Good sense and a practical plan are the only elements that will save our town from the “grab n’ go” construction frenzy that is sweeping the country. Our neighbors in Scottsdale have clearly fallen victim to this approach. Literally thousands of new apartments are underway from north to south, one 10 stories high, and the profit margin for the builder is just as high.
One must ask, “do the development goals and needs of our town meet their criteria – or ours?”
A 4-year-old knows you can’t fit a square peg in a round hole. Unfortunately, Daybreak developers cannot see that 450 apartments do not fit on a 23-acre plot. Why can they not see that a 67-foot fill will desecrate the topography of our desert beauty? Why is it not obvious to them that this ugly design plan is incongruous to its surroundings? Why can’t they see that 1,200 cars dumped daily into an already crowded arterial roadway system will put us all in potentially fatal danger?
Why? Because they are blinded by greed, just like the mortgage bundlers were in 2007. Making money is fine, but making it at the expense of all others is unconscionable. Their program is to build a pile of cheap, overpriced apartments, grab the money and scoot out of town, leaving us to gaze at the residential wreckage forever. It appears the race is on to see who can construct the junkiest apartments the fastest.
Our town founders gave us guidelines to safeguard against being used inappropriately. All we have to do is follow the plan and not be distracted by false promises and unbridled greed.
As Joe Kenda, the famous detective, likes to say, “You don’t have to define suspicious behavior...You’ll know it when you see it!”
