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New Burlingame dealto compensate city

Janet Urquhart

The latest deal between Aspen and the Zoline family will compensate the city by more than $300,000 for its costs in realigning the road to its Burlingame Ranch affordable housing.The city and the Zolines entered into a preannexation agreement four years ago that outlines plans for the affordable housing at the city’s Burlingame Ranch and the development of free-market homes at the Zolines’ adjacent Bar/X Ranch. City voters endorsed the original agreement in August 2000.It has since been amended and extended four times, most recently with the City Council’s approval of a newly amended deal on Monday. The latest version of the preannexation agreement contains several new provisions, and extends the deadline for land-use approvals for the Burlingame housing and the Bar/X luxury homes to Dec. 31, 2005. The old agreement was set to expire at the end of this year.The amended agreement also reflects a recent deal to realign the road now being constructed to the housing site, struck by the city, the Zolines and the Soldners, whose property abuts the roadway.To compensate the city for the additional engineering and staff costs associated with reworking the access road, $25,000 from the sale of each of the 12 free-market lots on the Zolines’ property will go to the city, for a total of $300,000.In addition, the city will receive $16,666 from the initial sale of each lot, to be used for open space or sagebrush preservation, to make up for the loss of sage habitat with the new alignment of the road.The new deal also allocates $8,333 from the initial sale of each free-market lot to a nonprofit of the Soldners’ choice that will be charged with maintenance and operation of their property as a cultural center, or toward an endowment for that purpose.Finally, with each subsequent sale of the free-market properties for 50 years, the city is to receive $6,666 for sagebrush or open space preservation and the nonprofit selected by the Soldners will receive $3,333.The new preannexation agreement also allows buyers of the lots at the Bar/X Ranch to pay $240,000, to be increased by 3 percent annually, to the city rather than purchasing a transferable development right from another property to boost the square footage of their home.The original deal set a maximum size of 7,500 square feet on the homes, but allowed buyers to up the square footage to 10,000 square feet by purchasing a TDR. Pitkin County’s land-use code established TDRs, allowing development rights to be sold off of backcountry parcels and applied in areas the county deems more appropriate for development, such as the lots at the Bar/X.Currently, TDRs in the county are selling for $150,000 to $180,000, according to John Worcester, city attorney.Construction of the affordable housing at Burlingame could start next year; the council expects to select a winning design for the project next month.Janet Urquhart’s e-mail address is janet@aspentimes.com