Cocoposts

Water Fee for New Development

The Albuquerque Journal's Sean Olson covers the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Water Utility Authority*

The one-time fee for buildings, called the "water supply charge," will be placed into an account the water authority can only use to buy new water rights or direct toward finding new sources of water.

    Lynne Andersen, National Association of Industrial and Office Properties president, said the fees will most likely be passed on to home buyers and business owners.  But as long as the fees are strictly for new developments, Andersen said her organization doesn't object.

    "It's just part of whether it pencils into the bottom line (for deciding to start a business)," she said.

Wait a minute.  The fee ought to pencil into the bottom line for deciding to build a building, not start a business.  Not the same thing at all.  Unless your business is speculative building.   Or there are no buildings already built anywhere else in town.   

Locating a business, new or not, in a shiny new industrial park outside of the already sprawling water service area just got a little more expensive to pay for the water.   

* ABCWUA - an entity as fathomable as the name.  Just try to use the acronym. It violates a basic  bureaucratic principle that a board moniker must roll off the tongue and fit on a file label.  "Abeckwooah"?  Ugh. Come on.

Googling SunCal

From the OC Register March 4, 2008:

In the past 4 ½ months, eight lawsuits have been filed in Orange County accusing SunCal of failing to pay its debts or complete promised work on projects. Four properties planned for future developments either were foreclosed on or soon will be. ...

Q: What is happening with the cash flow at SunCal?

A: (David Soyka, SunCal senior vice president of public affairs)  SunCal Companies is made up of many companies. It's discreetly financed, which is common for a real estate development firm. It's how non-public companies are financed. No two are identical.

The real estate business is cyclical. We've experienced downturns like this before.  Like every other homebuilding and land development company, we are facing market challenges.  The entire industry is affected, and we're working with our lenders and Wall Street financial partners, both public and privately held companies, to decide how to adjust our business plans.

Commenter Stan is frustrated that no one in Albuquerque caught on earlier to SunCal problems and suggests no one has ever Googled SunCal.  But these stories would be unlikely to make any difference to development proponents here who put a positive twist on the meaning of the adage:  Every calculation based on experience elsewhere fails in New Mexico.

More Residential

From the Albuquerque Journal we hear that approvals for SunCal have been delayed 60 days. 

The city Environmental Planning Commission has a laundry list of concerns it wants SunCal Companies to address before the developer moves forward on a 500-acre West Side residential development.

The commission's staff has, in fact, compiled 15 pages of "conditions for approval" that asks SunCal to provide more information about the development, get into compliance with the Northwest Escarpment Plan and improve design standards....

 Record national foreclosure rates should pose a bigger challenge to selling 500 acres of more housing than 15 pages of questions.  The developer complained the questions were vague.  Maybe one of them was, "Why?"

Water Rules Repealed

Albuquerque Journal says the Water Authority repealed the new water conservation rules.   

Cadigan linked the ordinance's repeal to one "special interest group"— builders— complaining about costs.  "They are not entitled to a special process because they are home building lobbyists," he said.

Oh, but they do so believe they are entitled.

(Bernalillo County Commissioner) Cummins stressed at the meeting that the board and builders believe in conservation, but the changes were not passed in the "traditional" way, with builders giving comment before the bill was drafted.  "I think the tenor of compromise is different than the tenor of starting with a clean slate," Cummins said of the repeal.

Tenor of compromise and the traditional way? 

I'm picturing a tradition of grandfathering -  exempting entire subdivisions from new requirements and calling it compromise. 

Fragmenting resource and land use regulation, in this case through multiple agencies with overlapping jurisdictions, maximizes short term real estate market and builder profits and hinders true community building.   Some tradition.      

Flat Tires on Economy

From a Denver Post story yesterday came news about jet manufacturing entitled "All the Air Taken Out"  in which they mention Eclipse Aviation's challenges:

The very-light-jet industry, which just recently seemed a promising economic-development niche for Colorado, has nearly fizzled out in the state. Within the past 3 1/2 months, Adam Aircraft and Aviation Technology Group, both based at Centennial Airport, have gone from up-and-comers in a potentially lucrative new business to shells of their former selves.

Even Eclipse was challenged   Even the most successful startup in the VLJ market, Eclipse Aviation in Albuquerque, has run into challenges.  ...

This morning the Albuquerque Journal's Sean Olson gives us the news about a defaulting developer  who insists this doesn't mean a thing for 57,000 acres in Albuquerque.   

California-based SunCal, developer of Albuquerque's massive Westland project, has had a rough year with some of its California and Nevada ventures— but insists that will have no bearing on its plans here. 

SunCal Companies defaulted on $184 million in loans— losing five properties in foreclosure.  At least nine lawsuits are pending in those states.

Moody's last month removed a bond rating on one SunCal company responsible for four developments in Southern California.  About $17.5 million in liens have been filed in two of its California projects.

But SunCal, which bought 57,000 acres from the heirs of the Atrisco Land Grant on the West Side last year for $250 million, insists none of its struggles to the west will affect the Westland project here.

DOT Public-Private Partnership

 From the Albuquerque Journal

The Governor's Office issued a scathing review Thursday of the Transportation Department's effort to redevelop its headquarters and district offices in Santa Fe, calling it a "fatally flawed process." ...

Gov. Bill Richardson halted DOT's plans for a private firm headed by Santa Fe art dealer Gerald Peters to develop $350 million to $400 million in office space, housing, a commuter train station and commercial and retail property on the headquarters land downtown. ...

