THORNTON, Colo. — Meetings of local elected boards do not often get news coverage unless something controversial happens.
That circus comes to Thornton on Tuesday night.
Thornton City Council will consider declaring a vacancy for one of its council seats.
If that happens, council will be pushing out a sitting council person.
Jacque Phillips represents Ward 1 on Thornton City Council.
At a 7 p.m. Tuesday meeting, that council will consider declaring her seat vacant over a residency issue.
"My property taxes, 2022, Thornton. My law office lease agreement, Thornton. My current vehicle registration, Thornton. Voter registration, Thornton. Driver's license, Thornton. Car insurance, Thornton. Law office, since 2012, Thornton. The deed to the condo that I own, Thornton. And that is all the evidence," said Phillips.
City councils are non-partisan races, but the ideologies are known. Thornton has a 5-4 conservative-leaning board. Phillips is one of the liberal members.
"This is a political grab," said Phillips.
Tuesday night's council agenda item is "consideration of evidence and a potential vote regarding the alleged Ward 1 vacancy due to residency of the Ward 1 Council seat held by Councilmember Jacque Phillips, pursuant to section 4.5 of the Thornton City Charter."
That section of the city charter deals with vacancies. The part that city council will focus on is the part about "moves from the City."
"I did not move. I never moved. My condo is here. My business is here. My law office is here. I didn't move. I live in Thornton," said Phillips.
However, last summer she got a new full-time job in Alamosa. She became the executive director of the San Luis Valley BOCES (Board of Cooperative Educational Services), which provides educational services for 14 San Luis Valley school districts.
"I'm doing some work in Alamosa and I bought a house in Alamosa," said Phillips.
"She signed a document that says she agrees to the terms of the conditions of the loan and one of those conditions is you must use and must occupy as your primary residence," said Thornton City Councilmember Jessica Sandgren.
Sandgren, one of the conservative-leaning councilmembers is pushing the agenda item to consider Phillips' vacancy.
"We're not trying to kick anybody off of council," said Sandgren. "We're not trying to force a vacancy. We believe a vacancy was already in existence based on her becoming a resident of Alamosa."
As proof that Phillips is no longer a Thornton resident, Sandgren has provided council a copy of Phillips' loan document for the Alamosa home. It has a paragraph that states, "Borrower shall occupy, establish, and use the Property as Borrower's principal resident within 60 days… and shall continue to occupy the Property as Borrower's principal residence for at least one year after the date of occupancy…"
"I already talked to my loan company, no problem. Obviously, I talked to my loan company about this before I even got the loan," said Phillips.
Next with Kyle Clark spoke with her lender and the National Association of Mortgage Brokers. Both essentially said that the provision means the person should be living in the home and not renting it out. A lender could do a residency check if it suspected something was not right.
"The people who voted for me, do they have a problem about my work that's out of Thornton? Which I've always worked out of Thornton. In fact, I'm in Thornton now than I've been in the past," said Phillips. "If the voters from Ward 1 don't like it that I'm working outside of Thornton, which I've always done, then certainly they can bring a recall, but I don't anticipate that."
"If she owned 100 homes, we don't care about that. It's where is your primary residence?" said Sandgren.
So where is Phillips' principal residence?
She did not provide a clear answer in this exchange with 9NEWS political reporter Marshall Zelinger.
Zelinger: "How often are you in Alamosa?"
Phillips: "I do -- I do a back and forth, so it depends."
Zelinger: "Um, do you live in Alamosa long -- more than you live in Thornton? I have to ask."
Phillips: "I never moved from Thornton."
Zelinger: "That, so that, I mean I have to, where do you spend more of your time?"
Phillips: "I do a back and forth. It's pretty split actually. It's a pretty -- it's a fairly even split."
"If you bought it as a second home, if you bought it as an investment property, if there was a mistake in the filing, just bring forward the document that clears it up and then we can move on," said Sandgren.
A councilmember resigning because they have moved is not unusual. In the last two years that has happened in Aurora and Parker.
In this case, the councilmember has not resigned.
"The element of the charter is, 'did I move?' Well clearly, I did not move. I have my business here. I have my house here," said Phillips.
If five members of council vote to declare her seat vacant, council would also have the power to appoint someone new to her seat with five votes.
Five conservative-minded councilmembers could replace Phillips with a sixth.
"I'm not sure how we can ever determine what like-minded is, but I would like to fill it with a person that represents the district.," said Sandgren.
"I'll be definitely discussing with my legal team what our next steps will be," said Phillips.