Dolores sets final hearing on 2024 building codes Monday

The Dolores Board of Trustees holds the final public hearing on a new set of building codes for the town on Monday, November 9, and will consider three resolutions including a $143,000 law enforcement contract with Montezuma County for 2027.

Graphic: Cortez Current. Source: Town of Dolores agenda packet for November 9, 2026

The building codes

Ordinance No. 594, Series 2026, comes back for its second and final reading, with a public hearing before the vote. The ordinance amends Chapter 15.04 of the Dolores Municipal Code to adopt the 2024 International Code Council codes by reference — the building, residential, fuel gas, plumbing, mechanical, existing building, property maintenance, fire and energy conservation codes.

The agenda says the ordinance keeps the residential sprinkler exemptions it already states, and gives an effective date of January 1, 2027. The listed action is a motion to approve it on second and final reading after the hearing, as presented or amended.

The board took its first look at the codes in October. Monday is the point at which anyone who wants to be heard on them has to turn up.

A $143,000 contract for sheriff’s coverage

Resolution No. 728 would approve the 2027 law enforcement services agreement among the Town of Dolores, the Montezuma County Board of County Commissioners and the Montezuma County Sheriff’s Office.

The agreement provides 40 hours a week of directly committed service from January 1 through December 31, 2027, at $143,000 for the year, paid in four quarterly installments of $35,750. The agenda says approval is subject to correcting or clarifying the contract’s heading and its approval-deadline provision before the contract is signed, and to the money being appropriated in the 2027 budget.

$10,000 for senior services

Resolution No. 727 would allocate $10,000 from the town’s 2027 budget to Montezuma County Senior Services for programs benefiting Dolores residents, which the agenda lists as nutrition, transportation assistance, wellness checks and community engagement. That allocation is also subject to appropriation in the adopted 2027 budget.

Senior services in Dolores have been in front of the board before. At the October 26 meeting, three people used public comment to raise senior lunches and the Dolores Community Center, one of them saying attendance at the lunches has been falling. County-level senior and aging programs are separately shifting to Region 9.

Region 9 appointment

Resolution No. 729 would formally appoint Town Manager Leigh Reeves as the Town of Dolores representative to the Region 9 Economic Development District Board of Directors for a two-year term covering 2027 and 2028.

The vacant trustee seat is not on Monday’s agenda

The town had originally set interviews and an appointment for its open trustee seat for November 9. At the October 26 meeting the board moved both to its November 23 meeting, and the November 9 agenda carries neither. The seat has been vacant since Linnea Peterson’s resignation took effect on October 1, and applications closed on October 29.

The rest of the agenda

The consent agenda has two items: the minutes of the October 26 meeting and the October 2026 check register. Under administrative business the board will update budget figures based on its October 26 budget workshop.

Written reports are listed from the sheriff’s office, maintenance and public works, the Community Center Advisory Board and the Planning and Zoning Commission, with spoken reports from the town manager, the town attorney and the treasurer. County Commissioner Jim Candelaria is listed for his standing report.

The future-agenda list carries road safety and a CDOT grant, culvert maintenance and cleaning, Flock cameras, a FastTrack resolution, affordable housing, a Montezuma Search and Rescue property request, revenue generation and a Dolores Community Center site visit. An executive session is listed at the end of the agenda with no topic given.

Public comment is limited to five minutes a speaker, and the agenda asks for a name and address.

The meeting starts at 5:30 p.m. at Dolores Town Hall, 601 Central Ave. The agenda says anyone who wants to attend online can find the link on the town’s website under Government, then Town Board Meetings. The full agenda packet is on that page.

The packet is a scanned document, so the Cortez Current read the agenda by optical character recognition. Figures above were cross-checked where the packet states them more than once; the quarterly installments multiply to the annual total. The agenda names the town attorney, but the Current could not confirm that spelling in a second source and has not printed it.