Campaign and Petition to Clean Up Calhan’s Management

Protect the Future of Calhan!

Please join the Campaign to Protect the Future of Calhan, and add your name to the Petition!

Let’s make our collective voices be heard with the Town of Calhan Board of Trustees!

The Town of Calhan is growing by leaps and bounds, and many governance and management decisions are occurring that will direct the future of our town for decades to come.

However, our Town of Calhan has suffered from both insufficient and incompetent management for many years. For several years, most of the Town’s management has been improperly in the hands of the Town Clerk, Cindy Tompkins, a person without proper qualifications or authority to oversee key contracts and other responsibilities for Calhan. Yet Tompkins receives an annual salary of over $46,000 a year, and to show for it, Calhan continues to receive ANYTHING BUT the efficient and fiscally responsible operations we deserve.

The negative impacts of the ongoing mismanagement of Calhan’s operations are severe:

Too much money has been wasted on projects improperly handed to the Town Clerks’ personal friends and work associates;
Contracts have been mismanaged and modified by the Town Clerk without authority, then awarded to vendors unwilling or incapable of satisfactorily completing them; and
Too many questionable expenditures and hiring and firing of employees have taken place!
See below for a list of just a few examples of how Calhan’s residents have been negatively impacted by incompetent town management!

Many examples of self-dealing, conflicts of interest, and abuse of power were outlined in a legal letter to Jeff Parker, Calhan’s designated Town Attorney (Calhan being among many municipalities he has legal responsibility for), however Mr. Parker refused to take any meaningful action to enact necessary changes. Parker won’t even make public the results of the investigation he claims to have conducted on the matter, despite our taxpayer dollars paying for Parkers’ and Tompkins’ salaries! Aside from Parker’s investigation results, you can find the rest of these communications on our website at CalhanChamber.com.

The time is now for us Residents to demand changes. We want our Town governed and managed responsibly!! As tax-paying residents of a Town undergoing significant growth, we deserve that!

Petition to Protect the Future of Calhan

Tell the Town of Calhan Board of Trustees we deserve qualified, competent management, and that you support this petition:

We want to replace the current town management with personnel who have proper experience and authority to manage Calhan’s affairs in the best interests of its residents!
To start, we urge you to replace the Town Clerk with a properly qualified Town Manager, who is hired through a broad search and transparent process.
And finally, the results of Calhan’s Town Attorney - Jeff Parker’s investigation results (that our taxes funded) of potential corruption and mismanagement by the Town Clerk’s Office must be released to the public. And if Parker is not willing to make the results public, then we call for his resignation so that we can replace him with a Town Attorney who will look out for Calhan’s residents, and not simply protect a select few of his buddies from appropriate legal and regulatory accountability.

WHAT:

The Town of Calhan Chamber of Commerce has been actively involved in monitoring the Town’s finances and expenditures to ensure that proper management and transparency by our local government is occurring. Unfortunately, we have instead found a continuous series of mismanagement, waste, incompetence, and lack of transparency - that seems to have become the normal set of operating procedures within the Town Clerk’s Office and by other Town employees. When Jeff Parker, Town Attorney, was asked to investigate the potential corruption by the Town Clerk’s Office, he seems to have chosen to enable and contribute to the corruption rather than do anything to fix it. Rather than hold anyone accountable or require badly needed changes, he has simply dismissed the numerous instances of wrongdoings. But we can’t know how he came to that conclusion because he refuses to make the results of his investigation publicly available. This is unacceptable behavior by our government employees who are being paid to protect us, not enable corruption and incompetence!

The main problem is that the Town of Calhan does not have people with proper credentials, experience or authority to manage its operations. Yet we are growing tremendously, and now more than ever need qualified personnel in place! Why are we paying a Town Clerk over $46,000 per year, when we could be using that money on a Town Manager with relevant experience and qualifications for quality municipal management of Town operations.

The solution is simple: Hire qualified personnel. To start, replace the Town Clerk, who has been found to be acting outside her authority and skill set, with a properly qualified Town Manager. The State of Colorado even has some funding available for this type of position that should be tapped.

