Selects: How Historic Districts Work

And the reason I know is because I did this podcast on them, and just having old houses around doesn't make it a historic district. If you want to find out what that really means, well then just open up your ears and continue to listen and you'll be done. So please to enjoy our Saturday Selector this week all about historic districts. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast.

I'm Josh Clark, There's Charles W. Chuck Bryan, There's Jerry over there, and that makes this Stuff you Should Know. Say the clock tower, that's good? Like that it's good? Just popped into my head. Oh for real? Yeah, I wasn't reading this article and doing this research thinking back to the future, back to the future. I'm surprised it just popped into my head. I actually hadn't thought about back to the future at all. But but that's a really that's very appropriate, Chuck. But that is not a

historic district. That is just a landmark building. I think that could still it could still qualify for a registry on the National Register of Historic Places. It just wouldn't be a historic district, which is what we're talking about today. Maybe this should just be the end of the podcast, the end, Chuck. Have you ever gone into a neighborhood, just been walking around town, and all of a sudden you realize that you're in the most charming, adorable place

you've ever been in your life. Sure, well, then you've probably been in a historic district. Yeah, this is pretty cool. I feel like this. We haven't done one like this in a while. You like this when I was fully expecting you to say like this so much. I love historic places, I know, but sometimes Yeah, I don't know why I thought that, but I'm glad that you I'm glad that it panned out. I actually selected it because I knew you were gonna hate it, so, you know,

eggs on my face. This is I don't know. It kind of harkened back to some of our episodes we used to do, like row houses and shotgun houses. Uh, yeah, that's that stuff. Saw houses, Yeah, yeah, shotgun houses. We did do a full episode on shotgun houses. Yeah, and their architectural importance. I thought that was a pretty good episode, agreed. I think we released it as a select recently too, didn't we m I don't think I did. But that might have been one of your picks. I don't think

I did. It was Jerry ghost producer. We need to let Jerry select him some from time to time. Jerry did time for that stuff. That's fine. She needs nothing else on her plate besides me, so that's true. And overseeing the largest podcast program in the world. Yeah, it's pretty impressive. Years Jerry said, thank you. Yes she does.

She's aid thank your holding me so super in her mouth. So, um, I think I've already kind of gotten the intro out of the way where I asked if you've been in a charming area and said you've probably been in a historic district. Well, I mean, there's a good chance that you have if you've been in the United States, because there are more than of them. Yeah, that's a lot. I mean there's all over the place. And you might

say like, okay, well that's great. Who this is an area that has been designated to have some sort of historic significance. Um, can I please go to sleep now? It will say no, no, please don't go to sleep yet, because there's a lot more to it. And in one of the more surprising twists you're ever going to have in your entire life, it's actually controversial historic districts can be Oh yeah, yeah, did you not read that one article? Yeah? I was just being coy. Okay, my stomach just bottomed

out in terror. So should we talk about Charleston, South Carolina? Yes, a place where I well I didn't go there. I went to the beach near there. Oh, the Isle of Palms, yeah, just a few weeks ago. Oh yeah, but we were within uh spitting distance of Charleston, South Carolina. Why would you spit on Charleston, I wouldn't. I love it. Bill Murray lives there, for God's sakes, Yeah he does. Apparently he's a man about town there and I think his family lives there too. Yeah, that's why he lives there.

Oh gotcha. Yeah. So, uh, they formed the very first historic district in the United States. Yeah, they established the Board of Architectural Review And this quote here is pretty great. Uh. This is the official quote from that Architectural Review board. Can you please read it in the mid Atlantic accent? Mid Atlantic? Why that? Because that's the that's the one, the old timey one. Okay that you're probably going to use. I was going to do an old Southern thing. Oh

that's okay, yeah, no, that's way more, way better. The preservation and protection of the old historic and architecturally worthy structures and quaint neighborhoods, which in pought distinct aspect of the city of Charleston. That is, that was beautiful. They actually have quaint neighborhoods in their charge. Yeah right, So, I mean, like, from what I've read too, Charleston like

