Everybody thinks the Cyrus family is good people. We think they’re good people. Government officials in Central Oregon think they’re very good people.
They think the Cyruses are such wonderful people, in fact, that they keep trying to rewrite the laws for them.
The Cyruses, whose ancestors came to Central Oregon in pioneer days, have been hoping for years to turn their Aspen Lakes subdivision near Sisters into a destination resort. Last year, the Deschutes County Commission fiddled around with the county’s new destination resort map to create a special loophole that would allow them to do it.
That didn’t sit well with neighboring property owners or with Central Oregon LandWatch, which decided to fight the county’s action before the Land Use Board of Appeals on the grounds that it violated state land use laws. We agreed.
Now the Cyruses have come up with a different – and much more ambitious – plan. They’re talking about developing a 1,500-acre parcel they own with as many as 495 homes, 100 RV spaces and various recreational facilities. The sweetener in the deal is conservation protection for 380 acres plus payments to local governments, non-profit agencies and the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Enter, in the guise of the Lone Ranger riding to the rescue, one Gene Whisnant, state representative for southern Deschutes County. Whisnant also thinks the Cyruses are swell people. And because they’re so terrific, he’s willing to sponsor a bill that would exempt their destination resort plan from state law.
(To be fair, the love affair our local elected officials have with the Cyrus family appears to be bipartisan. Former Rep. Judy Stiegler was going to sponsor the bill, but she didn’t get re-elected.)
The environmental, traffic, fire safety and other impacts of the Cyruses’ proposed development obviously would be enormous, and it’s impossible for us to see how doing an end run around the land use review process could be justified.
It’s equally hard to justify any legislation so blatantly custom-tailored to benefit one specific family. Yes, they’re good folks – but there are a lot of other good folks out there. And yes, they’re having financial difficulties (the company that owns Aspen Lakes recently filed for Chapter 11) but so are a lot of people, especially in the real estate and development business. There’s rumored to be a recession on.
Apparently Whisnant is having a tough time justifying the Cyrus Family Protection Bill himself. Although he’s agreed to put his name on it, he reportedly says he’s not sure if he’ll actively work for it. That’s a remarkably lame position. If the bill’s not worth pushing, Gene, why introduce it in the first place?
The Deschutes County Commission’s tweaking of the law to benefit the Cyruses was indefensible, and Whisnant’s bill, if anything, is much worse in terms of both the damage it might do and the terrible precedent it would set. We hope Whisnant will re-think the issue and decide not to introduce it. To help his thought process along, we’re giving it THE BOOT.
This article appears in Mar 3-9, 2011.
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I read about this in the Nugget Newspaper, in Sisters. Funny how the Cyrus family likes to bring up the fact that they’ve, “…lived in the Sisters Community for over 100 years…”
So what? Does that make them automatically more entitled to all things Central Oregonian? Does it make them more qualified to get preferential treatment under Oregon land use laws? Does it mean they’ll be better stewards of the land? Seems to me they’ve done a fairly piss-poor job of taking care of what they’ve got already.
Building a subdivision and throwing a few bucks at the school foundation doesn’t make a destination resort. Even if you do put in overnight lodging (which none of them have done yet), it still isn’t so.
Black Butte Ranch and Sunriver and perhaps Eagle Crest are destination resorts, and folks, those types of developments just aren’t being built around here. Oh everyone claims that’s what they intend, but it just doesn’t seem to be what we end up with.
Why does the length of time one has lived in Central Oregon mean so much to people? Or at least they think it does. You hear it almost daily in conversations around the region. 100 years or 1 year, who cares?
Being land poor is a tough thing to deal with, and the Cyrus family seems to be learning that lesson.
Just my opinion.
I didn’t think anyone was paying any attention to the self-serving, too-bad-for-the-other-guys activities of certain erstwhile developers and many of our elected officials. You are a breath of fresh air, and to be commended for your thoughtful comments. I’m hoping some of those short-sighted elected officials begin to figure out why so many of them lose their re-election efforts…and not that we do such a good job of replacing them but that we just don’t want them back! One day we’ll blindly elect folks here and there who can consider all of us as worthwhile constituants.
Hmm, I always thought that people who are loyal to their community, who are avid supporters of their community, who provide great benefit to their community, and who have earned the respect of their community deserve a little something in return. No, I don't mean “special treatment” or automatic entitlement to “all things Central Oregonian” (whatever that means). But, at the very least, they deserve a bit of honesty from their critics.
Here, the critics just can't seem to get their facts straight. In what way haven't the Cyrus' taken care of “what they've got”? Is there really anybody out there who doesn't think that the Aspen Lakes Golf Course and Community isn't an asset to the Sisters community? Aren't those jobs, outside bucks, and additional tax dollars a good thing? Have the critics actually read the bill? Wouldn't a more reasonable reading show that this Bill is an effort to address the very concerns previously raised by the opponents of re-designation?
Oh yes, the whole issue here is “re-designation”. When the Legislature enacted laws regarding “destination resorts”, they didn't consider or include the possibility of converting an existing resort into the “destination resort” designation. The Cyrus' have worked steadily, lawfully, and properly to accomplish re-designation. They have endured ridiculous and unsavoury personal criticism along with a bunch of inaccurate and inappropriate comments from critics. Now, they're using the democratic process as it is intended to pursue their open and intelligent goals.
Like Ms. Sanscel, I don't give much weight to the duration of the Cyrus' time in the County, but I do give weight to their steady commitment to the community, the merits of their ideas, and the propriety of their process.