I started asking 'who benefits' about small town zoning fights and it changed everything

Our city council was pushing a new water line project that seemed off, so I pulled the public records on who owned the land it would cross. Found out three council members had bought cheap plots there six months before the vote. I made a simple map showing the connections and posted it on Nextdoor. The project got pulled for review after two days. Has anyone else had luck with just following the property records?

2 comments

2 Comments

fionak631mo ago

Digging into property records is the real game changer. I did the same thing when they tried to rezone a lot near the old park for a storage facility. Turns out the planning commissioner's brother-in-law was the one who bought it. A few people at the town meeting brought it up and the whole thing just fell apart. It's crazy how often the answer is right there in the deeds. You just have to be the one to go look.

felix_fox1mo ago

Exactly. The paper trail doesn't lie.