On Aug. 26, the Falcon Highlands Metropolitan Districtís board of directors held a town hall meeting at the Falcon Fire Protection District fire station No. 3 to present information on proposed upgrades to the districtís water system and the funding for those upgrades.Kevin Haas, FHMD treasurer since October 2016, said the districtís water system is lacking and will not be able to sustain the growth expected in the area. Challenger Homes owns 360 acres within the district and wants to build more homes, but the district currently cannot issue more taps to their water system, he said.ìThe previous board put us in a position to be insufficient (in water) if we did allow additional water taps,î Haas said. After hiring Kennedy/Jenks Consultants, an engineering firm in Lakewood, Colorado, the district learned they needed more wells to supply the increasing demand for water, he said.Based on information from Kennedy/Jenks, the cost is $1.5 million to drill each well, and FHMD needs two wells to support the expected growth, Haas said. With additional water rights already secured, the district might be able to request that an existing well be legally allowed to draw more water, which means they might only need to drill one well to retrieve more water, he said.ìIf we only drill one well, we would only borrow the $1.5 million for it,î Haas said. ìWe only want to borrow what we need.îThe current water supply system also needs to be upgraded, Haas said. To fund all the necessary projects, the board has decided to put a measure on the Nov. 7 ballot, asking the residents for the authority to renegotiate the districtís existing bonds at lower interest rates to free up money, he said. Additionally, the ballot measure will ask residents to give the board authority to borrow additional money to pay for drilling a new well, Haas said.ìWe are not explicit to drilling wells, although that is the easiest route,î he said. The district has already contacted Colorado Springs Utilities, among other entities, to see about purchasing water from them; but whatever direction the board chooses, a vote of the residents through a ballot measure is required, Haas said.The passing of the ballot measure would not result in a change to the property tax rate because taxes are currently as high as they are legally allowed, he said. Improving the infrastructure and adding wells would ultimately spread out the taxes across a larger tax base and could result in lower fees down the road, Haas said.ìWe need to keep up with our own standards,î he said. ìThe standards we have to keep in the back of our minds are things like how much water we have available in the event of a fire. We have to have water on hand in immediate storage in case one of the businesses in the district catches fire. That comes with infrastructure requirements.îHaas said the board has been doing its best to mitigate the risks of having an infrastructure that has not been updated since it was built in 2002, but the current needs require funds, which calls for a ballot measure.Another town hall meeting is planned for October to further educate the residents on the ballot measure. The date has not been determined.
