The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Quick decision necessary
By Mark Reaman
The Crested Butte Town Council is hoping that all four entities that fund the Gunnison Valley Regional Housing Authority (GVRHA) agree to proceed with a proposal this November asking voters to consider a property tax to go toward affordable housing projects in the county.
But if just one of the entities, the county, the towns of Crested Butte and Mt. Crested Butte or the city of Gunnison, decides the time isn’t right, such a tax proposal would not move forward and the Crested Butte council would want to consider putting a Crested Butte tax issue before its voters. The initial idea would be an additional sales tax on short-term rentals in town. The council directed its staff to investigate that option and determine a timeline to make it possible.
The council’s housing authority representative, Jim Schmidt, said the GVRHA board decided in a split vote to proceed with the tax initiative but it is now up to the funding entities to agree to move ahead with a one mill property tax for affordable housing.
“The recent survey indicated it would be a very close vote,” said Schmidt. “This made some people on the board hesitant about proceeding. Each of the entities must agree to proceed and that decision has to be made before September 8. Everyone on the board did agree that any ballot issue would have to firmly define what the money would be used for but not everyone is ready to move ahead this year.”
Mayor Glenn Michel suggested the council ask the county clerk to put in a “placeholder” for a possible Crested Butte tax initiative if the county one did not materialize. He suggested a new sales tax could be imposed just on short-term rentals (STRs) in town and the money used for the town’s affordable housing budget.
“The question right now is whether we should ask the town manager and town attorney to begin the process of lining up such an issue,” Michel said. He told the council that a new 5 percent sales tax on top of current STR sales tax could generate about $250,000 per year. Interim town attorney John Sullivan indicated he believed such a tax measure is legally allowed by the state.
Councilman Chris Ladoulis wasn’t quite on board with the idea, saying the council hadn’t defined the differences between affordable housing and workforce housing, and what a new tax would specifically go toward. He made it clear that local businesses were seeking seasonal workforce housing, primarily through rentals. While he said the recent Brush Creek rental proposal could address that issue, he wanted more clarity on the projects within the town if a new tax were passed.
Town manager Dara MacDonald said that given election timelines, the council needed to make a decision pretty quickly on whether to proceed.
“I look at this as Plan B in case the county tax doesn’t proceed ahead,” said Michel.
“Doing this and pursuing Plan B sort of puts pressure on Plan A with the rest of the entities in the county then,” noted councilman Paul Merck.
“Affordable housing has been discussed as a major priority both in town and the county,” said MacDonald. “If we can move ahead countywide that would be great. This provides an option to perhaps move ahead on a more local solution if that doesn’t work out this time. The countywide solution is the best path but if it is not there yet, Crested Butte can continue to move forward.”
“Perhaps there should be a provision in the ballot language that states it will sunset and go away if a countywide tax for affordable housing is approved,” suggested councilman Jim Schmidt.
“What the town would fund would be different from what the county tax money would be used for,” said councilman Chris Ladoulis. “I don’t see them as mutually exclusive.”
“A Crested Butte tax would just apply to Crested Butte and the money would remain in Crested Butte,” emphasized mayor Glenn Michel.
The council asked MacDonald to continue investigating the procedure to possibly put such a Crested Butte tax on the ballot for this November.
