Pagosa real estate capitalizes on savvy marketing strategy

PAGOSA SPRINGS – Real Estate prices in Pagosa are leaving long-time residents and a few newcomers reeling. The stories seem incredible. Five lots in Twin Creek Village that sold a year ago for $75,000 are now $75,000 each. A house in Lakewood Village that two years ago was $150,000 is now on the market for more than $250,000.

The simple cause? Supply is down, demand is up and prices are on the rise. According to local real estate agent Lee Riley, comparing sales figures for the first six months of 2004 to the first six months of 2005, there is a 32 percent increase in the number of single family homes sold and a 31 percent decrease in available inventory. More dramatic are the numbers for vacant lots (a quarter acre to 35 acres): an 89 percent increase in lots sold and 41 percent decrease in the number of lots available.

Buyers seem frantic to purchase something in Pagosa Springs while they still can. Some feel that it might be too late. The great deals are gone. Yet many are just discovering Pagosa Springs as a relative bargain compared to other Colorado resort areas.

The average sale price for a three-bedroom, two-bath, two-car- garage home in Pagosa Springs in September 2005 was $270,652. Compare that to the average sale price for the same size home in September 2004, which was $230,441. A year ago, a home was on the market for an average of 142 days. Today, a home is on the market for an average of 68 days and the average list price for all residential properties is $454,248.

The question is, why the sudden increase in demand and decrease in supply?

A recent study by Economic & Planning Systems seems to have stated the obvious. “Housing prices are expected to undergo rapid price increases due in part to recent land speculation activities and greater marketing of local real estate, particularly on the West Coast.”

According to the EPS Economic Development Plan for Pagosa Springs, between 1999 and 2004, residential lot prices in the Pagosa Springs area increased by an annual average of 22.6 percent, far in advance of home prices which increased at an annual rate of 4.0 percent. However, EPS expects that these land price increases will translate into housing value increases in the near future.

The future is here. In the past year, home prices have increased 17.45 percent.
It’s a Pagosa land rush.

A rush propelled by the nationwide coverage of the proposed Village at Wolf Creek and the extensive marketing local real estate offices are doing to capitalize on the trend.

“Pagosa is showing up on radar screens,” Mike Heraty, broker at The Source said. “Relative to some of the more well-known Rocky Mountain getaway destinations, Pagosa Springs is an outstanding value, has beautiful scenery, available land, rivers, the hot springs, and we are a small and safe community.”

Heraty’s downtown real estate office is leading the trend by advertising properties in major magazines like Cowboys and Indians and Robb Report directly comparing Pagosa property to Aspen, Telluride and Vail. The savvy buyer can choose from a two-bedroom starter home in Aspen for $1 million or a hilltop home on 5 acres in Pagosa Spring for $625,000.

“We just happen to be one of the last towns to have this type of growth happen,” Jim Smith of Jim Smith Realty said.

“What is interesting to me,” Lee Riley said, “is that a lot of people are looking at the larger tracts of land. That’s been a softer market the last couple of years.”

Softer because a few years ago the Pagosa Area MLS had more than 1,000 lots for sale, mostly in the Pagosa Lakes area. Then, in the fall of 2004, National Recreational Properties, Inc., came in and bought 250 improved lots in Pagosa Lakes and 83 unimproved lots in Chris Mountain II.

“NRPI is a late arrival here, but took what was left,” Smith added.

NRPI is a real estate acquisition company founded eight years ago by Robert Friedman and Jeffrey Frieden. Based in Irvine, Calif., NRPI has various operations in California, Washington, Florida, Arkansas, Arizona and now Pagosa Springs. Friedman and Friedan are also the co-founders of LandAuction.com, Land Disposition Co. and Real Estate Disposition Corp.
From slick websites to television infomercials featuring Erik Estrada, NRPI typically has potential buyers pay a $295 travel deposit, which is put into a real estate trust account. The deposit is then applied to a purchase or refunded after a fly-before-you-buy trip to the property, paid for by NRPI. A buyer selects their lot from a licensed real estate agent. After signing a contract, the buyer has 72 hours to back out of the deal. NRPI provides the financing. In many cases, NRPI sells the lots, flipping them to new buyers if an owner defaults, usually at a higher price.

“People around here have been spoiled by the supply and demand; an over supply means that value stays down. Now that those property values have gone up, those who purchased lots in Pagosa Lakes 10 or 20 years ago, might break even,” Jim Smith said.

“The purchase prices for lots in Fairfield were higher between 1979 and 1983,” JoAnn Laird with Galles Properties concurred. “The prices are just now catching up to where they should be. Raising the pre-owned home prices is good for sellers.”

Not everyone agrees. “The average price for a lot that NRPI purchased was $15,000. Jim Smith put all of the lots back on the market and the average price was $40,000.” Lee Riley said. When NRPI opened their office, the average price of those lots increased to $60,000. “I think they are overpriced.”

A few months ago, real estate agents didn’t know what these prices would mean. Would buyers still buy lots for $60,000 that were priced at $15,000 a year before? The answer is yes. There has been no slowdown for local real estate agents.

“The days of millions of transactions are gone. The $4,000 lots are gone. In the future there will be fewer transactions, but the dollar volume will be higher,” JoAnn Laird said. “If you are going to buy, buy now; it’s not going to get any cheaper. Right now the prices are fair and equal for both the buyer and the seller, but I don’t know how long that will last.”

Lisa Scott, Chairperson of the School District CVC Task Force, presented a resolution supporting the relocation of the downtown school facilities to the School Board. The resolution, presented to board members for the first time Tuesday night, was a discussion item. There was no vote on the resolution.

The Task Force, authorized by the School Board, was charged with developing a conceptual and comprehensive master plan for Archuleta School District 50 Joint in order to align facilities to better support an environment conducive to student learning, district programming and safety for all individuals. The Task Force met three times over the past three months, in what Scott described as “difficult meetings with lots of discussion.”

The first thing the Task Force members did was to familiarize themselves with the District’s Master Facility Plan and the CVC Conceptual Master Plan. The Task Force then discussed the planning process, evaluated demographic information and agreed to set their sights on the goals, not focus on the obstacles. They then embarked upon evaluating the pros and cons of the current facilities. The Task Force determined that the high school and elementary school were not a priority at this time. However, the Task Force does acknowledge some fire code violations at the elementary school that need to be addressed and some identified maintenance issues that might be costly.

“The junior high and intermediate school have more compelling and paramount issues,” Scott said. According to the Task Force’s assessment, the intermediate school and junior high have inadequate bus drop and pickup and inadequate parent drop and pickup areas. Inadequate recess, playground and open area spaces and a dangerous crossing of Highway 160 for access to Town Park for PE classes and sports were also identified as problems. The intermediate school building is difficult to upgrade and modernize, especially plumbing and electrical. Another issue is that the closed campus concept cannot be easily enforced in schools within town limits and adjacent to highway boundaries. Additionally, the condition of the junior high roof is of utmost concern and there are fire code violations with the building.

On the plus side, the existing buildings have low operating costs because of the geothermal heat. The facilities are structurally sound and well maintained. The junior high has a science room, lab facilities and two gymnasiums.

The Task Force believes the intermediate school should be preserved as an historic site.

School superintendent Duane Noggle noted that if Pagosa Springs grows, the intermediate school cannot handle any more students. The junior high can handle 100-200 more students at the most.

The Task Force has identified potential school location sites and is working on a basic assessment of those locations. Scott pointed out that the multiple schools’ on one campus concept was just an idea. The Task Force determined at their first meeting that the district is not in a position to determine the viability of this idea.

“The Task Force is not leaning to a K-12 campus. We haven’t ruled it out, but it is not what is driving this and it did not end up in the CVC conceptual plan,” Scott said.

Finally, the Task Force addressed the perceived barriers and limitations to relocation, including enrollment issues, community perception and buy-in and funding. The Task Force acknowledged that proceeds from the sale of real estate can be reinvested in new, more modern facilities.

“Archuleta County needs to implement impact fees to help fund schools based upon growth,” Noggle said. Impact fees are charges assessed to a developer in an attempt to recover some, if not all, of the costs incurred by a local government to provide public facilities to serve a new development.

The Task Force voted unanimously to approve the resolution, which includes a recommendation that the District diligently pursue securing the Town of Pagosa Springs’ maintenance yard property located off 5th Street, adjacent to the High School parking lot, for its new Maintenance and Transportation building.

School Board Secretary, Sandy Caves, asked: “Does the Task Force have ideas of what they want from us?”

“What would you like us as a committee to help you with?” Scott replied.

Board president Mike Haynes suggested that the Task Force might help with the feasibility issues of how the district might fund new buildings. He was also interested in public opinion. “I want to hear from people outside of the Vision Council. I’m interested in hearing from everyone who has kids in school and doesn’t have kids in school,” Haynes said.

“The District needs to engage in their own planning process,” Scott replied, “to get information from their constituents.” Scott added that the January 13 public hearing on the conceptual plan will have a break out session focused on schools.

“We see the same people at these meetings,” Haynes said. “How do we engage more people to use as a barometer who aren’t showing up at these meetings?”

Task Force members include: Duane Noggle, Chris Hinger, Heidi Keshet, Rick Schur, Mark DeVoti, Bill Esterbrook, Steve Walston, Terry Alley, Carol Brown, Angela Atkinson, and Lisa Scott.

Commercial development changes the local real estate terrain

“My concern is that with Aspen Village and Harman Park, we are over saturating the market with commercial development which will force market rent down and commercial sales down,” Todd Shelton, from Century 21 said as we talked over lunch at Ramon’s. “The value of a building like this is the income it can produce,” Shelton said. He went on to explain how he helped the owner of the building housing Ramon’s increase their value by 25 percent by dividing the property into three with a main building and two vacant lots.

“We don’t have enough population to make mistakes,” Shelton added. “Businesses are running on a thread to survive and our local businesses are potentially going to lose.”

I presented Shelton’s concern to John Ranson, a key partner in the development of Aspen Village and to Medray Carpenter, the only native Pagosan real estate broker and a key partner with Fred Harman in the development of Harman Park.

“I look at this as an investment in the community and an investment for the business owners,” Ranson said. “The majority of what we are doing here, people are actually buying. We have very few leases. Interest rates are at a point right now that people can buy their own business at a lower rate than they can pay rent, in many cases. I don’t think we are going to have the impact on leases that people anticipate.”

Ranson believes Aspen Village will add to the community. He thinks the more businesses Pagosa has to offer, the more we will draw people from Chama and Ignacio, and keep them from going elsewhere.

Carpenter echoed this idea. “That’s been true in the past because we didn’t have the amount of people we need, but that is not the case now,” he said. “There are so many things we need in this community. There is room for all of us. The problem we have in Pagosa is that the residential side gets way ahead of the commercial side. I can sit down and make you lists of things that we don’t have. There are so many things that we need and our area is totally exploding and the commercial is behind.”

Aspen Village, Harman Park and the future Mountain Crossing are all major commercial developments that hope to provide some of those things the community needs.

“Our dream was to put together a village concept with walking trails, bike trails — a place where people feel like they can come and if they are stopping at one store they feel comfortable walking to various locations in here,” Ranson said of the Aspen Village concept.

Aspen Village began in 1997 when John Ranson, newly relocated from Kansas, and Dan Sanders, pastor of the First Baptist Church, purchased 38 acres near the Fred Harman museum, with the sole intent of giving seven acres to the church for a new building.

Since 1998, the partners have been discussing the possibility of development all the while watching Pagosa grow. “We wanted to do something that the Town would be proud of,” Ranson said. When the population of the Pagosa area reached 10,000, they began working with CDOT, because access was a real issue, in consideration of future development of the property. CDOT requires stoplights be spaced at least a half mile apart, and the existing Piedra light was less than a half mile away. In 1999 Ranson and Sanders brought in a third partner, Mark Kneedy, a Chicago based financier. In August 2003, they purchased an additional 48 acres from Joe Machock and the Timber Ridge development, which opened the door and allowed them to provide access to the property within the CDOT requirements.

Aspen Village is the first multi-use development in Pagosa Springs. Durango builder Emil Wanatka and his company Timberline Builders are handling the attainable housing portion of the development that will include town homes, called The Enclave and patio homes, called The Cottages. According to Ranson, “He [Wanatka] looked at Pagosa and he said you know this is a place that needs some voids filled.”

Wanatka’s attainable housing plan received preliminary approval from Town Council and will be up for final plat approval in May. Wanatka is likely to begin breaking ground in June and Timberline Builders will have their own sales office, separate from the Aspen Village sales office.

Aspen Village is located at Highway 160 and Alpha Drive. It is a 75-acre project with 61 developable acres. Future home to the new Parelli International Corporate Headquarters, the development is 63 percent reserved. Future tenants include a commercial bank, Pagosa Power Sports, professional office space, several restaurants and multiple retail opportunities. Ranson is also in talks with a major hotel chain and a grocery store, which he feels “pretty strong” about. They also designed the development with a site for a movie theatre and have a reservation that Ranson feels will benefit the community, but because of confidentiality, is unable to disclose.

The Plaza portion of the development is what brings a bigger smile to Ranson’s already happy demeanor. The Plaza is 46,000 square feet of retail and professional space, in a park like setting, with a gazebo and bar-b-q grills, designed as a gathering place. “We want this to be a place where people feel comfortable hanging out,” Ranson said. “Keystone has a place like this that is really popular.” Several buildings in The Plaza are already sold out and will be home to Sears, a furniture store, a hair salon, a real estate office, a clothing store, a gallery and a new technology firm moving into Pagosa. “We worked with Design Workshop out of Denver and they helped us come up with this concept of something in the center that is the heartbeat. And that’s kind of how we look at The Plaza; we think there will be a lot of the foot traffic, you know, where people feel comfortable walking from one place to another.”

Another retail center, called Boulder Crossings, is 80 percent full, and will have a restaurant, a coffee shop, a drive-thru dry cleaners and medical offices.

Ranson admitted that the development has been talking to restaurants and grocery stores since 1998. “Back then, everyone said Pagosa is on our radar screen, but it isn’t there yet. Now, everybody is interested in this growth and the town.”

I asked Ranson about chain restaurants and retail. “We tried, in the Village, to stay away from that,” Ranson said. “We have talked to chain restaurants, but our design guidelines are pretty tight and this is D4 zoning with the Town. But we do have one sit down chain and one fast food chain that are interested.” Additionally, two other restaurants from outside Pagosa will locate in Aspen Village, but they are not chain restaurants. “One is from Kansas City,” Ranson said.

“We don’t want to see a big, long strip mall in here, our feeling is that we are in the center of town, we are right across from the golf course and a beautiful lake and we really want for people to drive through Pagosa and say, gosh that’s nice. There’s a place for fast food and other kinds of businesses, but we really want to encourage people to get out and walk around.”

The concept for Aspen Village is the professional, live, work, play development and Ranson admits that prior to the big box moratorium they were approached by Wal-Mart, but they turned them down because they didn’t feel it fit their development and they didn’t want to see a Wal-Mart right across from the lake. “They are all looking,” Ranson said of the big-box stores.

“I’m against big box,” Ranson said, “but in all fairness to them, they were incredibly good, they talked to us and said, you know what our concern is that it’s a beautiful spot and we don’t like to do that in a community, but this was their number one site selection.”

Major construction on the next phase of the project is unde
rway. There will be streets with curbs and gutters; the lighted intersection has a target completion date from CDOT of August 30, but Ranson believes it will be closer to the end of September. Several Plaza buildings will be started, as will Pagosa Power Sports, and by July work should begin on Boulder Crossings. By autumn, the Parelli headquarters building and several additional projects will be underway. “A lot of dust is going to be flying around here,” Ranson said.

When I asked him why he thought the timing was right for mixed-use development in Pagosa, Ranson said he believes population numbers have the most impact on making this type of development possible.

