When I began writing this editorial series last week, I intended to use it as an excuse to better understand the idea of ‘authenticity’. What does it mean, when a community is ‘authentic’?
While strolling through downtown with a new friend, I stopped to point out the following sign on the face of the municipal geothermal building on S. 5th Street.
I had created this sign back in about 1995, when I was starting a new sign painting business in Pagosa. The geothermal heating utility, which provides winter heating to certain downtown buildings, was about 15 years old. Some people had believed that the development of a geothermal heating system would ‘put Pagosa on the map’.
As far as I could tell, that hadn’t really happened in 1995.
My friend asked about the ‘Pagosa Springs’ logo in the upper left corner. Yes, that was our town’s logo back then, used to identify municipal vehicles and buildings.
Back when Pagosa was an authentic town, I might suggest.
About 15 years later, the Town Tourism Committee decided that Pagosa needed some new ‘branding’… as if we were a company selling something. The TTC was, at that point, still a relatively new group, charged with spending Lodgers Tax revenues to encourage tourism, and they came up with a new logo design meant to illustrate, in a graphic way, the attractions visitors ought to enjoy when staying here for a few days. Namely, the distant mountains and the river.
The TTC also thought we needed a motto, and after considerable discussion, settled on “Refreshingly Authentic”.
Exactly what that motto was meant to convey, I cannot say. I have a feeling, however, that if you need to tell someone that you’re ‘authentic’, then you probably aren’t.
A couple of years ago, the Pagosa Springs Town Council conducted a day-long retreat and created a list of 14 long-term goals for the improvement of our community.
The retreat took place in a Pagosa Springs Medical Center meeting room — a room which, not so long ago, served as the waiting room for the Mary Fisher Medical Clinic. The medical center and hospital have grown exponentially since I arrived in Pagosa in 1993. 26 years ago, we had no hospital at all, only a very modest tax-supported clinic.
A fair number of other changes have taken place here in those 26 years. For one thing, the full-time population of Archuleta County has apparently doubled (if you can trust the estimates generated by the US Census Bureau.) Our Town government’s budget has nearly tripled in size, and they’ve spent millions of tax dollars encouraging a tourism economy. We saw the arrival of two very popular annual music festivals. A new high school was built. Possibly 10 percent of the single family homes in our community have been converted into (basically unregulated) mini-hotels known as ‘vacation rentals.’
At the conclusion of the day-long Town retreat, the seven Council members and core staff were each asked by facilitator Yvonne Wilcox to summarize the best future they can imagine for the community, twenty years from now. Presumably, these visions were related, at least peripherally, to the 15 pages of Town Council “Goal and Objectives” created by the retreat activities.
Here’s the list of fourteen goals, in no particular order of importance, looking 20 years into a possible future:
- Convenient Bypass for Walkable Downtown.
- Well-Connected Trail Network and Sidewalk System Leading to Multi-use Park Facility at Yamaguchi South.
- Pagosa Springs Continues to be a Refreshingly Authentic and Healthy Small Mountain Town.
- Residents Walking Through Neighborhoods on Sidewalks — Smiling!
- Businesses and Homes That Appeal To and Support a Wide Range of People.
- A Thriving Economy (not solely tourism based).
- Less Cars on Main Street (due to a new parking garage).
- Well Maintained and Connected Neighborhoods Where People of Diverse Backgrounds and Incomes Live Together.
- Preserved Open Spaces and Parks — Natural River Flowing Through Town (not encased in concrete).
- Streets, Sidewalks, Trails, and Parks are Modern, Clean, and Welcoming.
- A Diverse Age Strata Of Locals.
- An Active and Well-Functioning Local Citizen Government: Diverse Council and Long-Serving Staff.
- Infill Development Has Reduced Number Of Vacant Lots (infill vs. greenfield).
- A Large Community Recreation Center.
We have a thoughtful Town Council that’s been grappling with various issues related to our community’s long-range future, and we can assume that the 14 long-range aspirations listed above are a reasonable indication of the key issues that the then-current Council felt worthy of government regulation, intervention, and spending… in 2020 and going forward.
Of the fourteen ideas listed, more than half — eight of them, to be exact — referenced “walking” or “recreation.” The Council, two years ago, seemed obsessively interested in increased pedestrian activity.
Three of the ideas reference automobiles, and two of those refer to “less automobile traffic” in our core downtown, achieved via a “bypass” or via a “parking garage.” A third merely mentioned streets in passing, as one of the Town’s several maintenance issues.
The Council did not appeared to be terribly fond of cars.
One person expressed the hope that Pagosa would continue to be “a Refreshingly Authentic and Healthy Small Town.”
I’ve never come across a clear definition of the term “Refreshingly Authentic”, but it definitely implies that I have come here from some other place that was either unrefreshing or inauthentic — or both — and that being in Pagosa has refreshed me, and provided a rare experience of authenticity. I’m not clear whether the motto is intended to describe Pagosa as it currently exists, or if we are talking about an aspiration.
So… what does the term “Authentic” mean, to the average citizen? (Assuming without any evidence that our Daily Post readers are average citizens.)
Maybe we can start with a place that is the opposite of “Authentic.”
As I recall my experiences at Disneyland, as a child back in the 1960s — at the original theme park in Anaheim, CA — we did a lot of walking. The only cars I recall, within the park itself, were the tiny kid-friendly cars that drove around equally tiny streets in the “Autopia” ride. (My first thrilling experience of driving a car.)
The real cars were parked outside the entrance gates in a massive parking lot.
This was an authentic theme park… no doubt about it. But it was the opposite of an “authentic community.” No one lived there. No useful products were created there. The buildings were fake. The welcoming committee had plastic heads.
The place was meant to be experienced within the space of one or two days.
The future of Pagosa?