By Pat Orr
For the Apple Valley Review
Apple Valley consistently scores as the best place to live and work in the High Desert. We don’t have a big shopping mall or a Trader Joe’s or an easy path to the freeway which leads to all those places. So why then do people want to live and work here?
If you managed to get a seat at "Shrek, the Musical” last week at Civic Center Park, you got a glimpse of one reason. Apple people like wide-open, down-home community events. We don’t want urbanized neighborhoods with our neighbors 3 feet from our property line nor do we want the “convenience” of homes, condos and shopping centers all occupying the same space. We’ll leave that to Pasadena, Glendale and other spots where they want to live on top of one another and take the train downtown.
When the housing bubble popped, we had our share of empty houses but our large-lot law kept the “hit and run” developers from slamming together massive tracts of oversized homes that went into foreclosure because they were filled with folks who shouldn't have received a home loan in the first place. We are over-populated with NIMBYs (Not In My Back Yard) because most folks want to slam the door shut behind them once they get to Apple Valley. That has its upside because more folks here vote and get involved when big solar, wind or other disruptive projects threaten our “better way of life.”
NIMBYs also force change to occur slowly, but in some circles that's known as good, thoughtful planning. I also believe that our elected town officials are more accessible and still involved daily in the community they serve.
As we embark on another summer season with Sunset Concerts on Thursdays, aquatics and recreation programs in full swing, it's easy to see why our town keeps winning the “best place to live” award year after year. We may be small and simple, but that’s the beauty of this place and its people.
Spending like drunken sailors
Remember a few weeks back I was bemoaning the TV ads where little kids were being used to claim there just isn’t enough money for MediCal?
Last week, Senate Bill 4 passed with every Republican voting against and every Democrat voting for the new law that will grant MediCal benefits to undocumented residents under the age of 19 living here illegally and certain identified adult family members. The price tag is estimated at $40 million but no exact dollar figure has yet been tied to the budget for this new gift of tax dollars (it could go up).
Keep this in mind when you begin hearing the pleas we don’t spend enough on health care for the poor. There will never be enough as long as we keep importing and creating more poor people and do nothing to create jobs for them.
Fast Track to a slow death
The rumor mill is swirling that SANBAG (San Bernardino Association of Governments) staff are preparing to introduce the notion that we should use our transportation dollars to help kick-start a move to build FasTrack toll lanes up and down the Cajon Pass.
I'm so sick of construction projects now that I wouldn’t support any new projects — ever. Toll lanes may take 10 to 14 years to complete. They could literally be screwing up my freeway until I'm dead!
These ideas flow from a “sustainability” (a buzz word that always should put you on alert) scam produced by the elite planners of Northern California and Sacramento which “infect” local boards like SANBAG through its staff who, even though they are relegated to the boondocks of San Bernardino County, want to be able to say to their peers that they, too, are leading us backward folks into the new millennia of thought on urban transportation. Balderdash.
We are lucky that two desert people, 1st District Supervisor Robert Lovingood and Victorville Councilman Ryan McEachron are the new Chair and Vice-Chair, respectively, of SANBAG.
Hopefully they can get other appointees to the organization to understand that SANBAG members need to direct staff toward projects appropriate for our area and chosen lifestyle and not blindly go along with ideas and projects that create a future High Desert where we don’t want to live.
One wacky law we don’t have
Since we're hearing about a “once in a generation” El Nino weather event coming this winter, I'm actually contemplating putting up a rain gutter in the back of my house to catch run-off in more rain barrels (see above).
While researching this concept I found out that in some states you cannot capture the rain that falls from the sky because you don’t own it.
Huh? So can you get a note from God to keep the water?
Nope. This stems from some 19th century water rights laws that were created to protect grazing land. In the states of Washington, Wyoming and a few others it's against the law to “capture or divert” natural water fall thereby affecting the surrounding water table. Hopefully the Sierra Club or The Association for the Glorification of Delta Smelt doesn’t catch wind of these laws or they will have some nut job Assemblyman submit a similar “anti-rain bill” in our state legislature.
— Pat Orr is a local business owner, community volunteer and political junkie.