“I give the Town a lot of credit,” Ranson said. “They’ve really cleaned things up in the last three or four years with zoning and a concern for the community. They really want to see more of this, and that is one of the things that’s helped us. We included them when we did our planning; we actually had them come in with Design Workshop and said what do you think, and by working together it makes things go so smoothly. We just worked really well with Mark Garcia, Tamra Allen, Mayor Aragon, everybody’s been wonderful. My guess is we are just getting to the size of population that can support multi-use development. I give the town a lot of credit. They don’t want to see the metal sheds next to a nice building.”

Aspen Village has also worked with the homeowners of the Alpha subdivision, adjacent to the development. “We’ve met with Alpha, we’ve met with their board and tried to address concerns, we’ve tried to create a win-win situation or a meet halfway situation. I can understand, if I lived here I’d be concerned about looking at a big building, which is why we designed our residential back here,” Ranson said pointing to his colorful maps showing the single family and multi-family housing projects that will be part of the project.

“If you sit down at the table you can at least agree to disagree or come to a situation where everybody feels comfortable,” Ranson said.

The question then becomes how do these developments fit in with the downtown master plan and the CVC vision for Pagosa Springs.

“We think this is going to serve the local community a little more, whereas downtown is going to be more for the people who are visiting or looking for a night out on the town,” Ranson said. “This is going to be a little bit more service oriented for the community.”

The Harman Park development is billed as Pagosa’s only “upscale development,” which, according to Medray Carpenter, means no convenience stores, no fast food, no gas or tires or stand-alone bars. For seven years, Carpenter has been working with Fred Harman Jr. to create this development around the Fred Harman Museum.

Harman is working to save and restore dozens of older buildings from Pagosa’s past and he will be expanding the Fred Harman Museum, which houses the second largest collection of famed cartoonist Fred Harman Sr.’s artwork in the country. The museum has access to the other, larger Fred Harman collection and plans to build a new museum to house the entire collection. Harman envisions the area becoming a living history museum like Williamsburg, Virginia.

“It’s not going to be a traditional commercial development and it’s not going to be a rubber tomahawk tourist’s trap,” Carpenter said. “We want to see very nice professional office buildings, another museum or two.”

The development will be ideal for nice restaurants, galleries, and more upscale businesses that will reflect the historical nature of the Fred Harman Museum.

“Pagosa needs – very, very badly – a convention/cultural center all-in-one, and we are the perfect location for that,” Carpenter added. The difference between Harman Park and Aspen Village, according to Carpenter, is that “we didn’t push it until we had our final plat. We didn’t take reservations. Now we can sell, or give deeds because we will be totally finished with all of the infrastructure in mid-June.”

As with Aspen Village, Harman Park will not build any of their own structures for commercial lease; they will leave that up to individual developers who may want to build office buildings or retail spaces for lease. But initial customers for Harman Park will likely be those who want to build an individual business building. All 17 platted properties on the 28-acre development are for sale. Two offers are pending as of press time.

Wells Fargo Bank is a major anchor tenant for the Harman Park development and across the street will be a professional office building.

“The whole demographics of the area have changed and people don’t understand,” Carpenter said. “People don’t like change and they don’t understand change, but the only thing that’s constant in this world is change.”

Carpenter believes that Pagosa Springs will become a resort town rivaling Aspen, Vail and Telluride. “We should accept change, but control it to keep the ambiance of the area and do it right,” Carpenter said.

By Leanne Goebel Journal Correspondent

PAGOSA SPRINGS — Pagosa Town Manager Mark Garcia is enjoying the growth spurt his community is currently enjoying.
“The growth issues in Pagosa Springs are significant,” Garcia said in recent telephone interview. Garcia, a civil engineer by trade, has been the administrator of Pagosa Springs for almost three years. Soft spoken and friendly, Garcia smiles and manages his politically charged position with aplomb.

“In my 11 years working with the town, growth has been nothing like we are seeing now. In August we surpassed the all time high for building permits issued by the Town. We’re so busy, we haven’t even had time to compile the data,” Garcia said.
Pagosa Springs is known for its hot springs, its natural beauty and skiing in one of the last family-owned ski areas in the country. Incorporated in 1891, the primary industries were ranching, logging and lumber. The railroad didn’t arrive until 1900 and flood and fires destroyed much of the town between 1911 and 1921. The last lumber mill closed 30 years ago.
Today, Pagosa Springs is a sales tax-dependent town whose primary industries are tourism and construction. The second-home market accounts for 23 percent of housing in the County. In August 2003, The Rocky Mountain News ran an article about Pagosa Springs with the headline: “Paradise Found.” A year later, media coverage of the proposed Village at Wolf Creek put Pagosa Springs on the radar screen in articles from Minneapolis to San Antonio. In December 2004, Cowboys & Indians magazine proclaimed that Pagosa Springs was “Colorado’s Best Kept Secret.”

The secret is out. Today, Erik Estrada hawks land in Pagosa Lakes during infomercials for National Recreational Properties, Inc. — and realtors are the happiest people in town.

The population numbers for Pagosa Springs are deceiving. The town has a population of 1,618. Yet, 88 percent of the population of Archuleta County resides within the urbanized Pagosa Springs area, which includes Pagosa Lakes, a property owners association that is not within town boundaries. Population estimates suggest that 8,235 people reside within the county directly adjacent to Pagosa Springs, giving the greater Pagosa Springs area a population of approximately 9,853 people.

And then there are the tourists and part-time residents. This summer, the peak population for the greater Pagosa Springs area is estimated to have hit 16,444.

Town Planner Tamra Allen has her hands full with projects that are bigger and more elaborate than the town has seen in years. Allen has a degree in urban planning, rides her bike or walks to work on most days, where she juggles large projects like the 100-acre multiuse development, Aspen Village, and the 174-unit Trujillo Heights subdivision.
“It’s difficult to make long-range planning decisions without a comprehensive plan,” Allen said.

“We need a comprehensive plan to steer us into the future. A plan that the community embraces,” Garcia added.
The community has not embraced a conceptual downtown master plan unveiled in November of last year. Significant growth issues and a desire to strengthen the town’s economy spurred local business leaders and the mayor to create the Community Vision Council (CVC). The CVC, under the guidance of David J. Brown and Mayor Ross Aragon, raised the funds necessary to pay for the development of a conceptual master plan. The plan was then turned over to the town for adoption-a process that included public comment. The community was highly critical of the plan and in vocal public meetings, hundreds crammed into a gymnasium where emotions ran high. Citizens accused the CVC of being elitist by not including long-time local residents, a charge the mayor patently denied. “We’re community oriented and we had representation (on the CVC) from all sectors,” Aragon said in an interview last December.

The conceptual master plan focuses on restoring and revitalizing the historic downtown district, approximately one square mile.

“Ideally, we would have had a comprehensive plan prior to this boom,” Allen said. “Timing requires that we’re doing both (the comprehensive plan and the downtown master plan) simultaneously.”

Typically, the process begins with a comprehensive plan and then from that comprehensive plan a master plan is developed for the downtown corridor, design guidelines are fleshed out, parks and trails plan is drawn up, and a cultural plan is created.
The town is working with Clarion Associates to develop the comprehensive plan and has hired Winter and Company to direct phase two of the master plan — taking the concept and turning it into reality.

A Citizen Advisory Committee (CAC) was set up and currently 10 residents of Pagosa Springs and 10 residents of the greater urban area are helping Clarion create visions and goals for the future. There have already been several opportunities for the public to comment on the process.

“Things are happening in this interim time period that we may not like and may not fit the plan,” CAC member Patsy Lindblad said. “It’s a shame that the brakes can’t be put on in some way. There ought to be some sort of guidelines that people are working against.”

There are some guidelines. The town recently re-codified its entire municipal code and updated planning documents that were 10 years old. There are certain development standards that must be met.

“But it doesn’t mean we have a good document to work with in terms of planning and design,” Allen was quick to add. Without a comprehensive planning document that is supported by community input, Allen said it is “difficult to make long range planning decisions.”

Some members of the CAC committee are still confused by the process and how it differs from the master plan. Archuleta County wants to create its own comprehensive plan and the concern is that these efforts will not tie together.

“With all these things going simultaneously, at some point, they will have to ‘true up’ and see if they are overlapping,” Lindblad, a former executive with AT&T; said. She added she realizes that Pagosa Springs is a small town with limited resources. “If we did this sequentially, we’d never get there,” she added.

Allen understands. “It’s a lot for us to palate.”

Garcia echoed that not everyone likes the taste of growth. “It’s been really tough politically. Change is difficult for a lot of people.”

The Mission of David J. Brown

“With David Brown coming in and buying up the Sears store and all of this river property . . . I’m glad to see some of the improvement,” Lee Riley of Jann C. Pitcher Real Estate said.

As I talked with local realtors Mark Espoy (Jim Smith Realty), Mike Heraty (The Source), Stephanie Hill (Jim Smith Realty), JoAnn Laird (Galles Properties), Susie Long (Galles Properties), Lee Riley (Jann C. Pitcher Real Estate), Todd Shelton (Century 21) and Jim Smith (Jim Smith Realty), several mentioned David J. Brown and his acquisition of twenty plus downtown lots as another key to the resurgence of the real estate market in Pagosa Springs. The realtors also mentioned the Conceptual Master Plan created and paid for by the Community Vision Council.

“Long-range I think the planning is a very good thing,” JoAnn Laird said.

“CVC is fabulous and greatly needed,” Stan Seligman told me. “They are trying to do a very good job. But an area of huge need for any of this to succeed is reasonably priced housing.”

“There isn’t a real comprehension of the need to address growth. Like it or not it’s banging on our door with a sledgehammer,” Mike Heraty said. “You look at the fact that the Hot Springs [resort] has changed hands—that there is additional land being assembled by other owners downstream from the hot springs—large tracts. You look at the Aspen Village development; you look at the investments by Stan Seligman; a fellow from St. Louis, Tom Smith, has purchased a 1,500 acre ranch and is working through a development plan; the Valley View ranch which is under contract with a preliminary proposal for a very large residential development with a golf course and equestrian facility. And if you didn’t look at anything other than those issues, right there, right now, all at once you would have to say that the world as we know it in Pagosa Springs is changing.”

It was this need to address growth, which prompted David J. Brown to approach Mayor Ross Aragon in February 2004 and ask him to participate in a meeting of community leaders, elected officials and citizens. This group became the Mayor’s Council for the Future of Pagosa Springs and eventually the Community Vision Council. Their mission: “Given the inevitability of increased growth to the area, the Community Vision Council recognizes the need to guide growth in a way that preserves the intrinsic qualities of Pagosa Springs. Through a combination of positioning and planning strategies, the CVC seeks to encourage a healthy economy while sustaining the unspoiled natural environment of the region and a vibrant and diverse community.”

Brown and other members of the CVC donated about $180,000 to pay for the development of a conceptual master plan, the salaries of CVC staff, as well as for marketing, traffic studies and other related consultants required to pull the plan together. The Town invested $20,000 in this process. The creation of a public and private partnership such as this one is common practice in communities around the country and has been very successful in Boulder, Crested Butte and Durango. Currently, the Conceptual Master Plan is now undergoing the public process that will shape it into a comprehensive plan of the people.

Much criticism has focused on Brown and his role as co-chair of the CVC and his purchasing of downtown properties, criticism that many believe is unfounded.

Who is David J. Brown?

Pagosa Street will be the initial focus for development by Koinonia, LLC which owns twelve unique properties on about twenty platted lots in three key areas of downtown. Brown’s mission is to create a “thriving, active and prosperous downtown for Pagosa Springs.”

David J. Brown is the owner of Bootjack Ranch, At Last Ranch and now Mill Creek Ranch. But what do we know about David J. Brown? Brown has a Bachelor of Arts degree from Claremont McKenna College in Claremont, California and a Masters of Business Administration from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He is a founding member of the Wharton Real Estate Center, now the Zell/Laurie Real Estate Center. In the past, Brown has held professional affiliations with the UC Berkeley Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics, the Urban Land Institute, and the National Association of Industrial Office Parks (NAIOP). Brown served as Regional Vice President for Boise Cascade Building Company, and then developed commercial and industrial income properties for Holvick deRegt Koering, Newhall Land & Farming Company, and White Investment Company, before founding Orchard Properties in 1973. Over the years, Orchard, founded with minimal capital, emerged as one of the top three developers in Silicon Valley; was named four times as San Jose’s “Developer of the Year,” and received five awards from the City of San Jose for the “Most Outstanding Industrial Project of the Year.” Orchard was consistently one of the top three property management firms in Silicon Valley. Today, the Company continues to maintain its reputation for quality, impeccable honesty and integrity.

In 1995, Brown and Michael J. Biggar founded Orchard Investors, LLC to continue the development and investment activities of Orchard Properties.

Brown is married and he and his wife Carol have two young sons, one attending public school in Pagosa Springs, the other not yet school-aged. He has three grown daughters and nine grandchildren. One daughter and son-in-law with two of Brown’s grandchildren recently moved to Pagosa Springs. Brown and his wife are generous and active participants in this community. Carol Brown volunteers her time and serves on several school committees as well as the Community Vision Council. The Browns have donated generously to every major project, charity, and event in Pagosa Springs. According to Susan Lander, General Manager of Music in the Mountains, “Having concerts in Pagosa was the brainchild of David Brown, a patron from Pagosa, and our president, James Foster.”

Ministry and Bootjack Ranch

The Browns are active in their church and involved with Ministry and Community Outreach. The Browns host retreats with the DePree Leadership Center, an affiliate of the Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California, and Brown has endowed a chair in Marketplace Theology and Leadership at Regent College in Vancouver, British Columbia, an international graduate school of Christian studies. Brown served on the Board of the DePree Leadership Center, taking a leave of absence in 2001 when he was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma.

Bootjack Ranch is not only the place the Brown family calls home, it is also a retreat center that the Browns share with business leaders and their families. They come to Pagosa Springs to experience what Brown calls “the wonderful gift of our Creator.” On average, 100 visitors are in residence throughout the year and Brown believes his ministry is to share the gifts of silence, peace, solitude and living in community.

“Carol and I feel God has given us the gift of hospitality and relationship building,” Brown said. “I really enjoy the role of mentoring and sharing my life’s experiences—especially with men. I have been through a lot and want to pass on what I have and am learning.”

It was a dream that Brown developed more than 25 years ago with his friend and pastor, Dr. Stanley M. Johnson. The idea was to provide strength for the journey. “. . . They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint,” reads Isaiah 40:31.

“Coming from a very busy, stressful environment . . . living that lifestyle for many years . . . we wanted a place for couples and businesspeople, pastors and lay persons, to be able to come and experience the peace and slower pace of Bootjack Ranch. Stan provided couples with
professional counseling,” Brown explained.

Bootjack Ranch can accommodate 30 guests at any one time, by invitation only. The Lodge is a place for shared meals, worship, prayer and just hanging out. “It’s a place were we can ‘be’ rather than ‘do’,” Brown said. There is no cost for visitors who range from marketplace leaders to missionaries, pastors to family and friends, because the Browns believe in sharing their blessings. In addition, Bootjack hosts two or three structured retreats each year with a focus on building Christ-centered relationship.

“We believe that we have been entrusted with many blessings financially and otherwise,” Brown said. “And from that comes our strong desire to share and give back.”

Not an “Outsider”

Contrary to what you might have heard, Brown is not an “outsider.” His great grandfather, Harry Jackson settled in Arboles around 1892, then later moved to Durango and established the Jackson Hardware Company. Harry Jackson was also involved in real estate and served as Mayor of Durango. Brown’s grandmother was born in Durango in the late 1890s. His entire family was active in the hardware business until the early 1970s. Brown’s mother was born and raised in Durango; Brown visited the family cabin at Electra Lake every summer until his mother passed away in 1993. For two years, the Browns had a family condominium at Tamarron resort until they purchased the Bootjack Ranch and moved to Pagosa Springs in 1995.

