By Tom DeWeese, 8/20/15, Time to Treat Property Owners like
OWNERS!
The American way of life, based on a strong middle class
established through free enterprise and ownership of private property, is under
assault like never before.
That assault will dramatically increase in September as
thousands of Non-governmental Organizations (NGOs), global elitists and United
Nation’s bureaucrats converge on New York City to reboot Agenda 21. This time
they are calling it the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This new 15
year plan demands 17 points of global control to reorganize the world into a
Socialist utopia by 2030. If allowed to take control, there will be no
ownership of private property, very little individual choice, and national
sovereignty will be a thing of the past in this new agenda.
Meanwhile, the Obama Administration, through Housing and
Urban Development (HUD), is busy implementing the “Affirmatively Furthering
Fair Housing” rule (AFFH). This program targets specific neighborhoods that
have taken certain HUD grants. Eventually, however, it is fairly certain that
such policies will be expanded to every neighborhood in the nation for social
engineering. The plan imposes government mandated quotas of racial, ethnic and
monetary levels to be forced on higher income, level neighborhoods to make them
more “fair” as social justice replaces equal justice.
The 2030 Agenda and AFFH are mutual and direct assaults on
our form of government and on private property rights. If ever there was a time
for Americans to finally stand up and say “enough,” now is the time.
Of course, the 2030 Agenda and AFFH are only the latest,
most drastic assault to re-engineer American society. For more than two decades
property rights have been under attack in the name of Sustainable Development.
We’ve all observed the actions of Planners in nearly every community in the
nation as they are busy promoting their visions of our future through what they
call healthy, happy communities where neighbors interact, parents play with
their children, no stress from long commutes, as all the conveniences of living
are just a walk down the street.
These are all things Americans normally think of as personal
choice when choosing how and where we want to live. However, what is not
mentioned in the new
”vision” for our future is how the professional and government
planners have determined that none of it is possible unless they design our
cities, control our private property and rule over our personal life choices.
To create this “utopia” a process called Smart Growth or
“visioning,” is implemented and sold to us as a means to protect and guide the
community to “sensible growth planning.” Everything we want and need, they
promise, will be just a walk down the street for our jobs, schools, stores and
libraries. What more could we possibly want?
Since the early 1990s most communities have created and
imposed a comprehensive development plan that, in many cases, is mandated by
state government. These are driven by non-elected regional councils that have
been put into force without public knowledge or approval. They are fueled by
federal grant money that mandates specific rules for development. It’s all done
in the back rooms, out of sight of the general public. Unseen hands reach out
to decide the community’s future and EVERY community is now being structured
the same.
The plans, in reality, have little to do with creating
healthy, wealthy communities. Hidden in all the feel-good rhetoric is a
political agenda based on redistribution of wealth and control of resources.
The American Planning Association (APA) is one of the most
powerful planning groups operating in the nation and it works to install the
rules and regulations for how we live in nearly every city, county and state.
The APA is a member of the Planners Network. The Network’s Statement of
Principles says, “We believe planning should be a tool for allocating
resources… and eliminating the great inequalities of wealth and power in
society… because the free-market has proven incapable of doing this.”
That single paragraph, the root of the philosophy of
Planners across the nation, advocates Socialism’s redistribution of wealth
schemes which operate under the label of social justice. These social
engineering schemes imposed through Smart Growth plans are a direct attack on
the middle class. These are nothing but tools to divide our citizens and create
racial strife and envy. And it unites the goals of community planners with the
newly announced HUD AFFH regulations on neighborhood diversity.
The HUD plan dictates quotas that neighborhoods, whether
they are predominately Hispanic, Black, White or Asian, must be broken up by
bringing in different income and ethnic groups. The plan fits perfectly with
the Planners Network Statement of Principles for redistribution of wealth and
resources, as clearly stated in the Planners Network Statement of Principles.
In Smart Growth cities, such as Portland, Oregon, strict
controls are placed on community area growth, which planners negatively label
“Urban Sprawl.” This means that only a certain amount of land is available for
development and growth.
