Monument’s council directed staff to draft an e-bike and e-moto ordinance carrying a $250 fine for parents, sent a Jackson Creek Parkway drive-thru back for a redesign of its driveways, and approved a shop building that shrank because the site could not supply enough water — after discovering it could not locate the plan it was amending. The meeting ran an hour and 49 minutes and produced no executive session, which the mayor noted from the dais.
The Ordinance the Town Does Not Yet Have
Lieutenant Mitch Mihalko of the Town of Monument police department brought council an eleven-slide briefing headed “Education first. Safety always. Accountability when necessary,” and asked for a tool the town’s code does not currently give its officers. Monument has adopted the state’s Model Traffic Code and added nothing to it: as the Independent reported on September 4, the section of the town code listing local amendments reads, in its entirety, “None.”
The proposal has three parts. Prohibited motorized devices — off-highway vehicles, electric dirt bikes, and e-motos and mopeds operated unlawfully — would be barred from property the town owns, operates, maintains or controls: streets, sidewalks, trails, parks, open space, public parking and public facilities. A parent or guardian who “knowingly causes, authorizes, permits, or allows” a minor to operate one would face a $250 municipal civil citation. And officers could impound a machine on a list of triggers including a crash, a failure to stop, reckless or repeat conduct, or a prior warning.
Lawful Class 1, Class 2 and Class 3 electric bicycles are excluded by name, as are registered, insured, street-legal vehicles and government and emergency operations. “We are not against e-bikes at all,” Mihalko told council. “What we are focusing on right now is the e-motos, other off-road vehicles, and unlawful or unsafe conduct.”
The briefing put on the public record a collision the department had not previously described in a town document. At approximately 8 p.m. on August 24, an e-moto and a vehicle collided on Baptist Road east of Jackson Creek Parkway. The rider was seriously injured and taken to a hospital. The matter remains under investigation.
Council members raised two problems with the design. The first was jurisdiction. An ordinance limited to town property stops at the town line, and the Tri-Lakes is a patchwork: a rider leaving Woodmoor is under county rules, and the rules change again on entering Monument and again on entering Palmer Lake. A rider crossing the area on a single afternoon passes through at least five sets of rules, none of them marked on the ground. Mihalko said he had limited the draft to town property deliberately, calling it “the most reasonable and defensible space,” and that the question of whether a metropolitan district or a school could set a different rule inside town limits was one for the attorneys. Triview Metropolitan District, one council member said, discussed the subject at one of its own meetings and is deferring to the town.
The second was what happens after a citation is written. One council member said his concern was not officer discretion but the court’s: an ordinance needs to be drafted so that “the court and the prosecuting attorney can’t just wave it.” Mihalko suggested a penalty schedule adopted by the court might address it.
Council gave staff direction to bring a draft. Police Chief Patrick Regan’s department, staff said, tentatively has the item on the September 21 agenda. A work session open to the public to listen was raised as an option.
A Drive-Thru Sent Back
Ordinance 23-2026 would have approved the final planned unit development for a 7 Brew drive-thru coffee shop on a vacant 0.91-acre lot at 15822 Jackson Creek Parkway, inside the Monument Marketplace commercial center. The Planning Commission recommended approval 6-0 on August 12. Council did not vote on it.
Planner Rey Medina opened by handing out a rewritten ordinance, telling council he had omitted the condition of approval the Planning Commission attached. “My apologies for that,” he said.
The discussion that followed was about driveways. Mayor Pro Tem Steve King said the site’s exit sits beside the Wells Fargo exit to the north with no separation shown and no dimensions on the plan, and that a driveway across the private road lines up with nothing. Councilmember Marco Fiorito asked why the layout had not been inverted. Both returned to the same point: the entrance to 7 Brew is the exit from Freddy’s Steakburgers next door, on a shared-access easement, and vehicles would cross each other.
“I really don’t want to be right,” King said, “but I’m telling you, you’re going to have a problem.”
Planning Director Dan Ungerleider defended the spacing — a 25-foot sight triangle, he said, is a good design at this scale — and noted that access points on the private road have been reduced over time. Among them, he said, was one Target had proposed. “That’s been removed.”
Rather than put it to a vote, Ungerleider recommended a continuance and said staff would return with “a full analysis to show that either works the way it is or there would be changes incorporated.” The applicant’s engineer agreed. Council voted 7-0 to continue the ordinance to September 21 without opening the public hearing.
The Well Decides the Building
Ordinance 24-2026, a major amendment to the Native Sun Construction planned unit development at 15010 Woodcarver Road, passed 7-0. What the amendment does is move a shop building down off a hill, regrade the lot, add a deceleration lane on Woodcarver Road and open up the yard’s circulation. What it also does is record a subtraction.
