Among Teton Valley's unbridled growth a smarter big development

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

By Ben Cannon

In the amount of time it could take for a large development proposed in Jackson Hole to get to the early stages of the county application process, a 1,350-acre subdivision in Teton Valley, Idaho, was approved, broke ground and is moving towards building what its developers envision as something more than a subdivision.

Huntsman Springs, just off of Main Street in Driggs, is but one development underway across Teton Valley, where approved subdivisions and those likely to move ahead in the application pipeline are nearly too many to track.

That Huntsman Springs – a development very noticeable to the residents and passersby of Driggs, Teton Valley’s biggest town – moved from application to groundbreaking in less than two years has as much to do with a lack of development ordinances in historically conservative, formerly agrarian Teton County as it does with the deal-sweetening offer made by Utah’s prominent Huntsman family and partner Mike Stears, a local landscaper.

Along with up to 650 residential units – single-family lots, townhouses and cabins – and a site eyed for a 300-room hotel and a David Kidd-designed 18-hole golf course, Huntsman Springs will offer commercial space anchored around the future site for a new Teton County courthouse.

The land given by the developers to Teton County for the courthouse is valued around $1.5 million. The new courthouse will cost $5 million and the county will swap about $3.5 in land holdings in exchange for construction, less the difference.

“It’s a win-win situation,” said Teton County, Idaho, Commission Chairman Larry Young. “The county will get a big piece of infrastructure for less than half its value.”
Teton County’s coffers are so dry, county commissioners had to cut $500,000 from the annual county budget to fund basic services.

Meanwhile, the valley is booming with private development, but still lacks a capital improvements plan to assess the county’s needs and help mitigate rapid growth that is straining sewer and water infrastructure so much that Tetonia, Victor and Driggs need new or revamped treatment facilities.

With the courthouse, Teton County benefits with a new central administrative building, and Huntsman Springs gets a commercial hub that will surely develop around the county’s nucleus building.

 “It can be said the benefit to the Huntsmans will exceed that of the county,” Young said, “but our county is so strapped that people realize it’s for the best.”

Though a reservation program has been in place since May, Monday marked the first day buyers were able to go into contract with the Huntsman Springs group as part of the development’s initial release of property. Preliminary numbers suggest sales of the first release were more than double the national average for similar developments, spokesman Bill Reid said Monday evening, adding the group was “extraordinarily pleased with interest in the commercial property.”

Huntsman Springs is just west of Main Street near downtown Driggs. Its sales office is a sharply renovated farmhouse that belonged to the Curtis family, who, along with two other old-time Teton Valley families, sold the agricultural land that became the 1,350-acre spread. Of that, nearly 500 acres is preserved with a conservation easement. An elevated 1.5-mile boardwalk will allow pedestrians to take in the refuge that is home to a private bison herd now numbering 13 heads, including a white buffalo, a sacred emblem in some Native American religions. Efforts are underway to restore and reclaim wetland and grassy areas from decades of cattle grazing.

The Huntsman family – whose patriarch, billionaire Jon Huntsman Sr., founded Huntsman Chemical and is considered among the last of the great American industrialists of the 20th century – has kept up a regular presence at the Huntsman Springs development. Managing Partner David Huntsman and brother Paul are on site weekly. Jon Sr. and wife Karen have a house on the Teton River and are said to be fond of the valley. Huntsman Sr. was born in Blackfoot, about 100 miles west of Driggs.

Jon Huntsman Jr. is governor of Utah and is not involved in the family business.
“The Huntsmans are very involved in the community,” said Molly Stewart, who heads marketing for Huntsman Springs. “Driggs is important to their whole family and they knew it was going to be developed and wanted to make sure it was done well.”

Jon Huntsman Sr. is regarded among the top philanthropists in the U.S. He and Karen helped co-found the University of Utah’s Huntsman Cancer Institute, one of the country’s major centers, with a gift of $225 million. Huntsman Springs sales associates said part of the development’s sales monies will go to the cancer center.

Contrary to the current trend of re-imagining a landscape to construct a perfect golf course, which can easily fetch upwards of $20 million per high-end development course, the David Kidd-designed course at Huntsman Springs will keep more with its natural environment.

“It will mimic wetlands environments and marshes and high grass,” Stewart said, noting three holes had been shaped. “We’re not planting a lot of trees.”

The course and clubhouse, complete with restaurant and health center, are scheduled to open in 2010 with groundbreaking expected for the fall.

In the meantime, contractors will continue to erect houses and paint grassy links across the Teton Valley, though Larry Young is less concerned about the one going up adjacent to Driggs, which keeps density close to services and amenities, unlike much of the rural development sprawl scattered helter skelter across the valley .
“Huntsman Springs is a big, scary looking development,” he said, “but it does align with smart-growth principles.”
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Among Teton Valley's unbridled growth a smarter big development | Planet JH News Article: Victor/Driggs, ID

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