Group in Castle Pines North seeks to slow massive development

Our community made the papers again! Here's a recent story about the "Blight's Not Right" petition, which I signed this morning. No, there was not enough discussion in the community about the matter. If this process provides a chance for more understanding by Council as to why so many of their constituents are ticked off and why they're getting sued, or if the constituents come to understand why their elected officials voted for this, I'm all for the petition process. Here's the story by Carlos Illescas of The Denver Post:

A group of Castle Pines North residents is collecting signatures in an attempt to abolish the newly created Urban Renewal Authority, which blighted agricultural land to allow for a massive development.

So far, Blight's Not Right has collected about 300 signatures on its petitions, more than is needed to force the City Council, which acts as the authority, to abolish the URA or put the matter to voters.

Doing that, the group says, would slow down the project and allow more time for public input — something it says residents were not given. But city officials say the project was debated for two years.

The petition drive is the latest controversy for The Canyons, a 3,300-acre planned development east of Interstate 25. At build-out, it would have about 225 acres of commercial property and 2,500 homes.

"Our intent is to really vet it through the community properly," said Stacie Sneider, one of the leaders of the petition drive. "I certainly don't believe the community was well-informed on this."

The City Council took some heat in May for blighting the land a week before a new state law kicked in that would have, in most cases, prevented it from doing so.

Urban renewal allows cities to create taxing districts that funnel taxes generated from the authorized area toward public improvements.

Tom Ragonetti, attorney for The Canyons, said the development would pretty much continue as planned with or without the Urban Renewal Authority. It would just mean not being able to take advantage of a few tools a URA could offer.

"It really doesn't hurt us," he said. "It's not essential and never was."

However, City Councilman Doug Gilbert said, dissolving the URA would give the city less input into The Canyons development.

"If voters abolish the URA, it simply gives us less of a voice in what the developer is going to do," Gilbert said.

Sneider said she hopes to have more than enough signatures on the petition to force the issue on the ballot in November.

"We are doing what we can to slow down the process so citizens can understand what the Urban Renewal Authority is about," she said.

Regardless, Ragonetti said, the undeveloped area that is The Canyons probably won't see new construction for years, until the current economic situation improves significantly.