As mentioned in Part One, I wasn’t able to attend the ‘Interactive Community Forum’ hosted by Archuleta County Commissioner John Ranson and County Manager Longinos Gonzalez Jr. at the Springs Resort on March 25.
But I am able to share some comments from Mr. Ranson and Mr. Longinos about the event, as well as some comments posted to social media following the forum.
Archuleta County is hosting a series of community meetings related to a couple of specific upcoming decisions. The next Community Forum will be held on Monday, April 13 at 5pm at PLPOA Club House, hosted by Commissioner Warren Brown.
The County is required to update its comprehensive land use plan — the 2017-Arch-County-Community-Plan2017 Community Plan — by the end of 2026. Typically, such an land use update involves taxpayer input — and in particular, input from the real estate and construction industries. I expect this year’s update to also include significant input from affordable housing advocates, considering the important connection between land use planning and the current housing crisis in Archuleta County.
The other important decision facing the Board of County Commissioners this year concerns a possible ballot issue in November. The state of Colorado now allows county governments to collect Lodging Taxes as high a 6%, with voter approval, and to use the revenues for a variety of purposes, such as roads, infrastructure, housing, child care, and emergency services.
Previously, Colorado counties were limited to a maximum Lodging Tax of 2%, and could use the revenues only for tourism marketing. Those limits can be changed, with voter approval.
Yesterday’s editorial focused on the issue of available water resources — one of the key topics that must be addressed in the required land use plan update. The county had invited Justin Ramsey, who has served as district manager for Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District (PAWSD) for the past decade, to address water issues and answer questions.
Where water is concerned, the Community Plan update will likely focus on which areas of the county can reasonably be served, in the future, by municipal water, and how much population growth can be seen as feasible.
Often, local governments find themselves promoting population growth rather than promoting a “sustainable population”. This aligns with the same tendency coming from the business community. “More people” in a community nearly always equates to “more tax revenue” for government, and more business income overall.
Unfortunately, it also means more problems. In the case of Archuleta County, one of the most noticeable problems caused by population growth has been deterioration of the County-maintained road network. The failing roads are also related to the growth of the tourism industry — thousands of non-residents using our roads annually for recreational and business access.
County Manager Longinos refers to the possible Lodging Tax ballot issue in a summary of the March 25 Forum, emailed to the Daily Post last week.
Hi, Bill. Sorry you missed it but hope you enjoyed your family event. We had a great turnout, and the Springs Resort was a wonderful host. We had to bring in more chairs and I’m pretty sure we were north of 70 in attendance.
John gave a short welcome and State-of-the-County update (focus on roads) and then Justin [Ramsey] from PAWSD spoke on water issues and took questions. Justin did mention that because of the limited snow pack that they will likely do early water/drought restrictions this season.
Because we had questions on it at the last Community Forum, Jeff Sams spoke about AMI and how that relates to their work and the difficulties in getting grants and completing projects that meet those local needs. (See attached handout we had at the meeting.)
Although “housing” wasn’t specifically called out in Community Forum agenda for March 25, we’ll be discussing the “AMI” handout in a future installment.
Mr. Gonzalez’ email about the Forum continues:
I noted that my team is currently reviewing the Comprehensive Plan RPF submissions (we received three) and will discuss them at the Commissioners’ April 7 Work Session and Regular Meeting.
Mike Torres, our Public Works Director, gave a short update on roads and commenting on some of the questions that were asked at the last Community Forum (see attached Roads handout) and took a few questions. The bottom of the handout’s estimates to how much money the Lodging Tax could bring in for roads is based upon 2025 revenue numbers and IF 80% of the potential tax increase (to 4% or 6%) were allocated to roads and remaining 20% of increase elsewhere. Someone mentioned how we need to get more gravel options for our roads.
You can download the “Roads handout” that County Manager Gonzalez included with his email.
It briefly summarizes some of the reasons for the County’s inability to fully maintain our community’s paved and gravel roads.
Not all of the reasons, of course. But many of the reasons.
For example, the handout states:
Condition of Roads: R&B conducts an annual evaluation of all asphalt roads within Archuleta County’s responsibility.
16 roads classified as ‘poor condition’ which totals 5.69 miles [out of about 60 miles of paved roads, or about 10% of the paved roads.]
With our current flatline budget it is estimated to take 7-10 years to cover the 5.69 miles of road within this classification.
That’s just the paved roads. Doesn’t include the reported 422 miles of gravel roads…