In response to the February 27 release of the 26-page US Forest Service ‘Final Record of Decision’ regarding an access road to the proposed Village at Wolf Creek, we received a press release from some of the conservation groups that helped institute, over the past 20 years, a string of federal lawsuits attempting to prevent the development.
Public questions about the project date back to 1986, when the Forest Service denied a land swap proposed by Texas billionaire ‘Red’ McCombs — a trade of 1,631 acres of degraded land in Saguache County for 420 acres of Forest Service land near the base of Wolf Creek Ski Area — and then suddenly reversed its decision and approved the swap. Various legal efforts have since challenged aspects of the approval process.
Yesterday’s press release from Erika Brown represented groups Rocky Mountain Wild, San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council, and San Juan Citizens Alliance. The press release, which suggests a continuation of legal challenges, is excerpted here:
Rio Grande National Forest Again Sides with Developer in Wolf Creek Access Issue
The Rio Grande National Forest Supervisor, Dan Dallas, signed a Final Record of Decision that could result in an easement over our Federal Public Lands to facilitate construction of the massive “Village” at Wolf Creek. This decision circumvents a federal court ruling that invalidated prior approvals for this controversial real estate development. The “Village” at Wolf Creek, located atop Wolf Creek Pass, would house up to 10,000 people in as many as 2,000 housing units. The parcel, owned by Texas billionaire Red McCombs, was first obtained under the guise of constructing a 208 unit development. The now vastly inflated development plan has resulted in decades of controversy, and courts have repeatedly stymied attempts by the developer to fast track approvals or short-circuit environmental studies and public input.
A Colorado federal district court set aside the Forest Service’s approval of a land exchange to facilitate the development in May 2017. “The Forest Service cannot abdicate its responsibility to protect the forest by making an attempt at an artful dodge,” the Court declared. Now, the Forest Service hopes to use the same artfully dodged analysis, previously deemed in violation of multiple federal laws, to approve a different means of providing the developers access…
Not only is the Forest Service pushing ahead in violation of legal decisions, it has cut out the public in its latest decision. The agency declared that only individuals or organizations that commented on this project in 2012 could participate in the 2018 process. This administrative restriction has chilled the decision-making process and left many concerned citizens voiceless…
Local advocates and conservationists are particularly concerned about the project’s massive impacts to one of Colorado’s last best places.
“What part of creating a massive development in the middle of one of the last remaining core habitat areas in the Southern Rockies do the developers not understand?” said Christine Canaly, Director of the San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council, having participated in the public process since 2000. “What will it take for common sense to prevail in providing a lasting legacy to future generations of the public, over building a tombstone of housing units that enables ecological ruin at the Rio Grande headwaters?”
Conservation organizations who have battled this development for over a decade were not surprised that the Forest Service capitulated to the continued demands of a well-connected developer.
“We anticipated backroom pressure to bend to the billionaire’s demands, hence over 2,300 people recently contacted Rio Grande National Forest Supervisor Dan Dallas encouraging him to stand up for the public interest,” said Tehri Parker, Executive Director of Rocky Mountain Wild. “We are disappointed he chose the wishes of a Texas developer over local forest protection advocates…”
We’ve been following this controversy in the Daily Post since 2006, and I’ve personally been sympathetic to the Village opponents. I believe I even stuck one of those “No Pillage at Wolf Creek’ bumper stickers on my car at one point.
But in 2019, I am seeing this development through a slightly different lens.
In 1987, after the land swap was first approved by the Forest Service, the developers — Leavell-McCombs Joint Venture — agreed to a ‘scenic easement’ proposed by the Forest Service. The ‘Final Record of Decision’ signed earlier this week by Rio Grande National Forest Supervisor Dan Dallas mentions this ‘scenic easement’:
The easement limited the development to “a mix of residential, commercial, and recreational uses typical to an all-season resort village” and specifically states its purpose is to assure compatibility with the adjacent ski area including the scenic and recreational values of the adjoining NFS lands…
To ensure the private development will be compatible with the ski area, the easement allows the Forest Service to prohibit 19 specific uses of the former federal property including mobile homes, mining and feed lots…
The easement also ensures: 1) conditions for advertising signs; 2) that the architectural style of all structures will be compatible with the location; 3) that buildings will be harmoniously colored; and 4) that building height will be no greater than 48 feet…
The size, density and specific building restrictions for the Village development were left to Mineral County, while the scenic easement granted the Forest Service narrow authority to ensure that the planned resort was compatible with the ski area…
This language now give me the shivers.
Of course, we can understand the intention of the Forest Service in designing this ‘scenic easement.’ They wanted to ensure that the Village at Wolf Creek looked like all the other high-end ski resorts across Colorado. Harmoniously colored, with a compatible architectural style. No three-story apartment buildings. No mobile homes.
In other words, the Forest Service virtually demanded that the Village be a place where working-class family cannot afford to live — just like all the other ski resorts in Colorado. The Village was obviously intended to be a segregated community, where only the wealthy could afford a dwelling place.
So then, who makes the beds? Who delivers the propane? Who plows the streets? Who enforces the law?
The folks who would be needed to actually make the Village a functional and comfortable community are excluded, by design. They would have to live far away, in some more affordable place, and commute to work through miles and miles of (dangerous?) winter weather.
Where exactly would that affordable place be?
Certainly not Pagosa Springs, the way things are going.