Fort Lupton Press 13
September 8, 2021
WATER
FROM PAGE 10
From smooth sailing to choppy seas After being forced out on their own, acquiring sufficient supplies of water and building the necessary infrastructure, the north metro cities began to have different issues at the turn of the century. Jayla Poppleton, executive director of Water Education Colorado, said a variety of pressures collided in recent years that have driven up costs for local water suppliers. “Aging infrastructure in their system is catching up with them. Or they are having to get out on the market where water rights are increasingly expensive to provide for a growing community and need to build their water rights portfolio,” she said. Water Education Colorado helps community leaders and its citizens understand the intersecting challenges around water in the state. Poppleton added, “There are increasingly stringent conditions around water quality and safe drinking water. So, in some cases, communities are having to upgrade or even rebuild water treatment plants.” That was the case in Brighton, which was notified by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment in 2005 that the city’s reverse osmosis water treatment plant needed to meet new treatment standards, requiring the installation of expensive new equipment. The city was able to receive a permit extending the deadline for when it needed to meet new standards. Then, in 2014, the city drafted a rnew capital improvement plan that included a new treatment plant to replace the existing one that would -include equipment to meet the CDPHE standards, and also increase the city’s water treatment capacity. A rate consultant that Brighton hired recommended an 8% increase in water rates to fund the treatment plant, which the city did in 2015. The next year, in neighboring Thornton, the city council approved a 13% water rate increase to help fund a new water treatment plant and the Thornton Water Project, the proposed 74-mile pipeline to carry south the city’s water supply near Fort Collins. Following the rate increase,
Thornton filed its applications for construction permits to build the Thornton Water Project with Larimer and Weld counties in 2018. The Larimer County Board of Commissioners said no a year later, causing Thornton to respond by suing the Larimer County board in district court. Also, in 2019, a 10% water rate increase in Westminster went into effect to help fund Water2025, a new water treatment plant that would replace its current Semper Water Treatment Facility. Cascade Back in Brighton, the situation was escalating. Then-City Manager Philip Rodriguez called into question the money the city had saved up for the future water treatment plant — partly coming from water rates - for being excessive. Because the city hadn’t made certain progress on the proposed treatment plant, Rodriguez called the project “fictitious.” City Councilor Matt Johnston backed Rodriguez, saying the abundance of savings was evidence that the city “price gouged” ratepayers. Soon after Rodriguez and Johnston made their case to the public about the seemingly suspicious pool of “$70 million,” the city council voted 5-4 to fire Rodriguez for conflict between the city manager and city staff. But many residents believed it was a cover-up, so they launched a recall campaign against the mayor, Ken Kreutzer, for previously supporting water rate increases and for leading the charge to fire Rodriguez. Johnston was a leader in the recall effort. In the November 2019 municipal election, the residents successfully recalled Kreutzer. Less than a year later, back in Westminster, a group of citizens angry over the cost of water launched a recall campaign against four members of the council, then-Mayor Herb Atchison, then-Mayor Pro Tem Anita Seitz, and Councilors Jon Voelz and Kathryn Skulley. The effort to obtain enough signatures on petitions to trigger recall elections was initially unsuccessful, but after a court battle in Adams County District Court, the Westminster Water Warriors secured recall elections against Atchison and Voelz in April 2021. Atchison resigned soon after, while Voelz faced and survived a recall election in July.
Reverse osmosis treatment trains at Brighton’s water treatment plant, which went online in 1993. Eventually, the city will need to build a new water treatment plant, PHOTO BY BELEN WARD but the city doesn’t currently have enough funding for it.
Around the same time, neighboring Thornton finally received an answer from the Weld County Board of Commissioners regarding its application to construct the pipeline. It was a no, so Thornton sued. However, Thornton also learned a state statute would allow the city to override the Weld denial, which the Thornton City Council voted to do. Washed on the shore Despite the success with the Weld override, Thornton is still fighting a legal battle with Larimer County over its pipeline, now in the Colorado Court of Appeals. As for Brighton, the city still needs to find a way to meet the CDPHE standards for water treatment as it juggles present concerns about meeting peak water demand in the summer. Yet, the city doesn’t have the funding for a new water treatment plant, in part due to a decrease in water rates in 2020 following a new rate study based on a different capital improvement plan that didn’t include the treatment plant. Meanwhile, Westminster’s plan to replace its water treatment plant by 2025 hit a roadblock when the city council couldn’t reach a consensus
on a rate increase for 2022, which the city saw as critical to funding Water2025. After Atchison resigned and Seitz became mayor, the Westminster City Council was split 3-3 on water rates. The council never appointed a seventh councilor to fill the vacant seat.
Disagreements persist; problems intensify Kevin Bommer, executive director of the Colorado Municipal League, said elements of the north metro water controversies are similar to that of other CML members. “Water rates have certainly come up in a couple of places.” At the same time, he added, “I don’t know that they have been a central theme in as many other places.” To Johnston, now mayor pro tem on the Brighton City Council, it makes sense that the issue of water rates was so politically powerful in Brighton. “There is something to that being the cost that comes from the city,” he said. “The water bill is the face of how much you pay the city. It’s the thing that every citizen sees and goes, `is my city ripping me off SEE WATER, P15
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