AURORA | Aurora city leaders suggested Tuesday that a potential ballot question and tax hike are likely needed to fund the bulk of at least $700 million in essential city capital improvement needs identified by a grassroots effort.
“We have a lot of needs,” Councilmember Curtis Gardner said. “I think our staff has done a good job of winnowing that down to the most critical needs, which that number alone is nearly a billion dollars.”
City officials, speaking at a press conference Tuesday, did not detail the list, but they said it includes public roads improvements and repairs, recreation and parks improvements, safety, accessibility and other city infrastructure needs. The list was compiled by city staff and city council members.
Officials said the priority is “based on a number of factors, including in part, significant need, the condition of the asset and readiness for construction,” according to a statement.
“The initial list was identified by staff and City Council based on a number of factors, including in part, significant need, the condition of the asset and readiness for construction,” city spokesperson Julie Patterson said in a statement.
The list of projects is divided into three tiers. The categories were prioritized based on inquiries by the council and community, existing plans, geographic distribution, asset condition, initial feedback from a poll completed in December 2021, project status and how fast they could be completed.
Tier one includes $24 million for a traffic management center, $18 million for Americans with Disabilities Act sidewalk compliance, $21 million for Fire Station 8 replacement and $54 million for a new police evidence storage warehouse.
Tier two includes $35 million for bridge widening of Alameda Avenue over I-225 and $42 million for Utah Pool/Recreation Center improvements.
Tier three includes $50 million for a new park on Alameda Avenue and Airport Road, $47 million for the City of Aurora Public Safety Training Center expansion and $17 million for a pickleball court in Ward V.
“We’re looking for monies through grants and everything to supplement, but that’s never enough.” Councilmember Bergan said. “We’ve talked about this the whole time I’ve been on council, about going out for a ballot initiative, and then we’ve never made it happen because it takes a lot of education to get to that point.”
Councilmembers Gardner and Bergan said Tuesday they plan to engage the public to focus on crucial needs and find the best ways to fund upgrades and new developments.
Bergan mentioned the possibility of “De-Brucing” for potential funding as well.
The term refers to voters creating an exception to the state’s Taxpayer Bill of Rights constitutional amendment. The so-called TABOR measure requires voters to approve all tax increases. In addition, the law caps government revenues based on what was collected in previous years. The measure was promoted by Douglas Bruce, at Colorado Springs tax-protester, hence the reference to “Bruce.”
Aurora voters agreed to “De-Bruce” sales and use tax revenues in the early 2000s, according to Greg Hayes, Aurora’s budget officer. It essentially lifted a cap on how much sales and use tax can be collected each year.
“We are not De-Bruced for property tax,” Patterson said in a statement. She said the city could gain about $17 million a year in new revenue if voters were to “de-Bruce” those levies.
How much the city could borrow through a bond issue for capital improvements could be a chore for the new task force to help determine.
Aurora has notoriously been a difficult place to persuade voters to raise taxes, and Republicans, which dominate the city council, have traditionally been loath to ask for tax hikes.
“We’re really trying to involve the residents in Aurora and go through a long deliberative process,” Gardner said. “It’s been 25 years since Aurora voters have approved a tax increase. And you know, we think going through this process will get buy-in from our residents, but it will also allow us to hear from them what projects they would like to see.”
The city and Aurora leaders say they are taking a grassroots approach in order to gain public trust and support whatever funding options are offered during the process.
City officials avoided specifics but said it could mean a ballot measure and tax increase or something else entirely, depending on public input. Instead of dictating a way forward, city officials said they are focused on “transparency” and “collaboration” with city residents. Under state law, the city can raise money for capital projects through property taxes, sales taxes or fees.
Gardner also reflected on past failures, emphasizing the importance of including residents in decision-making.
“In the past, it was the city saying, ‘This is what you need.’ We’re doing this differently,” he said. “Residents will be part of the process.”
