In his definitive book Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States, the historian Kenneth Jackson noted that “it is almost a truism to observe that the dominant residential pattern is suburban.”1 As undeniable as the trend toward suburbanization has been, however, it is one that has long faced criticism. Jackson may have characterized suburban housing as “affordable homes for the common man.”2 Yet in her song “Little Boxes,” the folk music and protest singer-songwriter Malvina Reynolds scoffed at them, as “little boxes made of ticky-tacky…and they all look just the same.” Although far from narrowly negative about the phenomenon, Jackson offered the view that suburbs reinforced urban problems, as the affluent moved to suburbia and central cities became associated with social problems—indeed, that “the new houses of the suburbs were a major cause of the decline of the central cities.”3 To this he added the overarching American tendency to sort residentially by socioeconomic status, which he cast as an implicit negative.
Similarly, the localized suburban political model is often contrasted—unfavorably—with the aspiration of broad, regional governance, which its advocates believe offers gains in both efficiency and fairness across the metropolitan area. The urban scholar and one-time Albuquerque mayor David Rusk made the quintessential case for regional governance in his 1993 book, Cities without Suburbs. As Rusk wrote, “Segregating poor urban Blacks and Hispanics has spawned physically-decaying, revenue-strapped, poverty-impacted, crime-ridden ‘inner cities.’ These inner cities are isolated from their ‘outer cities’—wealthier, growing, largely-white suburbs.”4
An even more nuanced discussion of a positive role for greater regionalization of American public services is that of David Miller of the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Pittsburgh. In The Regional Governing of Metropolitan America (which concedes that “externally imposed solutions, although often seen as the visible form of regionalism, seldom work”), Miller nonetheless advocates that the deep American tradition of relatively small local government should evolve.5 As Miller writes, “I do not want to convey that I am a cheerleader for the existing system of relationships among local governments in metropolitan areas. Indeed, I will demonstrate that those relationships are fundamentally flawed.”6
Unremarked on, however, in most literature about suburbs and their governance, are some notable political features that drove and continue to drive and explain suburbanization: much smaller units of government, more local political control, and greater accountability to smaller electorates. Such desires, this essay argues, are evident in historical accounts of post–World War II suburbanization and continue today—not without good reason.
This essay takes the view that the demonstrated preference across the socioeconomic spectrum for smaller units of government should not be dismissed as a vestige of an antiquated, agrarian-era system. Instead, I argue that local government, particularly as practiced in small jurisdictions such as suburbs, merits appreciation and protection. It should be seen as an aspect of American federalism worth defending, one that should be considered a fundamental building block of the nation’s governance, a key to political accountability, and even a spur to economic development. One simply cannot dismiss the fact that Americans in great numbers, have chosen, and continue to choose, such governmental units. Some aspects of suburban home-rule might even be brought, to good effect, to central cities.
There is simply no way around the fact that Americans in large numbers have voluntarily migrated to suburban jurisdictions. One cannot assume, to be sure, that this migration is solely and mainly the result of the more localized government structures of suburbs; housing choices, public-school quality, and perceived quality of life, among a market basket of factors, surely matter (as reflected, for instance, in a 2012 survey commissioned by the National Association of Homebuilders).7 The numbers of those effectively voting with their feet are notable. As reflected in data from the US Census of Governments, between 1952 and 2012 the number of US municipalities increased significantly, from about 16,500 to 19,500. Between 1950 and 2010, the population of core US cities (in metropolitan areas where boundaries remained intact) declined by more than five million, while surrounding suburban area populations increased by thirty-two million. Moreover, as would be expected, those jurisdictions to which Americans were moving had smaller populations, per municipality, than those places that they were leaving behind. The 2010 population of some 4,300 noncore jurisdictions averaged 11,604 people (median, 3,632), while that of historic core municipalities averaged 961,000 (median 584,000).8 The suburban population shift included the emergence of predominately African American and Hispanic suburbs, from Prince George’s County, Maryland, to Hempstead, Long Island. Minorities, it turns out, are not necessarily against living in smaller, more localized jurisdictions.
