These newcomers bring with them all their fondest hopes of the future. They bring dreams that are the same as ours - dreams of a better life and a better future. What they don't bring with them are the roads, the bridges, the schools, the hospitals, the librairies, the parks, the utilities, the sewers, the water lines, and all the vast and varied human services that will be needed to realize our dreams. (Florida State Comprehensive Plan Committee, 1987.)
During the past three decades, Vermont has been a location of choice for many newcomers. At the same time, there has been a natural increase of the population, resulting from more births than deaths. Altogether, Vermont's population grew from 414,000 in1966 to 589,000 in 1996.1 That population growth tends to exacerbate these sprawled development patterns.
As the Florida report identified, an increasing population requires new infrastructure and services. In addition, more people have more environmental and social impacts on communities. When population growth creates sprawled development patterns, these economic, environmental, and social costs go up for everyone. 1 During the 1970s, nearly 60% of Vermont's population growth resulted from in-migration, while the other 40% resulted from the natural increase of more births than deaths. During the 1980s and '90s, in-migration accounted for about one-third of our population growth, and natural increase accounted for two-thirds.
Economic Costs
A common perception is that growth and development are always good for the economy and local tax revenues. But a careful look at the economics of population growth and sprawl shows that this is often not the case.
When new residents move into an area, the accompanying residential development increases the local tax base. However, the newcomers need new infrastructure and services, including schools; roads and bridges; police, fire, and emergency medical services; sanitary and storm sewers; water, electrical, telephone, and television cable lines; electric generating plants; solid waste disposal plants; government facilities; parks and recreation facilities; hospitals; and libraries. In addition, newcomers need all the commercial goods and services normally provided by the private sector.
The infrastructure and services that accompany sprawl residential development almost always cost more than the local community collects in increased taxes. When new homes are built away from town centers,new infrastructure must be built, often over longer distances. In addition to being inefficient, this drives up the average infrastructure costs for each household, and the higher costs must be paid by taxpayers or developers. Sprawl residential growth requires taxpayers to support not only a new infrastructure in previously rural areas, but also an older infrastructure in town centers, where population is usually declining and the infrastructure may be under-used.
Communities also regularly encourage commercial development, believing it will produce more jobs and increase their tax base without requiring as many services as residential development. Many communities even offer tax breaks or other incentives to lure large commercial development to an area. But commercial development usually attracts more residential development, either in the same community or in nearby communities.
When the accompanying residential growth takes place in a nearby community, inequities result in who pays for the growth. For example, town with ski resorts often have high property values and little affordable housing. Thus, when a ski resort or related commercial development grows, the new workers often can't afford to live in the ski resort town, placing the burden of new residential growth on surrounding towns. The surrounding town, in turn, often attempts to increase their commercial development in order to "pay for" the new residents, leading to an ongoing spiral of population growth and sprawl.
The implementation of Act 60, passed in 1997, should help to arrest this spiral in some areas. Towns which have had a difficult time raising taxes for schools won't have to court commercial development in order to "pay for" their schools, since education will be funded statewide on a per student basis. However, about one-third of the average Vermont property tax bill goes toward services not related to education, and the funding of those services will remain the same. Environmental Costs
The environmental costs of the population growth that creates sprawl are numerous, and they are often paid by society as a whole. One of the biggest impacts is the inrease in statewide vehicle miles traveled, which quadrupled between 1966 and 1996. This trend has depleted more of a limited fossil fuel resource and worsened air and water quality (See Chart).
Sprawl population growth also fragments and destroys forests, wildlife habitat and wetlands, increases polluted run-off into lakes and streams, and ruins scenic beauty. (See the related fact sheets: Vermonters and Wildlife Habitat, Vermonters and Wetlands, Vermonters and Transportation, Vermonter and Energy Use, Vermonters and Sprawl.) Social Costs
The population growth that creates sprawl also changes the social structure of our towns and results in a loss of community. More people spend more time in the car and less time with friends, family, and neighbors. There is more isolation, especially for the 22% of Vermonters who don't drive, including children, seniors, and handicapped persons.
In addition, sprawl growth can segregate society, leaving low-income and senior populations in areas where housing quality is poor, while those who can afford higher-cost housing move to other areas. Sprawl development also can displace long-term residents when they can no longer afford the increases in property taxes due to the increased demand in services.
Population growth resulting in sprawl also eliminates agricultural land and farms. Sprawling commercial growth can weaken or destroy our local downtown economies. This, in turn, weakens the economic diversity and resilience of an area. What We Can Do
Vermonters can address the economic, environmental, and social cost of scattered growth by channeling population growth into more compact patterns of development. For example, we can:
