LAND USAGE AND THE RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLE WHO OWN IT
In the next few years, there is one major issue that is going to be at the forefront of politics in Chaffee County and that is updating the Chaffee County land use code. There are many contentious parts of the land use code as it stands because of the rapid growth of our County. As the county moves into discussions on updating the code, Chaffee needs someone to stand up for the rights of landowners, business owners, and the people of this community. I strongly believe it is the right of people to use their land as they see fit as long as it isn’t a major Impact to the environment and surrounding community. There needs to be a well discussed balance. This includes standing up for farmers in this community and working with them to support the Right to Farm and Ranch ordinances. It is also extremely important to work with commercial properties, developers, and business owners to find the best way to help Chaffee County grow while also keeping in mind the environmental and Community impact around this issue.
ACCESS TO HOUSING
In recent years, Chaffee County has seen a massive influx of new residents. It seems at times that the whole world has found the secret about how much a gem this region of Colorado is. Through the quick change this region of Colorado has experienced, prices of housing have been driven drastically up due to the relatively low supply of housing in our community and extreme demand. This has had a detrimental effect on the people in this community as well as the business owners. While people who have been here are being priced out and forced to leave this community for more reasonably priced areas, every business in the county have “now hiring” signs up and have severe issues finding staff. These are things that should not be happening in conjunction with one another. This has grown to such a level that very few restaurants can even manage to open every day due to staffing issues and many businesses are really hurting to find help. This County needs to focus heavily on this issue in the coming years. Development and working with developers to keep up with this influx of new residents to this community is absolutely necessary. We need someone who will work with developers and business owners to ensure a legitimate place for the workforce that supports this community to live and create a home in.
PROTECTION OF OUR ENVIROMENT
The protection of this environment today is paramount to communities like ours which are so heavily reliant on the environment to live, have an economy and have a ton of fun in. There is a small line of balance between selling our natural resources, our land for commercial use, or personal use while preventing any destruction of an environment. This has been brought to the minds of every Chaffee County resident with the recent Nestle/ Blue Triton deal in 2021 regarding pumping water out of an aquifer to sell. Chaffee County needs someone who will keep a watchful eye on issues like this and provide proper balance to land usage with heavy forethought put into protection of this environment and this land we all love so much we decided to live here.
ACCESS TO PUBLIC LANDS
This is a major issue all over the world but has been at the forefront when it comes to Mountain communities such as Chaffee County. This has been brought up recently as an issue in this community due to recent proposed restrictions on camping and land use on publicly-accessible land. This community relies heavily on camping as part of our community and even our economy and a thing many of us enjoy being a part of. It is an attempt to create more regulations on the people to prevent law-breaking such as littering when the county is having trouble enforcing laws as they already stand. The times and Chaffee County are changing and growing more rapidly than anyone could have expected. Through all these changes, Chaffee County needs someone who stands up for access rights to our public lands, while also keeping a balance with environmental restoration efforts. This will range from fighting for the rights of people to use public land, as well as fighting for funding for the laws we have in place to protect the environment. Adding more regulation when we can and should just enforce the regulations we currently have is not the answer. People should have a right to use, access, and camp on public lands period.