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Quote of the Week

January 27th, 2012, 11:02 pm by

Attorney Pat Mika, who represented 19-year-old Hooters waitress Illysa Medina after she was accused of serving a visibly intoxicate patron, said the Colorado Bureau of Investigation of the Metro Vice, Narcotics and Intelligence Division on the case was nothing more than a whitewashing.

Mika said the investigation, which cleared the two detectives involved in the case of any wrongdoing, could not be deemed thorough or complete.

“They never talked to the victim of this false accusation and that is Illysa Medina nor they did they ever talk to the lawyer who represented her. They got nothing but self-serving information from the police officers who were there trying to preserve their careers, their reputations and their jobs.”

 

Posted in: People • • | Post a Comment »

Quote of the Day

January 27th, 2012, 1:49 pm by

City Council President Scott Hente has been in the news a lot this week.

Hente represents the council on the board of the Colorado Springs Urban Renewal Authority, which acknowledged this week that it was in default on bonds it borrowed for the high-profile North Nevada Avenue project.

When The Gazette asked Hente what the headline in tomorrow’s edition would be involving the North Nevada project, he said the authority was looking at a few things but that he couldn’t talk about them because they involved proprietary information.

“Even my church pastor has told me he’s been reading my name too much in the paper lately,” Hente said.

 

 

Posted in: City Council • • • | Post a Comment »

Hente absent when default on bonds was disclosed

January 27th, 2012, 11:54 am by

Scott Hente

No wonder City Council President Scott Hente didn’t tell his colleagues that the Colorado Springs Urban Renewal Authority had defaulted on a repayment of money borrowed for the North Nevada Avenue redevelopment project.

He wasn’t there.

Hente missed the Dec. 15 meeting when the board learned that the authority was short about $55,000 on a payment owed on $7.5 million in bonds, according to the minutes of the meeting.

Hente, who represents the council on the Urban Renewal Authority board, came under fire this week by his colleagues, who said Hente failed to tell them that the North Nevada project was facing financial problems before the voted in September to create a special taxing district on another urban renewal project called the Vineyards Data Center.

To be fair, Hente missed only one other Urban Renewal Authority meeting last year — the one in September — and he said his colleagues received all the agendas and minutes, which reflected the challenges facing the North Nevada project.

“I’m going to try to be polite here,” Hente said Thursday.

“My colleagues and I and the mayor and many members of the city staff … get copies of all the agendas and all of the minutes. That item was clearly discussed,” he said.

On Friday, Hente said he missed the Urban Renewal Authority board meeting because it fell on the same day as a special City Council meeting and a Utilities Board meeting.

During the special council meeting, the council overrode several of the mayor’s budget vetoes.

“I wasn’t goofing off,” Hente said. “I was doing city stuff.”

Hente said Thursday that the financial troubles facing the North Nevada project have been known for two or three years.

“I could almost that say we’ve know about it almost since the project got going because the project really got going when the economy started going down, and as other stores and retailers were not signing on, we knew that was going affect retail sales, which would obviously affect the tax base,” he said.

“That’s all been a matter of public record,” he said.

In June, The Gazette reported that the Urban Renewal Authority had been forced to dip into reserves “twice over the past six months to make payments on bonds it issued to fund the Nevada corridor improvements” because some stores hadn’t opened as early as anticipated.

Posted in: Boards and Commissions • City Council • Meetings • • • • • | 2 Comments »

Mayor, council team up to support bill to change PERA

January 25th, 2012, 10:56 am by

Mayor Steve Bach and City Council Presidente Scott Hente

As promised, Mayor Steve Bach and the City Council have sent separate letters to the State, Veterans and Military Affairs Committee in support of legislation sponsored by Sen. Ken Lambert that would allow local governments to increase employee contribution rates for Public Employees’ Retirement Association.

The city currently pays 13.7 percent and employees pay 8 percent.

