Happy Tuesday and welcome to another edition of Rent Free.
Government rules on new home construction make routine real estate development more difficult and expensive than it needs to be. Overly restrictive land use regulations also make it difficult to provide housing in more extreme circumstances. This week's stories cover a couple of examples of the latter phenomenon, including:
- Los Angeles looks to use the latest fires as a reason to exempt itself from state-level zoning reform bills.
- A Reason report from last week found that the island of Maui has managed to rebuild just three homes 18 months after the devastating wildfires on the island in August 2023.
- In Ohio, a pastor has been convicted of criminal violations of the fire code for sheltering people in his commercially zoned church.
