ARIZONA DAILY STAR: Weds., June 22, 2005
By Tony Davis
Pima County supervisors unanimously relaxed a key guideline for saving open space from 75 percent to 66.6 percent, for rezonings of certain types of environmentally sensitive acres.
But on the same 5-0 vote Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors increased a space-saving guideline from 75 percent to 80 percent on some very similar landscapes, including the Northwest Side's ironwood forests and the Altar Valley's mesquite flats.
The stiffer guideline covers land, some in growing areas, that's important to the federally protected cactus ferruginous pygmy owl, Mexican spotted owl and Southwestern willow flycatcher.
No one from the business community opposed it at Tuesday's meeting.
"Eighty percent is a number that has been floating out there for a long time," said Patty Richardson, executive vice president of the Tucson Association of Realtors. "It was probably not a big surprise."
Indeed, little dissent broke out over the board's entire rewrite of land-saving guidelines. Environmentalists supported the 66.6 percent guidance because supervisors threw in other measures aimed at ensuring the lands stay protected. Much of the land affected by both these guidelines, called multiple-use land, supports three to four species covered in the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan. The guidelines affect projects requiring rezonings.
The 80 percent set-asides will occur in Special Species Management Areas, which include 962,000 acres of private, state and federal land classified for multiple use. Other multiple-use lands that aren't special species areas use the 66.6 percent guideline.
The 80 percent figure came from the county's Science and Technical Advisory Team. While many of the conservation plan's guidelines cover a broad swath of species to protect entire ecosystems, the team decided that the three birds needed more specific measures, said member Robert Steidl.
The 80 percent figure stems from the best science available, based on experience with these and similar species, said Steidl, a University of Arizona assistant wildlife ecology professor. "It comes down to a point where you have to make an educated guess," he said.