The hottest Local government Substack posts right now

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Top U.S. Politics Topics

BOOM: Unanimous Vote Lands Land Value Tax Enablement on Governor’s Desk

Progress and Poverty • 1962 implied HN points • 05 Mar 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Virginia just cleared HB 282, which would let Charlottesville, Falls Church, Fredericksburg, and Newport News opt into a split-rate land value tax, making the state much closer to actual LVT implementation.
  2. Momentum is spreading beyond Virginia: Kentucky may allow Louisville to pilot a split-rate tax, Ohio has a high-profile push for statewide enablement, and cities like Syracuse and Buffalo are actively exploring the idea.
  3. Research and local advocacy show LVT shifts can be done revenue-neutrally and tend to tax vacant or underused land while rewarding dense, multifamily development, and grassroots advocates are doing the legal and data work to make pilots and laws happen.

I Was the Target of an FBI Sting

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 2026 implied HN points • 26 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Undercover FBI agents posed as out-of-town investors and made political donations that became part of an elaborate sting, which led to an arrest.
  2. Those donations looked like normal, legal contributions tied to a redevelopment project he already supported, so he didn’t expect them to be treated as bribes.
  3. The arrest upended his life and pushed him to fight to change the law that was used against him, while also prompting personal reflection about what matters.

The Unchecked Rise of Crazy Race Theory in Academia

TK News by Matt Taibbi • 9309 implied HN points • 08 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. A city housing official’s past social posts promoting collective ownership and using legal means against landlords caused a public uproar and the mayor publicly defended the appointment.
  2. An academic idea often called "whiteness as property" has gained traction in some university and activist circles, arguing that white identity and property rights are historically linked.
  3. Critics say this theory is racist and dangerous, warning it could undermine private property and Enlightenment values, and it has drawn legal and political scrutiny.

‘This is becoming the biggest issue for councils’

NN Journal • 178 implied HN points • 24 Oct 24
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. There is a huge budget crisis for special needs education, with a national shortfall of £4 billion. This could lead to some councils going bankrupt if the situation doesn't improve.
  2. Many councils are facing growing deficits in their budgets because more children need special education services, but funding is not keeping up with demand.
  3. Families are struggling to get the education and support they need for their children, with long wait times for necessary plans and some choosing to educate their kids at home instead.

Another cool paper and more notes on a bad paper on housing supply

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 463 implied HN points • 02 Mar 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Preapproved permits carry a large market premium: land and sites with ready-to-issue permits sell for much more and are far likelier to be developed, so permitting frictions explain a meaningful share of the gap between housing prices and construction costs.
  2. Common economic models and supply measures rest on assumptions like identical workers and costless mobility that don’t match how people actually behave, so those models can misread affordability, displacement, and migration dynamics.
  3. The 2008 mortgage crash and collapse in single-family construction shifted the supply picture nationwide, making many standard metro-level supply metrics uninformative; high prices in expensive cities often reflect broad demand vs. constrained supply, not unique local popularity.
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Decades of Wisdom from an LVT Advocate: Josh Vincent

Progress and Poverty • 615 implied HN points • 24 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. A land value tax (LVT) is a practical way for cities to capture the unearned value of land to fund local services, lower taxes on buildings, and encourage infill development so cities can compete with suburbs.
  2. Getting LVT adopted is a pragmatic, local political project: start with a clear fiscal problem, recruit a local champion, run straightforward data showing most homeowners and small businesses will save, and design a revenue‑neutral shift.
  3. Compared with income, sales, or one‑off wealth taxes (and restrictive rules like Prop 13), LVT is harder to evade, better aligns incentives for land use, and is especially timely as cities and states take on more fiscal responsibility.

Fighting back

Comment is Freed • 124 implied HN points • 11 Mar 26
🌍 World Politics Local government
  1. Recent by-election losses have triggered a wider momentum shift away from Labour, with the Greens climbing in polls and able to win seats without deep local roots. This trend threatens more poor results for Labour unless it is stopped.
  2. Labour is moving toward centering economic insecurity and the cost of living as the core issue, since frustrated voters are drifting to Greens and other parties for economic reasons. Focusing on everyday financial worries is seen as essential to get back on the pitch.
  3. Simply improving living standards may not automatically win voters' gratitude, so Labour must work out why people don’t give the government credit and build a strategy that goes beyond short-term economic fixes. Understanding that disconnect is critical to reversing the decline.

Mike Pence: Minneapolis Is a Warning

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 1219 implied HN points • 29 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Everyone deserves safe streets, laws that are enforced, and protection of constitutional rights; in Minneapolis those basic things were not upheld.
  2. The death of Alex Pretti is a tragedy that requires a full, transparent investigation and public accountability.
  3. Leadership matters: activist provocation and a series of political choices eroded public confidence and weakened lawful authority, which helped invite disorder.