And if our Town Attorney, Jeff Parker, refuses to take appropriate action to ensure our Town’s operations are running without special favoritism and conflicts of interest, well then he needs to step aside as well. We need a Town Attorney who will be diligent in ensuring that our government operations are managed without conflicts and abuses.

Calhan is growing, and major decisions confront our Town that will impact all of us for many years down the road. We want and deserve qualified personnel in place to ensure our Town funds are used appropriately, our contracts are awarded to the most qualified, our projects are completed to the highest quality possible – all for the benefit to all residents, not just a few who seem willing to abuse their authority to bend and break the rules to the detriment of the rest.

CalhanChamber.com

Let our Town’s Board of Trustees know you favor replacing the Town Clerk with a properly qualified Town Manager. Protect the Future of Calhan!

WHAT YOU CAN DO:

Residents must be involved to demand the changes to our government operations. Here are some ways you can get your message to the Calhan Board of Trustees. You can contact the Board of Trustees directly to inform them of your support for the Petition to Protect the Future of Calhan, or send your message to the Town of Calhan Chamber of Commerce and we will deliver them to the Board of Trustees for you.

HOW:

There are many ways you can make your voices heard!

Please take the one that is most convenient for you!

Call, mail, email or stop by the Town of Calhan Chamber of Commerce to request and sign the Petition to Protect the Future of Calhan to the Board of Trustees for the Town of Calhan – to take the proper steps to Protect Calhan’s Future!

Our address is: 1035 5^th Street, Calhan, Colorado 80808.

Our email is Calhanchamber@aol.com.

Download a Petition form from our website www.CalhanChamber.com and then mail it to the Town of Calhan Chamber of Commerce so that we can provide the Petition and signatures to the Board of Trustees.
Send an email to the Calhan Chamber of Commerce expressing your support for the Petition (below), and we will be sure to deliver your note to the Board of Trustees. Include your name and phone #, and send your email to calhanchamber@aol.com.
Call the Board of Trustees directly at 347-2586, and let them know: Enough is Enough! We want to Protect the Future of Calhan. Read the Petition to them over the phone!

WHY:

Some specific facts and examples concerning the numerous instances of incompetence, waste and mismanagement while the Town Clerk has been essentially managing Town of Calhan operations, and why we need to demand a change, are the following:

Town of Calhan Town Clerk, Cindy Tompkins:

Cindy Tompkins has been Town Clerk of the Town of Calhan since 2005.
During that time, there have been five different Mayors, none of whom have been involved in day to day operations for the Town of Calhan, leaving most of the responsibility for management of Calhan operations improperly in the hands of this unqualified Town Clerk.

Missing Water, Missing Revenue:

In 2014, while Cindy Tompkins has been serving as Town Clerk, millions of gallons of water have been identified as improperly taken, leaving the Town without the thousands of dollars of revenue it should have received for that missing water. See entire Calhan Water Report on this webpage.

The Town Pavilion That Almost Was:

Two bids for a Town Pavilion Project were issued in 2015, however, none of the viable contractors who bid on them were accepted. Instead, the Town Clerk substantially modified the bid from the original pavilion plans, and then awarded the project to a (now former) town employee and friend of Cindy’s. The construction contract was then also modified to accommodate this vendor. It is not clear that Cindy had the authority to modify the bids or the contract, and in fact, the project was never formally certified by the Town as completed - as was required by the construction contract.
What was intended to be a Town Pavilion, as now constructed - is a complete downgrade from its original design and appears more like a bus stop, rendering it nearly useless. The project was originally established as a two phase project, but it’s not clear that even the first phase was completed. We’re left with barely a hot dog stand with two bathrooms.
We’ve ended up with an embarrassment of a structure that is nothing close to what should have been the pride of the Town Center! The Town can’t even find a retail tenant for it, despite offering essentially free rent of less than $5 per month!
While luxury homes are built at a cost of around $160 per square foot, this glorified shed cost nearly $1,200 per sq. foot to build. What we’ve received for this premium cost is essentially the most expensive hot dog stand in the Country!
The “Town Pavilion That Should Have Been” stands as a scathing reminder that the Town Clerk is not qualified or authorized to be managing our Town’s projects and contracts, and of the urgent need for Calhan to have qualified, responsible management in her place.

