Rezoning would cost Pinal landowners

Pinal County landowners who spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to rezone land stand to lose that money and the zoning designation — as the Board of Supervisors plans to vote today to revert more than 7,700 undeveloped acres to its original zoning.

The move is intended to weed out speculative rezoning by landowners who haven’t began development. But landowners and property rights advocates say it devalues land and violates the law.

The 29 parcels targeted include properties near Queen Creek, Casa Grande, Coolidge and Florence. The board will have separate public hearings on each parcel and will have three options: reverting a parcel to former zoning, extending the time allowed for development, or finding the property in compliance.

The rezonings were done from 1986 through this year, and some county officials want owners to develop the land or lose the zoning. But District 2 Supervisor Sandie Smith said the board needs to hear from property owners about what they have done to improve their land, even if dirt hasn’t been moved yet.

“If this is just people going out to zone something and flip it over, I would be concerned,” Smith said. “But the people that have contacted me have done a lot of work bringing water to parcels and other things.”

Lori Klein, former executive director for the political committee that pushed for Proposition 207 in last year’s election, said down-zoning the privately owned property is the “biggest land grab in the state of Arizona.”

Prop. 207, known as the “Private Property Rights Protection Act,” was approved by voters and requires compensation to landowners if existing rights or the value of the property is reduced by government actions.

“I don’t think they are even considering that this downzoning could trigger a lawsuit,” Klein said. “This is really a draconian move by government officials.”

District 3 Supervisor David Snider said county staff has evaluated these cases for about a year and is abiding by a stipulation in all rezoning cases that allows the county to revert zoning if “substantial work” has not been completed within a given time period. That is usually 18 months, though some cases had two-year limits, he said.

“The stipulation is put on to discourage speculative zoning,” Snider said.

Klein said developers are hurting financially right now and reverting zoning “is extortion.”

“Everyone has the 18-month rule, but right now nobody’s doing anything,” Klein said. “The market can’t bear it right now. This is their land and they bought it to develop and the government is now saying, ‘We’re taking away your right.’”

Pinal County spokeswoman Heather Murphy said that because of Prop. 207 concerns, the Board of Supervisors may request additional legal research at today’s meeting.

Ahwatukee Foothills resident Greg Herbert, who owns 40 acres zoned for an RV park near Casa Grande, said he bought the property after it had been zoned for RV use and now the board is considering reverting the property to an agricultural land designation.

“I have part of the property under contract right now based on it being zoned for RV,” Herbert said. “It’s more valuable being RV.”

Herbert said the previous owner gave an easement to the county in exchange for the RV zoning.

“I’ve owned the property for about a year and a half but it was rezoned in 1987 — it’s been RV for 20 years, and now they want to rezone.”

Learn more

What: Pinal County Board of Supervisors

When: 9:30 a.m. today

Where: 31 N. Pinal St., Building A, Florence