| Published by the Floyd Hill Property Owners Association, Inc. Nov 2003 Edition | |
|
Next FHAPOA Meeting: Nov 19th at 7:30 pm at the Clear Creek High School Media Center |
|
      Issues:
|
Association News from Harry
Evergreen Volunteer Fire Department Presentation Charlie Neppell from the EFPD visited with us during our October 22 meeting. Charlie reported that a new Floyd Hill fire station will be built on JeffCo 65 between Pleasant Lane and Elmgreen Lane. This new station will house an Urban Interface Engine which is an off road capable high ground clearance four wheel drive fire engine that should be able to negotiate most of the roads in our area. EFPD is already in the process of acquiring the land and is expecting the delivery of the new engine in June 2004. With appropriate Evergreen Volunteer Fire Department volunteers in the Floyd Hill area, the new station should decrease response times in our area. Charlie also indicated that the EFPD is very interested in a direct emergency only route from the new station to Clear Creek High School which would avoid US 40 and both I-70 overpasses. This type of access would not only reduce response times to the high school, but could shave several minutes off response times to the Beaver Brook Canyon area.
Charlie mentioned that much of the EFPD station expansion, new stations and new equipment to be funded with the recent $9.75 Million bond issue will help reduce the district’s remote area ISO ratings from 10 to 9, which usually provides the biggest price break between ISO ratings on homeowners insurance. He also mentioned that in order to receive a class 5 ISO rating, you would need to live within 5 miles of the major EFPD stations and within a range that their tankers could deliver 250 gallons of water per minute for a prolonged period of time. The current EFPD goal for residents of the Floyd Hill area is an ISO rating of 9.
Charlie emphasized the importance of recruiting volunteers for the Evergreen Volunteer Fire Department from the Floyd Hill area in order to provide the best service to the Floyd Hill area. The Evergreen Volunteer Fire Department maintains a staff of a minimum of 85 volunteers on a scramble system. They also have a paid Ambulance staff. The EVFD training program takes 9 months and requires class participation on every Tuesday evening and one Saturday per month. A First Responder Certificate is awarded upon completion of the program. There is also a minimum of calls per year that volunteers must participate in to remain on the fire department. There is only one training program per year which starts in January. If you are interested in becoming an EVFD volunteer, please call the District Office at 303-674-3145. Charlie believed that there were still a few openings for the January 2004 training class.
Wildland Fire Danger The trees in Colorado and much of the southwest are drier than they have been in living memory. Normally the wildfire danger eases with the arrival of cooler weather, but this year it does not seem to be the case, probably due to virtually no moisture since mid-summer.
A bit of preparation goes a long way. Earlier in the year we invited Janet Arrowood to speak at one of our meetings. Her book, Living With Wildfires--Prevention, Preparation, and Recovery, (Bradford Publishing), has valuable checklists of what to take in the event of an evacuation and self- and property-protection information. It is available at Bradford Publishing, (1763 Wazee St. in Denver), or through www.amazon.com or www.barnesandnoble.com. It is information that could save someone's life. Here are a couple of links for more information:
Book review by www.firewise.org: http://www.firewise.org/pubs/wnn/vol17/no3/wnn-sept2003.pdf A site where you can preview the book: http://wildfires.bradfordpublishing.com Firewise: http://www.firewise.org Colorado State Forest Service: http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/CSFS/
US Forest Service Rocky Mountain Region:
http://www.fs.fed.us/r2/fire/rmacc.html
Daytime Emergency Notification Committee The phone number confirmations to participants and instructions to callers were distributed in August 2003 and our Notification Network is on line. The notification network will attempt to relay pre-evacuation or evacuation notices from the Sheriff’s Department to participating residents via a daytime phone number that the participating resident provided to Association volunteers. The County’s Emergency Preparedness network will provide a call to your home phone number and will be your primary source for emergency information. The Association is not acting as an emergency response agency, however the association would like to facilitate official emergency communication by attempting to pass along notice from the Clear Creek County Sheriff’s Office to area residents’ daytime phone numbers.
If you are not a participant in this program and would like to become a participant or if you would like to update your phone number, please call Karen Dobel at 303-679-6312 or email at Secretary@floydhill.org.
