File under “I’ll scratch yours, if you scratch mine”: Former Ada County P&Z board member Frank Martin cast the alleged “winning vote” for the destructive Cliff’s development on Hammer Flat. This 1,350 unit development on prime winter game range is still without access from SH 21 and joins the many other developments with insufficient demand or even infrastructure for its product, now or in the foreseeable future.
Lesson Learned: Putting developers on key approval boards makes for an unbalanced, sham of a process.

As a resident of Hill Road,I am happy to hear someone talking about the infrastructure downstream of these development. It seems reasonable that the roads should have adequate capacity for these developments before these developments are approved. If not existing capacity, at least, PLANNED capacity.

Right now, Hill Road and Harrison are taking the traffic that other designed routes can’t hold. Some people on Hill Road can’t leave there doors open during commuter times because of carbon monoxide alarms go off in their homes due to traffic.

I wonder if citizens were given a choice between the higher taxes it will cost to build/improve these roads and lose access to foothill land versus the same money going to buy more foothills land to preserve the essence of Boise, which they would chose.

Nice Bob….what a hypocrite. You escaped CA now hurry slam the door shut behind you right? Was your relocation here not an example of Treasure Valley “growth”. Oh…wait I get it…it was ok because that was back in 1990 and growth didn’t start until….apparently 1991 after you got here. Do you bozo’s read the stuff you post or do you just close your eyes and type? Unreal.

Here’s the 2006 SH 55 white paper prepared by NACFA/DCRNA: http://www.nacfa.net/assets/applets/06-1117–55_white_paper_v4.pdf

Though now somewhat dated, it gives an order of magnitude snapshot.

Note especially that SH55 now carries 6000-9000 vehicles per day and the trip capture rate (footnote one).

Antiphobe. …what a strange name. Is that European? Harsh words from a brave, anonymous soul.

Those of us who become victims of growth are expected to just stay put and suck it up then?

Unfortunately, as the evil machine of growth has relentlessly destroyed farmland and existing communities, it has pushed many to abandon their families, friends and homes in search of something better.

For 99% of human existence, we bipeds have lived in very small troupes of 100 to 200. We lived close to the land and knew our home intimately.

The way most of us live now is a cartoon of civilization that makes people very unhappy. Our sprawling cities have created legions of slaves to an economy that benefits the very few elites.

We are destroying the ability of the planet to sustain life. We are destroying all of the naturally occurring systems that provided clean water, food, and shelter to our ancestors back to the beginning of time.

Those who have been fooled by the propaganda machine into believing America is a great nation, are to be pitied.

When the last corporation shuts off their lights, packs up their machinery and ships it off to Asia, the brainwashed little consumers of America will, as always, be looking for someone to blame. …Someone to hate. They will waddle out onto their porch and wait for food handouts from their precious government that will never come.

It is not too late to start thinking and learning. The truly educated explore their world unfettered by popular opinion, which is often wrong.

What we think is ‘normal’ is really a monstrous display of oil wealth being squandered over a very short period of time. We have created a far-flung empire that cannot survive without cheap energy.

Once you understand the concept of ‘Peak Oil Theory’, you can move on to …what does it mean for us?

In short, it means our nation will be unrecognizable in the very near future, perhaps a few months, but certainly not longer than a few years. We are not preparing at all for the huge changes coming our way from expensive energy.

Where will we get our food? How will we survive the cold Boise winter without heat? These are questions that the most citizens find shocking because they cannot envision a future substantially different from our current reality and quickly turn off their mind if inconvenient facts present themselves.

Spend some time on http://www.energybulletin.net/index.php

The website is the world clearinghouse for Peak Oil information. You will quickly find that the world’s most respected business news sources have declared that the Peak Oil crowd was/is right. You will find that our American media is hiding the most important event in the history of humanity, the peaking of global oil production, and what that means.

The greatest cover-up in the history of the world is in full swing right now.

