Laserfiche WebLink
complaint concerning costs made it clear that the $3 million was <br /> a cost estimate. Accordingly, contrary to the trial court' s <br /> finding, the Division never represented to the defendants that $3 <br /> million would be the final amount sought by the Division against <br /> the defendants to complete reclamation. <br /> Moreover, the Division did not acquire full knowledge -about <br /> reclamation costs until it had a better understanding of the <br /> conditions at the site, until it had filled in the details of <br /> MCR' s reclamation plan, and until it had done invitations to bid <br /> the reclamation work (v. 2 , pp. 414-16) . See Denver Center for <br /> Performing Arts v. Briggs, 696 P.2d 299 (Colo. 1985) (Denver did <br /> not have knowledge of the facts until audit done; one-year delay <br /> not unreasonable) . Once the Division had those facts, it <br /> recalculated the cost of reclamation, and moved to amend its <br /> complaint to give the defendants and the court notice that <br /> reclamation costs would now substantially exceed the $3 million <br /> estimate (v. 2 , pp. 405- 12) . This notice came prior to the <br /> motions hearing, while discovery was still on-going, and was <br /> given three months before trial (v. 4 , pp. 262- 63) . See <br /> Department of Health v. Donahue, 690 P. 2d 243 (Colo. 1984) (delay <br /> in asserting claim did not justify estoppel where department <br /> given notice of claim three months prior to administrative <br /> hearing) ; see also v. 2 , p. 234 , where plaintiff states, in <br /> pleading filed in November of 1994 and served on the defendants, <br /> that the cost of reclamation could far exceed $3 million. <br /> 17 <br />