On Monday, October 8 th, I attended the Broomfield Land Use Review with a group of other Westminster residents to voice our opposition to the proposed changes to the retail development at 136 th and Zuni. Resident after resident spoke of their fears regarding traffic, crime and the safety of their children, of their concerns regarding falling property values and drainage, and asked that Broomfield be a "good neighbor." The speakers were sincere and spoke from the heart.

Towards the end of the evening, Commissioner Bob Davis said that he would probably have similar feelings if he lived in Amherst, and acknowledged that Broomfield was being "the bad guy." However, he then made a statement to the effect that Westminster had started the whole thing by putting in the I-25 interchanges at 136 th & 144 th and bringing in the big box stores on Huron. In other words, it was payback time, and the residents of Amherst have only the City of Westminster to blame.

The Commission voted to approve the changes to allow a fuel center and expanded list of potential tenants. And signs advertising the new King Soopers went up two days after the hearing - over two weeks before the Broomfield City Council will formally approve the changes. In other words, the changes are a done deal and our testimony meant nothing.

We should have been tipped off when we saw the work begin on the elevation changes and infrastructure before the proposed changes were even heard by the Land Use Review Commission this summer. But this is a democracy, and we were raised to believe that one person can make a difference, and that cities, like people, want to be good neighbors. What we didn't know is that it is payback time, and there is nothing that we can do.