Despite the funding disadvantage, Fielder believes his group can win because of the widespread frustration with traffic that growth has brought. Right after they hit, we're going to hit. Fielder says his group came together after the legislature failed to address the problems of traffic and disappearing open space. But it will keep development from sprawling across the landscape, he says. Once development springs up in the countryside, away from existing cities, all the land around it is viewed as ripe for development, Fielder says.
Land values go up, and farmers are tempted to sell to developers.
Once you put that cancer there, it's going to metastasize. Fielder, a publisher of calendars and coffee-table photography books, said that such uncontrolled growth could derail the Colorado economy because growth threatens the natural beauty that attracts industry to Colorado. Most of the business community, however, opposes Amendment 24. Jeannette Hillery, who follows environmental and land-use issues for the League of Women Voters, says her group is backing Amendment 24 because it involves citizens in approving city growth plans. Now, local planning boards and city councils hear from citizens when a project is proposed in their neighborhood.