Preserving Davis-Monthan and Tucson
Those of us who live in central Tucson are no strangers to the Davis-Monthan flight path. New and louder planes have been flying more frequently and at lower altitudes particularly in recent months, dramatically affecting the quality of life of many of our neighborhoods. And indications are that things will only get worse in the next few years as other bases close, and their missions end up here.
We want to support our base, and enable our military to do their job the best they can. But we need them to be a good neighbor. A process aiming to secure the future of the base–JLUS–took place last year, but did not include any city neighborhoods in the flight path. They ended up recommending an expanded noise zone, incorporating more than 8,000 existing homes in an area which would all of a sudden be declared, in the words of the recommendation, “incompatible with residential use.”
The city planning commission voted unanimously to delay this expanded noise zone until the negative effects on neighborhoods could be further studied. But our friend Fred decided that the neighborhoods should have no say, and rammed the expanded noise zone through the city council without citizen input.
Fred is also moving to ramp up residential development in the far southeast side as part of the HAMP process, a move that would wipe out a win-win solution whereby the DM runway could be shifted south so that the flight path would be over sparsely-populated land.
Now the neighborhoods are speaking out, and you can, too. We support our base, but we also support our quality of life and our property values. Jean de Jong of Tucsound.com is circulating a well-thought-out letter to Washington which you can sign and circulate and get back to her to amplify our common-sense voices. You can find the letter here.
April 17th, 2005 at 8:24 am
I am familiar with the JLUS process and the impact it can have on new development. I followed the political fight surrounding La Osa Ranch pretty closely and the only thing that derailed it was the combined political pressure resulting from the airforce making noise about closing their facilities in Pinal county if La Osa went ahead. The JLUS process was in part a reaction of the services to the rude awakening to encroachment issues La Osa gave them.
It seems to me that to effectively stop development and encroachment from the Southwest, an effective leader would bring in a bi-partisan and multi-agency coalition to express concern about it. If a candidate could stir up enough concern over the future of the base to get, say, the Governor, McCain, Grijalva, Kolbe, state legislators and the Air Force all expressing concern about future development, that might be enough to make local city and county officials shit or get off the pot. Already they are throwing money at the problem with mitigation grants, turning the screws a little more will have faxes flying into council and supervisors office faster than you can say ‘conservation easement’.