During its regular meeting on Thursday, Feb. 10, 2022, the Board of Directors for the Parker Water & Sanitation District (Parker Water) voted to exercise its right to terminate the inclusion agreement with Castle Pines North Metropolitan District (CPNMD).
The inclusion, which had originally been scheduled to be completed on Jan. 3, 2022, was delayed to provide time to address a number of unresolved issues necessary for Parker Water accept a fully functional CPNMD water and wastewater system and for CPNMD to obtain funds to pay for the inclusion.
On Dec. 22, 2021, Parker Water provided CPNMD a detailed list of measures that needed to be taken to complete the inclusion. Despite repeated outreach by Parker Water staff seeking a response from CPNMD, the first formal response was a letter from CPNMD legal counsel to Parker Water dated Feb. 3, 2022. Instead of addressing the substantive issues relating to completing the inclusion, the letter falsely accused Parker Water of unethical behavior.
With this information in mind, the Parker Water Board of Directors concluded that the relationship between the two entities was not conducive to resolving the outstanding inclusion issues. The Parker Water Board of Directors, therefore, voted to terminate the inclusion agreement finding that termination served the best interests of both Parker Water and CPNMD.
Following the vote, Parker Water District Manager Ron Redd commented, “We still believe there is an opportunity for an inclusion with Castle Pines North Metropolitan District. Even if we’re not able to complete it at this time, we still believe that it could benefit both communities. These are complicated agreements, and sometimes it doesn’t happen the first time around. We remain open to revisiting this opportunity in the future.”