The Coloradoan Covers PATHS’ Win To Keep Hughes Acquisition in the Citizens Ballot Measure
Continue Reading at The Coloradoan, February 15, 2021: Can voters require CSU to sell Hughes Stadium land? Here's what happens if ballot issue passes (subscription required):
“----The former part of the measure was in question because the city attorney's office considered land purchase an "administrative" matter that couldn't legally be included in a ballot measure.
Eighth Judicial District Judge Juan Villaseñor disagreed, so the measure will include the directive to purchase the land. The ballot measure can't force the CSU System to sell its property, but it can make the city attempt to purchase it at "fair market value," according to the ballot language.
PATHS (Planning Action to Transform Hughes Sustainably) collected over 8,300 signatures in support of the ballot measure. PATHS representatives told the Coloradoan earlier this month that they felt vindicated by the court order that preserved the measure as they intended it.----”
Judge Juan Villaseñor
8th Judicial District - Fort Collins, Colorado
Remarks in February 2, 2021 legal proceedings that affirmed the right of Fort Collins voters to make the zoning change and land acquisitions directive described in this ballot measure to protect Hughes Open Space as Public Open Lands:
“In the end, all political power is vested in and is derived from the people. And all government originates from the people.
So, that’s what undergirds everything, from the court’s perspective.
And as the supreme court noted there, this is a right that people have reserved for themselves.
It is a right of first order. And I think it lies at the heart of our representative democracy.”