actually is legitimately interested in its architecture and preserving its architecture. Yeah, although, as we'll see later, there are some people that think Charleston didn't do it right. Oh is that right? Yeah, that's in the article at okay, so, or that they're overdoing it. That's how I took it. Yeah, sure, okay, cool cool. So but Charleston was the first one to basically say, this is historically significant architecture. This is a historically a significant area you and we want to make

sure that it stays that way. So we're going to add a layer of protection, legal protection over this area that the rest of the city doesn't have. And within five years the word had spread to New Orleans and they said, that's a pretty good idea. Chief, We're going to do that for the French Quarter. Is my New Orleans accent? That uh yeah, and that you know, what they're basically saying is is that it can be either one. It can and it all depends on your local jurisdictions,

which we'll get to. But historically or aesthetically, these buildings in this area, they're linked together, right, And so the Charleston thing basically provided the Charleston and then the New Orleans when basically provided the groundwork, which was this area is protected, and we're going to form a board who is charged with making sure that it stays this way

as much as possible. We're going to vest some legal authority into them, and these people are you have to go through if you want to do anything significantly um uh, altering to the exterior of your place if you live in this area or have a business there, right, or maybe not even significantly depending on where you are. So kind of like you know, plotted along this idea. It was around for a couple of decades, and then this whole process of urban renewal that was kicked off after

the highways started being built. Um in part because of the highways, because people were saying, wait, you're gonna you're gonna blow right through you know, the Lower East Side in Chinatown with this highway in in Manhattan. We don't want you to do that. This is worth protecting, so build your highway elsewhere. And then also as the highways were built and traffic started being rerouted away from other towns, um, these other towns that used to be thriving started to

fall into disrepair. Some people are saying like, hey, let's knock down these old buildings and build new ones and maybe business will come back. Um It in initiated this idea that no, no, we've got some historic stuff here

and we need to protect it. And it really started to kick off in Earnest in the in the fifties, and by nineteen fifties six, the federalites had gotten involved and through the National Park Service established the National Historic Preservation Act that said, you, MPs, you're in charge of designating what's his an historic site and what's not. That's right, and uh in nineteen sixty six they created the National Register of Historic Places run by the National Parks are

or not run but I guess just sort of maintained. Sorry, yes, I said nineteen fifty six. I'm in nineteen sixty six. Okay, I got everything else right, Yeah, that's right. So, um, here's a deal. You can be listed on the National Register. And that's really like that doesn't I mean, it means something I don't want to say. It doesn't mean a whole lot. But if you really want to protect something, you have to go with your local historic district. You have to create and protect it locally. That's a very

big deal. But we're gonna go over both national and state, which is sort of like national, and then local, which is pretty different. It actually is, but it's really it's impressive that the local level is the one that has the real teeth as far as historic districts are concerned.

As it should be so, but most people want to start out with the national district at the very least, because there's a certain amount of cache to it to having your place designated as a National Historic um either structure, district, or area. But there's there's multiple things that can fall under or be um logged onto the Register of Historic Places. Apparently in other countries they have similar registers, but they'll include things like events, um people, just not necessarily things

or objects. But in the United States there's a real emphasis on place and situation and buildings in particular. And so if you're on the National Register of Historic Places, you are two things. You're an object and you're inanimate, and you probably are in situated in a specific area. You're like where you are, what you are is kind of tied to the area you're around. That's the real focus of the United States National Register of Historic Places.

That's right. So there are five overall categories. Buildings, it's pretty obvious. Structures also kind of obvious, but that could be it says in here that could even be an aircraft as a structure. Yeah, I saw that there's a grain elevator in the Fox, Illinois that's protected because it's an example of the transition between one story and two

story grain elevators. Amazing, It is amazing, And I don't want to yuck anybody's this thing about this like to me, like if you can see, chuck, I'm bleeding a little bit out of the corner of my eye from being bored and even saying that since but I'm sure there are people out there appreciate the different architecture of grain elevators. And that's the point. It means that if it's on the National um Register of His Story Places, it is

important to some group of people. And so don't you there, yum, even if you find it's boring, agreed, because they might find what you find interesting and boring. Number Three, it can be an object. Number four. It can be a site and this is a big one, uh in the United States because like Civil War battle fields, um, stuff like that Applach and trail. Yeah, the MLK Historic Site. Sure, it's like a bunch of well we'll tell you, we'll

