Pennsylvania Exclusionary Zoning Law: A Simple Alternative to Mount Laurel II?

Abstract

The long-awaited decision in Mount Laurel II, Southern Burlington County NAACP v. Township of Mount Laurel, 456 A.2d 390 (N.J. 1983), has drawn the eyes of most land use experts to New Jersey. See Mount Laurel II: A Case of National Significance, 35 Land Use L. & Zoning Dig., No. 3, at 3. But some commentators, concerned about the practical and institutional problems in implementing Mount Laurel II, have suggested that the simplicity of the Pennsylvania decisions is a source of strength. In Land Use Controls: Cases and Materials (1981), Ellickson and Tarlock have stated that “the current Pennsylvania rules on municipal obligations seem easier to understand than those in New Jersey.” And Daniel R. Mandelker, after noting that the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania adopted “a somewhat different test for exclusionary zoning” in Surrick v. Zoning Hearing Board of Upper Providence Township, 382 A.2d 105 (1977), 30 ZD 203, has said that the “… intermediate Pennsylvania commonwealth court has applied the Surrick tests with commendable results.” Land Use L. & Zoning Dig., No. 3, at 8.