The evening is unseasonably warm as the residents of Sylmar Manor Mobile Home Park enjoy the weather. A little girl cautiously balances on a pink and turquoise bike, while her grandma watches proudly through the window of her house. A cluster of children gather around an ice cream man’s cart before they scatter for home.

    Purple irises bloom next to red tulips in the front yard of a double wide mobile home where owner James Kramer watches a movie inside with his grandson, R.J. A year ago, he would have watched it with his wife, Shirley, the one who bought the flowers. She loved this place, he says, especially sitting together in the gazebo behind their house, watching the deer and wild turkeys that live beside the South Platte River.

    Shirley died the day after Mother’s Day, three days after being diagnosed with cancer. They’d been together 31 years, 12 of those in this house.  On a table beside his easy chair, surrounded by family photos, is a blue jar holding her ashes.

    He talks of life without Shirley and how his hours at work, where he is a mechanic, “the CSI of RV’s” at Cruise America in Johnstown, have been cut back.

    It’s been hard enough, he says, getting through this year, without wondering where he’s going to be next year at this time.  

    After nearly a decade of on again off again rumors, the first letter arrived late March.  

    “Dear Sylmar Manor Resident,” it began.

    After three paragraphs of explaining the value of wastewater treatment services “to the entire metropolitan region,” the point of the letter is abruptly revealed.

    “The project will eventually require Sylmar Manor to close and for you to move.”

    Kramer scoffs at a second letter, which thanks the residents for coming to an April 7 meeting to “get your questions answered.

    “They answered nothing,” he says with disgust.

    He says the letter bears that out.

    “We do not know the exact details about when you will be asked to move or assistance we will provide,” it continues, although “residents will need to move no later than June 30, 2011.”

    “I don’t know where I’m going,” Kramer adds. He estimates it would take 30 days and more than $7,000 for movers to come in, tear down his double wide and reposition it on another lot.     He doesn’t know where that would be. But he’s made inquiries, and he’s sure that it will cost more for park rent than the $430 a month he’s paying now.

    “Some parks” R.J. interjects, “charge twice as much for a double wide.”

    A year of pain has now given way to a coming year of uncertainty.

    “Can’t Brighton do this someplace else?” he asks. “I don’t see why they wouldn’t put it across the street. There’s nothing there. They aren’t only forcing me out of my house, they are forcing me out of my memories.”