I guess what I don't understand is why this would take more than about 15 seconds to pass in the OR legislature and then get signed by the Gov. My sense is that legislators should arrive in Salem and be ready to pass things like this with about one day of hearings. This is baseline "of course" in my book. I want to see things zing in Salem this next session - and stuff like this should be a no-brainer. We've got a lot to catch up on, I'm hoping the Dems are ready to move move move when it's there turn to bat.

I'd suggest $10,000 per house, btw. Lets look at the real costs of schools, not just money to build temporary structures. How about $15,000. I mean, seriously, developers rake in huge profits when they build, why not have them give some of that back to pay for necessities like schools? $20,000. $25,000. Might help discourage some growth, too. Not such a bad thing IMHO.

Builders and developers accept little financial responsibility for any of the demands their developments have on the infrastructure. Why shouldn't the cost of building and maintaining schools fall to the builders of new homes and passed on to new home buyers. After all, if the developments weren't put in, there would be no impact on the local schools, the amount of traffic and its consequence on road maintenence, police and fire protection, etc.

I strongly believe that developers need to pay such a fee and think this is a "no brainer" for Salem. Sure, it'll increase the price of new construction, or it'll take money out of developers pockets. As far as I can tell, there aren't too many developers in this town living off the Oregon Food Bank or on the street.

This issue has certainly come up in previous sessions but they never even made it to hearing. Rep. Linda Flores ( R-Clackamas) was the head of the house committee on education. HBA is one of her strong supporters. Stand for Children found a lot of bipartisan support for system development fees amongst the general public. I am very hopeful that the current leadership will make it unnecessary to put on the 08 ballot. Stand didn't want it to compete with local school levy's. SDC's wouldn't be able to bear the full brunt of construction costs. Builders who build homes in areas with great schools are able to sell them for a higher price. There are actually a number of home builders who understand and support taking responsibility for the impact their homebuilding has on a fast growing community.

Currently, here in Hillsboro the cost of building an elementary school for 600 students, including the cost of purchasing the land, is about 24 million, or $40,000 per student. A study done a few months ago on the population projections in the district showed that for every 100 new homes built, you get about 30 new K-12 students. The numbers are higher for single family homes and lower for condos, but that number is close to the average. This means that a $12,000 fee for each new house built would give school districts the funds needed to build new schools. In high growth districts like Hillsboro, this would cut property taxes by about 10% in the long term, as school construction bonds are phased out, and used only for school upgrades and maintenance.

I guess what I don't understand is why this would take more than about 15 seconds to pass in the OR legislature and then get signed by the Gov.

I suggest you go to the Secretary of State web site and look up the C&E reports for Oregonians for Affordable Housing, the homebuilders association PAC. They pay a lot of money to get their candidates elected. Do you think their elected representatives are going to vote the interest of their "sponsors" or those of taxpayers like you and me? Luckily, they usually give most of their contributions to Republicans (I think about 80%) to they may not have as much "political capital" in the next session to keeo this proposal from passing. One can hope.

The sad thing is the building lobby is using this as an opening to attack parks funding -- and the Democrats aren't just saying, "Listen. Our constitution already requires that these fees be connected to the direct impacts of this new development -- so stop your whining; we're just allowing local governments to cut your subsidy, not requiring them to do it."

Some initiatives in the past would have required local governments to not subsidize developers (and recover full costs of new infrastructure for develvopment), unless the local government specifically opted out. Adding school SDCs as an option is a baby step towards that.

The Democrats need to have some guts and be willing to do the right thing by taxpayers instead of bending to the lobby that's screwed them over the years and undermining parks funding.

This has been drafted, redrafted, etc. for the past seven years. It's not that hard to draft, once you work up the courage to do the right thing.

spicey I'd suggest $10,000 per house, btw. Lets look at the real costs of schools, not just money to build temporary structures. How about $15,000. I mean, seriously, developers rake in huge profits when they build, why not have them give some of that back to pay for necessities like schools? $20,000. $25,000. Might help discourage some growth, too. Not such a bad thing IMHO. JK: Puney!.....Lets look at a real subsidy: $500,000,000 dollars from the city of Portland to build 5000 housing units in the SoWhat. That is $100,000 per unit. Pure subsidy to make high density happen. Also a nice demonstration that high density is very expensive compared to low density. That is part of why housing is becoming un affordable in Portland.

That is what we should stop ASAP.

Then reduce the price of that million dollar-an-acre land by making more land available in the outer areas. Taking $100,000 off of the price of a house will greatly aid affordability and can be done at the stroke of a Metro pen.