An administrative building the company previously proposed is gone from the plan. Winston Jessop, one of the owners, said the office needed fire suppression and “the well that we have, without doing great big cistern tanks and all that fancy stuff, wouldn’t have supported the building.” Ungerleider put it in the town’s terms: the applicant “was not able to provide the water for the expansion that they previously brought to you. They reduced it down to something way less intense… There’s not much else they can do without finding additional water elsewhere.”
Native Sun now expects to buy or rent office space elsewhere in town, on a parcel with access to municipal water. The company builds on land it annexed into Monument; the water available under it decided how much of the company can sit there.
The Document Nobody Could Find
The same item produced an exchange about the town’s records. King could not evaluate the amendment because the planned unit development being amended was not in the packet and he could not locate it himself. “I remember this road from when this thing got approved way back when,” he said. “And unfortunately, I can’t find any of these documents. Including the PUD that we’re doing a major amendment on. So I don’t even know what we’re amending, to be honest.”
Told the file was missing from the packet, Medina answered: “Then that is a mistake on my end. My apologies. That should have been included.”
The gap is not only this packet. King said his usual route to town records no longer exists. “My default was always to go on Documents on Demand, but there is nothing there anymore.” Staff confirmed the town has retired that system: “We’re no longer using Documents on Demand. Everything’s on Laserfiche,” a system King called “much harder to navigate.” Ungerleider did not dispute it.
King said plainly that he had a problem approving a major amendment without knowing what was being amended, accepted staff’s verbal assurance that the original conditions carry forward, and then voted for it. The ordinance passed unanimously.
A Bridge, a Grant, and Two Different Numbers
Resolution 67-2026 authorized a Colorado Federal Lands Access Program grant application to replace the Mount Herman bridge, with a local match drawn from general fund unrestricted reserves. It passed 7-0. The application had already been filed on August 31, before council authorized it; the town’s grant policy requires council approval for a match above $20,000, and staff said the deadline did not permit it.
The record now carries two figures for the same application. The resolution council adopted, and the staff memorandum accompanying it, both state a grant of $2,000,000 with a $210,000 local match. From the podium, town accountant Suzanne Green said the town “requested $2.1 million,” described the $210,000 as “the 10% local match,” and asked council to authorize an application “in the amount of $2.1 million.” The motion was made as “$210,000,” corrected aloud to “$2.1 million,” and adopted in that form.
Two other statements sit at an angle to the packet. Green described the bridge as “currently in fair condition and is safe”; the staff memorandum says it “does not meet acceptable standards for railings, transitions and guardrails” and cites structural deterioration and localized scour. And Finance Director Jennifer Phillips, who filled the town manager’s role at the meeting, told council the town has “another $32 million in storm water projects” to take to partner agencies, where the memorandum says the 2026 Stormwater Master Plan ranked the town’s stormwater projects at “nearly $85 million.” The smaller figure may be a subset of the larger. The packet does not say so.
Asked what the match does to the town’s balances, Phillips gave the unrestricted general fund balance as about $9.6m, or 64 percent. “This is why I’ve encouraged that higher fund balance,” she said, “because these are the kinds of projects that can come up.” Three weeks earlier, on August 17, council had discussed bringing the expected general fund reserve down from 60 percent to 20 percent, with Phillips recommending 25.
Water Across the Town Line
Resolution 68-2026 passed 7-0 without discussion, on its third appearance before council since July 6. It authorizes a new tap serving two commercial buildings at 780 Highway 105 in Palmer Lake — outside Monument’s water service boundary, where service is at council’s sole discretion and rates run one and a half times the in-district charge.
The history is in the staff memorandum. In January 2023, council approved out-of-boundary service after a property owner reported radium in his own supply; the memorandum at the time described a mobile home park at 700 Highway 105 and estimated 10,000 to 12,000 gallons a day. The park has since been sold. When staff brought the commercial request in July, council said its understanding had been that the 2023 approval covered the mobile home park alone. Staff now says the two commercial buildings were always part of the same public water system, CO0121550, and so were covered. Usage since the connection was made in January 2024 has averaged 6,500 gallons a month.
Water Manager Jonathan Rigaud’s answer to council’s remaining concern — that the parcel might later be split — is a single one-inch tap between the two buildings, dividing into two three-quarter-inch metered lines and two accounts. The town puts the added base-rate revenue at $1,146.60 a year.
Parking at Monument Lake, Event Days Included
Ordinance 20-2026 passed 7-0 and repairs a drafting error. At a June 15 study session council directed two changes to the Monument Lake parking permit program: let residents buy a $50 annual permit, and drop the proposed waiver of permits during town-sponsored special events. The resolution was revised accordingly. The ordinance was not, and the waiver was adopted on July 20 by accident.
Repealing it means permits will be required at Monument Lake during town events. Director of Administration Laura Hogan told council the program will not start until January 1, because the resident permit runs on the calendar year.
