"Environmentally Friendly" Sells Anything...Heh

Excerpts from an interesting letter in the DB below, emphasis mine. Thoughts? I believe the difference between the PVPA affair and Johnson's Pasture is that the city would have to rezone the PVPA land in order for development to occur, which puts them in the drivers seat; Johnson's Pasture was on land that could have been legally developed, albeit within the very tight framework of regulation that is par for the course these days.

Claremont suckered on land purchase
A Feb. 10 Daily Bulletin story "Open season on open space?" regarding the purchase of 540 acres of land in northern section of Claremont, which has been preserved forever for saving water for the city, the following statement is made:

"Because the land is currently zoned by the city as open space, which does not allow for residential use, the city could block the development indefinitely."

I have had an uneasy feeling about the purchase of Johnson's Pasture for $12 million from the beginning. However, when you sing the siren song of "environmentally friendly" in this city you can sell almost anything.

My uneasiness was reinforced when some on the City Council are doubtful that the property is worth $12 million, and already one of the owners is claiming that her part of the land is worth more than offered.

I am in favor of keeping the area green, but since the city is in control of ingress and egress to the property, requiring permits, I feel building on the property could have been blocked indefinite and that we didn't have to pay a dime for the property.

Hello, suckers.

I'm sure that those on the City Council who sold this deal will give us a song and dance that my guess is plain wrong. However, the city planning was so poor when they came up with amount of the pending bond that they obviously don't even know the real value of the property.

I am so old I won't have to pay very long on the bond, but most of the rest of the citizens will be paying forever.

I wonder if it is too late to block issuance of the obligation?

JOHN S. MILLER, Claremont