First off - it's not the County's responsibility to protect your home values. That should have ZERO consideration when it comes to EDUCATIONAL decisions.

We are talking about property values in the one of the wealthiest counties in one of the the wealthiest states. Property values are not a "concern" here. And perhaps property values would not vary so widely, if certain communities didn't work so hard to segregate themselves from those they see themselves as better than.

And here's what makes me sad. Columbia has it written into it's core values that it is a community of shared resources and actively looks to integrate communities of varying economic status, attending the same schools, etc.

Then you have communities like Maple Lawn the get built overnight, sit nearly vacant for years before the demand catches up. Then once demand is there and people say "now we need affordable housing" and Maple Lawn residents say "oh but the infrastructure can't support it!!!" And they spend all of their money and political capital to keep "the poors" away from their community. No - they must go live in Columbia. And so what happens? You successfully segregate yourselves. And then the schools become segregated. And now the board has to resort to redistricting in order to correct that.

It's modern day segregation hidden behind property values. So yeah... pay the fuck up.