Steamboat Springs City Clerk Julie Franklin announced Tuesday that her office has certified a referendum petition for the city’s annexation of Brown Ranch.

Organized under the Let Steamboat Vote — Brown Ranch Annexation Committee, the petition collected 2,016 signatures, of which 494 were rejected by the clerk’s office for a variety of reasons including names not being found on the city’s voter registration list, the address of the signature not matching voter records, and signatures being illegible or not including dates.

Despite the rejections, the accepted 1,522 signatures collected by committee surpassed the threshold needed to force the Brown Ranch annexation decision to a voter referendum.

The petition began circulating after City Council members voted 4-3 to annex 420 acres of the Brown Ranch property in October. The Yampa Valley Housing Authority purchased the land in 2021 through a $24 million donation gifted to the local housing agency from an anonymous donor.

The annexation agreement between the city and the housing authority is designed to facilitate construction of more than 2,000 units of affordable housing at Brown Ranch by 2044. Funding for the project would be provided with 75% of the city’s annual short-term rental taxes directed to the housing authority through 2044 based on a ballot measure approved by voters on Nov. 7.

The council’s vote to approve the annexation agreement came a week after members had voted 4-3 to send the decision to voters at their first reading of the proposed ordinance. Ultimately, council member Joella West would reverse her deciding vote after she received a call from Gov. Jared Polis, who expressed to her the importance of moving the annexation agreement forward as quickly as possible so as not to jeopardize potential state funding for the project.

Three days after Steamboat voters approved the ballot question to direct the majority of the city’s short-term rental tax collections to fund the housing development, the state’s Department of Local Affairs announced $7 million in grant awards to the Yampa Valley Housing Authority to support on-site infrastructure development at Brown Ranch.

Now, with the petition to bring the annexation decision to a referendum certified by the city’s clerk, council members will hold a hearing in December or January to approve the certification and decide on a date for the vote, according to the city’s attorney, Dan Foote.

Before that hearing takes place, Foote said a provision in the election code allows for any registered voter in the city the opportunity to protest one or more signatures included in the petition. Those signatures are available for review on the city’s website.

Jim Engelken, a former City Council member and one of the leaders of the Let Steamboat Vote — Brown Ranch Annexation Committee, said this week roughly 50 volunteers contributed to the signature collection effort.

“There was a lot of face-to face contact with people and a lot of people had a lot of questions,” he said of the petition drive. “This is a complicated issue, and a lot of people didn’t know a lot about it and it was, for both the circulators and the general public who were signing, an educational process.”

Engelken, who volunteered to collect signatures during the petition drive, said a common misconception he heard during the effort came from a lack of clarity over what alternatives might exist to the currently proposed housing development project. He also noted the large amount of support in Steamboat, including among volunteers behind the petition committee, for affordable housing developments in the city.

“Where the conversation starts is where you get into the details of this proposal, which is a very large development, that will have significant long-term impacts, and there were big questions about how were going to pay for it,” Engelken said. “There are alternatives to this plan in what could be a smaller, scaled-back plan that would be far more acceptable to the general public.”

Yampa Valley Housing Authority Executive Director Jason Peasley has cited the lack of affordable housing availability in the city as the main reason for keeping the Brown Ranch development at its current size.

The city currently has 273 affordable housing units spread across five properties, according to figures provided by the housing authority, but the units are 100% occupied and the combined waiting list for the properties holds more than 800 applicants.

“It’s such a huge bite because we basically haven’t addressed the issue for 40 years,” Peasley said earlier this year in response to those asking for a smaller project proposal for Brown Ranch.

In response to the certified petition results steering the annexation decision to a referendum, Peasley said in a statement that the housing authority welcomes the upcoming vote.

“We know we have a severe affordable housing crisis,” Peasley said in a statement. “For the last 40 years, the demand for housing affordable to the local workforce has greatly outpaced the supply. And the magnitude continues to explode. The gap will continue to grow until we make a significant change.

“We also look forward to more community meetings to discuss the ongoing planning and development of the Brown Ranch in the coming months.”