Jefferson County Commissioners Have So Far Resisted Calls to Slow Development of Warehouses that Equal the Size of Jeffco’s Famed County Building Nicknamed “The Taj”
ARVADA, Colo., Aug. 1, 2023 /PRNewswire/ — McIntyre Neighbors United are calling on Colorado Senators John Hickenlooper and Michael Bennett to pump the brakes on a giant warehouse project planned for an area just outside of Arvada City lines in unincorporated Jefferson County. A similar, but vastly smaller, warehouse development approximately one mile from the new development’s site was earlier rejected by the Arvada City Council.
“Due to their committee appointments, both of our United States Senators from Colorado have the ability to join with our neighborhood group to pump the brakes on this poorly thought-out warehouse development,” said Anne Laffoon, a spokeswoman for McIntyre Neighbors United, a group that has the support of eighteen homeowners’ associations and many businesses in the impacted area. “Senators Hickenlooper and Bennett have been responsive to our concerns, and we very much appreciate the dialogue we have begun with them.”
Laffoon and her neighbors continue to fight the proposed 500,000 square foot warehouse project at 60th and McIntyre. Laffoon says the size and design of the project does not conform to the current I-3 light industrial Jeffco zoning regulations. “It is simply not compatible with the surrounding residential areas,” she said.
The formal site development application was submitted earlier in July by Constellation Real Estate Partners, a firm based in Texas. The application is under review by county planning and zoning staff.
“We continue to oppose this development because is detrimental to our health and the quality of life of our neighborhoods. The site development application shows three, forty-four-foot-high warehouses with more than 140 truck bays that will mean traffic, noise and air pollution from thousands of trucks going in and out every day. What county would consider a project like this, with its impacts, to be allowed under light industrial zoning?” Laffoon questioned.
More than 4000 residents of Jefferson County requested a moratorium by signing a petition in support of the action to pause new site development applications on land zoned I-3 (light industrial) and located within 500 feet of homes until the county’s land use regulations could be revised. The Jefferson County commissioners decided to deny the request on July 1lth, though they acknowledged that the industrial zoning regulations are outdated and are scheduled to be revised in the next 18-24 months.
The proposed project is to be constructed on roughly 40 acres of previously contaminated land that has been largely vacant for decades adjacent to Hyatt Lake in an environmentally sensitive habitat area. Preparing the site for construction of the warehouses will mean disturbing soils that have been in various clean-up programs for decades. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is considering whether the Farmers Highline Canal and Hyatt Lake waters may be contaminated during the construction and later with water runoff from the warehouse project.
The coalition has asked that an Environmental Assessment be done since there is such a long history of contamination from uranium and other contaminants on the site.
The site development application can be viewed on the Jefferson County website under planning and zoning “active cases” under the 5950 McIntyre address. McIntyre Neighbors United has information on its website, www.mcintyreneighborsunited.org.
About McIntyre Neighbors United
McIntyre Neighbors United includes 18 homeowner associations (HOAs) that have communicated on behalf of the community with the Jefferson County Commissioners, City Council of Arvada, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) and several open space/conservation groups about the community-led effort to examine the impacts of the proposed warehouse site adjacent to Hyatt Lake. The coalition is not anti-development; it simply wants a planning and approval process that supports sustainable and compatible development.
Contact:
Erich Kirshner, Lasso Digital
[email protected]
303.921.6733
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SOURCE McIntyre Neighbors United
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