Faced with public outcry over its removal, Firestone officials backed off a plan this week to replace a memorial in Harney Park honoring a 3-year-old boy who died in an accident in 2010.

Andrea Sutton, whose son Daniel died after an accidental strangling by a window-blind cord, opposes altering the memorial that town officials paid for and installed along the Firestone Trail eight years ago to honor the boy.

The memorial features a large stone adorned with a plaque holding Daniel's image and messages from his family.

It was dug out of the ground and moved from the spot Monday — while Sutton and her family were out of town on vacation — because the Firestone Board of Trustees voted Jan. 24 to enact an ordinance allowing town staff to modify memorials in public parks to make them more uniform.

The ordinance was put in place because town staff said residents filed complaints that it could be misconstrued as a burial site, which it is not. The memorial simply observed that Daniel often played in the park near the house in which he died.

"It's an extension of where Daniel is actually buried. It's sacred ground," said Trent John, whose son initiated the push to create the original memorial for the Sutton family as part of an Eagle Scout project.

When Sutton heard of the new policy and that her son's memorial might be affected, she got in touch with Town Manager Bruce Nickerson, with whom she reviewed design proposals for a replacement memorial the town would buy and install.

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But she didn't approve of the suggested changes, instead preferring the memorial as it originally appeared — surrounded by yellow bricks laid at its base to commemorate her son's love for the movie "The Wizard of Oz."

After raising her objections to a new memorial, she came under the impression the Board of Trustees would vote on whether to "grandfather" her son's memorial into compliance with the new ordinance and protect it from being moved or changed.

"I thought there was still a chance they would come to their senses and leave it alone," Sutton said. "Why do all memorials have to look exactly the same?"

A misunderstanding between trustees, however, resulted in that vote never occurring, and town staff went ahead and followed the recommendations of Nickerson to remove the old memorial and the yellow bricks to make way for the new, ordinance-compliant memorial that was scheduled to be placed in the next several weeks.

The move took Sutton by surprise, as she said she emailed town officials she would be out of town this week and wanted to be notified of any decisions regarding the memorial. She only learned of its removal through text messages from a friend.

"Monday was a very unfortunate, mishandled move by the town. Was it the right thing to do? No. Can they do it? Yes," John said. "They didn't notify the Suttons. They should have."

At Wednesday night's Board of Trustees meeting, though, officials backpedaled from the original plan to replace the memorial, instead waiting to finalize any decision on the issue until hearing more from Sutton when she returns to the state, according to Assistant Town Manager Jennifer Weinberger.

The town has asked landscape architect THK Associates to show Sutton some more looks for a replacement memorial paid for by the town. While the new memorial will also have at its base bricks stamped out of freshly poured concrete that will be dyed yellow, Sutton is unlikely to approve any new design.

John said town staff also has discussed wanting to change the memorial's location from alongside the Firestone Trail to further inside Harney Park's grassy area, to which Sutton is especially opposed.

"If they want to bury it somewhere in the park, they can just bring it to my house, because that's admitting there's something wrong with it," Sutton said. "They're the ones who put the memorial together. If they think it looks like a tombstone, that's not our fault. Why spend the town's resources and money changing it when there's nothing wrong with it?"

The original stone holding Daniel's plaque is currently ready to be transported to the family's new home in Berthoud at the town's expense, if that is Sutton's wish.

Friends of the family following its removal this week placed flowers and tied balloons on the bench adjacent to the memorial's former site, where there is now an empty patch of dirt.

The controversy has prompted Firestone officials to focus on improving communication and transparency from town officials with residents, Weinberger said.

The town recently hired Becky Schol to work as a communications coordinator. She can be emailed at bschol@firestoneco.gov.

Sam Lounsberry: 303-473-1322, slounsberry@prairiemountainmedia.com and twitter.com/samlounz.