RenewLV

I appreciate this op-ed by Greg Zebrowski of the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission. Greg has been outspoken on this issue during his time as chair. After readin...g the NYT article I began working on an op-ed as well but Greg beat me too it. I'll be finishing mine, posting here and submitting. In his op-ed Greg talks about the need for municipalities to value the irreplaceable land these warehouses have been built on. In Lower Macungie I'm proud of the fact that we have done just that. And it hasn't just been lip service. Over the last 7 years we've taken concrete steps to address warehouse proliferation. First, we were the first area community to remove warehouses from our zoning code in all areas legally allowed. Before that we strengthened conditional use requirements. The result is we will see no more by right warehouse applications in Lower Macungie Twp. Lower Macungie is finished with that land use. Next, we invested in farmland preservation at historic levels. This resulted in over 500 acres of additional preserved farmland in our township bringing our total to 1000 acres. We employed outside the box strategies to preserve large tracts of contiguous farmland in the residential heart of our township. Lastly, we completed an update to our regional comprehensive plan and then incorporated that work into a major zoning code rewrite. This work will guide high value future growth to areas of our township where infrastructure is already in place. We have also put into place strategies and policies that encourage developers to bring their 'A' game when building in our township. This makes our township desirable to the sort of high quality non-warehouse employers Greg speaks to in his op-ed. I can say with confidence. Lower Macungie turned the corner in terms of getting ahead of these issues several years ago. And now we are seeing our neighboring communities starting to do the same as well. Thanks in large part to residents saying enough is enough. Upper Macungie Residents for Smart Growth South Whitehall Concerned Citizens: Ridge Farms, Growth and Preservation

Fact: The U.S. spends more money on infrastructure today than it did in the 1960s, even when adjusted for inflation, even as a portion of the size of the economy, but all that old infrastructure is depreciating more quickly than we are increasing new infrastructure spending. We’re meant to read these shortcomings as a consequence of disinvestment. They’re not. They are a consequence of overinvestment, of decades of unproductive infrastructure spending accumulating to crowd out good investments today. It’s true that you don’t have to pay for road maintenance if you don’t build the road, but once you build the road, you are committed. Forever.

The first threshold for a productive investment is that it needs to pay for itself. The revenue the government receives as a result of the investment must cover the cost of the investment, otherwise it’s not an investment. It’s just consumption. That is the first threshold, and the easiest one, yet we rarely meet it.