LovelandPolitics.com Blog

We were hit yesterday by hundreds of fake blog postings along with some attempts to hack the main website server account. Our host server shut down access temporarily to the blog and our ability to update the news website was constrained due to some back-end links being temporarily disabled.

We apologize for the inconvenience. Everything is back now and we don’t believe any of your postings were lost. If you attempted to post a comment in the last day or two, please do so now if you remember your comment.

Thanks

A retired real estate broker surveyed the properties acquired by the City of Loveland between 2007 and 2010 in downtown Loveland. She found the city consistently paid higher than assessed values while private buyers did not. here is our story

Fixing Loveland’s dilapidated downtown became a cause celebre as candidates for Loveland’s City Council competed with one another 5 years ago to show a higher level of commitment to revitalizing the area. In fact, so much focus was later placed on the now infamous highway 402 property purchase in 2007 and the ongoing Centerra subsidies for apartments, few people paid attention to the efficacy of the city’s downtown revitalization efforts for the past 5 years. The city has continued acquiring properties in downtown even now with little or no scrutiny over prices paid by the city by any local media (including LovelandPolitics).

For those who might say a government created real estate bubble is good for downtown, consider two things.

1. There is little evidence the city overpaying for properties has in anyway impacted property values in purely private transactions.

2. The city is arguing the Home State Bank building and property it purchased in 2007 should now be sold for 80% less than what the city paid, as argued by Loveland’s city manager, “There have been some adverse market conditions”. see story

So apparently, downtown values are way up when the city is the buyer but way down when the city is the seller. Any thoughts?

Tom Lucero, Larimer County Republican Party Chairman, sent an email this morning to the Executive Board of the Larimer County GOP saying he will resign his position as chairman effective immediately. He also informed board members he will be departing for a vacation beginning tomorrow; so he cannot be easily reached for comment.

Lucero is reported to be planning a run for the 49th Colorado House District (HD). Represented currently by B.J. Nikkel, the 49th HD fell victim to a recent redistricting map that drew Nikkel’s home out of the 49th HD. Running for 49th HD is incompatible with serving as Chairman of the party. Party officials are required to remain neutral during primary elections. Lucero is credited with fixing the financial mess left in the wake of disgraced former GOP Chairman Larry Carillo.

Lucero is said to be appointing Devon Lentz, External Vice-Chair, on the Executive Board as the interim Chair of the Larimer County GOP. According to members of the board, this is unusual as Internal Vice-Chair Jerry Patterson should succeed Lucero according to their by-laws.

The appointment will last only until the scheduled January 12, Republican Assembly when a new Chairman can be elected. An announcement of both the assembly date and Lucero’s resignation will be sent to the press either this evening or tomorrow morning.

Loveland 912 leader Tom Buchanan is a potential candidate to replace Tom Lucero. Dorié Buchanan, Tom’s wife, is the Larimer GOP Area 3 Coordinator and member of the Executive Board.

Former Loveland Mayor Gene Pielin wants to find a way back into city hall. He has submitted an application to the Loveland City Council asking for an appointment to the Loveland Planning Commission. see story

Three of Loveland’s current Planning Commissioners (Troy Krenning, Buddy Meyers & Robert Molloy) have also applied to serve another 3 year term on the commission. Two of the three have run for city council in recent years which doesn’t sit well with some on council looking for new faces. In addition, new comer Julie Harden has also applied to serve a three year term on the Planning Commission.

Council is scheduled to vote on the appointments next Tuesday (December 20, 2011).

The City Council will likely vote this evening to enter into an exclusive negotiation with Brinkman Partners, a Ft. Collins based real estate developer, to sell the former Home State Bank property in Downtown Loveland for 80% less than what the city paid. See story

A subsidy by any other name, the City of Loveland purchased the property using mostly CEF’s (Capital Expansion Fees) which were collected from taxpayers for the sole purpose of expanding the city’s museum. These funds cannot be used to subsidize a private development. Therefore, the city will sell the property to only Brinkman Partners it bought in 2007 for $1.1 million for $200,000.

To recover the lost $900,000 in CEF’s due to what City Manager Bill Cahill described almost tongue and cheek as “adverse market conditions” the city intends to reach deep into the county and school pockets with a complicated and unprecedented Urban Renewal bait and switch scheme.

It is a complicated story but merits your attention. School Superintendent Ron Cabrera is so confused he wrote a memorandum to the city supporting their bait and switch tax scheme which by his own inaccuracies reveals a deep misunderstanding by Cabrera of what the city proposes doing. On November 22, Larimer County Administrator Frank Lancaster can also be heard in the meeting calling the bait and switch scheme a “wash” for the county financially because he thought taxes will be diverted anyway from the county until 2027.

The critical piece missing for both administrators is that an Urban Renewal Authority (URA) must have bond debt outstanding to divert property taxes. The Lincoln Place URA in downtown Loveland is near satisfying its public bond debt even though the term of the district runs until 2027. Instead of allowing the $150,000 plus in property taxes to flow back to schools and county as the law intends, the city is hoping to re-draw the boundaries of the URA to pay for the museum expansion using new debt.

While the sale of Home State Bank and the URA bait and switch are being considered together – they are completely different governmental actions that should each be considered each on its own merits and not necessarily together. By combining the two staff has confused council, the county and schools not to mention some in the local media.

