AURORA | Next week, the City of Aurora will ask Arapahoe County District Court Judge Charles Pratt to lift a stay placed on a countersuit Aurora filed against 11 mostly Denver hotels seeking to block tax incentives awarded to the massive Gaylord hotel project. Judge Pratt told both parties to report back to him after a ruling was given on the Denver hotels’ lawsuit.
If the stay is lifted, Aurora may review communication between the hotels involved in the lawsuit, says Tom Snyder, an attorney representing Aurora in both cases.
“We would look at any efforts the hotels have been taking to impede the progress of the Gaylord project,” he said. “We haven’t formulated the entirety of the discovery plan yet, but we would probably start there.”
The Denver hotels still have a little over a month to appeal the Denver court’s decision, which ruled in favor of Aurora.
“We believe they do have standing to make these claims, and we are considering all of the appellate options outlined by Judge Haglund,” Hilary Wells of Lewis Roca Rothgerber, attorney for the plaintiffs, said in a statement.
Aurora City Interim Attorney Mike Hyman said Aurora moving forward with the lawsuit would allow the city to investigate connections between the lawsuit filed against Gaylord and one filed in Adams County District Court by David Bishop and Regina Thomson in February. That lawsuit accuses the city of crafting a special taxing district and allowing just one person — a real estate developer from Denver — to vote on a special tax there to benefit Gaylord.
“We would like to confirm what we suspect, that the two plaintiffs in the Adams County lawsuit are being fronted by the hotels,” Hyman said.
In February, the Colorado Springs Gazette reported that the plaintiffs acknowledged being backed by the Aurora hotel opponents. Their attorney, Shawn Mitchell, also told the Gazette that two taxpayer groups were behind the Denver lawsuit, but he did not give names.
As of press time, Mitchell did not respond to repeated requests for a comment. Mark Grueskin, an attorney who is also representing the plaintiffs in Adams County, declined comment on the connection between the two lawsuits.
“I will believe it when I see it in the court papers,” he said. “We think the issue in front of the court is whether or not the city violated TABOR and state laws related to urban renewal authorities. If the city wants to talk about something else, that’s their prerogative. It’s a bad a litigation strategy.”
An Adams County Judge will hear several motions related to the Adams County lawsuit May 23, including a motion filed by the City of Aurora to dismiss the case.
Denver Judge Norman Haglund dismissed all of the claims filed by the Front Range hotels against the Gaylord project April 9 that included a request to the Regional Tourism Authority to revoke an $81.4 million tax incentive award to Gaylord after the project changed owners in 2012.
A group of hotels, chiefly from Downtown Denver, had filed the lawsuit in the summer of 2013, claiming that the state should revoke a massive tax rebate award because details of the project had changed. The 1,500-room hotel is slated to include 400,000 square feet of conference and meeting space as well as an indoor-outdoor waterpark.
Wendy Mitchell, president and CEO of the Aurora Economic Development Council, says the Denver lawsuit was the biggest hurdle to the project moving forward. She said Gaylord-developer Rida will begin work on drawings for the hotel and the next phase of construction now that the Denver lawsuit has been decided, which will cost $15 million.
“Nobody is worried about this one,” she said of the lawsuit in Adams County. “We have a good case.”
I am pretty that all the lawyers were wearing ties.
Should not have to look too far.
dave, this site is blocking my comments!
There could likely be several lawsuits filed, all with the common tie that Aurora underhandedly and illegally gave land and funds to Gaylord-Marriott-RIDA. The common tie is Aurora’s cronyism.