Thanks JK

The counter-argument the homebuilders make is that, unlike sewers, waters, roads, etc. a good percentage of new homebuyers make no use of the school at all, and therefore shouldn't have a school impact fee placed upon the purchase of their home - a fee which the homebuilders assert is passed straight through as a higher cost. They argue that schools are a community resource, and should be funded by the whole community.

But these arguments can be refuted. All new homeowners receive indirect benefits from adequate schools in the form of higher property values. Other services for which impact fees are charged are used at differing levels - certainly many new homeowners don't use the parks provided with the impact fees paid for them. And the whole community does indeed pay for the operation of their schools through taxes.

The school impact fees would only be used to construct new facilities required as a result of the new development. This would require school districts to study and justify the fees they charge.

For example, in Lake Oswego the school district has many schools that are not full, and a declining per capita student rate per household. While the school district passed a humongous bond measure several years back, the proceeds were used to rebuild the two existing high schools, not build a new facility. Therefore, it would be highly unlikely that the Lake Oswego School District could justify a school impact fee within its boundaries.

I would be surprised if Portland could justify such an impact fee either.

In contrast, although I'm not as cognizant of the facts, I'm sure Beaverton, Tigard-Tualatin, Gresham, and other suburban school districts could easily justify such a fee.

urbanplanningoverlord.blogspot.com/

I understand the desire for developemental fees and in some form they are probably desirable. But here's the rub, $10K/$500K is 2%, $10K/$100K is 10%. These are the direct impacts on housing costs and I submit to you that lower income housing quickly loses its affordability with 10% surcharges. Sure, these numbers aren't real applicable for Portland area, but it's simple math with simple numbers to make a point.

The most desirable outcome of building is to get people into first time homes, the impact of home ownership is huge, socially and economically. No, I don't build starter housing, my customer group is farther up the scale, but I am a huge backer of getting people into their own homes. Most starter homes are very near the edge of loan qualification for lower income people, it takes very little to tip over past that. Mortgage tax deductions may benefit the housing industry in general, but its purpose is the socially important goal of home ownership, a flat fee is directly counter to that goal. I am not referring to subsidized low income programs.

On the surface System Development changes for Schools, Parks, Roads, etc. sound like a good idea. Is there a down side?

As it turns out there is. The SDC's add the the cost of a new house, which adds to its sales price. The sales price of new homes tends to set the market for all homes including the existing homes that are resold. In markets like Bend where they added a SDC for roads a few years back, you can look at the market data, and see where existing home sales prices tracked that increase for new homes.

So, SDC's add to the price of all housing. While they are "fair", new growth paying for the need to expand services, they have the consequence of increasing housing prices. As it stands now, we are at the edge if not over the edge in terms of affordability in most of the real estate markets in Oregon. When an average income worker can't qualify for the median priced house, we are in trouble. This means that these people are held back in rental housing. This keeps the price of rental housing high too. -- Kind of a domino theory at work.

A median income worker makes about $44,000 a year (I think). They quality to pay about 40% of income for housing - or about $17,600 a year / $1,467 per month for principal, interest, taxes and insurance. If insurance is $50/month, and taxes are $150/mo, that leaves $1,267 to pay principal and insurance. A 30 year mortgage at 6.3% interest - and you get a $200,000 house at 100% financing. In the Portland metro area that isn't much of a house. What happens it you add $6,000 to that formula in SDC / increased housing prices? The payment goes to $1,304, up $37 per month / $444 per year. You'd have to make another $1,100 a year to qualify for the loan.

That may not sound like much, but there is a significant percentage of the population that would be disqualified from buying a home in this scenario.

So, System Development Charges cost everyone money, not just the developer. Do you want to pay $37/month on a $200,000 home for 30 years ($13,320) for that education SDC?

Steven Maurer: For the edification of other Oregonians, the term "SoWhat" is a degoratory nickname for Portland's Soutch Waterfront district. JK: You bet. It deserves every bit of “degoratory” that it gets. $100,000 per housing unit subsidy!! In Portland we feed the developer $100k per unit while we should be charging fair SDS instead.