Emergency Egress/Access Meeting with Beaver Brook Canyon I am working with Kay Harder to set up a meeting with the Beaver Brook Canyon Homeowners to discuss emergency access for the canyon. So far we have agreed on Thursday evening, 11/13, but we are still working on the time and place. I am hoping to cover the three possibilities below. If any Floyd Hill residents would be interested in attending this meeting please let me know, (hjd173@aol.com).
1. Future access from the top of Beaver Brook Canyon to the new Saddleback Mountain Development.
2. A possible access from the new Floyd Hill Fire Station, (EFPD), on JeffCo 65 between Pleasant Lane and Elmgreen Lane to the high school.
3. Improvements to the narrow section of Beaver Brook Canyon Road just past the turnaround.
Water Usage Late Summer and Fall have been very dry. We are still encouraging everyone to be good neighbors and be careful with your water consumption. Most wells on the hill are restricted to indoor use only. If your well was drilled before May 1972, then it may be grandfathered as a domestic well and allow watering of up to one acre of lawn or garden. Wells drilled after May 1972 are restricted by Colorado Water Law to in house use only. If you have any question about the classification of your well and the allowed use, please call the Colorado State Board of Water Resources at 303-866-3581.
Chipper Rental Our September 20th chipper rental was successful and I would like to thank all those who participated, especially our volunteer workers, (Ken Starr, Chris Abbott and Rick Sirotiak). I would also like to extend a special thanks to Steve Wakefield who arranged for the chipper rental and Rick Sirotiak who agreed to pull the 6200 pound beast with his pickup. We rented a ten inch, 85hp, diesel powered Moorbark chipper that made very quick work of the slash collected from six area households. The cost to the Association for the chipper rental was approximately $300 which was offset by cash contributions from the households that were chipped.
Colorado State Forest Service Wildland-Urban Interface Grant Clear Creek County has again applied for a Wildland-Urban Interface Grant to provide free slash disposal at the at the transfer station south of Idaho Springs on Soda Creek Road for the Summer of 2004. The 2003 slash disposal program has been completed and resulted in the delivery of 3200 cubic yards of slash to the transfer station by almost 500 county residents.
Thanks to Tim Martinez, the Association has also applied for a Wildland-Urban Interface Grant for 2004 that would allow us to fund a fuels reduction program for the Floyd Hill area. The program would consist of providing appropriate defensible space and fuels reduction information to area homeowners, inviting appropriate speakers to address our membership during meetings and encouraging homeowners to thin the fuels on their properties. The association would also rent a chipper and provide several dates to visit area homeowners to chip their collected slash. Volunteer and homeowner man hours provided on thinning and chipping efforts will be used as our matching contribution for the grant. We should hear about the grant approval or denial some time in early 2004.
Welcome Committee The Welcome Committee sponsored two events since our last newsletter, the Summer Picnic and the Halloween Party. I want to thank Lou and Autumn Montgomery for hosting both events and all those on the Welcome Committee who worked to make them successful. A good time was had by all. Thanks again. Pictures from these events will be on the web site.
Saddleback Mountain Homeowners Association Consideration of Road Improvement District During our September 2003 meeting, we discussed the County’s Local Improvement District process with our members and representatives from the Saddleback Mountain Association Road Committee. We would still like to determine the level of interest in the area for the formation of a Special District to pave some of our roads.
The formation of a Local Improvement District is a funding and construction mechanism through the use of special assessment bonds that are paid off by an additional property tax mill levy for members of the district. Establishment of Local Improvement Districts are provided to County governments under the Colorado Revised Statutes. I should also note that if deemed appropriate, the County could agree to contribute a portion of the total improvement costs for a specific improvement project through the use of previously collected traffic impact funds.
In the Saddleback proposal a Local Improvement District would be formed to fund the capital cost of a specific road improvement project such as paving a portion of a road or perhaps a portion of a number of roads in the Saddleback area. This is a lengthy process and must eventually be approved by a majority vote in a November General Election. The process would begin with a petition to the County from property owners that would benefit from the improvements. Property owners that benefit from a specific improvement may not necessarily own property on the road that is being improved, but would be assumed to benefit from the road improvement. For example, a drainage or widening improvement project to the lower portion of Hyland Drive that connects to the I-70 overpass road might include a good portion of the Floyd Hill area residents, (Aspen, Hy-Vu, Ponderosa, Hyland, Saddle Ridge and portions of Meadow View), as well as all of the Saddleback residents, in an improvement district. For this example it would be assumed that all these residents use this portion of Hyland Drive for their daily access to US 40 and I-70 and would benefit from improvements to this portion of road.
