Articles

Too often, property rights and conservation are treated as if they are in tension. But, in reality, property rights are a proven means to encourage responsible stewardship, resolve conflicts over limited resources, and empower environmentalists to protect resources they value. To achieve these positive environmental ends, however, property right ...

Good science fiction bends expectations in a way that encourages us to reexamine the way we think about things.  This morning, I finished Zero History, a noire thriller from science fiction great William Gibson (inventor of the term "cyberspace").  While primarily focused on the tension between cutting edge and mainstream culture in an age of insta ...

Author: Brian T. Hodges Today, PLF filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court urging it to review the unconstitutional exactions case, West Linn Corporate Park, L.L.C. v. City of West Linn.  The facts of the case are as follows.  The City of West Linn, Oregon, required West Linn Corporate Park to finance and build major off-site ...

Author: Brian T. Hodges Earlier today, PLF filed a petition for a writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court in the case, Kitsap Alliance for Property Owners v. Central Puget Sound Growth Management Hearings Board.  The petition asks the Court to review a Washington appellate decision holding that a city or county can force landowners to ded ...

Author: Brian T. Hodges Yesterday, Washington's Supreme Court issued a short decision in Citizens for Rational Shoreline Planning v. Whatcom County, ruling that the State Department of Ecology is the entity ultimately responsible if a local government's shoreline master program violates the law.  A simple proposition that brings with it chill ...

Author: Brian T. Hodges Full disclosure: I am a huge fan of the TV series Breaking Bad.  For the uninitiated, this show chronicles the downward spiral of Walter White (Bryan Cranston), a struggling high school chemistry teacher who is diagnosed with cancer.  Walt turns to a life of crime, manufacturing methamphetamine with the aim of se ...

Author: Brian T. Hodges Washington's Growth Management Act (GMA) envisions a scheme where every city and county, in every nook and cranny of the state, adopts land use regulations responsive to a host of general societal interests  (e.g, affordable housing, preserving property rights, protecting rural lands from urban development, protecting ...

Author: Brian T. Hodges Washington state is supposedly broke.  Lay offs, forced furloughs, shuttered libraries, and moth-balled parks.  But apparently, the state is not too broke.  The State's Department of Ecology recently shelled out $27,000 for Puget Sound Partnership, an environmentalist organization, to produce a neo-soul mu ...

Author: Brian T. Hodges Big buffers may be the easiest way for government to protect environmentally sensitive areas, but that does not mean they are necessary – let alone lawful.  Arguing that big buffers are necessary to assure that land use activities do not harm the environment is like arguing that government can decrease the number of au ...