12/12/12: Day of Infamy – The RPU is Approved

Not unexpectedly, on December 12, 2012, the RPU was easily approved by TRPA’s Governing Board, commencing a new era in the history of the Basin and the organization charged with protecting it. Unprecedented in its abandonment of its responsibility for achieving and maintaining environmental thresholds established to preserve Lake Tahoe as a national treasure, TRPA’s approval of the RPU is viewed by the conservation community as a turning point that will be viewed historically as having sanctioned the urbanization of the Basin.

The culmination of a process that had been underway for a number of years, precursors having comprised a variety of “prosperity” plans and public relations campaigns that promised sustainable growth, environmental gains, and other fairy tales that sound good and deliver great profits to resort developers and tax revenues to local governments, it is also testimony to the ability of well financed and persistent special interest lobbying in pursuit of profits to sell an illusion over reality.

Also nurtured by a threat on the behalf of Nevada and its SB 271 (see “Nevada’s Grand Bluff” on FLT’s Homepage) to destroy the bi-state Compact and the TRPA if its economic and political demands were not met, the threat became a comfortable defense for those who wanted to posture as saving the lake by surrendering to the demands and save the lake by saving the Compact. In reality, of course, with the RPU gutting the environmental protections for which the TRPA and the Compact were created, the argument fades into folly both figuratively and literally. Historians shall have a field day with both the nature and cleverness this and other ideologically incoherent arguments proffered by supporters of the RPU.

However, while the TRPA, local governments, and resort developers clearly won this round, it does not mean that the war is over. The track record of the TRPA supporting determinations that are not only contrary to their mission but also illegal is well established. It is not unusual for people to ask: “Why is the TRPA endlessly sued over this and that?” The answer is simple. It is due to excessive hubris on behalf of the agency that has resulted in a policy that holds: “If you don’t like it, sue us!” Unfortunately, the TRPA believes it can violate its own charter and the law with impunity unless directed otherwise by a federal judge.

If they would bother to listen to the conservation community surrounding them as well as abide by the laws that they are supposed to enforce, it is unlikely that they would either be sued, or lose if sued. Similarly, if the environmental groups that are forced to sue because of TRPA’s obstinance lost in court, they’d be disinclined to file. But that has not been the case. Litigation is not the choice of the conservation community, it is a requirement established by the TRPA and its supporters who want it all and believe they can have it all. A review of TRPA’s legal history shows that they still have not come to grips with issue.

The boxes below this one chronicle sequentially the unfolding history of this and related issues following the approval of the RPU on December 12^th.