Posted on 06/22/2003 9:28:03 PM PDT by chance33_98
"But it’s not a matter of what the neighbors want. It’s what’s best for the community."
Tony Davis, left, and Joe Bindbeutel discuss the potential impact Friday of a development proposed for the Philips tract along Gans Road. Elvin Sapp has an option to buy the property if the Columbia City Council approves his plan for a residential and commercial development. Davis and Bindbeutel contend the project would damage the watershed of Gans and Clear creeks. Sapp has said he’s gone to great lengths to protect the beauty of the area and the watershed.
Rolling fields of concrete? Pressure grows on urban fringe.
By DAVE MOORE of the Tribune’s staff
Published Sunday, June 22, 2003
There’s a place in Boone County where calves graze on hills of clover, where storm water disappears down holes that go down forever and where a lake is bluer than the sky.
It lies along Gans Road near Rock Bridge Memorial State Park. The area is close to ideal, and that’s the way the Clear Creek Neighborhood Association wants to keep it. Tony Davis and Joe Bindbeutel know they live in a sort of paradise. They also know some developers have their eyes on it - again. Davis and Bindbeutel are determined to protect the 489 acres in the center of their neighborhood the best way they know: rallying residents.
Developer Elvin Sapp has an option to buy the land if the Columbia City Council approves his residential and commercial plan. He said his proposal has gone to great lengths to protect the area’s beauty and its environment.
But Sapp has found that trying to string together a deal to please everyone - neighbors, city council and the executor of the trust holding the land - is about as tough as finding the Holy Grail.
When developers first started eyeing the Philips farm site, folks were still wearing woven cotton ties and parachute pants. That was 1979, and if you drive down Highway 63 south of town today, you’ll find how far they got. But developers, like Sapp, can be persistent.
The Clear Creek Neighborhood Association would like nothing more than to throw a monkey wrench into Sapp’s plan.
Maybe calling it an "association" is stretching it a bit. They don’t have annual meetings. They don’t have newsletters. And by the very nature of the rolling hills and winding roads surrounding them, neighbors literally can’t see each other. That’s fine by them. They bought their land so they wouldn’t have to deal with people all the time.
But don’t confuse the seclusion with standoffishness. With just the whiff of development at the farm, as many as 200 people seem to materialize out of nowhere, seldom fewer than 40. Most of them are well-educated and well aware that neighborhood associations have clout.
Group member Fred Vom Saal, for example, teaches biology at the University of Missouri-Columbia. He studies the effects of pollution on laboratory animals.
Joe Bindbeutel works for the state Attorney General’s office, prosecuting environmental crimes.
Sapp
Beck
Ash
Hutton Tony Davis is the owner and manager of a day camp he started back in 1984 and takes pride in his restored house, a portion of which is 170 years old. The three men are very careful to avoid the perception that they’re the Not-In-My-Back-Yard type: "We’re not opposed to all development," they all say in one way or another. "It just has to be the right kind of development."
No, they don’t want a McDonald’s where pastures used to be, but they say their objections go far beyond pretty. They’re quick to point out that paved commercial surfaces can create torrents of water that could seriously damage the Bonne Femme watershed. The geology, they say, is filled with sinkholes that funnel water into the aquifer. Decreased vegetation means more chances that water will run along a parking lot, through antifreeze or oil slicks and into the groundwater.
"Anything above 10 percent" in paved surfaces "starts to degrade the watershed," Davis said. The percentage of impermeable surface in blacktop and concrete that’s proposed - about 30 percent to 37 percent - is especially unacceptable in geology riddled like Swiss cheese, according to the group.
The last time the group rallied, it successfully reduced the nearby Bearfield Meadows subdivision from about 170 to 110 acres.
Developing the Philips property might be acceptable, if it’s done right, they say.
That was the case with the 31-acre subdivision near the Philips farm, Cambridge Place.
"That was a well-managed development," said Vom Saal. He said the developer came to the neighborhood group with his plan, before coming to the city.
But now the association is sounding the alarm louder than ever over the Sapp proposal. Members know how to show up well-organized, well-reasoned and in formidable numbers. But they will need more than that.
City Manager Ray Beck said the city’s growth has finally reached the Philips property, and avoiding developing the property altogether wouldn’t be wise urban planning.
"If there’s going to be growth, we’d like to see it in the city, and then around it," Beck said. "You can’t avoid it sometimes because you’ve got property owners selling their land."
If urban development doesn’t occur fairly close together, it sprawls outward, Beck said. It’s cost-prohibitive to extend sewer and water lines into diffusely populated countryside, he said. At the same time, Beck said, the city will examine whether developers have planned well enough to handle storm water drainage, so the watershed is protected.
But ultimately the decision is up to city council, which will weigh input from developers, neighbors and environmental groups.
"You have to listen to everyone’s argument and understand that in each group, consciously or subconsciously, they’re going to have a bias on their side," said Sixth Ward Councilman Brian Ash. "Sheer numbers are important, as well as what they have to say. What carries the most credibility with me is that if it seems like someone is willing to admit that some of the arguments on the other side are valid. But if they say everything the other side is saying is wrong, you kind of tune them out."
Third Ward Councilman Bob Hutton said the loudest voice is not always the wisest voice.
"As my wife has said, 50 million people might have an idea, but it might not be the right idea," Hutton said. "In some cases, there’s no way a neighborhood group will be in favor of something. The Philips tract may be a good case of that. But it’s not a matter of what the neighbors want. It’s what’s best for the community."
Translation: If the property is divided into large parcels.... thereby pushing sprawl outward to other areas ..... where of course, they don't care if it is "done right" or not since it's not next to them. This is called "leapfrogging" and is one of the main components of sprawl to begin with.
Most likely another community did the same thing which put pressure on their area to be developed to meet housing demand. (Larger parcels mean fewer people served).
The conservatives don't want people to be told what to do with their property. Their problem with nearby development in many cases is not that they want to control what developers can do with the developers' property, but rather that developers want to put restrictions on the farmers' property.
What you have to remember is that every one of the members of the association built their house on what was once an untouched piece of pristine land, but somehow they find it wrong for others to do the same. It is hypocricy at it's finest.
I hope the developer can find a way to prevent the members of the neighborhood association from earning their livelihood, the same way that they are preventing him from achieving his
It doesn't surprise me that you defend Smart Growth. Are you a feminist or a socialist? Is there a difference?
It doesn't surprise me that you defend Smart Growth. Are you a feminist or a socialist? Is there a difference?
I'll bet you for it are though.
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