LaPorte drainage plan approved

By Cherry Sokoloski
North Forty News

The LaPorte Master Drainage Plan received final approval June 1 from the Larimer County Planning Commission. The plan provides guidance for drainage structures that should alleviate flooding and high groundwater issues that have long plagued the LaPorte area. The structures would be recommended for inclusion in future developments.

The LaPorte plan for land use was finished late in 2003, but the county delayed adoption of the drainage plan to consider several plans at one time. Plans were also approved in June for the Dry Creek drainage, West Vine, Loveland and some areas on the periphery of Fort Collins.

Earlier this year, the master drainage plan was the basis of a recommendation for the Trail's End development in LaPorte. The planning staff asked for a donated 60-foot easement on that property, to be used for a drainage ditch. However, the subdivision was approved without the easement. The county did require a 60-foot setback on one lot that would allow for the future purchase of an easement there.

The challenge at Trail's End is that the county currently has no funds to buy drainage easements, according to Rex Burns, a county engineer. However, Burns said he hopes to have a financing plan in place in the next five to 10 years. Now that the master drainage plan has been approved, he said, the county can collect stormwater fees from new developments.

For future LaPorte developments, Burns said, the county will still try to obtain donated drainage easements. He noted that the Stegner family has already donated an easement across their current gravel mining operation, which they hope to develop later as a housing community.

Tim O'Hara, chair of the LaPorte Area Planning Advisory Committee, said he hopes that future developers will be willing to donate the drainage easements laid out in the master plan. "It shows good will on the developer's part," he said, "and should help them get their projects through."