As population naturally grows inside that restricted area,
the Planners must increase density regulations, forcing more and more
multifamily apartment buildings instead of single family homes. As the
population continues to grow, this eventually leads to the necessity of “stack
and pack” high rise apartment buildings. You will not have the choice to live
in single family suburban homes or in a rural area. These won’t exist. In fact,
just recently, Smart Growth city Seattle, Washington announced that it is
looking into the possibility of banning single family homes. Under Smart
Growth, one size fits all.
Obviously, what is missing in all of this planning is a
consideration for private property ownership and the natural rights that
historically have gone with it. The fact is, Sustainable Development cannot be
implemented without diminishing private property rights.
Every person, Black, White, Asian and Hispanic, wants to
choose how he or she lives rather than to be dictated to by government.
However, the use of eminent domain to enforce a top-down decision making
process necessary to complete the “visioning” plans leaves little room for
individual wants and needs.
In rural areas more such controls over private property are
growing through the use of Conservation Easements that restrict what land
owners, especially farmers, can do with their land; what crops they can grow
and how they may grow them. Conservation Easements are, of course, sold as
voluntary, but there are powerful forces working to scare and intimidate
farmers into signing. Once they do, the land owners find they have given up
major control of their property forever, usually to a private land trust that
has little, if any, government oversight over its actions.
More regulations on land come from the EPA, as it moves to
control every drop of water in the nation. And there are even more controls
through the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM). That out of control agency
has even resorted to armed standoffs in an effort to move ranchers from their
land, such as in the Bundy case in Nevada last year.
Every agency of the federal government, including the
Department of Transportation and FEMA, are in on the controls over what owners
can do on their own property. Add to these federal agencies the overlapping
controls by state and local governments and non-elected regional councils, and
you have a matrix that is choking off any possible existence of private
property ownership and control.
As a result, across the nation, there is a growing attack on
private property ownership and owner control. Interestingly, as the assault on
private property increases, our nation’s freedoms and wealth are diminishing at
a nearly equal rate. That’s because private property ownership is the key to
both a strong, healthy economy and the eradication of poverty.
The traditional American system of private property
ownership and control was the root of America’s rapid rise in prosperity. More than
60% of American businesses were started by individuals investing the equity in
their homes as they built the most prosperous nation on Earth.
Historically, other, much older nations were unable to
compete with America’s rapid rise, precisely because they didn’t provide a way
for citizens to benefit from owning property, if they were able to own it at
all. In fact, most of the world’s poorest nations are that way because they
won’t allow their citizens to own private property.
Consequently, with the new Sustainable Development rules
that are rapidly diminishing private property ownership, America’s middle class
is disappearing and the divide between rich and poor is growing. Third world
hopelessness is closing in on the United States of America.
Clearly, something must be done to counter this organized
attack on American private property rights. In addition, if freedom is to ever
gain a foothold in the world, a new effort must be made to help those in other
nations to gain their right to own and control private property as their true
path to ending poverty.
A new Plan of Action for Property Rights
Now is the time to stand up and say no to a global movement
bent on destroying private property rights! To that end, the American Policy
Center (APC) has created a plan of action to unite property rights activists
around the world into one mighty force.
First, a Statement of Principles has been drawn up to
clearly define what we mean by private property rights. “Private property
ownership,” says the Statement, “includes land, possessions, fruits of ones
labor and ideas.” “Without private property ownership,” declares the statement,
“freedom is not sustainable.”
Now, with the Statement of Principles to guide us, APC seeks
every supporter and promoter of private property ownership around the world to
join in a unified movement. First, property rights activists and supporters
should read the Statement of Principles. After reading, if you are ready to
stand with these principles, then sign the agreement to uphold and promote
them.
Along with the creation of the Statement of Principles, a
new symbol has been forged to unite the movement. The symbol’s message is
People * Property *Liberty. This message clearly depicts the reasons why
private property rights are so vital. People cannot be free without property
rights.
This symbol should now be used by every activist and group
around the globe that accepts and signs our Statement of Principles. The symbol
can be used in newsletters, web sites and other publications to clearly show
unity in the movement and our determination to make private property ownership
a major issue that must be protected in all public policy.
It is time for governments around the world to learn that
private property ownership is the key to freedom and prosperity. Public policy
must be controlled to respect property owners as OWNERS!
Sign the statement of principles now
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