Is Undervalued Vacant Land just a Baltimore problem?

Progress and Poverty • 692 implied HN points • 12 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Chronic undervaluation of vacant land is a Baltimore-specific problem — other Maryland counties do not show the same widespread under-assessments.
  2. The state appraisal office has acknowledged the issue in Baltimore and begun fixes, which means the problem is correctable rather than systemic across SDAT.
  3. Fixes focus on better data quality and sales validation, proper use of the allocation method (use a single local land rate derived from prevailing improved-property values), and mapping land values to spot side-by-side inconsistencies.

Mamdani Is Inviting a Property Tax Revolt

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 394 implied HN points • 19 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. The mayor proposed a 9.5% property tax increase to help close a roughly $5.4 billion budget shortfall after state leaders refused to raise taxes on the wealthy.
  2. The hike would hit a broad swath of New Yorkers — homeowners across boroughs and renters who could face landlords passing on costs or landlords going under.
  3. Progressive leaders have labeled the plan inequitable, and it risks provoking a voter backlash or tax revolt over rising property bills.

Mamdani's Estate Tax Will Suffocate NYC's Middle Class

QTR’s Fringe Finance • 44 implied HN points • 13 Mar 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. The plan cuts the estate tax exemption to $750,000 and raises the top rate to 50%, which sounds like it targets billionaires but the low threshold changes who actually gets hit.
  2. In New York City, $750,000 is often just a modest family home or the life savings of a teacher, nurse, or firefighter, so many middle-class estates would be taxed.
  3. Using this tax to close budget gaps would leave New York with one of the lowest exemptions in the country and end up taxing ordinary homeowners instead of only extreme wealth.

Landscape 6 – New Year, New Legislative Sessions and Launching the CLE Board

Progress and Poverty • 962 implied HN points • 21 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Land value tax legislation is gaining momentum nationwide, with new bills and carryover proposals active in states like Maryland, New Hampshire, New York, Minnesota, Washington, Michigan, and Ohio.
  2. A new Center for Land Economics board has been launched with prominent housing, parking, and policy leaders, signaling more organized and mainstream support for land value tax advocacy.
  3. Media, research, and political figures are increasingly discussing and endorsing land value tax, bringing more attention through reports and editorials even as some local pushback and policy rollbacks occur.

Affecting Change

Points And Figures • 399 implied HN points • 09 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Lots of political noise comes from people who never held elected office, so talking loudly doesn't equal the power to make change.
  2. People with real-world business experience should run for office. They can get real stuff done like modernizing outdated government systems and easing taxpayer burdens.
  3. Academic theories and ivory-tower analyses often sound impressive but don't work in practice, so measurable, practical results matter more than clever-sounding ideas.

Where Democracy Still Works

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 1850 implied HN points • 04 Dec 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Everyday local civic life — neighbors, schools, churches, and volunteer groups — is where democratic habits are actually practiced, and that sustains the republic when national politics are broken.
  2. People are building practical, local solutions like microschools, community relief funds, volunteer disaster response, and neighborhood microgrids that meet needs faster than distant authorities.
  3. These routine acts of trust and cooperation show democracy can be rebuilt from the ground up and remains alive in communities even as federal institutions struggle.

Minnesota Fraud Isn't Just in Minnesota

Points And Figures • 1172 implied HN points • 27 Dec 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Allegations of large-scale taxpayer and voter fraud, including claims involving Somali immigrants, are eroding trust in local government and making fraud feel personal to property owners.
  2. Punitive taxes, heavy regulation, and aggressive property assessments discourage improvements and business formation and push wealthy residents to relocate, creating a ‘‘trickle-down taxation’’ effect where the tax burden shifts to people who can’t leave.
  3. Career politicians often avoid real consequences for mismanagement or alleged corruption, so the suggested remedy is to hold them accountable at the ballot box to stop taxpayers from bearing the cost.

Trump Declares a Legal War on Sanctuary Cities

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 621 implied HN points • 18 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. The Justice Department is reportedly investigating Minnesota Governor Tim Walz and Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey for allegedly conspiring to obstruct ICE.
  2. Sanctuary policies let local governments limit cooperation with federal immigration agents, and those choices are generally protected under the Constitution.
  3. The White House argues sanctuary rules create a hostile climate that endangers federal officers and is using that claim to press a legal campaign against sanctuary cities.

