Denver quietly gave 20 additional acres to a developer in the city’s land swap deal to acquire the former Park Hill Golf Course, which opened to the public as a park on Tuesday.
The added acreage granted to Westside Investment Partners was needed to supplement the deal, a city spokeswoman said Tuesday, after officials discovered that two underground fiber optic lines would make part of the original allotment impossible to develop. But the need for extra land wasn’t announced publicly before the deal closed earlier this month.
Mayor Mike Johnston’s administration initially had agreed to swap 145 acres of empty city-owned land near Denver International Airport in exchange for Westside Investment Partners’ 155-acre former golf course property in northeast Denver. But an appraiser found that the city would need to add 32 more acres to the parcel to generate the same value, a city spokeswoman said Tuesday.
“The City and County of Denver deals fairly and is transacting an additional 20 acres to Westside with compensation for the other 12 acres that we are not delivering,” said Laura Swartz, with the Denver Department of Finance. “There is no added cost to the city.”
CBS News Colorado first reported on the added acreage involved in the swap Monday night. The addition means Westside was given 165 acres in total.
The deal’s intent was for each property involved in the swap to be worth $12.7 million. The city still transferred $12.7 million from its Parks Legacy Fund to pay for its side of the deal, but it gave slightly less, $11.8 million, to the airport — and the rest went to Westside to offset the final difference in acreage “to ensure the land swap still has a total value of $12.7 million for both Westside and the city,” Swartz said.
Johnston announced in January that the city planned to take over the former golf course’s land and convert it to a park after voters rejected Westside’s plan in 2023 to partially convert the parcel into housing and other uses.
While Johnston said the park would open to the public over the summer, the land swap took longer than anticipated to finalize. The city didn’t close on the deal until Oct. 2.
Denver City Councilwoman Shontel Lewis, whose district contains the new park, said she didn’t know about the added acreage in the swap until the deal was done. She added that she found it concerning that there wasn’t more transparency with the council — which had approved the land swap deal in May — as it was concluded in the months after that.
“That’s not how we should do business,” she said.
A spokesman for Johnston said the mayor did share the update with the council once city officials “felt it was at a good point and solid.”
“It didn’t require a new vote, but it was something we were happy to share publicly,” Johnston told The Denver Post on Tuesday about the added acreage. “It was just (that) we were trying to negotiate to get to that agreement, because it was a pretty significant change to the layout of the land that we swapped.”
Denver Parks and Recreation hosted an event to celebrate the park’s opening on Tuesday afternoon.
“Today has been years in the making, and we are here only because of the tireless efforts of community advocates and city employees who want to see this land transformed into Denver’s next great park,” Johnston said during the event. “But the work is not finished.”
The park, which still needs extensive renovations, will be open only during daylight hours. Parkgoers will be limited to passive uses of the park, including walking and jogging, according to the city’s announcement.
The project will receive an infusion of $70 million in upgrades under the Vibrant Denver bond package if voters approve it in next week’s election.
Denver Parks and Recreation officials are still deciding which features and amenities they will construct at the park.
Stay up-to-date with Colorado Politics by signing up for our weekly newsletter, The Spot.
