“We’re within about 30 signatures of having the required number,” said petition backer Bill Love. “But we need way more signatures than that to be sure we have enough that qualify.”
To put the question before voters, petitioners must gather at least 270 valid signatures from registered voters who live within Improvement District boundaries, County Clerk Fran Townsend has said. That represents 10 percent of the approximately 2,700 district residents who are registered to vote, she said. Petitioners must submit the required number of valid signatures by Aug. 8 in order to qualify the measure for a November special election.
The group hopes to gather as many as 400 signatures in case some are tossed during the validation process at the county clerk’s office.
“We want to make sure we have more than the required number,” said Barb Morra, a Spanish Valley Improvement District board member who also backs the petition effort. “Everybody who wants the chance to sign should have it.”
Morra said 244 signatures were sent Tuesday to the county clerk’s office to begin the verification process. Additional signatures will be submitted later this week, she said.
“There’s a very enthusiastic crowd gathering signatures,” she said. “It’s exciting to see people with different viewpoints in the community coming together with a common goal.”
The county council currently appoints all five members of the Improvement District board, which oversees water and sewer services for Spanish Valley residents, and some members of two other water agencies in the valley – the Grand County Special Service Water District which secured funding in the 1970s for the Ken’s Lake project for Grand County and northern San Juan County, and the Grand County Water Conservancy District, which oversees Ken’s Lake irrigation water.
In 1999, the county formed an administrative “umbrella agency” – the Grand Water and Sewer Service Agency – to provide financial, administrative, and budgetary oversight for all three water agencies. Each water agency is invested with specific responsibilities and still maintains a separate board, and all three are also represented on the larger Grand Water and Sewer Service Agency board.
But a proposal by some members of the county council to consolidate all three boards into a single district concerns some Spanish Valley residents who believe that consolidation will give control of the Improvement District’s $13 million in assets and $1 million in annual revenues to a board that does not necessarily have district rate payers’ best interest at heart. As evidence, Love and Morra cite the fact that some current members of the Improvement District board, and members of the other water boards, have pushed in recent years to expand the district’s boundaries to include portions of northern San Juan County where much of Spanish Valley’s development is occurring. So far, the board has turned down requests from developers to provide water and sewer service outside the district’s existing boundaries, but petition backers believe the move to consolidate the three water boards into one district is an attempt to expand the district and provide services to new housing developments.
This week, the county council voted to move forward with plans to consolidate the three water boards, and water agency officials have presented the council with a timeline that sets a Sept. 15 goal for completing the consolidation and creating the new water district.
Love sees the plans to quickly push through consolidation as an attempt to thwart a special election.
He said the petition effort would continue through the weekend.
"I'm confident we'll have enough valid signatures to get this thing on the ballot," he said.
He said the petition effort would continue through the weekend.
“I’m confident we’ll have enough valid signatures to get this thing on the ballot,” he said.
©2005 Lisa J. Church