BOOM: LVT Candidates Get Elected - Landscape #5

Progress and Poverty • 2155 implied HN points • 17 Nov 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. More candidates who support land value tax (LVT) are being elected, like mayors in Seattle and Buffalo. This shows that LVT is gaining traction in local politics.
  2. Katie Wilson's victory in Seattle is significant as she plans to push for LVT, making her city a leader in property tax reform.
  3. There is a growing conversation about LVT across the country, with more media coverage and legislative proposals, indicating it's becoming a mainstream topic.

Sanctuary Cities Are Built on Shaky Law

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 505 implied HN points • 22 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Sanctuary policies can conflict with federal law that forbids encouraging or inducing illegal immigration, and those actions could carry criminal or civil penalties.
  2. Some state and local officials who back sanctuary practices are facing Justice Department scrutiny and legal challenges that could lead courts to strike down those policies.
  3. Supporters argue sanctuaries only limit local cooperation with federal authorities, but federal statutes may impose broader duties on states and cities that make simple noncooperation legally vulnerable.

How municipal bond markets can save Britain

Odds and Ends of History • 1876 implied HN points • 20 Nov 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Municipal bonds could help local governments finance infrastructure more effectively. This would give local projects more control and accountability over their spending.
  2. By allowing local authorities to raise funds directly, it would encourage better project management and cost control. Local leaders will be more invested in making projects successful and efficient.
  3. Devolving fiscal powers can reduce reliance on central government and better match local projects with local needs. This means that communities would have more say in their development and investment choices.

Federal YIMBYs?

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 252 implied HN points • 11 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. The House is moving to loosen federal mortgage and construction rules—like easing underwriting and regulatory burdens—to help local banks and small builders lend and build more.
  2. A recent bipartisan House Financial Services hearing made clear that over-regulated lending and local land-use rules are key constraints on housing supply, with focus on zoning, permitting, and lending reforms.
  3. New York City's mayor has pledged to speed up permitting and cut red tape for small businesses and new housing, assembling reform-minded advisers to try to implement practical changes.

Zohran Mamdani's Magnificent First Two Weeks

JoeWrote • 582 implied HN points • 16 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Zohran Mamdani has moved quickly to prove a leftist can govern by using executive actions and bold appointments to deliver immediate results. He prioritized tenant protections, worker support, and a state-backed childcare pilot to show practical wins.
  2. The administration emphasizes concrete, everyday improvements—like public restrooms, suing exploitative gig apps, canceling harmful orders, and pro-worker commissions—to improve people’s lives rather than just talk.
  3. Significant pushback and legal hurdles already exist, from political attacks to court setbacks and policing questions, so governing will involve learning, tradeoffs, and managed growing pains.

Cool Paper on the progressive effect of upzoning

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 252 implied HN points • 09 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Targeted upzoning mainly triggers redevelopment on low-density, high-value parcels near city centers, and those changes tend to take many years to materialize.
  2. Newly added floorspace lowers rents only modestly and diffusely because supply effects spread across the region, so undoing the large scarcity-driven rent premium would require much larger, citywide building and depends a lot on migration responses.
  3. Mid-20th-century zoning now imposes large welfare losses because floorspace prices far exceed construction costs, and the post-2008 mortgage/finance shock that curtailed suburban single-family building amplified the current housing shortage.

Enacting Land Value Return in your hometown

Progress and Poverty • 923 implied HN points • 18 Dec 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Find a local elected champion and build a coalition of nearby allies; motivated local people paired with the right official can win reforms without a huge grassroots movement.
  2. Do the homework: study local law (uniformity, classification, assessment rates, exemptions, millage), involve the assessor early, gather parcel and valuation data, map land values, and model a revenue‑neutral shift so you can show who wins and loses.
  3. Be pragmatic and start small with voluntary, revenue‑neutral local opt‑ins (split‑rate, universal building exemption, leases, or targeted capture), and use short policy briefs and clear visuals to convince busy politicians.

Billionaires Can Flee Mamdani, But Small Business Can’t Hide

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 445 implied HN points • 14 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. The mayor’s ambitious social programs will be expensive and will require new revenue from the state to be paid for.
  2. Wealthy individuals can often avoid higher personal taxes by moving away, but corporations are harder to escape taxing because state and city corporate taxes are apportioned based on where their sales occur.
  3. If Albany raises corporate income taxes to fund these plans, the increases could ripple through the economy and end up hurting small, local businesses.

Understanding Mamdani's Vision

Can We Still Govern? • 511 implied HN points • 02 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. He lays out an unapologetically left-wing, pro–big-government vision that rejects neoliberalism and promises City Hall will govern expansively and audaciously to restore public trust.
  2. His policy agenda is framed as expanding real freedom rather than just fixing pocketbook problems, with proposals like rent freezes and free childcare and a heavy focus on actually delivering results through strong implementation.
  3. He centers collective citizenship and the city’s diversity, calling for solidarity among residents and asking people to stay engaged and demand excellence from both public servants and themselves.

