Not too long ago, I blogged the new “company town” (Any Color You Want … As Long As It’s Ruby) on the northern side of Color Country: Ruby, Utah. Here’s the very short version: “Due to a recent change in Utah law, a motel just outside Bryce Canyon named Ruby’s Inn has just become a town.”

At the time, I didn’t think it affected us too much a little further south. It looks like the rest of Garfield County might be a big loser, but I thought the damage might be limited to that. Ruby’s Inn is sort of unique.

Little did I know.

My sister recently alerted me to another instance of damage done by the ULL (Utah’s Looney Legislators) when they created another mess instead of laws. (I can’t resist quoting Will Rogers, “Whenever they make a joke, it’s a law. And whenever they make a law, it’s a joke.”)

According to an editorial in The Salt Lake Tribune on Monday (November 19), “As soon as the state attorney general signs off, Utah will have its 245th municipality.” Aspen, Utah.

Except that it won’t be a real town. It will be a housing development in Daniels Canyon. The Tribune’s bottom line on this is interesting too:

Developers will jump at the chance to avoid jumping through hoops, with minimal interference from government not of their own making.

Think of it this way. (Dean Sellers, the developer) is Ben Cartwright and Aspen is the Ponderosa. Now he’s going to appoint Hoss, Little Joe and Hop Sing to the town council, and run the town like Ben ran the ranch. He’ll make all the decisions. And Virginia City be damned.

Here in Color Country, some might say we have a problem with runaway development without giving developers the right to do whatever they damn well please. The nightmare of where this new law could leave us is starting to take shape.

With this thought in mind, I looked around my own back yard and asked, “Where could the same thing happen here? Is there a large tract of valuable, developable land in private hands that could possibly be the next Aspen?” (Aspen, Utah, not Aspen, Colorado. Although that might be a relevant image to hold in your mind too.)

The image above is taken from the official zoning maps of Washington County. The area crosshatched in green is …

• in private hands
• very developable

It’s actually the mouth of Parunuweap Canyon – the East Fork of the Virgin River. It’s really beautiful up there. (Click the image for a larger version.) The green crosshatching means the land is zoned OST-20: “to provide for the protection of primarily undeveloped private land.” (An interesting footnote is that the care and feeding of weaner hogs is specifically allowed in an otherwise standard and boring zoning law. There’s gotta be a story there! I wish I knew what it was.) I think it would be a genuine crime for that land to be turned into another version of Aspen (Utah or Colorado). The Washington County zoning helps to prevent that from happening.

But wait! The ULL passed a law that makes Washington County’s laws relatively meaningless. All that is necessary for one of the last unspoiled treasures in Color Country to disappear under the tracks of an army of bulldozers is the right set of circumstances.

Right now, we also have the protection that the the current ownership of the land gives every impression of wanting to protect this land. But things like that can change with the speed of a flash flood in a slot canyon.