Longmont City Council Open Forum – January 21, 2020

To listen to the meeting alongside a transcript, please visit:

Part 1: https://otter.ai/s/HLkGYNc_Qq69FhGuTzCzlw

Part 2: https://otter.ai/s/fUDx1ytPRgaTrYMznMGSvQ

For a transcript of the meeting, please read below:

Part 1:

8:14
Alright, let’s get started my apologies. traffic from Denver had me a little stuck. So sorry for the delay. Alright, let’s go ahead and start the meeting. Let’s open it up with roll call. Mayor Bagley, your council members Christiansen Indigo hearing. Martin Peck, Rodriguez, waters, Mary have a quorum. Alright, let’s say the pledge

8:42
pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

8:56
Alright, I don’t see the city attorney, your city manager down here so there’s nothing

9:00
Else, right? So we just launched right into it. Alright, cool. Well, welcome to our public forum.

9:05
The only night that we actually have the opportunity to have an interchange during I guess it’s not public invited to be heard. It’s more of an interchange. So what we’ll do is we’ll have a five minute time limit. So come up, ask your question, make your statement, whatever you want. And then we’ll have the opportunity to have a brief interchange or exchange. And we’ll go with that. So shall we start? Let us start

9:31
there and issues from councils before council before we begin.

9:35
All right. It looks like we’ve got

9:38
Danielle booth.

9:47
Was it Daniel Butler? Sorry, Daniel by handwriting must be terrible. No, it kind of looks like a I can see it. We’ll go with that. Very quick.

9:58
Danielle Butler, I’m the Executive Editor.

10:00
With the early childhood counselor Boulder County 1285 center village Dr. Lafayette Colorado

10:08
Good evening Mayor Bagley and members of city council thank you for this opportunity. I’m here this evening

10:17
to say thank you

10:20
short and sweet about I wanted to thank you for undertaking a good look at early childhood issues in Longmont and for actually getting them on the into your strategic plan we just need we need you to speak louder and get right up in there like right like this. Okay.

10:41
I’m so shy start with them. Good. Okay, so I’m just I’m here to say thank you.

10:47
I’m here to say thank you for undertaking a look at early childhood issues in Longmont and for creating goals and your strategic plan and also for

11:00
Considering funding them and going ahead and funding them for 2020 21 and 22.

11:07
I think that this was some

11:10
far reaching thinking that you’ve done not all communities do this. With the early childhood Council, I work with a lot of people across Boulder County, we have 13 board members, we have 20 over 25 advisory council members. We have been invited and participate in the Longmont City Council, Human Services bright eyes committee that looks at early childhood issues. And I can just tell you, we’re all really excited and really proud of Longmont and Boulder County for putting some dollars behind early childhood initiatives. So our birth to fives in the community aren’t always seen. They’re often invisible. We see their parents but their parents are really working. So their voices aren’t always heard and it takes an extra effort to pay attention.

12:00
You guys did. And it came to my intention that,

12:04
that it might be nice if you heard that, that sometimes you don’t hear those sort of things, feedback on on what you’ve done. So I trust there’s going to be more good news coming. I understand that your staff are looking at evidence based programs to fund with this money. So I can assure you that they’re those are around, they’re successful. They’re in the community, and children and families are going to be served. So thank you. Great, thank you.

12:36
All right, Julia rush.

12:40
Oh, sorry. Did you I’m sorry. Yes, Julia. Hold on one second. Cancel. I’m sorry, Danielle. You hold on one second, because we had questions from Council.

