Inevitable Consequences 1, Prairie Dogs 0

The Superior Board of Trustees has decided, as Boulder recently did, that there is a limit to tolerance of those who would choose to continue to expand their numbers beyond the resources available to them. The prairie dogs that have been living and breeding in a 20-acre drainage south of Eldorado Drive have outgrown the boundaries created in 2005 for the colony. A bid has been put out for complete eradication of the animals there and the area will become a "no prairie dog" zone.

The swing from tolerance to eradication is the knee-jerk reaction to a flawed plan a year ago that presumed the dogs could live within the boundaries created. The animals predictably ate and made more little prairie dogs, and kept moving outward into previously untouched land, including people's yards. This inevitability should have been addressed with a plan to humanely exterminate smaller numbers of dogs as they approached certain boundaries, but instead a mindset of irresponsible wishful thinking/denial put them on a path towards their doom (at a cost of about $30,000). Maybe that was the plan all along.

Read about the cheering crowd when the decision was made in this week's Superior Observer.

In the Wake of Walmart

Lafayette's Urban Renewal Authority has settled for a ho-hum vision for a large parcel at the south entrance to the city's downtown thoroughfare. After Walmart leaves this fall for its new Super spot on Hwy 287 most of the commercial space at the northwest corner of South Public and South Boulder Roads will sit vacant. The Lafayette City Council, in its role as LURA, went for a minimized redevelopment plan that misses a huge opportunity. Read more about the decision in the Daily Camera.

It was predictable that the Council that deferred to the mounting opposition to the Waneka property annexation would also prefer a scaled back plan for this site. The previously ambitious mix of residential, commercial and park space have been reduced to include only 130 residential units, not enough to attract the kind of important commercial development that could provide a solid long-term boost to the city's sales and use tax revenue. Redeveloping this parcel only half-way misses the point of quality in-fill redevelopment.

Read more on the Lafayette city website and check out details at the open house on the Redevelopment Project at the Lafayette Public Library, Oct 12 from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM.