Decrease in property values, maybe
October 3, 2008 · Updated 12:27 AM
Your June 2 article about the King County Critical Areas Ordinance was very interesting to me. The two people quoted against the CAO were John Day, a builder of beautiful homes, and Chris Breeds of SubTerra, which offers a "broad range of engineering services for each stage in the investigation, design and construction phases of mine and civil projects" (quoted from their Web site). I suspect that either of them might have a vested interest in unfettered development.
In this article in which Snoqualmie Mayor Fletcher calls for using the "best available science," Mr. Day proceeds to speculate that "thousands of people are not going to be able to sell their land." Perhaps, but I want to see the best available science on that.
The article went on to say that many property owners feared that their property would be worthless if the proposed CAO were approved. It might simply be that their land will not be worth as much as they had hoped, had they been allowed to develop four houses per acre. Not that it is worthless, but simply worth less.
Besides, is a fallow piece of land worthless? Judging by the recent voting on the Tollgate Farm and similar issues, it seems a majority of the residents of the Valley say "No."
Dave Eiffert
Snoqualmie
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