Pima buys land, lots of land

By Chuck Huckelberry
Special to the Arizona Daily Star

Four years ago this month, voters authorized Pima County to spend $164 million for lands that would receive special protection under the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan. In that bond election of May 2004, more than 65% of those voting agreed that money dedicated to preserving native plants and animals would be money well spent.

The 2004 bond election was by no means the first time local citizens had authorized funds for open spaces. Voters in Tucson and Pima County have repeatedly used the ballot box to reaffirm their affection for their natural surroundings. Some examples:

In 1974, when our population was 434,000 (slightly less than half what it is today), voters authorized $4.5 million in open space bonds, most of it to create Catalina State Park.
In 1986, when the population was 630,560, 62% of voter approved $16.7 million for parks, open spaces and flood control, bonds used in part to create Colossal Cave and Tortolita Mountain Parks at the eastern and northern extremities of the metropolitan area.
In 1997, when the population was 784,784, 68% of voters approved $36.3 million, in part to expand Tucson Mountain Park and to buy Canoa Ranch south of Sahuarita.
And in 2004, when the population was just under 1 million, 65.7% of voters approved a whopping $174.3 million as the first stage in implementing the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan — probably the largest and most dramatic expression of local values to date.

So far, Pima County has spent roughly $73 million of the 2004 bond authorization to acquire six ranches that include nearly 26,000 acres of private (patented) land and more than 116,000 acres in grazing leases, in addition to smaller parcels known as "community open space" properties.

The numbers — both the dollars spent and acres purchased — are important, of course, but they don't tell the whole story. The rest of the story must be read in the extent to which the numbers reflect the public will, how that will was translated into public policy, and ultimately how that policy was implemented and what it may mean to future generations.

Land planning tool

Though the SDCP is a separate entity from the Comprehensive Plan, in a practical sense the two documents are as closely related as interlaced fingers. Most people familiar with the SDCP think of it mainly as a way to protect plants and animals and preserve open spaces.

It is that.

But as the adjacent map showing land acquisitions made since 2004 illustrates, the SDCP is also a regional land use tool, the mechanism that defines our region's urban edge (what other cities refer to as an urban growth boundary). In that sense, it is the first major commitment that our area has made toward creating a regional land use plan.

FULL OPINION: http://www.azstarnet.com/allheadlines/238241