Brown is a very private man. However, he is happy to answer difficult questions and discuss issues, rather than have the rumor mill spreading untruths about him. He’s approachable. He’s kind. He’s generous.

“I’ve never seen anyone step up to the plate at any reasonable level as this family has,” Mike Heraty said. “How many people of substance will want to come forward and be personally attacked unfairly and unjustly as they have?”

Yet Brown is more apt to “turn the other cheek” than to stand up and defend himself, refusing to comment on the lease dispute with David Joy and the original deal he made with Lou Poma to purchase downtown property near the Courthouse that includes the Chevron station, Hot Stuff Pizza and Joy Automotive. On March 18, Brown did confirm via email during his family vacation that his company did acquire the Poma property. “Other than removing the underground fuel tanks, we have no immediate plans for development,” he wrote. “We will be working with the existing tenants.”

Yet Brown was clear about his decision to step down from his position as co-chair of the Community Vision Council.

Brown Steps Down from the CVC

“I moved over to allow expanded leadership. Our original objective of initiating the CVC was to bring vision and focus on how to guide and manage our inevitable growth. Phase I of this objective has been achieved. I believe my gifts are visionary and creative—not administrative,” Brown said. “With the CVC’s gift and transfer of the Conceptual Master Plan to the Town and County, it is time for the CVC to broaden Community Involvement in other areas. This requires new leadership and focus. The CVC Chairmanship requires a very large time commitment and I have a lot of other interests in my life that I want to focus on also. My wife and family, our investments and developments, my business in California, and other local, regional and national philanthropic interests, other outside Boards of Directors, and my interest in continuing the Ministries of Bootjack Ranch and our local Church involvement.” Brown will continue to serve on the CVC steering committee and is especially interested in education, preservation and the expansion of parks, trails and the river corridor. He is actively involved in serving on the Advisory Board to the Mayo Clinic Foundation in Scottsdale, Arizona, a place he has spent far too much time over the past three years.

A local rumor suggested that Brown’s health was a factor in his decision to step down. Not true according to Brown. “Other than a recent bout with flu and sinus infections I am in excellent health,” he said.

Brown, who has battled Multiple Myeloma (a cancer of the blood in the bone marrow) for three years, is 21 months post stem cell transplant and his cancer is in remission, all cell ranges are normal. “I feel better than I have in years. I am very grateful for my many blessings and want to give back and help in areas where our gifts can best be used.”

Pagosa Street

I asked Brown about another local rumor involving the properties he owns along Pagosa Street, including the building that currently houses Artemesia Botanicals Company, the vacant lots across the street, the little white house that was briefly a shoe store, the old Granny Moose location, the Funeral Parlor. Is it true that he plans to tear down those buildings?

“We are in the long-term investment and development business,” Brown said. “We have acquired properties in what we feel are long-term strategic locations. We are committed to the development of well-done, environmentally sensitive and hopefully profitable developments. We have three project locations—the east town, mid town, and west town projects. Our initial focus will be on the east corridor of Town on the Pagosa Street properties. We are currently in the planning and study phases. There are no definite plans yet. We are studying the Artemisia Building, but we have not made a decision one way or another. When we have, we will make our plans public and will involve the neighborhood in the process.”

And what about his recent purchase of the Mill Creek Ranch? “It’s a long-term investment. We have no development plans. We want to preserve the environment,” Brown said.

So why is there such a negative reaction to Brown? Many of the properties he now owns (like the Sears store) had been on the market for years. If they weren’t on the market, the owner was interested in selling the property and Brown just happened to be interested in buying. Why are a few downtown properties the focus of so much of the community attention? Brown is not the only speculator buying up property for long-term investment purposes.

“We all have the opportunity to buy property, relative to risk and financial ability,” Mike Heraty said. “Why are we penalizing someone who has more money than most of us? Why are the achievers somehow bad?”

In the past, according to the realtors I spoke with, eight to eleven percent of properties in the MLS changed hands every year. Sellers list property for sale and buyers purchase property. “A lot of people have gobbled up a lot more in value and area than he (Brown) has,” Heraty added.

Stanley Levine owns more than 300 acres in downtown Pagosa Springs. Bill Dawson and Matt Mees have 30 critical acres along the river with water rights to the great Pagosah hot springs. Stan Seligman owns over 100 acres west of downtown. The Valley View Ranch is 1,100 acres. The development slated for the intersection of Highways 84 and 160 is over 100 acres. Beyond the one-square mile of downtown focus, Stan Seligman owns three times as many properties as Jeffrey Frieden and Robert Friedman from National Recreational Properties, Inc. The Harman Park and Aspen Village developments will forever change the Pagosa Lakes region.

In fact, Brown only owns 12 unique properties on about twenty platted lots in downtown Pagosa Springs. No more than five acres. The properties are owned by a Brown family ownership entity known as Koinonia, LLC—a name that was originally chosen as the ownership entity for Bootjack Ranch. The word Koinonia has several meanings in Greek, but its primary meaning is association or partnership. Other meanings include participating in fellowship, sharing a common experience, participating with others, generosity.

“It seemed appropriate to use the name downtown,” Brown said.

Brown’s decision to hold the downtown properties in a business entity whose name means fellowship is testament to Brown’s vision for Pagosa Springs. “A vibrant downtown community is critical to a healthy, balanced community,” Brown said.

Just as vibrant, healthy blood cells are critical to the bone marrow.

Brown continued: “In order to create this, enough critical properties have to be assembled. We are nearing the end of this acquisition stage. The next stage will be planning and designing the three key projects.”

Three unique projects, that’s all. Projects that must be approved by Town Planners and the Town Council, a process that welcomes public input and comment. Many people agree with Mayor Ross Aragon and are anxious to see what a David J. Brown development will look like.

“David is going to build something we will want to show off to people. It will be done right. It will be done classy. That’s what we need,” Aragon said to me in a previous interview.

“There have never been a lot properties for sale downtown,” Lee Riley said. “Only one percent of the market has been downtown.”

In other words, no one has ever focused on downtown Pagosa Springs.

“To benefit our community we must have a thriving, active, and prosperous downtown. If not we will become strip development just like ‘Anywhere USA’,” Brown said. “We have a God-given blessing here and we as a community must be pro-active to protect and guide it. If we do not our long-term economy will not be grounded and the long-term resources will be threatened.”

Seeing the return of tourists during Spring Break should reinforce this idea with the community. There are people in town, people downtown, people walking around, visiting stores, restaurants, the hot springs. Like it or not, tourism is what feeds the economy of Pagosa Springs.

“We should do everything we can to help our Ma and Pa stores thrive,” Jim Smith said. This is exactly what Brown hopes to accomplish.

“Pagosa is one of a kind. We love it here and we are committed to a long term legacy of a quality and economic stability,” Brown said. “We owe it to the next generation. Things are changing very rapidly. We are involved because we care.”

Pagosa Springs is a living postcard, and it is being mailed more frequently these days.

The realtors I spoke with: Mark Espoy (Jim Smith Realty), Mike Heraty (The Source), Stephanie Hill (Jim Smith Realty), JoAnn Laird (Galles Fine Properties), Susie Long (Galles Fine Properties), Lee Riley (Jann C. Pitcher Real Estate), Todd Shelton (Century 21) and Jim Smith (Jim Smith Realty) all mentioned the recent bevy of media coverage on Pagosa Springs as one of the sparks fueling the real estate boom.

A discussion of media coverage must include the number one reason for the recent exposure—the potential development of the Village at Wolf Creek. Stories about Red McCombs’ and Bob Honts’ “Village” have surfaced in newspapers across the country, from Denver to Minneapolis, Casper to Vail, Austin, Dallas and San Antonio to Albuquerque—the Village at Wolf Creek is news.

Jim Smith said he is not for the development. “I’ll be surprised if it happens. There’s so much resistance to it.”

“The national publicity on Wolf Creek is big,” Todd Shelton said. “But I don’t see how it can happen. They don’t have enough water. And how are they going to get the planes in here?”

“The Village development will impact Pagosa Springs, both positively and negatively,” said Andy Knudtsen of Environmental Planning Systems, the company hired by the Community Vision Council (CVC) to provide an economic study for Pagosa Springs. “It’s something we have to look at.” The EPS baseline study will be complete by the end of April.

A front-page story from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune on August 25, 2004 with the headline: “In Colorado, Red vs. Green” details the struggle between Red McCombs and the environmental groups fighting the Village at Wolf Creek. “We still get calls from Minneapolis because of that coverage,” said Laurie Heraty, Mike’s wife and business partner at The Source.

“Pagosa is showing up on radar screens,” Mike Heraty said. “With the internet you can easily shop for a vacation or things to do or places to live. Pagosa is off-the-beaten-path, which is an attraction for some of us. It’s isolated.”

Aside from the media coverage of the Village at Wolf Creek, the number one trigger all the realtors mentioned was the article in the Rocky Mountain News, Saturday August 16, 2003 with the headline: “Paradise Found.” That article pointed out that 24 percent of the population of Archuleta County is 55-years-old or older, and that during the peak summer season, an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 visitors double the population of the County.

The Baby Boomers

As Mike Heraty put it, “The number one investment for the baby boomers is vacation property or second homes; whether that is a time-share, a condo, a cabin, land to camp on, or a dream home.”

We know that 30% of the homes built in Pagosa Springs are second homes. Are these second homeowners any less local than those of us who live in Pagosa Springs twelve months of the year? It’s a question Mike Heraty posed: “How long do you have to live here to be considered a local?”

Ross Aragon told The Rocky Mountain News in 2003: “People are coming in and building 9,000 square-feet homes and living in them one month a year. They have zero negative impact. They are a blessing to us.”

“Second homeowners provide minimal impact to schools, roads and social services,” Mike Heraty said. “On average, a second homeowner provides jobs for 13 people in ongoing caretaking, maintenance and services.”

Not only are they a blessing in terms of low impact, but the second homeowner is also very likely to be someone who supports our local charities, nonprofit and arts organizations.

“Their generosity is recognized and the impact of that is more tangible,” Heraty continued. “We see the results of what they give. They enrich our culture and service organizations. It would be a little more difficult to provide art, music and support of our senior center without the participation of second homeowners.”

The Northwest Council of Governments presented a report in July 2004, “The Social and Economic Effects of Second Homes,” (www.nwc.cog.co.us). Linda Venturoni, the Northwest Council’s director of special projects, surveyed residents of Eagle, Grand, Pitkin, Summit and Jackson counties and a wide range of mountain communities including Avon, Vail, Breckenridge and Aspen to Glenwood Springs, Hot Sulphur Spring, Winter Park, Grand Lake, Silverthorne, Dillon, Frisco, Walden, Montezuma, Kremmling and Granby. What the study found was that second homes created 44 percent of basic or primary jobs in the four counties – significantly higher than the 25 percent of jobs created by winter visitors, 14 percent by local dollars, 11 percent by summer tourists and 6 percent by “other.” Second homes bring in 34 percent of outside money, with winter tourists providing 28 percent, local income 18 percent and summer visitors 14 percent.

While these numbers don’t apply directly to Pagosa Springs – which sees significantly higher dollar impact from summer visitors over winter visitors – it is interesting to note the effect second home ownership has on these counties. Incidentally, 67 percent of all homes owned in Summit County are second homes, 63 percent in Grand County, 55 percent in Pitkin County and 49 percent in Eagle County.

“Relative to some of the more well-known Rocky Mountain getaway destinations, Pagosa Springs is an outstanding value, has beautiful scenery, available land, rivers, the hot springs, and we are a small and safe community,” Heraty said. “Like it or not growth is banging on our door with a sledge hammer.”

“We just happen to be one of the last towns to have this type of growth happen,” Jim Smith said.

Last November, traveling through the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport, I picked up the December 2004 issue of Cowboys & Indians because I wanted to know about “Colorado’s Best-Kept Secret.” Imagine my surprise as I settled into my seat (next to a woman from Aspen and a thoroughbred horse owner who had just watched his friend’s three-year-old win the Breeder’s Cup) to find a huge inside front cover spread suggesting I invest in Southwest Colorado Gold and let Herman Riggs help me find that just right gentleman’s ranch for an investment of somewhere between $1.2 million and $20 million.

Then on page 50, a beautiful photograph of the San Juan River advertising 41 acres available through The Source for Pagosa Real Estate, LLC. On page 96 I found an article about Leon Harrel and his cutting horse clinics at the Galles Ranch in Pagosa Springs. Finally, on page 98, I learned that Colorado’s best-kept secret is Pagosa Springs, my hometown, with a tag line that read: “There’s a lot more to this up-and-coming Colorado gem than a good steamy soak.” A smaller ad on page 103 from The Source offers the Lazy 8 Ranch for a mere $6,000,000. On Page 104, Galles Properties lists the Tierra Del Oro Ranch for $995,000 under the banner headline: “Live Where You Love to Play.”

Another ad from The Source on page 136, touts the “Real People, Unreal Lifestyle” slogan, claiming that Pagosa Springs has a population of 11,000. This is technically inaccurate. Pagosa Springs has a population of less than 2,000. Archuleta County has a population of close to 11,000. This ad directly compares Pagosa to Aspen, Telluride and Vail promoting how much a baby boomer’s dollar will buy—a two-bedroom starter home in Aspen for $1 million or a Hilltop home on 5 acres in Pagosa Springs for $625,000.

Media coverage is self-perpetuating. It fuels more media coverage.

“We don’t have to market and sell Pagosa,” Jim Smith said. “People are going to continue to come here because it is so beautiful.” Smith spends his money marketing to visitors by producing the Pagosa Springs Real
Estate Magazine and through numerous web sites.

In February, Wolf Creek Ski Area was mentioned in an article in The Wall Street Journal as having snow that surpasses rival ski resorts by feet, not inches. Google Pagosa Springs, Colorado and you will find 229,000 options. Our town is on Lance Armstrong’s website, because his “Tour of Hope” passed through on October 3, 2004. The writer describes us as “the friendly town of Pagosa Springs.” There are frequent mentions in Skiing magazine. An article from February 6, 2004 in the Pueblo Chieftan, “Spirit of the West: Comic strip cowpoke Red Ryder still rides range in Pagosa Springs.” I’ve found articles on Parelli Natural Horsemanship, Galles Cutting Horse Clinics, The Lodge at Keyah Grande. There’s even a racehorse named Pagosa Springs who came in first in a recent running at Santa Anita Park.

But it was still refreshing on a recent visit to Santa Fe, to have someone ask me where I’m from and when I told them Pagosa Springs, they said, “Where’s that?” Sixty miles east of Durango, I say, knowing no one ever asks where Vail or Aspen or Telluride is located.

“Pagosa doesn’t have a celebrity pecking order. It’s not attractive to celebrities. They will never be here. We’re not about ego and status,” said Mike Heraty. He believes that Pagosa Springs appeals to the baby boomers who are more interested in a community-based lifestyle as opposed to those who focus on buying acreage, putting up a fence and creating their own world.

“What is interesting to me,” Lee Riley said, “is that a lot of people now are looking at the larger tracts of land. That’s been a softer market the last couple of years.”

“Large land parcels are not looking as expensive,” Mark Espoy said. “You can spend $50,000 for a quarter acre lot or $250,000 for 35 acres.”

“The value is here,” JoAnn Laird said. “It’s prettier than most places in Colorado and 75% of the county is public land. We are getting more national exposure. We’re even on the Weather Channel now.”

“Vacant lot sales are up 120 percent over last year,” Lee Riley, of Jann C. Pitcher Real Estate said, comparing 2004 sales to 2003 sales. “Inventory on vacant land is down 23 percent. Home sales are up 55 percent from last year and inventory is down about 38 percent.”

