Choice provides individuals with a feeling of control of their destiny, which encourages a sense of pride and ownership in the community.  The CTHBA promotes giving individuals access to a freer market to enhance their ability and variety of options from which to choose.

Sadly, over the last several decades, we have saddled ourselves with growth controls that limit our choices.  For example, if price is any measure, the most desirable places to live and work are located in the beloved historic towns and villages of our region.  Neighborhoods found on the Charleston peninsula, the Old Villages of North Charleston and Mount Pleasant, and downtown Summerville and Moncks Corner exhibit more compact, mixed-use and walk-able land use patterns.  Their mixes of lot sizes and building types offer a greater number of choices in which to live and work.  However, such neighborhoods occupy less than 1/2 percent of the 1.65 million acre Tri-county region.  Why?  Because such traditional walking neighborhoods are virtually impossible to build under modern regulations, which proscribe segregated zones of commercial and residential land uses, which require the use of an automobile to get around.

Our land use regulations, including large lot size mandates, growth boundaries, and restrictions on the installation of public utilities have in fact contributed to sprawl, creating longer commutes, increased infrastructure costs, and a diminished quality of life.  We must recognize that our response to growth pressures should not worsen the results of growth, but make them better.  In fact, development patterns of the past, when government didn’t intervene with such a heavy hand, are far superior to the development patterns of today.

The point here is not to advocate for more traditional land use patterns, but to promote greater freedom, which absent a material threat to neighbors and the community, can expand an individual’s ability to live and work where and how they prefer.  Choice is consistent with American values.  The CTHBA desires to reform our land use regulations to embrace a vision that enables choice.