Arizona Issues
What Can You Do?
Tell your state representative to support efforts to conserve the state trust lands identified in Proposition 103. In northern Arizona, express support for the Open Spaces and Greenways Plan and the Regional Plan. Both plans protect lands in the Flagstaff area that were listed in Prop 103.
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Forging a new public-private partnership
Protecting natural habitat and open space around the San Francisco Peaks and Flagstaff is a priority for those living in this Arizona town, perched at 7,000 feet and a 90-mile drive from the Grand Canyon. In a remarkable cooperative venture, private landowners and concerned citizens have brokered a solution that protects private property rights while saving a special place — Dry Lake.
Dry Lake features a very unusual, 60-acre, ephemeral wetland within a volcanic crater located 4 miles southwest of Flagstaff. Home to a wide variety of plants and animals, the area is frequented by elk. Two development partnerships, Flagstaff Ranch Golf Club and Flagstaff Ranch Development, own the land in and around the Dry Lake crater. Working to create a solution to prevent development in the crater, Grand Canyon Trust, with our community partners, approached both landowners with a proposal to move their development out of Dry Lake and away from the wetlands.
The development partnerships agreed to swap their parcels and move their developments out of the crater to adjacent, less fragile land. The Trust purchased Dry Lake for $3.8M, keeping development out of the sensitive volcanic caldera. Dry Lake was transferred to the Forest Service in January 2002. Joining us in making this happen were the County Planning and Zoning Commission, the County Board of Supervisors, Northern Arizona University, Friends of Dry Lake, The Nature Conservancy, and the Arboretum at Flagstaff joined the Grand Canyon Trust, the developers, members of the business community, and others.
Our (and our collaborators’) work on the Dry Lake project not only resulted in a “community win,” but it is also a model for getting things done. Everyone won: The developers retained land for their plans, and the citizens of Flagstaff protected Dry Lake for future generations.
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