I think you have it backwards. The zoning change would be to dump "expensive" commercial real estate into cheap residential or mixed. In this case they are priv

I think you have it backwards. The zoning change would be to dump "expensive" commercial real estate into cheap residential or mixed. In this case they are privately owned but basically under the receivership of the city council. This is a small town in the boonies, so there isn't anybody with the time or the capital to force through zoning variances. There being a "market price" kind of assumes that real estate is a simple commodity, but cities themselves usually excerpt some control of their own destiny. Once you move out of a desirable coastal location you generally won't take for granted the amount of effort cities take to attract jobs. So some of it is zoning, some of it is infrastructure, and some of it is raw concessions that a city demands or gives its businesses.