Town of Larkspur

The Town of Larkspur lies in the southern part of Douglas County, Colorado and is a home rule municipality with a Council/Mayor form of government. Councilmembers are elected for 4-year terms. Larkspur is located off Interstate I-25 between the Town of Castle Rock and the Tri-Lakes area of Colorado. The Larkspur Public Works Department runs the Town's water and wastewater systems and is overseen by their Water & Sewer Board. Semocor, Inc. operates the water system on a contract basis.

Larkspur obtains its drinking water from three groundwater wells drilled into the Denver Basin Aquifer System. The land immediately surrounding the source waters include private lands within Larkspur’s town boundaries. Land use in these areas consists primarily of agriculture, commercial, and rural residential development. The Town of Larkspur operates a community water supply system that supplies drinking water to 275 residents located within Douglas County, Colorado. The Town of Larkspur’s source water supply comes from the Denver Aquifer and the Arapahoe Aquifer.

There is a growing effort in Colorado to protect community drinking water sources from potential contamination. Many communities are taking a proactive approach to preventing the pollution of their drinking water sources by developing a source water protection plan. A source water protection plan identifies a source water protection area, lists potential contaminant sources, and outlines best management practices to reduce risks to the water source. Proactive planning is essential to protect the long-term integrity of the drinking water supply and to limit costs and liabilities.

The Town of Larkspur began implementation of a source water protection plan to provide an additional layer of protection at the local level beyond drinking water regulations. The source water protection planning effort consisted of public planning meetings with stakeholders including private businesses, water operators, local government, and agency representatives during the months of May 2019 through July 2019, at the Larkspur Fire Protection District building.

The Town of Larkspur values a clean, high quality drinking water supply and decided to work collaboratively with area stakeholders to develop a Source Water Protection Plan. The Town of Larkspur obtains its drinking water from three groundwater wells (Denver 1, Arapahoe 2, and Arapahoe 3) in the Denver Basin Aquifer System. The Source Water Protection Areas for these water sources include a 500-foot radius around all three wellheads as well as the calculated distance from the Denver 1 & Arapahoe 2 Wells through which a parcel of water travels over a five-year time period (also known as a 5-year time of travel). These Source Water Protection Areas are the areas that the Town of Larkspur has chosen to focus its source water protection measures to reduce source water susceptibility to contamination.

The Steering Committee conducted an inventory of potential contaminant sources and identified other issues of concern within the Source Water Protection Area. They developed several best management practices to reduce the risks from the potential contaminant sources and other issues of concern. The best management practices are centered on the themes of building partnerships with community members, businesses, and local decision makers; raising awareness of the value of protecting community drinking water supplies; and empowering local communities to become stewards of their drinking water supplies by taking actions to protect their water sources.

This Plan is a living document that is meant to be updated to address any changes that will inevitably come. The Steering Committee will review this Plan at a frequency of once every three to five years or if circumstances change resulting in the development of new water sources and source water protection areas, or if new risks are identified.