Subdivision Road Paving Summary
1995
Boulder county redefined the definition of “road maintenance” to NOT include resurfacing, rehabilitaiton, nor chip sealing. It was reduced to snow plowing, pothole repair, and other minor repairs. The Boulder Office of County Commissioners meeting was closed and no minutes appear to have been kept. As such, in 2004 even the then BOCC were seemingly unaware of the impact of the 1995 change. Also, in 1995 there was no effort made to create funding to replace the funds for sub paving rehab that were “secretly” removed from the budget.
2004
It was not until around 2004 that residents started noticing roads deteriorating and the county not doing anything about it. Not even basic low cost efforts like chip sealing.
2006-08
Transportation director George Gerstle worked sincerely on several different plans that all failed to gain any traction. These included a flat tax on every household (not based on property value) and tax measures.
2011
NCA investigated incorporation of Niwot into a town for the purpose of maintaining roads. It was determined that the tax burden on residents far exceeded the benefit, so the effort was dropped.
2012-13
NCA investigated forming a Public Improvement District (PID) for the Niwot service area for the purpose of road maintenance. The Boulder County Commissioners requested that the NCA withdraw the plan so that they could come up with a county wide solution. The NCA, working in partnership and good faith, withdrew plans for the PID.
2013
A county wide PID measure failed 44% to 56%. (https://assets.bouldercounty.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/2013-election-official-results.pdf).
As promised (threatened) the county then implemented a Limited Improvement District (LID) on all unincorporated residents. Not only did the LID have unfavorable tax implementations, it attached a lien on all homes. BoCoFirm challenged this in court and won; The LID was dissolved, tax payments refunded, & liens removed. BoCoFirm went forward with another lawsuit in an attempt to get the county to fund road resurfacing / rehabilitation. That failed: https://niwot.org/subdivision-road-paving-lawsuit-dismissed/
2014
County budget kept the amount of funding for subdivision roads flat: https://niwot.org/no-additional-funds-for-subdivision-road-paving-in-2015-budget/
Continuing to work with the county, the NCA conducted a survey of residents and forward the results along with a letter summarizing sentiments to the County Commissioners: https://niwot.org/subdivision-road-survey-results-and-letter-to-the-commissioners/
2016
The NCA conducted another survey to gauge the tax payers appetite for a tax measure for road paving. At the time the county was offering to match funding by 20%. The results were NOT favorable: https://niwot.org/results-of-road-paving-tax-initiative-survey/ but the county moved forward with the plan anyways …
Measure 1A on the ballot to add a mill levy increase for 15 years to raise an estimated $82M to pay for the reconstruction, repaving, overlay and chip seal, concrete gutter and drainage improvements, sidewalk rework and related safety improvements for roads in incorporated portions of Boulder County and for neighborhoods in unincorporated Boulder County. It failed 46% to 54%. (https://electionresults.bouldercounty.gov/ElectionResults2016G)
2019
The Subdivision Paving Coalition (SPC) was formed (http://subdivisionpaving.org). Working in partnership with the NCA, the groups attempted to get the county to support a property / sales tax for subdivision roads.
2020-21
Covid and the Marshall Fire (12/31/21) dominated county activity and no progress was made on the road paving issues.
2022
The County Commissioners worked with the SPC/NCA to consider a tax measure similar to 1A in 2016 for the 2023 ballot. After conducting surveys in the spring of 2023, they came to the conclusion that their effort to extend a transportation tax that was sunsetting with a new tax was the only tax the electorate would support. Measure 1B passed 71% to 29% and made permanent a 0.185% sales tax for road projects. https://electionresults.bouldercounty.gov/ElectionResults2023C
In exchange for the SPC/NCA not pressing for a second tax measure on the ballot and support of 1B, the Boulder County Commissioners promised that they would continue working with the SPC/NCA for a solution to the sub-division road paving issue.
2023
The director of Public Works Jeff Maxell resigned out of frustration of reduced budgets for the department, specifically the reduction of funds for basic road maintenance projects.
In exchange for not pushing for dueling 2022 ballot measures the county promised
to continue working with NCA/SPC to put something on the 2024 ballot.
Newly elected Board of County Commissioners became split 2-1 on support of
a county wide solution to road paving measure.
2024
The new director of Boulder County Public Works, Steve Durian, met with the SPC/NCA several times, but nothing new nor encouraging resulted. The Board of County Commissioners remained split 2 for / 1 against in working towards a county-wide solution to sub-division road paving.
The SPA/NCA hosted a Subdivision Road Paving Summit to see if HOAs throughout unincorporated Boulder County could come together as a unified voice to coerce action by Boulder County. Unfortunately, this did not pan out as hoped with the disjointed goals of each HOA.
Large property valuation increases (over 40% in some cases) and the subsequent increases to property tax liabilities made the prospect of a new county-wide measure based on a mill levy increase not possible.
The Boulder County Commissioners, through their chief of staff, made it clear that they saw no reason to continue meeting with the SPA/NCA. SPA then disbanded, and on the subject of subdivision paving, NCA has had no direct meetings with the commissioners since then.
2025
A group of Niwot citizens successfully submitted a petition for a proposed ballot measure to create a Public Improvement District (PID) in Niwot for the purpose of collecting property taxes through a mill levy increase to be used to rehabilitate and maintain roads within Niwot and spend up to 5% of revenues for Niwot Master Plan projects.
Public meeting and hearings scheduled for July & August.