Ascendigo proposal must be rejected

Ascendigo wants to create a camp for autistic children and young adults in Missouri Heights. I fully support the cause in the right location on land that is zoned appropriately.

In this case, the chosen property is a subdivision zoned for 13-plus two single-family homes in the middle of a neighborhood consisting exclusively of other single-family homes. A

scendigo operates a business, albeit a not-for-profit business, and decided that it is a good idea to try to drop that in the middle of a residential area. I ask myself, Why? The conclusion I came to is that it is just economics. A property that is zoned for the commercial activity that Ascendigo is planning is extremely expensive in the Roaring Fork Valley. So, the easy option is to try to squeeze this in under a falsely labeled “educational facility” on residential-zoned land in the middle of other people’s homes.

After trying the same stunt in Emma earlier on and being defeated by a grassroots movement, they now moved downvalley to just past the border of Eagle County (the closest possible location to Aspen that is not in Eagle or Pitkin counties) in the hope that Garfield County would not see through the commercial nature of their proposed year-round camp.

The residents of Missouri Heights who trusted that existing zoning would keep their residential neighborhood just that, residential, now rely on the Board of County Commissioners to see through the smokescreen deployed by Ascendigo to see the camp for what it is, a commercial operation for which approval must be denied.

Tobias Munk

Carbondale