Proposed Revision to Title 2 Code Compliance

The Kitsap County Department of Community Development is working on a proposed revision to County Code Title 2 Code Compliance (Entry Policy 020719 DDL ) specifically to the requirements needed to enter private property to investigate possible code compliance issues. They are proposing to hold a public hearing on February 25 at the 5:30 PM Board of County Commissioners Evening meeting, Commissioner Chambers, County Admin Building, 610 division St, Port Orchard.

 

State Law and the State constitution are very specific about what a County inspector can do without the owner’s permission.  RCW 59.18 Residential Landlord –Tenant Act

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Support House Bill 1213

AN ACT Relating to granting local governments the authority to make challenges related to growth management planning subject to direct review in superior court.

The legislature finds that local elected officials are appropriately responsible and responsive to their citizens regarding land use decisions within their communities. The legislature also finds that citizens of these local governments have suffered significant financial and other costs resulting from reviews of disputes by the growth management hearings board that are subsequently resolved in a court of law. The legislature intends to relieve this additive burden of process by allowing jurisdictions with fewer government resources the ability to seek judicial interpretations of the growth management act without the costly and time-consuming practice of an initial review by the growth management hearings board.

HB 1213 http://lawfilesext.leg.wa.gov/…/Bills/House%20Bills/1213.pdf

 

Jan 31: KAPO Dinner at new location

We have a new location for our monthly Dinners; the Bremerton Dennys 5004 Kitsap Way Bremerton WA.

Our January  speaker is Bremerton Mayor Greg Wheeler. “As Mayor of Bremerton I was elected to make positive changes for Bremerton. One of the issues I heard from the community during the campaign was that citizens were concerned about the increasing costs of housing for all income levels in our community. The laws of supply and demand dictate that when housing demand outpaces supply prices go up and for many, regardless of income, housing becomes less and less affordable. As a local government, Bremerton can affect the supply by supporting initiatives that create more housing. In addition, as local leaders we can make sure that there are programs and funding strategies in place to support our most vulnerable population and ensure that there are measures taken to support the creation and maintenance of low income housing, which is often referred to as “deeply affordable housing.”

“I have made it one of my goals this year to address affordable housing and have given direction to my administration to implement policies and funding strategies that lead to the creation of more housing for all income levels in the City. I also will be proposing funding in my 2019 budget for programs that support deeply affordable housing. I believe that the initiatives I have outlined here  will increase economic development and produce a variety of housing types for our community.”

Please join us for dinner on Thursday January 31 2019, 5:00PM at Bremerton Dennys 5004 Kitsap Way Bremerton WA.

 

Supreme Court Deals Unanimous, Welcome Blow to Administrative State in Frog Case

Unanimity is elusive in today’s America but the Supreme Court achieved it last week. Although the dusky gopher frog is endangered, so are property rights and accountable governance. Both would have been further jeopardized if the frog’s partisans in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) had gotten away with designating 1,544 privately owned Louisiana acres as a “critical habitat” for the three-inch amphibian, which currently lives only in Mississippi and could not live in the Louisiana acres as they are now. The eight justices (the case was argued before Brett Kavanaugh joined the court) rejected both the government’s justification for its designation, and the government’s argument that its action should have received judicial deference, not judicial review.

Jan 31: KAPO Dinner Speaker Bremerton Mayor Greg Wheeler

We have a new location for our monthly Dinners; the Bremerton Dennys 5004 Kitsap Way Bremerton WA. Our January speaker is Bremerton Mayor Greg Wheeler. One of the Mayor’s primary platforms is Affordable Housing. Come out and hear his approach. Please join us for dinner on Thursday Jan 31, 2019 at 5:00PM at Bremerton Dennys 5004 Kitsap Way Bremerton WA.

The Consequences Of Land Ownership

“If a man owns a little property, that property is him.…it is part of him….in some ways he’s bigger because he owns it.” 
                                                              —John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

Property rights are the most fundamental institution in any economy and society. They determine who makes decisions about valuable resources and who captures the economic gains from those decisions; they mold the distribution of income, wealth, and political influence; they set time horizons and investment incentives; and they define who will take part in markets. These attributes are well recognized among economists for spurring economic growth.

But economists have missed another equally important characteristic of private property rights that has long been emphasized in philosophical, legal, and historical literatures and is captured in the quote from John Steinbeck above. Individual owners are more confident, self-reliant, and entrepreneurial than non-property owners. Where access to property is widespread, politics are more stable. Owners have a stake in the existing political regime. Moreover, people acquire property through the market and do not mobilize for forced redistribution using the power of the state through revolution and revolt. They expect property rights to be secure and view government regulation with suspicion. The use and trading of property assets is seen as a positive sum game. With broad property ownership and market participation, the state is less important than the market, and the economy in turn is less centralized, more atomistic, market-based, and supportive of entrepreneurship. This description characterizes the United States from its colonial beginnings through the 19^th century and generally on to today.

In contrast, in countries where property ownership is highly skewed and access to ownership open only to elites, non-owners view things differently. Acquisition of property, wealth, and political power can only occur through capture and then enlistment of the state, as occurred in the extreme in 1789 France or 1917 Russia, or is reflected in recurrent political upheaval and redistributions characteristic of Latin America with its many disaffected populations, military revolts, and coups that have occurred since colonial times. This political uncertainty and lack of overall optimism and entrepreneurship has contributed to slower long-term economic growth than a region so rich in natural resources might have otherwise enjoyed. Why has the southern half of the hemisphere had such a different long-term experience than the northern half? Why has there been more ongoing economic growth and political stability in the North than in the South? Differences in the ownership of land is the key.

Supreme Court hears “phantom frog” case

As a child, Edward Poitevent’s family cut down Christmas trees on their lumber-rich land in Louisiana, and one day he’d like to leave the property to his own children. But federal bureaucrats jeopardized his legacy when they declared nearly 1,500 acres of his family’s private land as a critical habitat for the dusky gopher frog—a species not seen in the state for more than 50 years. Neither the Endangered Species Act nor congressional intent justifies such government-sanctioned property theft. Represented by PLF, Edward sued and on October 1st, 2018, he will join another affected property owner, Weyerhaeuser Company, at the U.S. Supreme Court to defend their constitutionally protected property rights. Oral argument held at U.S. Supreme Court on October 1, 2018.