Denver homeowners and businesses won’t have to start paying the city’s new sidewalk repair fee until next summer after equity concerns sparked City Council to delay implementation Monday night.
The fee will now be collected beginning July 1, 2024, more than 18 months after voters approved the Denver Deserves Sidewalks initiative and six months after it was initially scheduled to begin. Councilwoman Amanda Sandoval, who requested the delay, said Monday those extra months will give a city task force more time to explore solutions to the program’s fee structure, which currently proposes starkly different charges to residents depending on the location of their home.
“I’m responding to constituents’ concerns, property owners’ concerns and basically inequity that was baked into the ordinance,” Sandoval said. “I don’t feel like it’s equitable to base sidewalk fees based on your street type classification. I feel there needs to be a more nuanced approach to this.”
She also lamented that the city’s task force had only recently began meeting, despite the ballot initiative passing nearly a year ago. Several council members who spoke Monday night agreed with Sandoval.
Councilman Chris Hinds read a letter from supporters of the program backing the delay, though another supporter told council before the vote that they shouldn’t wait to fix the city’s sidewalks.
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