Our Council, Commissions, Committees, and Boards are committed to preserving our history and tradition as a semi-rural oasis of repose. Our job is to continue to preserve its unique character – a pleasant, single family residential community inside a vibrant Denver metropolis. Our Village has been rated by the Wall Street Journal as the best suburb to live in America, and deservedly so.
Cherry Hills Village is almost entirely residential and depends primarily on property and limited sales taxes to pay for services, maintenance, and improvements. Preserving the City’s sound financial condition while negotiating regional intergovernmental agreements, public/private partnerships, and grant funding options, poses substantial challenges and opportunities to preserve, protect, and improve the best place to live in America.
We have achieved at lot these past four years, including:
• Stopping construction of a roundabout at Quincy and Colorado Boulevard; returning property taken from Kent Denver School without compensation;
• Undergrounding overhead power lines along Quincy Avenue from Happy Canyon to Holly;
• Negotiating and signing a High Line Collaborative Agreement with 13 different cities and stakeholders;
• Updating the 2008 Cherry Hills Village Master Plan, a year-long process spearheaded by the Planning and Zoning Commission and a Citizens Advisory Taskforce, along with many public meetings and surveys;
• Inaugurating the new John Meade Park;
• Celebrating our Village’s 75+ year birthday;
• Completing and opening the Hampden/High Line Canal underpass;
• Consolidating Village owned sanitary sewers lines;
• Completing a wholesale reorganization of the City Development Code Code, moving information into easy-to-read tables to provide a clear guidance that will enhance our property values;
• Issuing a record number of building permits in 2021 while meeting, the challenges of COVID-19;
• Partnering with Greenwood Village to install the traffic signal at Glenmoor Drive and Steele Street and construct the Belleview Avenue median improvements;
• Signing a Memorandum of Understanding with Cherry Hills Land Preserve to provide fundraising, volunteers, and programming for Quincy Farm;
• Approving a comfort station for the Cherry Farms HOA;
• Restriping the left turn lane at University Boulevard and Huntwick Lane;
• Striping the left-out lane from the Buell subdivision to University;
• Prohibiting commercial lawn mowing operations from working on Sundays and holidays;
• Installing video equipment to livestream and archive City Council meetings,
• Arresting the home invasion burglars who shot officer Cory Sack during a 2018 home invasion, and securing a 64-year conviction;
• Placing the nexus/lexis community crime map on the Village website showing locations of criminal acting in the Village and surrounding areas;
• Securing grants for body cameras and new video recording systems to enhance safety and enable our police force to continue our record as the safest suburban municipality in Colorado;
• Live-streaming and recording City Council sessions for our residents; and
• Filling key staff positions including Chris Cramer, City Manager; Jason Lyons, Chief of Police; and Doug Farmen, Director of Finance; all of whom have outstanding qualifications, experience, energy and commitment to lead the Village in the next decade.
Several top priorities in the next two years will be:
• Fiscal Responsibility. In 2017 the City – without asking voters and with no public discussion – borrowed $11.5 million with repayment planned over 25 years. The 2022 Annual Budget now discloses that “if revenues and expenditures increase as projected, the . . . General Fund will be depleted in 2032.” I promise to work to assure that the Village has viable plans to maintain solvency of the General Fund through 2042 while maintaining reserves adequate to meet unanticipated financial challenges.
• Property Tax Relief. I will honor the City’s 2002 promise to taxpayers that part of the revenue realized from withdrawing from South Suburban Parks and Recreation District – 7.422 mills – will be used to reduce property taxes. I support returning to taxpayers 2 of the 7.422 mills of restricted revenue that the City has been receiving since exiting SSPRD. Unlike sales tax revenue, these restricted revenues cannot be transferred to cure shortfalls in the General Fund.
• Public Safety. I support increasing the number of on-duty officers and providing our department with the resources necessary to maintain our Village as the safest community in the metro area. I support initiatives to increase video monitoring of traffic on public streets integration of public and private (HOA) video systems. I support using federal funds to study of cell phone coverage and implement changes that will assure complete 911 coverage.
• State Legislative Fix to Law Enforcement Integrity Act (LEIA). I promise to use my position on the Policy Committee and Executive Board of the Colorado Municipal League to support legislation to amend the LEIA to place limits on damage awards against municipalities, limit the definition of “contacts” for purposes of required police data collection, and confine municipal liability to circumstances involving the use of physical force.
• High Line Canal. I promise to continue working with Denver Water and the High Line Canal Collaborative on eventually transferring to the Village the responsibility for maintenance of the 150-foot wide and 4-mile long section of the Canal passing through the Village. This includes the analysis being performed by consultant ICON Engineering, which has prepared plans, drawings, and estimates for constructing capital improvements called for by the Master Stormwater Engineering Plan. I support improvements that will increase pedestrian, cyclist, and equine safety at the Canal crossings at Quincy Avenue and Colorado Boulevard.
I’d appreciate your vote to continue this work for another two years! Visit StewartForMayor.com for my resume and to find Mayors Reports with coverage of CHV issues from 2019-2022.