Posted on 11/18/2005 4:54:43 AM PST by TaxRelief
RATHDRUM, Idaho (AP) -- A developer has threatened to make a big stink after the Kootenai County Commission denied his request to rezone property he owns at the edge of town for a professional building.
Specifically, Steve Nagel plans to park a pig farm on the site, with hundreds of squealing porkers greeting visitors to the northern Idaho town.
(snip) Nagel doesn't want to be in the city because he would have to pay an estimated $300,000 to extend a sewer line a half-mile and a water line a mile under railroad tracks to the property.
(snip)Nagel, a Rathdrum native, said the pig farm, which he calls "Makin' Bacon Ranch," is no bluff, and that he's negotiating a contract to buy hogs from southern Idaho.
"I'm not going to stand back and let them stab me in the back again," Nagel said.
(Excerpt) Read more at hosted.ap.org ...
Well, I hope he follows through and there's no change in zoning and maybe the developer will move on. What's the point of zoning if developers can just operate with the assumption they'll change the use at their whim?
As long as people keep having kids, they have to live some where. If you are living in a place built in the last 40 years, I'm sure it was not built without some type of opposition.
The folks should embrace and celebrate the pig farm - just to piss him off more.
Who's property is it?
The reason was given for denying him his request. And it wasn't anything to do with zoning.
They want to annex the land into the city and force him to pay for water and sewer to the property that he would not otherwise be required provide. The city also gets to tax him forever on too.
Screw the city.
Start the pig farm.
All hail the Pig Farmer!!
Wow, if you don't want to spend $300,000 just because the city wants you to then you're a chump... Considering where his project is, $300,000 is probably 50% or more of the planned budget... Ya, what a chump...
Exactly WHY do the people in the rest of the town have to pay to extend the sewer and water lines to his property so he can make a profit? Sounds like you have your priorities backwards. Let the developer pay for the infastructure costs his development will require.
" Setting up a noxious business for spite should be punished."
Not if its an approved land use. There was a guy in my area who did the exact same thing. Had 200 acres on the edge of a town he wanted to sell developers. County refused to rezone the land from agriculture. He put in a mud pig pen with 300' of road frontage about 200' from the entrance to a high dollar neighborhood.
The land was rezoned within the year.
How about because nowhere does it say he is asking for sewer or water service. His land isn't in the city, it's county. Water and waste is his problem anyway. A well (or and existing well) and septic system are likely what his plans were.
The city wants to annex his land so that he is required to extend the cities sewer and water. Big plus for the city's infrastructure for other new development and tax base. Not so great for the one paying for it who doesn't want or need it.
I'm against the annexation, but also against his attempt to rezone it. Like I said, I wish him well with his pig farm.
From the article: "He also said the city shouldn't be able to sway planning decisions of the county. In protest, he plans to raise breeder hogs on the property, a use that's already allowed."
Let's see, he owns the property, he wants to build an office building to accomodate a business that he owns. The city denied this request, but the land is outside the city. The land is already zoned for use as a pig farm. Now the city is upset because he plans to use HIS land for a LEGAL purpose.
And your response is: "Setting up a noxious business for spite should be punished."
Why should he be punished for following the LAW?
Everyone should read this article from Imprimus:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1522350/posts
Why bother with zoning, then?
Did you read the article? It's a city battling with an entrepreneur who can match wits with them...What have you got against free enterpise?
I know what you mean. I know of a couple of instances around my small town where - after the subdivision is built - the developer lets it become annexed - and now all the problems become the city's - poor drainage - cul de sac's too small for school busses - etc... Now the developer is rich - with no more resposibilty for his development. We don't care for developers 'round here.
It may not be a case of can't, but of economics. That $300k could be a substantial portion of the potential profit. Most of these guys do a supply/demand analysis for the planned use before they buy the property, so he knows there's a market. But the idea is to make money, good ol' capitalism.
I worked in land development (as an engineer) for several years. I have never heard of an office building on a septic tank. If you have ever had to maintain a septic tank you know why. If he wants to put up the building, he needs the services to protect the health of the occupants. If he doesn't want to put up the building, he doesn't need them.
The biggest problems I ever had in land development was when some yahoo (usually with inherited land) came in and wanted to put up a high-rise building out in a cornfield somewhere. He ALWAYS wanted the City (read at taxpayers) to extend roads, sewers, water, and other utilities to his property at NO COST to him. They were idiots.
Those who expect the taxpayer to pay big bucks so that a developer can pocket even more money is NOT a conservative. Let the one who requires the services pay for them.
You forgot your </ sarcasm tag.
Does he need a lot of permits for the pond that holds the hog waste..?
Sure sounds like a Hate Crime to me. And we all know how much we support hate crime laws.
Nagel doesn't want to be in the city because he would have to pay an estimated $300,000 to extend a sewer line a half-mile and a water line a mile under railroad tracks to the property.
Probably. I'm pretty sure that after there's been a pig farm on land - it cannot be used for anything else (most things) for some # of years.
Private wastewater treatment for business parks is not unusual.
Sewage hauling is also available for interim use (while he waits fo r city growth to catch up with his property).
http://www.darcoinc.com/septic-tanks.html
Zoning laws are nothing more than fascism by a different name. One of the primary tenets of fascism is government control of private property. You may own a title to the property and you pay taxes on it, but the government controls how you may use it.
Under English common law, the owner of the property is invested with a number of rights in that property - the right to develop, to use, to sub-divide and bar others entry. We have come a long way from owning rights in our property and have adopted the German fascist model.
Zoning laws came into being in the 1920s, just as Marxism was being embraced by countries around the world. Before government zoning, land use was controlled by citizens in the community and backed by courts who understood English common law and the concepts of trespass and expected use. This prevented pig farms being built in areas where housing was common and expected.
