13 
function may not always be included within the general statutory 
authorization.” 
2. The State may enable localities to collaborate, join together 
through cooperative arrangements, or consolidate to provide services 
that are difficult for any one town to handle independently. This 
would encompass making provision for voluntary municipal mergers, 
the transfer of functions from city to special district or vice versa, 
the establishment of metropolitan study commissions or multipurpose 
functional districts; the creation of metropolitan planning agencies, 
regional planning agencies, or metropolitan councils of government. 
The State’s aim is usually to foster the enlargement or consolidation 
of local government so that municipalities become more capable of 
controlling metropolitan and regional growth. Local governments are 
usually responsible for taking the initiative themselves in these 
matters." 
3. The State may provide technical assistance to localities to help 
them fulfill their development responsibilities. An arrangement 
whereby a State planning agency provides staff service to a local 
government to help prepare comprehensive physical plans or special 
planning studies is only one of the many ways in which such technical 
aid can be utilized. The State usually requires localities to meet mini- 
mum standards of performance as a condition for receiving technical 
aid.” 
4. The State may extend financial assistance to localities in the 
form of loans, grants-in-aid, or tax concessions, in order to broaden 
the fiscal base the localities may draw upon in their efforts to combat 
urban problems. Financial assistance takes various forms. New Jersey, 
for example, has a program of issuing grants-in-aid to communities 
over a 5-year period to help carry out continuing planning. Several 
Northeastern States, including Massachusetts, provide funds to 
cities to help them meet their share of urban renewal costs.% A 
erowing number of States are taking a more active part in metropolitan 
open-space planning programs by authorizing funds which localities 
can use to purchase the fee or an interest in the fee on land. In most 
cases an adequate standard of local government performance is a 
quid pro quo for State financial aid. Grants-in-aid, therefore, provide 
State government with substantial bargaining power. 
5. The State may regulate or administer certain local activities 
that have areawide implications. The State may move directly to 
resolve disputes among local units of government in a metropolitan 
area, especially disputes that cannot be resolved at the local level 
by mutual agreement, or are of such moment as to impede the effec- 
10 For an explanation of this situation relative to Massachusetts law, see memorandum from James Powers, 
principal research assistant to Daniel O’Sullivan, Director of the Legislative Research Bureau, on ‘‘Devolu- 
tion of Powers: Features of Self-Executing Constitutional Home Rule in Massachusetts,” June 26, 1968. 
11 For an explanation of this situation relative to Massachusetts law, see report relative to regional govern- 
ment of the Massachusetts Legislative Research Council, Jan. 26, 1970, and report relative to voluntary 
municipal merger procedures of the Massachusetts Legislative Research Council, Mar. 11, 1970. 
12 The department of community affairs has responsibility for the administration of statewide planning 
aid programs. Local planning groups collaborate with community affairs and 11 regions participate in 
regional planning programs. Through 1969 these cooperative planning projects had an aggregate project 
cost of about $6 million of which the Federal Government was supplying about two-thirds. 
13 On redevelopment projects for which contracts for Federal capital grants have been signed, the Depart- 
ment of Community Affairs is authorized to make a grant from Statefunds up to one-half of the local share 
required by the Federal contract. In 1969 the limit on aid authorized to be granted from State taxes was 
$40 million with annual payments not exceeding $2 million. These limits will probably be doubled in the 
next few years. On projects to redevelop commercial or industrial areas for which no Federal aid is available 
State grants of 50 percent of the net cost to the community are authorized up to a limit of $20 million. 
There is little redevelopment in Massachusetts in this second limited class. 