talk about that later. Or it can be a district, which is basically some kind of combination of those first four. Um or just let me group like you know, the street has has ten houses. Ten ten beautiful Victorian houses are all built by the same architect and so this is, well, we're going to consider this a district, right, So like maybe in each of those instances, of one of those houses was in a neighborhood, it might qualify for designation

as a historic building. But if you put them together, because they're together, they form this district, which is, you know, the some of these parts form something larger and that connects them. And um, there's a couple of qualifications that they have to meet to to be part or listed on the National Register. Um. Almost without exception, they have

to be fifty years old. I think the law is that, um, it has to be exceptionally important to be younger than fifty years old and still be designated on the Historic Places Register. That's right. Uh. The other thing it has to be is significant, which sounds kind of broad, but um, and I guess it kind of is. Because significance is in the eye of the beholder. But that's why we have boards and things like that to determine whether or not they think it's significant to behold things for us.

And then finally it's got to be evaluated that's significant and historic context, which kind of speaks for itself, like it did any great history happen there? Um, well, you know it was this Bob Dylan's house in Minnesota when he was a child. Although I don't know if that's on the list. I just threw that out there. It could be. I mean, it could be that's that's a

that's a home run. But say, like let's say you said, um, well this this building used to house soda shop, a soda shop that made pretty good chocolate malts, um, and so it's representative of that time. Well, if you were on the board looking at this application, you would look around and try to put it in context, like, yes, people liked chocolate malts at soda shops at one period in American history, But was this the place where chocolate malts were invented or is this the place where everyone

widely agreed made the best chocolate malted. It's like no, Like it has a history, but not necessarily significant history in context of the larger era that it's a part of, so it would probably get passed over. Yeah, like the four sort of historic context that you you have, it's not shoeing necessarily, but you have a good chance if if something important historically happened there, like this is the place where so and so was shot and killed or born perhaps who on a more up note, okay, uh,

did someone live here that was significant? George Washington slept here? Sure or associated with them? Didn't have to live there necessarily? Um? Is it related to a certain architectural period or method of construction? Like that's a that's a big one for the Park Service, sure, like this is the um, this is the last house to be used that used plaster and laugh for their walls. Or there's a there's a college in Florida called Florida Southern College that is like

the entire campus was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. So that is clearly going to be accepted on the National Register. Or finally, was their information at this place that is historically important? Yeah? Or might there be because they can afford protection to say, like an archaeological site that's a known archaeological site that they haven't really dug yet, Like we'll find it right there, saying there's a pretty good potential that some information or history or historical significance will

be yielded from investigation of the site. But we want to protect it now before developers come in. That's right. Here's the thing though, if you want to be a historic district, um, that doesn't like if you if you want to say like these three square blocks or historic district, that doesn't mean that every single property in there is what's called a contributing property to that district. Yeah, they're

non contributing properties are allowed. Sure, Like if you have those fifteen Victorian houses on a block and then there's the one, you know, the one modern mcmanchin, right, that that's non contributing. I think we can all agree. But it doesn't disqualify the rest of the area in as necessarily. It just it depends on um. From what I've seen, it's very much a subjective measure. How much that mcmanchin detracts from the field or the um authenticity of the

rest of the site what they call um integrity. Yeah, that's really kind of interesting, I think, because all this stuff is subjective. But the integrity there is how that the physical characteristics of that property reflect, like on this day,

reflect that significance historically. Right, So like if you have that row of Victorian homes, but every single one of them was altered in the sixties or the seventies or the eighties, and the people inside made some really weird decisions and so altered the interior the exterior of these homes. That yes, they were all part of this Victorian era, and they were once pretty good examples of it. They

aren't any longer. Even though it qualifies for all these other things, it would not be consider ordered UM a site with integrity, and it might get passed over unless everyone agreed to restore the houses back to that Victorian era. That's the status letter to get I think is I'm sorry you've been denied because your property has no integrity pretty pretty much, you know, and you, sir, do not either.