12:53
It’s not really a question. I just wanted to let everybody know that segue on what you’re saying. Is that Jay

13:00
wary 30th next week we are going to have at the Longmont museum from,

13:07
from the National League of Cities a film called no small matter. You must have heard of that. Oh, yes, we’ve been invited. Yes, hooray. So I would just like to extend that invitation. It is a film that

13:19
stresses the importance of birth to pre to preschool and how you that a child learns from the moment it is born, and how we can interact to prepare them for preschool. So I invite everybody to come six to eight at the Longmont museum on January 30. That’s just another example of some of the innovative and wonderful things you’re doing. This community also hosted Mike Butler, your chief safety officer, brought to town and hosted Dr. Bruce Perry in November. So those things are really really important and they don’t happen everywhere. So please, you know, pat on the back to everybody.

14:02
Alright, thank you right now. Julie rush, sorry.

14:07
And then or with Michelle, do we have another sheet or this it?

14:12
Okay, cool. If Can somebody grab it?

14:19
Okay, can you hear me? We can hear you. All right. Good evening, council mayor. My name is Julia rush. I live at two to three bar and swallow drive. I am the board president of the our center. In November, I forwarded to you concerns that I had relating to communication I received from Councilman Peck and Councilman Councilwoman Polly Christianson. Since that time, there’s been a lot of discussion about how that complaint was handled. Whether or not that complaint should have been made, should have been kept secret from the public and discourse between council members. But there’s been little to no discussion about the communication that I actually received.

15:00
In October, the our center after careful review by the new executive director and a new board decided to put in an application to Boulder County to continue our navigation services under coordinated entry.

15:13
That service contract is administered by Boulder County, Long Island City Council does not have say and how that’s awarded. Almost immediately after that decision was made, and before it was public, I received a phone call from Councilwoman Peck and emails from Polly Christiansen opposing our Boulder County RFP application.

15:34
I’m not going to rehash that communication here. That was a part of my detailed complaint and you have those emails.

15:41
Despite statements denying that the communication was threatening, I felt threatened by it.

15:47
And I felt that there was significant effort put into making sure that those threats were kept secret.

15:54
I’ve lost countless nights of sleep, worrying about whether or not these two council woman we’re going to

16:00
cut our funding from the city of Longmont because we chose to compete for funding from another government agency in competition with an organization that they privately support.

16:11
No organization should feel threatened by this council.

16:20
We are very encouraged by your willingness to hold an ethics meeting.

16:24
But we want some assurances that the underlying issue will be formally addressed. All along on social service charities should be assured that the budgeting process is open and transparent. And advocacy for individual charities is open and free of conflicts of interest. If you sit on an advocacy committee or a board for charity, in your private life, that you may have a hand in funding in your public life that needs to be disclosed to the public.

16:56
This committee has recently demonstrated appropriate

17:00
advocacy and its handling of funding awarded tell committee. It was openly discussed in this forum. And there was absolutely no question about the honorable motives of the council woman who advocated for it. She appropriately disclosed her involvement and advocacy for that charity. That could be a model for advocacy on this council going forward.

17:22
This is a self regulating body, and as such, it has a duty to address my complaint, separate and apart from whatever decision is made by the district attorney.

17:32
I hope you’ll take that duty seriously.

17:35
It does not serve this community to set up a system that encourages social services charities to cultivate secret relationships with individual council members.

17:45
There have been several questions by this council about who our organization serves and what we do. We provide an extensive Longmont Services application that outlines several of our services. However, I would

18:00
encourage each of you to visit our facility in your official capacity. Come to one of our monthly coffee for cause meetings open to the public and learn about what we do.

18:10
We are more than willing to answer your questions and concerns. Thank you for your time and attention to this matter.

18:18
Councillor Martin?

18:21
Thank you Miss rush. Can you tell us a little more about the process that you entered with Boulder County? Was it a procurement process where you had to build have provided an application and entered into a competitive process based on your application? Yes, it was where the

18:43
applications meant to be confidential. They were were the will the roster of bidders meant to be confidential.

18:53
In other words, was the public allowed to know who was competing for the funding? You know

19:00
I don’t know that I’ve been information I’m sorry. Okay, thanks.

