ABSTRACT
Land-use regulation is among the most contentious areas of concern faced by any community. For communities within the wildland-urban interface, conflicts between newcomers and long-term residents, as well as differing private and public land management needs, can make reaching a consensus on land-use decisions even more difficult. These conflicts are bound to increase as land development within the interface increases. Between 1982 and 1997, most of the land developed for residential or commercial purposes in the U.S. had previously been forest or agricultural land (U.S. General Accounting Office [GAO] 2000) (Figure 6.1). There are several reasons why this rapid land consumption within the interface has often resulted in poorly planned development, with relatively little attention paid to natural resource protection or growth management. Federal and state policies regarding highway construction, housing, and financing over the past 50 years have acted to promote growth in rural areas by making land within the interface both accessible and affordable. In addition, zoning regulations that separate housing, jobs, and shopping have combined with low-density development that requires the use of a car to generate haphazard, inefficient development. Finally, because of their heavy reliance on property taxes for revenue, most local governments are reluctant to disallow any new development. Therefore, many land-use decisions are driven more by concerns about preserving the local tax base than preserving the character and natural resources of the community itself.
