Greeley council sends Cascadia PUD to ballot - BizWest
Thomas Clayton
Greeley council sends Cascadia PUD repeal to ballot
Cascadia would include a new arena for the Colorado Eagles minor-league hockey team. Source: City of Greeley.GREELEY — Voters in Greeley will get to decide Feb. 24 whether to repeal city-approved zoning for the Cascadia and Catalyst developments, but one member of the City Council hinted that the fate of the project itself might make it onto that ballot as well.
The council voted 7-0 Tuesday night to place the repeal issue on the municipal ballot in a special municipal election that the city has estimated will cost Greeley taxpayers $350,000. The decision came after citizens group Greeley Demands Better collected enough certified petition signatures to compel the council to either repeal its Sept. 16 approval of a planned-unit development encompassing the Cascadia project and city-owned Catalyst entertainment districts on the city’s western edge or send the question to a special election within 90 days.
Before the council’s vote, several citizens came to the microphone to speak against the project. After one of the project’s two strident City Council opponents, Tommy Butler, reminded them that passage of the measure would only repeal the zoning instead of stopping the entire development, the other opponent, Deb DeBoutez, asked City Attorney Stacey Aurzada whether other issues could be added to the Feb. 24 ballot. Those questions, she said, could include asking the voters to reject the city-approved financing plan or even the project in its entirety.
Adding those questions would require council approval, but the results of the Nov. 4 City Council election, including victories by three backers of the project, means a majority on that panel still supports the development.
The $1.1 billion Catalyst project would include a new arena for the Colorado Eagles minor-league hockey team, a hotel and water park. It would be largely surrounded by Windsor-based Water Valley Co.’s Cascadia commercial and residential development along U.S. Highway 34, east of Weld County Road 17.
The ordinance creating the planned unit development established zoning for 220.568 acres and rezoning for 613.218 acres, totaling 833.786 acres. The properties subject to the PUD are owned either by the City of Greeley, Patriot Energy LLC or VIMA Partners LLC. Patriot and VIMA are entities controlled by Water Valley. That company’s president, Windsor-based developer Martin Lind, owns the Eagles and wants to move their games to the new arena after negotiations with Larimer County broke down last year that would have kept them at an enhanced arena on the county-owned Ranch Events Complex.
Aurzada said that if voters repeal the council-approved planned unit development, property owners in Cascadia wouldn’t be able to reapply for zoning for a year but could apply for other types of zoning to keep the project on track.
In emailed statements to BizWest late Tuesday, both opponents and supporters of the project hailed the council’s decision to send the issue to voters.
“We are grateful the City Council chose to listen to the will of the people,” Rhonda Solis, co-chair of Greeley Demands Better, said. “Greeley residents worked tirelessly — through delays, legal challenges and every hurdle imaginable — to make sure their voices were honored. Tonight, democracy prevailed.” Solin served on Colorado’s 8th Congressional District Board of Education as well as the Greeley-Evans school district board.
Greeley Demands Better’s other co-chair, failed City Council candidate Brandon Wark, added that “this vote didn’t happen because developers wanted it. It happened because Greeley citizens refused to back down. We look forward to giving voters the transparent, fact-based information they deserve before they decide the future of their city.”
Meanwhile, Bill Rigler, a spokesperson for Greeley Forward, a citizens’ group formed to support the project, said that “Greeley voters sent a powerful message in November’s City Council elections: They want progress, they want opportunity, and they overwhelmingly support the vision and process that led to Cascadia.
“When City Council approved Cascadia,” Rigler said, “they did so because it will bring good-paying jobs, expanded entertainment options, new housing opportunities and a world-class arena for the Colorado Eagles. These are the kinds of community-defining investments that lift a city for generations — and they’re exactly what outside special-interest groups are trying to take away.”
The city has touted an analysis by CBRE that estimated that the Catalyst project would result in $486 million in construction spending and $44 million per year in new revenue from the entertainment district’s arena, youth-hockey ice rinks, hotel and water park.
“We welcome the opportunity to vigorously defend this project and its benefits, because the future of Greeley deserves nothing less,” Rigler said. “Residents have told us that they support the project, and some feel it’s significant enough to vote on — and we respect that. What we cannot ignore is that this special election — at a projected cost of $350,000 — is happening only because a small group of outside interests, funded by at least $130,000 in unreported Dark Money contributions, ran an aggressive campaign to stop progress in Greeley. That same group is now under investigation by the Secretary of State for its campaign and financing practices.
“Make no mistake: People from outside Greeley are spending big to halt growth, stop new amenities and deny this city the economic engine it deserves. But Greeley voters have already shown where they stand. We’re confident that the people of Greeley will choose progress, opportunity and a stronger future for our community. We stand with Greeley voters, with the Colorado Eagles and for every resident that desires a better community.”
Another issue committee, Greeley Deserves Better, had collected enough verified signatures of registered Greeley voters to place a different repeal question on last month’s ballot that would have rescinded the financing plan for Catalyst approved by the City Council in May, which included the use of “certificates of participation,” using several city-owned buildings as collateral.
But four Greeley residents protested the validity of those petitions as well, triggering an Aug. 26 hearing before city-appointed arbiter Karen Goldman, who ruled five days later that ordinances such as the financing plan were administrative in nature, not legislative, and thus cannot be repealed by voters under state law. Greeley Deserves Better then asked Weld District Court to overturn Goldman’s ruling, which a judge declined to do, denying an injunction that would have placed the measure on the Nov. 4 ballot. However, the judge has not yet ruled on the merits of the case.
On Nov. 5, two of the protesters, former city manager Leonard Wiest and former journalist Tom Hacker filed a campaign-finance complaint against a nonprofit group that was formed to shield the identities of donors to the petition drives. The complaint alleges that the nonprofit, We Are Greeley, is an issue committee and as such should be required to submit lists of donors and expenditures to the Greeley City Clerk but has not done so, and thus is in violation of the Fair Campaign Practices Act and the state Constitution.
However, Suzanne Taheri, the Denver-based attorney for the Cascadia opponents, disputed the protesters’ claim, telling BizWest that We are Greeley and other “501(c)(4)s, unlike political action committees (PACs) or super PACs, are not required to reveal their donors to the public.”
 | Tom Clayton Communication and Media Specialist, Public Affairs |
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