At 9 a.m., Thursday, Jan. 17, the proposed Rojo Grande Ranch housing project west of Sedona goes before Yavapai County Planning and Zoning Commission at 10 S. Sixth St., Cottonwood, for the second of four meetings requesting a zone change on a 171.11-acre parcel.
After the commission gives its up or down recommendation, the project heads to the Yavapai County Board of Supervisors.
We strongly urge the Planning and Zoning Commission and the Board of Supervisors to reject this zone change. The project is ill-suited for the property.
The parcel is currently zoned as a mixture of RCU-2A residential rural 2-acre minimum lot sizes and R1L-70 residential single-family 70,000 square foot minimum lot sizes with the potential buyer asking the county to rezone the property to Planned Area Development.
Instead, developer Equity LifeStyle Properties is asking the county to allow it to build 600 mobile homes and charge future tenants a minimum of $1,000 per month for the privilege of resting their home on their developer’s land.
ELS would still own the land beneath it so the buyers would be tenants, not real homeowners, beholden to the whim of the developer’s profit margin.
At any time, ELS could jack up the cost of the land to $2,000 or $3,000 on a whim for no added benefit to the “homeowner,” forcing them to either move their home or sell it back to the developer at any low cost the developer chooses. Because the development would be small mobile homes restricted to people age 55 and older, these would likely not be wealthy individuals who could afford to fight unlawful eviction in court, but would be people living on fixed incomes and limited means.
After booting the tenant and low-balling the cost of the home, ELS could then resell the home to a new buyer at high cost and start the scheme all over again, raking in cash with every non-eviction eviction.
Let’s not kid ourselves: If the county approves the project, it would not be creating 600 new homeowners, it would be creating 600 tenants who have no protection from being kicked out of their homes whenever doing so suits the developer.
There is absolutely no logical reason why the current zoning should change — certainly no financial reason. The current property owner, who is selling the land for $14.2 million, or the proposed developer could easily parcel out and sell off 2-acre parcels for $400,000 a pop and make $34.4 million on the sale. That would allow Yavapai County residents to buy, own and maintain their own homes while still turning a tidy profit for both the seller and developer, who could make $20.2 million just on the land. Should the developer build the homes for sale, it could make millions more and create 85 new homeowners — which the county could then tax.
Conversely, if the project is approved, the developer stands to make $7.2 million per year, every year, just on the rent alone, all the while not providing a single service to the tenants other the “privilege” of paying a Chicago corporation to rent at the site.
Rather than that money being better used to pay Yavapai County home builders, contractors, landscapers and maintenance workers working for homeowners, $7.2 million per year, every year, would be funneled out of Yavapai County to an office building overlooking the Chicago River. Since when did Yavapai County zoning commissioners and supervisors work for the state of Illinois? We did not elect supervisors to fatten the pockets of Illinoisans but to serve our communities and our taxpayers, who would also not benefit from all that money leaving our state annually, never to return.
The PAD request is no small increase either. It would make the location eight times more dense than what previous county supervisors thought the land could handle. There is a reason the land was zoned so sparsely: That’s what wise county leaders said the land could handle. The land hasn’t changed, so neither should the zoning.
There is no infrastructure nor amenities to accommodate these new tenants, meaning local business might see an increase in tax payments to county, but as the tenants will be paying vast sums on rent, the economic benefit will be marginal at best. Due to their age, Yavapai County District 3 Supervisor Randy Garrison suggested only 30 percent of the tenants will be working, meaning there won’t be an influx of new workers into the job market.
If the county wants to benefit neighboring communities, it should forbid the age restriction and allow residents of any age, particularly those of working age, to buy there. Sedona is already suffering a workforce shortage, which reduces county tax income. Forbidding working families from renting means they will find other places to live — outside the county.
Vote against rezoning.
Christopher Fox Graham
Managing Editor
