LAKEWOOD, Colo. — At the heart of a debate happening for more than a year in Lakewood is the issue of what property owners can do with land that has acres of open space on it.
Previously, if someone wanted to build something in the city, they'd have two options the city could consider to grant them: The property owner could be required to dedicate some of their acreage to the city to be protected park land, or they could pay a fee to the city and be able to develop over it. The fees would then be used for park improvements elsewhere.
In late 2024, a citizen led initiative got rid of the fee option.
"Is it really a requirement if you're allowed to buy out of it," said Cathy Kentner, who helped draft the citizen ordinance. "We've been developing, lot line to lot line, just a concrete jungle without any green spaces."
The initiative got enough signatures to go before city council and was approved as an ordinance, although state law requires that the fee option be available to property owners.
"We had to pass or we had to send to a vote," said Lakewood Mayor Wendi Strom, "To put something on the ballot that we weren't even sure would be able to stick, just didn't feel right."
The developer of a proposed apartment complex near Belmar Park ended up suing the city. Organizers started drafting the citizen ordinance after controversy surrounding the plans.
Once the new ordinance went into effect, homeowners started speaking out. Denver7 spoke to one family who was told they had to give up part of their backyard in order to rebuild their home.
"Their direct words is that we had to dedicate, through an easement, 1,300-square feet of our property back to the city, which equates to about a 37x37 ft. square, which means then that we can never build on it. We can't do anything with it. It has to just be open space and comply with the city's open space requirements from now until the end of time, which is ridiculous," Katie Christensen said when we spoke to her in January.
Lakewood
Lakewood family told they must give up part of property under new ordinance
According to Lakewood officials, hers was one of more than 100 projects that were hitting a snag due to the new ordinance.
"We saw town homes in there, we saw apartment buildings in there. We saw single family homes," said Strom.
The city said the new rule caused an urgent problem, while supporters of the citizen ordinance call it something else.
"Instead of applying [the ordinance] with integrity, they chose to manufacture a crisis," Kentner said. "They used people and created real harm just so they could get rid of the initiative."
When asked if the city was misinterpreting the citizen ordinance, the mayor responded: "I don't feel that's the case. Interpreting the law is a complicated thing. The way you get around challenged interpreting is there's got to be an incredible amount of clarity that's in there. That clarity did not exist."
The city recently repealed and replaced the citizen ordinance as part of a planned parkland dedication update that was already in progress. They brought back in the fee option for property owners.
"It was anchored in a study and recommendations by professionals that knew what they were doing, and it included those things so that it then became more defensible in court," said Strom. She went on to say the city is dedicated to increasing park land where they can. Since 2018, they have acquired 192 additional acres for the city that they say has park land making up 25% of it.
According to the latest council approved version of this ordinance: "Developers must dedicate 3 acres for a community park and 2.5 acres for a neighborhood park, for a total of 5.5 acres, for every 1,000 residents expected to live in the new development." It also requires the fee amount to be set by council annually based on market evaluations. Currently, if the fee is granted, a property owner would need to pay $432,727 per acre of open space that they do not dedicate.
It's great news for developers and property owners like the Christensens who are now able to move forward with their rebuild without giving up their backyard.
"We were very excited and very thankful," Christensen said of the latest council decision.
It's a huge blow the efforts made by the citizen group who said their only intention was to protect open space.
"We are not against growth. We're asking for the growth to be balanced by appropriate green space," said Kentner.
Kentner said at this time there are no current plans to re-write a new citizen ordinance about this issue.
