Debated is whether banning building on “steep” slopes is a state’s right or the right of local government. The Asheville Citizen-Times reported:
Landslides in Western North Carolina have caused an estimated $13.4 million in property damage and killed six people since 1990.
It is not stated whether the damage came to people who built on hillsides at their own risk or to people victimized from some idiot’s precariously-perched house sliding onto their persons and property. Evidently not on the table is consideration of making precarious builders personally responsible for property damage they inflict. Instead, steep slope ordinances have a reputation for being broad-brush infringements on property rights.
