In 2002, the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors got out of the growth business for the thousands of acres of lands surrounding the Sacramento International Airport in the Natomas basin. It wisely decided to empower the city of Sacramento to plan for any urban expansion and for the county to manage what was to stay as farmland.
Now, nearly a quarter century later, supervisors are on the verge of abandoning this long-standing commitment. Key votes in the coming months, starting Monday, will decide the fate of a vast new community of 25,000 residents just east of a bucolic stretch of the Garden Highway bordered by interstates 5 and 80.
Known as Upper Westside, this project, more than any, reveals how the county threatens the balance between growth and environmental preservation in Natomas. It feels like we are heading towards a historic conflict, particularly with state and federal wildlife agencies…