Vista Farms Disinformation Project

Take a look at the Vista Farms propaganda site here. Both Avery Wilkerson, the mayor of Cayce, and the "new team," who moderates the site, seem to be pushing the tax advantages and control advantages incurred by the citizens of Cayce in annexing the Green Diamond/Vista Farms plot. The project is being touted as a haves (Richland County) versus have-nots (residents of Cayce) campaign.

I have not personally witnessed any animosity between residents of Cayce and those "across the river." However, I find some of the other claims made on the site to be dubious at best. For example, the proponents of the Vista Farms project say that the annexation will lower taxes for residents of Cayce. Yet they site no proposals pending before the City Council to such effect. Further, they say that Cayce will not have to foot the bill for extending public services to the Vista Farms area. Even if the agreement between the developers and the City Council/mayor that the developers will foot the bill for sewer and water line extension is real, there is no mention of the costs of maintenance of those lines, the costs of extending the capacities of the sewer and water systems, or of the cost of providing other essential services to the area such as fire, police, and education. The proponents mention that the costs of services such as education, fire, and policing are a non-issue if the land is never developed and that even if the land is developed that the tax revenue from the developments will cover the costs of the services. What they fail to mention is that residential development tax revenues rarely cover the costs of such services.

Furthermore, the fact that the developers and the mayor who insist that there is no development plan, have also announced a plan to use 2/3 of the property for agricultural and environmental purposes suggests the disingenuous nature of the whole deal. So who will finance the very unprofitable "constructed wetlands" that are so highly touted by the developers? My guess is Cayce taxpayers.

Another problem with the view of the "new team" lies in their conception of the control of the land. They repeatedly mention that the zoning process is a public one and that the citizens of Cayce will have a say in how the area is zoned. Anyone who has attempted to sway the result of a zoning ordinance without bringing a big bag of money to the table can tell you how that turned out.

Finally, the biggest problem associated with the project is the levees. The existing levees were privately constructed to divert water from farmlands. It is well documented that the maintenance of levees is an expensive and time-consuming venture. So who will foot the bill for the levees? Well, the developers want you to think that private landowners will. What they don't tell you is the exorbitant cost of maintaining the levees would most likely prove prohibitively expensive for private landowners. So what will happen? Let the levees decay and endanger the whole development, or appeal the to the civic authorities for help?

Ultimately, as I have said on other occasions, the development of flood plains is a risky and expensive business. As Professor Adam Scales of the Washington and Lee School of Law put it: "maintaining a sinking metropolis that sits several feet below sea level is perhaps the ultimate faith-based initiative; these failures are surprising only in their capacity to shock.” (Adam F. Scales. A Nation of Policyholders: Governmental and Market Failure in Flood Insurance. 26 MISS. C. L. REV. 3. (2006))