WILL 2008 HAVE INDEED BEEN A "DEVELOPER FREE" YEAR AT ROYAL GORGE  CROSS COUNTRY RESORT?

Last December, folks with obviously way too much time on their hands (and/or a drive to get the news out about what over-development Kirk Syme, Todd Foster, and the new Royal Gorge LLC had planned for the future of Royal Gorge, Serene Lakes and Donner Summit), made a YouTube piece entitled "A Donner Summit Night before Christmas",  which ended with the jolly old man in red wishing all, " a developer free year!"

Here we are, a few weeks from Halloween (remember Don't Pull the Plug on Royal Gorge?), and still no plans before Placer County. According to a county spokesperson, there hasn't been a peep out of Royal Gorge for months. Perhaps Royal Gorge LLC's inability to come up with a second egress, as required by Placer County, has put a damper on the big plans.

Or, equally likely, Royal Gorge is parked on an enormous document dump/application for Placer County, but, knowing the county won't agree to keep the applications secret, in violation of the California Public Records Act, as they seemingly did last year at this time, is holding the delivery of their new and "improved" plans off until after the November election. 

Why, might you ask? Well, since the start of the year Royal Gorge LLC has funneled (presumably legally) a stunning fifteen thousand dollars to the incumbent, Placer County Supervisor Bruce Kranz, who's battling for his position (well-padded by developers and ski resorts) against Jennifer Montgomery, who bested him in the June election, despite another capable challenger-- both of whom reflected the desire of jettisoning the old "pay to play" ethos in the district for once and for all. 

Bob Houston, an estimable candidate in his own right, has come out in support of Jennifer Montgomery, and Bruce Kranz is now hanging on by the skin of his incredibly well funded teeth.  Maybe all the developer and ski resort money he has will, by virtue of his negative mailings, overwhelm the desire of so many of his constituents to fight for smart growth, instead of the perverse growth espoused by Kranz's strange property rights doctrine,which causes the ruination of rural areas for the benefit of developers-- never mind that all of the other residents have property rights too. Apparently, in Kranz's world, only big money has "property rights." Everybody else just pays taxes.

Or, maybe, not.  Take America's belated waking up to the fact that all is not right in our economic neighborhood, add in the fact that California is slowly coming to terms with the new realities of global warming, and, even more slowly beginning to understand that water is going to be a real factor in deciding whether new developments are practicable, mix it all up, and, no matter what shiny plans Royal Gorge LLC repackages for submission to Placer County, reality may dictate that 2009 will also be a "developer free" year.

And maybe a Kranz free year, to boot?  Hope springs eternal...