Guest Commentary
by Randy Lenac, President, Save Our Rural Economy
Save Our Rural Economy (S.O.R.E.) and many other key stakeholders in the County have been working to try and convince the Supervisors to scrap this bad plan and send staff back to the drawing boards to make it more fair and equitable for rural property owners and our rural economy. As it stands right now, County staff has taken 13 years to produce a plan that will push most of our future population (estimated to be about a million people over the course of the next 40 years) into the coastal cities and halt growth by downzoning the rural east County. This is the same crazy downzoning scheme that was foisted by radical environmental groups upon the voters of San Diego County twice over the past dozen years and rejected by large margins both times. Voters instinctively know that 40,80 and 160 acre downzoning is a dumb idea that violates property rights and borders on government seizure of property. County staffers think they know better.
So while our rural landowners, farmers and communities will be economically devastated, this plan will victimize our urban communities with congestion, high density housing and overburdened services. This is a bad plan all the way around for San Diego residents-urban and rural. As usual, the taxpayers will bear the burden for this dumb downzoning scheme. Independent analysis by respected economists predict that the economic impacts will be staggering in terms of lost tax revenue, property devaluation and lost economies of scale.
Then we have to ask ourselves, “why are we doing this to ourselves.” The General Plan itself says we have to downzone in order to save agriculture and habitat. Why then are the farmers and cattlemen saying this downzoning will destroy family farming and ranching by robbing them of the equity needed to sustain their economic operations? Congressman Brian Bilbray stated just the other day at the North County Economic Development Council that his experience as a councilman with downzoning to save farming along the coast 25 years ago was that it did the exact opposite by driving the farmers off the land instead of saving farming. Then there is the issue of habit preservation. Everyone is for preservation of habitat, except nearly 70% of our County is already in government trust and for the most part already dedicated to open space and habitat. The vast Cleveland National Forest, Anza-Borrego State Park and many more County State and Federal lands are and will remain dedicated to habitat. How much is enough and what is the fair and balanced thing to do regarding property rights and our rural communities? This Plan will govern land use for the next 40-50 years. We need to get the balance right.
Come out and tell your Supervisors to vote “NO on drastic downzoning and yes to protection of property right, farming and our economy.” The attached post card contains email addresses for all the Supervisors. Send each of them an email before the hearing at 9:00 AM, Wednesday, Oct 20.