The Larimer County commissioners spent Monday evening, not for the first time, hearing arguments for and against a pipeline through the county that would bring water owned by the city of Thornton purchased in the 1980s to Thornton proper.
Proponents, largely comprised of Thornton representatives and housing developers in the area, argued during a lengthy public comment portion of the land use hearing that the water is crucial to further housing development in the growing suburbs north of Denver and would help address the limits to that development. Opponents worried about the health of the Poudre River, where the water ultimately stems from, and questioned the honesty of the representatives from Thornton and from housing developers, with some arguing that they were “paid to be there.”
The crux of the issue centers around 1041 permits, which are a statewide method of cooperation between different governing bodies, in this case, counties.
Passed in 1974, the purpose of 1041 powers is to “allow for local governments to maintain their control over particular development projects even where the development project has statewide impacts,” according to the Colorado Department of Local Affairs.
If one local government is interested in a project that would directly affect another local government, that local government has the opportunity to approve or deny the 1041 request.
In fact, Larimer County denied a 1041 proposal for this very project in 2019, a decision that Thornton appealed and was later upheld by the 8th Judicial District Court. The Larimer County commissioners at the time determined that various elements of Thornton’s application were not in compliance with the county’s land use criteria.
In December of last year, Thornton approached the county again with a new proposal, one that county staff and ultimately county commissioners deemed complete enough to move forward.
Since that time, a number of public hearings have been scheduled, including Monday’s, to consider the proposal further and to receive public input.
That input was plentiful, stretching around an hour and a half Monday night, with local landowners who would be impacted by the construction of the 42-inch pipeline, environmental activists, college students and others arguing that the pipeline would either be damaging to the river, would negatively impact their livelihoods, or both.
Proponents of the plan, as well as some county employees, argued that the pipeline would have minimal impact on the surrounding area and that the benefits outweigh the costs.
According to Morgan Cullen, who spoke on behalf of the Homebuilders Association of Metro Denver on Monday, an unsustainable housing shortage is only reconcilable through more construction that the proposed pipeline would enable.
“Given that Thornton’s population is projected to increase by 100,000 residents in the coming years, if they have access to the additional water supply, it’s imperative that they’re granted access to the water rights so that the residential construction industry can begin building out of the current crisis we find ourselves in,” he said.
The commissioners on Monday left the public comment section open after they adjourned the meeting so that more people can talk at a scheduled followup hearing at 6 p.m. May 6 at the Larimer County Administration Building, 200 W. Oak St. in Fort Collins.