We should not be surprised by this. Traditional US local government is a strongly expressed American preference with deep historical roots. Woodrow Wilson observed, in 1898, “our local areas are not governed. They act for themselves. The large freedom of action and broad scope of authority given to local authorities is the distinguishing feature of the American system of government.”9 As even Rusk has conceded, the efforts of cities to annex additional area are typically defeated when voters have a choice.
It’s important to define what is meant here by “local government.” It is one which, in the United States, can be directed in a variety of ways: by an elected executive (e.g., mayor or county executive); by a legislature (e.g., city council); by a city manager chosen by elected officials; even, as in New England, by direct or representative town meetings that make collective spending decisions.
Such governments provide a recognizable market basket of services, such as police and fire protection, street cleaning, garbage pickup, library service, and, in many parts of the country, public education, although schools are often overseen by independent school district boards. In addition, local governments typically perform a variety of regulatory functions, particularly in the realm of zoning and other land usage.
In addition, these municipalities often fund infrastructure projects, including those for locally controlled or owned roads, bridges, and buildings, through the proceeds of tax-advantaged municipal bonds. To a great extent, this leaves decisions about the rate of taxation and how revenues should be spent to be made locally. Thus US local government is decentralized both in its provision of services and in its funding of those services. This characteristic distinguishes it from most of the world, in which taxes are collected by a central government and only then disbursed to localities. This difference is no small matter and can even be characterized as a critical aspect of American exceptionalism.
There is historical evidence that a desire for localized control over the quality and character of public services helped, among other factors such as the desire for single-family homeownership, to drive post–World War II suburbanization. Indeed, the desire for localized government was among the findings of one of the classic analyses of the great postwar wave of American suburbanization. The sociologist Herbert Gans, in The Levittowners: Ways of Life and Politics in a New Suburban Community, studied households moving into what was known as Levittown, New Jersey. Gans’s survey research found that, for a significant group of men (not women)—5 percent—the “principal aspiration for life in Levittown” lay in a “desire to have influence in civic affairs.”10 That was almost as high a percentage as those who chose having a better family life (6 percent). They ranked it higher than a desire to be active in churches and clubs (2 percent), and five times as high as decorating the new house. The highest ranking—18 percent—was given to “privacy and freedom of action in new home,” which, arguably, is not unrelated to the fundamental localist sentiment.11 The strong, evinced preference for residing in places within a small government jurisdiction can be explained in many ways, but one can look first to the nature of such governments. Their functions are intensely local and touch the lives of residents in a far more direct and personal way than those of other levels of government. What if the streets are dirty, or school buildings are in disrepair; if police are lax and crime is rampant; if major new residential or commercial developments are built; if traffic is congested or chaotic because of poor signals or signage? All these factors will have ongoing effects on the quality of life as experienced by residents every day of their lives.
But why choose a suburb as the venue for exercising such control? Put another way, why would those quintessential, original post–World War II suburbanites in Levittown—and their waves of successors over two generations—have seen the opportunity for participation in civic affairs as part of the attraction of the place? The reasons are numerous and help explain the ongoing popularity of America’s suburbs.
There is the matter of sheer numbers. As noted above, those moving from central cities to suburbs are moving to jurisdictions in which electorates are far smaller. One’s vote—and voice—has greater weight in an election for local office in a community of fifty thousand (or often much less) than it does in a big city. One inevitably has a sense that local officials are more accountable to local electorates. It is simply not as daunting a task to elect, or defeat, candidates in smaller jurisdictions.
In larger jurisdictions, spending and operating decisions are made at a distance from individual voters or even from specific neighborhoods. Under such circumstances, it makes sense for interest group politics to develop. It becomes more difficult to organize on behalf of the general interest (e.g., lower taxes) and easier to advocate for more narrow interests.
A teachers’ union in a big city accumulates dues and makes campaign contributions and lobbies. It inevitably has more power than a small parent group, which cannot devote the same level of time and resources to advancing or defending its own perceived interests. Thus, not only is an individual vote more greatly weighted in a smaller electorate, it is relatively easier for groups of voters to organize for specific goals and be less likely to face what amounts to professional, interest group opposition.