"While there may have been a conspiracy to defraud private developers involved in these projects, there is no evidence that any kickbacks or illegal payments were achieved," the Governor's Office said.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.  Defraud private developers?  What about bilking public projects?  How are private  developers even potential victims?  It takes two to tango. 

The Governor's office left the door of la sala wide open:

We need to go back to the drawing board on this," said James Jimenez, the governor's chief of staff. He added, "I still think that whole private-public partnership makes sense."

It never made sense in the first place.  How can it still make sense?

Oh,  just relax and listen to the music.  Hear a tango?

 

Villa Muse

Austin American-Statesman covers an interesting development with development.   

There was a deal being worked to enable a project in eastern Travis County - within Austin's ETZ - extraterritorial area.*    Called Villa Muse, the project developers demanded it be exempt from Austin's  planning and development requirements. 

No Go.  Austin's City Council declined.  Now the developer is taking his toys and stomping away from Austin's "regulatory grasp".   

The backers of a proposed entertainment studio and production facility in eastern Travis County say they are negotiating with other Texas cities to move the project after Austin officials refused to temporarily release the project from its regulatory grasp.

Villa Muse Vice President Paul Alvarado-Dykstra would not reveal which other cities the developers are negotiating with but said there was more than one and all were in Texas.

"We haven't closed the door on Austin, but we kind of feel like Austin closed the door on us last Thursday," he said. ...

The council voted to try to find a way to reach a development agreement within the city's future growth boundaries, but Alvarado-Dykstra said the developers are not interested in pursuing such a deal.

City and state officials say Austin's film industry has been losing jobs in recent years to nearby states with better incentives and facilities.

...and maybe fewer rules than Texas!    

*  You remember "extraterritorial" areas?   Well, Texas still has 'em.  Our legislature, inspired by the development lobby, eliminated Albuquerque's extraterritorial powers the same year they kneecapped annexation and kidnapped the water utility.   

Mining in Town

From the Santa Fe New Mexican and AP is news of Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearings about 1872 Mining Law changes and a new report by the Pew Campaign for Responsible Mining.   

... The Pew Campaign for Responsible Mining and the Environmental Working Group said in a report released Tuesday that active mining claims on federal land near Western cities and towns increased almost 50 percent since 2003, to more than 50,000 claims....

The National Mining Association says the increase in claims is driven by a surging worldwide demand for raw materials. The association's Luke Popovich said 5 percent or less of claims are actually mined and added the industry is working to lessen the amount of pollution it creates.

Tuesday's report, Popovich said, shows environmentalists are "against those communities that depend on mines for their livelihood."

The federal government reported last month that the metal mining industry disposed of or released 1.2 billion tons of toxic chemicals in 2006 — more than any other industry.

There is little difference, in practice, between community livelihood and community environmental health.  The National Mining Association and others benefit from weak public memory in obscuring this truth.

It is an uranium "renaissance" because we've forgotten what a bad idea it was. 

 

No More Dog Beach

From the Sarasota Herald-Tribune comes a tale of "private property rights" to spoon feed passionate defenders what they want to hear.  Only this self-made hero in the struggle against government in Florida is a little off-message.

During his 34 years practicing eminent domain, (Bill) Moore has been involved in most of the highest profile eminent domain cases in Southwest Florida.  He defended property owners against Charlotte County's efforts to seize land as part of its Murdock Village project. He battled Sarasota County's efforts to remove a developer's rights to build condominiums in the Myakka River Protection Zone and helped farmers get adequate reimbursement for land taken under the federal government's Kissimmee River Restoration Project.

After recounting a case in which he successfully closed a beach at Siesta Key - known as Dog Beach - to dog walkers, he boasts:

The moral of the story is that the government cannot take private property and turn it into a public park for dogs without compensating owners, Moore said.  His victory may not have pleased the average dog walker, but for Moore, it was a no-brainer. Private property rights are fundamental, and private citizens need to be protected against the almost overwhelming power of government, he says. David vs. Goliath -- always.

Now, which one had the dog - David or Goliath?

This fantasy is supposed to be about sticking up for the little guy against big bad government.  It is never about corporate power on the other side - like where land use regulations protect a neighborhood from industry or a big box.  Or where zoning restricts those towering beach condominiums.  No, in this fantasy it is the evil government - and dog walkers - we must be protected from. 

 

The Authority's Authority

The development community's objection to Albuquerque -Bernalillo County Water Authority's conservation measures goes deeper.  It is indicative of why the Authority was created under direction and support of the developer lobby in the first place.  Not about the cost of rain gutters.  Ya think?

 From the Albuquerque Journal:

"We feel the water authority has overstepped its authority," said Katherine Martinez, Home Builders Association governmental affairs director.  Martinez said her group does not believe the utility had authority to pass the legislation, which places requirements on the construction of all new buildings within the authority's service area.     She said those requirements can be imposed only by cities and, to a lesser extent, counties.  "Nowhere in state law does any other entity have the power to change building codes," Martinez said.

The state's largest water  utility is now an entity without any regulatory power - outside the control of representative city and county government and disconnected from the normal planning tools of building, zoning and subdivision codes.   

As a practical matter, how do you implement water planning without those tools?  The water system is semi-privatized and it is increasingly difficult for the public to exert any control over management of the resource.    

I may actually agree with Katherine.  The Authority has no authority.  By design.