The attorney for the Walter Berry Trust submited a letter to the town summing up their experience with the town over the past 20 years. Essentially, the town does not currently have enough water to provide for development at the lake property. There is concern with the buyer of the land from the Berry Trust concerning this and other zoning issues.

A property in Georgetown that has languished in limbo for two decades is nearing status for development applications, as the town's Board of Selectmen hammers out a plan for water usage.

The property in question is "The Lake Site," a series of land parcels between the Creek House Condominiums, 22nd and Argentine Streets, and the lagoon. The site is also known as the Berry Trust land, as it was acquired in 1984 by Walter V. and Idun Y. Berry, and placed in a revocable trust three years later, after initial development plans either fell through/

Since, the Berrys and representatives of the trust have continued in their attempts to either develop the land, or reach a long-term agreement with the town for its use. But in a recent letter from their attorney, the landowners expressed consternation with the town's lack of cooperation on the project.

Georgetown officials say they are interested in acquiring the land for recreational use, but according to Walter R. Borneman, attorney for the Berry Foundation, the town has been unwilling to explore grants to purchase the property, and repeatedly pushing for an outright donation of the land.

An appraisal of the property upon Walter Berry's death in 1999 sparked several developers' interest in the land. In 2004 The Berry Foundation entered into a contract with Scott Russell of Russell Solutions, a development company. Russell, according to Borneman, was aware of the town's vision for recreational use (camping, fishing etc.) and willing to work with it.

Now Russell's contract is nearing expiration, and virtually no activity has taken place on the land, which is stuck in a quagmire of discussions about the town's ability to provide water and water treatment. So Borneman's letter pointedly asks, "What does the Town now want the Berry Foundation to do with this land?"

Borneman and Russell attended the June 28 meeting of the board, at which its members expressed desire for development applications to come forward, particular to the Berry Trust land. Chuck Stearns, town administrator, summarized the board's sentiment saying that an agreement for water usage has been the primary factor holding up a deal, but that it should not be a sticking point that either dooms development, or keeps the property in the same holding pattern its been in since the mid-1980s.

While Borneman told the Courant that he is willing at this point to accept at face value the town's claim that water has been the major hurdle, he notes in his letter that no discussions that he has been privy to since 1984 ever contained mention of the town's inability to provide municipal services of water and sewer to the site.

While no deal has yet been reached, the result of the meeting was that Stearns will work on an agreement to lease water for the land. He is currently in talks with both Idaho Springs and Clear Creek County, as possible sources.

Russell's contract has been extended to July 20, 2005, to allow for a possible agreement being reached either at the July 12 Selectmen meeting, or shortly thereafter.

The history of the Berry Trust land in Georgetown was laid out by attorney Walter Borneman in his June 16 letter to the town and its Selectmen.

Prior to acquiring the land in 1984, the Berrys proposed a hotel/resort project, which included a ski area on Saxon Mountain. The plan fell apart, but the Berrys' interest in the land did not.

After their purchase of the property, Mr. Berry came up with a different resort plan, this one even more expansive and controversial. It involved building a tramway up to Saxon Mountain, and extending the Georgetown Loop Railroad to the town's original railroad depot, the Alpine Inn, on Argentine St.

The Berrys made numerous efforts to get on the town's good side, giving Historic Georgetown, then called The Georgetown Society, 51 patented mining claims on Saxon Mountain, which amounted to 250 acres for recreational and open space use. They also gave the Society $229,000 to pay off the mortgages of the historic Hamill and Bowman-White houses.

By 1986, the Berrys realized that the town was generally opposed to resort development, so they turned their philanthropic interests elsewhere. They established a children's health foundation at Stanford University, funding more than 45 fellowships aimed at curing childhood diseases.

In 1988, a lease agreement was reached for the lake property. The town paid one dollar per year, to utilize the land for recreational purposes. The town now had control over the hunting and fishing that took place there, and could hold special events at the site. Borneman alleges that since that time, the land has been used for other purposes, such as storage, and the temporary erection of a batch plant in 2001 for Guanella Pass paving tests.

Prior to the appraisal in 1999, a zoning study took place in 1997. The Georgetown Planning Commission took part in the study, and the trust agreed to listen to community input regarding future use of the land. The information and recommendations were incorporated into a separate zoning district (District X), and approved in April of 1999.

Since Russell's acquisition of the land in 2004, and until the recent meeting, he has repeatedly failed in his attempts to verify the availability of municipal services for the site

Georgetown town administrator Chuck Stearns said that while he has not been around for the majority of the timeline laid out in Borneman's letter, talks with various residents support the attorney's version of events.