Here is the mayor’s letter:

Hand Delivered

January 20, 2012

The Honorable Bob Bacon

The Honorable Betty Boyd

The Honorable Kevin Grantham

The Honorable Rollie Heath

The Honorable Tim Neville

 

The State, Veterans and Military Affairs Committee

200 East Colfax Avenue

Room 346

Denver, CO 80203

Re:  SB12-016, “Local Government Option to Change PERA Contribution Rates”

Dear Senators:

This is to express my strong endorsement of State Senator Kent Lambert’s above referenced bill.  In conjunction with the City of Colorado Springs’ City Council, we strongly recommend your support of this legislation.

Our City, in order to achieve fiscal sustainability, needs the flexibility to change the sharing of contributions to the Public Employees’ Retirement Association pension fund just as the State of Colorado has for its employees.

Thank you for your leadership and consideration.

Sincerely,

Steve Bach

Mayor

 

cc:  Senator Kent Lambert

Colorado Springs Delegation Senators Cadman, King, and Morse

Danny Tomlinson and Ed Bowditch, Tomlinson and Associates

Kevin Bommer, Colorado Municipal League

 

Here is the council’s letter:

January 20, 2012

 

The Honorable Rollie Heath

Colorado State Capitol

200 East Colfax Avenue

Room 346

Denver, CO  80203

Dear Senator Heath:

The Colorado Springs City Council joins Colorado Springs Mayor Steve Bach in urging your support for SB12-016, “Local Government Option to Change PERA Contribution Rates,” sponsored by Senator Kent Lambert.

Municipalities across Colorado face the same budgetary challenges that prompted the state to legislate a “PERA timeout” in each of the previous two sessions of the General Assembly.  SB12-016 would grant elected officials in cities that participate in the Public Employees Retirement Association the same option – to legislate timeouts for their local jurisdictions.  Currently municipalities are bound by the state PERA statutes, but the latitude the state granted to itself in the past two years was not extended to other jurisdictions in the PERA system.

State law currently requires the Colorado Springs City budget to contribute 13.7 percent of an employee’s salary to PERA, while the individual employee contributes 8 percent.  Senator Lambert’s bill would not reduce total contributions to the Local Government Division of PERA, but would allow local officials to institute a rate swap between employer and employees of up to 2.5 percent.  Moving toward an ultimate 50/50 PERA contribution match would give the City additional flexibility to achieve long-term fiscal sustainability.

If the City of Colorado Springs had had this option, it would have allowed us to reduce our 2012 General Fund expenditures by approximately $1.625 million, freeing those funds for other critical needs.

The City Council recently passed a resolution in favor of this proposed legislation and the Council requests your support of this bill.

Sincerely,

 

Scott Hente

President of the Colorado Springs City Council

 

Copies:         Senator Kent Lambert

Colorado Springs Delegation Senators Cadman, King and Morse

Colorado Springs Mayor Steve Bach

Danny Tomlinson and Ed Bowditch, Tomlinson and Associates

Kevin Bommer, Colorado Municipal League

 

Attachment:      Colorado Springs City Council Resolution 7-12

Posted in: Uncategorized | 5 Comments »

(The real) Quote of the Day

January 23rd, 2012, 9:01 pm by

Today’s Quote of the Day was met with big disappointment.

“Yawn.”

That was the first comment it received on Facebook.

So, let’s try again.

“As a founding member of original PPRTA Board,  I can recall that one of our most important founding objectives was to engage the entire region in solving our transportation problems. I find the Colorado Springs objective and weak reasoning to exclude a community to be most offensive. To City Council,  I appeal to you to support regionalism and stop thinking only of City power. You are already an 800-pound gorilla and should not fear for anything. You are sending the wrong message to all of your smaller neighbors,” Dick Bratton, mayor pro-tem of the Town of Green Mountain Falls, said today in an email to city and county officials.

Bratton was referring to the city of Colorado Springs’ opposition to letting the Town of Calhan join the Pikes Peak Rural Transportation Authority with a vote on the board.

 

Posted in: Uncategorized • • | 4 Comments »

Quote of the Day

January 23rd, 2012, 8:20 pm by

The city of Colorado Springs is planning a USOC Opening Day Celebration in downtown Colorado Springs on July 27.

