The Boulder County versus the state of Colorado oil-and-gas lawsuit may not make it to court.

The county on Tuesday filed a motion to dismiss the complaint filed last month by Colorado Attorney General Cynthia Coffman in which she demanded the county lift its ban on new drilling projects.

In its motion, Boulder argued that the state’s lawsuit is too late in coming and for that reason mostly irrelevant to oil and gas drilling activity in the county.

The last county moratorium was lifted on May 19, 2016, county lawyers pointed out. And the current moratorium is scheduled to be lifted on May 1, 2017, at which time new rules governing drilling activity in the county will take effect. Those rules are being presented in draft form for review at a public meeting scheduled for March 14.

“The State proposes to expend taxpayer resources on litigation over a moratorium the County terminated nearly a year ago, which does not present a live case or controversy,” the county attorneys wrote. “[A]nd it is unlikely that this litigation will have resolved the State’s claims related to the Current Moratorium by [the time the moratorium has expired].”

If the state means to argue that “local governments are powerless to enact moratoria on oil and gas development,” then it has also missed the boat for coming so late to the dock, the attorneys argue. And that’s a shame, they continue, because many local governments, including the Boulder County Commission, would have liked to have learned how the courts view the issue.

None of this will come as news to Attorney General Coffman. Boulder reports that it informed her office of these developments before she filed the lawsuit.

But Coffman has said she felt the need to sue Boulder as a kind of guaranty against future bad behavior. She has argued that the county’s repeat temporary bans on drilling – in place since 2012 –  suggest a pattern and amount on the ground to an indefinite ban, which is illegal.

“Because Boulder’s continuing moratorium, on its face, defies the Colorado Supreme Court’s rulings and is preempted by state law,” she wrote in her complaint, “the State seeks declaratory and injunctive relief invalidating and enjoining enforcement of the moratorium.”

Oil and gas policy is as politically fraught in Colorado as it is anywhere in the country, and it’s difficult to view the case outside of state electoral politics.

Coffman is perhaps the top Republican official in the state and a likely 2018 candidate for governor.

Deeply Democratic, health-conscious Boulder County is home to the University of Colorado’s flagship campus, major national environmental and health research facilities and a raft of environmental and renewable energy organizations and businesses.

“We pretty much have known all along that the end of the moratorium was coming and that new rules would take effect in May, so what’s the point of the suit? Why not wait and sue the county in May if it fails to lift or replace the current moratorium?” said Boulder Democratic state Sen. Steve Fenberg. “Well, I assume you only win points in a Republican primary when you sue Boulder County.”

State Rep. Edie Hooton, also a Boulder Democrat, praised the county for continuing to push back against the complaint.

“I applaud our County Commissioners for using every legal tool available to protect us against Attorney General Coffman’s efforts to advance the interests of the oil and gas industry,” she wrote in an email to The Statesman Tuesday night. “For too long Colorado has given sweetheart deals to oil and gas interests at the expense of their citizens and communities.”

Coffman has been unbending.

Boulder County’s “open defiance of state law has made legal action the final recourse available,” she said when she filed the complaint.

Her office had yet to post a release on the latest turn in the lawsuit Tuesday night at press time.

Coffman reportedly has two weeks to respond to the motion for dismissal. Then the county would likely have the same amount of time to respond to the attorney general’s response. That would be just two weeks from the expiration date of the drilling ban at the center of the suit.

The case is being heard by Boulder District Judge Norma Sierra.

– john@coloradostatesman.com