Re: "to" or "from"

["bill london" <bill_london@hotmail.com>]

Thanks Evan, for a refreshing view of the famous quality of life issue.
Everyone in Moscow seems to talk the same language.  Everyone wants to 
preserve our quality of life.
The difficulty is that the definitions of what constitutes that quality are 
so divergent.
Lewiston is thrilled to have recruited a 500-employee company to the valley. 
  The 500 jobs in a clean industry will --the local economic development 
agency says-- preserve the quality of life by providing good jobs.  Sorry, 
but more likely is that the new residents drawn by that big company will 
strain the roads, schools, and other services, increase taxes on established 
residents while eroding the pleasant "small-town" feel of the community.
Evan lists a number of programs (like plans, fees, and restrictions) to 
increase the barriers to development.  They are already in place.  What is 
lacking are the city officials willing to stand up to development money and 
myths.
Maybe that is something we can change during this election cycle.
BL

>From: Nancy Holmes <ncmholmes@moscow.com>
>To: vision2020@moscow.com
>Subject: "to" or "from"
>Date: Mon, 4 Oct 1999 23:11:50 -0800
>
>
>And Now For Something Visionary!
>
>(a few more words about development)
>
>
>Perhaps even more noteworthy than the creation of baseball and jazz music
>is our country's invention of private property and the almost inviolate
>rights of ownership. Over the decades, citizens and their governments have
>tried to backpedal from the pervasiveness of this concept and its
>consequences with a myriad of methods; zoning ordinances, comprehensive
>plans, planning commissions, scenic easements, the imminent domain concept,
>neighborhood covenants, et cetera. These counter measures tend to be weak
>and reactionary.
>
>Development and construction in Moscow (and vicinity) seems to have always
>happened piecemeal  and those charged with "regulating" it do so on a case
>by case basis. As Mike Curley has pointed out, the "regulators" become part
>of the process only in the final stages when the land owners and developers
>are ready to present their proposals. They usually have the high ground by
>then - legally, procedurally and in terms of preparedness. If the citizens
>of Moscow (and vicinity) want to challenge this venerated process then they
>must present a unified front and they must be able to articulate why.
>
>I believe that during the past few decades development here has been
>forestalled more because of local economics and weather than because of
>anybody's conscious attempts to control it. The appealing paradox to this
>is that Moscow (and vicinity) has thus retained its overall status as a
>place to move to rather than a place to move from. The obvious question
>arises: How do we prevent turning the corner from "to" to "from". And whose
>to say when this happens anyway?
>
>Probably the easiest way to build a consensus on this is to define the
>conditions that make a "from" place. Then begin to put in barriers to
>prevent them. These "barriers" might be development plans, citizen advisory
>groups, traffic limits, greenspace fees, land use restrictions or things
>that nobody has invented yet. The main point is that the citizens and their
>government must switch from being reactive to proactive. The intent, I
>suppose, would be to build higher hurdles and tighter hoops for would-be
>developers and builders. But, in fairness, they need to know what the hoops
>and hurdles are ahead of time.
>
>Remember that the rights of private ownership have legal precedence in this
>arena. And the  American model for economic prosperity includes a "develop
>and construct" cornerstone. We must ask ourselves how much we want to mess
>with this paradigm.
>
>As for me, personally, I'm willing to mess with it a lot.  I'd love to
>start the process of describing Moscow as a "from" place and defining those
>things we'd like to prevent from sneaking up on us. Maybe my kids will
>dress up as developers for Halloween! They can go door-to-door with a front
>loader...
>
>
>				- Evan Holmes   October 4, 1999
>
>
>
>

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