The outdoor celebration is part of the mayor’s Spirit of the Springs initiative.

“I’m proud to say that the city of Colorado Springs is the only city at this point who has permission from NBC to broadcast the opening celebration of the Olympics in London…Since we have the USOC headquarters here, we think we should celebrate that every chance that we get,” Donna Nelson, the mayor’s economic vitality specialist, told the City Council on Monday.

Runner-up for Quote of the Day:

“I hope it’s extra large,” City Council President Scott Hente said after Mayor Steve Bach gave him a jacket with a Spirit of the Springs insignia.

Posted in: City Administration • City Council • Civic Participation • • • • • • | 8 Comments »

WANTED poster ignites fight between musician and photographer

January 23rd, 2012, 11:22 am by

A “WANTED” poster that includes a photo of Councilman Tim Leigh trespassing at the Incline has ignited a fight between the man who created the poster and the photographer who snapped the shot.

After photographer Bob Kane saw the poster, he contacted creator Chuck Snow, a local musician who says Leigh should be arrested.

“I would like to make a public apology to Bob Kane, who’s photo of Tim appeared on my poster without permission © 2012 Bob Kane Design Photography,” Snow wrote Friday night on the City Desk blog.

But apparently the apology wasn’t enough.

Kane sent Snow an email Sunday night saying he is “tired of people taking advantage” of his work.

“There has been more buzz about the poster on Facebook but it only mentions you.  I know I will never get credit or cash for my work,” he wrote in an email to Snow.

“If you cannot pay me for the photo, please take them back from City Counsel (sic) and everywhere else you have sent them and destroy them!” he wrote.

Snow said he didn’t answer the email because he wanted to “remain polite.”

That was Sunday night.

By early Monday morning, Snow said he “couldn’t resist” and punched back.

“I am not personally on Facebook  so I don’t know what’s going on there,” Snow wrote in an email to Kane.

“I posted credits on both articles and apologized. I should also mention that you were on the Incline so you were trespassing as well, so why don’t we just call it even?”

 

Posted in: City Council • People • • • | 3 Comments »

Resident calls for citizen’s arrest of councilman

January 20th, 2012, 3:26 pm by

A local musician is calling for a citizen’s arrest of Councilman Tim Leigh for trespassing on the Manitou Incline.

“It is NOT currently legal to trespass on The Manitou Incline, and here we have one of our city council members (Tim Leigh) shamelessly breaking the law,” Chuck Snow wrote in an email to his friends.

“We simply cannot have our politicians flagrantly circumventing the law under the excuse, “Everybody Does It”…….” he wrote.

Snow is asking his friends to get the word out by circulating a “Wanted” poster on their Facebook pages or by circulating his email to other friends.

“Mr. Leigh obviously doesn’t think much of ‘overweight people’ either so I say it’s high time,” Snow added, referring to a comment that Leigh made to the editorial page editor of The Gazette.

“They got a guy to go sit up there and enforce it,” Leigh said recently. “But he was overweight. You’d go halfway up, and when you saw the guy you’d jump over to Barr trail. What was he going to do about it? He wasn’t able to do anything that required endurance.”

Leigh, who is on vacation in Hawaii, got wind of Snow’s efforts.

“Let’s say the fine is $150 per time. Let’s use this piece to challenge other Incliner’s to bail me out by making a donation to the ‘Bail-out Tim Campaign’ for the benefit of the Friends of the Incline,” Leigh wrote in an email to The Gazette.

“Just trying to make some lemon aid from the lemon,” he added.

Snow said he’s sending a letter to City Council along with copies of his poster

Here’s the letter that Snow plans to send:

Dear Valued City Council Member ,

Enclosed is a “Wanted” poster for your fellow council member Tim Leigh. Tim has been illegally trespassing on The Manitou Incline and has admitted it as such to the local press and has been photographed running up the Incline on more than a few occasions. Since he is an elected official, this is in direct violation of  The City of Colorado Springs Policy and Procedure Manual- Policy #41 Page 101. Business Ethics which says as follows;

“The City is committed to strictly observing all laws, and employees are expected to uphold this commitment to legal compliance. Employees should avoid any conduct creating the appearance of impropriety even if those actions do not violate specific policies, standards, regulations or laws.” 