Riley has more room in his real estate ads these days for animals from the Humane Society because the inventory of available properties has decreased dramatically. Yet, as of January 2005, there were still 704 vacant lots, from a quarter of an acre to 34 acres on the market available through the dozens of real estate agents in Pagosa.

In this series of articles, I’ve discussed the baby boomers buying up second homes and investment property. I’ve profiled Great New Homes, the first production builder to stake their claim in the Pagosa land grab. Now I will discuss what realtors Lee Riley, Jim Smith, Mark Espoy, Stephanie Hill, Mike Heraty, JoAnn Laird, Susie Long and Todd Shelton all mentioned as the single reason land sales have increased at such a sizeable percentage—National Recreational Properties, Inc. (NRPI) and their purchase, in 2004, of approximately 332 lots of which 83 are undeveloped.

“It’s really only about 250 improved lots in Pagosa Lakes and 83 unimproved lots in Chris Mountain II,” said Jim Smith of Jim Smith Realty who brokered the transactions. “But it wasn’t as many lots as they wanted to buy.”

A few years ago, according to Smith, the Pagosa Area MLS had over 1000 lots for sale, most of which were in the Pagosa Lakes Area. More than a few speculators, investors and individuals have been buying up these cheap lots for several years.

“NRPI is a late arrival here, but took what was left,” Smith added.
NRPI is a real estate acquisition company founded eight years ago by Robert Friedman and Jeffrey Frieden. Based in Irvine, California. NRPI has various operations in California, Washington, Florida, Arkansas, Arizona and now Pagosa Springs, Colorado. Friedman and Friedan are also the co-founders of LandAuction.com, Land Disposition Co. and Real Estate Disposition Corp.

From slick websites to television infomercials, NRPI typically has potential buyers pay a $295 travel deposit, which is put into a real estate trust account. The deposit is then applied to a purchase or refunded after a fly-before-you-buy trip to the property, paid for by NRPI. A buyer selects their lot from a licensed real estate agent. After signing a contract, the buyer has 72 hours to back out of the deal. NRPI provides the financing. In Arizona City, Ariz. an NRPI lot sells for $24,900. The buyer puts $1,295 down and makes payments of $329 a month at an Annual Percentage Rate of 14.9 percent. This excludes property taxes, Property Owner’s Association fees, and a one-time $995 documentation charge. In Ocean Shores, Wash. the lot price is $39,900 with $1,195 down and payments of $498 at an interest rate of 13.75 percent excluding a $500 one-time documentation fee and 1.53 percent real estate excise tax.

I contacted NRPI to ask them about their business model for Pagosa Springs. “We don’t discuss our business practices with the media,” Friedman said. Yet it was Friedman who Associated Press writer Brian Melley recently quoted as saying: “We are riding on the coattails of developers from the ’50s and ’60s. We identify these things, we re-expose them to the world, and our clients in the long run get incredible values.”

These “things” that Friedman refers to are the thousands of lots across the country in subdivisions that predate planning laws requiring sewer, water and power. Developments that were platted, but never completed. In many cases, NRPI doesn’t improve the lots, they just sell them, flipping them to new buyers if an owner defaults, usually at a higher price.

“NRPI offers no money down, high interest rate, installment land contracts. We don’t know how it will work in this market. Colorado doesn’t allow that type of contract, they frown on installment land contracts. If you foreclose on someone, it will take 3-6 months to get the property back,” Lee Riley said.

So will we see that infomercial they filmed with Erik Estrada on TV anytime soon? Are they opening an NRPI sales office in Pagosa? Will they be flying in prospective buyers from California shortly? Not according to Jim Smith.

“All of the developed lots are back on the local MLS,” Jim Smith said. “We are trying to keep it local. If they set up shop, the local realtors are out of the loop and so are the local customers. Right now a local customer can buy the properties versus all of the buyers being from out-of-state.”

Smith advised that this arrangement could change at anytime. NRPI could decide next month to begin their fly-in program. If that happens, Smith expects a significant price increase. He also anticipates that all of the lots will be sold within three to five months.

“So far to date, we have received over 16 offers on NRPI properties, most of which are under contract and some have closed. This is not bad for the middle of winter,” Smith said. “Each week we are getting more offers. I expect that by the end of summer, a large number of these properties will be sold.”

“When you look at the market they can target—California—a ten million person population base with expensive TV marketing, where $400 a square foot buys a junky tract home, it’s not unreasonable to think they could sell those lots in six months,” Mike Heraty said. “It’s the same principal as Fairfield with the timeshare sales.”

What about the 83 unimproved lots in Chris Mountain II purchased by NRPI? Will they just turn around and sell them as is, without water, sewer, power, roads to some unsuspecting client hoping to cash in on the Pagosa Springs real estate boom? Again, Smith says no, NRPI intends to improve those lots in that subdivision, a possibility that excited Smith, and his associate Mark Espoy, who both believe, such improvements will be a good thing for the market.

“Development costs are about $35,000 a lot, a tap fee alone is $10,000,” Smith said.

“That is a beautiful area,” Espoy added. “Very high end. It helps the economy to do improvements.”

It appears, that the NRPI business plan for Pagosa Springs is similar to that in Arizona City, where according to the NRPI website Arizona City has grown 126% since 1990. “This population explosion has resulted in families moving here from major cities to enjoy a lower cost of living and a better quality of life.” Since 1990, the population of Archuleta County has grown 110 percent, with thirty percent of buyer’s being second homeowners.

“People around here have been spoiled by the supply and demand; an over supply means that value stays down. Now that those property values have gone up, those who purchased lots in Pagosa Lakes 10 or 20 years ago, might break even,” Smith said.

“The purchase prices for lots in Fairfield were higher between 1979 and 1983,” JoAnn Laird concurred. “The prices are just now catching up to where they should be. Raising the pre-owned home prices is good for sellers.”

Not everyone agrees. “The average price for a lot that NRPI purchased was $15,000.” Lee Riley said. “Jim Smith just put all of the lots back on the market and the average price is $40,000. I think they are overpriced.”

“I don’t like it,” Susie Long of Galles Properties said. “From a seller’s standpoint, a lot of them paid $18,000 for a lot in 1978 and they sold that lot to National Recreational Properties for $10,000 and now that same lot is back on the market for $40,000.”

“From the angle of supply and demand, the inventory for lots, usually you had one on the market for a year. In the last couple of months, they’ve been on the market for a month or two because the inventory wasn’t out the
re. Now we have 350 lots out there at way over inflated prices and I don’t know what that is going to mean. We’ve always had more modestly priced lots, and maybe we are playing catch up and I’m the one behind the times. But I have a hard time selling something I don’t believe in. I don’t want to be avoiding the owner in the supermarket next year if they want to put it back on the market,” Lee Riley said.

“The days of millions of transactions are gone. The $4,000 lots are gone. In the future there will be fewer transactions, but the dollar volume will be higher,” JoAnn Laird said. “If you are going to buy, buy now, it’s not going to get any cheaper. Buy the vacant lot next to you. Right now the prices are fair and equal for both the buyer and the seller, but I don’t know how long that will last.”

NRPI is reaching out to the community, and recently donated $5,000 to the “Seeds of Learning” campaign to help build a new building for Archuleta County’s only non-profit childcare center catering to low-income families. In a company press release, Friedman said: “As a new neighbor to Pagosa Springs, we are fulfilling our quest to do our part for the disadvantaged children in this community.”

“We think Pagosa Springs is a gorgeous area, poised for growth,” Robert Friedman did say to me on the phone. “The town is filled with nice people.”

Great New Homes is the largest builder of production homes on the Western Slope. They average 310 homes a year and are now focusing on the southern tier of the state which includes Pagosa Springs, Bayfield, Durango and Cortez.

The Pagosa Springs real estate market changed dramatically in 2004. According to broker Jim Smith, the inventory of residential properties listed in Pagosa Springs dropped from 500-600 in early 2004 to around 200 properties in January 2005.

“When you consider the Aspen Village development, Great New Homes, and the Valley View ranch development, and look at this all at once, you would have to say the world is changing,” said real estate broker Mike Heraty.

Every realtor I talked with mentioned Stan Seligman or Great New Homes as having an impact or influence on the changing Pagosa Springs real estate market. Living in Pagosa Lakes, I was familiar with the signs, the homogeneous houses, but I knew little about the company.

“We are disliked by the building community,” Stan Seligman, founder of Great New Homes said, “Because we provide a better product for less money.” Great New Homes is the largest builder of homes on the Western Slope. They build an average of 310 houses per year in community housing projects from as far north as Rifle, Parachute and Glenwood Springs, down to Delta, Montrose and since 2000, in Pagosa Springs. Seligman told me the company is investing in the southern tier of the state. They are expanding into Bayfield, Durango and Cortez.

Great New Homes is a privately held, family owned business. Stan Seligman has been in the construction business for 52 years. His children Bret Seligman and Kia Kofron own the company. Bret and Stan are both licensed real estate brokers and Great New Homes and their subsidiary companies are members of the National Association of Home Builders.

Great New Homes is what Seligman calls a production builder. In Pagosa Springs, they are currently building on scattered lots throughout the area, primarily in Pagosa Lakes. The company is completely vertical, meaning they do it all from excavation to foundation, framing, plumbing and finishing. They supply all their own materials through a private lumberyard. Occasionally they will use an outside contractor such as an electrician, a plumber and here and there a drywall contractor, when the staff is too busy. “This allows us to avoid the markup on labor,” Seligman explained. “We can build more houses and lower the building costs and pass those savings on to the public.”

As of Tuesday, February 22, 2005, there were two Great New Homes available on the Pagosa Springs Multiple Listing Service. Those homes were priced at $122-131 per square foot, which according to Susie Long at Galles Properties, is about average for a home in Pagosa Springs.

Great New Homes is planning three separate subdivision developments west of Pagosa Springs in the Pagosa Lakes area. The first project is the completion of an existing, platted development called Park Meadows on North Lake Drive adjacent to North Village Lake and The Ranch subdivision. Currently there are only three houses in the neighborhood. The community will have 19 new homes when Great New Homes is finished building. Second, is Capstone, a gated community where Great New Homes will build 35 luxury homes. Third, is Pagosa Lakes Ranch, which will have 400-500 single-family homes and villas and a 42-acre shopping center.

“An area of huge need for Pagosa Springs is reasonably priced housing for the people who will help the town service growth. There is a great need for reasonably priced housing, especially in the downtown area,” Seligman said. “Great New Homes provides reasonably priced housing the Pagosa Lakes area only.”

“Many city and county employees live in our housing,” Seligman said, “Because they have no reasonably priced living quarter’s downtown. I’m really concerned for growth that the town have adequate living quarters for the worker bees. We can’t all be retirement folks and those flying in on jet planes.”

These large, planned developments are common in major metropolitan areas throughout the West. But if that is not what the community wants, then zoning restrictions, land use codes and other governmental controls will have to be implemented to control density in the future.

“We just happen to be one the last towns in Colorado to have this major overhaul in the real estate market happen,” Jim Smith said. Every large community has a series of production builders and developers. This is just new for Pagosa Springs.

“Without planning and land use codes, we don’t have the tools in place to evaluate the cost to the community for 500 new houses. Do we have the water? What about schools?” Todd Shelton questioned. “The thing is, it doesn’t cost the community for the development to be built, it costs the community when it is built.”

“Right now the market is more fair—equal. Prices are good for both buyers and sellers. I don’t know how long that will last,” JoAnn Laird said. “The type of high density development that Stan Seligman is doing will have an impact.”

Next week, National Recreational Properties, Inc.

Part One of a series, exploring the rapidly changing real estate market in Pagosa Springs

Nearly $150 million dollars worth of Pagosa Springs’ real estate changed hands in 2004, a 62% increase over the $91,630,136 volume for 2003. It appears that the Baby Boom generation has discovered Pagosa Springs.

“The number one investment for baby boomers is vacation property or second homes. Whether it’s a home, a timeshare, a cabin, or a piece of land that they can go camp on–it’s a tremendous economic wave in the marketplace,” said Mike Heraty at The Source.

JoAnn Laird at Galles Properties echoed this idea. “Baby boomers are fleeing the cities. They are buying now to get a foot in the door, even if they don’t intend to move here for three years.”

“They are refocusing,” Heraty said. “The baby boom generation is looking for a more community-based lifestyle as opposed to getting 35 acres with a gate and a fence and creating their own little world.”

“In January 2004 things changed,” said Jim Smith, of Jim Smith Realty. “There was a new attitude. People started coming in and buying things.” “People with money,” Stephanie Hill, an associate with Jim Smith, added. “I’ve had a lot more cash transactions.”

“And a lot more 1031 exchanges, too,” stated Mark Espoy, also of Jim Smith Realty. A 1031 Exchange refers to the IRS code that allows the exchange of income producing or investment real estate for other real estate to avoid paying capital gains taxes.

People are taking money out of the stock market and putting it into real estate, many local realtors told me. “It is a trend nationwide.” “Real estate is safe.” “You can’t go wrong with real estate.” Yet, according to The Motley Fool, April 4, 2002, the stock market is a better investment over the long term. “Burned by the market in the short term, many investors think residential real estate is a better place for their money. Over the long term, they have been wrong. Invest in stocks for long-term growth, but choose your home as carefully as you do any investment. That’s because for most people, a home will be something like their personal bank.”

However, The New York Times reported in July 2004 that while on the surface an investment in the stock market appears to promise a greater return than an investment in real estate, that perception does not take into account the ability to leverage an initial housing investment. Very few people pay cash for real estate. According to James W. Hughes, dean of the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University, if you bought a home for $100,000 in 1980, by 2004 its value would have increased to $400,000 — for a gain of $300,000.

“Assuming you only made a 10 percent down payment on the home — or $10,000 — that means your initial $10,000 investment grew to $310,000,” Hughes said. “That’s a gain of about 3,000 percent, which is far better than the stock market. If you had invested the $10,000 in stocks, it would have grown to $110,000 in the same 24-year period.”

According to the National Association of Realtors website, the median price of an existing home in the United States in 2004 was $184,100, an 8.3 percent increase from 2003. In December 2004, the median existing-home price in the West was $281,200, up 11.9 percent from the same month a year earlier.

The average home price for a single-family home in Pagosa Springs in 2004 was $230,862, only a 1.3 percent increase over the average home price in 2003 of $227,868. In 2003 that increase was much higher, at 12.5 percent over 2002. However, according to Lee Riley of Jann C. Pitcher Real Estate, “in the last 60 days, the average home price [in Pagosa] went up $15,000.”

So what is going on here? Why the sudden boom in real estate in Pagosa Springs? I sat down individually with realtors Lee Riley, Jim Smith, Mark Espoy, Stephanie Hill, Mike Heraty, JoAnn Laird, Susie Long and Todd Shelton and asked them what they thought was key to the resurgence. All of them mentioned several key things. First was Stan Seligman and Great New Homes coming in from Grand Junction and buying up lots in Pagosa Lakes and Meadows and building production homes. Second, was the purchase by National Recreational Properties, Inc. of what Jim Smith said were about 250 improved lots in Pagosa Lakes and 100 unimproved lots in Chris Mountain II. Third, was media coverage, including a favorable article in The Rocky Mountain News in 2003 and the recent national media coverage of The Village at Wolf Creek. Fourth, the acquisition of approximately 20 downtown area properties by David J. Brown and several downtown properties by other speculative investors, developers and local businessmen. Fifth, the Aspen Village and Harman Park developments.

This series of articles will delve into each of the five critical areas mentioned and explore all aspects of the real estate market. Next week: Great New Homes.

For the fifth consecutive year, the President’s budget proposal has eliminated funding for the Department of Education’s Arts in Education programs, which includes model arts collaborations with schools, teacher professional development, and arts programs for at-risk youth. The President has never requested funding for these programs. Traditionally, funding is restored by the Senate and accepted by the House during the appropriations process.

