Where did all our land go?

(Third in a series)
CURRIER and Ives New England falling prey to the bulldozer. Starter-castles swallowing land in suburbia. Middle class home prices soaring past the half million dollar mark. Roadways saturated with oversized signs guiding motorists to endless, cookie-cutter retail strips dominated by big-box stores. Old mill towns in deep trouble. Water supplies imperiled.

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Greater Boston's people ought to be asking, Is this what we really want? For ourselves? For our children? From 1950 to 2000, Massachusetts consumed more than twice as much land for development as it had in all the centuries since the Pilgrims' arrival. Isn't there a saner way to grow?

The dilemma is that a lion's share of the very growth the region has prized -- the offices and laboratories and manufacturing facilities along Route 128 and beyond -- has fed directly into the low-density, auto-dominated residential development that's triggering ever-longer commutes and consumption of the region's treasured countryside. So what's to be done?

To their credit, Governor Mitt Romney and Doug Foy, his secretary of commonwealth development, have dramatized the growth issue with two compelling arguments. First, work force -- that without more reasonably priced housing units, shortages of qualified workers can drive employers out of the state. And second, an inspiring vision of a Greater Boston region that prospers by refocusing development in its historic town and city centers.

As Romney puts it, "We would like Massachusetts to stay green, for our 351 cities and towns to be like New England villages, wonderful places to live, with housing near the centers, local shops, and children able to go to close-by schools." As for towns that say they want just two-acre lots, Romney suggests an attitude change: a town should offer a range of housing opportunities, youth to old age, "not just housing at a certain point in life when you can afford it." When towns approach state government asking for special aid, Romney says "the test is: Are you partners with us on smart growth?"

Romney made Foy supersecretary over four departments -- housing, the environment, transportation, and energy. Now jointly planning operations and budget, Foy's agencies control $5 billion, three-fourths of Massachusetts' yearly capital spending. The showpiece strategy is seeking to solve some of the housing crisis by "Taking it to the T" -- pushing housing units and commercial development on government-owned land around MBTA stations.

Opposition -- especially from obdurate towns -- can and sometimes still thwarts these new approaches. And critics note it's one thing to build high-end townhouses near transit stops and quite another to create housing units that are truly affordable to retail clerks, daycare workers, first-year teachers, and their families.

Still, the moment for significant breakthrough on Greater Boston's growth quandary may be at hand. Concerned businesses, university departments, advocacy organizations, and foundations worked from 2001 onward on the Commonwealth Housing Task Force which came up with the intriguing idea -- now partially enacted into law -- for state incentives to communities to create housing overlay districts in their downtowns, around transit stations, and in underused commercial areas.

In 2003, a Massachusetts Smart Growth Alliance was formed by a first-ever combine of the friends of fields and forests and advocates of housing that most workers can afford. Despite the ongoing tensions over "40b" housing projects, we heard that attitudes are softening in some towns as residents become concerned with finding housing for their town employees and grown children.

An acid test will be how the state and its towns decide to develop the now largely vacant South Weymouth Naval Air Station, just 10 miles from downtown Boston. We were stunned by the property's 1,432-acre size -- ample space for thousands of homes. But even more by hearing that the three local towns' initial ideas were to build a monster mall and housing for seniors only. Better ideas are now emerging with a master mixed-use developer (Lennar Partners): a new town with 2,800 homes in a range of housing types, a village center and Main Street with shops, 1,000 acres of open and recreation space, and diversity -- one million square feet targeted at biotech manufacturing.

Still, there's the harsh reality: The region can't wait long to address its severe growth and housing crises. To our outsiders' eyes, it seems clear that the Commonwealth -- Greater Boston's de facto regional government -- simply has to insist on a new set of principles and rules for 21st century growth. We suggest specific steps:

Recast tax law. Despite some school aid equalization, localities remain responsible for big parts of K-12 education costs. Local tax-raising power -- to fund schools, for example -- was severely restrained by Proposition 2 1/2, passed in 1978, with its rigid limits on property taxes. One result: ferocious town fights to stop new housing, especially multi-unit or rental projects with children -- in effect "vasectomy zoning." Because Prop 2 1/2 does allow local taxes to rise on newly constructed properties, there's a "race for ratables" -- cash-strapped towns going for strip malls, office parks, Wal-Marts, the very antithesis of the "urban village" ideal.

Foy is reporting on preliminary research that suggests 75 percent of towns actually make money on every new housing unit. If that proves out, resistance may subside. But the need to reform Prop 2 1/2 -- called the "third rail" of Massachusetts politics -- won't go away. Anything that fails to take on the property tax, substituting state funds (and taxes) for local, may be akin -- as one observer suggested -- to "tugging on Superman's cape."

Link transportation and land use. Big highway and transit spending decisions for Greater Boston get made by a metropolitan planning organization -- a mishmash of state and local agencies. The authority should be handed over to the region's Metropolitan Area Planning Council, made up of 101 cities and towns. The council has historically handled land use planning. Its expertise greatly outruns its authority. It's been building a big vision with a MetroFuture project that taps thousands of peoples' ideas. That vision begs for authority over transportation planning -- the key to better land uses.

In the handoff of transportation powers to the council, the Commonwealth should set clear goals -- for example to save open lands, favor rebuilding of cities and towns over greenfield development, put jobs close to workplaces, expand transit, reduce inequities.

Indeed, that's the kind of state-local interplay that could set a model for the new century. On the state side, Governor Romney and his department heads could reduce state regulation. Legislators could keep their meddlesome fingers out of town affairs. If they are serious about towns accepting more population, then they have to shoulder the school costs where that's a big disincentive.

The localities, in return, should be expected to fulfill their responsibilities as Commonwealth partners. Housing could be the first test. Why should any town not want all its workers to find housing they can afford? Set a real goal, something like 15 percent of all a town's housing. In a nation now debating the meaning of moral values, isn't this a big one?

Next Monday: Bold maneuvers.
Neal Peirce and Curtis Johnson, authors of the book "Citistates" and principals of the Citistates Group, were commissioned by the Boston Foundation to evaluate Greater Boston's 21st century challenges. Their report, "Boston Unbound," is available at www.tbf.org.