As you may or may not know, making a “Citizen’s Arrest” is perfectly legal in Colorado, and is certainly the responsibility of every law-abiding citizen. I urge you to follow this protocol to the letter in prosecuting Mr. Leigh for his flagrant disregard of property rights. Being a realtor he certainly must know the value of the law concerning trespassing and property rights. I’m certain he would not enjoy a family of squatters living in his back yard, or a motocross trail across his driveway. He seems to feel that because “Everyone is doing it”, he is entitled to ignore the law when in fact, as an elected official, he should be held to a higher standard for setting a good example for our kids and retaining the trust of his constituents.  I look forward to your swift action on my concerns to hold him responsible for his errant and lawless behavior.

 

Sincerely,

Charles D. Snow

 

Posted in: City Council • Civic Participation • | 13 Comments »

Quote of the Day

January 20th, 2012, 11:56 am by

Chief Communications Officer Cindy Aubrey released the expense reports of Mayor Steve Bach and several managers and department heads to all the news media in Colorado Springs this week after The Gazette filed an open records request for the information.

(Check out what the Indy had to say about the city’s tactics here.)

Anyway, Aubrey’s press release claimed that the mayor “has about $6,000 in unreimbursed expenses so far for which he will not seek reimbursement.”

Of course, one of the TV stations reported that little tidbit without any evidence to support it.

The Gazette has been asking the Communications Office to provide evidence to support the claim.

Today, Aubrey said she couldn’t.

“Because he is not being reimbursed  - those expenses are not public record,” Aubrey said in an email.

Posted in: Budget • City Administration • Colorado Open Records Act • • • | Post a Comment »

Who applied for Oil and Gas Committee? Who got passed over?

January 20th, 2012, 10:40 am by

Thirty-seven people applied to serve on the city’s new Oil and Gas Committee.

Council members Angela Dougan, Val Snider and Brandy Williams, who will serve on the committee, reviewed all the résumés and are recommending the selection of the following seven people:

Randy Case

Jan Handke

Stephen Harris

Chris Mendrop

John Maynard

Michael Martin

Ed McCord

The nominations have to be confirmed by the full City Council.

The city did not include the résumés of those seven individuals. A request for their résumés was referred to Dougan, who is apparently in charge of committee communications. Dougan did not immediately return a call for comment.

The committee, previously called a task force, was commissioned by council President Scott Hente in response to plans by Texas-based Ultra Resources to drill on Banning Lewis Ranch in east Colorado Springs.

Hente gave the committee until May to issue a report. That’s because the council issued a six-month moratorium on oil and gas exploration Nov. 29 to determine whether the city has the right regulations in place.

The committee will meet every Thursday from 8:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. starting Jan. 26. Committee members are expected to attend the weekly meetings on a regular basis, perform research assignments as needed and go on possible field trips, the city said.

Only Dougan, Williams and Snider, who will chair the committee, will have a vote on the final report to council.

Here’s a list of everyone who applied:

Jim Adcox

Val Barrutia

Russell J. “Jeff” Cahill

Randy Case

Gary Casimir

John Crandall

John E. Donovan

Jack Flobeck

Charles Guy

Jan L. Handke

Stephen D. Harris

Scott Harvey

Walter H. Heckelmann

Stephen Hench

Rob Henderson

Bruce Hughes

Michael Humberd

Stacy S. Jensen

Robert Jones

Robert W. Kettle

Liz Klein

R.Terry Krai

Randy Kraeger

Jonathan Macomber

Michael Martin

Mark Masters

John Maynard

Ed McCord

Chris G. Mendrop

Brian Penn

Dick Standaert

Cris Stoddard

John Stokes

Mary J. Talbott

Grady Vaughn

Michael S. Welsh

Lynn Wilkinson

Posted in: Boards and Commissions • City Council • Civic Participation • Meetings • Oil and Gas • • • • • • | 4 Comments »

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