19:07
Nobody else is in the queue. Don’t catch rush. Thank you appreciate it. All right art Cal,

19:28
Markel, 1297 Matthews way and airy Mayor Bagley, members of city council. I’m the Executive Director for the Center. Joseph stanovich, the Executive Director for hope wanting to be here with me this evening. But unfortunately he had a family commitment couldn’t join me.

19:43
So as a result, we because he couldn’t join me at the podium, we’ve crafted a written statement that I’d like to read to the council right now. In the past several months, the our center and hope have repeatedly been asked, Why can’t the Art Center Why can’t hope get along? Why can’t we work together? Well, the

20:00
Answer is pretty simple. We have been. Despite the issues brought to light by the our center board of directors and the ensuing public and private discussions, our two organizations continue to collaborate and seek ways to strengthen our partnerships moving into the future.

20:15
For example, hope is taking the lead in this year’s point in time almost survey. It is their goal that this year’s efforts yield the most comprehensive and accurate count for our community done today. Hope staff reached out to the our center and asked if we’d be willing to be a magnet site for families. And if we would reach out to our volunteer base for assistance on this project. Without hesitation we agreed to support hope in any way that’s beneficial to their efforts.

20:40
Joseph and I continue to meet on a regular basis to explore how our organizations can work together and we can support each other’s missions. Because at the end of the day, we both want the same goals. We want to end homelessness and we want to help individuals and families go from just trying to survive in our community to actually thriving in our community.

20:58
Additionally, we received many questions asked

21:00
What it is what do we do? What does organizations do for the community? Well, the center was founded in 1986 by a group of faith based leaders that recognize that those in need or turning to local churches for help. Those churches agree that unifying community resources would ultimately provide better help to those in need, and also give the church and community members a consistent place to refer folks.

21:22
Out of that realization grew the outreach united Resource Center, as you know, at the our center.

21:28
since the mid 80s, a lot has changed. Unfortunately, the issues of affordable housing, homelessness and foods, insecurities, just to name a few have not only grown in scale, but also in complexity. There is no one single factor resulting in homelessness, or resulting in the negative impacts on the other social determinants of health. Nor is there any one single solution to these issues or one organization that can provide all the services and supports to address these issues. As a result, in the past couple years, the our center has shifted its focus more towards families and that is because of the remarkable

22:00
Safety Net organizations in our community such as hope, but I want to be clear to that this shift doesn’t mean that the our center will not work with single adults, or that we’ve turned our back on the homeless. We’re in a very unique position not only can we provide supports the homeless community, but as a Family Resource Center, we can provide resources and referrals to a variety of households in our community. Last year alone, we provided 300,340 $6,705 in direct financial assistance to families and individuals in our community. Most of that was rent and utilities. We also provided over 80,000 hot meals and distributed 996,403 pounds of food back out to the community.

22:42
spite our best efforts, the individuals and families may still become hopeless homeless. Hope continues to fill this gap for adults, adult individuals who are experiencing homelessness. Hope offers year round sheltering as part of their HL HSBC navigation program that helps people get back on their feet.

23:00
Hope shelter also provides emergency sheltering for the community during the coldest winter nights. And hope continues to provide street outreach throughout the city on a weekly basis engaging the most vulnerable citizens and referring them to organizations like the our center when they’re in need of assistance The hope is unable to provide

23:17
together and 2019 through the navigation program, hoping the our center were able to successfully house 51 individuals, reunite another 60 with family and friends. And this year, we’re already looking at ways to collaborate on a family focused safe lot for those who are living in their vehicles in our community.

