The Erosion of Home Rule Through the Emergence of State-Interests in Land Use Control

66 Pages Posted: 20 Feb 2009

See all articles by John R. Nolon

John R. Nolon

Elisabeth Haub School of Law, Pace University

Date Written: 1993

Abstract

Twenty years ago, in Golden v. Planning Board of Ramapo, the New York Court of Appeals called for the state legislature to adopt a system of "State-wide or regional control of [land use] planning" to "insure that interests broader than that of the municipality underlie various land use policies." Returning to this subject after twenty years, the Court of Appeals, in Long Island Pine Barrens Society, Inc. v. Planning Board of Brookhaven, recently confronted the costs of fractured land use planning in a dramatic setting. The appellate division decision, which required that these projects, located in three separate towns, be subjected to a cumulative environmental impact analysis, alarmed home rule advocates who saw it as a threat to the authority of local governments to make land use decisions. The Court of Appeals overturned the decision of the appellate division, disarming environmentalists who had seen the appellate division decision as a mandate for cumulative environmental impact analysis of major projects affecting the critical natural resource areas in the state. New York's highest court referred this matter of "urgent public concern" to the legislature, as it had done twenty years earlier in Golden. How the regional impacts of local land use decisions are to be controlled is an enduring problem still seeking a solution in this state.

Suggested Citation

Nolon, John R., The Erosion of Home Rule Through the Emergence of State-Interests in Land Use Control (1993). Pace Environmental Law (PELR) Review, Vol. 10, 1993, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1346666

John R. Nolon (Contact Author)

Elisabeth Haub School of Law, Pace University ( email )

78 North Broadway
White Plains, NY 10603
United States

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