Property Rights

I am a supporter of giving our troops and our military every advantage they need to do their job. And, that includes the equipment and training facilities to complete their training exercises. Like most Coloradans I was pleased that at the end of the last BRAC (Base Realignment and Closure) round, Colorado’s military footprint increased. Most significantly, Ft. Carson Army Base in El Paso County expects an additional 10,000 troops. However, fallout from this realignment is that the Army also says it needs additional land for training, and they are looking in the neighborhood.

The Army already has 238,000 acres between La Junta and Trinidad known as the Piñon Canyon Maneuver Site, which opened in 1985. Making a un-flattering observation that the adjacent land resembles much of the middle-east geographically, the Army let it be known that it fancies tripling the size of the current site by acquiring more of the ranch land in the area. Over 400,000 acres more! How big is that? Well for those not familiar with the relative size of an acre of land, try to envision 1000 square miles of real estate, and that’s about the size of the proposed expanded facility.

Not surprisingly, the locals are up in arms. I am, too. Last summer I attended a meeting in Kim, Colorado, of mostly local folks aligned to stand up to the might of the Federal Government. Lon Robertson is heading the Piñon Canyon Expansion Opposition Coalition. You can learn more at www.Piñoncanyon.com. This is some of the best cow-calf grazing land in the state. Generations of some of the heartiest families in Colorado call this home, and annually deal with droughts, blizzards, market cycles, and government policy – all out of their control – to try to eek out a living and maintain a heritage on the land that embodies all that is left of the Old West.

Just the "possibility" of the Army taking all this land has cast an economic pall across the region that already has dealt with enough challenges. Who wants to invest, expand a business, open a new shop, or make any long term investment when everything might change with a single decision from Washington? Reports of land already owned by the Army vary between 15-25 million acres. It begs the question, "Is there no where else that the Army, or some other branch of the Federal Government, already owns that will satisfy there needs?"

The people of the land are among the most patriotic souls in America. They bleed red, white, and blue. But, understandably, they are up in arms that the Government they believe in might also be the government that ends their way of life – and perhaps unnecessarily so. Sure, the Army says it wants to work with "willing sellers." But, in a letter to me last year while I was still in Congress, they made it crystal clear that eminent domain was very much on the table, and they were perfectly willing to use it. "What's the big deal, as long as they get paid for the land?" That’s what the unknowing would say. The big deal is that when government becomes the ONLY game in town, every thing and every one changes. When the ranches go, so too does the equipment dealer, the café, the grocer, the hardware store, and even the preacher. And, what some don’t get is that all land isn’t created equal. Just because you pay a rancher the appraised value after you condemn his land, and assume he can go somewhere else and replace it, doesn’t make it all square. You see, they never can put an adequate value on land that's "home." This land is a way of life, a tradition.

From inside the beltway in Washington DC, Piñon Canyon in southeastern Colorado may not seem like such a big deal. When all the folks in Las Animas County get together and scream, the noise in Washington likely drowns out their few voices. But, that doesn't mean that whatever the Government wants, the Government should get to take. Here's a Line of Sight hats-off to Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave for being the stand-up elected official in Colorado to speak out on behalf of the landowners and challenge the government. Where is everyone else?

Some of the rest of us need to help in this fight, or the next time it might be our home and our way of life that Washington comes after. It does make a difference.