Each weekend this summer, thousands of Americans will host a backyard barbeque. They will invite friends, family, and co-workers to enjoy the weather, pleasant company, and grilled meat. Most of these gatherings will bother nobody. But a few may last late into the night, with music and loud talking disrupting the neighborhood. In many situations,…
Arlington has become the latest Texas city to consider regulating short-term rentals (STRs). In response to complaints about “party houses,” the city has been discussing what to do about the problem. The Forth Worth Star-Telegram reports: The city has already held town hall meetings where residents have complained that party houses pop up and cause…
This is an excerpt from Individual Rights and Government Wrongs. To meet budget shortfalls, a growing number of municipalities and state governments are considering some form of privatization for their parks. These proposals are usually met with indignant opposition. Private companies, it is claimed, would despoil the parks by building condos on the rim of…
The purported goal of land-use regulations, such as Austin’s CodeNext, is to plan the development within a community. On the surface, this seems like a reasonable goal. After all, we are often told that a business that fails to plan is a business that is planning to fail. But government isn’t a business. Governments and…
In the last post, we saw that Austin’s attempt to rewrite it’s land-use regulations (called CodeNext) has resulted in great controversy and divisiveness. That divisiveness is not the result of the process that was used, but instead, the cause was the principle that underlies CodeNext. By their very nature, land-use regulations are an attempt to…
In recent years, much controversy has arisen over companies such as Airbnb and Uber. Airbnb and Uber are the poster boys of the “sharing economy”–a technological revolution that has allowed millions to become successful entrepreneurs. That revolution has been successful because it enables individuals to circumvent the regulatory cronyism that dominates many industries, such as…
In 2012, Austin began the process of rewriting the city’s land-use regulations. The project came to be named CodeNext, and it has been mired in controversy, animosity, and finger-pointing ever since. While detractors have raised numerous points about the process of developing CodeNext, they haven’t questioned the principles underlying it. And those principles are the…
We often hear claims that lobbyists have undue influence on the legislative process. These claims are usually accompanied with horror stories of how some industry has used lobbyists to enact a bill that harms consumers, home owners, or some other group. While there is an element of truth in these claims, they fail to identify…
The recent Supreme Court ruling striking down a federal law that prohibited most states from allowing betting on sporting events was a double-edged sword. While it struck down a right-violating law, it will do nothing to prevent states from violating individual rights. According to CNN, The court said the federal law violated constitutional principles limiting…
Last Friday, the Texas Supreme Court ruled that short-term rentals are not a commercial use of property. The case involved a home owner association that claimed short-term rentals were a commercial use and violated its deed restrictions (also called covenants). Patrick Sutton, the home owner’s lawyer, said, This is about as strong of a property…