Steven Maurer: Your number of 1/2 a billion dollars is similarly pulled from thin air. JK; PDC admits to around $220 million. Just apply interest on that $220 million in bonds and you are at ½ billion. Even before the almost certain cost over-runs. Apply Tram style over-runs and you are over 2 billion. (That would be $400,000 per unit - makes sprawl look cheap)

Steven Maurer: For all Republican talk about "getting money into the classroom", we all know the main expense outside the classroom is the school-bus system. A lot of taxpayer cash goes to fill up gas tanks because kids are too far away to reasonably walk to school. JK; Then why do I see all those school buses in inner Portland neighborhoods? BTW, people with children, generally don’t choose to live in high density. Here you can walk to school (I did) and they still have buses because the schools choose to re-organize the schools in a manner that required buses.

Steven Maurer: It's really too bad that Republicans have become so psychotic and incoherent, JK: You aren’t doing so well yourself (on this post.)

Thanks JK

When homebuilders build a tract of new homes, they pay fees to develop new electrical lines, new sewers, and other new infrastructure. But in Oregon, the new homes don't pay for the new schools that will be required to service them.

Another simplistic idea. Let's look at this. A couple with eight kids moves up here from Phoenix, and buys a 60-year old house.

Bob Tiernan

Bob Tiernan a ecrit:

"Besides, I hate the idea that schools are infrastructure. They're no more infrastructure than a new Safeway."

What libertarian kool aid did you drink? Like it or not, public schools ARE part of the infrastructure. Public schools are a state and federal mandate; the local Safeway is not. End of discussion.

In Vancouver, Canada, they require developers to pay for:

-schools -daycare -roads -bicycle paths -parks -bicycle parking

and the list goes on! They leverage these things buy allowing a developer to build denser ONLY if they provide additional PUBLIC amenities.

In Portland (and most of US), we allow developers to build denser ONLY if we provide them with a subsidy. Wait a minute...

In reply to exempting affordable housing from school impact fees:

Aren't affordable housing more likely to house schoolchildren? After all, it's not older 50-year old couples with advanced careers & close to retirement having children; it's the 18 or 24 year old single mother with two kids, or the 30-year old couple with a new baby, and perhaps on their first or second career.

In general, they are on the lower rung of the income ladder, and thus will be seeking the cheaper housing. Because this is a housing tax, should we discourage children from living in the state of Oregon by implementing a tax such as this, or encourage it?

Obviously natives will have kids, and so will out of state immigrants, so this also turns into a pro/anti growth scenario. With too high a fee we could rather quickly empty the population of Oregon, it seems...

"What libertarian kool aid did you drink? Like it or not, public schools ARE part of the infrastructure. Public schools are a state and federal mandate; the local Safeway is not. End of discussion."

Yet you need both to live. Perhaps the Safeway more: you can homeschool your kids, but not live without food.

=============================== Another comment.

If you have a community with 5000 houses and 1 school that meets the capacity of those 5000 houses, if people immigrate to this community and replace people moving out, then you generally won't need a new school if:

1) households have the same number of children 2) no new housing is being built: no change in the # of households

In Portland, we are seeing the # of households increase, yet the # of kids/household is dropping. In smaller cities and the burbs, the # of households is increasing at a faster rate than the # of kids/household is dropping, so you need new schools.

So you SHOULD implement a school impact fee on new multi-roomed housing (perhaps lower on lower income properties, 1 bedroom and studio apts/condos as they don't have kids), because eventually you will need those extra schools if the population continues to increase.

However, the # of schools ideally wouldn't change every year, but the newcomers in brand new housing should pay for it. This may be an incentive for people to move into older housing stock instead of brand new housing, however:

If a family with kids continues to move every 3 years into a brand new house, they will pay the housing development charge over, and over, and over again. Perhaps this will encourage people to think of housing as a "home" instead of an investment?

Lots of people want more money for schools, but not too many are interested in where the money goes. I have heard that the Jefferson high school basketball team is on an out of state trip partially funded with tax dollars, but at the same time the students are having to photo copy pages out of the text books because the district can't afford new ones. Anyone know anything about this? Is it even partially correct? Thanks, M.W.

The argument for and against impact fees for schools, libraries and parks to me highlight two issues.

First, our citizens apparent abandonment of the social contract. Whether its schools, social security or whatever, it seems that everyone is trying to hoist a common and inter-generational responsibility on other people. So we have the argument about number of kids per household and how many kids in what type of housing. And how much builders make. And what would be a fair burden to impose on new people in our community. We, all of us, new comers and natives alike, are equally responsible for adequate funding to properly educate our kids, whether we live in condos, rentals or mansions, new or "used" housing. Rich or poor.

