FOXFIELD — Marie and Jim Mackenzie were early “settlers” when they moved to what is now Foxfield more than 40 years ago.
Back in the day, people rode on horses on dirt roads.
Everyone lent a hand when something bad happened, like when the Mackenzie barn burned down. The next day, the couple awoke to the sounds of chain saws as neighbors were cutting down the charred remains so they could rebuild.
“It was really a cozy community,” said Marie Mackenzie, 72. “Everyone knew everyone. It was just a great place to be.”
Foxfield, population 903, still has much of that same charm it did back then.
Homes are still on 2 1/2 acre lots. Horses are still here, too, although they no longer roam the streets.
But Foxfield, which incorporated in 1994, is evolving. A new commercial development on the southeast corner of Parker and Arapahoe roads is evidence of that. And more is on the way.
Critical to its survival, the commercial development is a sign that times are changing. But it’s a balancing act, to be sure, says Mayor Doug Headley.
“People don’t want it to evolve too fast,” Headley said. “Things we do here we do deliberately in slow motion.”
Before the Foxfield Village Center opened a year ago, the only retail was a convenience store/gas station, dry cleaners and liquor store. The three businesses — the only businesses in the city at the time — generated a meager $55,000 in sales tax revenue annually.
Those have since been torn down to make way for a new intersection with a flyover at Parker and Arapahoe roads.
But just east of there is Foxfield Village Center, with seven stores and shops, including a Walgreens, Firestone, Orange Julius, a carwash, restaurant and a dry cleaners. And there’s room for several more shops there.
The development is only the first phase of a project that will include 70 percent more retail when it is finally built out, Headley said.
Since the shopping center opened, the sales tax has about tripled to $163,000 annually. That’s more than a third of the town’s entire operating budget of $392,000.
“Without sales tax revenue, you just can’t have a viable town,” Headley said.
But frugality is the name of the game here.
There is no town hall, no recreation center, no taxpayer-funded public art projects. There is only one paid town employee — the town clerk — but that position is not even full time. Foxfield contracts with Arapahoe County for services such as police protection.
Since incorporation, the town has secured a public water system, installed water and sewer lines and paved over the dirt roads.
The town incorporated because residents feared that neighboring Aurora would gobble it up by annexing it, and they wanted to secure the wide-open space and scenic views of the Rocky Mountains.
Many of the families, like the Mac kenzies, have been here for 40 years or longer. But now the town is seeing new families moving in, scraping off existing homes and building new ones.
Sky Yost and her husband, Robert, are doing just that. They are building a house in Foxfield after living for years in the nearby Piney Creek subdivision in Aurora.
She would visit her mother in Centennial and pass through Foxfield and just fell in love with the wide-open spaces and rural feel.
“You know how you drive through a place and it just feels good to you? That’s how Foxfield is,” Sky Yost said. “You really feel like you are out in the country, and yet you have all the conveniences. And it’s only gotten better.”
Carlos Illescas: 303-954-1175 or cillescas@denverpost.com
A profile of Foxfield
Population: 903
Size: 1.28 square miles, or 820 acres
Roads: 10.2 miles
Paid town employees: 1
