‘Big Ideas’ Wither in Desert Town

Pat Wolfe told them it was a bad idea to build a power plant at the end of the airport’s runway, but city boosters laughed him off as uninformed.

They aren’t laughing any more. Wolfe’s plane nearly flipped during a landing approach in the spring that coincided with a test firing of the $370-million plant.

The potential threat to aviation is under investigation. The power plant, originally billed as a lucrative solution to this remote desert community’s chronic financial problems, has been mothballed because California has more power than it needs.

It’s a debacle as distressing and predictable as the heat that bakes the surrounding cotton and alfalfa fields this time of year.

There has always been a mirage of impending boom times in Blythe, where the unemployment rate is about 21% and city fathers are fond of saying that better times are right around the corner.

The trouble at the airport follows a dreary pattern stretching back to 1987. Then, the city begged for the state to build prisons here, hoping that would spark a renaissance of more and better restaurants, shopping facilities, housing and medical care in the city that existed for years as a gas and food stop on Interstate 10, about 200 miles east of Los Angeles.

Two prisons were eventually built 20 miles out of town. But they provide only modest benefits because half of their employees would rather live 100 miles away in the Palm Springs area.

The last few years have been especially tough in the isolated city of 22,000 people, about 8,000 of whom are inmates.

The number of supermarkets has dropped from three to one. An experimental private, four-year university is considering folding because of a lack of interest.

Six months ago, the local hospital closed its maternity ward because of staffing shortages. Last month, the editor of the local newspaper, the Palo Verde Valley Times, pleaded guilty in Texas to 13-year-old child custody charges.

Now many farmers want to sell their water to the Metropolitan Water District, raising fears that the region’s century-old agricultural base is on the verge of collapse.

And, adding insult to injury, foul odors emitted by the deteriorating municipal sewer system are backing up into the vents of homes and businesses.

The city intended to upgrade its rotting sewer system with tax increments generated by the power plant.

As long as the plant remains inactive, the city expects lower tax benefits than were anticipated.

Despite all that, city officials accept their situation blithely.

“I think we’ve finally turned the corner,” said Blythe City Manager Les Nelson, who lives in Palm Springs. “Just wait and see.”

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‘The Way It Is’

Blythe is buzzing with improvement plans. City officials are telling anyone who will listen that “first-class developers” are poised to build residential homes along the Colorado River.

A classy restaurant will soon grace the local golf course.

A lonely 3-acre lagoon known as Queshan Park -- the first thing westbound travelers see in California after crossing the Arizona Border -- will be transformed into a bustling recreation area.

The region’s first new subdivisions in years are sprouting up on farmlands that once produced lettuce, melons and cabbage.

This year, the city is spending $4 million on a beautification project along its main drag, Hobsonway.

But tearing up and then repaving the highway has brought hard times to small businesses with narrow profit margins, such as Dottie Hoover’s beauty salon, the Creative Curl.

“It’s extremely hard to stay in business in this town,” said Hoover, 35, as she teased a customer’s hair.

“Lately, it seems things have gotten worse than ever,” she said. “Just a few days ago, my 15-year-old daughter, who wants to be a teacher, said, ‘It’s time to leave this place, Mom.’ It’s getting to the point where I’m almost agreeing with her.”

Hoover’s complaints echo those of local farming industry officials, who shake their heads in dismay over a series of failed efforts to transform Blythe into another Palm Springs.

As one said: “You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s a still a pig. Some of us are happy living in Blythe just the way it is.”

“There’s always been folks coming into town with big ideas about getting rich quick, and then taking it easy,” said Ed Smith, general manager of the powerful Palo Verde Irrigation District, which enjoys top priority water rights claims to Colorado River water. “But they all learn the hard way that there’s not enough business to sustain such things here.”

All agree, however, that Blythe, which is about half Latino and has an average household income of $32,387 a year, compared with $42,887 for Riverside County, desperately needs an economic boost.

There are not many jobs outside of the fast-food stands, gas stations and motels along “hamburger row,” a nickname for Lovekin Boulevard, the exit from I-10.

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Not Much to Do

The rhythms of life have not changed in decades. Empty buildings dot the town. Teenagers hang out in the parking lots of downtown strip malls.

There are few cultural attractions. The 55-year-old Horny Toad Saloon remains a popular watering hole.

Blythe pioneer Walter D. Scott, 86, can remember when the residential streets fanning out from the business district were made of dirt and flooding was routine.

Seated with his wife Henrietta on an old clapboard swing tied to the limbs of mulberry trees at the family farm he is selling for development, Scott said, “Blythe can go nowhere but up.”

The power plant was touted as a major step toward a brighter future when the City Council approved its construction four years ago during the state energy crisis.

In an interview, Wolfe, a fixed-base operator at Blythe Airport, recalled, “They promised me it would be 300 feet south of the runway’s center line. Instead, they built it almost dead center.”

Wolfe said he was attempting to land one morning in April when “I hit severe turbulence over the plant’s cooling towers. People saw me flip over. When I got out of the dive, I was level with the power plant fence. I managed to get back in the air.”

Since then, several local pilots have reportedly encountered turbulence when one of their wings passed over columns of steam rising out of the towers during tests of the power plant.

While many city officials downplay the incidents, or dismiss them as fantasy, Blythe’s assistant city manager, Charles “Butch” Hull, said, “As far as I’m concerned, that plant is suspect. There will be no compromise on pilot safety.”

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Safety Issue

At Hull’s request, Caltrans aeronautics division investigators flew over the towers several times last week, but were unable to detect rough air.

Figuring that the trouble may be most pronounced when the weather is cooler, Hull said, “I’m calling the investigators back in January.”

Trouble is always part of Hull’s schedule. Over the years, Hull, who grew up in Blythe and worked his way up the ranks in City Hall, has had to deal with flash floods, 70 mph winds, broken sewer mains, angry farmers, suffocating county, state and federal regulations, and clashes with the 15 agencies with authority over the Colorado River.

Sometimes even he wonders whether Blythe is on the verge of becoming a ghost town.

Guiding his sleek ski boat off its trailer and into the river water on a recent torrid and moonless weeknight, Hull said, “Some people wonder why we don’t move. But we have something that can’t be duplicated -- the river and the desert are our backyard, and we wouldn’t trade that for anything.”

Putting his hands on the steering wheel and peering through the darkness ahead, he said, “There’s no one else on the water. The river’s all mine tonight. Hold on.”

Hull gunned the engine and boomed up river under a big sky filled with stars, bats and owls. Two miles upstream, he switched the motor off and let the boat drift in the current.

“It’s so quiet, you can hear your heart beat,” he said, admiring the Milky Way. “This is what Blythe is really all about.”