Proposed Longmont prairie dog ordinance Longmont’s city staff’s draft of a proposed set of regulations that would impose new restrictions on property owners’ ability to exterminate prairie dogs, as well as a link to the proposed ordinance that would implement those regulations and a link that people can use to submit comments through June 15, can be viewed at bit.ly/prairie-dog-regs People can direct specific questions about Longmont’s prairie dog regulations project to Don Burchett, planning manager of the Planning and Development Services Department, at 303-651-8330 or don.burchett@longmontcolorado.gov

Longmont on Thursday unveiled a draft of potential changes in the city’s prairie dog management policies and regulations and is inviting public comment on those revisions.

Under Longmont’s current city code, regulations about when — and under what conditions — private property owners can exterminate prairie dogs apply only to properties that have applied for formal city approval of development or redevelopment projects.

The owners of private properties not in Longmont’s development review process could exterminate any prairie dogs on those properties without getting advance city permission to do so.

That has led to outcries from prairie dog protection advocates, including appearances by a number of those activists at several council meetings over the past year.

On March 20, Longmont’s City Council directed staff to undertake preparation of possible revisions to the city code’s existing regulations pertaining to prairie dogs.

The new regulations would apply to all property within the city, regardless of whether a development is proposed on the property.

In general, property owners would have to demonstrate — before the city could approve the killing of prairie dogs — that good-faith efforts had been made to try to relocate the animals to other sites.

According to a city webpage, the staff’s draft up for public comment would address a number of the issues that council members indicated they wanted dealt with in any future policies, including:

• Longmont would require a city permit before allowing the extermination of prairie dogs on private properties, as well as any removals or relocations of the animals, or trapping them to donate to raptor and ferret recovery programs.

• Pressurized carbon monoxide would be required for any permitted prairie dog exterminations, rather than poisonous chemical pesticides.

• Longmont would require relocation of prairie dogs before any extermination is approved by the city, if a pre-approved relocation site is available at the time.

• The city would be subject to the same prairie dog management requirements on its own properties that it applies to any private property.

On the Longmont Draft Prairie Dog Regulations webpage — bit.ly/prairie-dog-regs — the city staff said that “while we know that there are many different ways to write these regulations and many different outcomes that could be required, this draft is staff’s attempt to take the City Council’s direction and craft rules and regulations that implement the council direction.”

One point upon which most council members appeared to agree in their March meeting was that organizations such as Prairie Protection Colorado — whose members and supporters have argued that relocation sites are available — should bear more of the burden of finding locations where a property owner could move prairie dogs to within a reasonable period of time.

Council members said relocation sites also should have the necessary advance private approvals of Colorado Parks and Wildlife and the commissioners in whatever county is being proposed as the animals’ new home.

Longmont is calling the proposed prairie dog regulations revisions “a public comment draft” and said online comments and suggestions received by June 15 will be reviewed and compared with the council’s March 20 directions.

The staff might then produce another revised draft of the regulations to present to the council for further reaction and initial and final votes on adopting an ordinance containing those regulations. The staff did not say when those ordinance-consideration dates might be.

The draft of the proposed ordinance includes a number of exemptions from the measure’s other requirements. It would not apply, for example, to: property owned for the operation and maintenance of Vance Brand Municipal Airport; dams and irrigation ditches; properties without any prairie dog burrows; qualified relocation sites within Longmont’s city limits where the animals are being managed to prevent damages to the habitat or to adjacent properties; and properties that prairie dogs have recolonized after the owners previously got city prairie dog removal permits.

Prior to the council’s March 20 meeting, Prairie Protection Colorado had submitted its own suggested ordinance language proposing rules, restrictions and procedures that the city and private property owners would have to follow before property owners could exterminate prairie dogs.

Longmont resident Susan Sommers, Prairie Protection Colorado’s board president, said in a Thursday night email that “we are excited that this process is moving forward.”

However, “there are many areas of the code the city has published that we believe need expanded upon,” Sommers said. “We have submitted our comments to the city staff.”

Contact Staff Writer John Fryar at 303-684-5211 or jfryar@times-call.com or twitter.com/jfryartc