Eli Pace / epace@skyhinews.com
A representative of IgadI is disputing information in a letter representing the Granby Board of Trustees’ position against the company’s proposed retail marijuana store outside town.
The letter signed by the mayor on the board’s behalf seeks to thwart IgadI’s attempts to open the dispensary at 843 W. Agate Ave., barely beyond town limits, by asking the Grand Board of County Commissioners, with whom the decision ultimately rests, to deny IgadI’s application.
The Sky-Hi News reported on the letter taking aim at IgadI’s application last week, and David Michel, general counsel for IgadI, requested a copy of it after the newspaper called him for comment.
At the time, Michel said he planned on speaking to the full board on Tuesday. Meanwhile, the board had scheduled a Tuesday discussion and potential vote on a new resolution opposing the store to follow up on the board’s letter.
In the letter, the town says a representative of IgadI told board memebers the company wouldn’t follow through with its plans to open the new store if the board was opposed to it.
“Prior to such application, Mr. Salturelli had stated in a number of conversations with different members of the Board of Trustees of the Town of Granby that if the Town Board opposed the application, the Applicant would not proceed with its application,” the letter reads.
However, addressing the board, Michel said it didn’t happen like that. As he described the timeline, Michel recalled inviting Mayor Paul Chavoustie and Town Manager Aaron Blair out to IgadI’s dispensary and grow room in Tabernash on June 3, almost two months before the application was filed, to test the waters with the town. Michel said he reached out ahead of time because he wanted to know exactly where the board stood on the issue before IgadI filed the application.
“We don’t want a political fight. We don’t want a PR issue,” he told the board. “We just want to run a business.”
Michel said the conversation was between him, Blair and Chavoustie, not Salturelli as the letter says it was. Salturelli’s name is listed on the application.
During the conversation, Michel continued, he told the town manager and mayor that IgadI would “seriously reconsider” its plans to open another store outside Granby if the town was opposed, but he never promised not to pursue it.
Additionally, Michel said that Blair told him the town wouldn’t take a position on the application, either for or against it, and that’s what led IgadI to file for an application with the county.
While the board and town attorney asked questions of Michel, and gave him plenty of responses, neither Blair nor any of the board members disputed Michel’s claims that the town manager told him the town wouldn’t take a position before IgadI filed the application.
Some board members told Michel he should have reached out to the entire board to see where they all stood on the issue. Others chalked it up to “miscommunication” as they essentially told Michel that the issue was rendered moot, given the board remains opposed to a new store, regardless of how they got to this point.
After Michel addressed the board, and other residents had offered their comments as well, the board unanimously backed the resolution, though there was a long, drawn out pause before the motion got its second.
The issue looks destined for the commissioners, as Michel said that IgadI gone too far at this point, having spent too much money and time on the application, including signing a lease for the building, not to see it through.
The Grand Board of County Commissioners have set a hearing for the application for 1 p.m. Nov. 12.