Owners and would-be developers of Denver’s Park Hill Golf Course must pay more than $250,000 to a nonprofit that spent nearly that much renovating a dilapidated clubhouse before being told that it couldn’t use it, an appeals court ruled Thursday.

It is the latest in a series of legal victories for Sisters of Color United for Education, a community health group founded on the city’s west side in 1989, and the latest setback for Westside Investment Partners and the Holleran Group, which were prohibited from redeveloping the closed course by voters last year.

Sisters of Color is “ecstatic,” its lawyer said.

“This was a classic David versus Goliath situation,” said Aaron Boschee, “where Westside, which is one of the largest real estate developers on the Front Range, and its co-developer tried to bully Sisters of Color — a small, minority- and woman-run nonprofit — out of virtually all of its assets, while acting like they had the interests of the Park Hill community in mind.”

Westside bought the shuttered course along Colorado Boulevard in 2019 and brought Holleran on as a partner the following year. That November, Sisters of Color was approached by a co-owner of Holleran,  who suggested the charity open a community center at the course’s former clubhouse. Sisters of Color agreed to but the clubhouse contained mold and mice, so pricy cleanup work was needed.

The landlord and tenant came to an agreement: Sisters of Color would renovate the clubhouse in lieu of paying rent. The nonprofit spent $196,000 doing that in the first half of 2021.

But when Sisters of Color attempted to hold an event at the newly renovated clubhouse in June 2021, it was told that another group had booked the spot. There was another double booking that August and the nonprofit was informed it would need to sign a new lease or leave.

The Park Hill Golf Course clubhouse before it was renovated. (BusinessDen file)

“Around the same time, Sisters of Color reviewed the lease agreement and realized it did not contain a provision addressing the reimbursement of its expenditures on the clubhouse through rental credits,” the Colorado Court of Appeals explains. “Throughout the summer, the parties attempted to renegotiate the lease, but they were unable to reach an agreement.”

Out nearly $200,000 with nothing to show for it, Sisters of Color sued to recoup its money. A trial was held and Judge Martin Egelhoff in Denver sided with the nonprofit last fall.

“Sisters of Color was denied access to the very property renovated at their expense, without compensation and to their detriment,” he wrote, awarding it $196,157 plus interest.

Westside Investment Partners challenged that ruling, arguing before the Colorado Court of Appeals that Sisters of Color had not been evicted, it only had to share the clubhouse with others, and should not be reimbursed for incomplete renovations. Plus, the lease that Sisters of Color signed didn’t allow for the renovations to be reimbursable, it noted.

The appeals court disagreed. The lease was void since it did not comport with the two sides’ verbal agreement, and the renovations were clearly valuable, three judges found.

The court upheld Egelhoff’s $196,157 judgment, along with $36,903 in interest and $25,802 in court costs. Holleran and Westside must now pay $258,862 to Sisters of Color.

“We’re very appreciative of the justice system,” said Boschee, one of four Achieve Law Group attorneys representing Sisters of Color. “It worked the way it was intended in this case.”

Westside’s owner and lawyers, Dennis Polk and Eric Torgersen with Holley Albertson & Polk in Lakewood, did not respond to requests for comment on the court’s decision.