The President’s budget is the first step in the appropriations process. While it serves as an important framework, Congress has the power to set its own priorities and change these funding levels. Make your voice heard by writing Members of Congress and urging them to increase funding for arts and culture AND restore funding for arts in education programs. Just visit the E-Advocacy Center at www.capwiz.com/artsusa and write to your elected officials urging them to support funding increases for the arts AND arts education.

Our schools are looking for ways to engage students and have them perform better on tests—up those CSAP scores. The Arts for Academic Achievement (AAA) program is about teaching students to love learning, to explore their world through unbridled access to the arts, and to apply themselves in ways they have never done before. It’s more than just teaching students how to paint or dance, and Minneapolis AAA reports that third grade reading scores on tests show “extensive” improvement. For more results, visit their website at Arts for Academic Achievement.

We need to ensure that Colorado has a creative workforce for the future. In a study (Gaining the Arts Advantage: Lessons from School Districts that Value Arts Education, President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities and Arts Education partnership, 1999) of 91 school districts nationwide, it was determined that the arts enhance a students ability to find creative solutions to problems and adapt to unexpected situations. Colorado has one of the most well educated workforces in America. The next generation deserves the opportunity to continue that trend.

Want to strengthen the arts program in our schools? Participate in or host an Innovative Teaching Through the Arts Workshop, April 15 and 16 at Adams State College, Alamosa. Teachers in ALL disciplines are encouraged to participate to learn exciting ways to use the arts in their classrooms. Graduate credit is available. Call 303-778-9374 or e-mail caae@artsedcolorado.org for more information.

Funding for these and other valuable programs is critical for the future of our country and our children. Please support the arts! Write to:

Senator Wayne Allard
954 East Second Avenue, Suite 107
Durango, CO 81301
970-375-6311
970-375-1321 (fax)
http://allard.senate.gov/contactme/index.cfm

Senator Ken Salazar
SDB-40A Senate Dirksen Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
202-224-5852 (Phone)
202-228-5036 (Fax)
http://www.salazar.senate.gov/contactus.cfm

Representative John Salazar
1531 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515-0603
Phone: (202) 225-4761
http://www.house.gov/salazar

http://www.artsperspective.com/current_detail.php?aID=a0a7f93a19282378aff1889d3379b766

An exclusive club?

Pagosa mayor Ross Aragon welcomes the community to the CVC’s initial public presentation last November. Aragon and David Brown are co-chairmen of the CVC.

Leanne Goebel: The CVC plan mentions the importance of diversity, as does the community survey, yet some have suggested that the CVC is not a diverse group. Many feel that the Vision Committee is an exclusive club of wealthy community members. How do you respond to that?

“Trust me it isn’t that,” Aragon said. “Other than my friend [Brown], I would say that everyone is working class people. That could be the perception, but it’s not that way. Everyone is working and everyone is trying to make a living.”

“You can’t have everyone in the community on the council,” Brown said. “We have subcommittees that have kind of evolved. I guess my personal answer to this is yes, I did get the funding going, but since I started, several other groups and people have significantly contributed to this. I mean, Mark Weiler’s recent donation is an example [$40,000 for an economic study]. Had we not started, then we wouldn’t have been able to grow. I have been richly blessed by God with financial success. I started with zero and I feel an obligation and a responsibility to give back to the community. I think that Ross can attest to this and its been demonstrated time and time and time again.

“To me, this is how we help do something significant for the Town and we have convinced other people to do the same thing. So if you want to call that an exclusive club then call it an exclusive club, but that’s not what it’s about. It’s about a group of people who care, who have contributed thousands of hours of their time and yes, lots of money, but I think that it’s the spirit in which this has been done and it’s unfair to say this is a club and a group of people that are pursuing their own self interests. That’s not what’s happening here and it’s evidenced by the result of this plan that is now being given to the community. We’ve basically produced it and are giving it back. Now, if it were our club, why would we give it back? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Dave and I have become good friends through this,” Aragon added. “I didn’t know David. I never knew who he was. My daughter had worked at Bootjack [Ranch].”

“The first time we met was at the first meeting,” Brown said.

“We said, finally we meet,” Aragon said. “But [over the years] what I’ve seen David do is I’ve seen him make contributions, big time contributions, to this community, all anonymously. To me that impressed the heck out of me. The other thing that impresses me about Mr. Brown is that he could have his kids go to boarding schools, private schools, wherever, and they are going to our local schools. I mean he cares. I wouldn’t be sitting here if his kids were going to boarding schools or private schools, they are right in the mix of the community. That tells me he is community oriented. But his generosity says a lot about him and his wife.”

Brown went on to say, he felt in his heart and in his spirit that what he and CVC are doing is the right thing and that he is at peace with his decisions.

Disclosure of Property Ownership

But I had to ask him about the controversy over the four-to-five acres of downtown properties he has purchased over the past few months. Properties directly involved in the future vision plan. And the request by J.R. Ford at the November meeting that all members of the CVC and the consultants provide full disclosure and map the properties they own. Wasn’t it a bit like insider trading?

Aragon responded by telling the story of a man who came into his office one day, crying because he thought that David Brown had bought the Catholic Church and was going to tear it down. It was a wild rumor that spread through town. Brown did not buy the Catholic Church.

“Anytime that David made a purchase, he contacted me to ask my advice and he contacted other people and said this could be perceived as a little sensitive, and of course we knew that some of these projects had been on the market for a long time. And a lot of these properties, David didn’t contact them, the owner contacted David and asked if he wanted to buy their property,” Aragon defended. “I knew if David bought the property he was going to build something we would want to show off to people so that they would make this a destination point. It would be done right. It would be done classy. And that’s what we need. I’ve seen enough fly-by-nighters that I don’t want to see any more of those. So it’s actually an asset for the town that people like David can come and buy and do things right.”

“These properties have been available for a long, long time, so anybody could buy these properties, so it’s totally not true that this is insider information, ” Brown said. “The properties that I’ve acquired and other people have acquired are obvious properties anybody could have picked them up. It doesn’t take much to know that the Sears store is a corner location and that it’s the entry to the town. To suggest that what happened is that we waited for the plan and then we bought the properties is just not a correct statement. It’s simply not true.”

Aragon went on to explain that years ago he attempted to broker a deal with Pat Parelli to buy the Sears store from William Seielstad. Today, Brown owns that building and several others in “ground zero.”

“Someone called me the other day and said I’m interested in investing in downtown and I don’t want to compete with you, and asked if I was interested in a property,” Brown said. “I told him I think the more people that buy property downtown the better it is, because that shows that people are invested. I encouraged this person. I said I’m not going to compete with you. I said, go for it. I didn’t even know that this building was for sale. So, I don’t know how you get around that mentality.”

“What are they afraid of?” Brown wondered aloud. “That’s the question I ask. What are they afraid of? If I own ten properties or I own twenty properties? Somebody’s going to buy these properties. There are properties all over this town for sale and anybody can go down and buy them just as well as I can or somebody else can. “

“David didn’t go and say I want this—its mine and be a land grabber. He didn’t go and do that,” Aragon said.

“I have people calling me once or twice week saying do you want to buy my place?” Brown added. “I’m not trying to buy the whole town.”

Future vision

I asked them both what their future vision was for Pagosa Springs? Where did they see the community in ten years?

“My personal vision is that it’s going to be a thriving community year-round. That’s the goal,” Aragon said.

“I think I feel that way to,” Brown said. “And to add to that I see here in five years more parks, better recreational facilities for our kids, improved river systems, trails. I see the whole school situation changing dramatically, because these facilities that we have are in dire need of repair. I personally know this, that some of them are not legally up to state standards. Some are worse than others. I see better control of traffic. We’re never going to get rid of it but I think we can help it and make it safer. I see shops open at nighttime. I see people living downtown. I think it’s huge.”

Brown went on to say: “We can choose to ignore what’s happening here, but people are discovering this place, people are moving from all over the country to get out of the cities and into more rural environments. We can let them just take it over and let it happen haphazardly, as it has in the past, or we can create something unique here and preserve our legacies. I want my boys to grow up here
and I want them to graduate from school here and I want them to continue on with what Carol [Brown’s wife] and I are starting. That’s my own vision and I think it’s exciting.”

Then Brown added: “There’s been a lot of suggestion that we’re not concerned about affordable housing and that’s just not true, we are trying to plan areas where that can go, we want to encourage that. We would like to see businesses come in here to create more jobs, but you have to take control of it and create an opportunity in order to get them to come it doesn’t just happen. We have to make it happen.”

How do we move forward?

What would be the one thing that you would ask for to help really propel this thing forward? I asked.

“I can tell you right off the top of my head,” Aragon said. “The one thing that’s got a little bit of a strangle hold is working with the bureaucracy of CDOT, that is probably what I see as the number one issue.”

State funding for highways is nonexistent. For many years there has been a theoretical plan to widen Highway 160 to four lanes across Southwest Colorado. Aragon stressed the need for those four lanes going up Putt Hill, but he doubted he would see it happen in his lifetime.

Then he went on to say: “We’re going to have to be persistent and optimistic about that and right now I’m working with Mark Larson. I met with him yesterday. I’m trying to do the things it’s going to require to get some funding, but I know it’s going to be hard.”

“I think we need to create a task force to represent the community and we have to go and fight for what we want,” Brown said.

As for what Brown wants to help move things forward. He said, “I think we have to start with the God given resources we have in this community: The rivers, the environment, the mountains, the trees, the forest, the hot springs. Most communities don’t have anything half this good. So my hot button is yes, the traffic, we’ve got to get that going. But getting moving on the park system, getting moving on the river restoration, getting moving on the trail system and helping the schools think through what they really need long term—that’s critical—because what the school decides is also going to have a big impact on the downtown. And we’ve got to get a handle on these [educational] facilities. I’ve got two boys in these schools and I’m very concerned about it.”

How can the average citizen get involved?

Since most of us aren’t members of the CVC, how can we participate in this process? I asked.

“Right now, at Town Hall, we have the renderings. People can go down and take a look at them. If they write down their questions and submit them, we can start analyzing them. That would be the first place to start,” Aragon said.

The conceptual plan is also available for download from the CVC website at www.communityvisioncouncil.org. And individuals can email questions and comments to Angela Atkinson, Executive Director of CVC at info@communityvisioncouncil.org.

“After the meeting, a young group of students came up to me and said how can we help?” Brown said. “And we got to kicking around some ideas. Well, one way students can help is when we get this trail thing figured out, let’s have them help us build the trails. You know? So that everyone in the community is participating and feels good about being involved. If they don’t have money they can contribute some time. I personally would like to see, a much broader financial contribution from the community. If somebody can give us $25 that means they’re vested and they have an interest and $25 adds up.”

In the end, Brown summarized. “If we create more jobs here—and jobs are created by tourism and by people coming here and spending money—its’ a ripple effect, then we can keep the people here. I’m blessed, but most people don’t have an opportunity to make a living here. So they have to leave. Instead of saying oh, poor us, we can’t do it, let’s say, okay, we have a lot to offer here and let’s make it happen. It’s an attitude. Half full or half empty? We have to make that choice every day.”

How does the CVC see the role of the Arts in Pagosa’s future?

David J. Brown clarifies his reasons for getting involved in the town’s planning process, at the Community Vision Council’s November Town Meeting at the Community Center.

Goebel: There is a lot of information in the summary report for the CVC that talks about marketing to DINKS (“double income, no kids”) and branding the community to appeal to second-home owners, and those who don’t need jobs to come here, either they are retired or telecommute or freelance. This is what Dr. Richard Florida defines as the “creative class.” Florida’s thesis is that these people are drawn to places of diversity with thriving art and culture. And our community survey results show that 58% of respondents want to see a conference/performing arts center in Pagosa and 38% of those want to see this downtown, yet this aspect is completely missing from the conceptual plans.

“I don’t agree with you at all,” Brown responded emphatically. “First of all, we have to start someplace. Look what’s already been done here in 11 months. We started from zero to something. These are preliminary ideas, these are concepts, these aren’t absolutes, they aren’t saying that we are excluding anybody, it’s a place from which to start. One of the things on the plan, is that in the future, the Junior High and the Intermediate schools could become the location for a town plaza. It was thought that the [Intermediate School] could become a cultural arts center, that building, because it’s a great old building. To restore that and to make that whole section there across from the new town park as a gathering place for these types of event to occur.

“Now, I personally think that the performing arts thing is great, but you know, we have so much time, we have so much money, so now we’re ready to take this to the next step. And I think it’s why it’s vital to have the community input for people to say what you just said, we really want a performing arts center. I personally would love to have one here, the question is where should it go, how do we fund it? It’s not a matter of not wanting it. The central issue we have is to preserve the most valuable assets of our community—the river, develop the trail system, develop the parks while we have the land, develop the hot springs, work on this education thing and out of that will spring such things as the performing arts.”

“We’d be poor representatives if we said we have to address priorities. And the priority is a cultural center,” Aragon added. “We have to start with the economics. The economy. We have to build that. We have to make sure that the shop owners can stay open hopefully six, seven days a week in the future and if our marketing strategies are productive, we’ll be able to do that in order for the town to prosper. That’s what its going to take. And subsequently the cultural and performing arts will follow. It will follow.”

It’s about Unity

I couldn’t help but wonder about the two local groups—Friends of the Performing Arts (FoPA) and Music Boosters—who are both separately attempting to plan and develop two completely different Performing and Cultural Arts Centers for our Community. I think both of these groups need to be working together and they need to be working with CVC. I asked Brown and Aragon what they thought and if CVC would be open to working to bring them together.

“It would be better if they would [work together].” Aragon said. “I think that’s what’s so neat about our group. Is that we’re community oriented, we’re including everyone. I don’t see how a group can go out by themselves and say we’re going to do something. It won’t work. It can’t work.”

Brown added, that CVC has an open door policy. “We’re going to be having public hearings starting in January and this is the time that people need to stand up and say what they would like to see. But let’s try to encourage them not to be negative. Let’s try and encourage them to be positive. Because if everyone goes in their own direction then you can’t achieve unity. That’s pretty simple.”

Brown sat back and then continued his voice softer. “I am personally a Christian and I have a strong faith, and in the book of Ephesians, written by Paul the Apostle, he talks about the body of Christ and whether you believe that or not, it’s the same illustration. The body is made up of many components, fingers, feet, legs, arms, thighs, hair, head, all these things. Well in order for the body to work, they all have to work together. If the finger goes over here and says I’m going to be a finger and doesn’t want to be part of the overall body, then it doesn’t work. It’s the same concept. So if we’ll all come together and work together instead of doing what so many other communities do, and try to go with our own self interest, we have an opportunity here, to do something that would be incredible and that’s what I’m trying to say to people.”

“But we have to also be realistic. We’re dealing with priorities to get this thing off the ground,” Aragon added.

“Back to the illustration. If this wheel doesn’t start turning, then nobody wins,” Brown said, pointing to the picture he drew. “If everybody is sitting here arguing about what they want to do we don’t get anywhere. Start the wheel going, and it will evolve.”

What role will CVC take?

You have said that CVC will continue to advise the Town and I read in the materials that CVC sees its role as coordinating between governmental groups, organizations, businesses and volunteers to develop an implementation plan, establish priorities and put the plan into action? Will CVC push this planning strategy at the county level? What other role will CVC take now that the plan has been turned over?

“I think the committee is just starting to work,” Brown said with a laugh. “We’re not entirely clear, I think it’s something that evolves, but some of the things we’ve talked about are to help the town with its river corridor and provide advice and experience, help with the trail development, help with the traffic issues, which are a huge problem. Some of us have contacts with CDOT at various levels, to try and get that accelerated. Move forward on the acquisition of the land for the parks. Help the school district move along in their planning process. Just encourage them. We’ve had great progress in that area. We’ve got them thinking about a long range plan. They never had a long-range plan. So to bring the resources of the group, and I don’t mean the financial resources, but the benefit and the experience of this group to help whoever needs help. You know, if the performing arts thing wants to get going, you know we can lend our advice and support to help them think through these things.”

