The State of Maine Uses Housing Crisis to Double Down Central Management over Home Rule

A Look at Maine's New Emergency Housing Act!

Chuttersnap - Unsplash

This is a layman's view of Maine’s New Housing Act!

I have often noted in this newsletter that today our government is run by public-private-for-profit-nonprofit relationships as no more apparent than in An Act To Implement the Recommendations of the Commission To Increase Housing Opportunities in Maine by Studying Zoning and Land Use Restrictions

Nationally, Corporate ownership of single-family homes is a great cause of homelessness, and the lack of affordable housing. This phenomenon has not hit Maine yet, to my knowledge, when it does it will be more difficult than ever to become a first-time homeowner or have housing security, but you will not find that considered in Maine’s new housing act that calls for all municipalities to conduct a major overhaul of their municipal code using grants to incentivize municipalities to work with a State program.

Instead of acknowledging the direct correlation between the rise of Airbnb, and homelessness, across the globe, the public narrative identifies the cause of homelessness as zoning ordinances.

The measure has attracted bipartisan support, reflecting a growing consensus that local governments' zoning regulations are making housing unaffordable and that state preemption of those regulations is one means of bringing housing costs down and returning rights to property owners source (empasis by author)

Given that there is no attempt by the Maine government to acknowledge the Airbnb effect on the rest of the economy, or to even directly mention the fact of expanding short-term rentals, it is fair to describe this act, by omission, as a plan to rearrange our communities around the short term rental industry.

Expansion, for the Airbnb Industry, means progressively taking over living spaces formerly occupied by year-round residents. In the process, the fabric of the former society disintegrates. To be unapologetically cynical, our government, in the guise of solving a housing problem greatly exacerbated by Airbnb has decided the solution is to redesign our communities to accommodate Airbnb. Affordable workforce housing must be packed tightly together to be somewhat competitive with the real estate value and state revenue from Airbnbs.

There is something to be said for the fact that many communities were ignoring the homeless problem that expanded in conjunction with Airbnbs and migrated to Portland which provides some services for the homeless, but the emergency housing act did not address the causes of the housing shortage, begging the question, how many of our legislative actors are engaged in Airbnb, or have stock in corporate real estate companies?

Solving the problem with an ax.

This state-wide act mandates outcomes of community debates and allows the density of housing developments to be unrestricted by the density requirements of the surrounding region, where the cause of the housing problem proliferates as expanding Airbnb communities. The allowance for densely-packed housing developments eliminates individual lawns and rural relationships with the land in exchange for urban blocks for the resident economy in the midst of the rural vacation industry occupying former resident housing.

§4581-A. Unlawful housing discrimination

It is unlawful housing discrimination, in violation of this Act:

5. Housing development. For any municipality or government entity to restrict the construction or development of housing accommodations in any area based upon criteria that refers to the character of a location, the overcrowding of land or the undue concentration of the population. For the purposes of this subsection, the following terms have the following meanings.

……….

3. Ordinance requirements. A municipality may adopt a rate of growth ordinance

only if:

12 A. The ordinance is consistent with section 4314, subsection 3; and

(Strikes out the entirety of Paragraphs B & C)
D. The number of building or development permits for new any kind of residential dwellings, including but not limited to building or development permits for affordable housing, allowed under the ordinance is recalculated every 3 years not restricted. (emphais by author)

Lest anyone doubt that this act is about redesigning our entire culture and economy in the interests of the Airbnb industry, an accessory residential unit is allowed which may not be used for any other purpose (such as a working studio, or other income-producing activity) and cannot be rented for less than 30 days, prohibiting short-term rentals but allowing mid-term rentals, in a tip of the hat to Airbnb, although the state sales tax does not apply to mid-term rentals.

Considering that this is an emergency housing act that eliminates all density and character restrictions, why is the owner restricted from renting the accessory dwelling unit to a year-round tenant, other than family?

Businesses in residence are considered only by being prohibited except for mid-term rentals.

Sec. 11. 30-A MRSA §4364-D is enacted to read:

§4364-D. Accessory dwelling units

1. Use permitted. A municipality shall allow an accessory dwelling unit to be located on the same lot as a single-family dwelling unit in any zone in which housing is permitted.

