Eagle P&Z held off making a decision on its Foothills comp plan changes until June 11. After that, giving the okay to 20,000 “units” (to start!! “bonus” units can be added to that) in the North Foothills will go to the City Council. I’m 99% sure they’ll approve the plan, even though everyone who spoke at the P&Z meeting EXCEPT M3 and Suncor developers didn’t like it. And one landowner’s attorneys admitted that they didn’t like the plan because they want MORE density!

How many hundreds of thousands has been spent on Blueprint for Good Growth and COMPASS in order to get the cities and county to agree on where, when and how growth SHOULD occur in this valley? How long will it take for Eagle to kick sand in the faces of all their fellow Blueprint counterparts by deciding to annex the North Foothills into their city and give a thumbs up to huge developers? Blueprint, RIP.

Your BoCC opinion was incontrovertibly true before Paul Woods was elected (saving us from yet more havoc and even higher taxes had the Queen continued to reign). Woods is a proponent of growth paying for itself, instead of developers dumping the infrastructure bill on us, and has voted that way in the few instances which have come up since January.

Yzaguirre is running again and I expect we all remember he just squeaked by Wilson…which leads me to endorse your second point. People need to speak up. Particularly since Y has to run again and needs every vote, he’s likely to be more responsive on everything, at least pre-election. (I have acquaintances who think that since they’re Boise residents they can’t vote in BoCC elections…for real.)

Now, how do we fix it? We get ACTIVELY involved! Make sure that there is citizen representation at the CCDC – ACHD – Council – Commissioners meetings so that this junk can be stopped before it gets so out of hand. When you go to any of the above named public meetings and you see 3-4-5 people there, (and they are only there because their personal ox is being gored).

You can’t help but understand why the “leaders” think they can do whatever they want. And who should we throw out first? Let’s start with the “idiot” we have for a mayor, and then go to work on ALL THREE of the county commissioners! It’s high time we took this community back. And when we do, the CCDC’s and the ACHD’s and all the rest will fall into line. The REAL crime here is that we have a mayor’s race and city council races coming in November and we will be lucky if 20% of us show up at the polls!

I wish I would have given that speech 35 years ago before you and all of the folk out east of me moved in..

Talk about a NIMBY

COMPASS’ traffic counts for Warm Springs make it clear that the bulk of the ever increasing weekday traffic comes from the increasing number of houses in places like El Paseo, Foothills East, Warm Springs Mesa and other density increases adjacent to Warm Springs west of Harris Ranch that the EPB will not benefit. So, on any week day, and all late fall, winter, and early spring, the EPB will do east-enders very little good.

Worse, if you look at the proposed layout of Harris Ranch, there is a northwest section of about 300 – 500 houses. The traffic from that section will be able to sneak out the “back door”, thus avoiding 2-5 roundabouts, the EPB, and Parkcenter Blvd, by taking the existing Warm Springs into the city. In traffic speak, that means the building of the bridge and subsequent approval of Harris Ranch will put as many as 3,000 – 5,000 additional cars per day on the already overcrowded Warm Springs. East-enders may see that as the lesser of many evils, but it is a substantial further degradation of the current situation. It is a degradation that is not necessary and for which we will all be charged $170+.

I remain convinced that there are fewer than 3 clear winners in this debacle. ACHD and Boise City could have, and should have required them to cover the cost of the Bridge in return for the go-ahead to develop Harris Ranch.

Until that is rectified, everyone in the valley, regular citizens, businesses, and other developers alike, should be outraged.

When will the deciders wise up to quality of life issues?

Why, because Joe and Suzy Idaho don’t lick the boots of the deciders like the developers do. As a matter of fact, Joe and Suzy Idaho don’t bother to vote because they are too worried about the latest sale at Wal(Commie star)Mart. Who are the deciders going to listen too?

The “deciders” tell Joe and Suzy Idaho, the ones willing to vote, they are the defenders of “freedom”. Joe and Suzy keep the “deciders” in power while their middle class jobs get exported to the the deciders new communist friends with the giant cheap labor pool. The promise (myth) of freedom is the currency of political corruption.

Purple hearts and bronze stars are the new, decider provided, cracker jack prizes for the poor and middle class.

People are moving to Idaho because it is cheap and the politicians want it that way. Get used to it. More are on their way.

There’s a tremendous recreational use particularly through the summer months in that direction. The big geographic issue that has been ignored thus far in these comments is the narrow and obnoxious space between the mesa/tablerock and the river making Warm Springs undesirable as the main route. As Sara points out, they made Parkcenter a broad 5 lane roadway because it couldn’t be done cheaply on the other side. Of course that requires the bridges, the first of which was finished about a decade ago.

But the EPB has been mired in the Harris Ranch debacle in an effort to get the development to pony up some of the cost. Nobody got it in writing though and when Bureau of Rec insisted on 4 different designs at several hundred thousand dollars, Harris Ranch pulled the plug.

I would also point out that the difference in price cited by the Guardian is also the difference between a two lane and a four lane bridge. One of the most ridiculous aspects of the initial negotiations was that they were only talking the cost associated with a 2 lane bridge which would have been obsolete before it was constructed.

From someone that rides Warm Springs everyday, the need is there. But I agree that Harris Ranch should be paying alot more than it is to get her done.

At the same time, I think it is a rhetorical mistake to constantly attack growth. Without growth, our local economy would implode. Growth is fuel for the economy.

EDITOR NOTE–Mr. Bond, growth is also fuel for the foul air that yesterday was TWICE as dirty as Los Angeles air.