Judge upholds denial of Thornton Pipeline permit

A district court judge has upheld the Larimer County commissioners’ 2019 decision to deny a permit for the Thornton Pipeline.

In a decision issued last week, 8th Judicial District Court Judge Stephen Jouard denied Thornton’s request to overturn the county decision and grant the city a permit to build a pipeline that ultimately would be used to transport water from Fort Collins east to Weld County and then south to Thornton.

The Board of County Commissioners rejected the permit in February 2019, saying Thornton’s application to build a 75-mile underground pipeline did not meet seven criteria in the county code, denying it primarily because of the impact on private land.

Thornton disagreed, saying the county abused its discretion on all seven of those factors and should have granted the permit.

The court ruling agrees with Larimer County on three of those criteria — that the pipeline did not fit with the county’s master plan, that Thornton did not provide reasonable alternatives for the location or design, and that the project did not provide adequate mitigation to adverse environmental effects.

The citizen group No Pipe Dream, which supported the county in the court case, praised the court’s decision, saying that the commissioners’ decision to deny the permit “put the citizens of Larimer County’s concerns first.”

Thornton was required to apply for a county permit under 1041 regulations, which govern projects of statewide interest including pipelines, to allow counties to have a say on projects that affect their residents.

A statement from No Pipe Dream states that “counties have the duty to insure that (those) applications benefit not only the applicant, but benefit and do no harm to the county and its residents. That was key to the Board’s 3-0 vote against Thornton’s application.”

The other four reasons the county cited for denying the permit — including Thornton’s decision not to consider keeping water in the Poudre River for some of its route — were not valid, the judge ruled.

But because he upheld three criteria, Jouard upheld the overall decision.

“We are certainly disappointed and disagree with elements of the Larimer County District Court’s decision,” Todd Barnes, spokesman for Thornton, said in a written statement. “Although we agree with the court’s decision that the commissioners exceeded their authority to require any consideration of a non-pipeline alternative such as sending Thornton’s water down the Poudre River.”

Many opponents to the pipeline argued, during a public hearing in 2019, that they believed Thornton should keep the water in the Poudre River through Fort Collins, starting its pipeline east of the city. They said that would mitigate many environmental problems as well as worries from residents west of Fort Collins about the pipeline being built in their neighborhood.