That's how they finish every letter like that. Should we take a break and talk about how you might create a historic district? There is one other thing before we do, Chuck, I think it's a fine idea. I'm not shooting down your idea, but I do want to point out that UM areas have to be unified, not necessarily physically, visually geographically, but somehow they have to be linked to be considered

a district. That's all right, now, you wanna take a break, yes, okay, if you want to know, then you're in luck just to ex Alright, So if you're a person and you live, let's just take us for instance, Like let's say I wanted to get my house in my neighborhood and in Atlanta recognize as it or my block as a historic National Historic District. Okay uh. And the real reason I want to do this is because of the street near

my house. They're going to expand and it's a real bummer because they're gonna have to tear down, um a few of the houses that are really what I think are significant, and they might take possession of that little strip of land that you've been exercising squatting on. More importantly, they will take my little strip of land, right, Okay, So what would you do? Like, what what are you gonna do? And um, as step one took to protect your home, well to place it on the National Register.

I would start at the state, uh, the Historic Preservation Officer. And this is a person every state has one. You can go to the NPS website to find out who yours is and get in touch and they're basically gonna help you out with I mean, you're gonna you're gonna plead your case, of course, but they're gonna help you

fill out this form um explaining why. I mean. They may say listen, don't even bother, But what they're supposed to do is help assess whether or not it might be eligible and help you fill out all your national forms to send in. Right, they might say like how old your house? And if you're like, oh, it's Bill in the nineties, it's still pretty nice, they'll be like,

don't don't bother, that's right. But um, you're since you have never done this before, your dinghis at it, and they're there to help you figure this out and how to do it right. They're not the ones who are going to judge this. A board will, and typically a state board um for a state historic preservation board. Their review board is made up of people who know what

they're talking about. Architects, his story us, archaeologists, anthropologists, people who have been trained in this stuff, who can say, yeah, this actually isn't that great. There's a much better example of it. You know, a couple of blocks over. As a matter of fact, why don't we go to the

other place and make that a historic district? And then you're like, no, snobs, but um, the the officer that you are contacting, it's their job to help you get there, your application in in state your case, and then get it in front of the review board who will then take it from there and say this is a great idea, there's a terrible idea, or I don't care either way, and it's time for lunch. Approved. That's right. And this

is again going for that National Register. And one reason you might want to do this is because here's the thing. It's it's sort of a badge of honor um, like we said before, and we'll we'll uh, we'll talk about again later about the local one. That's one you really want.

But if you are on the National Register, it does provide you with some legal protections federally, so if that road is a is a federal highway project, then it could protect your house, or even better, even if it's a local or a state project, if it's getting any federal funding whatsoever, same thing applies sure where they have to say what's going to be the impact on any historic district of this project? And if the impact is

deemed too great, the project won't go forward. So there is there are some protections for it but for the most part it's kind of symbolic and there's a little bit of cache, and you know, you can put it on your zealo page that your house is part of a national historic district, right, but you can't. They can't say, I mean you can. You can live in a historic a national historic home, and you can let it fall

into disrepair and look like garbage. And they can't come in and say, whoa, whoa, whoa, you're you're on the National Register. You can't let your house fall into disrepair like this, right, Yeah, clean yourself up. You gotta stain on your shirt, get a shape, what's your problem. They don't say that, as those are individual property rights, and it's only up to local governments to infringe on individual

property rights, not the state or federal government. So while the state or federal government will have laws restricting its own activities in regards to historic districts, like expanding a road or something like that. Yeah, if you get on the National Register of Historic Places, your whole neighborhood gets on there. Your neighbor can do whatever they want with

their house. Still, So if that was your whole employ all along chuck to really keep your neighbor from doing something like, say, I don't know, putting a second story on their house. Um, you're going to find that you have been frustrated. That's right. Um, you can go to the state, But the state is basically like federal um as far as protections and stuff like that go. Where where the real teeth come in is with the local

historic districts, and it is very different. They don't have to meet the same guidelines a lot of times very similar, but they don't have to have the same exact guidelines as the national historic districts do. So the first thing that you're gonna need, though, is there's got to be an ordinance, a local preservation ordinance, which is basically just, hey, here are the rules on how we do this around here. Here,