Zoning laws are nothing more than opportunities for little local fascists to act like dictators and enrich themselves and their friends.
Good for him.
Hope he follows through.
It is going to cost him WAY more than the $300,000 he didn't want to spend if he is planning to put in a pig farm. With all the environmental regs he is going to have to comply with ( builing a waste treatement plant for all the runoff for starters ) he won't have any money left to feed the pigs !!!
He doesn't WANT the city's tender services.
He will use his own utilities, not the town's. They are the ones pushing to take him in forcefully.
Now you've done it...
Better get that firesuit on... Incoming...
No, in most places like this farming is an already approved use.
I can't imagine anyone even noticing a pig farm in DOWNTOWN Rathdrum. Nevermind on the outskirts of town.
To sum up Rathdrum as a community... It looks as if the local honky tonk just up and grew into a town. Even the town church has a neon cross on the steeple.
I imagine that there was lots of talk about "controlling sprawl" which of course is nonsense because Rathdrum is the northern end of Post Falls, the western end of Hayden, and the eastern end of Spokane.
"Why bother with zoning, then?"
Zoning increased the value of the land from $15,000/acre undeveloped to $250,000/acre developed.
My father-in-law's friend bought some land "in town" back in the 60's; the land was zoned agricultural, but he planned on opening a fence business on it. One of the town councilmen blocked him from doing this, so he bought a bunch of farm animals for the new property. After the stench of manure began permeating the neighborhood, the neighbors complained, and the same council person told Johnny he couldn't have farm animals in town. Johnny told him that his property was agricultural, and he planned on changing his profession to farming, and would bring in even more animals,and there was nothing he could do about it. Needless to say, he was allowed to open his fence business.
Commercial development almost always benefits the jurisdiction. It gets tap fees, sewer and water usage fees, property taxes, employment base, potential for lodging and meals taxes, etc. Yes, the developer benefits, but so does the jurisdiction. If the costs of infrastructure are so high that the developer can't make the project work by shouldering the entire infrastructure cost, it's totally appropriate to ask for government participation. The government will then decide whether its better off financially if the project happens or doesn't happen. If the jurisdiction determines it's better off financially if the project happens, it will be willing to help out. These private/public partnerships happen all the time. I'm not saying that the developer shouldn't bear any infrastructure costs, but depending on the situation it's certainly appropriate to ask the jurisdiction to participate.
The developers ALWYAS "don't want" the governments services. But they are only too happy to let the people who buy into their developement complain to the City, State, or Federal government because they didn't know they were getting substandard (and often dangerous) services and please, please have some other taxpayers rescue them. I don't want to be that taxpayer.
I have never seen yet a developer willing to put in sewer services that are even equal to the ones licensed by the Feds (and certainly not better). In case you haven't noticed, bad waste treatment causes a whole raft of bad illnesses. Anybody who wants to do that to the general public deserves to be put in jail.
Let him try to build a pig farm. There are more restrictions on that than the building he wants to put up.
BTW, we had a doctor a few miles from here a while back. He wanted to maximize his profit by reusing single-use needles and vaccines. He spread hepatitis to 300 people. As soon as it became known, he ran back to Packistan where he was born. The State (read as taxpayers) is picking up the cost for his greed. Very similar to the developer here.
I have worked on several of those developments (including some TIF projects, which is a bad word around here). Sounds like the City has made their decision in this case. If they have to pay the $30,000, it is not worth it to them. The guy has the choice if it is worth it to him. If not he can "try" to open a pig farm, but from the regulations around here, it would be easier to do the original development.
It wouldn't go in South Carolina where I am from. Just last month the same thing happened to me. A guy who owned a piece of land behind my house wanted to put up apartment buildings. The land was not zoned for that. We opposed him and he threatened to build a pig farm. We said " Go ahead " You see, I am an environmental regulatory consultant and I know the law in SC. Not only would he have to install a treatment plant for the discharge into the water system, by law he has to notify every business and household within a 2 mile radius - personally or by registered mail - of his intent. There are hundreds of locatuons he would have to notify. Failure to do so is a heavy fine for each residence he fails to notify. Now that is just the state regs. The land is next to a wetlands , so the EPA regs kick in on top of it.All this would have cost him more than the land was worth.
I'm in California. Where I'm located, land that is already designated for farm land use can be used for that purpose without any additional county supervision. In addition, farm land that is used for farming qualifies for lower property tax rates. Many people with larger parcels try to produce some form of crop or another to qualify for lower taxes.
Counties around here have given farmers many incentives to continue farming. They want that small town farming community feel to remain. In truth most of the true farms are already gone. Thirty years ago it really was a farming community.
You do understand that it is unincorporated county land already zoned for farming don't you?
In most situations like that, the farmer wins. It is the people that build their houses next to farm land that should beware.
To make a sweeping statement that developers"ALWYAS" want government to "rescue them" is a crap statement.
You sound like a fascist federal bureaucrat. Are you?
LOL! I used to play in a band in a Rathdrum honky-tonk (the Shady Rest - wonder if it's still there?) and you are absolutely correct.
This is all about how the community deals with/cashes in on an influx of affluent and aging population from California and Seattle (and elsewhere, of course) that wants to establish a rural enclave with all the amenities of downtown San Diego. On somebody else's dime because that's how it's done.
I dunno - my property taxes have doubled in five years south of Sandpoint and it's getting a little irritating to hear the newcomers bitch and moan. No, I don't want to turn that elk pasture into a soccer field so little Bobby can live out his daddy's adolescent fantasies. Leave it be.
Click on my name to see. You sound like a DUer. Are you?
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