The City of Golden and the nonprofit Pioneer Museum management group appeared in a District Court to decide the ownership of 1,300 artifacts.
The trial was originally scheduled to end May 14, but Judge Brooke Jackson continued until after Memorial Day in hopes the parties may reach a potential settlement.
In a separate, but related matter, Barbara Mills, business manager of the former Pioneer Museum now Clear Creek Heritage Museum, was ordered to pay some city attorney’s fees after being found in contempt of an earlier court order.
Judge Jackson said Mills violated an agreement to turn over the computer that had been kept in the Pioneer Museum’s curator’s office.
Before the city took ownership of the computer, the machine’s operating system and records had been deleted.
“We’ve been faced with the problem of trying to reconstruct records ever since this case began,” said Golden attorney Dave Williamson.
Mills and her attorney’s argued that no records, except a visitors’ log, were kept on that computer and the settlement agreement did not include turning over software along with the machine.
Mills was not found in contempt for other allegations put forward by the city, including keeping Carey Southwell, the city’s representative in artifact mediation, from using a work table and protective cotton gloves at the museums storage site.
Mills admitted to events at the offsite storage unit, saying she had her “knickers in a knot” over the court proceedings.
Possible settlement on artifacts
Golden City Council called an emergency executive session to obtain legal advice on the possible settlement at their May 14 meeting.
City Manager Mike Bestor did not expect details of the settlement, if one was reached, would be released by press time.
The Mount Lookout Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, which managed the Pioneer Museum until the former managers took over in 2000, claims ownership of about 1,300 artifacts that were given to the museum before 2000 by the chapter, members of the chapter or members of other DAR chapters based on museum records.
“I think that is the best evidence we have of what belongs to the DAR,” said Jody Alderman, an attorney representing the Daughters of the American Revolution.
The scope of the artifact dispute has been reduced from 10,000 items after Judge Jackson ruled in March that the city owned the Pioneer Museum.
In September 2008, city council awarded management contracts of all three of the city’s history museums, the former Golden Pioneer Museum, Clear Creek History Park and the Astor House Museum to the Friends of the Astor House nonprofit.
That group has since changed their name to Golden History Museums. The Pioneer Museum is now called the Golden History Center.
The nonprofit Golden Pioneer Museum has moved to a new museum, Clear Creek Heritage Museum.