At their regular meeting on May 5, the Pagosa Springs Town Council unanimously approved the second reading of Ordinance 932, authorizing a special election. Town voters will be asked whether to amend the Home Rule Charter to require voter approval before the Town Council or its newly-formed the Urban Renewal Authority can use Tax Increment Financing (TIF) to fund ‘urban renewal projects.’
The Urban Renewal Authority was created last November, following a finding of ‘dangerous blight’ on the vacant 27-acre parcel adjacent to the Springs Resort. The parcel is owned by real estate developer Jack Searle, who had circulated a petition last summer requesting the creation of the Urban Renewal Authority (URA). That petition required the Town Council, under Colorado law, to consider whether ‘dangerous blight’ existed anywhere in the town, and whether a URA ought to be formed to address said ‘blight’. The Council voted 4-3 in favor of creating the URA, which encompasses the entire town limits.
The Searle petition followed an earlier presentation to Town Council by the Springs Resort principal David Dronet, suggesting that $79.6 million ought to be diverted from future taxes paid by the Springs Resort, Dronet Development, and Mr. Searle — property taxes, sales taxes, lodgers tax — via a ‘TIF’ funding scheme. According to Mr. Dronet’s proposal, these future taxes would be refunded to the developers over the next 25 years to help pay for a proposed $180 million resort expansion project.
Under Colorado law, other local taxing entities — School District, County government, Fire District, Library District, Health Service District, and three water districts — could required to refund tax revenues to the developers. The following chart shows how much tax revenue might be refunded by each district to Mr. Dronet’s proposed development, according to the numbers provided to the Town Council last summer.
Approval of the proposed Charter amendment would allow the town voters to have a ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ vote on future TIF funding arrangements proposed by the Urban Renewal Authority commission..
At the May 5 meeting, Mayor Don Volger clarified that the Council was not necessarily endorsing a change to the Town Home Rule Charter, but merely authorizing an election as required by law, following the submission of petitions containing the signatures of 173 town residents.
“This [ordinance] is just calling for a special election,” Mayor Volger explained. “It’s not that we’re necessarily in favor or against it at this point in time. There will be probably some further discussions along these lines at some point in time prior to the election… For now, it’s just whether we can have an election and whether everything was done properly.”
The special election will be held on July 14 as a mail-ballot election and is estimated to cost the Town about $5,000.
At the meeting, Town Attorney Clay Buchner reminded the Council that voters have the Constitutional right to petition certain types of issues onto the ballot.
“The Town is going to back [the election] 100 percent,” said Buchner. “As far as what the Council thinks of it substantively, that’s, of course, up to your personal opinion. But as far as voting for the ordinance to go to election, there’s really not a choice. It’s constitutionally protected.”