There is a pause before Brown continues. “I think there is a misconception here that we [CVC] have a lot of authority. We don’t have any authority. This is a volunteer group and we are here to help the county and the Town to do things they may not be able to do by themselves. Or to achieve their objectives in a timeframe that we all feel is necessary due to the pressure on the community.”

CVC and Archuleta County

Do you think you will be helping the county develop their land use codes? I ask.

“Well the county is part of our board, so by definition, yes,” Brown said pointing out that Mamie Lynch, County Commissioner is a member of the CVC.

“The Town has been participating and we’ve included the county as part of the community, but financially they have not made a contribution,” Aragon pointed out.

“We’re asking for one next year,” Brown said.

“Hopefully they will see it as beneficial,” Aragon continued. “You know, from my perspective I will see then that there’s more of
a commitment, there’s really no commitment until they sit down at the table.”

“I think one thing that Ross and I are very proud of, is that when we initiated the moratorium on the big box stores, which came out of the CVC, within five days the county adopted the same ordinance,” Brown said.

I recalled a conversation I had at the Post Office with a passionate local resident who was frustrated after the unveiling of the CVC vision in November. This person was concerned that county money would be used to finance the Town’s one square mile master plan. How can the county afford to give money to this when the county can’t afford to pay for roads?

“The county is part of the community in my opinion,” Aragon said. “They own property in this core area that we’re talking about, very valuable property. That is one way of looking at it.”

“If the economy grows here and activity grows here, then more funds are generated for the county right?” Brown responded. “As more funds are generated then they can fix the roads. They have to become a seed investor in order to get the benefit.”

An interview with the Community Vision Council co-chairmen

Council leaders answer some of the hard questions

David J. Brown and Mayor Ross Aragon say they have become friends during the past eleven months working together as co-chairmen of the Community Vision Council.

“The Community Vision Council is not a governing body, we’re an advisory body. We have no authority. I work for the Mayor,” David J. Brown said.

I sat down with Brown and Mayor Ross Aragon on a sunny December day in the Mayor’s office overlooking downtown Pagosa Springs. From this vantage point, much of the one square mile focus of the recently unveiled conceptual master plan for the community of Pagosa Springs is visible.

“I’m really excited about this. It’s what makes me get up every day. It’s very fulfilling to see what we’ve accomplished in eleven months and we’re just at the beginning,” Brown said, his voice soft and gentle, a broad smile on his face, a glimmer of joy in his eyes.

“You know I was sick for three years, and I was off my feet for 2 ½ years with cancer. I just decided that I have a lot to offer and a lot to give back and I want to make the best use of the remainder of my days,” Brown said.

The best use of his time might be in helping Pagosa Springs develop a vision for the future and create a master plan for economic stability. With over 34 years of real estate experience, as the founder of Orchard Properties, Brown has acquired and developed over 8.5 million square feet of commercial real estate, primarily in California. With an MBA from the Wharton School, he was a founding member of the Wharton Real Estate Center and his professional affiliations include the UC Berkeley Center for Real Estate and Urban Economics, the Urban Land Institute, and the National Association of Industrial Office Parks.

Add to those credentials Co-chair (with Mayor Ross Aragon) of the Community Vision Council, Pagosa Springs, Colorado.

“CVC has turned the master planning concept over to the Town and now it’s up to the Town to take it wherever they need to. We will continue to advise them on other priorities,” Brown said.

How the CVC was born

“To me, it’s always been about the economy,” stated Aragon, a Pagosa Springs native who has been Mayor since 1978.

In February 2004, Brown contacted Aragon and asked him to participate in a meeting of community leaders, elected official and citizens. About 25 people attended including J.R. Ford, Bob Goodman, Mamie Lynch, Sally Hameister, Aragon and Brown. Also at the meeting were California based consultants: Marianna Leuschel from L. Studio in Santa Monica, CA and Philip Durbrow of Marshall Strategies in San Francisco, CA.

“The consultants were working at Bootjack Ranch, for me, on another project,” Brown said. “I asked them one day if they had ever done any work with towns to help create a vision and establish a plan and help create a focus. They said yes and that’s kind of how the thing started.”

The idea was for the group of 25 to help underwrite some preliminary studies that would help the community create a vision for the future. The consultants spent a few days prior to that initial meeting talking with local business owners and civic leaders.

“The thing that I remember is what Philip Durbrow said. His statement was that the merchants are hurting,” Aragon said. “And that remark stayed with me. The revenue derived from sales tax is the only source of income that the town has. So, if the merchants fail, we fail as a community. I thought it was academic and imperative that we get involved and try to promote the town so we can have the economy be stable, not on a seasonal basis, but twelve months of the year. So that’s how I got involved.”

“I think the feeling is that the town doesn’t have a central focus, and it’s growing very rapidly. Based on the experience of the consultants and other people in the room, the concern was that if we don’t grab hold of this it’s going to grab a hold of us and we need to guide it rather than let it control us,” Brown added.

The Mayor’s Council for the Future of Pagosa Springs was born. With seed money provided by Brown and a few others, including public funds from the Town of Pagosa Springs, the preliminary study was completed.

“This stuff is extremely expensive. This study cost over two hundred thousand dollars. The Town didn’t have the funds to do it, so the private sector stepped up to help fund it,” Brown explained.

One square mile or an entire community?

I pointed out that the growth figures used to justify the CVC plan are from Archuleta County. Population for the Town of Pagosa Springs has not grown significantly in ten years as Town Manager, Mark Garcia pointed out at the November 17 public presentation. Wouldn’t it make more sense for the community vision to embrace all of Pagosa Springs and not just one square mile downtown? I asked.

“The answer is yes and no,” Brown said. “The problem is a matter of economics. We felt that if we could re-instill the historic downtown, the one square mile, and bring activity back to the town that the entire area will then benefit. And we had to start someplace. We certainly do agree that it needs to be expanded, but we had to start. We felt that this is where the history was, this is where we were founded, these are the values that the people love, the river, the central part and there’s a lot of character here that could be redeveloped and preserved,” Brown continued. “We feel very strongly that there is an opportunity here to redevelop historic downtown to make it a place where people from all over the county would like to come and work and live and have fun. I think the other thing we felt was, that if we could create a model here, and develop the criteria of what we want the Town to be and what we want in the future, then, is it not logical that it would spread to the entire community. This gives us a model and a case study to start.”

I spoke with a local merchant in the Pagosa Lakes area who felt left out of the future vision. They pay taxes, because they are part of the Town, but they are not included in the conceptual plan. How do you respond to them? I asked.

“We’re community oriented and we have representation from all sectors. We had to start somewhere,” Aragon echoed. “People stop here, in Pagosa Springs, in the town, because the hot springs is here, so we’re trying to sell that. I was in the restaurant business for 22 years and I’d see people coming and going, stop and eat, and guess where they were going? To take the train ride to Silverton or to Mesa Verde and it would almost make me sick that they weren’t staying here, they weren’t utilizing our recreation and all the things we have, all the amenities that we have, because there was nothing to make them want to stay here. But now, with us doing the historic renovations and all these things. Its going to be different.”

“This is a philosophical thing, too,” Brown continued. “We are certainly not ignoring those people. You mentioned that they are paying taxes. This thing has been funded 90% by private enterprise. If the Town and County could have afforded to do this, then private enterprise wouldn’t have had to step up and do it. Everybody is invited to participate. We have sent a plea out for everybody in the community to please help fund this. It’s extremely expensive. And if you think about it, this is what we call ground zero.” He pointed out the large window onto the Town below and then continued.

“If these businesses down here do well, which is where the tourists are going to come first, because the tourists want to come to where the tourist attractions are, which is the hot springs and the river and the trails and the hiking. Then it has a r
ipple effect and it will benefit all the merchants. That’s just the way towns grow. Everybody needs to unite and realize that this is for the benefit of everyone, and not to the benefit of a few. Those merchants out there are just as important as the merchants down here. But they need to pitch in and help us, too, and not feel left out because it’s not a matter of feeling left out it’s a matter of practicality. Where can we start?”

I asked if the CVC had approached Fairfield Resort, and if they were participating in the vision.

“The committee has approached everyone in terms of the public outreach.” Brown responded, adding: “People have to make a choice whether they want to participate or not, that’s their choice. No, we haven’t excluded them. I think the issue is that they bring a huge tax base to the community, but when those people come here in the timeshare to stay, where are they going to go shop, where are they going to go have dinner? Where are they going to go to the river? Where are they going to go to the hot springs? So this makes sense. This is going to be the stabilizing influence on the economy. I think it just makes sense.”

It sounds as if you are asking merchants to help fund the study and implementation of the plan, which focuses on one square mile of downtown Pagosa Springs, I said. What about the business owner who is thinking, what am I going to get out of it? Doesn’t that mean that more people are going to go downtown and they aren’t going to visit my store out West or East?

“That’s not what really happens in other towns and cities throughout the country. What really happens is that competition breeds competition. If there are more people here coming through the community that means everyone does better, whether the shop is over there or down here. Every town and city in the country grows this way. It’s an attitude. Do we join together and work for the benefit of the whole or do we all say well, I’m only going to worry about my little shop. That’s not very good thinking,” Brown said.

Some people want to work together and some have this very independent spirit. How do you reach them and get them to participate? I asked.

“I haven’t seen that,” Aragon said. “I’ve never heard that until you mentioned it that we might potentially be alienating the people West of Town. That’s not the intent. We didn’t call it the Town Vision Committee we called it the Community Vision Committee because we consider community, by definition, a long way from town. Town is here, downtown, the core area, we’re not saying the core area, we’re saying community. That’s the last thing I would ever want to do is to alienate anyone. However, no matter what you do you can’t please everyone, and so we have to deal with that.”

Aragon pointed out that Mark Weiler, president of Parelli Natural Horse-Man-Ship is a representative of the Pagosa Lakes area as a member of the CVC.

The wheel revolves around a central axis

“Let me try to explain it how I’ve learned from my own business.” Brown said asking for a piece of paper on which he drew a circle, some spokes and a rim. “This is a wheel. If you’re a shop owner out here on this spoke. And this is the entire community. This wheel won’t go around if you are just one spoke. What makes the wheel go around is that you have a core, a hub and you have the spoke. So in my view, if you’re a shop owner sitting out here, you have two choices to make. You can remain a spoke. Or you can say, I want to do better, I would like the town to do better. It’s important for my business to do better, so I have a choice to make. I can sit here by myself and not worry about everybody else, or I can choose to join the center and by everyone joining the center and working together, then the wheel goes around.”

Brown handed me the piece of paper and continued his explanation, pointing out that the conceptual plan is only an idea and that now it was up to the members of CVC and civic leaders to reach out to the community and show us that this idea will benefit all of us.

“We’re looking to the global, total benefit of the community and Pagosa Springs is the center of the community. It’s the largest town in the county. We’re talking about things like education, we’re talking about traffic, we’re talking about parks and recreation and the safety of our children,” Brown said with passion and conviction. “This is a huge model when you think about it. So I guess the choice that people are going to have to make and I’m sure I’ll be criticized for this, but I think everybody has to make a choice. Do they want to join and be a part of this or do they not want to join. But history shows that if we all work together, we do a lot better.”

Marketing a Community

Well, then how do you envision CVC working to support local businesses? I asked.

“Marketing strategies would be one way,” Aragon said.

“Marketing is number one,” Brown agreed. “If you are a business owner, what do you do to attract people to your business? We need marketing. We need to promote the tourism. We need to promote the image. We need to make this a more desirable place for people to come and visit and stay. That’s a key thing. That helps the local businesses. Right now, we’re a drive-thru community.”

Many visitors complain that stores aren’t open on weekends and evenings. How can the CVC work with local business owners to coach them, train them or advise them on how to appeal to tourists. I asked. Do you see that as a role you might play?

“The answer to that is that we have to create a reason for people to come downtown and to stay here and then the shops will stay open. Right now, the shops can’t afford to stay open because there is nobody here. What we need to do is to promote more activities around the hot springs or more activities like the balloon festivals, the horse events. We have to create events and festivals like Music in the Mountains. That started with zero and now we’re going to have 1,000 people come this year,” Brown pointed out.

“The shop owners would stay open if they knew people were in town,” Aragon added. “In fact, going back to Philip Durbrow, I remember him stating that he visited one business that had two sales in one week. Why are they going to stay open on the weekend? Why?”

“You’re hitting on a key thing,” Brown said. “Part of our job is to market and create more activities and more reasons for people to come and visit Pagosa so they’ll spend more money, and therefore the shops will be doing better, whether the shop is out near Fairfield or down here, I don’t think makes any difference. Because when you go to a town and you’re a tourist, you want to look at a lot of shops, right? So what we need to do is promote. Everybody needs to join together to promote their own shop, but for the benefit of the total.”

Somewhat like the work that the Chamber of Commerce does, I suggested. Will CVC be working with the Chamber of Commerce, local business owners, the lodging association, to develop and implement the marketing plan to attract more tourists to this area?

“We have representation from the Chamber on our CVC,” Aragon said.

“We’d like to see the downtown business owners get reunited and help work together to create that central core. They are stakeholders,” Brown added.

Every major culture throughout history, has invested energy in making public art.

According to Fulbright Scholar and University of New Mexico professor Mark Childs, the major function of public art is to make a place special. Childs was the first of three speakers in the “Creative Spaces Speaker Series,” sponsored by the Community Vision Council Art and Culture Committee.

He addressed a crowd of 60 Aug. 15 that included Pagosa Springs Mayor Ross Aragon, town staff, and council members Tony Simmons and Darryl Cotton.

In order to have a good government and a strong economy, we need a civil society, a complex overlapping set of social networks that help engender broad representation, a marketplace of ideas, social capital and creativity. Or what John Locke defined as that part of our collective lives that is neither market nor government.

According to Childs, there are several methods for developing this civil society, but the top two are civic spaces and “storied landscapes.” Public plazas and squares are places to see and be seen, to gather, to watch the sky.

Childs advocated for the development of a town square in Pagosa Springs and suggested the parking lot next to Tequila’s along the river as a location where the seeds of gathering already exist. “This parking lot is a great place for a square and you could include auditorium-style seating for people to sit and watch the river.”

Tell town’s story

He also suggested that the most important thing we can do is to tell the story of the community in our civic spaces and through our public art and events. One idea involves the local duck race sponsored by the Knights of Columbus. This is a story from our town. “Instead of ordering 1,000 rubber ducks from China, can you spend the same amount of money and have local children build boats or rafts and have a race?,” asked Childs.

“Public art is part of the infrastructure of your town,” Childs said. “Just as your town provides water, sewer, roads, it can provide art because art is literally how you make the road, the bridge, the power pole.”

Childs’ Power Point presentation showed manhole covers in Seattle designed as a map of the city, tree grates that identify the species and leaf shape, elaborate downspouts by Buster Simpson that are literally sculpture on the side of a building. “How can each thing be what it needs to be and add something more?” Childs asked. “How do these (manhole covers, buildings) work together to make a town?”

Childs even suggested a place to begin.

Focus on water

“Water is your key asset,” he said. “Take the theme of water as far as the collective imagination will go – streams, rivers, hot springs – how we collect water from the roofs to prevent flooding.” Even the underside of the Hot Springs Boulevard Bridge over the river is ideal for an art project.

When asked to clarify if he was suggesting that our community didn’t already have a town square, Childs responded: “You have a Main Street with missing teeth and blank walls. It could be stronger. A town square is different than a promenade.”
Create your ideas

But Childs was also conscientious in suggesting that the audience and town planners and management copy nothing from his lecture. “Take the ideas and make them your own,” he said.

