Cheyenne city officials to pursue 15th Street development for second time

“We’ve spent a lot of money on this already, and now we’re having another design group come in and redesign it. What a waste,” said Cheyenne City Council member Tom Segrave. “We should never have accepted the first product if it wasn’t to our standards to what we were anticipating.”

The initial 2022 plans included a covered pedestrian walkway over the railroad tracks from the depot to the roundhouse, multiple train cars in a horseshoe pattern to create an outdoor plaza, and designated pedestrian and bike lanes.

Council members described this plan as overly ambitious and a waste of money, since nothing ever came of it. These kinds of plans outline potential developments to an area that let the city choose which ones to open to bids for development and updates. The contract approved Monday is with Denver-based DHM Design for $153,055.

Initially, the funding was slated to be pulled from the fifth-penny sales tax. However, the council decided that this project would not be an appropriate use of those funds.

Cheyenne City Engineer Tom Cobb said he believed this allocation would not be able to come directly from that tax, since it is primarily used for capital projects or operating needs. Instead, he suggested the committee consider funding it with sixth-penny sales tax.

Those tax funds must be used for specific purposes. Proposition 10 outlines that funds may be used by the city of Cheyenne for downtown improvements and maintenance projects to improve and maintain infrastructure, such as roads, parking, curbs, gutters, sidewalks, lighting and alleys in the Downtown Development Authority district.

While Cheyenne City Attorney Stefanie Boster said she believes this money would fit under those requirements, it is ultimately a policy decision. Segrave said he believed it would be “cleaner” to fund this contract using reserve funds.

“I do believe some of these funds could be used ultimately for the final product, once that’s developed — curb, gutter, sidewalks, lighting, etc.,” he said. “But as far as the planning and the design, I think that’s outside the intent of the original sixth-penny specific-purpose item.”

While the contract with DHM was approved, council members expressed a need for caution with projects like this to avoid a repeat of the 2022 situation. That’s particularly important for stakeholders like the local business owners who have invested in the area.

“This is a major, important, game-changing effort on 15th Street and the Reed Avenue Corridor,” Councilman Pete Laybourn said. “We can’t quit partway because of the commitment that those individuals have made to their businesses. How that proceeds has to be based on something better, something more realistic.”

He expressed his trust and support for DHM because the city has worked with the firm before, and it is also coordinating the design efforts for the Reed Avenue Rail Corridor development plan. Council members said this may bring fluidity between the two projects as part of larger efforts to revitalize Cheyenne’s West Edge.

DHM will begin work immediately. It will begin by surveying the area and meeting with city staff to set goals. Following that, its staff will begin a conceptual design phase and then develop those concepts. They will then put together a construction document for the designs and allow the city to begin accepting bids for the projects.

Council members Bryan Cook and Mark Rinne were the only two to vote against switching from using fifth-penny sales tax funds to spending city reserve funds on the project instead. Council member Michelle Aldrich was the only one to vote against the approval of the contract, as amended, saying there should be more caution in the use of reserve funds.

“Once again, we’re spending more money on a second consultant for the same plan,” Aldrich said. “So, I would support it coming from the general reserve with the caveat and understanding that we know that this last period, our sales tax revenue is starting to show the impact of our current economy, and just want to be cautious of how much we’re spending out of reserves for perhaps redundant services.”

The most recent state sales and use tax report from the city treasurer shows that revenue was lower in the first two months of 2024 than it was in the same months a year earlier — $76,892 lower in January and $224,823 lower in February.