Colo. Senate kills measure Aurora Gaylord proponents say threatened massive hotel

DENVER | With less than an hour left to act late Monday night, legislators killed a last-minute state Senate bill critics said was aimed squarely at the embattled Aurora Gaylord hotel, breathing life into the massive project once again.

“We appreciate the Senate for putting Colorado jobs first and keeping Colorado open for business,”  Aurora Economic Development Council CEO Wendy Mitchell said in a statement after the state Senate unexpectedly voted to lay over Senate Bill 284, effectively killing the measure.  “We are pleased that a large coalition of over 90 businesses and organizations came together to support the project and continue a strong tradition of regional cooperation. The Gaylord Rockies Hotel and Conference Center has broken ground and is moving forward.”

It was the second time lawmakers scrutinized the $825 million hotel project, which was awarded an $81.4-million state tourism grant in 2012 and garnered about $300 million in Aurora sales-tax credits.

Earlier this year, a legislative audit committee proposed having the state auditor’s office look at how RTA money has been awarded to statewide projects, including Aurora’s Gaylord hotel.

Aurora officials and Gaylord proponents said Downtown Denver and Colorado Springs hoteliers and their political allies are bent on crushing what could be the state’s largest hotel because they fear competition. Aurora officials have maintained that the project by design would draw primarily tourists and business groups that otherwise would not visit Colorado.

Gaylord Hotel builder RIDA Corp. said they broke ground April 22 after erecting a fence and using heavy equipment to move dirt. The surprise move was made to ensure state lawmakers could not hamper the project.

It’s unclear whether or how the measure could have threatened the Gaylord project since the bill exempted past projects from scrutiny. Gaylord proponents were convinced, however, that it would trigger court action, adding delays to a  hotel that is already years behind schedule.

Kevin Bommer, deputy director of the Colorado Municipal League, said the bill in addition to being unclear was unfairly punitive towards Aurora.

“If any changes are made, they should apply prospectively and not impact those who followed the rules established by the legislature,” he said. “One of the hallmarks of good government is that state and local partnership exists. Senate bill 284 did not represent the best as far as that’s concerned.”

The late-status bill was approved by the state Senate Judiciary committee on a 4-1 bi-partisan vote  before it was killed by its sponsors, Sen. President Bill Cadman and Sen. Majority Leader Mark Scheffel, on the Senate floor.

Both Senators testified at the committee hearing that the bill’s intent was to close a five-year-old loophole in the state’s urban renewal law that  allows municipalities to use a tool that some believe should be used only for urban infill to fund development on agricultural land.

Aurora and other area municipal officials balked at that.

“It is anti-special district, anti-school district, anti-county, anti-city, anti-urban renewal, anti-state economic development office, anti-local control, anti-competition, anti-business,” Aurora Mayor Steve Hogan said in a statement he had prepared for the committee.

Trey Rogers, a lawyer for 24 Denver hotels and lodging groups that petitioned to have state money pulled from the Gaylord hotel project in 2013, said it was unclear whether the bill could impact Gaylord if passed.

“Under Colorado law, the base tax must be set when an urban renewal plan is approved,”  he said.  “The reason that it’s unclear is Aurora has cut corners pretty dramatically in violation of their own ordinances and processes for approval of development. They have rushed through approval of civil plans. Aurora has now notified the Adams County Assessor that they have broke ground. That is the trigger in the urban renewal plan. They have asked the assessor now to set the base. We think the assessor cannot set the base for this plan.”

Rogers said that Aurora stood on “shady ground” and used the urban renewal “loophole” to blight agricultural land for the hotel project, and that the city illegally broke ground on the project when it started erecting a fence and using heavy equipment to move dirt last week. He referenced an Adams County district court ruling that said the city held an invalid election to create a special tax district around the future hotel project.

Hogan countered that Aurora had won most of the lawsuits targeted against the project, including one filed by 11 mostly Denver-based hotels that was struck down by a Denver District judge last year.

He said one provision in the bill, which said any resident of a city could sue the city if they thought agricultural land was unfairly blighted for urban renewal, would just further delay the project with unnecessary litigation.

Hogan’s points were echoed by Adams County Commissioner Chaz Tedesco and Arapahoe County Commissioner Bill Holen, who testified against the measure.

Nick Colglazier of the Colorado Farm Burea was one of the few people who testified in support of the bill.