Sen. Jake Flake was quoted in your March 18 issue: “Forty-four-thousand acres isn’t a small amount. If you were to develop that 44,000 acres, we’d be taking in $10-15 billion.” [Sen. Jake Flake: Ex-House Speaker Talks About Tough Year]

His comments were apparently meant to make the case that more state trust land should not be set aside for open space without compensating trust beneficiaries. Such a conclusion ignores the realities of the Arizona land market. Although we are a growth market, there is only so much new growth. Arizona has vast amounts of land upon which that growth can go. For the last 100 years, very little of that growth has gone on state trust land, and the trust has not received its fair market share of revenues from that growth.

There are many reasons that the trust has not achieved its potential, but the Legislature certainly must share the blame. Legislators have generally viewed the State Land Department as another cost center, and not a profit center. It has the potential to be a major profit center, if managed properly.

There are millions of acres of trust land upon which the trust can achieve its share of growth, and which is not particularly environmentally or aesthetically significant. Instead of focusing on the “cost” of setting aside sensitive lands for open space, we should focus on maximizing the “profit” that will result from trust lands receiving their fair share of Arizona’s growth. —