Scout's service project to be demolished

ARVADA – A wheelchair ramp, built as an Eagle Scout project by a teenager whose mother uses a wheelchair, will be ripped up due to a land dispute.

Stephen Grundy, a Boy Scout and Pomona High School senior, completed the project to earn his Eagle Scout Medal.

The 42-foot-long ramp, finished in October 2007, allows wheelchairs and strollers to access a previously-built bridge over the Farmers Highline Canal in Two Ponds Wildlife Refuge. The Farmers Highline Canal Company now wants the ramp removed to allow maintenance of the canal.

Two Ponds covers 72 acres in Arvada near the intersection of West 80th Avenue and Kipling. Refuge Manager Vic Elam says Two Ponds is the country's smallest federal wildlife refuge in an urban setting.

Elam says the trail system at Two Ponds was largely wheelchair-accessible, with the exception of the entrance to the bridge. Grundy agreed to take on the project.

Grundy and Troop 176 put in 350 hours of work and $1,200 to complete the ramp to the specifications of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

"I think he did a great job with it," Elam said.

Of the canal company's subsequent request for demolition, "It's unfortunate. I feel bad about it," said Elam.

The Farmers Highline Canal Company says Elam and Two Ponds only had authorization for a bridge, not a wheelchair ramp allowing accessibility.

The company referred questions to its attorney, Brice Steele, who released a statement reading in part: "The High Line Board was aware that the ramp had been a Boy Scout project, the decision to require its removal was not made lightly. The Board believed and continues to believe that the ramp as it is currently constructed presents a hazard to those who use it and a potential liability to the company."

Steele also cited a need for dredging work along the canal that he said cannot be accomplished with the wheelchair ramp in place.

The news of the ramp's impeding demolition upset frequent refuge visitor Dana Hart.

"What a sad thing," she said. "That is just a disgrace."

"I'm so disappointed," Grundy said. "I worked so hard on it."

He worried he'd disappointed his mother, who would no longer be able to navigate the Two Ponds trail system in her wheelchair.

"She's a big part of my life," he said. "She's the reason I'm an Eagle Scout now."

"It's just heartbreaking," Sandy Grundy, Stephen's mother, said.

But she encouraged her son to remain positive, even as refuge workers prepare to take apart his treasured project.

"The scouting spirit is here and the community service is here" she said of the site. "That's really the most important part."

The demolition will be undertaken by employees of the wildlife refuge.

The canal company has proposed a larger-scale, more costly, wheelchair access solution, but that would need to be paid for with tax dollars and constructed by refuge employees.

It is uncertain if that will happen. Multiple projects vie for a limited amount of funds, according to Elam, that is why the refuge relies on the volunteer work of Eagle Scouts.

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