Sundance is back in full bloom after a two-year break for the plague. They say that absence makes the heart grow fonder, but I have to say I had forgotten how thoroughly it tramples everything in town. The skiing has been great because the mountains are empty to the point of being spooky.
For a real horror story, with a macabre sense of comedy mixed in, Sundance disappoints when compared to the Utah Legislature. They are in session this time of year for 45 days of bad ideas and sleazy backroom deals. The hope is that they finish off without doing any lasting damage. If they do, it’s not for lack of trying. The two big issues this year are water and housing. Offhand, you might think those two are connected. But you would be wrong. The state is desperate to get more water flowing into the mud flat that used to be the Great Salt Lake. There are all kinds of bold proposals, including a special “Great Salt Lake” license plate. Nothing will cause the rains to come and rivers to flow like a few people spending $25 for a special license plate on their car. It might raise enough cash to pay for the plates.
It’s hard to complain about inadequate snowfall this year, though that is the root of the problem. Without snowfall, there is no runoff, and without runoff, there is no river. Then, of course, there is the issue of all of us taking water out of the rivers. In a pathetic runoff year like the last several, there isn’t much water that makes it to the lake. So we get mud flats, and the very real risk of nasty dust storms blanketing the state with the accumulated pollution going back to 1847. Or we could use less water.
Which brings us to housing. The developer-dominated Utah Legislature is of the opinion that the state’s soaring housing costs are a direct result of too many public hearings in the subdivision approval process There probably are more procedural delays than strictly necessary (the PEG project withdrew the application after three years in planning purgatory, and the city was no closer to a decision than the day the application was filed). The legislature would like the process streamlined and standardized because the review for a subdivision on the sand flats of Washington County is exactly like the review of a subdivision with roads clinging to the side of mountains in Wasatch and Summit Counties. They are exactly the same in the legislature’s mind.
Somehow, in the price of a generic $600,000 house (in other counties, not here), I have a hard time thinking that the per-square-foot price increment of a third or fourth public hearing and a couple of months’ delay is more than a rounding error. The light switch covers probably cost more than an extra planning commission meeting. But there’s the answer to the housing crisis — more expedited approvals with less public engagement, making it quicker and easier to build more houses. With the water supply dependent on sales of special license plates.
The Mayor of Ivins, a boomtown next to St. George, finally said they were out of water. They had bet the future on a pipeline from Lake Powell solving the water supply. Nobody figured out that a pipeline to an empty reservoir is very likely an empty pipeline. The proposal is still on life support, but it’s hard to see anybody spending a billion dollars or so given the lack of water in the Colorado River Basin.
We can get more water in the municipal systems by buying out the agricultural water use. That’s fine, other than most of us like to eat, too. Utah’s best farm land was paved over generations ago. Shutting down marginal operations (like mine) would push more water toward the cities and leave a relatively few people without livelihoods in a very different, dried-out landscape. But it’s a possibility. Or we could quit growing and encourage people to move someplace where there are the resources to support them. There really are limits, and we really are bumping up against them.
School vouchers are a controversial issue. They want to give teachers a $6,000 a year raise, but have that coupled with a voucher program that would give something like $8,000 a year in a voucher for parents to send their kids to a private school of their choosing. Or home school. Families down in Hildale would love getting $8,000 a year for each of their 30 children so they could homeschool them in things like drywall installation and roofing. Might bring down the cost of housing. What could possibly go wrong?
We’re going to get a new state flag out of this session. I’m sure all of you have followed that, and have a clear image of the boring flag that is being replaced. I saw a picture of the top 10 designs, and there were a couple that were pretty good. Not New Mexico-flag good, but good. They didn’t choose my favorite option, but if they spend a lot of time dealing with the flag and designating an official state spider, maybe they will leave kids struggling with gender identity issues alone.
And we might get a $50 income tax cut, too. They are really looking out for us.