here's how we're gonna identify these houses. And here's what it means if you have one right so, and this isn't like this is like square one stuff like this is what a city has to do before it ever creates its very first historic district. If your city has already done this, then you would just basically go through the same process that you would with the National Register in applying to get historic designation for your neighborhood in

your city from your local municipality. But if they've never done it before, they've got to create new legislation for it, new laws protecting you know, historic areas. And then they also have to set up a preservation commission to basically the same thing that that Charleston, South Carolina did all the way back in nine team thirty one. That's right. So you're gonna go in front of the commission. Uh, They're gonna hold some public hearings where people can come

and argue the case for or against. Yeah, because not everybody likes this idea. No, not everyone does, as we'll see, Um, you have to have in fact, it's it's kind of hard. You have to have, like the community has really got to be behind this in order for this to go through. Hey. Yeah, in most cases, from what I've seen, you need a majority of homeowners and business owners in the area to agree to this. And I think even if the opposition is particularly vocal and mad about it, it's they still

might be able to derail local ordinance designation. That's right. But it's all going to be considered by the commission. Uh, and they're gonna make that recommendation to the officials. They're gonna say, you know you're gonna reject this. Are you're gonna say it's okay? Is it all great or not? And here's a deal. If you get named local historic district, this is when um, they can say, oh no, no, no, no, you live in a historic home in this district. You

can't let it fall out of disrepair. You can't. There was this one case where was it in Maryland? I think where? I guess these front porch columns, Um, we're being replaced by a family and they skimped a little because what is expensive and used whether use fiberglass or something right, and they said, no, no, no no, no, you can't do that because you live in the historic district and you have to use uh these original materials to preserve this house. Yeah, you gotta use you would like

you said. I don't know. Maybe they were like, we don't want to cut down a tree, or maybe they were just cheaping out. But um, I think they sued or yeah, I believe they sued in order to try to keep them. But that's a really typical. UM. Part of any local historic district ordinance is if you're going to make any kind of repairs, especially significant repairs, any alterations to the exterior, anything like that. You need to

use historic, clear, accurate materials. Well, you have to submit it for approval to a local design review board too, right, Sorry, I got ahead of us. So the first thing you have to do is say, I want to replace the columns in the front of my house because they're falling apart. I want to replace them. Um, can I please do that? Please sir? Please let me and the local review board or commission will analyze this and they'll say, sure you can.

But this is what they have to look like. This is the materials they have to um, they have to be made out of, and this is the color that they have to be painted. And you have to follow that or else you can be fine. They can place a lean on your property, and um, the penalty can be pretty stiff. Actually, yeah, And here's the thing, Like I can at least understand this and what we'll and we'll talk later about, you know, freedoms to do what you want with property that you own. But this I

can stomach a little bit. And we've talked about homeowners associations before. Those are the ones that really get me to where it is not historically significant. It is an ex urb with seven hundred houses and a subdivision that

require you to have the same mailbox. Right. So the in that sense, having a homeowners association covenant, UM and having a historic preservation district on a local level where they both have teeth that they can actually, you know, find you or tell you what to do to the

exterior of your house or your yard. The point is the same in this sense, and that they're trying to keep things a certain way, right at least, I think what you're saying is, at least with the historic district, they're trying to preserve something that has been deemed historically important, whereas with the suburb, it's just they want to make sure everybody's lawn is cut or that just looks the same,

or no one paints their house pink or whatever. But they have the same aim, which is like, this is what we're all saying is very nice and pleasant. I just watched Pleasantville last night for like the five hundred times good movie, but oh man, it's so good. But um, we've all agreed that this is pleasant and this is what we want our area to look like, and then this is how it's going to stay and you can't

change it. And if you do, you have to petition, and this review board can tell you know you can't do that. Yeah, And of course I know that the answer to my problem with these ex orbists don't don't move there then like you know the stuff going in, then don't buy a house in that neighborhood. And I think most people who do buy out there are pretty aware of that, and I think some of them are looking for that because it tends to protect property values.

