Summary: Sacramento has called on Californians to reduce water usage as the state enters its fourth year of drought. While many parties bicker about how we should allocate water, municipalities have brought vanity into the arena. Many cities are willing to adopt new cutbacks, but others are reluctant to change appearance requirements in their zoning ordinances. Such hesitation places residents in a tug-of-war between Sacramento and their respective cities.
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By Joseph Simpson
California is now in its fourth year of drought. The drought has created conflict between multiple levels of government, but the conflict between the state and municipal governments has turned some California residents and their lawns into a rope for a tug-of-war match. Governor Brown recently announced new urban water use limitations , calling for a twenty-five percent cut in water use. Cities seem to have adopted the restrictions without backlash, but things were not that simple a year ago.
A luscious green lawn at the Newport Beach Civic Center. Is it the healthy choice for Southern California?
In the city of Glendora, a couple stopped watering their lawn to conserve water. Los Angeles County had recently announced fines for using too much water to conform with suggestions from Sacramento. The city, however, did not like that the couple let their lawn go brown. Because the city did not think the lawn was aesthetically appealing, it sent the couple a fine for violating the zoning code. But the couple could have received a fine for doing just the opposite! As more cities accept directives from Sacramento to conserve water, situations like the one in Glendora are less likely o happen, especially now that the California legislature has stepped in to prohibit such fines.
Glendora recently updated its zoning code to conform with Governor Brown’s new directive. The code no longer includes aesthetic requirements, but that the yard is “healthy.” But what is healthy in the city’s eyes? One may assume healthy and aesthetically appealing to be quite similar, especially given the underlying purpose of the requirement in the first place: to maintain property values. If the couple’s yard does not look appealing, then it may cause other properties to lose their value to potential buyers. But Southern California is a desert. The natural landscape is shrubs and “weeds.” Many people may consider healthy to imply something natural. Many of the rebate programs for removing lawns and replacing with drought-tolerant plants prefer natural and local species. What would truly be natural, however, would be a dirt yard with various “weeds.” Many people find that kind of yard to be unattractive. If healthy implies natural but also aesthetically appealing, then healthy may be impossible to achieve.
A hillside of shrubs and native grasses outside of the Newport Beach Civic Center
In 1926, the U.S. Supreme Court in City of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Company approved of the fairly new practice of municipal zoning. The Court ruled that cities may use zoning regulations as long as they promote public health, safety, morals, or general welfare. In Southern Californiawhere wildfires are prevalent, especially during prolonged droughtsregulating yards makes sense. Making sure that residents keep their plants far enough away from their homes promotes public safety because it reduces the chances of fire spreading from vegetation to homes.
Mostly non-native yet drought tolerant succulents at the Newport Beach Civic Center
Requiring residents to maintain healthy lawns, however, seems to fall under the “general welfare” category. If a city intends “healthy” to be equivalent to “aesthetically appealing,” then healthy lawns promote general welfare because they keep property values high for entire neighborhoods. But what is natural for Southern California is not aesthetically appealing. If a city intends “healthy” to be equivalent to “natural,” then healthy lawns would possibly harm the general welfare because property values would decrease. The only other possibility is that the city is so eco-conscious that it intends to promote morals by advocating for a more natural environment. The most likely explanation is that the city’s idea of healthy has more to do with vanity than actual health
The drought in California has surely made citizens think twice about how their actions impact the environment. Even sports teams have reacted to water cutbacks in a positive manner. While some parties may argue that we have enough water but we need allocate it better (see the debate about the Delta Smelt ), municipalities still should not demand citizens to unnecessarily use more water.
Finally, people may want to reconsider their idea of beauty. We should consider a truly healthy environment to be beautiful in itself rather than deciding that Earth needs to wear more makeup. For Californians, accepting the beauty of our natural landscape may be necessary to ensure that the next generation has something to drink.
Joseph Simpson is a third-year law student and current Editor-in-Chief of the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law. He graduated from Iowa State University in 2013 with majors in History and Political Science. He is currently interning for the California Office of the Attorney General’s Land Law Section in Los Angeles. He intends to practice in the land law field after graduating. Joseph enjoys baseball, running, Ultimate Frisbee, and generally being outdoors.
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