The second is that its the absurdity of our present tax structure that causes these searches for new sources of revenue. And development fees are an easy target because they are ultimately paid by "rich developers" and/or by new homeowners who simply borrow more money and amortize it over 30 years. Its an easy tax in many ways, because it can be largely hidden from the purchasers.

IMO People should pay according to their ability. Not according to whether they are trading up to a larger, or smaller but newer, home within their community. Lets fix the tax structure to provide appropriate funding, instead of adding a new, and I believe somewhat arbitrary, tax.

One more thing. when new homes are built they will help pay for new schools because the property tax they pay can be used to float the construction bonds.

Hmmm. No one seems to have been able to answer my question from this morning. What does bug me about all of this is that we have about a 30% dropout rate and another group that goes on to college needs to take remedial courses in English and math. To my way of thinking that suggest we have a significant problem, but some seem to think that more money will cure the problem. Maybe we are looking at the wrong thing. How's Oregon doing on the teacher quality issue? Are the education schools attracting the right candidates? Do the colleges of education do a good job? Thanks, M.H.W.

Lack of SDC's not only means inferior infrastructure, it creates a subsidy for growth. This leads to irrational growth. Why should generally lower-income residents of established neighborhoods pay for schools needed by generally higher-income buyers of new houses in growing suburbs?

They shouldn't.

Tom Civiletti: Lack of SDC's not only means inferior infrastructure, it creates a subsidy for growth. This leads to irrational growth. Why should generally lower-income residents of established neighborhoods pay for schools needed by generally higher-income buyers of new houses in growing suburbs?

They shouldn't.

JK: Right. Now lets apply that same standard to the PDC’s taking property tax money to subsidize the Pearl and SoWhat.

Thanks JK

Jim,

I should have qualified my comment: They shouldn't.

More completely, I should have written: They shouldn't unless we want to subsidize growth.

There may be times when the subsidized growth serves people's interests, but will not happen at the optimum rate without subsidy. I believe that subsidies are used in many situations where the people's interests are not served. Rather, the interests of developers are served. I don't know enough about the areas you mention to know whether or not those subsidies are appropriate, but my position would be to question all subsidies until a very good reason for them is established.

For instance, it may be appropriate to subsidize low-income housing if the free market does not satisfy people's housing needs. Of course, very often low-income housing is lacking because of other subsidies that end up destroying low income units.

Most of this discussion has taken place in the realm of the theoretical, not the practical.

Again, SDC's raise the entire market. Where the payment is made is when anyone buys an existing house.

The dichotomy as presented that only the new houses pay the the SDC and the existing houses do not is false. The SDC's lift the entire market's housing prices, so all pay - pretty much equally. The Government will get its money from the new houses with an SDC, but then that cost lifts all housing prices in the market. Who profits? Lenders and Realtors. In fact, the hidden part here is that out of lifting an entire market somewhere between 1 to 2% with the addition of a SDC, the government will only get about .1% of that money in one year as a single payment. The extra 1 to 2% cost continues year after year for home buyers - adding about $13,000 to everyone's 30 year mortgage per the example I gave in my earlier post.

The concept of a SDC is on the surface fair, but the cost is a burden to everyone way beyond anyone's definition of fairness. If everyone's property tax were raised .1%, they would pay 90% less than for SDC's, and ironically for paying 90% less, the government would get at least 10 times more money to build schools. The profit created by SDC's would then be taken from the Lenders and Realtors, and be put to work in reduced mortgage payments and more money for building schools.

Simplistic solutions create complex problems.

You all need to look at this with more care.

I think former planner's objection to SDCs is bogus. The current subsidies for development reduce housing values below free market conditions under his scenario. SDCs simply restore equity and let values fall where they will. Subsidizing developers and higher income house buyers is a goofy way to control housing prices, if one has the inclination to control housing prices.

Tom - Bogus, Goofy? Hard math.

We have a "status quo" or settled market more or less in real estate. Add a new feature, and it will ripple through the market. My core objection to the SDC is that it has an unaccounted for downside. Let me explain, more clearly -

Assuming we have about 20,000 housing starts a year, we would generate at $6,000 per new house about $120 million a year for schools, or about 3 to 4 schools a year - Statewide - with the SDC.

$6,000 on a $300,000 house is 2% of the value. As the price of new houses goes up, the price of existing houses follow.

Assuming we have about 875,000 single family housing units that are owner occupied (never mind how I got to that number), and they go up in value 2% - sooner or later the mortgages on those houses will be up 2%. If the average existing house price is roughly $250,000, that 2% will equal $5,000. A 30 year mortgage at 6.3% would have that extra $5,000 cost $369.44 per year of interest and principal. 875,000 houses x $369.44 = $323,260,000 per year.

