaced at the August Plan Commission meeting. In both cases, the rational has been that the style doesn’t fit the community. As near as I can discern, (and I could be missing something) it doesn’t have much to do with the post frame construction, but more about the look of vertical metal siding, since these homes can be indiscernible from homes built using standard framing.

Post frame construction is most often associated with the “Shade & Shelter” functionality of Pole Buildings. Where post frame barns are designed to protect farm equipment, post frame homes are generally better insulated, stronger structurally, sealed tightly and have a different aesthetic. It’s just a different framing technique that has recently had a resurgence in popularity.

Post Frame Construction showing below grade piers, posts, girts & purlins Image from Roper Buildings

The main difference in this style of construction is the use of posts (poles) to provide the frost protection and uplift protection in lieu of the footings and frost walls used in standard construction. They are nearly always slab-on-grade (SOG) for the first floor. (Many standard construction homes are SOG as well, but standard homes could also have crawl spaces or basements.) Standard construction will use 2×4 or 2×6 studs at 16″ or 24″ on center to form the shell. Post frame buildings have posts spaces as much as 8′ on center with horizontal 2x4s girts to support the siding. Standard construction will have trusses or rafters at 24″ on center, where post frame buildings space out the trusses to bear on the posts and then use 2×4 purlins to support the roofing materials.

For a pole building, the big advantages are the ease and speed of construction. The construction is very forgiving. It is generally a big box to provide the most cubic feet of storage with the minimum of effort. They tend to leak and creak over time, but provide the basic shelter function needed. For a post frame home, there are a lot of enhancements:

  1. In standard home construction, the frost wall is insulated, in our area, down to 3′ below grade. In post frame home construction, insulation is added under the slab extending 3′ – 6′ from the perimeter to provide a similar thermal break.
  2. In standard home construction, there is continuous sheathing, generally OSB or plywood spanning the studs and providing the exterior diaphragm framing stiffness. In post frame home construction, this is provided by the wall girts which also support the vertical metal siding. Sheathing would still need to be added if a horizontal finish such as traditional siding or a brick veneer is used.
  3. In standard home construction, interior wall finishes such as drywall or wood paneling can be applied directly to the studs. In post frame home construction, it will be necessary to add interior girts to provide support for the interior finishes.
  4. In standard home construction, the wall depth is based on the stud depth, so in general there is a cavity of 5-1/2″, if 2×6 framing is used. Each stud is a thermal transfer point as there is no insulation between the interior and exterior at stud locations. In post frame home construction, the exterior wall thickness is determined by the post thickness (6″ or 8″) plus the 2×4 girt thickness on the interior and exterior, giving a wall cavity of 8-1/2″ or 10-1/2″. Unlike studs that create a thermal transfer from top to bottom, post frame construction reduces the transfer points to just the locations where the girts bypass the posts. This allows for super insulation, more than doubling standard exterior wall R values.
  5. In standard home construction, the roof framing is generally webbed trusses with OSB or plywood decking to tie things together and provide a substrate for shingles. In post frame home construction, either the trusses need to be moved closer together (generally requiring a collar beam) to allow sheathing on the trusses or the sheathing is installed over the purlins.
  6. In standard home construction, interior walls are often load-bearing. In post frame home construction, interior walls are non-bearing, allowing doors without headers, allowing standard slab thicknesses and often, greater stud spacing.

While some of these homes embrace the barndominium style, such as the one to the right that even includes a simulation of a silo, they often are hard to distinguish from their neighbors. It’s not the framing that determines the exterior aesthetic, and in many cases you wouldn’t know the framing style if you didn’t see it under construction. Three of the apartment buildings at The Paddocks have a definite barn aesthetic, yet they were stick-built.

Stating that the style doesn’t fit the community seems a particularly curious thing to say about a home in Culver. Culver has a myriad of building styles ranging from traditional to bungalows to A-frames to geodesic domes. Culver has exterior finishes ranging from siding to painted concrete block to limestone to fieldstone. The siding breaks down to various styles including vertical, horizontal and diagonal. We have buildings with vinyl, steel, aluminum and wood siding. Culver is allowing new construction to expand in size to the point that they encourage replatting/combining of small lots to accommodate the larger construction.

