Rooney Valley News

Brookfield has a long history of suing when when they don’t get their way.

They recently sued Solterra residents for not issuing bond debt fast enough.   (Even though, as reported in earlier blogs, Brookfield probably isn’t entitled to raise more of Solterra residents’ taxes to pay what appears to be just more Brookfield profit.)

Now (yesterday) Brookfield is suing (again)

• to try to force Green Mountain Water and Sanitation District to provide more sewer service

• than was required by the agreement Brookfield wrote and demanded.   (The agreement is called the “Solterra IGA”)

• even after that agreement expired.

To be clear, someone at Brookfield messed up.

The agreement which Brookfield apparently insisted on between two Green Mountain Board hearings on July 10, 2007 and August 28, 2007, provided that Green Mountain would supply sewer service to the new Solterra development.

But it expired.  The agreement turned into a pumpkin on January 15, 2023.  

After January 15, 2023, there was no longer an agreement to provide sewer for any new construction Brookfield proposed to build.

Clearly the service already provided to the actual Solterra residents by January 15, 2023 will continue.  No need for fancy port-a-potties in Solterra backyards.

But Brookfield  wants to build more condominiums.  It isn’t done yet.  They have new construction they want to build.  But they messed up.

Brookfield didn’t build the condominiums fast enough over the past 16 years.  They ran out of time.

• On a deadline they set.
• They wrote the expiration date into the agreement.
• And now they are blaming Solterra and Green Mountain.

It didn’t have to be this way.  They had a choice in July and August, 2007.  The Green Mountain Board back then said the best way to provide service to Solterra was by including Solterra in the Green Mountain district.

The new Solterra development was not in Green Mountain’s sewer district.  It was in Mt. Carbon’s sewer district.  And still is.  Mt. Carbon (which is now providing sewer to Red Rocks Ranch because RRC is in Mt. Carbon’s sewer district) is the sewer district for all the Rooney Valley properties.

But Brookfield turned away from Mt. Carbon and wanted to get sewer from Green Mountain instead.  Outside their district boundary.

And according to the minutes of the July 10 and August 28, 2007 Green Mountain board meetings, it appears Brookfield insisted on doing it with an agreement (IGA), not inclusion.  An IGA (Intergovernmental Agreement) instead of being included in the Green Mountain district.  Why didn’t Brookfield want Solterra to be included in the Green Mountain district?

Might have had something to do with public hearings.  Inclusion requires public hearings.  There was no public hearing with the IGA.  (Although since it violated the Green Mountain Service Plan there should have been two public hearings).

So, for the first (and only) time, under the leadership of Adam Paul, Green Mountain decided to provide residential service outside its boundaries in 2007.  

But that was then and now is now.  

• The residents of Green Mountain have made it clear.  

• They object to providing service outside their district boundaries.  

• And, if they had been invited to a public hearing 2007 they probably would have objected to providing service outside their boundaries then, too.  

• But Adam Paul didn’t ask them in 2007.  No one did.  

• The new board (since 2018) has asked and the residents have spoken.  

• No extraterritorial service.

So, if the 2007 agreement which allowed extraterritorial service has now expired – on January 15, 2023 – how is Brookfield suing.

Well, as Brookfield is want to do, they are making up a reason.

• They are saying that the Service Plan for Solterra, which they wrote, says Brookfield will get the sewer from Green Mountain.

• And it does.  When Brookfield applied to create the Solterra metro district they had to tell Lakewood where they were going to plan to get sewer.

• So Brookfield wrote into the Service Plan they were getting it from Green Mountain.

• And so, says Brookfield, since they told Lakewood in 2007 in the Service Plan that  they planned to get sewer from Green Mountain, then they have to get it.

But for how long did they plan to get sewer from Green Mountain for new development.  According to Brookfield’s own agreement, until January 15, 2023.

And not mentioning the expiration date when they said they were getting sewer service from Green Mountain in the Service Plan doesn’t magically change the terms of the  agreement with Green Mountain, including the expiration date.  Especially since Green Mountain had nothing to do with the Service Plan.

Of course what they don’t tell the Court in their legal claim is that 

• the only way Brookfield can get sewer for their new development from Green Mountain is through inclusion or an agreement.  

• And in 2007 Brookfield chose an agreement.  Their decision.

• And Brookfield wrote the agreement in 2007.  Their agreement.  

• And Brookfield wrote into the 2007 agreement that the promise to provide service for new development expired January 15, 2023.  Brookfield’s deadline.

So, what they don’t tell the Court is that the provision in the Service Plan they wrote, based on an agreement they wrote, expired on January 15, 2023.

And what they don’t tell the Court is that Green Mountain doesn’t have to provide more service to Brookfield than it received the past 16 years.

Because Brookfield’s new development  is not in Green Mountain’s district.

And because Brookfield’s agreement to provide sewer to new Brookfield developments outside Green Mountain’s district expired on January 15, 2023.

Here is the history with the documents:

History of Extraterritorial Service in Green Mountain

Here is the new claim filed yesterday by Brookfield against Solterra and Green Mountain.  (Note, they now like to call themselves “Solterra LLC” instead of Brookfield.   Not sure why . . . .)

2023-02-17 17-29-04 2023-02-17 Motion to Enforce Service Plan Redacted

The claim should be denied in short order.

• Green Mountain is not a party to the Service Plan.

• And, again, it’s not the Service Plan that obligated Green Mountain to supply service outside its boundaries to Brookfield’s development applications.

• It was the IGA that provided that obligation.

• An IGA written by Brookfield.

• An IGA (agreement) that expired and no longer exists.

• Because Brookfield, no one else, Brookfield – messed up

• And now blames everyone else.

The new Brookfield development is still in the Mt. Carbon district area.  The Mt. Carbon pipes are still there.  Mt. Carbon is providing sewer to Red Rocks Ranch down the road.    And if they go back to Mt. Carbon, Brookfield won’t even need an agreement . .  .  since they are already in Mt. Carbon’s district area.   Brookfield messed up but there are other options.

But making a claim against Green Mountain and Solterra shouldn’t be on that list just because its cheaper to sue than fix their mistake.  Cheaper to try to make it someone else’s problem than their own.

John Henderson