Territorial Review Copenhagen - Region Hovedstaden

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Capital Region together with the City of Copenhagen and other
municipalities in Copenhagen may opt to follow Vancouver‘s example and
first commission a discussion paper for a Regional Affordable Housing
Strategy, which would then inform a debate around a regional housing
action plan. 25 Critical to the framing of this project is a consideration of the
direct effects of growth management and land use planning regulations on
the stock of affordable housing. 26 Accordingly, such an evaluation would
need to take into account such factors as opportunity costs – of using the
land for agriculture, the resources used to construct the house, and the cost
of infrastructure, e.g. schools, police and fire, water and wastewater, and
transportation services – the present location value and future location value
of a development.
The issue of housing has in many ways been de-institutionalised in
Denmark. Since the dissolution of the Ministry of Housing in Denmark in
2001, discussions on housing have been fragmented amidst myriad agencies
and ministries. Over the course of the past several decades, the capacity of
municipalities to support the development of homes of modest cost has been
gradually eroded. The authority of municipalities to support residential
building, including providing financial security, is, for example, limited to
the options granted under social housing legislation, unless there is a
separate legal basis, such as the Danish Integration Act. 27 In one sense,
Danish municipalities had more planning powers over housing stock before
1958, when the Housing Construction Law was ratified. 28
Given evidence of the negative effects of rent control, the Danish
Parliament might re-examine the implementation of this policy. The Danish
Economics Council (De Økonomiske Råd) recently found that rent control
was poorly targeted and misaligned with the original equity goals that
inspired its creation. The Council argued that ―the highest benefits go to
high-income groups, while the lowest benefits accrue to middle-income
groups‖ (Economic Council, 2001). Other research in Denmark has
documented that household wealth and income are positively correlated with
the rent control benefit (Jespersen and Munch, 2001; Munch and Svarer,
2002). Given these inconsistencies, it is appropriate to explore changes in
existing rent control practices that would more effectively target the most
disadvantaged groups.
The national government could better facilitate the production of
moderate-cost housing in the Copenhagen metropolitan region through
allocating additional planning powers, especially with respect to limits on
collaboration between the government and private developers. One of these
powers could include the ability to sell land that would be used for social or
moderate-cost rental housing at reduced prices. Unlike municipalities in
England, Germany or the Netherlands, such a practice is currently not legal