In 2024, the Aurora City Council formed the Infrastructure Task Force to develop a 10-year strategic plan for infrastructure investment. The committee’s responsibilities include crafting phased strategic plans for short-, mid-, and long-term improvement needs, establishing criteria prioritizing projects, promoting collaboration with stakeholders, engaging residents and exploring funding options.
Task force members include Ray Barnes, former Aurora Fire Rescue chief; Joel Boyd, Town Center at Aurora mall manager; Steve Coffin, Steve Coffin Strategies; Naomi Colwell, Aurora Chamber of Commerce CEO; Rita Connerly, Fairfield and Wood, P.C.; Bruce Dalton Visit Aurora CEO; Ryan Frazier, Frazier Global; Jeff Knight, Hispanic Contractors of Colorado and Wendy Mitchell, Aurora Economic Development Council CEO.
With Aurora experiencing nearly 40% population growth over the past two decades, the demand for roads and services has intensified, according to a statement. This has impacted the city’s economic stability and residents’ quality of life.
“The high cost of capital needs, which increases daily, will continue to skyrocket,” Councilmember Françoise Bergan said, saying need continues to far outpace city resources. “People think property taxes fund everything, but the city receives only about 10% of those taxes.”
The other funding comes from the local sales tax of 3.75%. Bergan listed everything the city has to pay for with tax funding, including police, fire, libraries, recreation centers, city roads and more.
Some parks have been left unfinished for almost 20 years, Bergan said.
To ensure public involvement, the city plans to host forums, town halls and online engagement sessions to prioritize projects and work toward buy-in for a potential bond issue election.
“We promise to put the money where it’s needed, and it won’t go into a black hole,” Bergan said.
Both Councilmembers said they hope a transparent, community-driven approach will foster trust and result in success.
“We’re excited about what this means for our community,” Gardner said. “This is about ensuring a better future for every resident of Aurora.”
The short answer is “absolutely not! No new taxes or tax increases”. When the government at all levels can demonstrate real fiscal responsibility, then maybe we should consider allowing tax increases. Until then, I have absolutely no confidence the city of Aurora can manage our taxpayer money and spend it responsibly. There’s absolutely no transparency when it comes to how the city or state allocates it’s tax to its operating budget and expenditures. With the high cost of literally everything right now, we don’t need to have our city cost us even more money. Inflation is outpacing pretty much everyone’s income increase percentages.
Just say “NO!” to higher taxes.
This Council just ended the head tax and now they want to increase property taxes. Meanwhile, the City is giving Philip Morris $7.1 million in tax rebates and paying Ryman Hospitality (Gaylord Rockies) more than $1.3 billion in tax rebates. We also should not forget about the ongoing London Mine boondoggle. How many millions of dollars has the City sunk into that hole? It would be nice if this Council treated the residents as generously as they treat big corporations. Instead of putting the tax burden directly on the people, the Council should be better stewards of our resources and make the big corporations pay their fair share.
Why do that when majority Republican council members can coddle corporations with the expectation that the city will eventually turn into a strong mayor leadership with untold amounts of dark money campaign contributions added their coffers?
Absolutely agree! Jurinsky and others killed the Aurora Occupational Tax, putting millions of dollars per year back into their own pockets as business owners instead of into our city. Not to mention that she used profanity-filled text messages sent to several council members to force them into voting her way on this issue.
And now they want us to pay for services that should have been paid for from the Occupational Tax revenue??? Yeah, let’s see how that works out for them.
I hope the task force has distinguished between “needs” and “wants.”
Kill the traffic enforcement program, the ridiculous camera speed enforcement which we all know doesn’t work and is a waste of money, then cut your administrative costs, and we’ll talk.
Installing “art” in parks does not improve them.
Throwing money into old Aurora along Colfax from Peoria to Denver has been a loser for years. All the money used there has not improved anything. Still lots of
crime and run down property. Buying a hotel, improving and maintaining it for some unknown period of time to house homeless individuals has taken a huge amount of money.
Need to look for ways to cut expenditures not just ways to increase revenue to spend more.