The potential to influence elections extends, of course, to the greater influence voters can have in the most crucial matter decided at the local level: the specific mix of public goods that the local government will provide and the extent to which a jurisdiction will direct more resources toward one group of public goods (e.g., schools, parks) compared to others (e.g., law enforcement, services for the elderly). This was the essential point made by Charles M. Tiebout in his classic essay, “A Pure Theory of Local Expenditures,” in which he wrote: “The consumer-voter may be viewed as picking that community which best satisfies his preference pattern for public goods. This is a major difference between central and local provision of public goods.”12
The establishment of suburban households by young families should not be viewed as a phenomenon confined to the immediate post–World War II era. The ongoing movement of many such households to suburban jurisdictions reflects the preference for what are often perceived to be higher-quality suburban public school systems. Multiple studies have demonstrated that public school districts located in suburban neighbor-hoods—where administration of education is most localized—are generally associated with better outcomes for children in terms of student achievement, access to gifted and accelerated programs, and preparation for success in college and employment.13 Although it has been argued that this disparity in educational outcomes arises due to the higher concentration of poverty in urban areas, the superior performance of most suburban education systems holds even when comparing suburban and urban areas with equal poverty rates among school-attending children, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.14 It may be that suburban school systems are often showing outcomes that one would expect with students of higher socioeconomic status, but control and accountability of officials matter in this regard as well. Strong local government units allow households greater ability to prioritize public education in their own community—and crucially, to discipline elected school officials—such as members of local boards of education—through the ballot box, when quality is perceived to fall or other types of preferences (curricular or extracurricular) are not delivered. There can be little doubt that those choosing suburban life value this combination of quality and accountability. The National Association of Realtors’ 2013 Community Preference Survey revealed that 74 percent of households considered high-quality public schools to be important or very important in their decision about where to live, signaling a strong demand for suburban neighborhoods.15 Perhaps this would explain why millennials, who are entering the prime years of household formation and having children, are showing strong preferences for living in the suburbs.16 Put another way, the movement to US suburbs should not be seen as a limited post–World War II, Levittown-era phenomenon but as an ongoing part of American life.
Although there remain a great many suburban school districts that serve as population magnets, it is worth noting that regional consolidation of school districts has broadly taken place in the postwar era. There were more than fifty thousand independent school districts in 1957, compared with just over thirteen thousand in 2007.17 The consolidations have coincided with a steady increase in education costs and national concern over educational achievement. The existence of suburban school districts continues to offer a geographic version of school choice—and Americans avail themselves of it. The dynamics on display with regard to education have multiple implications related to local government. Local governments can best reflect specific voter-consumer preferences, and local governments must compete with other local governments, both in the types of public goods they offer and in the cost-effectiveness of their provisions. As Gans wrote of the “political-decision making process” in Levittown, “Although Levittown’s public decisions were made by a handful of elected officials, responding principally to demands and pressures from a small number of citizens and interest groups, many decisions were remarkably responsive to the rest of the citizenry, particularly the lower middle-class majority.”18
Thus suburban voters have the potential, in the classic economist Albert Hirschman formulation, for both voice and exit. Indeed, within the suburban framework, they enjoy the possibility of exit as their life circumstances change. For instance, elderly voters may choose a jurisdiction that invests less in education and more in meals-on-wheels. At the same time, they may realize that a robust public education system is more likely to help maintain the value of their property. If they can afford to do so, they may be willing to continue pay relatively high property taxes for public schools even after their own children have grown.
The role (and attraction) of local government goes beyond the choice of existing services in different municipalities. One of the most powerful aspects of US local government is its control over land use and development (as per Gans on Levittown). The power of local zoning, planning, and architectural review boards—many staffed by local professionals serving as volunteers—is frequently cast as the power to restrict. And, indeed, there are a small number of affluent communities that can afford to require homes to be built on 2-acre lots and such. But this emphasis on NIMBY-ism (Not In My Backyard) and restrictive zoning ignores the fact that, in marked contrast to the calculus faced by neighborhood groups in big city settings, suburban voters have good reason to approve new projects. Suburban jurisdictions have far greater assurance that they will not just endure the costs, but also enjoy the benefits of new economic development, whether commercial or residential.