The Saddleback folks would need to set the scope of the project and collect signatures from at least 25 percent of the property owners who would stand to benefit from the improvements. There must be at least 25 percent of the benefiting property owner’s signatures on the petition for it to be considered by the Board of County Commissioners in order to proceed with a cost estimate and budget. Once the budget is established, it will be sent to each property owner along with a questionnaire asking if the property owner is in favor of the formation of the LID. The County needs to have at least 51percent favorable response in order to proceed with a November ballot question.
Provided there was sufficient interest in a paving or improvement project in the Floyd Hill area, we would look to coordinate projects with the Saddleback effort to minimize equipment mobility costs. We have briefly discussed this item in the September and October meetings, but have not been able to determine the level of support or opposition for the formation of a LID to do any road improvements in the Floyd Hill area.
Absent a survey process for the area, I am inviting anyone reading this newsletter to send me their comments to suggest an improvement project, express their support for an improvement project, or oppose a project or the LID process. Any input is welcome. Please email me at hjd173@aol.com. I will provide a list of projects for discussion at a future meeting and in a future newsletter, if any are suggested.
Ride Stop
Pete has asked if the Floyd Hill Homeowners Association, (and we might consider asking the Saddleback Mountain and Beaver Brook Canyon Homeowners Associations), would be interested in taking on this shelter project as a community effort. Pete would ask the Associations to purchase the mortar, lumber, paint, and shingles. Lights may be another possibility since there's a power pole right next to the pad for the shelter. I had hoped to discuss this item at our October meeting, but basically forgot to.
I would like to get some feedback from our members as well as Saddleback and Beaver Brook Canyon members on Pete’s idea. Bert Weaver, (Community Development Director for the County), reports that the previous shelter was a constant maintenance problem. Contractors working in the area used it as a dumpster and people pulled of the highway and used it as a bathroom. It was frequently subject to vandalism and graffiti. This was so burdensome to Bert that he recommended against rebuilding it. He did eventually suggest that it could be rebuilt, but it would require a commitment from area residents to manage it, which would involve the unpleasant task of keeping it clean and emptying a trash can placed inside the shelter as much as twice a weekend and once or twice during the week.
Pete believes that part of the problem for the abuse of the previous shelter was that there was no CDOT Rest Area on I-70 between Denver and Vail Pass. This problem will be remedied in December 2003, with the opening of the Georgetown Visitors Center which will function as an official CDOT Rest Area with 24 hour Restrooms.
I would encourage you to email your thoughts to me on this item, hjd173@aol.com, and we can discuss it at our November meeting and I can provide a report in the next newsletter.
Quicksilver Connect Wireless High Speed Internet Service We invited the folks from Quicksilver Connect to speak to members interested in high speed wireless Internet following our October meeting. Having listened to a good portion of our meeting, Scott Schreiber of Quicksilver Connect, Inc. and Dan Brown on behalf of the Clear Creek Technology Park and Beaver Brook Communications, have agreed upon a plan that they hope will provide some incremental revenue to our Association to help us address our financial needs. In turn they hope that this plan will help stimulate their high speed wireless Internet access business in the Floyd Hill area.
FHAPOA High Speed Internet Access Program Effective October 27, 2003, Quicksilver Connect, Inc. and the Clear Creek Technology Park, Beaver Brook Communications, LLC will donate $50 dollars to the FHAPOA for each new subscription to the wireless high speed Internet by any FHAPOA member.
Initially, the program will run from October 27, 2003 until December 31, 2003. After the first of the year, Quicksilver Connect will take a look at the results and evaluate their progress. If they are successful, they would plan to continue the program into 2004 and beyond.
These $50.00 credits will be calculated on the total number of approved applications. The payments will be made monthly based upon the total number of installations that occur during each month. As an example, if they receive and install 50 new subscribers in November, the association will receive $2,500 in the month of December. If the installations cannot be completed by the 12/31/03 deadline, then they will be carried over into 2004 or until the installations are complete. The registrations must however be completed by the December 31, 2003 deadline. All proceeds will be made payable directly to the FHAPOA.