My real estate friends tell me that house sales north of the river, from Boise to Star increased by 50 percent last month. Don’t get too excited. Three houses sold last month, two the month before.

For all the hype, the only thing that is really going into the ground at Avimor and Hidden Spring is money.

Antiphobe is probably in the mortgage business or some form of lending endeavor. He is a perfect example of the greedy mindset that brought us the S&L crisis, the mortgage lending crisis, gas crisis, and is sure democracy and WMD’s will be found in Iraq. People like him are parasites who get rich of the backs of tax payers.

Mercy sakes. Please don’t be too hard on Antiphobe. The poor dear was probably used to making a six digit income for really no effort at all in the real estate business. Now it is likely that he is up his income stream without a paddle. And, they may have also canceled his HELOC and lowered the limits on his credit card limits to next to nothing.

Goodness, if things don’t change for the better soon, he may have to go out and try to find a job.

Another point is that ACHD does not care about how much traffic there is anywhere…period.

As a weekly matter they vote to agree to developments that overload streets – and they don’t care. In fact they do it over and over again.

We have seen them actually state in public hearings that “we don’t even follow our own policy” when it comes to traffic loads on roads.

So who cares how many subdivisions anyone builds?

ACHD for one is not going to do anything…or care about the growth so why should the Copunty Commission?

We’re on the verge of 4th of July weekend, when traffic on SH 55 hits an all-time high and boat trailers stretch as far as the eye can see. Imagine this, times 10+, and you’ll get an idea of the new and (not) improved SH 55 if this intensity of development goes in… and not just on the 4th, but every commute. We’re talking a car every 7 seconds at Brookside and 55, and that’s if they’re spread out over a 24-hour period, not just at rush hour.

Folks, it’s time to wake up and demand better planning from your County Commissioners — they’ll do it, and make the developers do it — but only if you hold them to it. Please send in your comments before the Dry Creek Ranch public hearing on 8/27/08 (6 pm, Ada County Court House) to [email protected]. Or, get your licks in by testifying personally on 8/27. And of course, don’t forget that it’s an election year for two of these commissioners.

Also, Cartwright Ranch PC will go before the Ada County Commissioners on 7/16/08. Try to comment on that one, too. And no, ACHD has NO plans to fund the 36th Street extension. North End, buckle your seatbelts. Your world is about to change like you can’t imagine.

…to Cyclops – none that I know of.

Regarding Real Estate being cyclical…

In Orange County Ca, around 1987, I was a realtor. Boeing laid off 20,000 people about 30 miles away and real estate went into a coma for about 10 years. Sales were essentially at a standstill and prices dropped each year.

Why is the drop in real estate different this time??

Houses have become too expensive in relation to income, they have to lose a lot more value to realign with real incomes. Also, real incomes are dropping like a rock with the skyrocketing commodities prices. Our government inflation statistics are bogus. You can find inflation statistics calculated the old fashioned way at…
http://www.shadowstats.com/
They say the CPI is much higher than reported.

Another reason house prices will keep dropping is that folks are already starting to cram more people into fewer houses because of economic factors.

A final reason is that these houses are energy pigs and very poorly insulated compared to what is possible. Natural gas production in America is falling off of a cliff and liquid natural gas is not working out the way we thought it would. Soon, the houses in Boise are mostly going to be cold and dark in the winter, and that just won’t make for high resale numbers.

http://www.energybulletin.net/node/830
–Matt Simmons (the worlds largest energy financier) pointed out that North America hit its natural gas peak in 1973 and is now falling off the production cliff. Presentations exploring Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) imports to the US concluded what FTW [Ruppert’s website] already knew. The cost is too expensive, the lead time too long, and the capital investment too great to make much of a difference here.

Antiphobe, sadly, your evaluation is mostly correct. However, the biggest difference in development in Middleton as opposed to the foothills is that we don’t have to look at a pile of concrete and wood 24/7.
Obviously Sharon can be as obnoxious as your first wife. But I would much rather have her
“squeaky” novel than the “Opus” cartoon we currently are suffering with.