New development, after all, brings new revenue through property taxes, the lifeblood that makes possible the delivery of suburban public goods. New development may bring additional traffic, or more public school children, but it will also build the tax base. A small jurisdiction, moreover, can be confident that it will realize (and be able to choose) the benefits of that more robust tax base, whether in the form of a new wing on a high school (at least in those cases where municipalities control schools), road resurfacing, or a new recreation center. Communities in big cities, in contrast, must face the prospect of negative impacts from new development, such as a major new apartment complex, at the same time knowing full well that tax proceeds that accrue from it will flow to the center of government, to be disbursed based on a wide array of factors and influenced by many interest groups distant from any one community.
One should not be surprised, for instance, that in New York City, local community boards—which must be consulted in the context of development decisions but have no legal veto or approval power—are known as obstacles to development. They have, after all, no good reason to believe their neighborhoods will be the ones to enjoy additional public goods and amenities, which might be financed by additional tax revenues. The umbilical connection between public goods and the property tax, so central to suburban government, is broken in larger jurisdictions.
To be sure, local control may lead to large-lot zoning in some jurisdictions, but hardly in all. US suburban municipalities are characterized by tremendous variety. Some may zone out multifamily housing, but many others welcome industrial parks and garden apartments, based on the preferences and, of course, the incomes of their residents. Thus local control can and has fostered economic development. Although it is true that, in recent years, localities have received revenue from state and federal, as well as local, sources, their relative fiscal autonomy is profoundly disciplining and provides incentives to assess the relative costs and benefits of development, as well as the affordability of services and employee compensation.
Moreover, the fact that individual units of government have the capacity to borrow via tax-advantaged bonds exposes local decision making—via ratings agencies—to the discipline of financial markets. This is internationally atypical and differs in a positive way from a norm in which localities that are untethered to their own sources of revenue have an incentive to spend in undisciplined ways.
Critics of existing suburban government arrangements such as Rusk have argued that regional governance better encourages economic growth, in part as a result of the efficiency of such government. There is reason, however, to be skeptical of such analyses. The emergence of the San Francisco Bay Area as an economic powerhouse—in which governance is shared amongt San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose, as well by many smaller jurisdictions from Palo Alto to Sunnyvale—would seem to belie the Rusk thesis. One of the few major North American examples of local government consolidation is that of metropolitan Toronto in 1998, which had the goal of efficiencies and cost-savings. Critics, however, estimate that Toronto’s government costs have actually increased post-consolidation.19 It is not my point or purpose, however, to make the case for local government on narrowly utilitarian grounds, based on its relative efficiency, or to rule out the possibility that, for some purposes, regional governance cooperation makes sense and saves dollars. The most obvious example is the mutual aid system for firefighting. It is in the interest of small municipalities to maintain local fire and emergency medical units in proximity to residences, but it surely does not make sense to own and maintain a large fleet of fire engines to fight a potential five-alarm blaze.
But a defense of local government virtues in the United States also extends to more philosophical issues and the nature of community. Those Levittowners who aspired to be “active in local affairs” understood that there is camaraderie and shared purpose to be had through such involvement. More newcomers were interested in civic affairs than in clubs, suggesting the possibility that the former was seen, in part, as a substitute for the latter. Those who run for modest local offices, like those who volunteer to serve on a range of possible boards—planning, zoning, tax assessment, libraries, even tree planting—are jointly engaged in a kind of a virtuous conspiracy to maintain and improve the place in which they live. That they have a financial interest in protecting their property values there is no doubt. Still, in the process, they learn to know and trust each other, and simply to enjoy each other’s company, though local politics can be fractious, as well.
The collateral benefits of these relationships are impossible to calculate. They include everything from helping a household in need to offering advice to the children of a fellow board member. Such are the bonds of American communities, and local government helps forge them. There is joy and satisfaction to be found in civic participation.
Rather than seeking ways to diminish or dilute the role of local government through merger or subordination into regional structures, reform-minded urbanists should look for ways that residents of central cities can enjoy some of the benefits of local government that are now denied to them. Breaking up the large, unwieldy school districts of New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles has been proposed. Let many smaller districts compete for students on the same basis that suburban municipalities now compete with each other through a reputation for high quality. This would begin to level the playing field between parents and publicsector labor unions, as well as to provide a sense for residents that increased property tax revenues could lead to specific improvements in nearby educational offerings or physical plants. This is a long way from the sort of “community control” that was bandied about in the 1960s, relative to inner-city minority communities. The term was never defined to include the sort of fiscal control, which suburban jurisdictions have.