So they need taxes for roads and bridges. Make the license tag scofflaws pay up! Saw a temp tag yesterday that expired MAY 2023! Increase the fines, enforce the laws, collect enough to probably cover what needs doing! Government at its best-throwing good money away because of LAZINESS!
Wow! Jurinski made a big stink about the occupational privelege tax, so she doesn’t have to pay it for her bar employees. It’s now repealed – woo hoo! Now we have to dig deeper to replace capital requirements. I get it, infrastructure needs to be replaced, but please notice that other than lie about what a hell hole Aurora is, Jurinski made sure to take care of her gripe! We the citizens will have to replace the lost revenue. Please, Danielle, don’t talk about fiscal conservatism!
uh, that’s county level stuff you know?
HELL NO! Not when City Council leaves over $40 million in sales tax on the table by perpetually ignoring the sickly retail tax base for decades– telling us everything is fine.
Shut down and sell the libraries, rec centers, parks and golf courses. Then start over.
The extreme, hyper-conservative attitude of city council over the last 30 years DIRECTLY LED to this situation. Don’t let anybody claim otherwise. The benchmark data does not lie.
We all have access to the city budget. They have a planning committee. We all can attend the meetings. It’s pretty transparent. Go see. To ensure public involvement, the city plans to host forums, town halls and online engagement sessions to prioritize projects and work toward buy-in for a potential bond issue election.
Meanwhile?
NO: $54 million for a new police evidence storage warehouse
NO: $35 million for bridge widening of Alameda Avenue over I-225
NO: $17 million for a pickleball court in Ward V.
Maybe?: $42 million for Utah Pool/Recreation Center improvements.
Consider though:
40% population growth
demand for roads and services has intensified
cost of capital needs, which increases daily
“People think property taxes fund everything, but the city receives only about 10% of those taxes.”
The other funding comes from the local sales tax of 3.75%. Bergan listed everything the city has to pay for with tax funding, including police, fire, libraries, recreation centers, city roads and more.
Some parks have been left unfinished for almost 20 years
Winter Park – 11.2% sales tax. 2.9% state tax, 1.3% Grand County tax, 7% Winter Park tax.
Empire – 10.55% sales tax (tie) …
Idaho Springs – 10.55% sales tax (tie) …
Silverton – 10.4% sales tax (tie) …
Snowmass Village – 10.4% sales tax (tie)
Maybe we should actually consider raising the sales tax? EVERYONE pays those.
Billy- The City’s retail tax base per resident (the sum of taxable business divided by the number of residents) falls 14% below the average of Colorado cities and 59% below Denver’s. That’s both a failing grade and a clear indicator of serious opportunity.
Meanwhile Aurora residents pay over $8 million/year to the Denver Scientific and Cultural Facilities District which in turn returns less than 9% of that .1% sales tax to entities in Aurora. $8 million per year and the Fox Theater celebrates its new sign?!?! Frankly, the Denver SCFD operates as a Ponzi scheme but its soon up for reauthorization. Its time for Aurora to exit and form our own without raising the rate.
So forgive me for REJECTING any and all suggestions that any tax rates should be raised. Bringing the retail economy just up to Average would generate over $40 million in additional sales tax for the city. So how do we boost retail activity by 14%? That should be aim, first and foremost.
We need council to acknowledge to chronically anemic state of retail, dining and entertainment in Aurora and then act strategically and decisively to fix it. Exiting the Denver SCFD and investing the .1% cultural tax it currently collects here, in Aurora’s entertainment infrastructure is what I mean by acting strategically.
City Council has far better options other than raising tax rates. Frankly, this initiative is a non-starter.
No tax increase, it would hurt retirees more than others, but right now we are all at out limit. Eggs. $6-9 a dozen. My question is Paul Beck rec Center Pool has been out of service for over a year, and it was not on the list. Do you already have funding for it? Do you plan on fixing it anytime soon? I also notice all of your repairs or building in Aurora was in Arapahoe County and nothing in Adams County north of Colfax.