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Ruskin: Ranch development a lock
SELIGMAN, AZ-- Ranch owner Fred Ruskin says that if the Yavapai Ranch
land exchange does not go through, he will move forward with developing
subdivisions within his 110-square mile ranch here -- and the land
has enough available water to do it. Ruskin already has the planning and zoning clearance to subdivide his ranch for housing. With two-acre lots, Ruskin could have 25,000 homes sitting within a few miles of Interstate 40 -- and a couple hours away from the exploding metropolis of Las Vegas. "If Congress can't do this land exchange in short order, I'm developing," Ruskin said. And it's the short-order work in Congress that is the hot topic this week. On Saturday, U.S. Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl are scheduled to visit Flagstaff and Camp Verde for town hall-style meetings on the legislation. Meanwhile, U.S. Rep. Rick Renzi's House version of the bill has been approved. Ruskin is a board-certified anesthesiologist and pediatrician who has not practiced medicine in six years, namely because of his work with the ranch and the exchange. He's also the father of three young children whom he and his wife raise in the Phoenix area. He also oversees the partnership and limited liability corporations that make up the Yavapai Ranch holdings -- and this has put him at the center of what could be the largest public-for-private land swap in Arizona in nearly 50 years. According to information from the Forest Service, the sprawling ranch represents 90 percent of all of the private inholdings within public lands in the state. It appears on the map in a checkerboard formation with forest land, and a land exchange consolidates 35,000 acres of property for the Forest Service. Ruskin is left with 12,000 acres of consolidated ranch land, and he picks up property around Flagstaff, William, Camp Verde, Clarkdale and Cottonwood. Some of the land he passes along, and others he keeps for private development. Although the deal sounds lucrative for Ruskin and the ranch, he contends that the laws in place for land exchanges make it so that it has to be completely fair and equitable. And he will pass on much of the Forest Service land he acquires to municipalities without chance of saving the land for appreciation or selling it on the market.
He wonders whether he could make more money with selling lots. "I lie awake at night worrying about the trade as it sits," Ruskin said, referring to his belief that it might not be as lucrative as developing housing. "But diversity is coming out of the trade, and it diversifies risk." However, critics of the land swap believe Ruskin and his family will get a sweetheart deal if it goes through. He'll pick up commercial land along Interstate 17 in Camp Verde, and he will retain 1,100 acres of land traded out for industrial park development in Flagstaff. Anita Rochelle-Goss of the Citizens for Responsible Development -- a grassroots group formed specifically over concerns with the exchange -- said it appears the taxpayers are getting the short shrift. She said Ruskin still retains some of the water rights on the land and he'll still hold the grazing permits. "If he gets the water and he gets the grazing rights, what's actually getting exchanged here?" Rochelle-Goss said. "There's also trading of land without water. It's like trading flesh without blood." Ruskin explained that he is keeping half of the water rights of three wells that the Forest Service gets in the exchange. They are getting a total of seven. He's keeping the rights to those wells to maintain water supply for the 12,000 acres he consolidates. The ranch already has an established pipeline system to deliver the water. By comparison, Ruskin said he gets no land parcels with developed wells on them as part of the proposed exchange. As for the grazing permits, he said he does not get to keep those permits in perpetuity. He will have to reapply and compete with other interested ranchers when the permits expire. Another concern with the proposed land trade is that, as a legislative land trade, it is not getting the public disclosure and study that an administrative land trade would require. Max Licher, a Sedona architect, is a concerned citizen who has followed the progress of the trade and has done some of his own research. He said the complexity of the exchange is a good reason to look at it from an administrative perspective, where experts are working on in-depth studies of possible impacts. "It's too big and too complex to assume our legislators will understand the impacts," he said. Ruskin, however, said the red tape that comes with administrative trades would make the exchange nearly impossible. The amount of land getting swapped means extensive studies that Ruskin contends could take a decade or more. The impetus for concern in the Verde Valley is that Ruskin will pick up the Forest Service land in Camp Verde, and there is no reliable water supply there to support that kind of commercial development, detractors say. The bills in Congress, however, contain specific water use caps for Ruskin's development parcels. Supporters hold that the land swap allows for growth in places landlocked by the Forest Service, and it creates preservation in a pristine area. The Seligman-area ranch includes the largest antelope run in northern Arizona and the largest stand of ponderosa pines on private lands in the state. It also has 800-year-old alligator juniper trees that are four and five feet in diameter -- and it's the upper watershed for the Big Chino Wash. Ruskin said he's worked to ensure that, if the exchange works, it works for the good of preservation. "I've tried hard to make a trade I can be ecologically proud of," he said. Reporter Seth Muller can be reached at 913-8607 or smuller@azdailysun.com
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