Commerce City, CO Zoning Overlays & Bonuses: Downtown Design Guide (2026)

Sec. 2-3003 of the Commerce City Revised Municipal Code establishes the Derby review board to interpret and apply the Derby design guidelines to development inside the Derby sub-area, a defined commercial district near Dick's Sporting Goods Park. The board has three powers: it hears and decides development applications for the sub-area against the design guidelines, it hears requests for variances from those standards, and it administers the Derby commercial catalyst program, including which projects qualify for catalyst funding and any limits on how, when and where that money is spent.

A variance is not automatic: the board may grant one only if the deviation still satisfies the intent of the Derby design guidelines as the board itself determines. The board seats five regular members appointed by city council, two of whom must be design professionals with architecture, urban planning or landscape architecture experience, two of whom must live in, own a business in, or hold real property in the Derby sub-area, and one of whom is a sitting city council member. Council may also appoint up to two alternates.

Three members present constitute a quorum, and meetings are called as necessary with notice and an agenda posted to the city's website. Members serve staggered three-year terms and may serve no more than two consecutive terms. Because the board is a quasi-judicial body under Sec. 2-3000, its design decisions on individual applications are appealable the same way as the planning commission and zoning board of adjustment.