Pennsylvania planners perpetually find themselves in a pickle. Here's the issue: Counties are required to write comprehensive plans. Municipalities are not. However, municipalities don't have to follow county plans.
The planning system can affect a region's economic development, said Ed Drogaris, president of The Drogaris Companies, a real estate development enterprise in Lancaster.
"(All the municipalities) can get together and talk the talk, but as soon as there's a problem, they just walk," Drogaris said. The strong, independent community focus of the state can foster competition among municipalities, he said.
Pennsylvania's local government structure affects the planning and economic-development policies for Harrisburg and its region. The same is true for capital cities Annapolis, Md., and Richmond, Va. All three metropolitan regions are of comparable size but have vastly different approaches to planning and economic development.
There are more than 100 municipalities in Dauphin, Cumberland and Perry counties alone. The Tri-County Regional Planning Commission oversees planning for them all. Executive director Jim Szymborski sees the same disconnect that Drogaris pointed out between planning documents and enforcement rights in Pennsylvania. He and his staff host centralized planning workshops, encouraging municipalities to consider cooperative plans.
"If you have centralized decision-making, you're inclined to have a coordinated effort toward planning," Szymborski said.
In Virginia, counties collect taxes, draft growth plans and enforce them. Cities are autonomous from counties. Some towns have some power over their regulations. Richmondarea counties work together to plan for their region, said Paul Fisher, executive director of the Richmond Regional Planning District Commission. One thing that he encourages among the nine local governments the commission serves is to work with the private sector to spur economic development.
"All of our political jurisdictions have a very open-door policy to allow permitting," Fisher said.
One part of the Richmond community that helps bring in outside investment is the Greater Richmond Partnership Inc., founded in 1994. Three counties, the city of Richmond, and private companies contribute to Greater Richmond, which is the first point of contact for businesses looking to relocate in Richmond. Together, the contributors give the nonprofit an annual budget of about $3 million. Leaders in Greater Richmond meet with prospective businesses and discuss their needs. Then, the local officials try to woo the firm. Greater Richmond has offices in China, Korea, Germany and England, as well as Richmond, said Greg Winfield, the nonprofit's executive director.
"Taken as a region, Richmond is a much more powerful product," Winfield said.
Philadelphia and Pittsburgh have similar economicdevelopment organizations, Winfield said. But Drogaris isn't sure the big-city model would work for Central Pennsylvania.
"If that example were used here, it would be at least 60 municipalities involved. It's hard enough to get three (local governments) working in the same direction," Drogaris said.
Cooperation is a challenge even in Maryland, which has the most unified governmental system of the three states. Annapolis collects its own taxes and sets its own zoning laws but is officially part of Anne Arundel County, which collects taxes and sets zoning for the rest of the county, including the Annapolis suburbs.
"In the region around Annapolis, there's a lot of tension," said Daria Hardin, chief of comprehensive planning for the city. "Connections (between city and county planning) are mostly on a professional level. There is no mandated, formalized coordination. That's something people are calling for. But on a political level, no one wants to give up power."
Despite friction between county and city, Annapolis' economy is booming. Commuter spillover from Washington, D.C., in addition to Annapolis' government and tourism markets, keep the economy stable, Hardin said. Another tool her department has used to direct development is strict, clear land-use ordinances, especially in historic districts.
"As much as people whine about the red tape, it really has preserved the architecture that's here over the years," Hardin said. "Even if processes are very stringent, it's better than them being very vague."
Here in the midstate, the Tri-County Planning Commission is working to clarify local ordinances. The nonprofit is writing model ordinances that municipalities can adopt or tweak for their own use, Szymborski said.
Szymborski's staff also tries to keep an eye on developments in other counties and states, seeing what others are doing and adapting some ideas to fit Central Pennsylvania.
"I think it's important for states, counties and municipalities to look at what others are doing," Szymborski said. "One of the first things we do on each project is contact one of our neighboring county planning directors and learn from their experiences.
Regional planning is getting better in Pennsylvania, Szymborski said. He regularly attends transportation and environmentalplanning meetings with government officials from throughout the state.
Those efforts are unlikely to have teeth unless tax revenues are shared among groups of municipalities in Pennsylvania, Drogaris said. But he thinks planning improvements can be made on the local level, even within the current system.
"They need to have a plan that is executed systematically, block-by-block, until there is meat on the bones of the community," Drogaris said. "The best thing we could have is a comprehensive economic plan, broad-based, and stick to it."
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