In the Jan. 12 issue of The Durango Herald, there were two interesting articles that pertain to the future of La Plata County.
One was about the demise of the Republican Party (“Has La Plata County shed its purple skin?”). It quoted Travis Oliger, chairman of the La Plata County Republican Party: “People in the county can’t stand people in the city,” he said. “So they don’t shop here, they don’t spend their money here, they go elsewhere, they really do.”
He said rural residents would rather travel farther to shop in Farmington than go into town.
“They don’t feel part of this community,” Oliger said. “And I sense that pretty heavily from just about everybody that I talk to. And it’s terrible. It really is.”
The other was an opinion piece by Steve Doob accusing the county planning commission of ignoring local planning efforts (“County’s district planning process is just a sham”). Doob had been involved in a planning effort for the area between Edgemont and Helen’s store along Florida Road. He accuses the La Plata County Planning Commission of ignoring a local planning committee and approving high-density growth along U.S. 160 between Durango and Bayfield.
He’s suggesting that the county is just going to do what it wants and ignore citizen input.
There is a formula for creating plans at the local level and then incorporating those into a vision for the county that I would like to share. That would include a paid professional facilitator to lead each of the 12 local planning groups toward a cohesive plan. But it can’t just consist of what the local people who happen to volunteer for that committee want. The committees have to be structured to include vocal locals, a representative of the county, representatives for open space, a non-governmental wildlife advocate who understands habitat and migration needs and perhaps something I’ve failed to think of.
These plans have to recognize that change is coming to La Plata County in the form of population growth. They also have to recognize the natural values that bring people here and are a critical part of the landscape in the county. At present, these committees are not facilitated professionally nor do they include important aesthetic values that form the character of the area.
It might be said that rural residents of the county oppose zoning and any imposition on their property rights. But zoning can be good for rural residents. Ranches in the area have value beyond people making a living raising cattle or sheep. Those values are scenic open space, places for wildlife to live and migrate and lending the county its strong rural ambiance.
Ranches bring character to the county and ranchers shouldn’t feel like no one appreciates them.
However, ranchers are guilty of stubbornly holding on to ideas that no longer serve them. Many are stuck in the past. If they fail to recognize that change is coming, they will simply be run over by it.
I say all this coming from a place where I have an affinity for ranchers. I’ve traced my roots on both sides and we are farmers as far back as I can go, which is about the 1830s. Dirt and livestock are in our genes, same as ranchers who settled these lands.
I can understand resentment for the change that’s happening in the county. But stubbornness serves no one, especially the ranchers themselves. Trying to hold on to what they’ve been doing isn’t going to work. They need to step up and collaborate positively.
Everyone needs to ask what kind of place they want to live in, then contribute constructively toward making that happen.
The land-use plan is the mechanism to design a future based on shared ideas.
Ranchers need to get with the program or they’re going to die out as a breed and their ranches will be subdivisions. Their great grandkids won’t know what it’s like to work the land, to know the mountain, to rely on the weather and to work for no man.
The land-use plan is important in light of growth that will happen with or without it. Planning and zoning can be good for everyone, including ranchers and rural residents.
The current path of rural residents objecting and the county acquiescing leads to loss for everyone; a landscape full of subdivisions and busy streets.
Jim McMahon led the Nature Conservancy’s Mackinaw River Project in Illinois. He lives in Durango.