When an audience member asked about gateways, Childs said he was not a big fan of gateways, as gateways. “The East side of town needs to tell a different story. It needs to say you are in Pagosa and it is cool. It needs to tell a story of the river and be a continuation of the Wolf Creek valley.”

Town Manager Mark Garcia added he has challenged the Art and Culture Committee to come up with ideas for the gateways.
Childs’ provocative ideas were followed Aug. 18 by the practical experience of Joe Napoleon, planning director for the City of Woodland Park, Colo., and Harold Stalf, director of the Grand Junction Downtown Development Authority.

“You have to have an ultimate goal,” Stalf said in his opening comments. “Be careful what you dream up. It will take ten to twenty years.” Stalf who has also served as town manager for Aspen and Crested Butte spoke from his experience.
Restaurants are anchors

In a downtown, restaurants are anchors and Stalf expressed his belief that downtown business associations and towns need to require that local businesses stay open on nights and weekends like shopping malls. Shopping malls were designed based upon the original concepts of downtowns. In Grand Junction, the major tenants downtown were once Sears and JC Penney.
Downtown Grand Junction features “the serpentine way” a wavy wall planted with trees that lines the main street. It was also the first city to implement an “art on the corner” plan. Today, Grand Junction has 100 sculptures on display; two-thirds of them are owned by the city or the DDA and one-third are rotating, temporary works.

One of Stalf’s most entertaining slides was of the art meters – an installation work of old parking meters painted and decorated by artists, now on display in downtown Grand Junction. Grand Junction is unique in that it has a symphony and a 50-year-old art center. Both struggle to survive financially, but Mesa County has been unsuccessful in attempts to implement a Scientific and Cultural Facilities District similar to the funding district on the Front Range.

Stalf believes a community should look at what it already has or could implement every day rather than focusing on big events. “Events are a killer,” he said. “Everyday people dine out, they go to movies or a nightclub.

“Planning is not about trails and sidewalks, it’s about a lifestyle,” Stalf said. “Your 500-pound gorilla is U.S. 160. You can implement narrowing and calming, but if I were you I’d try and get it rerouted.”

Retail is fragile

The challenge for downtown business owners is that retail is very fragile. Stalf pointed out the average income in Grand Junction from 1970 until today has remained flat, at around $26,000. But for individual business owners, from 1970 until today, that income has dropped from $26,000 to $18,000. “Chains kill these small stores.”

A Downtown Development Authority is a quasi-governmental agency funded by Tax Incremental Financing. In the first 20 years in Grand Junction, the DDA had a budget of about $10 million. They will have a budget of $12,000 in the next five years. In Woodland Park the DDA was created by a TIF bond referendum based on property taxes. This TIF provides $30 million for downtown development. A DDA cannot condemn property, but can purchase and renovate old buildings. In Grand Junction the DDA recently purchased a building that housed a strip club and they will be renovating the property.

“The pressures on beautiful places in Colorado are real,” added Napoleon. “The community has to really understand the vision.”

Woodland Park is a community of 7,200 permanent residents. Napoleon took the job as planning director in 1994 and all the streets were dirt and the downtown businesses were boarded up with plywood. But Woodland Park wanted to be more than a “potty stop.”

Build on heritage

“You have to maintain the identity, history and culture of your community. Never give it up. It has a value you can’t put a price on,” Napoleon iterated. “You have wonderful things here. Build on who you are. Understand your heritage and history and build on it.”

Napoleon acknowledged this is not an easy process because everyone has a different idea, but eventually you can come to a consensus and a plan. “Once we had a plan (in Woodland Park) the boards came off the buildings.” He suggested that Pagosa begin by creating an inventory of what we have and what we need.

“Art is not going to be your salvation. Art is one element,” Napoleon said. “But it is a very important element. It creates a feel and a look for a
community. We added art to our Master Plan and our Downtown Development Authority Plan.”
Napoleon advocated that art attracts a certain demographic that is appealing to a community. The value of art is intrinsic and is reflected in the people on the streets and in the schools. “Creating a sense of place is difficult for planners, but art can help,” Napoleon said.

The first thing Woodland Park did was to turn its old middle school into the Ute Pass Cultural Center. They had no money to buy art, but serendipitously a local artist donated a sculpture to the town. Today, Woodland Park has public art all over their town, but the town has only spent $200 to purchase one sculpture by a local artisan. The rest of the work has been donated and now developers and business owners try to outdo one another with a bigger and better sculpture. Even the new big box store being built in Woodland Park was required to purchase a $100,000 sculpture from a local artist.

Another thing they did was to move their library downtown and build a new library that today hosts 100,000 visits a year.

“The people who frequent libraries add to the value of your community.” Napoleon said.

As for graffiti, Napoleon said they have had no problem. “The art is for the people who live in the community. They respect it.”

Looking to the future, Napoleon unveiled the lifestyle center being built in downtown Woodland Park. The focus of this center is the Colorado Festival of World Theatre that will feature a 500-seat theatre, a small black box theatre, retail, lodging and residential units. This 21-acre village is a project of the DDA and the request for proposals suggested a village built on the heritage of Woodland Park, a heritage that includes mining, the West and the railroad. Their number one priority was to create a downtown for the people who live in Woodland Park, to capture the regional market and to capture the tourists who now just stop in Woodland Park for a convenience.

“What you’re trying to do here is nothing new,” Napoleon said. “Every community is doing this type of planning.”

“It was an eye opener,” Pagosa Springs Town Planner Tamra Allen said of the Culture, Commerce and Community Conference she attended May 20-21 in Denver.

Sponsored by Colorado Council on the Arts, the Denver Office of Cultural Affairs, the Lab at Belmar and Colorado Business Committee for the Arts, the event was billed as a think tank on current research and theory on the role of the arts in economic development and community engagement, and as a practicum, providing useful models for stimulating civic and commercial life through the arts.

“I don’t think I’m truly in the dark about culture and the role it plays in community, but this (the 3C Conference) allowed me to see the significant role art and culture plays in bringing together eclectic, community oriented, civic-minded creative people,” Allen said. “You get the out-of-the-box ideas and the generation of a new perspective, a new twist on how to do things, from creative people.”

Allen attended with the encouragement of Town Manager Mark Garcia. Both felt it was very timely, as Pagosa Springs grapples with the idea of how to maintain the small-town character of our community and tries to define what it is that makes a place unique and livable.

Allen believes the conference provided a theoretical, as well as an applied approach, that isn’t typically found at planning conferences. Angela Atkinson, executive director of the Community Vision Council and Crista Munro, executive director of Folk West, also attended the conference.

“I was pleasantly surprised at the blend of practical information, such as case studies, that was presented alongside more academic, philosophical discussions, such as what is the role of public art in our communities,” Atkinson said. The public art issue is one the Community Vision Council Social/Cultural Committee is currently researching.

“Public art is very much on the radar screen for many, many communities,” Atkinson continued. “We’re all seeking to differentiate ourselves and to communicate what is unique and special about the places we live – public art allows us to do that in a way that expresses our character and individuality.”

Allen, however, found the idea of the arts and culture as an economic driver to be counter-intuitive and ironic. “Looking at art and culture as an economic driver is the antithesis of why we have art and culture – for visual, tactile enjoyment, for the aesthetic value, for pleasure.”

In the end she understood the push for the arts as an economic driver because, as she said, “How do you rationalize spending public money if there isn’t a proven return?”

Allen thought some of the best ideas presented at the conference – to get the Pagosa community involved – were cultural heritage programs like the Alamosa Mariachi Conference, the Meeker Classic Sheepdog Trials and the City of Delta’s Council Tree Pow Wow. The Colorado Council on the Arts employs a state folklorist for Western Colorado to help communities develop their cultural heritage.

Munro currently provides the most successful cultural tourism event in Pagosa – the Four Corners Folk Festival. Both Allen and Atkinson mentioned the Spanish Fiesta as a way Pagosa Springs can capitalize on its cultural heritage. The Fred Harman Museum and Western Heritage Center is another entity poised to take advantage of the economic benefit of cultural heritage programming.

Another idea proposed to involve the community is cultural tourism. Americans for the Arts reported in 2000 that two-thirds of American adult travelers included a cultural, arts, heritage or historic activity or event in travels of 50 miles or more away from home.

“From a tourism perspective, statistics were presented showing how public art, galleries, unique architecture, even our public spaces, all serve to attract and engage visitors,” Atkinson said. “A successful public art program will actually fuel our economy and should work hand in hand simultaneously with other improvements being made to our downtown.”

Two concurrent sessions, “Cultural Tourism&emdash;Maximizing City Assets” and “The Arts and Tourist Dollars in Rural and Mountain Resorts,” ran during the conference. Panelists for the Rural and Mountain Resort session included Liana Carlson, director of marketing and public relations, Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival; Laura Smith, director of communications, Aspen Music Festival and Maurice LaMee, executive/artistic director, Creede Repertory Theatre.

The Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival provides a $7.4 million impact on the Vail Valley and $550,000 in taxes. The Aspen Music Festival pumps $52 million into the Aspen economy.

In Aspen, the cultural traveler stays 60 percent longer and spends 60 percent more than a traveler who does not attend a summer cultural event.

In Creede, the Repertory Theatre provides $2 million in economic impact for Mineral County. Twenty cents of every dollar spent in Mineral County comes through the theatre. Yet none of these highly successful, cultural tourism draws is self-sufficient.

At the Aspen Music Festival, ticket sales cover only 20 percent of the event costs, 30 percent comes from student tuition to the Music Festival School and the bulk of the budget, 50 percent, is donated by the Board of Directors and National Council, some individual donors and a small amount of corporate sponsorship.

The City of Aspen provides less than one percent of the Music Festival’s $13 million budget. In Vail, the Bravo! Vail Valley Music festival is funded 25 percent by ticket sales, 50 percent by individual donations and 25 percent by grants, fund-raisers and advertising. In Creede, 55 percent of the budget comes from ticket sales, advertising and gift shop, and 45 percent is donated.

While cultural tourism can provide huge economic benefit, the costs of events like these do not happen overnight and are expensive. In other words, cultural tourism is not a panacea.

“It was interesting to hear people iterate what they are going through, the demographic changes we are seeing, the growth in second home owners,” Allen said. “The baseline study EPS just did, matches the information we heard at the conference. We can’t stop growth. People are going to move somewhere. There is a need for every community to address how it can be creative and unique, how they can retain their old culture and find a new niche.”

Keynote speakers, Richard Florida, author of “The Rise of the Creative Class” and the new book “The Flight of the Creative Class,” and Joel Kotkin, author of “The City: A Global History,” envision the future of America as a federation of neighborhoods, or an archipelago of villages that are great places to live, work and raise children.

“The social cohesion is unraveling as we speak,” Florida said. “It’s a new type of class warfare. The battle is between the new people with money and ideas coming into a community where we’ve always done things the same, where my grandfather and father lived and worked and raised their family.”

This comment seemed to resonate with Allen and Atkinson. The challenge facing Pagosa and every other community is this type of change. It is the old versus the new.

Allen felt the biggest difference between Florida and Kotkin was on the issue of tolerance. “I liked what Florida said about our country being founded by immigrants and the flow of ideas they provided. He said that since 9/11 we seem to have collective amnesia that we used to be a tolerant country. As a community, we have to be tolerant of the immigrants, the new people moving here. We can’t prevent it. We have to figure out how to tap into their needs and desires to be an integral part of the community. These new residents are affluent, well skilled, knowledgeable. We have to tap into this ‘human capital’ as a new resource for creating ideas. How do we help Pagosa transition from a one-dimensional place whose sole economic f
unction is tourism? How we go one step further to sustain ourselves?”

Atkinson believes one idea is to create a “percent for art” program where 1 percent of new development cost is required to fund a public art display, an artistic feature inside or outside a building, or be provided in the form of an art donation or financial donation to the community.

“I think that while we’re looking at a downtown master plan and design guidelines,” she said, “we should also be looking at how public art fits into the big picture of community development.”

To that end, Atkinson and the CVC Social/Cultural Committee are organizing a speaker series in August with Mark Childs, planning professor at University of New Mexico, an expert in plazas and public spaces, and Nore Winter, Winter & Company, an expert in design guidelines and application of public art into planning documents.

The speaker series developed during a late night brainstorming session between Allen, Atkinson and Munro over takeout Indian food at their Denver hotel.

Allen is still looking for answers. She likes the idea of tapping into the local culture and arts to improve the tourism aspect of Pagosa. “But we want to also keep Pagosa a great family-oriented place to live.”

Special to The PREVIEW, Aug. 4, 2005

Want to buy a six-foot-tall, forton puma?

Twenty-six of the 29 pumas from the San Juan Mountains Association “Pumas on Parade” will be auctioned online starting Aug. 15. Until then, puma sightings around Pagosa include the Visitor’s Center at the Chamber of Commerce, the Pagosa Springs Community Center and Town Hall.

Originally designed as a fund-raiser for the San Juan Mountains Association (SJMA), to bolster tourism, support local artists and to enhance the public awareness of caring for our natural resources, “Pumas on Parade” has become a financial drain for the nonprofit organization.

The mission of SJMA is to enhance personal and community stewardship of natural, cultural and heritage resources on public lands in southwest Colorado through education, interpretation, information and participation.
SJMA volunteers build trails, monitor cultural sites and ruins, host field seminars, serve as public land ambassadors, lead naturalist hikes and host the Clean Forest Hunter Information program and the Wilderness Information Specialists program – both providing experts in backcountry and wilderness survival to educate hunters and hikers alike of the importance of “leaving no trace.”

With more than 500 volunteers, SJMA development director Felicity Broennan, believed her idea to pattern a public art project, based on the highly successful “Painted Ponies,” in New Mexico, would be easy.

The native of Santa Fe consulted with Ponies executive director Rod Barker and other cities around the country that have launched successful public art programs such as this – cows in Chicago, orcas in Vancouver, trout in San Luis Obispo, horses in Aiken, S.C. and alpine swine in Grand Junction. In Aiken, 30 horses were sponsored by local businesses based on the concept alone. The business sponsorships paid to have each horse sculpture-cast and provided a stipend for the artists to design, decorate or embellish the sculpture.

“I thought my volunteers would help out, but they want to hike, monitor and build trails, not throw parties, do public relations and drive sculptures around,” Broennan said.

And business sponsorship didn’t work quite so well in Southwest Colorado as it did in Aiken. “We really overestimated the capability of the business community,” Broennan said. “This is a very sophisticated project and people didn’t get the value of what this is and what it can do for the community.”

The original program concept was to bring communities together, to bring tourists to the area to see the pumas, to increase visibility, traffic and cash flow, to form partnerships and alliances among businesses, the arts community and public land agencies, to celebrate the centennial of the San Juan National Forest and ultimately, to raise money for SJMA’s ongoing educational outreach and heighten the visibility and effectiveness of SJMA as an organization.

The pumas were unveiled on the Fourth of July and in the past few weeks have been put on display in locations from Cortez to Pagosa Springs, Telluride to Durango. To date, three pumas have been sold. Most businesses don’t see the benefit of paying $3,000-$10,000 to have a six-foot tall, five-foot long puma taking up space.

This is the height of tourist season in southwest Colorado and businesses are booked all summer. As Broennan bemoaned, a bank in Cortez didn’t understand the concept and felt it was more important to give $10,000 to resurrect the local rodeo than buy a puma for which they would have to find a permanent home, insure against vandalism and maintain. And people who frequently give $5,000 to Kiwanis, felt that was too much money for Pumas on Parade.

“We have 2.2 million visitors to our public lands every year,” Broennan said. “The businesses didn’t understand that they could support tourism and the stewardship of public land.”

The problems are multifaceted.

“Public land is not that sexy,” Broennan said. “SJMA is not a well-known organization. This is the biggest fund-raiser we’ve undertaken. Music in the Mountains would have had a different response.”

Maybe, maybe not.

