Open space advocates launch educational initiative for bond issue

LOGAN – The promised educational effort for the Cache County open space bond issue began Tuesday, with advocates for the proposal appearing on Utah Public Radio.

County Executive David N. Zook warned listeners that the proposed $20 million bond issue would be “a drop in the bucket” compared to the funding that the open space initiative would really need.

We want to leverage this money and multiply it,” Zook explained.

By that, the advocates say that the $20 million generated by proposed bond issue could be used as matching money to bring other dollars into play. Hopefully that will include donations of land and money from individuals and non-profit groups as well as money from the state and federal governments.

At their regular meeting on July 26, the members of the Cache County Council voted to approve adding the bond issue to the ballot in November.

Jack Draxler, the co-chair of the ad hoc Open Space Advocacy Committee, then promised to mount a public education campaign to convince Cache County voters of the benefits of the open space bond issue.

Zook was joined in the Access Utah broadcast hosted by UPR’s Tom Williams by open space committee members Draxler, a former Utah lawmaker and mayor of North Logan, and entrepreneur Erik Eliason.

Local open space advocates point to the Logan’s Kunzler Conservation Easement as a prime example of how public funding can be leveraged.

In May, city officials announced that they had finalized an agreement with the Kunzler family to obtain a 47-acre conservation easement along the north side of the Logan River from approximately 1000 West to 2000 West.

In addition to precluding commercial development in perpetuity, the easement will facilitate the city’s flood and stormwater mitigation efforts; provide access for potential river restoration projects; and allow extension of the city’s Blue Trail, a river pathway for kayaks, canoes, tubes and other non-motorized water craft.

City officials explained that the price tag for the easement property was slightly more than $20,000 an acre, for a grand total of $963,000.

The city’s funding partners in the land deal include the state of Utah’s LeRay McAllister Critical Land Conservation Fund; Cache County, with grants of RAPZ tax funds; and members of the Kunzler family.

Specifically, the McAllister fund contributed $481,750 in response to a successful grant request from city officials; the Kunzler family contributed $96,350; and Logan City and Cache County each contributed $165,240 obtained from RAPZ tax grants. The remainder of nearly $55,000 came from city trail grant funding.

We’re going to have to be pretty strategic in what land we look at,” Eliason admitted. “Twenty million dollars is only going to go so far …”

But the entrepreneur added that there are state and federal dollars set aside for land acquisition that Cache County normally doesn’t receive because the county doesn’t have any seed money.

“Some of this could be leveraged at three-to-one or even six-to-one,” he explained.

“Obviously, we can’t preserve every piece of open space in the valley,” Draxler acknowledges. “But we feel that we can make a difference now …”

The idea of Cache Valley open space bond issue has been kicking around for many years, Zook added.

A similar proposal made it to the county ballot in 2008, but was defeated by voters made edgy by the housing market collapse and recession that year.

The idea resurfaced in 2020 at the same time as the coronavirus outbreak, leaving its local advocates certain that the time wasn’t right in the midst of that emergency.

But Zook, Draxler, Eliason and others agreed that the time is ripe now, particularly in the wake of recent polling that revealed strong support for open space.

About 90 percent of nearly 200 Cache Valley residents who responded to that survey felt it was important to preserve scenic lands and vistas.

About 75 percent of respondents felt that it was important to preserve agricultural lands in the north and south gateways to Cache Valley and to add to the valley’s public trail network.

Most surprising, however, was that valley residents said that they would be willing to pay an average of $20 per year in property taxes if needed to preserve open space.

Open space advocates say that the proposed bond issue would add an average of $25 per year to county property taxes.

The open space advocates said that, between now and November, their educational efforts would continue with neighborhood meetings to fully explain the bond issue.

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1 Comment

  • Ttunac August 10, 2022 at 2:05 pm Reply

    “We’re going to have to be pretty strategic in what land we look at,” Eliason admitted. “Twenty million dollars is only going to go so far …”
    Sounds like they’ve spent it already.

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