Council raised a category the program does not currently address: drivers displaying disabled or disabled-veteran plates and placards, which national and state parks commonly exempt. Hogan will bring back a comparison of how smaller municipalities handle it.
| Item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Kiosk permit, per 24 hours | $5.25 |
| Resident annual permit | $50.00 |
| Fine, per vehicle per day | $50.00 |
| Program start | January 1, 2027 |
Also on the Agenda
A liquor license, with a caveat from the dais. Council, sitting as the local licensing authority, approved a new beer and wine license 7-0 for Milano Nail Spa Monument at 1036 W. Baptist Road, Suite 5. The applicant is NOA-MNS Development LLC. Wine would be served to clients during a service rather than sold at a bar; the operator said the company runs comparable locations in Belmar and Westminster with a fourth under construction in Aurora. A councilmember asked whether the arrangement fell under House Bill 23-1061, which governs permits to serve complimentary alcohol; the clerk said the application before council was a license, not that permit, and did not review the bill.
A water engineer joins the Planning Commission. Resolution 66-2026, adopted on the consent agenda, appoints Daniel Tucker as an alternate member through December 31, 2027. Tucker is a licensed Colorado professional engineer who has worked since September 2025 as a water resources planner at Colorado Springs Utilities, where his application describes him as an in-house expert on the utility’s water rights cases. He has served on the Arkansas Basin Roundtable and vice-chairs its Agricultural-Municipal Committee. The commission now has seven regular members and one alternate, with one alternate seat vacant.
Creek Week proclaimed. Council proclaimed September 26 through October 4 as Creek Week, the Fountain Creek Watershed District’s thirteenth annual nine-day cleanup. Mary Wilson, the district’s lead outreach coordinator, told council the district covers 927 square miles from Palmer Lake to Pueblo, that twelve years of Creek Week have drawn roughly 25,000 participants and removed more than 190 tons of litter, and that Monument already has three cleanups scheduled — one private, two public, both on the Santa Fe Trail.
An emergency connection to Triview. Mayor Mitch LaKind asked staff to bring back the emergency water connection to Triview Metropolitan District as a future agenda item, saying the funding is already in hand. “I’d like to know when and how soon we can make the connection.” Phillips said she is in communication with the district and “we’re already working on the project.” Council and the district hold a joint study session on September 23.
The budget slips two weeks. Phillips told council the draft 2027 budget, previously scheduled for September 21, will now come on October 5.
An offer from a new resident. Jamie Kimmes, who moved to Monument four weeks ago, used public comment to offer the town free AI and data literacy training for staff or residents.
What comes back, and when
September 23: joint study session with Triview Metropolitan District, 5:30 p.m., Council Chambers
October 5: draft 2027 budget; National Veterans Small Business Week proclamation
Unscheduled: a comparison of disabled-plate parking exemptions in other municipalities; the Invoices Over $25K item, once corrected
Meetings: Monument Town Hall, 645 Beacon Lite Road, 6:30 p.m., with remote participation via Microsoft Teams
Sources & further reading
The Independent’s own coverage: E-Bike Rules in the Tri-Lakes: What Parents Should Know, which established that Monument’s list of local amendments to the Model Traffic Code reads “None” · Monument Town Council, August 17, 2026, the meeting whose minutes were approved here · Monument’s Target Has Its Permit. Construction Has Started., on the development next to the private road discussed in the 7 Brew hearing · Monument’s Draft 2040 Plan Is Out. Here Is How to Weigh In.
Town record: Regular meeting agenda, September 8, 2026 (tc-agd-09082026) · agenda packet, 131 pages (tc-packet-09082026), containing the August 17 draft minutes, Resolution 66-2026 with Daniel Tucker’s application and resume, the Creek Week proclamation, the e-bike council briefing, the Milano Nail Spa licensing file, Ordinances 20-2026, 23-2026 and 24-2026, Ordinance 13-2026 and Resolution 33-2026, and Resolutions 67-2026 and 68-2026 · the meeting recording, posted to the town’s YouTube channel.
Entities: Town of Monument · Triview Metropolitan District
Methodology
This account is based on the town’s own agenda and 131-page agenda packet, both read in full before the meeting, and on the recording of the meeting posted to the town’s YouTube channel. Item numbers, dollar figures, dates, addresses and legal descriptions are taken from the packet wherever the packet carries them.
Quotations and vote counts come from the recording’s captions. Those captions are generated by automatic speech recognition rather than written by a person. Machine transcription misrenders names, garbles figures and carries no speaker labels, so names in this article were checked against the agenda or the town’s own published record rather than taken from the transcript — a check that does not establish which person spoke a given line when a role is filled by a stand-in — and figures come from the meeting documents wherever the documents carry them. Where the transcript and the packet disagree — as they do on the size of the Federal Lands Access Program application and on the total of the town’s ranked stormwater projects — both are reported and neither is presented as resolved.
Characterizations of what a document says are the document’s; characterizations of the meeting’s tone are avoided. The Independent has not put questions to town staff about the matters described here.