Some communities establish aesthetic requirements. Culver doesn’t have these. As it stands, they’re zoning decisions are based mostly on safety. Post frame verses traditional framing is more of an issue for building codes and as of this time it is allowed. Many would object to the use of vibrant colored residential standing seam roofs as not fitting the traditional aesthetic, but nothing has been said about banning those. Personally, I’m fine with the diversity. Culver shouldn’t stoop to the level of a group of Karens. A flock of Karens is known as an HOA. Culver shouldn’t go there. (Neither should Plymouth…)

Culver Zoning Revisions

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Steve Gorski, Culver Building Commissioner, has stepped up to the task of updating the Culver Zoning Ordinance. Having served on multiple committees to do this, I know this can be a mind-numbing and somewhat thankless task. This was one of the goals of the 2024 Comp Plan and Mr. Gorski has tackled it. At the last meeting, he presented a lot of the changes and corrections he is proposing. It wasn’t really open to the public for discussion, but was handled as a line-by-line presentation to the commissioners.

For 100% of what he presented, I appreciated what he was trying to do and the clean-up it represented. I think there was 10% that could have been improved by some additional input. My concern with the current approach being taken is two-fold:

  1. Mr. Gorski is the Building Commissioner, so naturally he tends to look at things from the administration and enforcement side of things. While those are relevant and extremely important, it doesn’t always pick up the implementation side that is important to the citizens when they try to comply with the ordinance.
  2. In the past, this has been done by a subcommittee, involving Plan Commission members and members of the public. While Mr. Gorski has a good working relationship with the Plan Commission, it’s harder for the Commissioners to question his suggestions since they are more personal than if they were created by a subcommittee. It’s impossible for one person to do this without it being affected by their personal experience. That is tempered by a committee. (Though this can easily double the time it takes to do this work.)

There is also the factor that Mr. Gorski has only held the position for a couple of years. I’ve written about “Institutional Memory” here before. This applied to more than a few items that he suggested changing. A couple examples just in the category of height restrictions:

  1. In the existing ordinance, there is a restriction that accessory structures in the residential districts have a height limit of 16′. This was added to the ordinance because multiple permits were issued for garages that later had a second floor area remodeled into a second residence, which was not permitted. Mr. Gorski has been questioned multiple times about this and would like it remove it.
  2. In the existing ordinance, the S-1 district allowed accessory structures to have a height of 50′, above the regular height restriction of 35′ in other districts (except A1 – Agriculture). The 50′ limit is there to accommodate grain elevator legs from before there was a separate A1 district. It was left in the ordinance during the last revision so existing farmers in the S-1 weren’t forced to rezone to comply if they added an elevator to their silos.

The ordinance is meant to be somewhat of a living document, so I am by no means saying that these things are written in stone. But the institutional memory of why they are there, could temper the decision to change them.

A couple larger items I struggled with on the changes were:

Image borrowed from the Strong Towns link (Hierarchical Zoning) to the left.
  1. Many of the tweaks, were to address current recurring problems, such a setbacks on small lots. I whole-heartedly agree with the thought process that the ordinance should be changed to reflect the reality of variance being given. Where I struggle with this is in the tweaks being made to setbacks in the R-1 district (as an example) to eliminate current setback issues on existing small lots, without considering how this would affect new lots with the larger lot sizes recommended by the ordinance. If the smaller existing lots are acceptable in R-1, then change the ordinance so new developments mimic the existing. Else, leave them intact as aspirational to what is desired in new construction. Or create new districts and district overlays to accommodate the current needs.
  2. The Comp Plan suggested some major changes in how zoning is handled. In some ways, it suggests moving away from Euclidean Zoning to more Hierarchical Zoning. This wouldn’t have to be done all at once, but could be done in steps or waves. Much of what is currently being fixed reinforces the current Euclidean Zoning. I did bring this up in the public comment section of the agenda and those that seemed to agree with me felt that fixing what we have is a good first step towards this. I hope that’s true since I know sometimes things get busy and major change is hard.

Overall, I commend Mr. Gorski for taking the bull by the horns and moving something forward. I hope the Plan Commission continues to work on this and takes the next steps recommended by the Comp Plan.