RELEVANT FINANCIAL INFORMATION WITHHELD
Hello,
This is my contribution for Citizen's Discussion at Tuesday's City Council meeting:
Good morning,
The first public meeting for the land swap was held on February 24th 2016 at Gold Camp Elementary School.
Sara Bryarly gave a presentation for the city.
She said that the land owned by the Cog Railway had drainage problems and erosion damage.
After that I began asking for the estimated cost to repair those issues.
My repeated inquiries throughout the public comment process are documented on my Facebook page titled “COS Land Swap”.
The city never mentioned that the city of Manitou Springs was spending $40,000 a year doing repairs to the land that the city wanted to acquire.
Finally on January 31st 2018 Kurt Schroeder said this in an email:
“Since 2013 RMFI has put $211,128 of maintenance work into Barr Trail.”
That would add up to just over $40,000 a year for the summers from 2013 through 2017.
There have been 4 more summers since then, we can assume that another $160,000 has been spent doing repairs on that land.
This means that somewhere around $370,000 has been spent on this land that was appraised at $1,300,000.
That is nearly 30% of the appraised value of the land.
This alone proves that relevant financial information was withheld during the public comment process.
The Barr Trail on this land is still in terrible condition. No work has been done to repair the erosion damage yet. That work cannot even begin until all drainage problems have been corrected.
There is no doubt that the land we acquired still needs hundreds of thousands of dollars more in repairs.
Was the city aware that Manitou Springs was spending $40,000 a year in Barr Trail parking lot fees to do repairs on this land during the public comment process?
Did the Broadmoor provide the total estimated cost of the needed repairs to this land to the appraiser?
Why did the city refuse to answer this one simple question of mine during the public comment process.
What is the estimated cost of all needed repairs on the land that we acquired from the Cog Railway?
Thank you, Carl Strow