Sedona City Councilman Pete Furman said he was trying not to use the word “sprawl,” but he did eventually use it during the Sedona City Council’s discussion on Tuesday, Dec. 10, of annexing 3,422 acres of mainly Coconino National Forest land west of Sedona.

The annexation would increase the city’s size by 29%.

City Attorney Kurt Christianson explained that the proposed annexation would extend Sedona’s western boundary by approximately three-anda-half miles further west, and then three and a quarter miles south, across an L-shaped area occupied entirely by the Coconino National Forest, Arizona Department of Transportation right-of-way and the city’s Wastewater Reclamation Plant and undeveloped property colloquially known as “the Dells.” State law does not permit municipalities to annex islands, so state contiguity requirements resulted in this shape in order for the city to connect the desired parcels to its existing boundaries.

“There are no other proposed annexations of any real property, although it does touch the Sedona Shadows development,” Christianson said. “No one in Sedona Shadows or Sedona Pines or El Rojo Grande Ranch, their property, is proposed to be annexed in this.”

“It’s literally just a function of bringing in our own owned property within the city limits,” Councilman Brian Fultz said.

“It’s not like we can develop it. We don’t own it,” Christianson said. “It’s just a way to get to the wastewater treatment plant.”

“We did a pretty good job talking about ‘the what’ and ‘the ‘how’ but not ‘the why,’” Furman said. “You leave me scratching my head about what ‘the why’ is, what the problem is we’re working to solve.”

“To show other cities that we are interested in this area and we don’t want other cities coming in to encroach on it,” Christianson said. “Two, it’s to facilitate the development of the city’s transit and maintenance operations facility … This would just make clear that it’s part of the city’s — that [Yavapai] County has no authority over it anymore.”

The proposed transit facility has not yet been approved by council, while outgoing City Transit Administrator Robert Weber has repeatedly referred to the city’s transit program as experimental and said it could shut down due to lack of need.

City Manager Anette Spickard declined to comment on what steps the city would take if it annexed the land but council shutters the transit program.

“Has the county interfered with, or unexpectedly or unnecessarily complicated the work that we’ve done at the water treatment plant?” Furman asked.

“That’s exactly the question,” Christianson said. “We told them we were going to be building this, and they said under what authority can you just do that. It was explained to them, they said we disagree … It was explained that we have this IGA [intergovernmental agreement] with you that says we can do this, and they said that’s inapplicable … We just kind of went back and forth.”

Christianson described staff expenditure on the project so far as “a significant amount of staff time,” “many weeks’ work” and “the greater part of the summer.”

Public Comment

Four Sunset Hills residents spoke on concerns related to having the city’s boundary adjoining that of their community.

“Why suddenly do you feel a need to go out and encompass that?” Trish Janke asked. “It’s been working fine the way it is; why suddenly is there a need for a change?”

“We are still concerned about the vagueness of what’s going to come in the future,” Bonnie Johnson said. “Can we get any assurances of no development back there in the future?”

Development

“The city cannot develop Coconino National Forest,” Christianson said. “The only way anyone could develop Coconino National Forest … would be, I believe, through a land exchange. A land exchange means that you own National Forest property somewhere else and you’re wanting to exchange it with the National Forest — they generally will want more valuable property for less valuable.”

“Often, a land exchange has to be approved by an act of Congress,” Christianson added.

The Red Rock Ranger District has had an effective moratorium on land exchanges since 1998. Land exchanges are rare, such as the one that transferred the property for the future Sedona Cultural Park to a nonprofit in 1998; the 2005 auction of 21 acres of the old Sedona Ranger Station on Brewer Road for $8.4 million; a proposed swap of 369 acres owned by Yavapai County near Cottonwood in 2018 for 80 USFS acres in Cornville; and a recent swap with the Yavapai-Apache Nation to trade 4,782 acres of lands the tribe bought in the Prescott, Coconino, Kaibab and Apache-Sitgreaves national forests for 3,207 acres of USFS land adjacent to tribal lands.

“I really fail to see the necessity of making this effort today,” Furman said. “The city’s cost structure is largely determined by its size … expanding our footprint will likely have a significant impact on future budgets.”

“It’s actually in our interest to have this land be part of the city and under our control,” Vice Mayor Holli Ploog said.

“It is about us having control of what we need to build out there,” Councilwoman Melissa Dunn said.

Councilwoman Kathy Kinsella said she would be more comfortable with Sedona controlling the zoning instead of Yavapai County should a U.S. Forest Service land exchange take place at some point in the future.

“Who’s the best stewards for this area?” Kinsella said. “I think that’s the city of Sedona.”

Furman, Kinsella and Mayor Scott Jablow all rejected the idea of near-term development of the Dells property regardless of whether the annexation went ahead.

“Stuff this genie back in the bottle,” Furman said.

“I think that the way to protect the Dells is by making sure that it comes into the city’s jurisdiction,” Kinsella said. “It’s one of the few really untouched and pure lands that we have … It’s directly on the water, the creek is right down there, it’s riparian.”

It is unclear as of press time what creek Kinsella meant; Oak Creek is approximately 1.4 miles from the Dells at its nearest point and the Verde River is 7.2 miles away. The Dells is currently used for spraying of the treated effluent from the city sewage plant and as leased pasture for cattle.

Council voted 6-1 to proceed with the annexation process, with Furman opposed.

A public hearing on the proposed annexation is currently scheduled for Jan. 14. Council can halt the annexation process at any point during the process.