For the purposes of this section, "accessory dwelling unit" has the same meaning as in section 4301, subsection 1-C

2. Restrictions. An accessory dwelling unit may be constructed only:

C. As a new structure on the lot for the primary purpose of creating an accessory dwelling unit.

B. A lot where a single-family dwelling unit is the primary structure and an accessory dwelling unit has been constructed must be zoned as single-family

H. An accessory dwelling unit may not be rented to a person for a period of less than 30 days. ..

A year-round rental to anyone other than a family member would violate the single-family rule but the accessory dwelling unit may be rented to a person for a period of at least 30 days. ..as a mid-term rental. Why doesn't the definition of a single-family home violate 5. Housing development?

A. "Character of a location" means the unique characteristics of a municipality or specific area within a municipality or other political subdivision.

B. "Concentration of the population" means the density of the population within a municipality or specific area within a municipality or other political subdivision being too high.

Without having done a systemic analysis of this act, I am getting the impression that many aspects of this act are self-contradictory. It is a very long act and so to gain a systemic understanding of the act itself likely requires five or six readings and I am only expressing first observations in the interest of a wider conversation about municipal ordinances than the act promotes.

The future of life in Maine will be written by those who are assigned to the municipal zoning committees.

Who will be on those municipal code committees? The government will give the money to those anticipated to carry out its plan, not to those who would innovate around the loopholes to create something fairer than what this act represents. If a municipality wants to innovate, is it better to get money from another source? After all, Maine is a Home Rule state.

Municipal Home Rule.

Section 1.  Power of municipalities to amend their charters.  The inhabitants of any municipality shall have the power to alter and amend their charters on all matters, not prohibited by Constitution or general law, which are local and municipal in character.  The Legislature shall prescribe the procedure by which the municipality may so act.

While every municipality must comply with statutory law, municipalities are not prohibited from creating additional zoning ordinances. The task of overhauling our municipal code needs to be considered systemically, which the new housing act fails to do in a multitude of ways, beginning with ignoring the two large elephants in the room, the Airbnb Industry, and the looming corporate ownership of single-family homes that have taken over in many other places. To demand that municipal code be massively overhauled under the leadership of the state that is ignoring these two causes is outrageously irresponsible government behavior.

The municipal ordinances will determine the quality and lifestyles of our communities.

§4364-A. Municipal incentive program

The Department of Economic and Community Development, referred to in this section as "the department," shall develop a program to incentivize review of municipal zoning ordinances and land use ordinances. A municipality may participate in the program for up to 3 years.

Later the Act talks about a new State review board, named the Municipal Housing Development Permit Review Board, whose members are appointed by the Governor based on recommendations made by the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives. This board will have the authority to overturn municipal board permit decisions. The legislature is writing rules for municipal code and within those rules the Legislature mandates that a board recommended by its own leadership will be the court of appeal. In a system designed to ensure a balance of powers, it is the justice courts that decide if the rule of law has been properly applied.

The ten-year plan, with which the state-run municipal boards will be co-ordinating their overhauls of municipal code is filled with rhetoric about diversity and inclusion but the header makes it clear that it only pre-existing organizations collaborating with other pre-existing organizations can participate.

It would be better for municipalities to work together as decentralized regions rather than as centralized corporatism, which accepting the State grant money will entail. The question is will individuals and organizations not funded by the state be permitted to have input in the redesigning of our community zoning and ordinances?

$25,000 is a pittance for a community considering dropping 50 million for a new school system, as is the case on the Boothbay Peninsula. Speculatively, the legislative housing plan targets housing that is part of a three-pronged plan pursued by some local Peninsula interests that include the fifty million dollar school and the industrial park.

The State is a separate corporation serving its own self-interest. If the State can derive greater revenue from the Airbnb industry- that de-prioritizes big tech and downgrades it to second place. In accepting the state grants, the municipalities that collaborate with each other under the State program are the counterpart to private corporate teams, working for the corporate state mission. On the Peninsula, the three-pronged plan is a locally generated agenda. The workforce for the latter is targeted to be squeezed into smaller and smaller spaces by the municipal zoning plans of the former and the latter. It is now law that affordable housing can be at 2.5 the density of the Airbnb industry. Affordable housing is affordable to tech industry workers, by and large.

In my experience, most organizations operate like a closed circle and typically those whose problems the organization is said to be solving are not invited to the table, except in instances where the factions invited are the factions receiving special benefits and are useful in promotional material.

This act was passed at the end of April.

On May 9th I came across this notice on the Boothbay Website:

After sending an email to request an application and receiving no reply, I went in person to the Town Office where I was told no such committee existed and there was no notice online. I went home and located the above notice in my internet browsing history and made a screenshot.

Today I decided to look for the application rules for serving on the committee, as described in the Act, on the Department of Economic and Community Development website.

