Metro district board candidates face election challenges because of coronavirus restrictions

The novel coronavirus pandemic has been a challenge for dozens of metropolitan district board candidates across Colorado as they grapple with stay-at-home orders and social distancing impacting their campaigns.

With a May 5 election looming, residents who stepped up to wrestle control of metro district boards from developers who dominated them for years say getting word about their candidacies to other residents has been tough.

That’s in addition to other election-related troubles district residents say they have faced.

“Traditionally, our ballots could be dropped off at our community center if you didn’t want to mail it in,” said Ross Garret, a resident candidate for the Southshore Metro District board. “However, this year, they say they are only collecting them at our election official’s office, a law office located near Golden (45 minutes away). That’s just frustrating.”

It’s unclear just how many metro district seats are up for grabs on May 5 and how many are being challenged by residents who live there. The Colorado Department of Local Affairs, which compiles the election results for more than 1,800 districts statewide, doesn’t monitor the elections. Neither does the secretary of state or any other election-related office at the county level. It’s all up to a designated election official appointed by a metro district board, often a lawyer or paralegal already working for the board.

“The actions of the board and their designated election official give us no confidence that this election will be conducted according to Colorado law,” Conservatory Metro District resident candidate Peter Simmons wrote to Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold in March as part of a complaint that the official’s law firm had placed election signs for the incumbents opposing Simmons on public property owned by the district.

“This is a historic election,” Simmons told The Post. “Every election has been canceled since inception and the first houses were built here in 2004. No one’s ever challenged these guys, and now we are and they don’t seem to really like that.”

Residents say they chose to run after reading Denver Post stories that detailed the inner workings of metro districts, including how developers work both sides of financial deals by creating and then serving on metro district boards. While serving on those boards, developers approve multi-million-dollar bonds to reimburse themselves for infrastructure costs. They then levy taxes to pay off the bonds.

The system developed in large part as a response to TABOR, as developers sought ways to pay for infrastructure.  But the result has been that developers are shielded from risk should their projects underperform, and homeowners can be caught in a cycle of rising taxes for decades, particularly when developments are not built out.

But the pandemic put a damper on residents’ campaigning to get a voice on their boards.

“The virus, of course, has eliminated in-person meet and greets, town hall meetings, and going door to door to campaign. Handing out fliers is out, too,” said Claude Selitrennikoff, a resident candidate for the board of the Whispering Pines Metro District #1 in Aurora. “I have resorted to use social media, such as Nextdoor and Facebook, to post my bio and other materials. Social media is very interesting and a new experience for me. I am of the corded rotary phone generation, having grown up with a four-party phone line in the Midwest.”

It’s much the same in Lakewood, where Kristen Miller, a registered nurse running for a spot on the Indy Oak TOD Metro District board, has seen COVID-19 take a toll.

“The election has been tricky,” Miller said. “We were able to rally some neighbors to run prior to COVID regulations, but getting the word out to the community to actually vote has been hard. We cannot go door to door, so we passed out a flier with information about who is running and are relying on word of (masked) mouth.

Metro district manager Charles Wolfersberger said a number of other challenges could put a damper on election results, including whether developers are able to run for a seat that’s challenged by a resident.

“The law isn’t very clear on whether that can happen or not, and there are several districts in which a developer is trying to retain control despite residents wanting to represent their community,” Wolfersberger said.

But metro district expert Brian Matise, a Centennial attorney, said the law’s restrictions only applies to a new developer candidate, not one who’s already on the board seeking re-election.

“It’s odd, of course, that the law could distinguish that way, but it appears to,” he said.

Some residents, however, have been pleased to see little resistance to their candidacy.

“Originally there were nine people interested in three board positions,” said Kathy Snyder, a former U.S. attorney in San Diego running for a board seat in the Cundall Farms Metro District in Thornton. “Before the coronavirus crisis, a meeting was held with all interested parties and the group ultimately decided on three consensus candidates to join the board, so there won’t be an election.”

Additionally, Snyder said a fourth person has said they would join the board if the sole remaining developer incumbent stepped down.

“It was a very productive, collaborative effort,” she said.

Still, not all developers are pleased to see the additional resident involvement.

In Lakewood, Miller said meetings have not been in-person affairs, making it difficult for residents to keep up.

“The district meetings have been held over telephone conference,” Miller said. “Although it’s been hard for me to attend, being that I am at the hospital so often, it seems like the current board slipped in a special meeting here and there, where they already approved another $5 million in bonds.”

In the Highlands Metro District, unopposed resident candidates were dismayed to learn of a meeting that occurred without their knowledge.

“They had a special meeting just over a week ago (April 14) that we didn’t know about as it was posted on a light pole outside of our neighborhood,” said Devon Schad, a resident candidate for the Highlands Metro District #2 board who will be automatically appointed after May 5. “They held their meeting virtualy and voted at that meeting to be able to do so. Since we’re not board members, they won’t let us see the unapproved minutes, so it’s hard to say what happened.”

Records show three of five board members resigned and the meeting, with only two board members, continued. Efforts to reach the district offices were unsuccessful.

In Denver’s Green Valley Ranch, residents were miffed at delays in putting candidate biographies on a website run by the district for residents’ benefit.

“All we wanted was an avenue for residents to read all the pertinent biographies, questionnaires filled out by the candidates,” said resident Gail Bell, who spearheaded the effort. “They went to lawyers and dawdled for weeks, and then said they would not place the link to the information because it was political.”

The COVID-19 crisis made things especially difficult, Bell said, because the largely elderly group of volunteers couldn’t risk the contact that came with campaigning.

“It was very frustrating,” Bell said.

Finally, on April 17, the Ebert Metro District relented and allowed a link for the profiles to be placed on the website, but with a disclaimer that it was not endorsed by the district.

“At least finally it got done, but with lots of push-back,” Bell said. “It shouldn’t have to be this difficult to have an election.”

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