Preserve Vistoso Thanks Council For Attempting Land Purchase

Yesterday, LOVE reported that the The Town of Oro Valley was going to negotiate to purchase the former Vistoso Golf land from Romspen, the owner, with the intent of converting the the land to a permanent town amenity.

The following is statement from the group, Preserve Vistoso. They have been working tirelessly to bring this amenity to our community. We have titled key areas for reading convenience.
---
Preserve Vistoso thanks town council for their unanimous action

"Preserve Vistoso is pleased that the Oro Valley Mayor and Town Council listened to our 1,300 members. Although open Town Council meetings have been prohibited due to Covid-19 restrictions, Preserve Vistoso members communicated to Town Council via emails, letters and open Zoom meetings that we want to retain the recreational zoning and save the Vistoso property as a nature preserve and community trail.

At last week’s Town Council meeting Mayor Winfield proposed that the Town initiate communications with Romspen to negotiate the sale of the former Vistoso Golf Course to keep it zoned as open space. The Council voted unanimously to support this motion. We thank the Town Council for approving this action and we look forward to hearing updates on their progress as they engage with Romspen.

Setting the recored straight: "No side deals ever"

During that meeting a few residents made disparaging and inaccurate comments about Preserve Vistoso. We know that volunteer community boards can face criticism, but it is unfortunate that the Preserve Vistoso board was accused of somehow engaging in backroom efforts to pursue a separate deal. Those comments aren’t true and should not detract from the dedicated efforts of our members and our board to let the Town Council know that we want to protect this beautiful desert property.

Here are some facts

• Preserve Vistoso is a 501c3. We publicly supported The Conservation Fund (TCF) and its efforts to buy the property. Our members pledged more than $1.5 million to help TCF purchase the property. This included more than $200,000 in pledges from our board. We also fully supported TCF offering Fair Market Value for the property.
• Preserve Vistoso has never pursued or proposed any side deals with Romspen. We are not working on any other offer. Prior to our partnership with TCF, we distributed Romspen’s development plans to secure input from a few members of our community. Based on community comments, the Preserve Vistoso board agreed to oppose Romspen's proposed development plans. Suggesting that reviewing Romspen's plan meant that we were going to propose a side deal with Romspen is totally inaccurate. 
• As a community driven organization, we send out regular updates to our members and have an email address available for members to ask questions. We have a website that identifies our board members. We participate at Vistoso Community Association (VCA) board meetings, which is open to all Rancho Vistoso members and we provide information for the VCA monthly newsletter. The public is invited to learn more about us at preservevistoso.org. 

Our commitment is to ensure that the Vistoso property remains open space and is protected by a permanent conservation easement.

Preserve Vistoso "
---