By Peter Lagios
It is recognized current codes and regulations have been orchestrated to protect a certain ideal concerning how land use should be distributed and regulated. Rather than pick thru the myriad and extensive zoning codes and ordinances found in most city and county municipalities, Unified New Nation starts over with creating new consensus and agreement. Forging a new path by essentially dismissing all the previous body of work as drafted up by preceding rulers.
Land use represents the most important vitally important area of Constitution as it is the deciding factor of whether or not humans are free to cohabitate, build, dwell or whether they are estranged from the land and forced into sub-desirable situations, such as apartments, sleeping rooms, planned subdivisions, jails, prisons, homeless shelters, mental institutions, hospital wards, under bridges or other homeless scenarios, or even dead in morgues or cemeteries.
Land use is the single most important piece of legislation / Constitution. From it, the population either flourishes in freedom or languishes in misery. Under present guises county supervisors and land managers have drawn up a plethora of ordinances / zoning regulations which outright declare their intention of protecting property values, and control how the land is used:
Article 1 Purpose
This Ordinance is adopted for the purpose of promoting public health, safety, morals, comfort, and
general welfare; to conserve the values of property and encourage the most appropriate use of land; to
secure and provide the social and economic advantages resulting from an orderly planned use of land
resources; and to facilitate adequate but economical provisions for public improvements, all in
accordance with a Comprehensive Plan and as permitted by the provisions of Chapter 358A of the Code of Iowa, as amended
It should be viewed as suspicious that the Supervisors deem themselves worthy to know “the most appropriate use of land”, rather than the people themselves. This single line (to conserve the values of property and encourage the most appropriate use of land) reeks of rulership and monarchy. WE as a population of people have to make a decision. WE are either going to LIVE FREE, or we are going to live controlled.
Freedom as defined how? How are we defining this word anymore? Freedom to do what?
ï Purchase various things at stores?
ï Move about on the roadways between towns, counties, states, or overseas?
ï Free to squander, save, or create wealth?
ï Free to buy a lottery ticket, drink a beer or go gambling?
Shouldn’t use of land and what we build and how we live on land be one of these freedoms? Shouldn’t freedom from land use restrictions be THE MOST IMPORTANT FREEDOM we cherish and fight to protect / secure?
I argue boldly and plainly here before you right now that none of us are truly free until we secure land use rights and are free from:
ï The restrictive codes and ordinances which dictate what we can build
ï How much land we can purchase or sell
ï Limits on the number of humans that can dwell on land
ï Predetermination of the distance between one building or another
ï Classifications for single family, multi family, agriculture, commerce etc..
Tell me…what business is it of anyone else what a human does with his / her land? Who can dictate what land can be bought or sold in a free market society?
WE have the freedom to trade with a communist country (China) yet we cannot trade freely amongst ourselves? What sense do these laws make other than to protect the rich in their holdings and to keep the poor from enjoying title to land free and clear?
I propose some changes here and now:
1. Zoning restrictions / codes must be dropped unequivocally comprehensively in their entirety. If you are worried about commercialism making it into your neighborhood then you pick up the gray area by enforcing environmental protection restrictions and noise, atmosphere contaminate, water contaminate ordinances. If a person manufactures something peacefully and cleanly on their land…the county or another human has NOTHING TO SAY ABOUT IT. The only reasons such restrictions were put in place in the beginning was to protect neighborhoods from toxic manufacturing practices. Toxic manufacturing shouldn’t be done IN ANY ZONE.
2. All building codes must be dropped. If a human wants to build something for themselves someone else doesn’t like or agree with– too bad. If someone else buys the land later…they can opt to tear it down or remodel it. The County or city should not be coming onto a person’s property and dictating what and how they build. That is left to the human themselves. That is freedom. Some people may prefer to live in a igloo, hut or lean-2. It’s not the counties business to tell them Yes or No.
The strong forthrightness of these proposals can of course be fine tuned and modified to reflect accommodations, but the general sentiment and spirit of freedom and unobtrusiveness should resound loudly and clearly. Reformation comes when TRUE FREEDOM and LIBERTY reaches the people. Henry David Thoreau understood the need for land free and clear from the rest of society. It brings peace to the mind and restoration to the body and soul. We the people need this freedom and rejuvenation for our own souls to heal. Let us reform the agreements for how we live…for how we buy and sell land, for how we plan, and build. The 2nd Agricultural Revolution is upon us and we must open up the land for our citizens to flourish and thrive on the land. IT IS OUR LAND…not some, not just the few….but the MANY.
Peter Lagios
peterlagios@yahoo.com
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