Property Value vs. Junkyards: The Privileged Viewpoints

September 2021 lone blog (forgot to publish)

Long running theme - how I learned as an Environmental Protection Regulator that Enforcement does NOT correspond so much with toxicity as it does with land value.

Dollars spent on pollution abatement and policing come from property taxes. Environmental Justice advocates are correct in this sense - that in "melting pot" societies like the USA, lower incomes correlate with lower property value. 

There's a natural free market "valuation" in play. Junkyards are better for future generations than hard rock mining. We applaud reuse and recycling rates, as we know that the carbon and habitat and water use from recycling is less than we spend mining raw material out of the earth.

But as much as a real estate agent will avoid property next to a Superfund CERCLA copper mine, they don't much want to represent property next to a junkyard, either.