2. Grant program. The department shall develop a program to provide grants from the Municipal Planning Assistance Grant and Incentive Program Fund established under subsection 3 to municipalities for the purposes of contracting for services and hiring staff to help administer municipal responsibilities under this chapter. The department shall adopt rules outlining the application process and criteria for a municipality to receive a grant under this subsection. Approved uses of grants issued under this subsection include but are not limited to the following:

A. Contracting for the services of a regional planning organization or other private entity for assistance in the development and implementation of zoning ordinances and land use ordinances under this chapter; and

B. Hiring municipal employees to oversee or assist in the development and implementation of zoning ordinances and land use ordinances under this chapter. (emphasis by author)

The zoning ordinances and land use ordinances in this chapter are exclusive to the benefit of the Airbnb industry while entirely excluding other businesses in residence, which is a category of economic development and affordable housing that has been historically excluded from both maps for far too long. The only business in a residence that the act accommodates and in fact embraces is Airbnb. The common defense for Airbnb is to portray it as a means for common people to afford their homes, which holds for any business in residence but local ordinances have traditionally sought to limit the growth of the rest of the business in the residence economy, citing cars in the driveway as the offense of the industry. That beats destroying the entire fabric of society.

I searched The Department Of Economic and Community Development website for the term Municipal Planning Assistance Grant and Incentive Program Fund which produced no results. So I contacted a name in housing and asked for information about applying for serving on this board:

I was told:

Hello, that program has not been developed yet.  I believe the plan is to begin that process once the new staff have been hired in the next few months…

All of the details will be developed during the rule-making process. During that time there will be the appropriate staff available for questions.

I pushed on the questions because every stage will affect the ones that follow it, starting with an Act passed by the Legislature that fails to address the present and future causes of our housing problem, an act that applies to every municipality in the state. The act’s solution to the housing problem is to squeeze the year-round inhabitants into smaller and smaller spaces. This act treats the housing shortage as an isolated event while catering to the Airbnb industry and ignoring the concerns of every other industry. The act has solutions, even if bad solutions, for affordable housing, but ignores the business in residence even as there is an expanding remote working movement afloat. In other words, this act is absent a systemic approach to something as fundamental as the availability of living and working space for the inhabitants of the State.

After searching around the site and I see JOIN US, which is structured for existing organizations to collaborate with other existing organizations- excluding individuals from participating in the ten-year plan:

I haven’t read the ten-year plan but chances are I can tell you what it says as it reverberates the omnipresent corporate rhetoric and the way the Legislature has been centrally managing our economy since 1976. When that happened the State became one big corporate culture. All corporate cultures have eerily similar rhetoric.

I am currently reading a paper about the Chinese version of corporate culture based on Taoist philosophy. It is a paper that I am reviewing for HSSC, so I will not identify it and only speak in general terms.

The Tau Te Ching is a classic of Taoist thought. I became involved with the western version of the I Ching, with a foreword by Carl Jung, in my twenties and I have consulted with the I Ching throughout my life. The paper speaks of following Taoist thought to encourage a feeling of psychological ownership, one of the purposes of which is to encourage individuals to innovate. The philosophy expresses the importance of recognizing the individual uniqueness of each worker, and all of that is explained as a way to encourage the ability to innovate and loyalty toward the enterprise, the true owner. Thus the corporate state of Maine has its claims to ownership of intellectual property rights of any person it claims to be using the publicly funded facilities more than incidentally, in place at the University of Maine.

The characteristics of psychological ownership articulated in this paper are a well-articulated description of the psychology of ownership, which I recognized as an invaluable motivator leading to my vision of a network of independently owned ceramic slipcasting studios. The difference between psychological ownership and the psychology of ownership is more relevant than ever today when current generations question whether they will ever be able to own a home.

While an advantage of large corporate enterprises is the income security it provides, experiential evidence being revealed all over social media is that in the long term, there is no job security even for the most loyal and productive employee. Employees can be let go without notice, particularly as qualifying for pensions approaches. This omnipresent story is at the heart of the Great Resignation. It is the dissolution of trust.

I came across a link on the DECD website that said “submit your ideas”. The result of clicking on that link says it all:

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Serendipitous Connected Events
A while back I wrote about Craft Fellowship Archive Grant and looking for someone who might write the story of Andersen Design but anticipated that I would have to do so. myself, as usual. I attended the Zoom meeting which left me confused. We were told that grant recipients must work from archives, they don’t have to be institutional archives, but the grant recipient can’t create the archive themselves. What then? I thought.

