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Show Idea. Why is it so easy was telling one more county commission one more to an new for us to accept the false notion that adding buildings existing tax base will result new that is buddings to an existing in lower taxes for everybody? The simple truth adding tax base merely adds new demands for services: local government expands, taxes go ..everybody's taxes. If you think government gets more efficient when it gets bigger, think again. In this case, the developer was asking the county commission fra1 some favors the local P&Z board had refused. He argued that his new condogolf coursehousing project would add $1,500 tax revenue for every unit built He said nothing about fire fact that the building was being done on unincorporated county farm ground and that those new residents would be wanting sewers, roads, schools, water, police and fire protection, etc, not to mention the added overhead expense of expanding every county administrative office. Add the probability that fills stuff needs to be provided at the outset before the county starts to realize any additional tax revenue and you appreciate why these developments are bad for the people who already live in the county. But these Ideas always sound good, especially to poor county budgetera. The second point I want to make on the growth issue is that I've been fold by St George residents that the biggest mistake made in the current boom over there was to allow rldgetop development Aside from the obvious flash flood problems that have already surfaced (no pun intended), it finally dawned on St George residents that most people would rather look up at rimrock than look up at housetops. I was hoping that Moabites might learn something from Big Brother St) George. Which gets me to the third and real point of this section: The Grand County Council and its captive cohorts on P&Z are falling all over themselves trying to outdevelop the developers. It's approving rldgetop developments right and left (of the Sand Flats Road) and we'd all better start planning on taxes going up to help pay for it. I'm guessing that one of the incentives is Grand County's own piece of Sand Flats ground that has the developers, and apparently some of the Council, drooling. The old shooting range, now called Musket Ridge Estates or something is being considered for development by its owner Grand County. All of these developments off the Sand Flats Road have been in the works for several years now; they were temporarily delayed by the former county council with help from a concerned Moab City, but were quickly rate of the first proud accomplishments of the present county council. wrong-heade- Over die yean I've invented myself a pastime of redrawing political boundaries in the western US, trying to do a better job than our forefathers or foremothera or whoever it was drew all those lines on maps in the 1800's. I always thought that straight lines running north and south or east and west for hundreds of miles were senseless. I mean really, wouldn't the Great Basin (eastern Nevada and western and northern Utah and parts of southern Idaho) make a better boundary for a state than the present Utah or Nevada? Poor Idaho is already three states: Southeast, Southwest, and Northern. Of course, the State of Northern Idaho would need to include Jordan, Montana, but that's just too long a as well as politically. The Siena side of Nevada belongs to northern California, while the southern California desert is really part of ArizonaNew Mexico. Glacier National Park, Yellowstone, the Sawtooths, the Wind Rivers, the Tetons, and most of the Montana Rockies would make a better national park than a state. Closer to home, the state of Navajo would include most of the Four Comers area, Colorado ought to recognize that its eastern half is more Kansas than Kansas, and the area between the Wasatch Front and the Front Range would make a great state. Honestly, somebody tell me why towns like Vernal and Craig and Rifle and Price and Grand Junction ought not to be part of the same intermountain state. Moab, Monticello, Blanding and Green River make a county. But that county doesn't get the east side of the LaSals- -t hat's part of Montrose County. So much for my ideas of common sense; instead we get Green River and Castle Dale in the same county, but not Castle Dale and Price. Really makes sense doesn't it? No wonder that Green River folks are perennial complainants and ready on November 7 to bolt from Grand County. If only we could get Emery County to buy upper Spanish Valley from San Juan County and then trade Elgin for it I think Grand County would come out all right. OK, after the last five paragraphs. I've taken tongue out of cheek and will now just report facts: The good folks in Green River lobbied the Utah legislature to pass special legislation allowing Green River to move the county boundary to the east All it needs is ratification in the November election-a- nd I don't mean ratification by Grand County that would be following the statute that everyone in Utah (except Green Rivet) has to follow. The law was changed so that all of those nice neighbors could be in the same county. It had nothing to do with the tax revenue from the four biggest motels in Green River taxes that will now go to Emery County instead of Grand County. It was done because a new boundary makes eminent good sense; it wasn't done to put more money under the control of Emery County. of Grand County noticed that I wonder if any of those Emery County just passed a school bond election on top of an already high tax rate and that die city of Green River has a pretty sizable property tax. It looks to me like Grand County will be better off by not having to provide services to Elgin; Emery County will have enhanced tax revenues, and only the affected residents will suffer due to higher property taxes. Anyhow-- if Green River gets more transient room tax to promote the hell out of its new golf course, maybe it will divert some of the upstate crowds that now try to cram themselves into Moab every weekend. stretch-geographic- ally More Planning and Zoning A couple of weeks agp, while driving through beautiful Teton Valley, Idaho, I was reading about local growth and development in the Teton Valley News. One more developer d Looking cast on Center St. toward Moabs ridgeline What's worse is that the Council is approving this stuff before real problems have been solved. The Council is saying that it doesn't know how to solve the problems of sewer, water, road, drainage!, etc., but it approves the projects anyway. At least in die Teton Valley example above, Teton County merely gave extensions iff time, not approvals, ft makes one wonder who's really in control-I'- ve seen examples of subdivision requests before five subdividers even own the land in question. Our council acts like it expects the developers to police themselves, like we don't really need all that dumb regulatory stuff normally provided by P&Z commissions and county governing boards. In particular, it seems to me that the Sand Hats Road, at least file section between town and the dump, is not designed to handle a whole bunch more traffic. Shouldn't traffic problems be resolved before the subdivisions go in? It's time for the City to get involved again. These proposed developments are in reality Moab City developments regardless of any arbitrary city boundary. There seems little reason for all the subdividing zone changing and PUDing approved by five County, except to make it easier on the developers. The problem with county control at this point is that the developers are leaning on Grand County to provide the services because the county just might become a joint developer. On June 3rd, a piece of file development was approved and another piece was given a public hearing Two weeks later, another piece was approved. There's no water, inadequate roads, no sewer just some developers who want ifs 106 in the shade and out there walking you're around in the heat. Ifs the Dog Days of Summer, folks and 78 S. 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