Re: Housing Development On The Rise Near National Forests

This is an extremely bad trend. Housing developments should never be allowed to blossom near National Forests.This type of sprawl causes a variety of deleterious effects including:

1)Loss of valuable agricultural lands and forest resources

2) Conversion of agricultural and rural lands to uses inconsistent with their current designation drives out traditional land uses. Rising tax assessments force farmers and ranchers to give up their lands even if they would prefer to continue using them for traditional uses.

3) Loss of crucial wildlife habitats. Commercial and residential uses cause blockage and fragmentation of crucial habitats and corridors for wildlife.

4) The EPA has identified urban runoff as the principal source of contamination to inland and coastal waters in most urban areas. Paving over ever more watersheds in the rural areas and/or adjacent to National Forests will exacerbate the problem by adding new sources of pollution, and removing natural filtration mechanisms. Already, we suffer beach closures due to contamination everytime it rains.

5) Sprawling development causes increased automotive traffic and air pollution.

6)Sprawling development drains public infrastructure resources from our urban centers, harming services in our cities.

7) When housing developments are built adjacent to National forests, residents of far-flung bedroom communities commute to the urban centers and use these services, but don't pay for them.

Southern California is already ruined. I'd hate to see the same thing happen in other states.