Roger Baker, Gilpin County Manager.  While Gilpin County may not undertake promotional events and street fairs like our two cities, that doesn’t at all mean the County Commissioners are unconcerned with economic development.

At the June 30 Commissioners’ meeting, for example, the Commissioners entered into a lease with a private cell phone tower construction company to place a 195’ tower that should greatly improve cellular and data communication in the County.

One of the Commissioners’ goals for 2015 is to “aggressively explore additional cell phone and broadband service opportunities,” and this project certainly helps meet that goal.

A couple of years ago this same company proposed constructing a 340’ tower on County land just uphill from Dory Hill Cemetery, but the project never made it past the planning stages for a variety of reasons.

This time, the company came back with a scaled-down proposal—the shorter tower will be much less obtrusive, and won’t require FAA-mandated warning lights—and the Commissioners (after some discussion) approved it.

Here, the issue wasn’t so much that this project will provide jobs or financial gain to the County (the lease payments are pretty modest), but it will be another piece of communications infrastructure that will enable more residents to work from home with enhanced internet service.

Moreover, the company has promised use of available tower space for placing antennas and dishes for County law enforcement and emergency preparedness use, and the tower will deliver greatly improved 911 service for folks along Highway 119 and (especially) 46, a real public safety benefit.

This wasn’t totally unlike what was originally envisioned for senior housing, when a private developer proposed a project in accordance with another of the Commissioners’ goals to “explore funding/county land opportunities for affordable senior housing.”

As with the first cell tower proposal, that original plan never made it very far, but now a non-profit group has been formed to fundraise for and operate a few units of senior housing somewhere on the Justice Center complex.

Here again, the impetus is to meet a long-standing County need by leveraging County assets (land and water) in working with a separate organization to provide this housing.

And once again, though a long-term job or two (for maintenance) might be created, and an entrepreneur might be encouraged to provide some contract services to the residents, that’s not the primary motivation.

To some extent, even, that’s what the County hopes will happen with the Belvidere Theater in Central City. The County acquired the property through unpaid back taxes, but would happily sell it to a private investor if one came along and wanted to make some constructive use of the building.

Since that hasn’t happened, the long-term goal is to work with another newly formed non-profit entity, as well as the City of Central, to get the building rehabilitated so it can make a positive contribution to the local economy.

As with the senior housing proposal, when non-profits with limited funding are involved, things take a lot longer. By contrast, the cell tower that will be built with private funding should be up and operating by September!

Right now, the County is applying for a State Historical Fund (SHF) grant for a historic structure assessment of the Belvidere; that report should be completed by November, and then the County will know what kind of expense will be involved in at least stabilizing the building—and that is just the necessary first step in the rehabilitation process.

So it may make sense for the County to keep the property a little while longer, since it can apply for SHF grants, the City can’t, and it may take some time before the non-profit is in a position to do so.

The County’s not in the business of operating theaters, any more than it is of providing cell phone service.  But utilizing County assets to facilitate projects like these that might not have happened otherwise seems to be a very cost-effective way to offer better services and increased opportunities to our citizens.

And that’s the real bottom line…