Like you're never going to have a neighbor who just parks like a boat with a moth eaten cover over it in their front driveway for five years. Um, Like that's just not gonna happen out there. But at the same time, it's also eye bleedingly boring to live out there as well. Can I also just say that I love that You're Halloween October movie watching is pleasant? Bill? Do you know how I watched last night The Texas chains On that it was so good? The original? Yeah,

I had never seen it. Can you believe that? Uh? No, I had never seen it. That's really surprising. What do you think? Uh? Wow? It was it was disturbing. Yeah, that hammer scene that he drags out for like twenty minutes of the hour and twenty minute long movie. Yeah, it was tough. Um, And I realized that, you know, I'm prepping for a movie crush h slasher movie special, But um, I didn't. I never watched a lot of

that stuff growing up. But I don't know if it's because I was churchy, sure, but just rail answer right there that maybe so, because and I don't think it was like, oh I thought I would be in trouble. I think just like the people I was around didn't

really get into that stuff. So you missed a really crucial window in horror movie watching, because yeah, I can see coming into it as an adult, you're like, like you said, this is highly disturbing stuff, and this is this isn't fun, like you like, it has to kind of dovetail with period of your life where you feel immortal, um, and so it kind of bounces off of you, the disturbing nous of it, And then as you get to be an adult you can kind of start to appreciate

the truly disturbing aspects of it, but it's still tempered by that, you know, teens and twenty something doing that you remember as well, just coming into it like this, You know, late forties is not a good time to start watching Texas Jainsaw mask Man. I feel for you. I liked it. I mean I thought pretty much appreciate it.

It is well it's a classic alright, Chuck. So we've kind of hinted a little bit at the idea that not everybody's on board within historic district and for you know, getting a real designation, like a local designation where there's actual restrictions on you, the person who owns the home um can or can't do things without permission from a board of people you might not even have ever met in your life. UM. You the for it to be really successful, you need the community hind that to to

get that designation. And everybody going in with their eyes open saying, okay, you know this is We're willing to spend the extra money on wood. We're willing to um spend the extra money on you know, a hand handmade window if one breaks, because we're not allowed to replace the original single pane windows that make it twenty degrees in our house all winter long. Like we're we're we're

going in with our eyes wide open like that. But even if most of the community does, there's probably still going to be somebody who says, I'm a libertarian, I don't believe in this kind of stuff, and I'm really not happy about this, And that person is basically going to have an historic district shoved down their throat. Yeah. Um, And you'll probably not you, But if you are that person, you will be the one that's vocal. If you know about the meeting and you're there and you want to

make hay, but you can be overruled. Uh, and all of a sudden you are subject to those whims Berterians hate that. Well, there's a bunch of sides to this coin here. Um. One is, there's a bunch of factors. One is, let's talk about the pros. How about that? Yeah, I mean one of the pros is many times, uh, it increases property values because there's a standard that has to be upheld in your house and those around you

won't be falling into disrepair. Right. And Plus, if you are like if you're if you're housing prices are stable and rising in relation to the rest of the town, your tax base, your your taxes also tend to rise to and so these areas very quickly start to become very wealthy areas of town. So it's a wait for

for people to basically secure their investment in their property. Yeah, and I guess we're talking about disadvantages mixed in here too, because there's some people that say, hey, in the US, that's can be code for keeping the wealth in the in the pocket of the few. But is who's going to be owning these houses? Are people that have a

lot of money. Yeah. There's a guy named Kristen caps Um who wrote an article on City lab back in two thousand and sixteen that basically said the the um inequality and housing in the housing pricing crisis related at the feet of historic preservation districts, which is pretty preposterous in a lot of ways, but he did make some real he sure, but the I think that his point was, like, just do away with historic preservation for districts, for neighborhoods,

because most of these things are covered by zoning laws that say you can only have single family homes in here. Well, only certain people can afford really expensive single family homes in UM with really high taxes, and so it keeps out people who would otherwise love to enjoy this amazing neighborhood with this, you know, these mature oak trees and beautiful sidewalks and neighbors walking around being friendly and jos on every corner, or really good schools that they're these

neighborhoods shouldn't just be for extremely wealthy people. But in saying that it's only single family housing allowed in this, no one can ever build a high rise with a bunch of apartments that those people who who might be able to afford to live in and enjoy the neighborhood. And so there's so on the one hand, they're like, well, yeah, we don't want high rises here, that it has nothing to do with the historical architecture and it's a blight.

