A 2,300-acre preserve in Marana originally set aside to protect an endangered bird may be endangered itself.
Citing fiscal reasons, Marana officials want to end the town’s 99-year lease on the Tortolita Preserve with the State Land Department.
The town says it makes no sense to keep putting money into the lease now that the once-endangered pygmy owl for which the preserve was established is no longer listed as an endangered species. But environmentalists say it makes no sense to let the preserve slip from the town’s hands.
The Town Council took a preliminary step Tuesday night toward letting go of the preserve. It voted to terminate its separate agreement with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to manage the land as a preserve.
Town officials note the once-endangered cactus ferruginous pygmy owl hasn’t been federally listed since 2006. They say the money they’re putting into the state land lease — which will total more than $121 million once it expires in 2099 — would be better spent elsewhere, perhaps on buying other open space.
“We feel it’s wiser to have title to open land than having a lease,” Town Manager Gilbert Davidson said this week. “We’d rather take this money and be able to buy property.”
State land officials — whose mandate is to raise maximum revenue for public schools through trust lands — are noncommittal about prospects for renegotiating the lease.
But Marana Mayor Ed Honea said, “I’d rather spend this money on parks, roads and other things. There’s really no need for it anymore.”
Environmentalist view
But Christina McVie, an environmentalist long active in efforts to preserve Sonoran Desert land and protect the owl, says this would be an ill-considered move, given the preserve’s value to other species such as the endangered lesser long-nosed bat and the declining Sonoran Desert tortoise.
“It is important to find some way to preserve the area as the mature ironwoods may be anywhere from 300 to 1,000 years old and the mature saguaros are 100 to 200 years old,” said McVie, who is active with the Tucson Audubon Society and the Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection. “We cannot re-create that mature habitat elsewhere, nor mitigate the habitat functions with baby plants in subdivisions.”
Mike Hein, the former Marana town manager who helped engineer the 2000 state lease agreement, agrees this preserve still has inherent value without the pygmy owl issue, just for its beauty. He added that he’s not trying to advise his former employer about the land.
Today, the preserve is essentially a large, mostly flat patch of the old growth saguaro-ironwood forest that marks much of the metro area’s far northwest side. Those entering it first see jumping cholla cacti, prickly pear, palo verde, saguaro and mistletoe-filled ironwood trees.
The preserve adjoins the large Dove Mountain development on the south and west, but the homes are out of sight as hikers start the 9.2-mile trail through the preserve. A sign at the entrance says, “This is their home. Leave the critters alone. For your safety and theirs.”
When Hein negotiated the preserve agreement with the state back in 2000, he was ecstatic at what he called a “win-win-win” situation.
That’s because the preserve created a large public park, while allowing continued development of the Dove Mountain project. Construction had been stopped at Dove Mountain for more than a year because a pygmy owl had been seen on the development site. That required developers and federal officials to negotiate over the owl issue.
rising lease rates
But over time, Marana officials have soured on the preserve agreement, as annual lease rates kept escalating. Every five years, they rise another 10 percent. Rates started at $432,000 annually, are now $522,000 and will hit $2.64 million once the lease runs out in October 2099.
By then, after the town has paid more than $121 million in leases, “guess what we will have — nothing,” Town Manager Davidson said.
A significant portion of this money comes from the town’s bed tax, paid by customers of the Ritz-Carlton resort at Dove Mountain and about 10 other hotels, town officials say.
At the same time, Davidson acknowledges that the state lease has no provision for early termination, and “the state will not just let us out.”
“We will have to work with them” to renegotiate the lease, said Davidson, adding that town officials would like to meet with Land Department officials “as soon as possible.”
State Land Commissioner Vanessa Hickman said she’s open to meeting with Marana officials. But she added, “We would have to make any decision in the best interest of the trust.” State trust land is supposed to reap the most money it can from sale or lease, with most of the money earmarked to support schools.
Hickman said the land department would be willing to discuss what benefits the department and the land trust might receive in lieu of the Marana lease income.
mixed feelings
Others have mixed feelings about the preserve’s fate, including the president of a mountain biking group.
Zach MacDonald, president of the Sonoran Desert Mountain Bicyclists, said his group has made use of that land. But its members have ridden the preserve less and less since a major network of trails was built in the Tortolita Mountains — “they’re so much more interesting because they give you views,” he said. “This piece is kind of an island.”
“It would be sad to have that piece not be preserved,” McDonald said, “but knowing what Marana is trying to accomplish, it would be better to put that $500,000 into protecting other areas, building trails in other areas that are maybe more valuable.”
