However, there is a tipping point for all growth. The immigration from Mexico is an example. I don’t mind if Mexicans want to move here but when you get to a number above 10 million who didn’t even ring the doorbell you have to wonder how many more tablesettings you can find in the pantry. This would be just as true if it were 10 million Brits or 10 million Chinese.

Our valley is under a similar pressure – how many more thousands can we welcome before the quality of life that folks move here to enjoy will dry up? You obviously can’t tell the last few hundred thousand who moved here to leave. (Like the plan the US Senate hatched up – “if you haven’t been here two years or more you have to leave.” Right.)

Who even knows how to calculate the number of people we can reasonably welcome? Where are the enviromentalists? Is anyone seriously worrying about the wildlife situation?What about water? What about gridlock? What about air quality? What about the effect on property taxes when dozens of more new schools need to be built? Where are the hikers and bikers and fishermen? Do they want traffic lights on the trails and rivers?

I don’t think any of our politicians want to think more than two or three years down the road but we older folks owe it to the next generations not to leave this area unlivable. I have no family left in Boise but I still feel an obligation to the children and grandchildren of families in this valley.

Why does City government want to turn beautiful downtown Boise into another “urban blight” area, full of pollution , traffic congestion,and canyons of steel and concrete?
Because the same developers they give the green light will keep them in office as lifetime incumbents. Now, that’s the epitomy of selfishness!

The undeveloped areas east and south of Boise teem with native wildlife… these areas are prime camping and natural touring areas for hikers, bikers and those who love the outdoors ,including hunters and fishermen.

We have the best of both worlds here in Boise- -a rural city surrounded by a paradise of nature. Let’s stop the developtment GREED and keep it that weay!

Where are all our local “investigative” TV and paper reporters?

There’s something so massively un-American about this, it turns my stomach. Perhaps by the time Patriot Act III rolls around, the little guy can add a clause that will allow us to lock up politicans that demonstrate such short-sightedness (ugh, who am I kidding?).

It’s important to note that after all the attention focused on protecting critical wildlife habitat and ensuring public access to open space in the Boise City Foothills Policy Plan, the levy is doing little to realize the plan’s objectives. The area now proposed for development by Skyline was for sale long before Skyline purchased the property, but the city failed to seriously consider purchasing the land with levy funds. Now the property is expotentially more expensive.

Of further interest in that Mr. Tony Jones, the most vocal opponent to Skyline’s proposed development, himself lives up on Hammer Flats – in a residential development illegally subdivided no less. I guess he got his, now screw everyone else.

I’ve seen the same thing happen in Albuquerque, Anchorage, and Tucson. Unlike the previous commentator, I see little of “unintended consequences” at play.

Ahh, the Golden Rule – he who has the gold, makes the rules. But, in this case public funds have been extracted from the common man – and are being used to keep the common man out of the picture. Isn’t it nice that our money is being used to construct our own, less than, guilded cage. And, all of our best laid plans will be used to line the bottom of that cage.

I think that at some point we, our children, and grandchildren will become tenants in our own community. There’s already a huge disparity between the Have’s and Have-not’s in the valley. Our public schools are collapsing, transit services are virtually non-existant, and our basic public services are coming down around our ears. All while our elected leaders play their fiddles while Rome burns.

Economics 101, supply goes down while demand goes up, prices soar, i.e., profits soar for remaining landowners.

I wonder if some of the people behind the clever foothills land supply reduction act are themselves owners of foothills land. What an ingenious way to make money!

EDITOR NOTE–A current city councilor once told the GUARDIAN he favored the foothills levy because it, “would attract more CEOs who would move their companies to Boise.”