Law enforcement and elected officials representing Teller County and its communities stood together in asking Colorado Springs to drop its proposal to withdraw from the El Paso-Teller County 911 Authority at a news conference on Tuesday.

“Mayor Yemi [Mobolade], you’re a friend, and I know your staff brought you a proposal. … You can turn this down; this is a bad idea,” Teller County Commissioner Dan Williams said.

Williams and other Teller County officials say the loss of those funds will harm Colorado Springs residents’ ability to call 911 once they leave city limits, something ensured since the authority’s formation in 1990.

A Colorado Springs Police Department spokesperson said that was unknown.

“The city can’t comment on or predict exactly what moves our proposed plan would result in for other counties,” the spokesperson said. “We certainly acknowledge adjustments would need to be made.

“The current reality is that when people who live in Denver, Aurora and Pueblo leave those city limits and call 911 from neighboring counties, there are currently robust 911 services available in those neighboring counties and jurisdictions and they are not experiencing problems calling 911 in those neighboring areas.”

Williams was not interested in burdening the county’s residents with a possible $2 million loss caused by the departure because the majority of them are over 65 and living on fixed income. The commissioners could place tolls at entrances into the county if they want to try to recoup the funds, assuming the agencies “fail to work together.”

“The regional approach is so we can all have shared pain and benefits — and it’s the Colorado way,” Williams said. “Our governor has said that, our DNR has said that, everyone has said that. That’s how we do everything in Colorado, so this is abhorrent, it’s wrong … just take it off the agenda.”

Mobolade, alongside Colorado Springs fire and police officials, announced the move on June 22 and notified the authority of their decision hours beforehand. They said that the money saved will benefit the city by keeping dollars currently contributed to the authority by its residents within Colorado Springs. That’s an estimated $3.8 million more than current allocations.

To divert those funds, the Colorado Springs City Council needs to approve its own monthly phone fee that is statutorily required to be used for 911 services, which can be set up to $2.19 without approval from the Colorado Public Utilities Commission.

The authority currently uses the $2 fee it collects to fund dispatch centers in Colorado Springs, Cripple Creek, El Paso County, Fort Carson, Teller County and Woodland Park.

The mayor and other city leaders, including CSPD Chief Adrian Vasquez, “presented in detail” the “disparities” with the authority to the City Council, according to a news release by the city Tuesday evening.

“Colorado Springs handles about 75% of the regional 911 call volume, yet we receive only 45% of the 911 funding,” Mobolade stated in the release. “Our first responsibility is to the people of Colorado Springs, and we are done subsidizing the Authority through this agreement.”

A CSPD spokesperson described the current authority funding mechanism as “materially disadvantaged” to the city’s residents and taxpayers, according to an additional Tuesday evening news release. He added that the city would only rejoin the authority if it agrees to “at a minimum”:

• Restructure the authority’s intergovernmental agreement. 
• Reform the Authority Board makeup to be proportional to population, 911 calls and fee contributions.
• Create a “restructured, equitable and defined method” to distribute authority funds.
• Reform administrative cost.

The City Council will take up the issue on Aug. 10 during a work session, which will feature presentations by both city and 911 authority officials. The nine Authority Board members are set to further the discussion alongside the city’s three representatives at their meeting on July 29. 

“It is not the time to unravel public safety; it is not the time to come up with some novel approach that says, ‘We’re going to take care of our own and not our neighbors,’” Teller County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Chief Kevin Tedesco said, referring to Colorado’s dangerous wildfire conditions.

Williams and Tedesco emphasized the importance of the authority’s role in providing vital dispatch resources during the Waldo Canyon and Black Forest fires.

El Paso County Sheriff Joe Roybal cited the same fires in praising the Authority’s role in providing interoperable radios; he wrote in a statement on June 24 about the city’s impending departure.

Colorado Springs has not determined when in 2027 it will depart from the Authority, whose bylaws grant Mobolade unilateral control over the decision.

Still, the relationship between the Teller County commissioners and the city remains unchanged so far.

“It has not damaged the relationship and we don’t want it to,” Teller County Commissioner Erik Stone said. “That’s why we’d like the city to set this aside and say, ‘You know what, it’s a bad idea. We don’t support it.’”

The commissioners have not had formal conversations with the city about the subject but have sent the city a letter about their concerns.

It is unclear whether Colorado Springs could rescind its announcement to leave the Authority, although it would likely require Mobolade’s signature.

If a new authority is approved, Colorado Springs could become the fifth city in the state to have a 911 authority within a county authority and the first since 2020, joining Aurora, Federal Heights, Pueblo and Thornton.

Pueblo and Aurora have always had separate city authorities, while Thornton and Federal Heights left Adams County’s authority, ADACOM911, in 2004 and 2020, respectively.

Dispatchers with the cities of Pueblo, Thornton and Federal Heights, and Arapahoe County previously told The Gazette their working relationships have not been affected by having separate city and county authorities.

At Tuesday’s news conference, Tedesco said he has “heard some detriments” of having separate authorities, but he did not want to mention any specifically at that time.