And other people say, well, you're also just keeping poor people out too, So it's it's um it's definitely a double edged sword, because that's that's very much accurate. But it's certainly not the cause or even a major solution to the housing crisis either. Yeah, and there are Republicans in Michigan that are trying to do away with a

lot of these UM. I don't know about districts, but maybe potential future designations, because their whole thing is like, you don't want the federal government coming in here and telling you what you can do and what you can't do with your house, although it wouldn't be the federal government, and that it would be local, be local, but these

must be state reps uh and local reps. But they're saying, let's let's do away with some of this stuff, like Michigan has far too many of these, and your freedoms are being squashed right exactly, you want to paint your house pink, then you should be able to. And so some some preservation district commissions are a little more laid back than others. Apparently in Georgia, UM, if you it's up to you to pick what color you want to paint your house, if they repairs you're doing are minor,

you don't have to have a certificate of appropriateness. And then in other places it is a staunches is kind of an understatement. UM. Old town Alexandria very famous, like you can't do anything to the outside of your your house in this old town district. But as a result, it's an extraordinary it's an extraordinarily charming place to be the like, tons of people who visit d C make the trip over to Old Town just to go shopping

or to eat or to do whatever, just walk around. Um. So that's another benefit of having an the story preservation district. It attracts business or it attracts customers to businesses, and very frequently you'll find an influx of tourism dollars coming into this area too. Yeah, and you know we've talked about before the legendary um fabulous Fox Theater here in Atlanta are only remaining, like amazing, huge, old school Egyptian style theater was was going to be a bank parking

lot in the nineteen seventies. Man Like, they were literally going to put a parking lot there. And I remember when I was a kid, they had to save the Fox Theater campaign and it took you know, uh, these celebrity benefit concerts to raise money. Ben Vereen did he come. I could see it. It was the right era that Frank Sinatra came. He was one of the big wigs. Really yeah, yeah, Frank came to Atlanta and perform to raise money. And I was like, no, you can't tear

down the Fox, guys. That's my Frank. It was okay, I should have gone with Sammy. You should have done a Charleston accent for Frank. But uh, that's the other side of the coin, which is like if people don't I mean, there was a time in this country in the fifties, sixties, and seventies where that could, that can very easily happen, and that did happen in downtown Atlanta. If you look at old pictures of downtown Atlanta, it looked like New York, a smaller version of New York City.

And uh, you know, now we've gotten some of that character back. But there was a period where they just tore down everything old in favor of putting up these bland, white buildings in the name of like the future, and they called the urban renewal. And thankfully, in the last ten twenty years, I'm not sure where the idea came from, people said, no, you can have the same effect. You can have businesses, you can have mixed use development by

reusing and rehabilitating these these same buildings. You don't have to tear it down and build something new. It's usually cheaper to do that, but it's much better if we do it the other way. And kind of preserved the history, and that's definitely become the push lately. But yeah, there was definitely a period in the middle of the last century where a lot of stuff was torn down and

as a result. I was on a website I can't remember the name of it um where they were listing the most boring cities in the world the world, chuck, and the first one was Atlanta. What the reason. One of the criteria they were using was history like history, like how much history is just kind of mixed into

the the fabric of the city. And part of it is all the tearing down that they did in the fifties and sixties, but also part of it was um late at the feet of General Sherman who burned the town to the ground and burned up a lot of the history as well on the March to the Sea. So Atlantis has kind of had a twofold um knock around where a lot of historical stuff was not preserved and was actually torn down. As a result, it lacks a certain amount of character because it compared to other

cities that have more history, the old twofold knock around. Uh, yeah, that's that's a dumb I mean I'm not saying this just because this is my hometown. Atlanta is not the most boring city in the world, in the world. That was in the top ten the dumbest thing I've seen ever.

