For the week of April 23 - 29, 2003

Quality of life
debates to watch

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Like clockwork every year, Bald Mountain closes and political debates bloom like daffodils.

How the debates are settled will have far-reaching effects on life here. Here are four new ones worth watching.

Ketchum Hotel: The debate is coming back. Developers whose design for a Main Street hotel was rebuffed 2-1 by the Ketchum City Council are scheduled to return with a new plan. Height defeated the first plan, but there’s more at stake.

The real fight in the hotel debate is the future of the valley’s tourism economy. The city has to face up to the fact that ordinances governing downtown development are so restrictive that even some existing hotels could not be built today.

While freezing the city in time may sound romantic, it could lead to its demise if misguided attacks on business development prevail.

Paid parking and HOV lanes: Paid parking in Ketchum and a High Occupancy Vehicle Lane for buses and carpools on a new State Highway 75 could make both the city and the highway more pleasant places.

Yet, the state’s highway consultants did not include paid parking in recent highway efficiency evaluations. Consequently, they concluded, HOV lanes would make commutes longer, not shorter.

The consultants said they would revise the analysis before the evaluations go to state and federal agencies that control the highway. This is one promise that must be kept lest the valley find itself with a new highway that becomes congested nearly as soon as it’s built.

Affordable Housing in Sun Valley: Don’t look now, but conversations about including community housing in major residential developments are coming from an unlikely quarter: the Sun Valley City Council.

We don’t anticipate any progress in a city that has totally ignored community housing. Yet, stranger things have happened.

Ban on Jetskis: Blaine County is considering a ban on jet skis on Pettit Lake. The ban would not prohibit motorized boats or water skiing, just Jetskis.

The ban is justified if only for safety. On small lakes, the rules of boating seem to evaporate when someone hops on a Jetski. Not to mention the peace of the high-mountain strongholds shattered by ear-splitting engine noise.

 

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