Smart Growth Amer­i­ca (SGA) and the U.S. Envi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Agen­cy’s Office of Brown­fields and Land Revi­tal­iza­tion recent­ly cre­at­ed a set of anti-dis­place­ment fact sheets.

The fact sheets “high­light strate­gies com­mu­ni­ties can use to help mit­i­gate dis­place­ment in the con­text of brown­fields rede­vel­op­ment,” accord­ing to an arti­cle by Jared Klukas. “Although there are many approach­es to mit­i­gat­ing dis­place­ment dur­ing and after the com­ple­tion of a brown­field rede­vel­op­ment process, many com­mu­ni­ties may be unfa­mil­iar with spe­cif­ic tools or how they can be imple­ment­ed.”

The list of fact sheets reveals some of the tools explored as options for anti-dis­place­ment mea­sures con­nect­ed to brown­field mit­i­ga­tion and devel­op­ment. Titles include “Com­mu­ni­ty Ben­e­fit Agree­ments,” “Com­mu­ni­ty Land Trusts,” “Inclu­sion­ary Zon­ing,” “Small Busi­ness Preser­va­tion,” and “Tax Abate­ment.”

The fact sheet for inclu­sion­ary zon­ing (IZ), always a hot top­ic in plan­ning debates, lists the ben­e­fit of the tool as the main­te­nance of afford­able hous­ing and hous­ing afford­able for a range of incomes in con­text of ris­ing hous­ing prices. “Research shows that inclu­sion­ary zon­ing pro­grams are most effec­tive when they are manda­to­ry and cou­pled with incen­tives that encour­age devel­op­ment. Incen­tives used to attract and encour­age IZ pro­grams for devel­op­ers include den­si­ty bonus­es, fee waivers, park­ing reduc­tions, and more stream­lined and expe­di­tious per­mit approval process­es,” reads the fact sheet.

To cre­ate the fact sheets, the orga­ni­za­tions con­duct­ed inter­views with com­mu­ni­ty groups and munic­i­pal lead­ers from across the coun­try for insight into what works and what does­n’t.