Lawsuit over Centerra South pacts to go to trial

LOVELAND — The city of Loveland will allow a Loveland resident’s lawsuit challenging the validity of the City Council’s spring 2023 approvals of the Centerra South urban-renewal and financing agreements to go to trial.

“I can confirm that the City of Loveland is not contesting his suit and we are moving to trial,” Kim Overholt, the city’s manager of communications and engagement, told BizWest on Tuesday.

Barbershop owner Bill Jensen sued the city last December, alleging that the previous city council’s votes to approve the agreements with developer McWhinney Real Estate Services were invalid based on violations of city and state open-meetings rules and improper notice.

District Court Judge C. Michelle Brinegar in March threw out Jensen’s complaint — but not based on its merits. She instead dismissed it based on laws that prohibit relitigation of claims that already had been decided. Jensen had filed a complaint in June 2023 echoing Loveland mayor Jacki Marsh’s contention that the council didn’t provide sufficient notice for the May 2, 2023, hearing and vote on Centerra South, and asked the court to determine whether Colorado’s urban-renewal laws had been violated. District Judge Laurie Dean dismissed that complaint last September but also not on its merits; she ruled Jensen filed it after a statutory deadline.

Jensen appealed in May to the Colorado Court of Appeals in Denver, alleging that Brinegar’s ruling was in error and that his complaint should be remanded back to the Eighth Judicial District Court in Larimer County. By not contesting his appeal, the case will return to the Larimer district court, at a date yet to be set.

“At least it means we’re going to start arguing the merits,” Jensen said Tuesday. 

The allegations stem from letters that council members Dana Foley, Patrick McFall, Steve Olson and Andrea Samson, and former council members Richard Ball, John Fogle and Don Overcash signed on Loveland City Council letterhead and sent to Gov. Jared Polis and state lawmakers. The letter to Polis was sent April 19, 2023, and signed by all but Samson. All seven signed the letter to members of the General Assembly that was sent April 27, 2023.

Jensen filed a second complaint against the city earlier this month, Representing himself, his new lawsuit contended that the council deprived him of transparency and violated open-meetings law when a quorum emerged from an executive session at 2:15 a.m. on Feb. 21 and reversed its Nov. 21 decision to rescind the McWhinney agreements. Jensen alleged that the action was done “without a full and timely notice to the public” and without citizens’ opportunity to comment on the action it took.

McWhinney sued the city on Nov. 28, a week after the newly elected council majority’s vote to rescind the agreements, and Jensen’s lawsuit alleged that the developer offered a settlement agreement at 7 p.m. Feb. 20 during the council’s meeting — but that the tendered offer was only valid for five hours, ending at midnight, a half hour before the council quorum went into executive session and more than two hours before it emerged in the wee hours of Feb. 21 and voted to restore the Centerra South agreements.

Jensen’s complaint alleges that that 2:15 a.m. vote was taken “when ordinary community members are asleep in their beds … thus denying the public of their broad rights to transparent policy making.”

Jensen said Tuesday that “it’s interesting to note that, on both occasions, the creation of Centerra South and then later the reinstatement of Centerra South were both done without proper public notice. Conversely, only its rescission was publicly noticed.”

The first lawsuit is Bill Jensen v. Loveland City Council in Larimer County District Court, case number 2023-CV-246. The second lawsuit is Bill Jensen v. Loveland City Council in Larimer County District Court, case number 2024-CV-170.