Palmer Lake Dollar General Community Meeting, Aug. 16 – Ehrhardt family addresses community concerns

By James Howald and Jackie Burhans

The Erhardt family held a community meeting on Aug. 16 in the Palmer Lake Town Hall to discuss the sale, announced by builder Kurt Ehrhardt at an earlier meeting of the Palmer Lake Board of Trustees (PLBOT), of the undeveloped lot north of the Tri-Lakes Arts Center for the Arts and west of Highway 105, to Dollar General for use as a retail store. The meeting was independent of the town’s administration or Board of Trustees. Nick Ehrhardt, son of Kurt Erhardt, moderated the meeting; he was elected to the town’s Board of Trustees in the last election and said he organized the meeting as a private citizen, not as a board member.

Kurt Erhardt’s announcement of the sale generated a firestorm on social media, with most posts opposed to the sale, some hostile and insulting. Mayor Glant Havenar wrote a post on the Nextdoor platform acknowledging that a Dollar General store “is not welcomed by many residents,” but the PLBOT does not have the authority to approve land sales, and the property is zoned correctly for the intended use. She applauded the Ehrhardt family for scheduling a meeting with the town, and said Kurt Ehrhardt “loves this community, is a wonderful member of our community and seeks to work with the community as he moves forward with this development.”

In his opening remarks, Nick Ehrhardt told the crowd of more than 100 attendees that his parents Marsha and Kurt own the property jointly and that he wanted them treated respectfully. He said rumors that he had used his seat on the board to influence events were “insulting and unfounded.” He turned the meeting over to Kurt Ehrhardt.

Kurt Ehrhardt told the attendees that Dollar General made an offer of $475,000 for half of the lot adjacent to Highway 105. The other half of the lot was worth about the same, he said. He recounted two other attempts he had made to develop the property. When Facinelli Motors lost its lease on County Line Road, Ehrhardt proposed it move to the property. Ehrhardt mentioned another effort to develop the property as a mix of commercial and residential uses. Both projects fell through, he said.

After his summary of past development efforts, Ehrhardt announced that he and his wife were trying to withdraw from their contract with Dollar General. This was met with applause from the audience.

Note: Several days after the meeting, Ehrhardt announced on social media that he had been successful in canceling his agreement with Dollar General.)

Ehrhardt said the land had been for sale for 10 years and he had been burdened with property taxes on it. He believed a Dollar General store would have generated between $150,000 and $200,000 in annual sales tax revenue for the town and that had been a consideration in their acceptance of Dollar General’s offer. He encouraged anyone to step up and make something happen on the property.

Following his remarks, Ehrhardt asked for comments from the audience. In the discussion that followed, several residents thanked Ehrhardt for his openness with the community and his decision to try to withdraw from his contract with Dollar General. There were offers to help Ehrhardt deal with any negative financial consequences of his decision.

Some of the residents described Dollar General as a predatory company that looked for cash-strapped, low-income communities and built stores with lax security and inadequate staffing that caused traffic problems.

Bill Fisher, an architect who currently serves on the Palmer Lake Planning Commission, said that, while he was not completely opposed to franchise stores in the town, he wanted to see an approach to main street development that uses on-street parking serving multiple store fronts, with pedestrian zones, not a big-box store with a large parking lot. He said the Colorado Department of Transportation had come to believe that their policies, which promote large parking lots dedicated to a single store, are contrary to what towns want and he hoped the PLBOT would support more enlightened guidelines for main street development. Other residents said they preferred a complete ban on franchise stores.

**Above:** On Aug. 16, the Ehrhardt family held a community meeting at the Palmer Lake Town Hall to address concerns over a pending sale to Dollar General of some land just north of the Tri-Lakes Center for the Arts building and just west of Highway 105 from Palmer Lake Regional Park. Over 100 attendees crowded into the hall, which was set up for a local theater production. Developer Kurt Ehrhardt explained the history of development efforts on the lot. He announced that he was withdrawing from his contract with Dollar General to the applause from the audience and offers of help with any financial costs of doing so. Photo by Jackie Burhans.

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No additional meetings are planned on this issue.

James Howald can be reached at jameshowald@ocn.me. Jackie Burhans can be reached at jackieburhans@ocn.me.

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