OPINION: False Information Not Helping the Thornton Water Project

Yesterday, the “Home Builders Association of Metro Denver” and the “Colorado Association of Home Builders” sent a comment letter to the Larimer County Commissioners about the proposed “Thornton Pipeline”. The Home Builders’ letter, pasted in below and posted here, is uninformed, harasses the Commissioners, and includes false information.

Here is the letter:

Dear Commissioners Kefalas, Stephens and Shadduck-McNally:

I am writing to submit formal comments on the ongoing legal challenges surrounding the Thornton Water Project. These comments are being provided on behalf of the Home Builders Association of Metro Denver and the Colorado Association of Home Builders.

The HBA of Metro Denver represents over 500 homebuilders, developers, remodelers, architects, mortgage lenders, title companies, subcontractors, suppliers, and service providers in the eight metro-area counties we serve. The Colorado Association of Home Builders has over 2,000 members across the state, representing over 40,000 jobs that play a crucial role in providing housing for Coloradoans.

For many years, Colorado has established itself as one of the best places to live, work and raise a family. Colorado has a proud history of communities working together to tackle tough issues, solve problems and improve the prosperity of all its residents through collective reciprocity and regional collaboration. Be it in politics, business or our shared civic responsibilities, we have always prospered because of that reason: We work together.

However, we have grown concerned that this spirit of regional collaboration and problem solving is being threatened over a critical issue in northern Colorado. By refusing to allow Thornton to access the water it has owned for nearly forty years, Larimer County is impacting the livelihood and ability for families and individuals to live closer to where they work and inadvertently exacerbating Colorado’s housing attainability crisis along the front range.

The HBA of Metro Denver and the Colorado Association of Home Builders has included the attached letter to this email, outlining our concerns regarding these ongoing delays and the need reconcile the situation in an expedited manner. In the spirit of regional cooperation and housing attainability in Colorado, we respectfully request that Larimer County work in earnest with the City of Thornton to come to an agreement on this issue that has gone on for too long.

Thank you for your time and consideration of our concerns.

Sincerely,

Morgan Cullen
Director of Government Affairs, Home Builders Association of Metro Denver

The Home Builders are uninformed and are sharing false information to the County Commissioners and the public. It is Thornton, not Larimer County, who is refusing collaborate and is delaying the delivery of water. We’ve been in contact with Thornton for 14 years about this issue, and it was Thornton who originally planned to send the water down the Cache la Poudre River, not put it in a pipeline. It is Thornton, not Larimer County, who changed its mind and spent more than a decade and millions of dollars trying to get a permit to build a pipeline in Larimer County. It is Thornton, not Larimer County, who filed a lawsuit, spending more millions of dollars, which further delayed the delivery of water and refused to collaborate.

In fact, if Thornton simply would’ve collaborated with us and stuck to their original plan and sent the water down the Poudre River — using the River as a conveyance — and then diverted the water in Weld County near Windsor, Thornton would not have even needed a permit in Larimer County and would’ve had its water 10 years ago.

We encourage the Home Builders to get their facts straight and stop harassing elected officials and the public in Larimer County.