Sweet Reason – again more displaced anger. Developers pay Impact Fees and the residents of their developments pay Property Taxes. Those funds are intended to improve roads. ITD and ACHD are your culpritt…not developers. Don’t hate the player – hate the game.

Antiphobe, can you explain to me how developers get impact fees and property taxes to ITD? Last I heard, ITD gets its revenues from gasoline taxes (only). Also, I estimate it will take $600,000,000 or more to upgrade SH-55 to a limited access expressway. Assuming 20,000 homes along SH-55, this would be $30,000 per home in impact fees.

I really don’t see a culprit, only a general unwillingness on the part of developers and govenment agencies to acknowledge that there are some – literally – life and death issues at stake here.

Actually Anti-everything, impact fees do not cover the cost of the infrastructure.

It takes fees along the lines of 25% or more of the value of the developement to pay the real costs. Our fees are a little token so that the developmonsters can say “look, we’re paying our share”.

We the people of Idaho could shut down the developers in a New York minute by freezing zoning laws in the name of sanity. We the people of Idaho are powerful beyond our wildest dreams.

The ‘growth is good’, ‘growth will happen no matter what you do’ crowd are dead wrong. It is up to the people to control our destiny, not the greedy few who can never have enough of anything.

The only thing that stands between us and a better life is the corporate mouthpiece / advertising delivery devices known as television and newspapers.

If I had my way, I’d confiscate the local media buildings, run all of their bubble headed bleach blondes out of town, and turn their properties and capital over to non-profit news organizations.

Sorry to be repetitive, but I really think you need to look outside the Valley at what is happening in the wider world. It isn’t just the real estate market in CA, FL, AZ, and NV that is tanking; it is the entire world economy based on easy credit and cheap energy that we have learned to rely on since the end of WW2. The party is over, guys, but the sobering up period has hardly begun.

There will be no real estate ‘uptick’ in 2010 . . . that’s when the Option ARMs start to reset and all the nice middle-class people with good jobs lose the homes they are already upside down on. But that’s just housing. The noose is already tightening on commercial resort developments, and it will hit commercial office and retail soon after. Anyone noticed what’s happening with Starbucks, GM, Ford, Home Depot, Linens n’ Things, and dozens of other companies that were expanding right along with the housing boom? Those businesses are shedding property and jobs as fast as they can, hoping to trim down to survival weight before the lending tsunami really hits.

To extend the analogy: all we have seen so far is the tide starting to recede, unexpectedly, as the sub-prime meltdown finally ended the go-go real-estate madness. The credit tide is still going out and out and out. The further it goes, the bigger the tidal wave that will follow. It’s going to wash away a lot of the world we took for granted, and we will be spending a long time rebuilding sometime after 2015 . . . perhaps long after.

The whole world finance structure has come unstuck, and is causing chaos in Europe and Asia, not just the US. No one knows how to stop it. It looks a lot like 1929 on steroids. Read the European papers online and see what’s happening in Ireland, Spain, Italy, China, Japan, the UK. Then do what you can to survive what is coming.

Thank you Bob Blurton for the forwarded rant.

I have been thinking for some time as I pass land being torn up for unneeded buildings that will not have tenants that Idaho really needs to put any useable land under cultivation for food — human and animal — now. Zoning laws should encourage people to keep a given number rabbits, chickens, ducks and other small farm-type animals on urban and semi-urban properties. Support intensive programs to teach people how to grow edible garden plants or do urban farming. And, as in the 1960s and 1970s, share skills and knowledge about what you can produce yourself to supply household needs.

Idahoans were a pretty self-sufficient people when we moved here 42 years ago. I was constantly amazed at the life-skills ordinary people used (and shared) regularly. And every summer, a surprising number of them strapped on backpacks and headed out of Boise on foot for the mountains. There was a steady stream of them walking up the two-lane stretch of Highway 15 (now Highway 55) past Floating Feather where we lived that first summer.

