The Denver City Council on Monday voted 6-5 to postpone until July 30 voting on an ordinance that would have cleared the way for new power-line towers running through Ruby Hill Park.
City Hall was packed with Ruby Hill residents as the council heard the proposal.
Dozens of people donned brightly colored paper badges reading “Protect Ruby Hill, Vote No.” But Xcel Energy officials said the replacement was needed to ensure service.
Monday’s meeting had been an anticipated marathon, with five public hearings scheduled back-to-back and council members making the rare gesture of limiting their own comments. But by far the most interest – and the most contention – was on the Rudy Hill issue.
Power lines already divide the park, but a plan would replace the existing towers with ones that are 5 feet to 26 feet taller. To do that, Xcel needs the city to amend the view-plane ordinance at the park.
Xcel officials say they need the new towers to run lines with a higher capacity and prevent looming energy shortages to some 60,000 customers.
“The core here is the issue of reliability,” said Jerome Davis, Xcel’s area manager for government affairs.
“In the last 10 years, both the number of customers and the energy they use increased.”
But neighbors around the park have been stalwart in their opposition, preferring that Xcel bury the lines.
“Don’t do this,” said Charlie Busch of the West Washington Park Neighborhood Association. “Not this way. Not this big panic.”
State Rep. Mike Cerbo, who represents the area in the legislature, said the change “gives us an opportunity to really look at those power lines and do something.”
He said the extra cost associated with burying the lines is “stuff that we can hash out and get to.”
Councilwoman Kathleen MacKenzie, who represents the area, has been equally adamant. She has said the plan to amend the view plane at Ruby Hill Park and make way for the towers is a rush job and smacks of “backroom politics.”
She asked her colleagues to postpone a decision saying if they passed the changes it would set a “disastrous precedent.”
But Xcel and the view-plane amendment’s sponsor, Councilman Charlie Brown, have said burying the lines would be too expensive. Brown said that while the new towers would cost $600,000, burying the lines would cost $5 million.
As MacKenzie pushed for postponement, she said neighbors are planning to form a taxing district to pay to run the lines underground.
Councilman Brown said that none of the speakers talked about forming a taxing district.
“We have to be responsible to all our taxpayers,” he said. “Whose budget do we cut to get to $5 million?”
Staff writer George Merritt can be reached at 303-954-1657 or gmerritt@denverpost.com.
