Great idea! I knew this was on the Pullman ballot this fall but haven't heard
much of the debate pro and con.
Are the real estate/builders/building supply folks putting money into
advertising to defeat the de-annexation? Has WSU taken a stand? (If WSU adds
10,000 students in the next 15 years, as its long-range plan calls for,
it will need every one of those building lots, plus more, for new faculty and
staff.) And has the Daily News supported or opposed the referendum?
Passage of the referendum would raise some interesting questions for Moscow.
If Pullman succeeds in stopping residential growth while allowing employment
growth, where will all the new WSU employees live? Commute from rural Latah
County and add to the congestion on the Pullman-Moscow Highway?
Fort Collins' city planner spoke to my class last week about Boulder's
experience. In the mid-1980s, Boulder limited residential growth to 1% a year
while actively seeking new businesses. The result: Boulder now has 80,000
residents and 80,000 jobs. About half of the jobs are filled with people who
commute from up to 50 miles away, living in towns like Longmont and Louisville
that didn't have the infrastructure to handle rapid growth. Now, Boulder is
reconsidering and may rezone large parcels previously set aside for commercial
and industrial uses to residential.
--Kenton
Kenton Bird
Department of Journalism
and Technical Communication
Colorado State University
Fort Collins, CO 80523-1785
Phone: (970) 491-5986 Fax: (970) 491-2908
e-mail: KBird@vines.ColoState.edu