ACHTUNG: This is not a “fair and balanced” article. This is an editorial by the editor.
It’s becoming one of the oldest axioms in local government — you can’t stop population or economic growth, you can only regulate it.
This lesson needs to be applied pronto for three local examples in which area residents are sticking their thumbs in the dike to hold back the onrushing water. It’s an emotional exercise in futility.
The three examples that have visited this area recently are:
- The proposed GRI residential development on the east side of Division near 12th Street, which includes plans for an apartment complex for 248 units. A public hearing before about 50 people was held last Wednesday night by the Leighton Township Planning Commission, which kicked the can down the road for a second time.
- The proposal by an economic arm of the Gun Lake Tribe to build an apartment complex on the former Cars2Go empty parking lot at the intersection of Reno Drive and West Superior Street. Fox News has reported this proposed development as a done deal, but Planning Commission members have expressed reservations about traffic congestion and the deliberations continue without approval as yet. However, announcement of a Michigan Department of Transportation grant for the area has made this more than just a possibility.
- The news that technology giant Microsoft has purchased two parcels of land in Dorr Township has fueled speculation that a new data center is in the works, meaning more jobs, but also more encroachment by city slickers.
There are many politicians and government officials in West Michigan who have railed against regulations of business and praised the invisible hand of the free market instead. But if these developments come to fruition — and it certainly looks like they will — we citizens are going to have to insist that rules on operations be obeyed.
We cannot permit community newcomers run roughshod over us.
This can be somewhat personal for me and my family. We moved to a Leighton Township house in 1986 and were getting away from the city. We were pleased that we lived very close to the Rabbit River and a wooded area, which was enjoyed immensely by our children in their youth.
However, it wasn’t all that long that the Serenity Ridge housing development came in to close off our access to the woods and the river. We certainly were not pleased, but we understood there wasn’t much we could do about it.
I have to mention this because a very common contention from rural citizens in these situations is, “We moved here to get away from the city. Let’s keep this country feel the way it is.”
Unless we are willing to buy up all the property that surrounds us, we no have right to move here and then expect no one to follow us. Wayland Township Planning Commission Chairman Larry Scheidel told such a group of residents back in 1986 very simply that they were being selfish.
The Dorr, Wayland and Leighton Township area apparently is considered desirable for living and doing business here.
As Leighton Township Commissioner Steve Shoemaker pointed out at last Wednesday’s meeting, growth is inevitable.
The only thing can do is regulate it.
