Photo: Financial consultant Troy Bernberg presents to the Archuleta Board of County Commissioners on December 19, 2024.
Please join the County Manager and the County Attorney for a Public Information and Input Session regarding Purchase of Land for the County Monday, December 16, 2024, from 5:30 – 7:00 pm Commissioners Meeting Room 398 Lewis Street… The December 16 meeting will consider the various land options only, and will not discuss details of any construction. Members of the BoCC will not be present at the meeting…
— from the Archuleta County website
At Tuesday, December 10 regular meeting of the Archuleta Board of County Commissioners, the proposed agenda had suggested that the commissioners were ready make a final decision about buying a vacant five-acre parcel, as the site for a new County Administration Building.
This same decision had been on the BOCC’s September 3 agenda, but at that meeting, two of the two commissioners — Commissioner Warren Brown and Commissioner Veronica Medina — had put forth the argument that they didn’t yet have enough financial information to make a good decision…
…and also, that they had not yet heard from the community. How did the community feel about the proposed sites?
Here’s Commissioner Medina, on September 3:
“Well, I don’t think that it’s a matter of trying to push the decision down the road, or to not make a decision. I think my point in asking what I asked last Tuesday — because I heard the community loud and clear, and [audience member Marybeth Snyder] is one example of what’s being said — is to have a community meeting so they can come forward and present their ideas…
“And I know that we are the ones who make the decision, but I feel like it would be prudent of us to get a financial advisor, to show us what the cost would be. Then we can show our constituents what it would cost to renovate a building, if that’s how we decided to go. Or if we were going to purchase property in Harman Park, or Aspen Village, or [South Pagosa Boulevard]… I think it’s a reasonable request. Because even we don’t know how much it’s going to cost…”
Following a somewhat heated debate, Commissioner Brown moved to table the real estate decision to a specific future date: December 10, 2024. This would give the BOCC time to hire, and get advice from, a financial advisor… and also time to schedule meetings with the broader community — the voters and taxpayers whose money they would be spending — and hear the community’s ideas.
When the appointed morning of December 10 rolled around, the BOCC had still not heard from the community, nor had they heard from their financial consultant. Financial advice was delivered at a work session that morning, by Troy Bernberg from Northland Public Finance.
Mr. Bernberg has a particular expertise in helping governments put their communities deeper into debt — in most cases, apparently, without voter approval — but at his presentation to the commissioners on the morning of December 10, he did not reveal any particular expertise in recommending building sites. What he exhibited was ordinary common sense.
From what I could tell as a member of the audience, his advice was not based on a terribly deep understanding of the Pagosa community, nor of our real estate market.
Nevertheless, he suggested that he “personally” preferred a 5-acre site on Alpha Drive, adjacent to Walmart.
He did not, however, provide any information that would help Commissioner Medina “show our constituents what it would cost to renovate a building” instead of building something brand spanking new.
But maybe his advice — as amateurish as it was — was better than nothing?
I mentioned that a final decision (to be based on Mr. Bernberg’s last-minute advice?) was on the agenda for that afternoon’s regular BOCC meeting, with two possible parcels under consideration: one in Aspen Village subdivision and one opposite the Pagosa Springs Medical Center on South Pagosa Boulevard.
Commissioner Brown moved to table those agenda items — again — to the December 17 BOCC meeting. This would allow County Manager Jack Harper and County Attorney Todd Weaver to host a public meeting on Monday, December 16.
According to the press release about this “community meeting” sent out on December 11, the meeting will run from 5:30-7:00pm at the Commissioners Building, 398 Lewis Street. The Commissioners will not be in attendance, according to the press release.
So I’m going to come right out and say it. I have a problem with sloppy government. I have a problem with phony, last-minute presentations by unqualified presenters, giving half-baked advice about multi-million-dollar projects.
Especially, I have a problem with phony, last-minute efforts at “community participation”.
In fact, I have a problem with phony “community participation” even if it’s announced weeks in advance.
Sure, the County can invite the “community” to a 90-minute meeting. But did the Commissioners and their staff provide the Bernberg report to the general public? (We provided it yesterday here in the Daily Post.)
Is there a packet of useful information available that will help the public understand the core issues, and options?
What’s the chance that a member of the public will come to the meeting armed with the traffic study and the geological survey that was sorely missing from the Bernberg report?
If a member of the public actually arrives with a well-documented, well-researched option that the County has not yet considered… will it be then considered? Or will it be ignored?
Does the BOCC really want input, or is this just an example of phony, disingenuous “community participation”? Based on the fact that the commissioners will not be in attendance at the meeting, I have to suspect the December 16 meeting is mostly an attempt at political theatre.
But there’s also a deeper issue here, about “community participation”… an issue could be illustrated by something that happened at the Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District (PAWSD) meeting yesterday evening, December 12.
Read Part Two, on Monday…