Expensive Fire Tower Truck Purchased Due to Increase in Downtown High-Rise Residentials

With every new downtown development, taxpayers bear an increased burden of paying for services and infrastructure. Is Colorado Springs entering a new era of government efficiency, or are taxpayers still seen as personal ATMs?

Last month, a video was passed along to us that we found amusing. It was another example of public servants forgetting who pays their salaries, as well as who funds what they use to perform their jobs. The video showed Colorado Springs Fire Department firefighters “surprising” Mayor Mobolade by popping up outside his City Hall office window.

They were inside the basket of a new fire truck and had raised the basket to the level of the mayor’s window. They held a poster thanking the mayor for the new truck. They likely thought their stunt was worthy of capturing and promoting. We saw it as another example of out-of-touch public servants. Here’s the video.

This is the first time the City of Colorado Springs has purchased a new tower truck in over 40 years. A tower truck is meant to fight fires in buildings 3 stories or taller and for that reason, it will be operating out of the downtown Colorado Springs Fire Department (CSFD) location on Weber Street.

Tower vs Aerial Ladder: What’s the difference?

What are the differences between a tower truck and an aerial ladder truck? Fire Apparatus Magazine went into a lot of detail in this article to explain. One thing stood out to us in the comparisons: Tower trucks are typically custom-built trucks and are more expensive.

In general, aerial ladders are often used for quick rescues and accessing roofs and windows when speed and agility are crucially important. Tower ladders, with larger platforms, offer a more stable and secure environment for complex rescues and firefighting operations, especially in high-rise locations such as downtown Colorado Springs.

High-Rise Growth Spurs Tower Truck Need

Over the past 5 years, there has been a residential-rental building frenzy in downtown Colorado Springs. Past and present city officials seem to be enamored by the idea of “infill” and prioritize downtown over the rest of Colorado Springs. The Casa Mundi and The Mae added high-rise inventory in 2020. Elan Pikes Peak broke ground in 2021 and opened in 2023. In 2024, the Weidner Homes Experience at Epicenter added more residential units and expects to reach 1,000 units. Next up is the 27-story One VeLa apartment complex that is working it’s way through the approval process to become the tallest building in Colorado Springs. 

Former Colorado Springs mayor John Suthers authorized the tower truck purchase in April 2022 and Front Range Fire Apparatus was pre-paid $1,407,297 on April 15, 2022. The price was discounted around $50,000 for pre-paying. Front Range Fire Apparatus had the city’s funds for over 2 years before production of the truck started. Production began in July 2024. It was a custom-built truck and there were a number of upgrades made, as production progressed.

Custom-built fire tower trucks take years to build. These are custom-engineered vehicles, not mass-produced, off-the-shelf purchases. The timeline from order to delivery can be quite long, mainly due to design complexities, specialized manufacturing, and rigorous testing. Additionally, the costs of building these trucks have skyrocketed over the years. If Colorado Springs had waited to purchase the tower truck today, the costs likely would have ballooned upwards into $2-$2.5 million.

We decided to look into the new truck, Tower Truck 1, so we filed a Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) request. 

What Did the CORA Say?

The CORA told us that CSFD wanted to make the truck really nice. The $1,407,297 truck that was paid for in 2022 wasn’t exactly what the CSFD wanted. They made a lot of upgrades. They were excited about upgrading the radio from the standard $1,000 radio to the $1,900 radio with Sirius, Bluetooth, and AM/FM. They got extra speakers for the radio, too. They wanted to “brand” the truck with special markings.  

By December – just before the truck was delivered – some of the CSFD personnel who had made all the add-ons to the truck were sweating it. The long list of add-ons had ballooned by over $78,000. There was some back and forth in emails among CSFD about how to obtain extra funds from city coffers to cover the increased cost. There was no mention of communicating to Mayor Mobolade or his office. The add-ons were approved by the CSFD Apparatus Committee in December 2024. The contract change order request was signed in January 2025 to compensate Front Range Fire Apparatus for the additional expenses of the add-ons.   

We asked CSFD Public Information Officer Ashley Franco why the firefighters wrote a thank you to Mayor Mobolade (on a poster) when they surprised him in his office with Tower Truck 1. Why were they thanking him?

She replied, “He continued to ensure we had the funds to move forward with the purchase and make any adjustments to the truck as production took place. Mayor Suthers isn’t in office but he had a large part to do with it as well and was very much thanked on the back end. Both Mayors assisted in ensuring we could continue to fund this incredibly important resource for our community.”

We asked Franco, “Was there a requirement that CSFD purchase a tower truck? Why did they go that route instead of a standard ladder truck?”

Franco’s answer confirmed what we suspected. She replied, “Due to the increase in high rise residential structures in the downtown area this piece of apparatus is necessary for us to have. The Tower (Truck 1) has capabilities that no other truck in our fleet has.”

Our Take

In the new era of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), many more citizens are becoming aware of the government using taxpayers as their personal ATM. Were $78,000 in additional changes necessary to make sure the new tower truck could fight fires? The truck we paid for in 2022 was equipped to fight fires and had everything to do that. We’d like to see more penny-pinching from public servants.

Additionally, we’ve made no secret that we’re not fans of changing the Colorado Springs skyline to resemble Denver’s. With so many new high-rise residential buildings popping up downtown, the city is starting to feel more crowded and less like the Colorado Springs we know and love.  The entire city has been “infilled” and overbuilt to the point that we’ve nicknamed Colorado Springs “Apartment City USA.”

We see taxpayers carrying an increased burden to pay for services and infrastructure, as unrestrained growth continues. The constant focus on having a cool, hip, and trendy downtown is an expensive endeavor.

Isn’t it time to tell them that the taxpayer ATM is out of cash and that we’d like to see a Colorado Springs DOGE?