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What Will Happen To Homewood? Tahoe Resort "At a Crossroads"
By J.D. O'Connor
May 30, 2006
Homewood Mountain Resort encompasses more than 1,000 acres of prime Lake Tahoe real estate. Its two lakes, precipitous slopes and sweeping views of Lake Tahoe are enough to keep skiers and real estate developers up nights - for altogether different reasons.
Owner Jeff Yurosek had hoped to sell the 1,086 acres to the U.S. Forest Service in a deal that would have kept the ski area open, the land protected, and put enough money in his hand to build a commercial center along Highway 89 that would remain privately held. The deal, had it gone through, was estimated to realize more than $60 million - testament to the area's scenic beauty.
But that plan, conducted largely in secret, came to a crashing halt after a local congressman, Rep. John Doolittle, R-Roseville, submitted a one-sentence rider to an Interior Department spending bill - and instantly picqued fears the land will be carved into as many as 23 estate-sized lots for the mega-rich.
The Forest Service wanted the property and had gone to Congress to get the money to buy it. But, as the Sacramento Bee reported Tuesday, when the text of a 2007 spending bill for the Interior Department was made public just before its approval by the House, Doolittle's provision was revealed - essentially prohibiting the Forest Service from spending any money from any source to buy Homewood next year.
"We're at a crossroads," Glenn Williams, a consultant working for Yurosek on the transaction, told the Bee. He called Doolittle's provision "shocking and unprecedented." Environmentalists, kept largely in the dark due to the secrecy surrounding the deal, were only beginning to react to the news Tuesday.
The Bee story quoted Brian Jensen, Doolittle's district director, as saying the government already owns too much property that it can't manage properly. Putting more land into federal hands would mean lower property tax revenues for Placer County.
"We don't see a real environmental benefit because there's no change in land use," Jensen told the Bee. "The landowner would be selling property to the federal government and then leasing back that portion it actually uses. We don't see how that's an improvement."
Doolittle has been tied to the headline-grabbing Abramoff scandal, linked by his association to embattled former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, and with funding for the political action committee he administers coming from co-conspirators in the "Duke" Cunningham political corruption case.
This latest action is sure to inspire just as much controversy in the weeks to come.
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Comments
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As a supporter of private property rights and a former Lake Tahoe resident I read this with the proverbial "grain of salt." But after reading and doing a little research, I feel there is some sort of power play at work here. Homewood needs to stay as it is. It would be nothing short of criminal to parcel it out to a few monied individuals. |
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Posted by: Byron Lee Lee & Assoc. | May 31, 2006 02:57 PM
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This administration has a lot to answer for. History will be a grim accountant for this government. I am amazed the American people allow them to remain in office as long as they have. |
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Posted by: Sarah Pickering | May 31, 2006 04:37 PM
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Look behind the curtain on this one and you'll see a developer waiting in the wings. |
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Posted by: Azim Rastanfani PEI Alternatives | June 1, 2006 09:09 AM
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We can not allow Homewood to be sold off to the highest bidder. It needs to be kept open for all of us to enjoy.
One of my greatest fears is that the owners would sell it to a big developer who would bring in the dozers and devastate this part of our West Shore.
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Posted by: Deborah DeBartolo | June 1, 2006 09:30 AM
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Homewood is a diamond in the rough. Part of the charm is the lack of pretension. Unfortunately, any company that is planning on developing the base but not the ski slopes is really a real estate developer not a ski area operator. |
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Posted by: mike baaden | June 17, 2006 10:07 AM
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