Frankstown fights county abandonment

Ivan Moreno, Rocky Mountain News

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

CASTLE ROCK - You can't abandon what never existed.

At least that's what an attorney for tiny Frankstown argued at an abandonment hearing Tuesday.

Douglas County requested the hearing in an effort to abandon 10 towns in its jurisdiction, including Frankstown.

But Tuesday, Frankstown attorney Charles Free said a court ruled in July that Frankstown was not a town, and therefore, Douglas County could not abandon it.

"It is our position that there is no emergency to hold a funeral for Frankstown," said Free, who represents Frankstown's 19 registered voters.

However, last summer, Frankstown argued the town did in fact exist. That's when it asked a judge to officially designate Frankstown a town so it could hold an election.

The judge said no.

Frankstown — with an "s," not to be confused with Franktown, also in Douglas County — was the county seat in 1870. It was among 10 towns being considered for abandonment Tuesday. The county asked Secretary of State Mike Coffman for the abandonment designation of the towns ? some of which are not populated or which sit on private property now ? because those places have not had an election in five years.

With the request, county officials are trying to prevent small groups of people ? like those in Frankstown ? in areas once considered towns from obtaining eminent domain and annexation powers.

That would happen because of a state statute, which the Frankstown residents are using, that allows towns that existed before 1877 to incorporate without meeting the 150-resident threshold.

The idea of being considered abandoned has some residents of Louviers wondering what the designation means.

"It's an implication that we don't exist," said Tim Graf, a resident of of the community of about 100 houses west of U.S. 85 on Airport Road.

County attorney Lance Ingalls tried to reassure Graf, telling him that the term means "abandonment of town governance, nothing more, nothing less," and that it doesn't erase their location from the map.

Louviers and Frankstown were the only towns on the list that protested at the hearing. Coffman will rule on the fate of the towns later.

Meanwhile, Frankstown residents are holding an election in November to elect trustees, despite Douglas County District Judge Nancy Hopf's ruling in July that said they didn't have the authority to do so.

At the hearing, several people from the Franktown area of more than 3,000 residents, spoke in support of the county's plan to call the land of their 19 neighbors abandoned.

"These people would like to have the authority to make their own rules," said Mike Mullinnix, who accused Frankstown residents of trying to incorporate to have the power to expand and increase their property values.

But Frankstown Pat Arfsten denied that was the case, repeating her fellow resident's mantra that they want to govern themselves to prevent other municipalities from annexing them.

"We have no desire to become a big town," she said.