Friday, September 9, 2016

If It Works, Kill It

Much advocacy has gone into an Amador future of agri-tourism and wine tasting. Promotion has included public money being spent via the Amador Council of Tourism. The success of this part of our economy has pleased most everyone. But the Shenandoah Valley and related area's boom has turned into a bust with nighttime noise and too much traffic for the quaint roadways. The Planning Commission has grabbled with expansion plans on a case by case basis to minimize impacts without a seemingly overall conception or direction.

This diffuse approach has led to the inevitable. An application for a small winery tasting room on Ostrom Road was turned down cold. Was door was slammed shut? Other ventures probably felt the chill. I certainly did, because it felt like the restrictive circumstances that led the ancestors of many of us from Europe to America. If we kill our entrepreneurial spirit, we have turned our future into something other than the existing and self-sustaining America.

The applicant’s presentation to the Planning Commission contained a 32-page Environmental Negative Declaration from our Planning Department. US Fish & Wildlife contributed an additional nine pages. Another 32 pages contained staff reports from other related agencies, public comment and other documents. Every move is under review. As I read these 73 pages, all I could think of was how many bureaucrats (or tax dollars) it takes to screw in a light bulb.

Along with this stifling process, those who most wanted agri-tourism prosperity are now among those preventing this new wine tasting venture. What did they think would happen?  Aside from the obvious possibility of failure, did they think that some sort of fantasy perfect would result? Success breeds success until the market becomes over-saturated. The cure for high prices is high prices say the commodity traders, just as they say the cure for low prices is low prices (production is either reduced or expanded).  How long will this wine boom continue? Are the wine tasters' twenty-somethings beginning a life time habit or middle aged people about to fade away?

But presently, supply is being denied due to external factors. Presumably road improvements could be made without sacrificing the area’s charming qualities. Assuming no new taxes and uneconomic increases in traffic mitigation fees (which the proposed facility did pay), there appears to be three sources of road funding. The first would be cleaning up the corruption and waste at CalTrans. But we lack the courage and leadership to de-fang that imperial behemoth. The second, getting rid of the bicycle/pedestrian set aside, would yield a very small but useful amount of funding. However, that is politically impossible in green California. The third possibility would be increased County tax revenue, but the project denial is the opposite of this.  How much revenue has the County lost due to the delays of the Newman Ridge project? How much public money has AWA wasted fighting lawsuits?

While the three road funding suggestions above are all feasible, none are likely. Katherine Evatt of the Foothill Conservancy has suggested doing a specific plan for this area. While that is procedurally correct, why is more government always the answer? Aren’t the noise problems sufficiently abated through the existing regulation? Does the Planning Department have the staff for a specific plan or do we hire a consultant? Who pays for that? And how long will the process take including hearings, reviews and possible law suits in relationship to the problem just dissipating? But a plan’s worst outcome could be picking and choosing winners or losers rather than have the proprietor’s drive and hard work determine their success.

While I have no magic answers to all the valid complaints of area residents, denying this new facility and the dreams of its instigators is far worse than the alleged problems this tasting room winery could create. The denial will be appealed to the Board of Supervisors this coming Tuesday morning, 9/13. Be there and voice your support for entrepreneurship, freedom and prosperity.

Copyright 2016, Mark L. Bennett