Harris: ULUC Opposition Unprincipled

From relentlessly sunny Southern California, I noted the recent and growing uproar over Kootenai County’s land use code re-write. And from here, where the sprawl goes on and on and on for miles, the growing opposition to Kootenai County’s Unified Land Use Code (ULUC) project appears to be either pointlessly obstructionist or appallingly uninformed . Either way, if the opponents were truly interested in property rights and regulatory streamlining, they’d be supporting the County’s reform efforts. Ignoring the completely nutty “U.N. Agenda 21″ conspiracy theorists, the ULUC opposition appears to be based primarily in a “property rights” viewpoint that ignores both the law and the policy choices that guide modern land use across the country.  Despite the bluster coming from the usual North Idaho know-it-alls, “property rights” are simply not absolute. In fact, property rights of individuals are balanced to protect the property values in the community /Terry Harris , KEA Blog. More here. (Phantom Photographer photo: Part of large crowd on hand at the Kootenai County workshop for the Unified Land Use Code project at the Coeur d’Alene Library last week)

Question: Do you consider property rights to be absolute?