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The Aspen School District is attempting to obtain an employee-housing unit through a court order that would void a 2021 sale by a former faculty member to one of his sons.
The district's litigation concerns the ownership status of a single-family home designated for public school employees. At the center of the dispute is a three-bedroom, two-bathroom home that then-ASD employee David Conarroe acquired in early 2000 after winning a housing lottery held in the fall of 1999.
The Aspen-Pitkin County Housing Authority conducted the school district's housing lottery. Eight of the 31 units, all of which were built as part of the James E. Moore Family Planned United Development in the area of the ASD campus and Aspen Highlands, were designated for district employees to buy within their financial means.
In a lawsuit filed April 25, the district contends Conarroe and his wife violated the Moore housing project's master deed restriction in 2021 when they sold their home to their son, who is not a district employee.
Additionally, the couple did not give the ASD the first offer on the property, which is a condition of the master deed restriction, the suit alleges.
The lawsuit's four claims aim to cancel the sale of the property from the parents to their son and make them honor the school district's "right of first offer" on the property.
"The Property's intended purpose was always for it to be occupied by a District employee," the suit says. "The Conarroe Parents benefited from their qualified right to possess this affordable housing unit for more than 20 years. The Conarroes' actions in failing to comply with the ROFO deprived, and continue to deprive, a similarly deserving District family from the same opportunity from which the Conarroes have long benefited. The Property's intended purpose was never to allow for it to be directly passed down to lineal descendants, potentially in perpetuity."
The Conarroe family doesn't dispute that David Conarroe was employed by the district in 1999 and acquired the property through a housing lottery. They also don't dispute the fact that parents David and Judy Conarroe transferred the home deed to their son Andrew in 2021.
In their answer to the lawsuit filed May 9, however, they reject the school district's claims that they violated deed restrictions or contractual obligations tied to the home.
Laurel Quinto and Lucas Van Arsdale of Aspen law firm JVAM represent the Connaroe family in the dispute. Quinto, speaking to the Aspen Daily News in early May, declined to discuss the Connaroes' plan, such as whether they will fight the suit or settle it. She said the family disagrees with the district's assertions.
"The Connaroes will do what is right based on the law here, and u
David Connaroe worked for 36 years, from 1976 to 2012, at the Aspen School District, where he taught economics and business and coached boys and girls basketball and track and field. He served as the district's athletic director from 1989 to 1998, according to his profile on LinkedIn. He and his wife live in Colorado Springs, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit cites guidelines from the master deed restriction for the Moore housing project as a basis for its claims against the Connaroe family. The deed restriction allows school district employees to own the Moore project homes if they remain residents, whether employed or retired, in Pitkin County.
The deed restriction, entered in August 1990, says: "Aspen School District will have the right of first offer for any of these specific units, which may come available for resale. If an owner of one of these units is no longer employed with the Aspen School District, that owner retains the right of ownership as long as that owner is a qualified employee of Pitkin County, or retires as specified in the Affordable Housing Guidelines."
The district's housing director discovered the property sale in the fall of 2023 during a review of title documents for district properties on an unrelated matter, the suit says.
However, the Connaroes dispute the district's claim that it was never properly notified about the sale and they argue that relevant documents "speak for themselves."
Douglas Stevens of Denver firm Caplan & Earnest LLC did not return a message left in May or on Monday. When contacted about the lawsuit last month, ASD Superintendent Tharyn Mulberry declined to comment.
Lawyers on both sides in the dispute "have met and conferred concerning possible settlement. To this point, the Parties have been unable to reach a settlement," says a case management order approved June 2 by Judge Laura Makar of the Pitkin County District Court, which is where the suit was filed.
The Moore housing development was completed in 1998-99.
APCHA allows for family members to transfer their housing to another family member so long as it meets the guidelines in their property's deed restrictions.