A "Shortage" or "Crisis" versus Regular Scarcity: Part 2

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 126 implied HN points • 17 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Stable rent-to-income ratios hide a real housing shortage because families cope by downsizing, delaying household formation, and accepting lower-quality housing, while prices and low‑tier rents rise much faster than rents for high‑end homes. This means survey spending shares can look unchanged even as scarcity and displacement get worse.
  2. Fixing housing requires a hierarchy of policies: expand single‑family rentals and mortgage access, then upzone to add dense, amenity‑rich housing, and only after that tackle hard socio‑economic planning like public safety and inclusion efforts; badly designed measures like inclusionary zoning can tax new supply and make shortages worse.
  3. Most recent home price gains are driven by inflated land value from scarcity, and broad property taxes already act like a Georgist land tax; building more homes and freeing up supply will reduce the land premium and bring prices down, whereas restricting supply keeps the scarcity tax in place.

The Challenge of Commercial Upzoning

The Discourse Lounge • 854 implied HN points • 19 Nov 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Commercial upzoning can create more housing, but it needs to be balanced so local businesses can survive. Business owners worry that new developments will push them out and replace them with chain stores that can afford higher rents.
  2. The process to open a business can take a long time due to complex city rules, which can harm local shops. Simplifying the permit system could help more businesses start and thrive in the community.
  3. What happens to commercial spaces after new housing is built is important. It’s necessary to have a mix of housing and businesses to keep areas lively and support a walkable community.

Grants to Combat School Violence Redirected to Defray Costs of Illegal Immigration

OpenTheBooks Substack • 194 implied HN points • 21 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Some federal school-violence grants are being used to pay for services for immigrant and English-language-learner students instead of just physical security upgrades.
  2. School districts report that recent influxes of migrant families have strained resources and coincided with higher juvenile arrests and disciplinary issues, so they’re hiring counselors, translators, and running cultural-competency programs.
  3. Critics argue this diverts money from the program’s original goal of funding locks, alarms, and proven safety measures, noting about $13.5 million across 15 grants explicitly serve foreign students.

Zohran’s high-risk, high-reward strategy

Silver Bulletin • 247 implied HN points • 12 Jan 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. He mixes outsider, risk-taking politics with a cosmopolitan, media-friendly persona. He proudly calls himself a democratic socialist while also looking like the kind of NYC striver many young professionals like.
  2. His coalition is a strange mix: big margins in Muslim, Black, Hispanic and gentrified neighborhoods but weak with many Jewish, East Asian, and fiscally conservative voters. He won by just over 50 percent, so his majority looks fragile and might be hard to expand.
  3. He’s promising bold, transformative policies and says City Hall will act audaciously. But city institutions and political polarization — from the council and state legislature to the police and media — create veto points that could limit what he can actually achieve.

“Blizzard” Gives NYC Mayor Mamdani Pretext For A “Climate Lockdown”

QTR’s Fringe Finance • 36 implied HN points • 26 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Media coverage treated a heavy but historically normal snowstorm as an extreme emergency, which helped justify dramatic government action.
  2. The mayor declared a state of emergency and a travel ban that limited private vehicle use, set mandatory sidewalk-clearing duties for property owners, and allowed fines for noncompliance.
  3. Exemptions for NGOs, delivery services, and other allies raised concerns about preferential access, erosion of civil liberties, and potential national security risks if movement can be broadly restricted.

DeSantis is Half-Right About Property Taxes

Progress and Poverty • 1885 implied HN points • 16 Jul 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. DeSantis wants to remove property taxes, but he should keep the tax on land. Building taxes can hurt investment and should be removed since they don’t help with housing affordability.
  2. Land taxes are important because they make sure the community benefits from land value. If landowners aren't taxed, they might just sit on land without developing it, which can hurt the economy.
  3. DeSantis has a chance to be a leader in property tax reform, but he needs to understand the difference between building and land taxes. Removing just the building tax but keeping the land tax could lead to better development and growth.

Why Blue States Can’t Have Nice Things

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 1567 implied HN points • 29 Jul 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Public spaces can be very well-managed without a lot of red tape. For example, a farm in Utah quickly fixed a safety issue on the spot.
  2. In contrast, places like the Los Angeles Zoo face more bureaucracy and delays when dealing with problems. This can make for a frustrating experience.
  3. The difference in management styles shows how some places can prioritize quick action and customer experience, while others get bogged down by rules.

