Dear HCN,
To set the record
straight, Tom Chapman is not an owner in TDX nor has he ever been.
The TDX real estate brochures advertise private property for sale
from one private party to other private parties. The TDX proposed
homes are no different from other homes being constructed near
Vail.
The homes offered on the Black Canyon are
no different from the park supervisor’s home located next door. Our
property rights are no different from anybody else’s. Our desire to
get the highest possible price for our real estate is no different
from the federal government’s desire to get the highest possible
price. The BLM recently auctioned public land near the Black Canyon
seeking, and in some cases getting, prices above appraised
values.
The liberal media and some elected
officials like to put forth the time-tested assertion that any
inholder attempting to use or sell his land for profit is “taking
advantage” of the public. Is that really true? Or is it a
smokescreen for exactly the opposite and a convenient excuse for
elected officials to hide behind? Most private landowners have no
input whatsoever in being surrounded by wilderness. They are not
consulted. They receive no correspondence. No calls. Nothing. The
landowner wakes up one day – and he’s
surrounded.
Once passed by Congress, wilderness
designation requires the Forest Service to lock and close all
existing roads. Then, at the request of environmental groups, the
counties gleefully pile on with various forms of “backcountry”
zoning, delivering the final lethal blow to inholder property
values by drawing arbitrary, capricious, and unconstitutional
“redlines,” which deny all building permits to wilderness inholders
with no mitigation. The inholder is now stripped naked. He has the
right to watch nesting songbirds in dead trees, if he doesn’t cut
them, and he has the “right” to pay his property taxes every
January.
Next comes the federal appraisal. While
acknowledging an inholder’s legal right to reasonable access,
provided for in the Wilderness Act of 1964, the federal government
gives instructions to the appraiser, telling him he must appraise
the property on the basis of existing access (locked gates and no
vehicular access) and existing county zoning regulations (no
building permits). The incestuous partnership between federal and
county government delivers the predictable low price and the final
blow. The inholder is now the proverbial cooked goose on the
platter, for how could anyone argue against “appraised” value? This
is a failed policy. Anyone can tell when they are being cheated,
even backwoods wilderness inholders.
Is this a
fair process, or is it an act of intimidation against private
landowners? Is it a flagrant taking of private property? Does it
violate the Fifth Amendment? What does our Colorado delegation
think of these policies? Do the inholders have enough legal
resources to challenge the Goliath U.S. government and well-heeled
environmental groups, or is this an insurmountable tag-team that
reigns with impunity in stripping private property
rights?
The federal government’s penchant for
entrapping private lands in wilderness is a failed policy (at
present, some 400,000 acres are trapped). The policy of denying
reasonable vehicular access is a failed policy. Those counties that
gleefully and wantonly redline against a specific group of people
for the sole purpose of denying them a residential building permit
are practicing a failed policy. The environmental community
practices a failed policy when it encourages politicians and county
commissioners to snuff out inholder property
rights.
We believe the record will show that
federal and county governments essentially practice genocide
against inholder property values. But government and the liberal
media have the bully pulpit, and will no doubt continue to
disseminate false information about TDX, on the premise that the
good of the “public” justifies fudging on the facts or snuffing out
a few individual rights here and there. Of course, that is the same
argument the Chinese government uses.
In the end,
we believe the rights enjoyed by millions of Americans for over 200
years will prevail when the issues are examined carefully. We are
not against wilderness. We are simply saying that wilderness
designation should not usurp the rights of private property. What
remains to be seen is the level of commitment wilderness advocates
have towards private property rights and civil discourse on the
issues.
L.T.
Trussell
Montrose,
Colorado
The writer is
president of Brenner-Stahl Inc., a general partner of TDX, a land
investment company.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Wilderness inholders are victims of genocide.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
