Smaller Homes & Zoning Issues

A Journal Sentinel article by Paul Gores covers a builder, Miracle Homes, that is building a smaller home, "Mi-Pad" (I think that's Apple's lawyers on the other line), with a 3 bedroom and 2.5 bathrooms that supposedly sells for as low as $89,000.  Here's a hint-you don't need 2.5 bathrooms for a 3 bedroom home!

I don't see this on Miracle's website, but the article says they'll have two Mi-Pads for this year's Miracle Tour of Homes (apparently not to be confused with the Parade of Homes).

Here's what jumped out at me.

Not every community welcomes small homes, but Hignite said he's found that Mount Pleasant, Belgium and West Bend are among those that do.

My question is-why doesn't other communities welcome smaller homes (on, presumably, smaller lots)?  Smaller homes offer more affordable options for people, as well as options for lifestyle preferences.

Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission offers a list of communities and their zoning policies.  As you can see, there are quite a range in the minimum sizes of single-family homes and minimum lot sizes.

I've heard jokes that very often many older dense areas would be illegal under modern zoning policies, and that's true to a large degree.  Zoning for new developments very often have larger requirements than older parts of the community.  To some extent, this is intended to bring in more upscale housing for more property tax revenue, but I suspect this will come back to bite many communities in the backside years later when those homes are no longer upscale, yet the community has to spend money to maintain the infrastructure and services for those homes.