Zohran Mamdani's Budgetary Buffoonery

QTR’s Fringe Finance • 45 implied HN points • 18 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. A nearly 10% property tax increase runs against the mayor's affordability promises and shifts a big bill onto homeowners and landlords.
  2. Property taxes are a blunt tool that often lead owners to pass costs to renters or cut maintenance, which undermines housing affordability.
  3. Relying on repeated large tax hikes risks eroding political support and could drive wealthy residents and businesses away, shrinking the city's tax base.

On leadership, planning, careers with Shin-pei Tsay

Exasperated Infrastructures • 14 implied HN points • 05 Mar 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. City innovation works best when data, design, and civic experimentation are joined so pilots can be tested, evaluated, and scaled across departments.
  2. Parking is an everyday, retail-like urban problem that affects car owners and non-car users alike, so it needs a clear inventory, better communication, and creative mixes of policy and technology to balance people’s needs.
  3. Genuine public engagement and storytelling should define problems before prescribing solutions, and should be paired with flexible zoning and incremental, well-communicated action to meet climate and mobility goals.

Micro versus Macro thinking and affordability

Erdmann Housing Tracker • 273 implied HN points • 14 Dec 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Micro thinking focuses on surviving day-to-day and treats high housing costs as an inevitable local problem, while macro thinking asks why systems and policies produce those costs and where levers for change might be.
  2. A long run of shocks plus legal and capacity constraints—like zoning, mortgage rules, and post-2008 supply limits—have kept housing supply too low and pushed prices up, making it more expensive for people to "trade down" and worsening affordability.
  3. The affordability squeeze affects everyone but hurts lower-income families worst, so middle-class strains are a warning sign that zoning and mortgage suppression deserve serious policy scrutiny and collective solutions.

The debt-laden Christchurch City Council NZ seems to have a spare $50K to splash out on a rainbow pedestrian crossing.

A B’Old Woman • 639 implied HN points • 20 Apr 24
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. Christchurch City Council is considering spending $50,000 on a rainbow pedestrian crossing despite being in significant debt. This is seen as controversial given their financial situation.
  2. Rainbow crossings may not comply with regular traffic safety laws, posing potential confusion for both pedestrians and drivers. Standard zebra crossings are designed for clear road safety.
  3. There is a suggestion that the council should allocate funds to more pressing social issues, like supporting women’s shelters, instead of spending on symbolic projects like a rainbow crossing.

Why the President crushed so hard on Zohran

The Rubesletter by Matt Ruby (of Vooza) | Sent every Tuesday • 285 implied HN points • 25 Nov 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. The president was clearly smitten after a great first date with Zohran, and both seemed to come away happy.
  2. NYC’s Jewish community is rattled by ugly chants outside a synagogue and many are upset with the lackluster response from the incoming mayor.
  3. Fear and outrage around topics like Jews and Gaza make perfect fuel for algorithms, turning local incidents into larger online battles.

New York Can’t Afford to Sideline Private Developers

QTR’s Fringe Finance • 21 implied HN points • 25 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Local government
  1. New York needs to build many more homes where people want to live, and the private sector is essential because the city can’t afford to pay for all the new housing itself.
  2. Policies that sideline developers—like strict tenant controls, talk of expropriation, or big public housing plans—discourage investment and reduce the supply of rental housing, which tends to raise rents.
  3. Given tight city finances and the risk of people and firms leaving if taxes rise, the practical way to close the housing gap is to work with private builders and use market-driven solutions.

The Lost Stones of London

Londonist: Time Machine • 399 implied HN points • 08 May 24
💾 History Local government
  1. London's geography is linked to ancient stones like Oswald's Stone, which has been almost forgotten, highlighting the city's rich history.
  2. Historic stones in London served various purposes like marking boundaries or council meeting spots, adding unique character to the city's landscape.
  3. Despite being forgotten, remnants of ancient stones like London Stone and Wealdstone can still be found around London, connecting the modern city to its past.

Power to the People

Comment is Freed • 76 implied HN points • 18 Jan 26
📰 News Local government
  1. Labour is shifting toward a communitarian approach with Pride in Place, aiming to rebuild local civic life instead of just delivering top-down, technocratic fixes.
  2. Evidence from Big Local shows long-term, flexible, community-led funding that protects local space, follows local instincts, and helps projects spread can grow social capital, improve outcomes, and attract more investment even with modest per-person spending.
  3. Top-down managerial programmes can upgrade buildings and services but struggle to create lasting community power or emotional buy-in, so Pride in Place should avoid reverting to technocracy and prioritise methods that build pride, agency and momentum.