Moratorium’s end is welcome news
Don’t pop the tops on the champagne just yet.
The state’s decision to allow the city of Hollister to begin
issuing building permits Monday following a six-year drought is
widely hailed as good news.
Moratorium’s end is welcome news
Don’t pop the tops on the champagne just yet.
The state’s decision to allow the city of Hollister to begin issuing building permits Monday following a six-year drought is widely hailed as good news.
The state-imposed building moratorium – the result of disastrous mismanagement of the city’s wastewater treatment plant – stretches back to 2002. It’s given people the opportunity to understand that, just as runaway residential growth can lead to failed communities – 2002’s spill of 15 million gallons of sewage comes to mind – no growth brings a stagnant malaise felt throughout the community.
Local school districts, faced with rising costs and mostly static enrollment, are grappling with difficult cuts. The empty storefronts in downtown Hollister speak volumes about how jobs that produce money locally send economic ripples far from their source. Part of that paycheck in a roofer’s pocket may end up at a car dealership or a local cafe. Another chunk might go to support local nonprofits.
Even though Hollister City Manager Clint Quilter said some commercial developers may move soon, the housing market across most of the nation went soft while Hollister was in its state-imposed slumber. The local housing boom may just have to wait for a while.
San Benito County faces many challenges. Fully half of those of us lucky enough to have jobs must commute outside the county to work. And high local unemployment numbers remind us that – commute or no – those of us who are working are the lucky ones.
Spiraling fuel costs will change our community in ways yet to be calculated.
Our community lacks many of the things others in the area take for granted. We’re short of parks and open space. Our library is cramped and dated. Many of our roadways are crumbling. Many residential areas even lack sidewalks. But local governments are hard-pressed to maintain the most basic services.
In short, don’t look to the end of the moratorium as a panacea that will change things overnight.
But there’s good news. The building shutdown allowed the community to take a deep breath, to consider its past mistakes and successes. A group of local citizens concluded a three-year consensus-building process called Vision San Benito, meant to create a blueprint for the kind of community we want. Leadership San Benito brings a new class of people who are informed and prepared to be involved in their community each year. Local governments and business leaders contributed toward a strategic plan for downtown Hollister that, if realized, would give us all a vibrant common living room, a place that combines housing, open space, and lively commercial spaces.
There’s more cause for hope. Community involvement caused the Gavilan College District to reconsider the location of a local campus. Voters rejected an ill-conceived planned adult living community not too many years after they roundly rejected a slow growth measure. Hollister voters, understanding the city’s financial peril, last November issued a vote of confidence in passing a local sales tax for city services.
Yes, there’s cause for hope. Just don’t expect the transformation to happen next week.
