Dear Editor,

Last week the City of Black Hawk (referred to as Black Hawk below) made a non-negotiable offer to provide $1 million dollars yearly towards the funding of the Gilpin Community Center. Though on the surface this sounds like a generous offer, in my opinion it is bad for Gilpin County.

If you Google “black hawk city financial report” you will see a link to Annual Comprehensive Financial Reports (Audit). Click on this link and choose the link to 2022 Black Hawk Audit. On page 7 on the right side under “Totals” you will see that the “Ending net position” shows that in 2022 Black Hawk had over $169 million dollars in reserve (Ending net position). Contrast that with the $20 million or so that the County has in reserve.

Here is a summary of the most important things Black Hawk City wants from the voters of the County for their donation of $1 million.

• To give up the ability to raise property taxes in the County above 10.695 mills, including the Library mill levy.

• To never impose any mill levy, County Sales Tax, Use Tax, Lodging Tax, or any other tax that includes Black Hawk city.

• To never join a Regional Transportation District.

• To keep the Community Center open full time (84 hours a week or 12 hours a day).

• To give all Black Hawk residents free access to the Community Center.

• There are several other restrictions. I encourage everyone to read the IGA and the response of the County (so far) at https://buff. ly/4a9URNT.

Here are my objections to this agreement for Gilpin County.

• A city with a population of around 125 wants to limit the sovereignty of the voters in a County of almost 6000 people.

• According to the Assessor’s abstract of Assessment, the County’s mill levies currently come to 9.441. The Library mill levy, which the County has no control over, automatically adjusts for inflation so in effect Black Hawk is dictating that Gilpin County can never raise taxes, even during a dire emergency.

• Black Hawk seems to think they should be the only entity in the County to set tax policy.

• Though it may not need to be said, $169 million in the bank makes the $1 million offer to Gilpin County look greedy and predatory. Why not be generous and offer to pay for the Community Center without restriction?

• $1 Million doesn’t even cover the amount lost when Initiative 1A failed ($1.3 million). Keeping the Community Center open every day for 12 hours would double the staff requirement and is estimated to cost $3 million.

• Once this agreement is in place Black Hawk will have Gilpin County in golden handcuffs.

• Black Hawk has a similar agreement with the Gilpin School and though they claim it is hugely beneficial for the School, RE-1 voted down a mill levy increase in 2022, probably for fear of losing the funding from Black Hawk. Meanwhile, the School can’t keep up decent teacher salaries and is taking out a multi-million-dollar loan to pay for a new sewer line.

This letter expresses my personal opinion only.

Eric Douglas

Gilpin County