Today, the first step toward taking back our lives in the Treasure Valley and beyond should be to call a halt to development that does not have the infrastructure to support it, that may not have adequate water available and that will serious degrade life and even use of property in the neighboring areas. Public officials need to look long and hard at whether there will even be a way to finance the needed infrastructure in the foreseeable future — and be required to state what the financial means are, if they believe it is possible.

Doesn’t seem that residents in the Valley care much that the proposed Dry Creek development would canabalize one of the most productive agricultural tracks in the area…

Not that the traffic issues are anything to sneeze at, but the out provided to any developer is that they can buy all necessary improvements to mitigate the traffic impacts. If a development requires six lanes and overpasses, then when they can reach traffic concurrency (when the supply reaches the demand) then the development gets approved.

But how do you mitigate the permanent loss of local farmland?

It has been argued that growth is inevitable — that it’s just a question of when it all happens and its eventual distribution. This is a specious argument since the capacity to support all these mouths is not limited by manmade infrastructure but by the very ability to grow local crops.

Wasn’t the county’s staff at one point working on a set of agricultural preservation strategies? Wasn’t the Blueprint for Good Growth suppose to address this limiting factor? Doesn’t the very Long Range Regional Transportation Plan for Ada & Canyon County accept that farmland preservation is the lynchpin for growth (not roadway capacity)?

It seems that the leadership we expect of our elected officials to care for the public’s health, welfare, and safety is sorely lacking. And no one is blameless. It is incredibly easy for one agency to fire off a letter pointing out the problems facing another agency — but how damning can their criticism be when these same agencies have officially accepted the ag-based limiting factor on growth in the Valley AND they withhold the necessary resources to develop a joint comprehensive plan to deal with this issue?

The City of Boise is worried about Dry Creek? Where’s its support for Agriculture and Agricultural Processing preservation? COMPASS is worried about SH55 carrying capacity? Why hasn’t it cited it’s own LRTP’s AG Preservation policies regarding the loss of the Dry Creek farmland? Why have all the land use agencies in Ada County renegged on their obligations to fully implement the Ag Preservation policies spelled out in their own Blueprint for Good Growth Phase One Report?

At one level it really is okay to take the position that a “generic” parcel of property can be developed — as long as the development mitigates its impacts. You establish what constitutes an Adequate Public Facility — and you set up the rules to ensure that no one crosses that line.

But, when a development encroaches upon our communities’ abilities to feed the populace the time to define un-mitigatable impacts is upon us. Is farmland a “public facility”, is sufficient drinking water, is breathable air?

Clippity,

If you mean that I seem to have transformed into a “growthaphobe” then I’m afraid you’re in for a disappointment. There is a legitimate roll for growth to play in the Valley, both in & out of municipalities.

Outside of cities, limited high-density growth can (and should) be used as a mechanism to convert valuable open space and ag land to permanent preserves. The inability to see the correct roll for ex-urban growth was one of a handful of horrible oversights in the Boise Foothills Plan. Further, the existing municipal governments’ inability to embrace the concept of a Transfer of Development Rights by identifying the necessary Receiving Zones is another.

While my short-term stint at the county was enlightening, I was left disheartened by how the concept of growth has been demonized — and how many have chosen to highjack the public process to achieve their own selfish ends.

Though Ada County is the most wealthy county in Idaho, to be the King of Paupers is nothing to boast about. If the tax structure in the state were corrected (with a local option tax), and the individual levy rates were set to address all the problems that face the citizens of the region — then preservation-through-purchase might eventually be a viable option. But even with such a hugh overhaul of the tax system, it’s doubtful that a culture of have-nots will choose to pool their limited resources to tackle the big regional issues.

