Lora Thomas's SPOTLIGHT #25-12

This section is copied from former Commissioner Lora Thomas's Newsletter #25-12

---

There were several folks in the courtroom today, and many more wanted to be there but couldn't.  Here is a quick update on many things that came to my attention today. . .

Plaintiffs' statement in regard to 2025CV30410 Marshall et al. v. Douglas County Board of Commissioners - heard Tuesday, April 29, 2025

“Public policy is public business and may not be conducted in secret.”

"At today’s hearing on our lawsuit pertaining to Open Meetings Violations against the Douglas County Board of County Commissioners, it was abundantly clear that not only did the Board repeatedly violate Colorado’s half-century old Sunshine Laws, but that the Board and its attorney do not even understand the basics of what the law requires. The County Attorney testified under oath and absolutely conceded that several supposed “executive sessions” the Commissioners held in early March, in which they decided to refer two ballot measures in a Special Election this June, did not comply with Colorado’s Open Meeting Law.

Additionally, despite the Board’s efforts to keep the judge from considering several “smoking gun” pieces of evidence,[1] one fact was absolutely clear:

The County Commissioners reached consensus to initiate the Home Rule process in February 2025 and then held multiple closed-door meetings, in violation of the Open Meeting Laws, regarding their plan to carry that out. Yet the Board waited until March 24 to call a Special Meeting, with only 24 hours-notice, even though they decided weeks earlier that they would vote to approve two formal Resolutions.  The Special Meeting lasted only 4 minutes and did not allow for any input from the public. The Commissioners then adjourned and held a previously scheduled and a scripted Press Conference. 

Never mind that Colorado law forbids this conduct by public officials, this is not the type of behavior or actions of a Board operating in good faith or with fair and transparent dealings with the public. Their conduct should not be tolerated."

LORA THOMAS                 BOB MARSHALL                  JULIE GOODEN 

[1] The Douglas County GOP Chair’s March 24, 2025 email to the commissioners’ pre-selected candidates and the billing statements for tax money spent on the media program BEFORE the resolutions had been approved.

Next Steps

At the conclusion of today's hearing on the Plaintiffs' request for preliminary injunctions against the Board of Commissioners, Judge Lung took the matter under advisement and directed each side to provide to the Court by May 9, 2025 its own draft of "Findings & Orders" for the court to review and adopt.   

Ask Miss Information!

Dear Readers, 

What a day in court--and I wasn't even part of the case! Well, not directly, but every single resident of Douglas County had a great deal at stake Tuesday morning.  For more than four hours, Gertie and I sat in Division 6 in the Douglas County Courthouse and listened to the attorney for the Plaintiffs present their case for an preliminary injunction against the Douglas County Commissioners for violating Open Meetings Laws. Naturally, as is our judicial process, the County also got to present their case to refute those facts/arguments.  And, as is often the case (no pun intended...well, okay, maybe just a little pun!), it looks like we are going to have to wait a while before the Judge issues his ruling.

Unfortunately, Gertie and I could NOT attend the home rule public discussion hosted by Mandy Connell and Deborah Flora at DC Citizenry tonight, but we heard from a couple of folks who attended the event.  Here are a couple of statements from those attendees:

"The Weld County attorney was pretty good.  He is throwing cold water on the other 5 [panelists]," said an audience member, who also noted that the Weld County attorney also stated that "counties are the administrative arms of the state, so it's pretty hard to avoid something when they order a county to do it," and "The biggest benefit if you are home rule is asking the legislature to exempt you." 

Observers also said "There were a lot of people there who were not happy about the lack of transparency and the short timeline to accomplish this (home rule).  The Metro State University Professor stated that home rule only pertains to county-specific issues and does not allow for superseding state law." Where have we heard this before, dear readers? The word is getting out that those claiming that county home rule is going to open up a whole new world of autonomy from the state government are selling you a bill of goods!

Shifting gears just a bit, I promised that I would publish the names of the individuals who qualified to run for the 21-member Charter Commission that could be elected on June 24.  See the list below (in the order they will appear in on the ballot you receive around June 2) which I found on the County's website: 

As usual, you can count on my Sherlock and Gertie's Watson to ferret-out the important info necessary to keep you informed - as soon as we know, you will, too! 

Until then. . .

Don't forget, and like I always say. . . 

GET--AND STAY--INFORMED and vocal. . .or keep paying the price of apathy!!