NYU Furman Center Summer Speaker Series: Stephanie Kestelman
Please join the NYU Furman Center for a virtual lunchtime presentation:
The Economics of Discretion in Land Use Decisions
with
Stephanie Kestelman
Doctoral Candidate
Department of Economics - Harvard University
Tuesday, 7/23 @ 12:00 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. ET
This paper uses quasi-experimental variation to study the benefits and costs of reducing discretion in land use decisions. Kestelman leverages the Transit-Oriented Communities (TOC) policy in the City of Los Angeles, which limited community discretion for a subset of projects within .5 mile of bus, metro and rail stops. Using a difference-in-differences design, the author first estimates the impact of this policy on supply, both on the extensive margin (i.e., whether more projects are proposed for entitlement and permitted) and the intensive margin (i.e., how many units, building floor-to-area ratio, number of income-restricted units). Then, Kestelman estimates the impact of TOC projects on property values, rents, crime, 311 calls, and local community composition using non-parametric difference-in-difference. The author argues that these projects would have had to undergo discretionary review absent the policy reform, so they are only selected based on profitability, and not on the probability of community approval. Finally, Kestelman builds a model of discretion in land use decisions that captures the trade-off between by-right and discretionary approval.
About the Presenter: Stephanie Kestelman is a PhD candidate in economics at Harvard. Her research focuses on the economic, social and environmental impacts of housing regulation.