On Point: Golden's rules

Published December 28, 2005 at midnight

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Last week Golden said it intends to spend $1.68 million to expand open space on Lookout Mountain by buying about 65 acres on which local TV stations want to build a telecommunications tower. If that tower goes up, however, four existing towers will be razed, freeing up about 70 acres for permanent designation as . . . open space.

In other words, Golden's real purpose in moving to acquire the Lookout Mountain property - if necessary, through condemnation - has little to do with protecting open space and much to do with a local government determined to win a development dispute at all costs. Golden opposes the construction of a digital TV tower that is outside its jurisdiction. And so it is threatening to condemn the land - land that isn't even now contiguous with the city - in what would qualify as one of the most remarkable abuses of eminent-domain power in recent state history.

Those television stations filed an application with Jefferson County more than seven years ago requesting zoning to allow construction of the consolidated tower. Since that time they've been through a mind-numbing series of political approvals and rejections, reapplications and court rulings, while the issue remains unresolved. The process may be cumbersome and costly, but at least everyone understands the rules. Or thought they did.

Now Golden has decided to discard the rules - or rather, to substitute the precepts of a playground bully: "You won't give me your lunch? I'll take your lunch."

It's crude, effective - and very close to lawless.

The problem with ethanol

Colorado corn growers have been celebrating their victory earlier this month over Denver metro motorists, but the revelry may be premature.

Sure, the corn lobby just persuaded the state Air Quality Control Commission to maintain a wintertime ethanol mandate for two more years even though Denver is not remotely at risk of violating the federal carbon monoxide standard that prompted the mandate in the first place. But hold on. Ethanol is blended into local gasoline year-round, including summertime when ozone, not carbon monoxide, is the air-quality problem - and a potentially serious one at that.

So does ethanol help reduce ozone? Not quite, according to Doug Lawson, a commission member and researcher with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

"Ethanol in gasoline increases its Reid Vapor Pressure," Lawson told me, "so there are more evaporative emissions of ozone-forming VOCs (volatile organic compounds). Ethanol in gasoline also increases a type of evaporative emissions called permeation emissions, which escape through soft fuel system components such as plastic fuel tanks, hoses, and seals. In addition, ethanol in gasoline increases acetaldehyde emissions, which are toxic and a powerful ozone producer . . .

"In my opinion, ethanol in gasoline . . . actually increases ozone in the Front Range area."

At the very least, state regulators should consider banning ethanol during the summer to keep the region within the federal standard. But if they do that, why on Earth would they maintain a wintertime mandate that is little more than a gift to corn growers?

Pact with the devil

Victor Batarseh is an ambitious fellow who wanted to become mayor of Bethlehem. But he needed political allies, and there were only two ways to go. He could seek the support of a party of thieves and self-serving scoundrels who had looted local government for years (Fatah) or a party of Islamic terrorists dedicated to eliminating Israel and to making non-Muslims like himself (he's Christian) into second-class citizens.

Batarseh chose the second party, Hamas, and the result is recounted in a fascinating article in Friday's Wall Street Journal. Batarseh got to be mayor, all right, but it remains to be seen whether his pact with the devil will long survive. It can't be easy for him to do business with colleagues who would, if they ever ruled a Palestinian state, impose a special infidel tax on him. "We in Hamas intend to implement this tax someday," one Hamas council member assured the Journal.

And so it goes in another fledgling Arab democracy. If nothing else, the involvement of Hamas in Palestinian politics makes the Shiite religious coalition in Iraq look like the very model of tolerance.

Vincent Carroll, editor of the editorial pages, writes On Point several times a week. Reach him at carrollv@RockyMountainNews.com.

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