If you go What: Lafayette City Council When: 5:30 p.m. Tuesday Where: 775 Baseline Road More info: View full agenda: bit.ly/2mkJPAj

An ordinance aimed at forestalling the state’s authority in oil and gas development will return to Lafayette’s City Council for a vote Tuesday, a decision that will weigh heavier on the minds of city leaders amid heightened scrutiny from state officials.

The vote, which will come only a few weeks after Colorado’s Attorney General Cynthia Coffman filed a lawsuit against Boulder County’s oil and gas moratorium, will be held in the city’s public library in anticipation of a large public turnout.

Boulder County’s “open defiance of state law has made legal action the final recourse available,” Coffman said in a statement announcing her filing in Boulder County District Court last month.

Lafayette’s anti-fracking proposal has played out over the past two months amid the drama of Boulder County’s moratorium.

Crafted by East Boulder County United, the ” Climate Bill of Rights and Protections” has brought with it a swarm of climate activists and fracking opponents who have rallied around the city’s latest call for self-governance.

“We have been left with no alternative,” said Councilwoman Merrily Mazza, who along with her son, Cliff Willmeng, has championed the proposal. “We gave up hope that the state and federal environmental agencies would protect us, or that the courts would put the rights of real people over the rights of the corporate person.”

The vote was tabled last month as several council members were absent from the meeting.

The proposal has also brought with it the attention of fracking proponents, most notably Colorado’s Oil and Gas Association (COGA), whose representatives have kept a quiet presence at some of the gatherings.

“While this measure is supposedly targeted at oil and gas,” Dan Haley, president and chief executive officer of COGA, said in a statement, “it is going to affect anyone doing business in Lafayette. Any ordinance that ties the hands of our police officers and allows citizens to disrupt the operations of a business they simply don’t like is of great concern to the entire business community.”

The provision to legalize non-violent direct action protests — such acts can include sit-ins, strikes, workplace occupations or blockades — would target drilling activity and allow protestors unprecedented immunity from arrest or detainment.

Lafayette’s city attorney David Williamson said earlier this year that most, if not all of the bill’s language would most likely be “unenforceable” and in violation of the constitution and charter if passed.

“This ordinance is so extreme,” Haley added, “even the city’s own attorney says its illegal and unenforceable. City council should reject the measure and have a real conversation that allows us to address any issues they have in a meaningful way.”

State or industry officials have yet to comment on what possible legal retaliation could look like if Lafayette approves the ordinance.

Anthony Hahn: 303-473-1422, hahna@dailycamera.com or twitter.com/_anthonyhahn