Growth is the topic as Tom Strand is joined by sustainability advocate Dave Gardner, who thinks the benefits of city growth are dwarfed by the costs of that growth. They discuss the impact of growth on traffic, taxes, police protection, open space, and jobs. Banning-Lewis Ranch also comes up. Bill Murray returns next week.
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Tom and Dave, Thanks for having the discussion! I appreciate the perspective on growth, though don’t agree with all of conclusions nor the underlying presumptions. Here are some random thoughts . . .
• Those that are in the military that moved here and now want to put up the fence are fascinating! They fought for freedom around the world yet fail to recognize that one of the things that growth reflects is just that – FREEDOM! Freedom of people to choose where they live, where they choose to earn a living, where they choose to invest their civic interests, enjoy their families, earn enough to retire, participate in the economy, etc.
• Dave is correct that local government reflects the interests in the community that believe that growth is the proper direction. Nothing wrong with elected government officials reflecting what their constituents think. More about why it is good below.
• His list of problems is indicative that people don’t want to pay for their impacts on their communities. Isn’t that the American Way? Get the other guy to pay for it! And those retired military tax payers are the worst; they have been doing it for a lot of years and are still being fed at that trough. Nothing wrong with it, just sayin’ it’s a factor.
• There are a lot of good things that come from a growing and changing economy. If we take a look at places that did not grow, what would we think? Places like Toledo or Pittsburgh or St. Louis or any number of rust belt cities. Think of the families that lost their life savings in their biggest investments – their homes. The disruption to families that broke apart because there were no jobs for their children to grow into. Those are results of communities not changing and staying with the current economy. We should not strive to be those communities.
• Life cycle costs of the development. It does not make any sense to continue to not pay for the services we demand. That does not mean that growth is bad. If anything, that means that growing and being a proper investor is imperative.
• Colorado Springs is a middle aged city that has not realized its full potential. We have so many underutilized assets – open space, trails, a gorgeous backdrop,
• But many challenges – aging infrastructure that is worn out and also needs modernizing (Drake, stormwater, Academy Blvd., etc.), costs of sprawl development, water challenges (yes even still), and aging neighborhoods.
• Cities are by their nature economic entities. People choose places to live for their own quality of life. I say they move to places where they can be wealthier – however they measure wealthy. That can be quality of life, money in the bank, family, whatever they value. BECAUSE THEY ARE FREE TO DO SO IN AMERICA! If you don’t like it here, if you do not feel it is where you want to be for your wealth, then you are also free to move. Some move to Phoenix or Florida for warm weather, some to the mountains for aesthetics, some downtown Denver, some home to Toledo, some to DC for grandkids . . .
• It is totally American to complain about local politics and local weather and local growth and change. But I would like to be taller. In other words, make your case (as Dave always does so eloquently). Win or lose in elections. And enjoy your freedom to choose and speak and move and complain.
Dave finally got to state some of his arguments growth issues
• That the City hires firms that work for developers so they can’t be trusted . . .yet cites the developer organization, ULI, in his comments about open space being cheapest land use for city to maintain
• Developers try to stay away from paying their costs; which ignores the fact the developer sells to an owner who then votes against paying taxes to maintain their impacts and tries to get the next guys developer to pay for it! Developers and builders pay for their impact. If the taxpayer won’t pay for the upkeep, that is not their fault. That IS a problem, see above.
• Ignores the fact that this City has competitors at its boundaries that don’t agree with the no-growth agenda, are more than willing to compete with the City to build new houses, shopping centers and infrastructure. That is the leapfrog issue that Tom spoke of.
Thanks for the opportunity to comment! Hope to see you in the Comprehensive Planning Process!
Thanks, Kevin. Sorry for the delay in getting your comment approved. For some reason our website wasn’t notifying us of new comments. Here are my reactions to your comments:
I’m not proposing putting up a fence or otherwise interfering with anyone’s freedom to move here. I’m simply proposing actually letting the free market work. Connect the costs of the behavior with the behavior. Colorado Springs subsidizes the cost of new real estate developments because of our blind faith that growth helps us balance the budget (how’s that been working out for us?).
An economy can be dynamic without constantly expanding. What makes you think our city can grow indefinitely? If you don’t, then at what point do we AT LEAST stop subsidizing growth – knowing what we know about limited water supply and our ecological footprint (did you know the population of Colorado requires an area the size of Colorado AND Utah just to meet its needs?)
You think our open spaces are underutilized? Have you ever tried to find a parking spot at Waldo Canyon (back when it was open), Section 16, Mt. Cutler trail, or the top of N. Cheyenne Canon on a pretty weekend?
Our growth simply cannot go on forever. Therefore we would be smart to manage when and how we stop. Every city is going to stop growing. If you think that means they’ll all be economic disaster that’s just a sign that you cannot wrap your head around an unknown future. There are lots of beautiful places in the world that we Americans pay big bucks to visit, many of them have had pretty stable populations for a long time. We’ll have to figure out how to have a healthy local economy without continued expansion. It will be different, but we may find it delightful. We’re certainly struggling to keep up with the growth in the infrastructure arena (which proves that prosperity from growth goes not to the average citizen, not the city coffers, but to the multimillionaire developers and builders).