This leaves preservation-through-entitlement as the only option. So far Ada County is the only jurisdiction that has figured out how to do this, but the process is still overly reliant on the whims of elected officials — and not on the hard science of preservation. To their credit, the commissioners do rely on technical staff to guide them, but even that guidance has its limits.

The best next step is to continue the Blueprint process to the next logical level — the creation and adoption of Subarea Specific Plans that identify the critical resources and best growth scenario for each subarea. These Subarea Plans cannot be a simple McHargian Constraints Analysis, but an actual Specific Plan with listed pre-entitlement rights for individual parcels. No parcel owner would be forced to develop his land as identified in the adopted plan, but if he so chooses then he enjoys a greatly streamlined approval process. If he wanted to do something else, then there’s the whole public review process left to him — with the additional burden of convincing all the citizenry why they were wrong when they adopted the Subarea Plan.

Ultimately, such action would require that each unit of local government respect the authorities and constraints of the others. The one thing we’ve learned through Blueprint is that this is almost impossible. Until elected officials feel the anger of the citizens when they demonstrate an inability to play nice together — we’re doomed.

I would imagine the largest hurdle for the County Commissioners is fiscal – not a systemic avoidance of good planning. Though with their appointment of a non-planner as the director of the county’s Development Services department (for no other reason to save money), I’m not sure they haven’t cut their nose off to spite their face. It will take years to re-build the necessary depth of staff to deal with the emergent issues facing the county citizenry.

Though the county was the largest single financial contributor to the Blueprint process (and the largest contributor of staff resources), the funds came from one-time set-asides that were targeted for the re-write of the Comprehensive Plan. With that money now spent, the chances that additional county-citizen tax money will flow to prepare subarea plans is extremely unlikely. The North Ada County Foothills “Subarea” Plan portion of the revised County Comp plan is not a true Subarea plan, in that it falls far short of an actual Specific Plan — its current status is due to the lack of funding needed to develop a true growth plan for the region. It’s simply a list of contraints — and in some places at odds with the City of Eagle’s proposed plan.

The technical staff working on the agency portions of Blueprint’s implementation did propose a work-around that would shift the fiscal burden to the individual cities that would grow into the developing areas. This seemed reasonable since it would eventually be the citizens of those cities that would be expected to provide muncipal services to these areas. This was done through a fine-tuning of the State’s Area of City Impact modification process — via the insertion of a Planning Boundary Area that would establish a communication protocol between all the parties of interest. Within these PB’s the cities would fund and lead the Subarea planning process, with the county invited to participate as a key stakeholder.

One of the most galling aspects of the Blueprint process was the position that some leaders took in regards to regional cooperation. When the hired consultant suggested that an additional level of scrutiny should be applied to proposed developments along strategic transportation corridors and (already defined) preferred development nodes (and only during the Blueprint study), the Valley’s leadership balked and refused to implement the necessary interim statutes. Even though state law would automatically sunset these statutes in twelve months to protect private property rights, mayors and councils refused to cooperate. The county, for one, was prepared to move forward with an ordinance — but the cities unanimously halted any further discussion. The City of Eagle went one step further and wrote an official FU letter to the consultant stating that it felt it had the necessary plan already in place to deal with the situation (its Soaring Eagle Comp Plan) — and it added that if a development opportunity presented itself that deviated from their plan, it reserved the right to countermand its adopted language.

How’s that for cooperation? It should be noted that the mayors of Eagle and Meridian were instrumental in firing that consultant because he had the termerity to suggest that the cities in Idaho really don’t have the legal authority to annex property outside their respective Areas of City Impact. It’s not as if the consultant (Robert Freilich) didn’t understand the legal ramifications of his statement, he’s one of the most preeminent legal authorities in the country regarding land use issues — the American Bar Association even published his book “From Sprawl to Smart Growth. Successful Legal, Planning and Environmental Systems”. He’s also written 26 other publications related to the legal implications of growth management — but I guess an Egg Heiress and an Uber Soccer Mom know best.

Am I sounding grumpy?