To raise $120 million for new schools, the State's consumers would (after a period of phasing in new mortgages) end up with annual payments 2.69 times higher than the money raised for schools - but payable to mortgage companies. Realtors would also see higher commissions.

It just seems to be that extra mortgage payments 2.69 times higher than the funds raised is an awfully large unintended consequence for raising this SDC.

I just don't follow the argument that there is a subsidy provided for the new schools by not having the SDC. As has been pointed out there are logical flaws with that reasoning, but more important to me is the practical -

If you do this (the SDC), it will cost you lots more than you can ever raise for the schools. It's a flawed approach.

I will state from the outset that I am not a developer but I have built several homes on both sides of the river for my family. The expansion of the school subsidy or locally imposed tax is a design of the Southen California trend which started about 20 years ago. It is selective and unfair. It stems from the position that those who are pre-existing in a community will not oppose the tax because they have their happy home and it does not impact them. The new perspective home owner/member of the community is not represented and there is no concern for the impact on them. Please note that this is not an expense on the developer. It is additional cost which is passed onto the buyer with a margin added for the additional risk and investment.

The public educational system is a very important social investment which should be paid for across the broad tax base. The expansion and ongoing expenses of this system should not be paid for by a select few.

A family of 4 decides to locate in a particular neighborhod. They can purchase an existing house or build a new structure next door. Both children will attend the public schools down the street. If the family purchases the existing home, there is no $10,000 direct expense. If they build, they must write that check. Tell me that this is a fair form of taxation.

If we want to conserve our resources and promote the infill process and build our tax base, we will walk away from impact fees. We need to spread the total costs over the entire tax base. This will create a situation where everyone has a stake and concen for effeciency and excellence in our schools. It will also remove the ability of local politicians to impose more and more taxation without due process or public participation.

I am afraid that there is no quick fix with the imposing of impact fees. It is a knee jerk response to a complex social and community problem. What we are really looking at is kust how we will decide to finance the expansion and ongoing opations of the school system. Do you use a discriminatory tax or does the entire community participate at a much lower rate per capita.

I will state from the outset that I am not a developer but I have built several homes on both sides of the river for my family. The expansion of the school subsidy or locally imposed tax is a design of the Southen California trend which started about 20 years ago. It is selective and unfair. It stems from the position that those who are pre-existing in a community will not oppose the tax because they have their happy home and it does not impact them. The new perspective home owner/member of the community is not represented and there is no concern for the impact on them. Please note that this is not an expense on the developer. It is additional cost which is passed onto the buyer with a margin added for the additional risk and investment.

The public educational system is a very important social investment which should be paid for across the broad tax base. The expansion and ongoing expenses of this system should not be paid for by a select few.

A family of 4 decides to locate in a particular neighborhod. They can purchase an existing house or build a new structure next door. Both children will attend the public schools down the street. If the family purchases the existing home, there is no $10,000 direct expense. If they build, they must write that check. Tell me that this is a fair form of taxation.

If we want to conserve our resources and promote the infill process and build our tax base, we will walk away from impact fees. We need to spread the total costs over the entire tax base. This will create a situation where everyone has a stake and concen for effeciency and excellence in our schools. It will also remove the ability of local politicians to impose more and more taxation without due process or public participation.

I am afraid that there is no quick fix with the imposing of impact fees. It is a knee jerk response to a complex social and community problem. What we are really looking at is how we will decide to finance the expansion and ongoing opations of the school system. Do you use a discriminatory tax or does the entire community participate at a much lower rate per capita.

Flash Gordon:

In Vancouver, Canada, they require developers to pay for:

and the list goes on!

Bob T: I suppose that's someone's idea of a "free society".

Flash Gordon:

They leverage these things buy allowing a developer to build denser ONLY if they provide additional PUBLIC amenities.

Bob T:That's not free society stuff, man. So much for being anti-authoritarianism! If one agrees with it, it's great I guess!

Flash Gordon: In Portland (and most of US), we allow developers to build denser ONLY if we provide them with a subsidy.

Bob T: Well, no. What the elitist establishment here does is manipulate developers into building higher density by preventing them from building anything other than a desired density of units (save for leaving the land undeveloped) and throwing corporate welfare at them to get them to build the density they really don't want to build (rather than let them leave it undeveloped fo a longer time).