State of The Art Motorola Technology Wireless Internet 256K Guaranteed 24x7 Redundancy Combining Wireless and Hard Wire Technology
Quicksilver Connect offers a 256Kb/s wireless Internet connection at a price of $49.95 per month with a three year service agreement. There is a $150 installation fee, but no charge for equipment with the three year contract. There is a $175 disconnect fee for discontinuing service prior to the end of the three year agreement period. They also offer a three year cash deal for $1482.46. Please call Quicksilver Connect for details at 303-674-3173/303-674-6816 or email at www.myqci.com.
Beaver Brook Watershed I have received an update from Congressman Mark Udall’s Office on the US Forest Service purchase of the Beaver Brook Watershed for 2004. The amount set for 2004 fiscal year was $2.4 Million, which means that there is more than $7 million needed for fiscal year 2005 to complete the US Forest Service purchase transaction for the Watershed with Golden.
Just as a refresher, the total purchase price for the 6000 plus acre Beaver Brook Watershed from the City of Golden is $21,130,000. Including the $2.4 Million appropriation for 2004, $13.5 Million will have been allocated by the US Congress for this purchase. Since the purchase contract with Golden expires in 2005, we will need to lobby our representatives for over $7 million for next year or ask that they seek an extension on the purchase time with the City of Golden.
County Master Plan The Master Plan is nearing completion and there will be two public meetings, one in the east end of the county and one in the west end, to present the plan and collect public input. We expect these meetings to take place in November or December. I will do my best to provide the date and times for these meetings and I will encourage all County residents to attend one of these meetings and provide their feedback on the plan.
Clear Creek County Greenway Initiative The County’s Open Space Commission was successful in applying for a grant from Great Outdoors Colorado for the creation of a detailed Greenway plan. GOCO awarded $60,000 for the Greenway plan and the Open Space Commission is actively pursuing bids for the development of the plan, estimated to be around $100,000 total. The plan will include land analysis, conceptual trail alignment, facility development and an overall action strategy. Strong community support will be required in order to make the Greenway concept a reality. The Association has pledged a $100 contribution to this effort.
Lost Dog and Cat Signs I have been asked to request that anyone who has posted a lost cat or dog sign in the area to please remove the signs if the dog or cat is found or after some reasonable length of time, (perhaps 30-60 days). Thanks.
CDOT Access to Gaming Area Environmental Impact Study - (improved access to Blackhawk and Central City) The recent sale of the Southern Access Road bonds has allowed the Central City Business Improvement District to begin construction of the road from the I-70 Hidden Valley interchange, (Exit 243), to Central City. Construction is scheduled to complete and the road scheduled to open in October 2004. The reality of the Southern Access Road has driven the tentative preferred alternative for the Access to Gaming Area EIS to the Silver Dollar Metro District Tunnel combined with four lane widening of State Route 119, (see below).
SDMD Alternative, (publicly funded preliminary costs, $101 million / privately funded preliminary costs, $156 Million) A new tunnel will be built at Exit 244 that will connect I-70 to SH 119. The new Silver Dollar Metro District Tunnel will have four general purpose travel lanes and connect to SH 119 at mile post 2.8. SH 119 widening to four general purpose travel lanes will be included from mile post 2.8 to Blackhawk. Also included are safety improvements within the current CDOT right of way on US 6 from I-70, (Exit 244, Kermitt’s), to Golden. An additional version of this alternative will include a Bus/High Occupancy Vehicle Lane.
The SDMD tunnel alternative was chosen over the other “build” alternative due largely to a reduction in publicly funded costs, (see below).
SH 119 Alternative (publicly funded preliminary costs, $132 million) SH 119 widening from two to four general purpose travel lanes from the intersection of US6 and SH 119 to Blackhawk. Also included are safety improvements within the current CDOT right of way on US 6 from I-70, (Exit 244, Kermitt’s), to Golden. An additional version of this alternative will include a Bus/High Occupancy Vehicle Lane.
CDOT I-70 Mountain Corridor Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement On November 18, there will be a follow up meeting to the I-70 PEIS Listening Forum held in September. We expect CDOT Executive Director Tom Norton to announce the preferred alternative grouping at this meeting. The alternatives in the preferred grouping will be carried over for additional study in the Final PEIS and one of them will likely be selected as the preferred alternative. The November 18 meeting will be held at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds at 12:30pm. I will provide a list and description of the preferred alternative grouping in the next newsletter. |
