This debate should not be about growth or no growth at this point. It should be about doing what is best for the residents of Carson Valley. Unless it has escaped anyone's notice, this country is in a financial crisis right now. It is the same type of crisis facing our valley but on a grander scale.
We have a liquidity problem in Douglas County. With the downturn in home prices, many county residents are upside down in their mortgages. Many more have leveraged their homes to the max so that they no longer have any equity to borrow against. There is an excess of housing inventory in the Valley right now creating an imbalance in the supply and demand curves. This is only going to further depress home prices in this valley and further the liquidity problem. People are already not buying extras as their money tree has dried up. This means more pressure on local businesses, and lack of work for our major job market, the home builders and the supporting industries.
Our county has banked heavily on growth, but with the current crisis, tax revenues will continue to decline. Foreclosures are on the rise, jobs are disappearing and infrastructure promises are not being kept due to budget problems. This is going to create a very dangerous situation if not addressed soon.
It only takes a casual observer to see the problems facing Douglas County. We now have our own "road to nowhere" (Muller Lane Parkway) that the county had previously relied on putting onto the backs of developers. Those developers are now gone and the road is not complete. We also still don't have a decent highway to where the jobs really are, in Reno, and the gridlock is growing daily. Retail spaces have been sitting for years with no tenants.
Our population is also aging. Who is going to buy their homes with literally two RV garages, or 15-car garage, when they are gone? Will we continue to rely on people moving here from California with their windfall real estate money? I think those days are long gone.
The majority of our county budget is now spent on personnel costs, and those will also continue to rise as major waves of retirees are now hitting the county budgets. It is only going to get worse in the coming years as many of our county budget excesses have been used to fund services (fire and police) for the growing population.
This whole Park Cattle debate is also about politics and not about the people of Carson Valley. There are really only two entities who would benefit today if this project goes through. The Town of Minden, as the town only cares about its water rights, and Park Cattle who will see an immediate shift in their balance sheets as their property assets will be worth more (on paper). There is no other real benefit to the county or its citizens today, or the foreseeable future.
I mean seriously, do we actually care if all we can see is grass on that property now? I almost can't believe the head of the "smart growth" coalition used the argument "if we don't act now, there will be nothing on that land."
I also could have told you three years ago that Park Cattle was up to something when they stopped maintaining hundreds of acres of land bordering Buckeye Road.
Is that what a responsible landlord does? They have made grand promises for things that are not going to really benefit the current residents of Carson Valley. We don't need a horse venue. There are already many in Northern Nevada that aren't fully utilized and has previously mentioned, the" Horseshows In The Sun" was not successful here.
Horse owners already in this valley are already seeing rapid increased in prices for hay and a diminishing supply. We also don't need more industrial space as there are already many unfilled vacancies in the Valley.
We don't need promises of jobs from Park Cattle either. It's a carrot, but a rotten one. As they try and build these new homes in a recession, keeping their costs down is paramount. How do they do this? By bringing in guest workers from outside of the area. Don't believe me? Look at the new shopping center being built across from the Raley's grocery store. I don't see any local builder's banners, or many English speaking workers. Is their money staying in the Valley if they bring workers down from Reno or farther? And where do these jobs go when the project is finished or we are built out?
Affordable housing is another myth. Many communities were built in this Valley as affordable worker housing already, but were bought and flipped so many times that they are no longer affordable. The breaking of the housing bubble is helping bring these homes back down to realistic ranges. The only problem now is to find a way for people in this Valley to afford them, or keep them, like creating and maintaining jobs.
We are also being bullied into making this amendment before the next election. Everyone knows that the current board is almost always 3-2 on the pro-growth side. But all this might be changing this next election and Park Cattle knows it. This is a now or never proposition for them and they will be pushing hard to rush this through the current commissioners. But it's not in this valleys best interest to rush into this right now.
Our county commissioners were elected for one purpose, and one purpose only, to become the vanguards for our Valley and to protect its current citizens. What this means is that their main concern right now should be to protect the prices of our homes from further decline. You don't do this by printing up more homes. They should also be looking at ways to sustain county revenues and prevent against a local recession. Again, printing up more homes is not the answer.
There is only one fiscally responsible thing the commissioners can do, and that is to deny this project. Let's practice the first rule of holes right now, and stop digging.
n Dale Paul is a Gardnerville resident.
