JUDGE DEALS BLOW TO PLAN FOR VILLAGE AT WOLF CREEK RESORT
Texas billionaire B.J. “Red” McCombs has won few battles in his 30-year push to build as many as 1,700 homes and a resort village atop Wolf Creek Pass.
Last week, the 89-year-old businessman lost yet another skirmish when a federal judge declined to reconsider an earlier decision that overturned U.S. Forest Service approval of a land exchange that allowed access for the proposed Village at Wolf Creek.
McCombs’ three-decade plan to build a city for 8,000 people on a remote mountaintop in southern Colorado has garnered fervent opposition from conservation and environmental groups concerned about the impact of the project, which would be adjacent to the separately owned Wolf Creek ski area.
In 2015, after 15 years of planning, the Forest Service approved a land swap that gave McCombs access to a roughly 300-acre island of private property surrounded by federal land at 10,000 feet atop Wolf Creek Pass.
A coalition of environmental groups sued to overturn the decision in 2016, arguing the Forest Service was influenced by McCombs and was not transparent in its review process.
The Forest Service approval ceded details of the proposed village to Mineral County, which approved the project in 2004 in a decision that was overturned in 2005 by a federal court.
District Judge Richard Matsch in May reversed the land swap approval. McCombs attorneys filed a motion asking Matsch to reconsider his decision, and last week Matsch rejected the motion.