Comparison of Property Values of Contaminated and Non-Contaminated Sites By Land Use Category in Ramsey County, Minnesota

Abstract

The commercial and industrial use of land for various kinds of economic activity can result in contamination. Contaminated properties, when not correctly remediated, may persist for years within a community remaining underutilized or unused entirely. Contaminated and underutilized land is a concern to citizens and governments as these properties remove productive land from development and may pose health risks as can contribute to reducing property values for the surrounding properties and can diminish the property tax base used to fund government programs and activities. This analysis will attempt to use geospatial techniques to assemble various types of public data to determine if land values of properties known to contain a contamination record are comparable to land values with sites not having a known contamination record. Land values—normalized by parcel to the unit of ‘assessed value per acre’—of contaminated and non-contaminated sites are compared within their respective generalized land use categories. The study area will encompass Ramsey County, Minnesota (170 square miles). The data for this analysis includes the sites (as point data) of the known contamination from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, property values from County records contained in parcel polygon data and existing land use types to be assembled from municipal governments, available as polygons.