But by now it's hard to tell whether or not many of the developers work out these deals in order to get that money, or start out trying to build projects they prefer but are prevented by elitist planners who then throw in the subsidies. The cat is out of the bag, and as is usual with the leftwing subsidy welfare state, when something is subsidized more people get in line.for the handouts.

Ever notice that many of these developers have been hailed as "visionaries", like Homer Williams? Just because he praises New Urbanism (of course, he says that while depositing the subsidies he gets). And ever notice that someone like Mark Hemstreet doesn't seem to get on this gravy train by promising to build a hotel mixed with so-called Transit Oriented Development in exchange for subsidies, yet is trashed?

Bob Tiernan

Mr Fearless47:

What libertarian kool aid did you drink? Like it or not, public schools ARE part of the infrastructure. Public schools are a state and federal mandate; the local Safeway is not. End of discussion.

Bob Tiernan:

"End of discussion"? Well, fortunately for the long run discussions or debate are not ended, thus leading to the overturn of such lousy USSC decisions as Plessy v. Ferguson, the anti-free market decsion rubberstamping "separate but equal" nonsense which had been disappearing thanks to business's interest in one color -- green. Yes, the rednecks in the South hated that and said that corporations didn't care about regional concerns, and thus interference in economic activity and property rights was increased.

Anyway, mandate or not, schools are a fake infrastructure because, unlike court houses and roads and sewer lines and stuff, mutiple private systems can exist side by side. Such "visionaries" as Horace Mann made sure that State controlled schooling became the dominant and often only choice, thus creating the bogus infrastructure label.

And don't forget, here in Oregon we saw the most serious attempt at criminalizing private-sector (free society stuff) schooling in the early 20s when the state actually banned it entirely (and just to get at religious schools).

Fortunatelt for freedom the USSC threw it out, noting that the State does not own the nation's children. Sadly, too many people now think that it does.

Bob Tiernan

former planner,

Math is bogus if it's based on false premise, as yours is. The staus quo is massive subsidies for development. Your complaint that school SDCs will increase housing prices is analogous to complaining in 1860 that ending slavery would increase the cost of US cotton production. The proper answer to either complaint is "yes, but so what." Subsidizing growth is not as heinous as enslaving people, but that's not a good excuse for putting up with it.

Also, it's odd to see supposed libertarians support subsidies for certain privileged members of society. That seems such an unlibertarian viewpoint. "Schools are fake infrastructure," though, is classic libertarian That's the kind of position on the commonweal that makes libertarianism so attractive to the citizenry.

Tom - you go way over the top - Slavery? Had to go back 145 years for a strange comparison.

You claim that every aspect of infrastructure should be financed by developers, and that anything else is a subsidy.

I believe that some things are so important to a society, that they should be undertaken by the society at large. Education, police, jails, courts, foster care, senior care, health care, military protection, the weather service, mental health care, etc.

So, if you want to resort to exaggeration, I can go there too.

Are you saying that since more crime follows having more people move to an area that developers should pay for court houses, jails, prisons - and while you are at it nursing homes, child treatment institutions, mental hospitals, tilt meters on Mt. St. Helens, and tanks for the military? Anything less would be a subsidy!

My point, which you avoid with your exaggerations, is that any finance method will have a down side. I have only argued that this should be examined, and the resulting social policy issues be addressed.

If the implementation of further SDC's raises the cost of housing, do we have safe guards for low income housing.

If the implementation of further SDC's raises everyone's mortgages 2.69 times what the fees paid to government equal - with extra profit to mortgage companies and Realtors - shouldn't alternatives be examined. Perhaps there is a less expensive way for actual normal people who own houses and pay mortgages to raise funds to build schools.

Tom, I am a humanitarian, not a slaver. Good grief!

former planner,

The purpose of analogy is to illustrate a similarity, not suggest equivalence. Hyperbolic analogies are quite useful because most everyone is familiar with and understands the implications of the reference. This is why I used the slavery reference. You seemed to miss my point earlier that lack of SDCs for schools is an in situ subsidy and, in my view, a perversion of the market. I do not suggest you support slavery, nor that you do not have humanitarian impulses. I suggest that your argument against SDCs is bogus because it implies that the status quo is nonproblematic.

If artificial depression of housing prices is desirable, there are ways to do this that do not subsidize the relatively well off and promote inappropriate growth. We are doing both of these by preventing school districts from charging new construction for the cost of building new education infrastructure. We are also creating overcrowded schools, and thereby, substandard education; something that has lifelong consequences for students and for society.