COIN may become the new term for ACE. Here is the link to our story

Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper announced the Colorado Innovation Network (COIN) earlier this week as an initiative to
transfer technologies in government paid labs over to industry while creating new jobs in manufacturing. It appears very similar to ACE except the participants are more from academia than NASA and it is open to many more varieties of commercial products and technologies than ACE.

We understand that only Loveland City Manager Bill Cahill and Economic Director Betsey Hale are communicating with C&W and the Governor’s office about this issue and an announcement may be forthcoming. We tried to get access to those communications and emails today but were unsuccessful.

In the meantime, we have looked into CAMT and found what one insider described as a “virtual” organization since they only have some 5-6 highly paid senior staff and everyone else “working” there are hired only as “independent contractors.” It seems ironic for an organization funded by the federal government to create more jobs painfully avoids hiring people. Are they trying to avoid payroll taxes?

If CAMT refuses a minor role (again) they risk losing everything and seeing the entire project migrating over to COIN. We spoke with a number of people in and outside the relative organizations we reported on and feel very confident about the veracity of the information provided. Perhaps the most memorable quote about CAMT was that they sure are great at spending other people’s money!

As always, your comments are welcome.

Ft. Collins real estate broker Clayton Roberts forwarded us an email he sent a State of Colorado investigator threatening to sue the publisher of LovelandPolitics along with other parties over a state inquiry into his participation in a lease with option to buy real estate transaction we reported on last June. see our latest story and his letter

Without getting into all the nitty-gritty details he is not the first person to threaten a lawsuit and will likely not be the last. We were, quite frankly, shocked by both the tone and language of the email he sent to a state investigator looking into a complaint about his license. Our story wasn’t about Roberts but instead another former car dealer now in real estate named Marty Hutcheson. Roberts was only mentioned once as the person the tenants claimed signed their lease agreement.

If you want to read the original story here is the link. We would have been happy to publish his side of the story at the time but since he didn’t return phone calls that was a little hard to do.

Feel free to comment but please refrain from any defamatory language like calling someone a “liar” the way Roberts did in his email to us.

Thanks

Below is the link to an audio on YouTube of Loveland’s City Council asking State Legislators to oppose any legislation clarifying or strengthening Colorado’s Open Meetings Law (COML).

Some background facts you must know before listening to the tape:

A judge found Loveland’s council violated the law NOT because they met in clossed session to discuss the selection process of the next City Manager but because each councilor VOTED in closed session for the candidate they wanted for that job (a vote that should have been made in public).

The council WAS NOT using closed sessions to protect the privacy of the candidates but instead to hide from the media the fact they didn’t have enough votes for any one candidate. Mayor Cecil Gutierrez pretends that advocates of open government want personnel issues in the open which is false. Gutierrez argues on the tape that the definition of personnel is “very, very vague” but opposes any legislation clarifying the term?

Just like with the Mayor Pro Tem vote, the Mayor wants the public only to see a prepared show and not the true give and take between councilors that took place when he attempted to make Joan Shaffer Mayor Pro Tem during private negotiations but couldn’t get a unanimous vote.

Only Councilman Daryle Klassen spoke up during the November 15, discussion to explain to those who didn’t know that the council violated the law when VOTING in private not discussing the hiring process or candidates. When asked what reasons newspapers or the Colorado Press Association have for trying to make personnel matters public, City Manager Bill Cahill answered, “Good Press” to which everyone laughed.

The bottom line is Loveland’s Mayor is speaking from both sides of his mouth on this issue. He abused the personnel exemption in the Colorado Open Meetings Law to hide from the media a disagreement between councilors of who they supported for City Manager. They did take a “public” vote but that was after the dust settled in private and they could show a unanimous front to the public just like Mayor Pro Tem.

During a working breakfast with state legislators in Loveland last Tuesday, Mayor Gutierrez lobbied state lawmakers to crack down on open government legislation and help put a stop to the Colorado Press Association agenda of transparency.see story

Normally cautious about what he says in public, Gutierrez was apparently unaware that an open microphone in the room was recording even though no members of the public or press were present. Gutierrez was joined by Councilwoman Joan Shaffer who agreed and also Loveland’s City Manager, Bill Cahill, who outlined “the city’s concern.”

It is particularly ironic that Loveland’s council never took a public stance on the issue. Apparently, the $25,000 attorney fees and judge’s decision that Loveland’s council broke the law has had little to no impact relative to the Mayor’s view of whether he was in error.

Historically, Loveland’s City Council votes on the legislative agenda each year and hashes out the city’s official position before anything is presented to members of the legislature who represent Loveland.

It is doubtful many citizens of Loveland oppose the Loveland Reporter-Herald’s view or that of the Colorado Press Association. We found it especially ironic that Gutierrez’s conversion on the issue hasn’t been the topic of any citizen meetings or comments during meetings he knew were being recorded.

We received an unusual request by “Ax” to publish a commentary regarding Loveland, HP’s departure and employment practices regarding protected minorities. read commentary by Ax

The request stated,

“The RH printed a ridiculous letter today in its open forum. I’d like to respond to it, but 350 words isn’t enough, and they wouldn’t print it anyway. You interested in posting it under my pseudonym?”

For the record, Ax clarified he never offered it for publication (in a later email) since it didn’t fit the RH guidelines anyway. We found the commentary to be an honest view from an outsider regarding his experience in Loveland with some valuable history on the law relative to employment practices. While we don’t necessarily agree with the conclusions we found it an interesting read and believe it worth sharing.

Any comment?