< PREVIOUS ] [ 2000 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >
For about as long as I can remember, growth has been an
issue in Colorado. My political memory extends back unto
the days of Gov. Stephen L.R. McNichols, who was defeated
in 1962 by John A. Love, whose motto was Sell
Colorado
because there wasn't enough growth in those
days.
Love went off to Washington in 1973 to become America's
first energy czar.
His lieutenant governor, John
Vanderhoof, became governor.
Vanderhoof had a pro-development reputation, though he
did veto the first serious proposal for Two Forks Reservoir
southwest of Denver on the South Platte River. He was from
Glenwood Springs on the Western Slope, and years after he
left office, he told me he was tired of the Denver Water
Board riding high, wide and handsome, doing whatever it
pleased. Somebody had to put a stop to that.
Vanderhoof didn't last long in the governor's office; he was defeated in 1974 by Dick Lamm.
Lamm had an anti-growth
reputation, bestowed on
account of his opposition to holding the 1976 Winter Games
in Colorado. As a state legislator in 1972, he led the
charge to put Olympic funding on the ballot, and when the
funding was defeated by Colorado voters (despite the almost
unanimous support of everybody who mattered), Lamm's
political star rose.
The mantra in those days was controlled growth
--
put growth in the right places, and society would benefit.
To that end, Lamm proposed to disperse state government by
putting the archives in Colorado Springs and the Division
of Wildlife in Gunnison. He also announced a human
settlement policy
which had an ominous, Orwellian
sound.
So by 1978, when he was up for re-election, he was less than popular. But the Republicans helped him out by nominating a weak candidate, Ted Strickland, and the global economy assisted by giving Coloradans good reasons to fear major growth -- if that was coming, then it was logical to keep a governor who cared about coping with this assault.
The assault was detailed in an influential 1980 report
from the Club of Rome called The Limits of Growth.
That report argued that the world was running out of fuel
and minerals. Demand and prices would rise.
And Colorado had plenty of coal, uranium and oil shale, along with gold and silver. No matter where you went in the mountains back then, you were likely to run into prospectors and survey crews. By early 1980, gold was $800 an ounce, silver was $20, and oil prices appeared to headed toward $50 a barrel.
Lamm was worried that Colorado would turn into Appalachia, with few public resources left after the wealth had been ripped from earth. He pushed for mineral severance taxes and up-front impact fees, so that Colorado could build schools and other public infrastructure that would enable the state to construct a new economy after the veins pinched out and the boom ended.
The boom ended a lot sooner than anyone thought. Higher prices led to more production which led to overcapacity which led to lower prices. By 1982, mines and mills were closing, and Exxon soon gave up on oil shale. Huge office towers in downtown Denver, constructed in the hope of profitable energy tenants, sat empty.
Colorado began to lose population. Lamm didn't run for
re-election in 1986. The new governor, Roy Romer, didn't
promote controlled growth.
Any growth at all was
welcome, and when the defense cutbacks came at the end of
the Cold War, Colorado appeared to be on the decline.
According to the census, 26 of Colorado's 63 counties lost
population during the 1980s.
A rebound started in the early 90s. Colorado had the infrastructure in place for a larger population than it held, so facilities were relatively cheap here. Growth came, though Romer was still stuck in an 80s mindset.
No matter where the growth was proposed, even in a fast-growing area like the metro suburbs, Romer was willing to step up with subsidies for United Airlines or Ziff-Davis, in contrast to Lamm's idea that growth should be channeled to deserving areas.
Meanwhile the state government established a confusing maze of enterprise zones with tax abatements and industrial revenue bonds, supposedly in the interest of funneling growth to the right spots.
Growth seemed to be happening everywhere, except out on
the plains, where places like Baca and Phillips counties
have been on the decline since the 1930 census. Romer
responded in 1995 with Smart Growth,
and now his
successor, Bill Owens, has picked up that slogan.
But growth seems to happen, or not happen, without much concern for slogans or who occupies the governor's office. The next year or two ought to be quite interesting. If petroleum prices stay high, then the distant developments are going to hurt while the oil-shale and coal counties prepare for another onslaught, and we'll be back where we were about 25 years ago.
Will we be talking about controlled growth,
limits to growth,
smart growth,
or something
new?
< PREVIOUS ] [ 2000 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >