Preserve Midtown

 This was submitted to us by a supporter of PreserveMidtown and is included here for your enjoyment.

Slum Lords

The superrich make lousy neighbors—
they buy a house and tear it down
and build another, twice as big, and leave.
They’re never there; they own so many
other houses, each demands a visit.
Entire neighborhoods called fashionable,
bustling with servants and masters, such as
Louisburg Square in Boston or Bel Air in L.A.,
are districts now like Wall Street after dark
or Tombstone once the silver boom went bust.
The essence of superrich is absence.
They like to demonstrate they can afford
to be elsewhere. Don’t let them in.
Their riches form a kind of poverty.

Jerry Gustafson

About Neighborhood Conservation Districts Myth: Supporters of Neighborhood Conservation Districts (NCD’s) “under the radar.”                                                                                                            Mythbuster: PreserveMidtown hasn’t been hiding anywhere!

1.  Through a suggestion by Cason Carter, PreserveMidtown was created to bring public awareness to the issue of infill development in January, 2007.

2.  We attended the Mayor’s neighborhood picnics throughout the summer of 2007 to speak to the issues of infill development.

3.  We launched our website www.preservemidtown.com in June, 2007.

4.  We hosted a public forum on “Teardowns in Tulsa”  on infill development in October, 2007.

5.  We discovered through networking with Homeowner Associations that Maria Barnes was championing NCD’s.

6.  PreserveMidtown, along with the Brookside Neighborhood Association, the Coalition of Historic Neighborhoods, the Tulsa League of Women Voters and the South Peoria Neighborhood Connection Foundation, hosted a District 4 and District 9 City Council Candidate forum on February 25, 2008.

7.  PreserveMidtown distributed a survey to all city council candidates about the infill issues and posted it on their website, www.preservemidtown.com. 

8. PreserveMidtown distributed over 500 signs at the request of supporters of “building homes that fit the neighborhood.”

Myth: Supporter’s of NCD’s is a small group.

Mythbuster: We have contacted over 2,000 people who support and are interested in NCD’s.

 Myth: The committee drafting the NCD document is unfair.

Mythbuster: Steve Novick, attorney-at-law, who is a neighborhood advocate and board member of PreserveMidtown, sits on the committee.   Paul Kane, who is executive vice- president of the Homebuilder’s Association, also sits on the committee.

 Myth: Preserve Midtown just wants to control people.

Mythbuster: That is exactly what PreserveMidtown is against—control.  We want the discussion of who “controls” the neighborhoods to be held in a public manner with input from as many resident property owners as possible.

If anti-neighborhood conservation districts people don’t like control, why are they trying to control what happens in other people’s neighborhoods. 

Why would someone living on 45th street try to control what happens on 22^nd street by denying that neighborhood the ability to adopt a neighborhood conservation district?

   Myth: The city is acting like a communist government.

Mythbuster: “A conservation district zoning overlay is a more site-specific application of the city’s authority to plan and zone. The legal basis for conservation districts, therefore, are essentially the same as the legal basis for our current zoning code, as are the fundamental policy considerations (i.e. balancing private property rights and community interests.)” Jack Blair, “Neighborhood Conservation Districts”, November 20, 2007.

  (more…)

Americans love tearing down buildings. We rip our homes up to the studs, scrape them down to their foundations, and are riveted by the ultimate demolitions: imploding skyscrapers. It’s part of a cultural need to make way for the new and improved.

But the construction and operation of buildings sends up twice as much greenhouse gas emissions as the entire U.S. transportation sector, according to the National Trust for Historic Preservation. (Analysts with the federal Energy Information Administration say it is probably closer to even, all factors considered.)

Read more of this article at: http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-re-teardown-nation-0413apr13,0,6149123.story

The Conservation District Ordinance for Tulsa is under review by the TMAPC.

If enacted, a Conservation District would have to be adopted by an organized neighborhood to be enforceable.  The neighborhood would decide what characteristics of their neighborhood they would like to maintain.  A Conservation District Ordinance is a tool that neighborhoods can elect to use.  The city will not force neighborhoods to become a Conservation District. 

A Conservation District will allow an organized neighborhood group to ELECT to set limits on issues like setbacks, structure heights and open space requirements that are compatible with the existing homes in that neighborhood.

A Conservation District does not regulate aesthetics of homes.

Communities routinely make investments and create land use policies that affect property values for the greater good. Regulating infill development is no different. It affects the quality of life and character of the community at large.  Although some may frame the issue as an intrusion on the property rights of the owner who wants to sell or knock down their house and build something new, it is important to remember that it works both ways.  Teardowns affect the property rights and investments of neighbors who have to live with the results.  With property rights come responsibilities.

The highest and best use does not always mean the most profitable use imaginable.

Go to the following Batesline website to listen to Michael Bates discuss Conservation Districts with Darryl Baskin on 1170 AM radio KFAQ.  Learn more about this new idea for Tulsa land use planning.                                                                      http://www.batesline.com/archives/2008/03/neighborhood-conservation-distri.html

Speech presented to the Commonwealth Club, San Francisco, CA, June 28, 2006.

Teardowns wreck neighborhoods!  They spread through a community like a cancer, destroying the character and livability that are a neighborhood’s lifeblood.

“Builders used to be afraid to be the first person in a neighborhoods to tear a house down.  Now they’re looking around and saying they don’t mind taking the risk,” stated a New Jersey builder.

While the destruction of historic houses is wasteful, environmentally unsound and unnecessary, it’s often just the beginning of the problems caused by teardowns.

A few things that people and communities can do to stop teardown destruction; a temporary moratorium, get a local historic district designation, conservation districts or design review districts, educate realtors and new residents about the history of older neighborhoods and provide guidence in rehabbing or expanding older houses.

What is most important is that people are taking action instead of just sitting back and letting teardowns destroythe place they call home.

Some say that change is simply the price of progress–but this kind of change isn’t progress at all; it’s chaos!

Read the entire speech at http://nthp.org/news/2006/20060628_speech_sf.html

As space becomes an issue, infill development zoning keeps cropping up.

The development issue that won’t go away is coming back Wednesday.

Tulsa World Reporter: Kevin Canfield

Read the complete article at the following web site:

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?articleID=20080217_1_A21_hAssp71208

City Councilor Maria Barnes and Michelle Cantrell, a member of the city’s Planning Commission, are spearheading an effort to put further restrictions on infill development in older residential areas.

Tulsa World Reporter: P.J. Lassek

Read the entire article at the following website:

http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?articleID=20080215_1_A13_hButs76356

The Brookside Neighborhood Association will host an important meeting on Wednesday, February 20, 2008 to provide information about a very significant proposed apartment complex in Brookside. Specifically, the Bomasada Group of Houston, Texas proposes to build an upscale, 5-story complex consisting of approximately 250 units at the southwest corner of 39th and Rockford.

Bomasada wants the input and support of the neighbors before completing their design and presenting it to the TMAPC and the Tulsa City Council.  Bosamada principals will be present to share their plans and answer neighbors’ questions.

This meeting will be held at Wright Elementary School, 1110 E. 45th Pl., (one block west of Peoria).  Doors will open at 7:00 p.m. and plans for the project will be available for review.

The presentation will begin at 7:30 pm.

This will be your chance to air your concerns and state what you think should be built in Brookside.  All interested parties should attend!  Please share this information with anyone who may have an interest in this precedent-setting Brookside development project.

Ridge Pointe homeowners are trying to protect the safety and serenity in their community!  They are objecting to a change in the commercial development adjacent to their neighborhood from a planned high-end, small shop style center to a “big box” Target Superstore.

They need our help to convince those on the TMAPC board that this is an inapproriate change.  They want the commercial development that was originally on the development plans. 

Please keep on sending the letters and don’t forget to cc incog@incog.org  and Councillor Bill Christiansen as well
dist8@tulsacouncil.org.
Remember: Attend the T.M.A.P.C. Meeting rescheduled for Wednesday, February 20, 2008.
More information is available on the website www.ridgepointe.us

As always thank you all very much for your support.