Uh Well, here's the other thing too. I think there is a and this isn't necessarily about preserving history, but I think there's just been a general return to taste and craftsmanship across the board in the last like fifteen years. And some people may call it hipsterism or whatever, but you know, people there are artists and bakers now, and you know, handcrafted cocktails instead of fern bars, and when they are building new buildings, they're trying to make them

blend in. And I just feel like there was a time where I think every everyone in America thought the future was just going to be sterile and white, and these sterile, white buildings were going up everywhere, and these and the baseball stadiums that were just round white objects. And then starting with Camden Yards in Baltimore, they started building these old style ballparks and that's all you see now.

And I think that's just across the board. Is I think people are respecting craftsmanship in history a lot more than they did for a long long time, like decades. I agree, But it is true that that comes at a price because if you look at those neighborhoods where you know, they are being rehabilitated and preserved by the

people who are moving in there. As they're doing it, um, they're raising the home values and which also raises the taxes, and so people who have traditionally historically lived in these neighborhoods are being pushed out of the neighborhood. So so that is one part. It's one facet that has yet to be cracked, like how do you how do you keep a neighborhood you know, um mick, as far as like income goes or use goes, Like how do you

how do you really preserve that kind of thing. So so it's not just like, yes, we're preserving this neighborhood at the expense of the residents who used to live here, because it's you know, richer people who are coming in and rehabbing areas gentrifying basically what we're talking about that in our gentrification podcast. Okay, but but that's a that's a big thing. So it is a criticism of historic preservation, but it's certainly not a reason to do away with

historic preservation. And one of the other challenges I've seen is, Okay, so let's say we're going to allow somebody to come in and build a high rise in this amazing historic neighborhood. Do you really think they're going to be building it for low or mixed income people to move into. No, They're gonna build it for the wealthiest people, who probably have even more money than the people who own the houses in this historic district. And it's not going to

help this housing crisis at all. It's just going to exacerbate it and will have ruined a perfectly beautiful, uh historic district in the process. We should totally do one on gentrification. I agree. I agree. I love episodes like these where it's like, oh, what's the resolution? There is none? Yet you gotta stay tuned. Everybody. We know you're very

anti resolution. So I've read before that people who read fiction uh tend to be able to deal with open ended like endings more than people who don't, which is weird because I don't read much fiction these days, but I can still I still hang with with no resolution, no closure, no closure, you got anything else, nothing else? You're just waiting for me to stop talking. It looks like maybe, Well, if you want to know more about historic districts, why don't you go try to get your

place put on the national register. Why don't you as you do that, let us know how it goes. Maybe keep us posted um in the meantime, though, first, before I tell you how to get in touch with us to keep us posted, let's say it's time for a listener, ma'am. I'm gonna call this government shutdown follow up. Hey guys, I'm a member of the permanent government in d C. I thought you did a great job. It was great. The emphasize the cost of a shutdown is the key

thing most people don't understand. These things aren't just a blip. I want to point that the effects of the last shutdown still aren't over. When we got back to work, we were told that it took the agency six months to recover from the previous shutdown that lasted sixteen days. And these things are exponential, not uh linear. With the thirty five days shutdown, we just don't know how long it's gonna take to catch up. We have settled into

our normal and just expect to miss deadlines. The people we serve regularly understand and are working with us, but I don't think the general public gets it. You can't just push back all deadlines by thirty five days because new work is constantly coming in. There's no pause button. Just because the government is shut down. We're all working to catch up. It hasn't happened. It's not like we

can blame the shutdown either. People don't understand how work submitted after the end of the shutdown can still be affected by it. But we can't just double our workload. There's only so many hours in a day. And that is from Nate. Thanks Nate. It was a nice little follow up. Yeah, thanks for bringing us down here, right. We had just kind of gone out on such a

mediocre level, and it's down level. Well. If you want to get in touch of this, like Nate and bring us down or to keep us posted on how it's going to in your quest to get your house or your neighborhood on the National Register of Historic Places, you can go onto stuff you Should Know dot com and check out our social links there, or you can send us an email to Stuff Podcast at iHeart Radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio.

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