Voice
Lone Tree 10-24-2013
Lone Tree
October 24, 2013
A Colorado Community Media Publication
ourlonetreenews.com
Douglas County, Colorado • Volume 12, Issue 41
C-470 project awarded funding CDOT money to cover half the cost of construction By Ryan Boldrey
rboldrey@ourcoloradonews.com
Lone Tree’s Greg Mandel, addressing the city council, was among a crowd of residents packing the council chambers Oct. 15 to comment on future plans for the city’s library. Photo by Jane Reuter
Library issue ignites debate Councilmember’s proposal for two sites rejected by most By Jane Reuter
jreuter@ourcoloradonews.com Lone Tree residents who filled the city council’s meeting room Oct. 15 expressed overwhelming support for the city’s plan to eventually convert the current library building into a community center. Only a handful endorsed Councilmember Kim Monson’s proposal to pursue the operation of two libraries. A library official who spoke before the public comment portion of the meeting said Douglas County Libraries couldn’t feasibly operate two branches in the city of 11,000 residents. RidgeGate has offered the library district a site in its development south of Lincoln Avenue for a new, larger facility. The current library at Yosemite Street and Lone Tree Parkway and the proposed site near the Super Target are 1.1 miles apart.
“We believe (operating two libraries in Lone Tree) would be impossible for us,” said library spokesman David Farnan, citing administrative and other costs. “We are a lean machine. The only way we’ve done that is finding smart, efficient ways to run libraries.” Construction of a new city library to replace the space now too constrained to adequately serve the area still is three to five years distant, and the land deal is not yet sealed. The city recently hosted a series of community meetings about its idea to buy the 10,000-square-foot library building and convert it into a community center with limited library services. On Oct. 10, the Lone Tree Voice published a guest commentary from Monson, in which she said the city could support two libraries. Monson’s commentary surprised and irked her fellow councilmembers. “The rest of the city council doesn’t believe two libraries is a practical solution,” Mayor Jim Gunning said. “Most of us have
been here long enough to know the little library on the corner is important to this community. A virtual library would still be able to serve many of the needs.” Several residents who spoke said the proposed site on the high-growth side of the city someday will be more central than the current one. “What I love about being a banker is no new taxes,” said Don Rogers, president of Lone Tree’s First Commercial Bank. “What I also love is free land. I don’t see too many cases where you have a win-win. We get a new library and we get to keep the old library for a community center. This is a win-win.” Dave Tanin is among those who likes the idea of two libraries, but said it appeared that was not under consideration. “It seems to me the board and council have pretty much made up their minds; community outreach after you’ve made up your minds doesn’t make much sense,” he said. Library continues on Page 14
The first phase of the C-470 expansion project shifted into high gear this past week following the awarding of $100 million in RAMP funding on behalf of the Colorado Department of Transportation. The expansion project, which will add a managed toll express lane in each direction between Interstate 25 and Kipling Parkway, is the recipient of the largest amount of money among 44 statewide projects to receive Responsible Acceleration of Maintenance and Partnerships funds from CDOT this year. The funds, which were requested by Douglas County, will account for half the cost of the now-scaled-back project that is currently in the design phase. According to the county’s capital improvements projects manager, Art Griffith, the rest of the money will be funded by a combination of local, state and federal loans that will be paid back with toll revenue over the next 30 years. “They (CDOT) have a fairly aggressive schedule and would like to see all these projects completed and open to traffic by January 2018,” Griffith said. For the C-470 expansion project, he said, it is likely to be in the design phase for much of 2014 and construction will start in 2015. The project, in addition to new lanes, will include the addition of a continuous auxiliary lane from Santa Fe Drive to University Boulevard and also involve the replacement of some existing infrastructure. “The ultimate plan was to add two C-470 continues on Page 14
Lone Tree man’s class ring comes full circle Owner gets jewelry back nearly half-century after loss By Jane Reuter
jreuter@ourcoloradonews.com
Paul Squyer holds his senior class ring, which he lost in a Wisconsin lake 49 years ago. Photo by Jane Reuter
Lone Tree’s Paul Squyer recently had a different kind of class reunion. Forty-nine years after losing his class ring in a Wisconsin lake, it is back on Squyer’s hand. A little less shiny than in 1964, but overall in good condition. The ring, a gift from his sister, was only a week old when Squyer took a swim in northwestern Wisconsin’s Perch Lake near his hometown of New Richmond. When the high school senior emerged from the lake, the ring was missing. “I looked in the water, but we’d been swimming there quite a while and I couldn’t find it,” Squyer said. Worse than losing the ring was telling his sister, he remembers. Soon after, Squyer joined the military and left Wisconsin, never to return. Forty-nine years later, on an early Oc-
tober day, scuba diver Ken Johnson’s metal detector alerted him to a find at the bottom of Perch Lake. The Wisconsin man routinely searches the lake for artifacts, and while it wasn’t the first ring he’d found, this was the first that offered clues to its past. The initials “NRHS” matched that of nearby New Richmond High School. The year “1964” and initials “P.S.” gave Johnson points from which to start his detective work. “I went to the high school and sat down with the yearbook,” Johnson said. “But nobody in (the class of) ’64 had those initials.” That’s because Squyer spent his senior year at a high school in a neighboring community. Unwilling to give up, Johnson kept searching and found Squyer’s name in the 1962 yearbook. His was the only name that matched the initials on the ring. “After finding the name in the ’62 book, I just did an Internet search,” Johnson said. “He came up on Facebook, and listed his hometown as New Richmond, Wis. That was the final clue.” Squyer said he initially thought John-
son’s phone call about the found ring was a joke. “I was really surprised,” he said. “I did call my sister and tell her. She said, ‘I guess, after 49 years, I won’t be mad at you anymore.’” Johnson said returning the ring to its original owner was well worth his time. “I thought it was kinda fun,” he said. “I could have taken it down to the guy who buys gold and sold it to him, I suppose. But usually these rings mean something to people.” Squyer plans to have the ring cleaned and resized to accommodate his now-larger hands. “I’ll have to wear it a few days even though I didn’t wear it much when I had first had it,” he said.
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