Skarvan: Enough with greed
Sour grapes make good whine. Two candidates for City Council and mayor admit getting interested in local issues and politics during our moratorium and election relating to escalating and damaging STRs and construction activity overwhelming our community. They claim no one listened to them.
The fact is they were listened to, and the majority of the community didn’t agree with them per clear election results.
I’ve listened and heard a lot of references to that election, how the group that established Aspen Deserves Better, stinging like a Red Ant after losing big, and how it related to their businesses and out-of-town interests — the same language we heard from proponents of the oversized 1A project. The aftermath of that extremely divisive election has revealed the luxury lodge won’t be locally built or operated, and the massive project wasn’t needed for World Cup to return. Honesty and integrity matter.
The perceived need for more, while promoting excessive development, will continue to cause great harm to our environment and community. For example, over 1,000 construction sites in Aspen (population 7,000) are more than Arvada (population 120,000), per staff.
Construction and demolition generate stress, significant air, noise, sight and litter pollution, about a third of our traffic and 58% of the material filling our landfill, dramatically shortening its life to sub-10 years.
They cry for more! When too much is ever enough, that’s greed. What do the rest of us have that they don’t? Enough!
As a 40-year resident, I’ve known Torre for decades and appreciate his deep passion, experience and knowledge, needed for one final term. He and Skippy made mistakes, including Centennial ownership and rental inaction. But most importantly, they’re about community over commodity.
Vote Torre and Skippy to protect our community from growing selfishness, excess and greed.
Erik Skarvan
Aspen
