Co. Springs annexation to add 6,500 homes could go to ballot in Summer, after signatures contest it

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) - A large-scale annexation in Colorado Springs that could add upwards of 6,500 homes could be headed to a special election ballot measure this summer, after tens of thousands of signatures contested the decision by the Colorado Springs City Council to pass it earlier this year.

The developer behind the Karman Line Annexation, Norris Ranch Joint Development (NRJD) sent the letter seen below to the city council on Thursday. The letter, which was obtained by KRDO13, explains that although NRJD feels that close to $250,000 dollars in 'dark money' was spent by outside forces to fuel the petitioning efforts to contest their annexation, they want to respect the will of the people.

"The voters should decide if in the future there's going to be one developer to develop the balance of Colorado Springs or there's going to be competition. And we think they at least need to know going in that we think competition is always good for affordability and house prices," explained Kevin O'Neill, a Managing Partner with Norris Ranch Joint Development.

Petitioners submitted over 30,000 signatures in late February of this year, around one month after the Colorado Springs City Council voted 7-2 in favor of the 2,000-acre annexation near Schreiver Space Force Base. They asked for a referendum on the vote and to have the council reconsider their decision.

The letter also claims that the signature gatherers were from outside Colorado Springs and even out of the state. They claim this is a direct violation of City Charter, Section 12-30(b), which requires a circulator to be a registered elector of the city.

Meanwhile, an organizer behind the petitioning effort, Daniel Cole, tells KRDO13 that a lawyer had already advised them of a Supreme Court case that struck down voter-registration-to-petition requirements to be unconstitutional.

“A series of Colorado court rulings have prohibited both state and local residency requirements for circulators... the City Clerk is prohibited from enforcing the Colorado Springs Charter residency requirement because it has been eliminated by these court rulings (even if it is still on the books)... Colorado Springs residency requirements for circulators has been rendered void for over 20 years.” Cole said over a text to KRDO13.

O'Neill stated that if the rules are in the City Charter, then they should be abided by. He also claims that the money spent against their annexation effort, to those petitioners, belonged to a fellow developer.

"Really what we're looking at is ... we believe that one group was behind it. It's the largest developer in town, [that] was behind funneling the money to make sure there is no competition," he said.

Daniel Cole, another one of the organizers behind the signature gathering efforts tells KRDO13 that there was no 'dark money', and that the $247,000 dollars that they were paid to those in the petitioning was public information.

In response to the idea that it was a developer behind that money, Cole explained that the money came from a 'collection of organizations', in support of water conservation.

The petitioning effort came after a swath of opponents spoke out against the annexation during the city council's final vote in late January, including first responders, farmers across the Arkansas River Valley, and local residents.

They expressed fears over water usage, dried-up farmland, and emergency response times as a result of accommodating the massive new development, which could see several thousand new homes built in the area.

However, O'Neill claims, those worries are either fabricated or have been addressed already by water authorities like Colorado Springs Utilities.

"At the end of the day, we're not taking any farmer's water, we're not taking any rancher's water. That is just a fallacy to get people riled up around where is this water coming from." said O'Neill, "The fact is we're shipping it here. And we spent several... billions of dollars, actually, 20 years ago bringing in a new pipeline for water to bring it over the mountains." he added.

Another organizer for the petitioning effort, Ann Rush, tells KRDO13 that the city council will vote this coming Tuesday to either reaffirm their vote on the annexation, which would then put the question onto a Special Election Ballot measure this summer, likely in June. If the council changes their vote, however, to strike it down, the annexation would be eliminated altogether.

O'Neill tells KRDO13, however, that if the council does vote to strike the annexation down, they plan to ask the council to consider a ballot measure regardless.