“None of us recognized what we were taking on,” Broennan admitted.

In 2004, Broennan went to work for SJMA as their program director. She had been on the job just two weeks when the call for grant applications from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Forest Service for a joint Arts and Rural Community Assistance Initiative came across her desk. This special grant program supports arts-based rural community development projects utilizing the arts as an economic and community development tool, and as a steward of natural resources.
While SJMA executive director, Susan Bryson and the board of directors embraced the proposal, no one evaluated the organization’s readiness to take on a project of this magnitude from a community perspective. No one had the artistic experience to handle complicated molds and sculptural casting. No one thought about hiring a public relations expert to insure the major media exposure that other public art events such as this have garnered.

They focused their time and energy on choosing an appropriate animal, considering lynx, bear and even a giant pine beetle. But they chose the mountain lion for its powerful aesthetic and symbolism. “This elusive predator, a native to the Four Corners, is integral to our ecosystem and arguably the most majestic animal on our lands. Cautious and cagey, the graceful puma embodies the beauty of nature, while epitomizing the intense conflicts triggered by human-wildlife proximity,” Broennan writes on the SJMA Web site.

Twenty-nine artists were promised a stipend of $500 for materials to enhance their puma. Many were surprised at the size of the sculpture. Many spent more than 500 hours and thousands of dollars to create their original work of art. Most have not received their $500. Some artists have offered to donate their stipend to the cause.

“Pumas on Parade has been a capital intensive project. We are trying to make our payroll,” Broennan said. “Layoffs are not okay.”

Some artists have questioned why it’s okay for SJMA staff to get paid when the artist is already receiving a mere token for their time and effort.

“We feel horrible,” Broennan said. “The hardest phone call I had to make was to tell the artists we didn’t have money to pay them and that we were in breach of contract. It’s the hardest thing in the whole world.”

Broennan feels lucky to have worked with such terrific artists and believes the finished products speak for themselves. They are each unique and beautiful. “I have worked with the most phenomenal artists,” Broennan said. “Other communities had challenges with artists. We didn’t.

“And $500 doesn’t even come close to what they deserve,” Broennan added. “They should get $1,000, but that’s almost $30,000. All of this was predicated to bringing in $90,000 of business sponsors.”

They have only raised one-third of that amount.

What about the original $10,000 NEA grant?

“I didn’t know how much this would cost when I wrote the grant,” Broennan admits. “It was my naivete about the art world.”
Broennan thought artists might donate their mold or create an original sculpture to be used as the form for each puma. In most cities the artwork is created specifically for the project. Painted Ponies had Santa Fe sculptor Star Lianna York create two original horse sculptures, one standing one running, for the project. Broennan chose an existing sculpture by Loveland artist Rosetta. Rosetta’s “On the Alert,” is of a mountain lion, a cougar, a puma, frozen mid-stride, ever alert to the slightest sound or movement.

Rosetta’s original sculpture was limited to an edition of eight and the mold was unusable. A new mold had to be created. The NEA funds covered Rosetta’s fee and the creation of a ne
w mold by a second artist in Loveland. Then each puma had to be hand cast by a third pair of artists. SJMA has picked up the tab for casting, shipping and crating.
Broennan still believes this is a viable project.

“I still feel honored. I still think it’s the right animal. I’m proud that we were able to give each artist something of this stature. These are handmade sculptures. They are not hot fiberglass poured. Each is its own unique work of art from start to finish.”
Pagosa Springs artists Paula Bain and Kathy Steventon are still supportive of the project, despite all the problems.

“I think it was a great idea, but publicity is absolutely essential,” said Bain, whose puma is on display at Town Hall. “It can’t survive without this. Everyone worked very hard and it turned out great.”

“I suspect it can turn around,” Steventon added. “Most of the artwork is beautiful, but marketing is a mess. Publicity costs lots of money and where is this coming from?”

Steventon, whose puma is on display at the community center, found the project to be enriching on many levels: personally, she is proud of her work; socially, she enjoyed working and getting to know other artists; philanthropically, she felt she was supporting a worthy cause.

“It really made me realize how difficult it is for nonprofit organizations to get the support that they shouldn’t have to ask for,” Steventon said. “Many in the community can support this and they haven’t come forward.”

Her concerns are that SJMA is not using the resources available in the community to help this project succeed. “They didn’t handle this professionally. There didn’t seem to be a strategy. Everything was a crisis and reaction.”

“Every project has a risk,” Broennan said. “I still believe in this model. It will teach people about mountain lions, it is beautifying to the community and I’ve loved working with the artists and the business community. I would do it again in a heartbeat.”

Broennan added she would get the capital up front and take a more cautious route. She would start smaller and would know what is involved in the process. She would know what mold they were going to use and exactly how much it would cost to cast. She would hire a public relations expert. She would raise funds for something more appealing than the stewardship of public lands where the community falsely believes their tax dollars pay for upkeep and maintenance. She would allow two years for completion of the project and the ability to have the sculptures on display. She would have a track record of getting her board of directors to invest time and money in the project. She would have a larger staff. She would want a more connected, more active board.

“All these things have added up to NOT the plan.”

Broennan hopes the online auction, sponsored by Alpine National Bank, will be a success. The auction will begin Aug. 15 at www.sjma.org. SJMA is looking for more people like Dick and Connie Imig of Durango Coca Cola who purchased a puma and donated it to the City of Durango for their permanent collection.

“They see it as the cat’s meow,” Broennan said with straight face.

For more information on Pumas on Parade, contact Broennan at the San Juan Mountains Association, (970) 385-1256 or log on to www.sjma.org.

An art gallery is a place full of promise. Creative energy emanates from paintings, sculptures, ceramics, glassworks, and jewelry. The hopes and aspirations of each individual artist are brushed across canvases in alizarin crimson, cadmium, cobalt, chromium oxide, and raw sienna.

Taminah Gallery & Gift Shop in Pagosa Springs is such a place for me—at least it was. It is a soft-spoken place, much like its owner, Karen Cox, a tall, slender woman with short blonde hair, soft cerulean eyes that meet your gaze and a tender smile.
The blonde brick building sits in the shadow of the Liberty Theatre marquee and a railroad mural that hides a vacant lot. Its worn western façade is slightly tilted and missing some bricks. Four large phthalo turquoise tiles are gone. The sign above the door reads Taminah Gifts. One window announces that the place is a “Gallery of Fine Art and Distinctive Jewelry.” The other window proclaims “Custom Framing Center.” A vivid floral print flag waves near the door and reads OPEN.

The building was erected in 1895, and a black historic marker states that this is the oldest building in Pagosa Springs and has been home to a millinery shop, an automotive store, an ice cream parlor and even served as the Courthouse at one time. The location of the building was once the site of the barracks of old Fort Lewis. In the 1990s it was home to the Milton Lewis Gallery and in September 1999 became the home of Taminah Gallery. Taminah is a Shoshone word meaning forever spring. Karen Cox owned a gallery with the same name in Alta, Wyoming before returning to her hometown of Pagosa Springs.
For the past four years, business at the gallery has been a dichotomy: forty percent gallery, sixty percent custom framing. “The closest thing to a gallery we have in Pagosa Springs,” said nationally known artist Pierre Mion, whose original watercolor paintings of “Clear Creek Falls” and the “Commodore Mine” hang near the back of the shop. “A little bit of Santa Fe in Pagosa,” is how Sally Hameister, former director of the Pagosa Springs Chamber of Commerce, described it.

As I enter Taminah Gallery for the last time, I am aware of the gentle tinkling of a waterfall near the door, the smell of ylang ylang, patchouli and lavender, a plate of pink frosted sugar cookies and red cellophane wrapped chocolate candy greet me. I resist the temptation. A Rada CD plays in the background, her original piano compositions a cross between Rachmaninoff and Yanni. Most of the paintings are landscapes and western scenes by local artists. Elegant oil paintings by Carol Cooke of places I see every day. A small oil by Chama artist Avanna Lee Landwehr, “Ranch with Blue Barns” capturing the tranquility of a ranch on Highway 84 that will soon become a golf course surrounded by trophy homes. And a Claire Goldrick original oil painting immortalizes a fly-fisherman casting in the light of an October evening, somewhere along the San Juan River.
Gregory Hull captures the “Blanco Basin” and “East Fork Morning.” Pat Erickson’s work reflects intricately accurate prismacolor drawings of eagles, horses, cougars and hawks. Wayne Justus’ cowboy scenes, Randall Davis’ oil paintings of “Dyke General Store,” and a “Barn of Archuleta County,” and Celia Jones’ hunter hauling out an elk in “Packing Out,” are poignant in their contemplation of a lifestyle that is rapidly changing.

Dozens of local artists are now without a home, a place to display their work, a venue to reach their audience. “Sweep & Son,” a bronze sculpture by Celia Jones, will no longer have temporary shelter at Taminah Gallery. Randall Davis’ native warrior on horseback, “As the Crow Flies,” must now take flight.

“My mission has always been to share the tradition of artistic expression,” Cox said. “To help individuals give meaningful gifts to one another.”

The last day Taminah Gallery will be open is Saturday, February 26. Cox and her husband have sold the building to Galles Properties who will move their real estate office into the location at 414 Pagosa Street. “Last year was our best year,” Cox said. “Business is thriving. We are closing for personal reasons.” Cox wants to spend more time with her family and her elderly mother. I set aside a pair Anasazi potsherd earrings and a pendant with turquoise that I’ve had my eye on and a necklace by Brooklyn artist Andrea Lucille that I have coveted since before Christmas. All jewelry is 50% off beginning Thursday, February 10, and there will be special savings on art and accessories.

“I want to thank the community for all of their support,” Cox said, tears filling her eyes. She took a deep breath, composed herself. “And especially the Arts Council and all of the artists.”


Venues need updating.

Venues are scattered.

Event volunteers and organizers are experiencing burnout.

Events are organized around holidays when lodging is already filled and businesses are busy.

The town needs better gateway markers and signs to identify the historic downtown and develop transportation links between event venues and downtown. There is a lack of communication among event planners. The town has insufficient structure in place for event approval, facilitation, involvement and permitting.

These were the challenges identified by the Community Revitalization Partnership (CRP) Team in a presentation June 9 to a small group of town staff, citizens, the Chamber of Commerce and local event planners.

CRP is a partnership involving the Colorado Community Revitalization Association (CCRA) and the Department of Local Affairs (DOLA). The town and Chamber of Commerce applied for a DOLA grant to help the community develop a strategic work plan for improving the economic viability of existing special events in Pagosa Springs, as well as a strategy for developing a support network for new events. The Pagosa team included Barbara Silverman from CCRA, Sophie Faust from the Office of Smart Growth, Amanda Miller and Peggy Lyle, both from the Fort Collins Downtown Business Association.

CRP findings were straightforward: The Chamber of Commerce will continue to serve as a mechanism of communication until the town can fund an event or cultural coordinator position. CRP recommended improving the marketing and communication tools including e-mail, Web site and an event calendar; better communication with local businesses about upcoming events and quarterly meetings between the town, Chamber and event planners.

The team suggested the town needs to develop guidelines and requirements including permits for risk management and insurance, parking and traffic, event layout, public safety (including police and EMTs), liquor, waste management, and traffic safety. The Pagosa Springs Parks and Recreation Department should be responsible for keeping a master calendar, implementing usage fees, identifying venues and meeting staff needs. Structurally, the municipality must address the collection and tracking of vendor sales tax revenue and event-related transportation solutions.

“I think [the CRP recommendations] are not unreasonable and I don’t think that anyone should be surprised by them,” said Julie Jessen, special projects manager for the town. “They came in and gave us a good perspective from outside the box. Our community is quite transparent. We are not complicated or hard to figure out.”

“I think they put a lot of thought into it,” said Mary Jo Coulehan, executive director of the Chamber of Commerce. “Their recommendations ran very parallel to what Linda Hill and Company (the consultant helping create a marketing plan for the Chamber) recommended. Identify what we have and create an infrastructure to support some of our current events and analyze what we need to keep as a community event and what potentially we need to make bigger and better. It’s the direction the chamber is already moving in and where we are trying to help the community to the best of our ability.”
Coulehan explained that the Chamber of Commerce is trying to become a clearinghouse from a publicity standpoint to let the community know what is happening. They are working to revamp their Web site, highlight events and develop their calendar of events more fully. They also want to create specials and packages for visitors to the area that provide tickets, lodging and special offers from local restaurants and retailers. Coulehan is also trying to expand WinterFest.

“I’m trying to create a weekend that is not weather contingent, or totally balloon contingent,” she said. “I’d like to have a winter triathlon and a snowmobile rodeo, and I’m working on getting groups involved that do that. In essence, I become an event coordinator.”

Event coordination is the big question that Crista Munro, executive director of the Four Corners Folk Festival, was hoping CRP would address. “I don’t think our community is facing a lack of ideas,” Munro said, “our problem is making them happen.”
Munro was hoping the CRP would make recommendations for creating an Office of Cultural Affairs or an event planning position within the municipality that could be partially funded by an increase in the lodging tax.

“The Chamber does enough,” she said. “They are fulfilling their capacity. Is asking them to take on another role the highest and best use of their time? If these things need to be done, then there needs to be a staffing recommendation for at least a part-time employee.”

Jessen had a different view. “I think event coordination is a great idea,” she said. “Mercy Korsgren, at the community center, is working on event coordination and how the community center can fill the gaps. I know we are looking at the Chamber to fill that gap, but maybe we have Mercy continue to do this. She is already doing this.”
Munro’s argument about the best use of time applies to Korsgren as well.

“The money is here,” Munro suggested. “Money will perpetuate more money. We have to make an investment. When you have an atmosphere in town where you have special events regularly, it helps a town become known.”

Jessen agreed with Munro. “I think that special events are definitely one catalyst that brings tourists to small towns. I go to other small towns because of events. They give a flavor of what the town is like.”

However, Jessen believes some of the challenges identified by CRP will be difficult to overcome, particularly the venues. “The fairgrounds are run down. It will take money to repair them and I don’t think that people realize the necessity of updating the venues. An amphitheater at Reservoir Hill would increase the use up there and still keep it a natural area.” Yet Jessen pointed out the town is still subsidizing the community center. “The more the community center is used, the less taxpayer money has to be used to subsidize.” Jessen believes it’s a marketing issue and that usage fees for the Community Center are comparable to other communities.

When asked about the idea of creating a municipal position for an event planner, Jessen was supportive. “It goes back to funding. I think it would be nice, but first we have to have a semi-organized coalition of event coordinators, event planners, businesses and the community. I don’t think it’s a full-time position at first, but it is something that would make life easier. There are creative ways to figure out those types of positions.”

Munro believes an Office of Cultural Affairs could be the umbrella organization under which all events and festivals fall, instead of each event creating a different non-profit corporation and waiting three years to apply for grant funds, as is typically required. Munro pointed out those non-paid volunteers who work a full-time job and then try to build an event from scratch in their spare time run most events in Pagosa, leading to the burnout identified by the CRP Team.

Coulehan said she could support the idea of an event coordinator in the future. “I think right now it’s a little too soon. I think we need to look at what we have and where we think an event coordinator can really help us. I do think that would work well for us.”

Another critical issue is sales tax collection. “We currently have no way to know if a vendor is paying their share of taxes,” Jessen said. “In other communities, when they control the collection of sales tax, they see a ten to twenty percent increase in sales tax funds. Is there leakage? We don’t know. Right now it is confidential information that the town and county get from the department of revenue at the state level.”

The first step to identifying and controlling the leakage is to establish business licensing. “We are looking at business l
icensing in the future,” Jessen said. “That will lead to tracking the viability of our businesses. What we have, where is our leakage and then in a couple of years going to sales tax collection.”

The final report on the Pagosa Springs Community Revitalization Partnership Team Visit will be available in July and accessible via the Town Web site: www.townofpagosa springs.com.