Of course these calculations are the norm in suburban jurisdictions, and not just in the most affluent ones. In comparison to their suburban counterparts, central city residents are disenfranchised (or, at least, less enfranchised, as it were). The reasons for their disconnect from local decisions include a lost connection between local taxes and spending decisions, whether for schools or other public goods, and the fact of their relatively diluted votes.
Such discussion opens the door to the concern that some communities are better off than others and, as a result, will have the capacity to spend more on public services. This is a discussion that can be analogized to the larger contemporary discussion about income inequality and what, if anything, should be done as a matter of public policy to reduce it.
The benefits of localism are not just for the wealthy but also for a very wide swathe of the American public. Nor is it accurate to suggest that large governments serve egalitarian ends. Research shows that our largest cities tend to be the most unequal. Many large cities are widely accused by poorer residents of using city resources to force them out. A smaller town may be less tempted to do this, particularly if working-class residents have a strong say.20
Some jurisdictions are able to finance what amount to luxury public goods, whether public swimming pools or golf courses, while others make do with less. But, as spending patterns have demonstrated, relatively less-affluent jurisdictions may spend as much or more per student for education as higher-income areas, with poor results. Similarly, employee compensation levels, fringe benefits such as pension and health insurance, can be high in poor communities. A classic case is Detroit. The once proud Motor City, prior to the adjustments wrought by municipal bankruptcy, exemplified all these points.
The fact that it is easy to cite isolated examples of poor communities with dysfunctional governments does not detract from the fact that the potential exists, even in such communities, for self-correction over time. Welcoming new development that more affluent communities might reject is one obvious approach. What may be acceptable in a blue-collar community may not be in a more affluent place. Residents of poorer communities, like those of poorer nations, can derive benefits from development—say a port expansion or the placement of a new factory or warehouse—that can directly improve the lives of local citizens and expand the tax base in order to improve services. This is not to say, of course, that they should be forced to accept environmentally dangerous uses—nor that oversight in that regard from higher units of government should be lax.
Does this mean that all public services should be provided on a strictly local basis or that assistance should never be offered to communities facing sharp declines in their fortunes and tax revenues? Not at all. Localities faced with needs that cross borders, whether flood control, pollution abatement, or fire protection, have every reason to cooperate, as they do when building a regional library collection more extensive than any one community could afford. These sorts of regional arrangements are better by virtue of their voluntary nature. Miller argues that this sort of regionalism is, indeed, taking shape. The measures differ profoundly from a “city without suburbs” approach, which would, in effect, redistribute tax revenues across a wider geography and in the process sacrifice the proximity of voters to spending decisions. It is better for areas that have declined to have the incentive to improve their fortunes by offering a hospitable development climate.
Might there be occasions—for instance, following the loss of a major employer—in which a municipality might justifiably look for help to maintain its schools, parks, and police? Indeed, yes. But emergency assistance is quite a different matter than an ongoing cycle of grants-in-aid, as, for instance, those distributed through the federal Community Development Block Grant program.
Emergency assistance can come in the form of a loan from state government, or a one-time grant, tied to what might, in the international context, be referred to as structural adjustment (reductions in cost commensurate with reductions in populations and required services). Grants-in-aid, often available only for select purposes, are viewed as “free” money and come without the accountability relationship that makes government most effective.
The broad point here is this: ensure that an adequate level of public goods can be best met within the overall US tradition of local governance. Fostering irresponsibility from “the commanding heights” is no way to promote better communities; that work is best done at the local level.
It is tempting to describe local US government as a patchwork, with the implication of inefficiency, ineffectiveness, and redundancy. But if there is any wisdom in crowds, Americans are convinced of the virtues of small units of government—and have voted, quite literally with their feet, in favor of them. Their common sense decision deserves our respect and should neither be dismissed as the choice of those merely fleeing urban problems nor patronized as that of the middle-brow.
