The Cost of Community Services in Three Minnesota Cities, 1994. Although taxing systems vary from state to state, the public costs of new development in some areas exceed the property tax revenues it generates. Haggerty, Fiscal Impacts of Different Land Uses on County Government and School Districts in Gallatin County, Montana, Local Government Center, Montana State University, Jan. 1996. SDCs cover a fraction of the costs and exclude schools. Exhibit A to Draft Dolan Application Final Order on remand from the U.S. Supreme Court.
Good planning saves taxpayers money.
Failing to fund planning is penny wise and dollar foolish. All of these savings are caused by using only 165,000 acres, instead of 292,000 acres, to provide land for jobs, housing, transport and services for 530,000 additional residents and 654,000 new workers. To put the New Jersey acreage figures in perspective, Oregon already has about 800,000 acres zoned for rural residential, rural commercial or rural industrial development, plus 800,000 acres inside Urban Growth Boundaries. The American Farmland Trust conducted a study of two alternative growth patterns for California's Central Valley, as it population triples to 12 million by 2040. The compact pattern would yield budget surpluses for local governments, while the low-density alternative would produce significant local government deficits by 2040, necessitating reductions in services.