Winston Churchill once said that "a nation that forgets its past, has no future." If you have yet to read our previous update titled "Let’s Change Lot Size Minimums! A Look Back to 1956", we encourage you to read it before reading this update.

What's In A Name?

We decided to dig deeper, past 1956, and what we thought we knew in search of even older references to Biloxi’s 5,000 square foot minimum lot size requirement, and we found one. But it wasn’t the age of the ordinance that caught our attention—it was its name. A name that doesn’t just hint at intent, but declares it outright. The ordinance that established this standard was titled, quite strikingly:

• City of Biloxi, Mississippi, Ordinance Number 790, 1940: An ordinance to promote the health, safety, morals, and general welfare of the community; to lesson congestion in the streets; to secure safety from fire, panic, and other dangers; to provide adequate light, air, and access; to avoid the overcrowding of land, and the undue concentration of people; to facilite the provision of transportation, water, sewerage, schools, parks, and other public requirements; to promote the best use of lands and the size, shape, and use of buildings; and to provide for the administration and enforcement of this ordinance under the laws of the state of Mississippi.
• Read the Ordinance: Sun Herald, Monday, 20 May, 1940 (Ordinance Number 790)

Civic Wellbeing

Did something truly change? Have the fundamental standards of health, safety, morals, and the general welfare of a community evolved so drastically since 1940? Because those backing the Beauvoir Villas project won’t just imply that they have — they’ll be forced to argue it. To justify packing 213 homes onto lots a mere 1,500 square feet in size—a far cry from the long-standing 5,000 square foot benchmark—they must persuade the public and City Council that this sudden shrinkage serves the very pillars of civic wellbeing. That it somehow safeguards our health, upholds our safety, and protects our community. 

That is a case they have yet to make.