We were told there were other grants as well but every time I went to the grant link that we were provided, the grants said that the applications were closed so I contacted support and was told that the grant deadline had been moved to the end of July and so I put it on the back burner.

About a month ago, out of the blue, I received an email from the Field, I didn’t know anything about the organization. It looked interesting but I was busy with other things and I filed it away for later. I was aware there was something to apply for with a deadline at the end of June.

Then another email from The Field arrived on Monday the 27th of June. I clicked on it and there I saw that The Craft Archive Grant was listed and I could open it for the first time and the deadline was that day- June 27. Obviously, the Universe was telling me I am meant to apply otherwise I would have seen it on the 28th! So I did. I read the application for the first time and applied in one day.

When the application asked what archive I would use, I said the Andersen Design collectors who have been collecting our work since 1952, handing collections down from one generation to the next. The collections are not in an institutional archive, nor have I created the archive myself- so it fits the definition I was given.

Then I looked at the Field website and I saw the grant that had a deadline of June 30 was for fiscal sponsorship scholarship for social justice artists. The website is so dominated by supporting racial minority groups and LGQT that I wasn't sure white people could apply. I looked at the artist listing and I saw a couple of white-looking people so I decided to go ahead with it.

I submitted the application and up popped "Thank You, You will hear back in March!"

I hope that is a mistake, I thought, and then more ominously, I hope that is not a message specifically targeting white people. That is a very long time to wait.

As it turns out The Field offers Model A fiscal sponsorship, which I have been looking for for a very long time. Most non-profits use Model L fiscal sponsorship which allows the non-profit to create a for-profit subsidiary and fiscally sponsor themselves. The models are always evolving with the sponsor trying to take more control over projects. This definition of Model A fiscal sponsorship sounds more like comprehensive fiscal sponsorship. When I first applied for model A fiscal sponsorship with Fractured Atlas, it was a very simple fundraising agreement, not a management agreement. This seemed appropriate for Andersen Design, which I know how to manage. When I learned about comprehensive fiscal management, that seemed like the right way to go for the museum. Today there seems to be a reinvention of Model A fiscal management as comprehensive fiscal management wherein the sponsor takes over the management of one’s project. This is Model A Fiscal Sponsorship in Name Only.

Fiscal sponsorship allows an entity that does not have 501(3)(c) status to apply for non-profit funding sources as a project of the fiscal sponsor. Speaking as an informed layperson, these financial structures are legal inventions. There is no reason to replace simple Model A fiscal sponsorship with comprehensive fiscal sponsorship. It undermines the quality of which corporations are in hot pursuit- the ability to innovate. The three characteristics of “psychological ownership”, are one and the same as actually being a business owner. These are identified as space, self-efficacy, and a sense of home and are encouraged by corporate culture because they create innovative abilities within the workforce.

Self-efficacy refers to an individual's belief in his or her capacity to execute behaviors necessary to produce specific performance attainments (Bandura, 1977, 1986, 1997). Self-efficacy reflects confidence in the ability to exert control over one's own motivation, behavior, and social environment. source

According, to theories about encouraging innovation within the workforce, the more a fiscal sponsor takes control over the management of a project, the more it disrupts innovative behavior. The more the middle class is squeezed into smaller and smaller spaces, the less space for innovation and creativity and so innovation has to take place in State and corporate-owned facilities that own the products of innovation by the workforce. Thus Chinese ghost cities were based on densely-packed workforce housing with large public spaces, and the local Party of the New has also been pushing for densely packed workforce housing and a fifty million dollar school and perhaps some corporate headquarters at the Industrial Park. The people do not need their own space. They will have institutional spaces that will create psychological ownership.

Based on what I have read so far about the Field, it seems like it is using the original Model A fiscal sponsorship. It’s easy to apply and affordable. You must set up an artist’s profile. Here is mine. I am not fiscally sponsored yet. In addition to applying for the scholarship, one can just apply and there is a small monthly fee. I am told it takes about a week to learn if one is approved. At the moment I can wait because there is so much to process before I am ready for that. However, talking about serendipitous, occurrences, in exploring the groups working on municipal planning, I found a place where it said one had to be either a 501(3)(C), to be fiscally sponsored- so being fiscally sponsored might get one over one small hurdle. As I understand it one must be part of one organization that is collaborating with another organization. As a matter of coincidence, my vision is composed of two organizational networks, neither of which currently exists but fiscal sponsorship would be a big help in getting there. Money talks and walks.

Mackenzie Andersen Profile The Field

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