2 Ibid., 116.
3 Ibid., 244.
4 David Rusk, Cities without Suburbs (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1993), 1.
5 David Y. Miller, The Regional Governing of Metropolitan America (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2002), 5.
6 Ibid., 5.
7 “David Crowe et al., “What Home Buyers Really Want,” National Association of Home Builders, 2014, http://ebooks.builderbooks.com/product/what-home-buyers-really-want.
8 US Census Bureau, “Metropolitan and Micropolitan: Core Based Statistical Areas (CBSAs) and Combined Statistical Areas (CSAs),” last modified February 1, 2013, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.census.gov/population/metro/data/def.html.
9 Woodrow Wilson, The State: Elements of Historical and Practical Politics, rev. ed. (Boston: D.C. Heath & Co., 1898), 501, 506; as quoted by Martha Derthick, “Federalism,” in Peter H. Schuck, Understanding America: The Anatomy of an Exceptional Nation (New York: PublicAffairs, 2008), 125.
10 Herbert J. Gans, The Levittowners: Ways of Life and Politics in a New Suburban Community (New York: Pantheon Books, 1967), 39.
11 Ibid., 39.
12 Charles M. Tiebout, “A Pure Theory of Local Expenditures,” Journal of Political Economy 64 (1956): 418.
13 Suzanne E. Graham and Lauren E. Provost, “Mathematics Achievement Gaps between Suburban Students and Their Rural and Urban Peers Increase over Time,” The Carey Institute—University of New Hampshire, June 1, 2012, accessed November 14, 2015, http://scholars.unh.edu/cgi/view-content.cgi?article=1171&context=carsey; Paul Emrath and Natalia Siniavskaia, “Household Type, Housing Choice, and Commuting Behavior,” National Association of Home Builders, last modified December 1, 2009, accessed November 14, 2015, https://www.nahb.org/en/research/housing-economics/special-studies/household-type-housing-choice-and-commuting-behavior-2009.aspx.
14 “Urban Schools: The Challenge of Location and Poverty,” National Center for Education Statistics, last modified June 1, 1996, accessed November 14, 2015, http://nces.ed.gov/pubs/web/96184ex.asp.
15 “National Community Preference Survey October 2013,” National Association of Realtors website, last modified October 1, 2013, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.realtor.org/sites/default/files/reports/2013/2013-community-preference-analysis-slides.pdf.
16 Kris Hudson, “Generation Y Prefers Suburban Home over City Condo,” Wall Street Journal, January 21, 2015, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.wsj.com/articles/millennials-prefer-single-family-homes-in-the-suburbs-1421896797.
17 US Bureau of the Census, U.S. Census of Governments: 1957, vol. 3, no. 1, Finances of School Districts (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1958); US Bureau of the Census, “Local Governments and Public School Systems by Type and State,” 2007, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.census.gov/govs/cog/GovOrgTab03ss.html.
18 Gans, The Levittowners, 336–37.
19 Wendell Cox, “Local and Regional Governance in the Greater Toronto Area: A Review of the Alternatives,” PublicPurpose.com, January 10, 2007, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.publicpurpose.com/tor-demo.htm.
20 Alan Berube, “All Cities Are Not Created Unequal,” Brookings Institution, February 20, 2014, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2014/02/cities-unequal-berube; Thomas Sowell, “Race and Rhetoric,” Creators.com, 2012, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.creators.com/conservative/thomas-sowell/race-and-rhetoric.html; Nikole Hannah-Jones, “In Portland’s Heart, 2010 Census Shows Diversity Dwindling,” Oregonian, April 30, 2011, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/index.ssf/2011/04/in_portlands_heart_diversity_dwindles.html; Henry W. McGee Jr., “Gentrification, Integration, or Displacement? The Seattle Story | The Black Past: Remembered and Reclaimed,” BlackPast. org, 2007, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.blackpast.org/perspectives/gentrification-integration-or-displacement-seattle-story; David Price, “Home Matters! Seven Policies That Could Prevent Roxbury’s Gentrification,” Nuestra Ciudad Development Corporation, April 14, 2014, accessed November 14, 2015, http://www.nuestracdc.org/blog/2014/04/14/15-home-matters-seven-policies-that-could-prevent-roxburys-gentrification.
