Rather than persecuting home-based businesses, local regulators should grant them permits and leave them alone.
Rather than persecuting home-based businesses, local regulators should grant them permits and leave them alone.
S ingle mother Bianca King rebounded quickly when she lost her job as a program manager in the aerospace industry as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. Turning the situation into an opportunity, she opened a state-approved babysitting service at her home near Austin, Texas.
Enterprising individuals — especially women — have operated similar businesses for centuries; home-based child care is an ordinary activity that fills an important societal need. Unfortunately, not everyone celebrated King’s new venture. Her home in Lakeway, Texas, is adjacent to the eighth hole of the Live Oak Golf Course, and three golfers complained to the city about the hardship of teeing off within earshot of children.
One of the golfers, a former Lakeway mayor, described seeing playthings behind a fence in King’s enclosed backyard. “There were huge blowup toys and things that were outside in the backyard that were fully visible to the golf course,” he told the city’s Zoning and Planning Commission during a public hearing. The only inflatable toy that King owns is a five-foot-tall rainbow sprinkler — nothing out of the ordinary in a family-friendly community.
The golfers’ only other complaint was about parents’ picking up and dropping off their kids. But again, the outrage was exaggerated. King watches only two to four children at a time — in addition to her own son and daughter — and all of her clients live nearby. They drive in their own neighborhood during daylight hours, and some of them walk with strollers. The business generates no outside traffic.
Despite the lack of any legitimate gripe, Lakeway sided with the golfers. Relying on onerous zoning rules that make home-based businesses nearly impossible to start, local officials rejected King’s application for a city permit in November and denied her appeal in February. The one-two punch has put King’s sole source of income in jeopardy, while creating uncertainty for her clients.
Rather than accept the violation of her rights, King is fighting back: On Feb. 16, she filed a lawsuit against Lakeway, in which she’ll be represented by our public-interest-law firm, the Institute for Justice. By itself, a legal victory for one small-business owner would have little economic impact. But King is not alone in her plight.
Home-based businesses make up more than half of all U.S. businesses and generate nearly $500 billion a year in revenue. Governments should welcome the massive economic boost provided by such businesses. Yet instead, they frequently exploit zoning laws to stifle market entry.
Some municipalities thwart home-based businesses by blocking customer visits. Nashville, Tenn., widow Pat Raynor hit this hurdle when she tried to open a state-licensed hair salon at her home after her husband died. Nashville eased its rules in 2020 as an emergency pandemic-mitigation measure, but zoning officials in Boston, San Francisco, Newark, N.J., and elsewhere have continued to criminalize customer visits to the home. In these jurisdictions, piano teachers cannot give lessons in their living rooms, math tutors cannot help students do algebra in their dining rooms, and photographers cannot make portraits in their home studios.
Other municipalities consider applications on a case-by-case basis, but routinely say no. The zoning police recently shut down yoga classes on an eleven-acre property in rural Noblesville, Ind. Officials rejected a home-based craft business and a real-estate-appraisal company in Buford, Ga. And Tim Sienold hit a wall when he tried to open a home bakery in Abington Township, Pa.
Cities and towns have legitimate reasons to regulate commercial activity in residential areas. Nobody wants to live next door to a meatpacking plant or a drive-through restaurant. But officials go too far when they stop people from earning an honest living without a good reason. Some neighborhood cranks stand on their front porches and scream, “Get off my lawn!” Others go one step further: They try to control what people do on their own properties. Cities and towns do a disservice when they listen to these voices. Rather than stifling people like King, the zoning police should grant them permits and leave them to make a living in peace.
Erica Smith Ewing is a senior attorney at the Institute for Justice (IJ). Daryl James is a writer at IJ.