LETTERS

criteria, primarily that it was not compatible with the character of the surrounding neighborhood according to current zoning regulations and the Douglas County Comprehensive Master Plan. Two commissioners ignored the advisory body they had appointed and voted to rezone anyway. Now the proposed zoning criteria changes would essentially allow more apartments to be built by removing the requirement for new development to preserve the character of the existing neighborhood. Zoning is the mechanism that determines the very nature of a community; zoning criteria preserve the reasons that residents love Douglas County and have invested their sweat, tears and savings into their homes and raising their families here. ese families have every right to expect local government to preserve their communities without being labeled NIMBYs.

Government should not permanently alter neighborhoods after thousands of families have moved in, trusting the existing rules.

Also, changing the zoning criteria as proposed would make it nearly impossible for citizen groups to appeal the commissioners’ rezoning decisions. It’s probably not a coincidence that the local homeowners’ group that objected to the rezoning is doing just that; their appeal is now before the Colorado District Court. Bit by bit, state and even local governments seem allied in their in a half-mile radius around transit rail stations and a quarter-mile around corridors with bus rapid transit or where a bus stops every 15 minutes, e Colorado Sun reported.

(If a municipality doesn’t want to allow building of two, three or four units next to certain transit stops, it could opt to zone for that kind of housing in a di erent part of the city or town proportional to the area determination to chip away at our property rights and urbanize our neighborhoods. If you’re concerned, email your county commissioners who will meet in May to vote on the new zoning rules: BOCC@douglas. co.us

Joy Overbeck Parker

Survey says ...

Two years ago (May 2021), Douglas County Commissioners released their bi-annual “Citizen Survey” results. It showed a continued decline in things being in the “right direction” (the survey and gures stated here are at https:// www.douglas.co.us/documents/ douglas-county-voter-opinion-polls1995-through-2023.pdf/). is trend was dismissed at that time as “due to the increase in Democrats in the county.”

Now another survey has been released, and it revealed the same kind of results: 49% were concerned that we are on the wrong track. e commissioners once again stated that “partisanship was ... a driving force behind opinions.”

What the commissioners are ignoring in this “partisan” reasoning is that Republican participation was almost double Democratic (37% vs. 20%), and una liated was even higher (43%). Almost half of the county concerned about our direction can’t be blamed solely on party a liation, and the survey results proves this.

Results showed “Right Direction” dropped 14% since 2019. at is far more than the 6% reduction of Republicans in the same period. at means that some Republicans must