Other Improperly Sourced Construction Projects:

At least one other construction contract was awarded to the personal friend of Cindy Tompkins and (now former) employee of the Town, which seems to be a violation of the State of Colorado’s regulations against self-dealing and conflicts of interests.
In November, 2015, another project for over $23,000 of fencing in Calhan was awarded to the same family that was awarded the pavilion project, despite the obvious conflict of interest and self-dealing violations it represented to make the award to a family member of a personal friend to the Town Clerk and employee of the Town. It does not appear that an open bidding process was made available to multiple vendors to determine what could have been a lower bid and contract price for the job.

Calhan Mosquito Spraying Resources, Used to Benefit Another Town:

As reported in the Ranchland News in August 2016, the Town of Ramah had the benefit of mosquito spraying using equipment and labor of the Town of Calhan. While all of this seems neighborly of us, the obvious questions arise.
Why did Ramah get fully mosquito spray coverage in 2016, while Calhan received none? Yet Ramah only paid for 1/3 the spray. It seems the spray that was paid for by Calhan was used only in Ramah. Why didn’t the Town Clerk for Calhan send the Town of Ramah an invoice for the labor and equipment costs for the spraying? Why did the Town of Ramah only get Could it be because the Town Clerk for Calhan lives in Ramah and cares more about her own home-town and living comfort that ours?
It’s not clear that safe spray was used – the Chamber has received nearly a dozen calls from Ramah residents reporting that hundreds of birds have been found dead, and some unexplained illnesses by dogs and cats, and increased rater of respiratory issues for some of those residents!

Lack of Transparency and Accountability:

Colorado Open Records Requests have identified many thousands of dollars that have been resourced to the Town Clerk for time and mileage for running errands and making purchases including for candy and soda pop. Notwithstanding whether these purchases are even needed, most of the items purchased are eligible for free delivery. These funds going to Cindy Tompkins for her time and her gas tank, could be more effectively utilized for repaving streets in bad need of repair, or for many other more important needs of our residents.
The Chamber of Commerce has requested a full audit of all accounts for the Town of Calhan, but this request has been refused. Neither would the Board of Trustees stand up to Cindy Tompkins and require her to fulfill this request for transparency and accountability!

PETITION TO PROTECT THE FUTURE OF CALHAN

Click here for a downloadable, printable form that you can sign and return to the Board of Trustees

The residents of Calhan deserve proper transparency and accountability by our Town Officials. Sign the Petition to Protect the Future of Calhan to let them know!

Let the Town of Calhan Board of Trustees Know You Wish to Protect Calhan’s Future!

As a resident of the Town of Calhan, I urge the hiring of qualified personnel to oversee management of the Town of Calhan in a manner that is in the best interests of its residents!

I support the following Petition:

We want to replace the current town management with personnel who have proper experience and authority to manage Calhan’s affairs in the best interests of its residents!
To start, we urge you to replace the Town Clerk with a properly qualified Town Manager, who is hired through a broad search and transparent process.
And finally, the results of Calhan’s Town Attorney - Jeff Parker’s investigation results (that our taxes funded) of potential corruption and mismanagement by the Town Clerk’s Office must be released to the public. And if Parker is not willing to make the results public, then we call for his resignation so that we can replace him with a Town Attorney who will look out for Calhan’s residents, and not simply protect a select few individuals from appropriate legal and regulatory accountability.

Signed:

______________________________________________ _____________________________________________

Printed Name Signature

______________________________

Date

________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Address

Other Resources

The following documents are resources that demonstrate the strong need for residents and businesses to call for transparency and accountability for the Town of Calhan.

A. Calhan Hall of Shame references and media articles.
B. Campaign document
C. May 9, 2017 Request for Records and response concerning updates to Calhan procurement policies.
D. April 3, 2017 Request for Records and response concerning investigation of Town Clerk activities.
E. Jan 18, 2017 Response by Calhan Town Attorney Jeff Parker to Request for Investigation
F. Oct. 2016 letter to Calhan Town Attorney Jeff Parker to request investigation of activities by Town Clerk Office.
G. Brochure sent to Calhan Residents in 2015 regarding missing bulk water, investigation by Colorado Bureau of Investigation, and increased water rates.