| ▲ | cucumber3732842 2 hours ago |
| > Its owner, a nonprofit that supports a community of Benedictine monks, put it on the market earlier this year. >The foundation put the property up for open auction in early February, meaning there was no minimum or maximum bid, she said. It accepted the offer the state made under the bill that passed. >The listing worried fans of the natural wonder. But at the tail end of the legislative session this month, a bipartisan group of lawmakers stepped in and approved $2.1 million to buy the falls and its surrounding land. Zero chance this wasn't arranged in some capacity off record. The state doesn't "just" buy waterfalls without such plans being tacitly agreed to beforehand or at least deemed viable by people who "know things". |
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| ▲ | hadlock 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| Probably they had been trying to sell it to the state for months/years/decades, and nothing had happened, so they escalated. Here in California in east bay there are thousands of acres of land around Mt. Diablo that are held by a non profit trust because the state/parks department is too lazy to aquire it/don't have funds to manage it. The privately owned/managed land around Mt. Diablo is roughly equal in size to the state park it surrounds. |
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| ▲ | bombcar an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | This kind of thing exists in many places in the USA for many reasons (tax relief, government stupidity or inability or lack of funds, etc). Sometimes the government is forbidden from buying land but nothing stops an individual or charity. | |
| ▲ | cucumber3732842 33 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | >Probably they had been trying to sell it to the state for months/years/decades Third option: Monks want to put up some minor tourist attraction, put in some parking and hand rails or engage in literally anything, doesn't really matter what since it's all invariably regulated near water. Bureaucrat who doesn't "get it" says no this is a special site if you want to do that you need to do XYZ first or GFY. Monks say we can't afford XZY, that would make this whole thing a nonstarter or defeat the point. Site languishes for a decade or two because while the subsequent bureaucrats may know what's right they can't necessarily ignore what the first guy said without sticking their necks way out. Eventually the monks find someone to help them out who gets the state to take it off their hands. Maybe they monks get a fair deal, maybe they're losing their ass, who knows. This fact pattern is really common with redevelopment of eyesore unoccupied buildings in prime locations so it wouldn't surprise me to see it going on with some natural site like this. | | |
| ▲ | jdlshore 8 minutes ago | parent [-] | | This sort of cynical catastrophizing isn’t really helpful. If you have a concrete example that applies to this situation, please share it, instead of gesturing vaguely in the direction of “government bad.” (Buildings in prime locations aren’t equivalent.) |
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| ▲ | wing-_-nuts 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Drat! I was going to buy this and put the entrance to my secret lair behind the waterfall. I would have gotten away with it too if not for those darn kids! |
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| ▲ | Aboutplants 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| One of the rare times where I’m probably kind of ok with it |
