{"id":2453029,"date":"2020-01-08T22:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-01-09T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/?p=318883"},"modified":"2020-01-08T22:00:00","modified_gmt":"2020-01-09T05:00:00","slug":"former-councilman-leavitt-says-basalt-mayor-race-needs-slow-growther","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/former-councilman-leavitt-says-basalt-mayor-race-needs-slow-growther\/","title":{"rendered":"Former councilman Leavitt says Basalt mayor race needs slow growther"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Rob Leavitt<\/strong>
Courtesy photo |<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

A third person is contemplating a run in the Basalt mayor\u2019s race this spring.<\/p>\n

Former Councilman Rob Leavitt said he picked up a nomination petition Wednesday and will decide by Thursday, Jan. 16, whether he is officially in the race.<\/p>\n

His primary motivation is concerns over growth and related issues such as traffic, parking and overwhelming the infrastructure and natural environment. He said he believes the entire Roaring Fork Valley faces growth challenges \u2014 including Aspen, Eagle County, Garfield County as well as Basalt.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t build your way out of a growth problem,\u201d Leavitt said.<\/p>\n

As a member of the Basalt Planning and Zoning Commission, Leavitt has expressed concerns this winter during work on a master plan update that the process is geared toward high or medium levels of growth in the future. He believes low growth \u2014 lower than what\u2019s been presented as an option \u2014 should be on the table.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re being steered toward a growth pattern that\u2019s more than people want,\u201d Leavitt said. \u201cSmall should have been an option.\u201d<\/p>\n

The planning commission and Town Council will hold a joint meeting Tuesday to discuss the master plan.<\/p>\n

Leavitt said he believes serving as mayor is probably the best way to \u201cmove the needle\u201d on growth-related discussions. He served as a councilman from 2012 to 2016 but lost a reelection bid. He has said in the past he didn\u2019t put enough time into the campaign.<\/p>\n

Leavitt said he has talked to both men who have declared their candidacies for mayor \u2014 Bill Kane and Bill Infante. He feels he favors slower growth than either of them.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think people that want smaller growth need to be represented,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Current Mayor Jacque Whitsitt cannot run again because of term limits. Leavitt noted Whitsitt was elected twice on a slow-growth platform, reflecting the majority opinion in the community.<\/p>\n

Leavitt, 55, is a ski instructor at Aspen Highlands and a general contractor. He and his wife, Erika, have two daughters, 14 and 16 years of age, who attend the Basalt public schools.<\/p>\n

The town government\u2019s relations to the schools would be another issue for him, he said. When he was on the council, he said, there was an annual meeting with the school board to discuss issues of mutual concern. He wants those revived.<\/p>\n

Basalt voters will select the mayor and fill three council seats in the April 7 election. Three people have taken out petitions for the three council races. They are incumbent Jennifer Riffle along with Tiffany Haddad and Glenn Drummond.<\/p>\n

Candidacies aren\u2019t official until the nomination petitions are submitted to the town clerk and 25 signatures from qualified electors are verified. People have until the end of the day Jan. 27 to turn in petitions.<\/p>\n

scondon@aspentimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rob LeavittCourtesy photo | A third person is contemplating a run in the Basalt mayor\u2019s race this spring. Former Councilman Rob Leavitt said he picked up a nomination petition Wednesday and will decide by Thursday, Jan. 16, whether he is officially in the race. His primary motivation is concerns over growth and related issues such […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2453029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-18 21:54:02","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2453029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2453029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2453029\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2453029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2453029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2453029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}