John Scarffe, Nederland.  The Nederland Downtown Development Authority Board discussed options for a November debt authorization election during the Board’s regular meeting on Wednesday, June 21, 2017, at the Nederland Community Center. The Board had anticipated that Boulder County would place the debt authorization question on the November ballot, but Boulder County does not have the capacity to run the election.

Board Chair Katrina Harms asked the NDDA Board to approve engaging the firm Collins, Cockrel & Cole to become the Designated Election Official (DEO) and run the debt authorization election, according to her memorandum to the Board. The NDDA Board plans to ask district members to approve a debt authorization. The Town of Nederland does not have the capacity to run the NDDA election, so the NDDA approached Boulder County to place it on the ballot.

The County informed the NDDA that it does not have the capacity to run the NDDA Debt Authorization Election either. “We are back to doing the election ourselves or engaging a company who does this type of election for municipalities and special districts,” Harms wrote.

The NDDA can have elections in November with the national and county elections or in the even years that the Town holds elections. The next opportunities are in November 2017 or in April 2018, Harms wrote.

“Since the Town could possibly want to hold an election for a bond issue in April 2018, we should really try to do ours this November. The cost to hire the firm CC&C to become a DEO and run our election could run $20,000. CC&C comes highly recommended by Boulder County, and our lawyer, Kim Crawford,” Harms wrote.

Micki Mills, who would run the election for the NDDA, has been instrumental in helping to form special districts and run their elections. She just managed the Timberline Fire District inclusion election. She also has done work with Business Improvement District elections, which require the affidavit process similar to the NDDA’s, Harms wrote.

“As with most legal firms and these kinds of projects, they don’t do an estimate. They bill by the hour, but where we can, we could bring parts of the process to Nederland for our staff to do. The firm would handle identifying property owners, managing the affidavit process, creating a poll book, train judges and the TABOR [Tax Payer Bill of Rights] noticing,” Harms wrote.

The NDDA could do the printing and mailing and hire election judges. “Since we are not changing a lot in the resolution and ballot question, it will also save some time,” she wrote.

Harms identified $15,950 from the NDDA budget that could be spent to hire the firm.

“Because CC&C feels this would be really close we will ask the town to cover anything we would go over,” Harms wrote.

Harms told the Nederland Board of Trustees at the May 20 meeting that the NDDA would like to hire the firm to run the election, because having the election next November is important. Hiring Collins Cockrel & Cole to become the Designated Election Official could cost $20,000, and the NDDA has $15,000 to $16,000 available.

The NDDA can work with the firm to keep costs down, and the Board would like to go ahead. She asked the Trustees if the Town could cover the rest if the costs go over the NDDA’s available funds.

The benefits of this are that the firm would identify the NDDA District property owners and get a final list of people who can vote. The firm would train the judges, have a polling place and handle the TABOR part, Harms said.

“It gives us that little bit of extra, but it needs to be decided very quickly. We have an extra month. For whatever I can get from you going over the $16,000 we will do everything in our power to make sure we are working with this group so this doesn’t happen.”

Nederland Mayor Kristopher Larsen said the Trustees were considering placing a question on the ballot for the first Tuesday in November, but it would involve different election judges. The Trustees will put language together in August.

Harms said that, if the Town was doing an election, the NDDA could piggyback on that. In the previous NDDA election, they sent a little over 200 ballots.

Trustee Topher Donahue said, “We’ve done this once, and it didn’t pass, and now we’re going to pay for this again. Do a survey so we can get some confidence this will pass.”

Harms said the NDDA doesn’t have time and staff, but they hope they can address the issues with better communication. The NDDA has a letter, fact sheet and master plan to pass around to area businesses to gain their support.

“We didn’t lose by that many votes. If we went around and talked to people they really want something to happen,” Harms said.

Mayor Pro Tem Charles Wood asked about the difference between holding the election in November and the following April. Harms said that if the election is in November the NDDA can start working on things and be ready for the building season. “I don’t see that happening if we wait until April. I don’t think the Town wants to do the election because it’s so complicated.

Town Clerk LauraJane Baur agreed and said it is better to have an outside group do it. Larsen said the step forward would be to coordinate with Baur and the firm to discuss whether November or April would be better. Trustee Kevin Mueller asked Harms if she thought it would be better to conduct the elections with the town or separately.

Harms said that cross over among the voters is not that huge, but the perception could affect the Town. It would be better for both to do it alone. The NDDA needs to tell the firm yes or no by the end of the July or they won’t have enough time to do it.

Larsen said he and Harms could talk about this on Thursday, June 22, following the NDDA Board meeting and then he could bring it to the Trustees as soon as possible.

At the May 21 NDDA meeting, the Board agreed to seek quote from another firm to handle the election, Harms said.

(Originally published in the July 29, 2017 print edition of The Mountain-Ear.)