23:35
So Joseph, and I would like to invite not only the members of the city council, but also members of the public to come visit our organizations, see our programs and action. Meet our professional dedicated staff. Come ask all the questions that you want to know about our organizations at the our center, I’d like to personally invite each and every one of you to a coffee for a cause. Our next one is February 5, but we hold it every other month. And if you’d rather have a mortician

24:00
One on one I’m more than happy to sit down with anyone or any group one on one and answer any questions and discuss the future of the our center and how we partner with organizations like hope. Thank you. Accounts verbeck

24:13
Thank you Mark, thank you for that letter. Just I appreciate it. I have been to coffee with at the our center and really appreciate them and have worked with the the youth on Trick or treat for the homeless or you go gather all canned goods and also took advantage of your programs to with a with a homeless woman that that I actually put up in a hotel until the our center could find housing for her. So I totally appreciate and have voted for funding for the our Center for five years in a row. Thank you. I appreciate that support. And we all have we this council has always supported the our center and what they’re doing.

25:00
But I am really, really glad that the city is coming together, bringing all the resources to to tackle this incredible challenge that we’ve got, which is one of the reasons that I supported our inclusionary zoning ordinance so that we can start getting housing on lower and for,

25:21
for people who need housing. So thank you for all your work. And I would like to sit down with you and learn more about what you’re doing. Sure. I would love to have that conversation. Thank you. Thank you.

25:38
All right.

25:40
Customer, let’s go with Councilmember Christiansen.

25:45
Thank you, Mark. I really appreciate that letter to I I know how hard the staff of the center works, and how hard you work and how hard Joseph and the staff of hope work and

26:00
We can’t, we need all the help we can get for human services. So I really appreciate that.

26:08
I’ve been over at the our center, stocking your pantry

26:13
with Excel and of course, and when I did a wonderful job for many, many years, so it’s very heartening to see the two of you,

26:23
you know, publicly expressing and explaining to the city at large what we do because you have very different missions. But we need both of you. And

26:34
there’s no doubt about that. And

26:37
that’s all I’m gonna say. But thank you. I would love to come over and talk with you sometime, sir. Love to have a discussion. Thank you.

26:45
Councillor waters.

26:48
Thanks for thanks for both for the work and for your kindness tonight.

26:54
Could you just talk a bit more about why you signed up to be here today.

26:58
Well, exactly the way

27:00
I started the Congress are my my presentation is both Joseph and I have heard on various venues and asks us directly, you know, despite what’s happening over here that Julia discussed before I came up, a lot of people believe or asking, is that affecting what we’re doing boots on the ground in the community? And we both felt it was very important to come out and say, it’s not affecting us. We’re still doing our work. I just wanted to make maybe reinforce, sir, I know there’s a perception because I’ve heard it from some somehow our our two largest kind of leading nonprofit serving a very specific segments of poppy of the segments of the population are somehow at odds, and you’re here to deliver the message that you’re not Yes.

27:49
Together of the same segments of our vulnerable population that you’ve been serving in the past. Just one other question, do we?

27:58
Maybe this is a

28:00
Question for council maybe, you know, are you still providing navigation services? So we are in a month, the month while we’re waiting for the DHS office to contract has not been

28:11
awarded? Exactly. Yes, that is correct. Thank you.

28:19
Michelle, please. All right. Thank you.

28:22
Mr. Christian, are you still in the queue? Okay, that’s right. Customer, Martin.

28:28
Thank you. I also appreciate the work that you do. And I’m very glad to hear because a number of constituents have expressed concerns to me that about hope in the our center being perceived publicly as being at odds. So I’m extremely glad to hear

28:48
that that’s not the case.

28:51
I do have some questions about the coordinated entry process and about the procurement process. Are you able to

29:01
Answer the question that Miss Russ rush was not able to answer. Do you know whether the list of of of applicants for that award was intended to be confidential according to the terms of the of the agreement? No, I could not answer whether that was whether that was to be made public or not, I’m not sure. Okay, excuse me, how is that who prepares who prepares those applications on behalf of your organization? So our development department works with our program team to basically receive an RFP that outlines what information that we should be providing, excuse me, and then we put that packet together and send it in. Okay. So you as the executive director are not aware of the particular terms of the RFP of the RFP itself. Yes. And then what happens and what’s public after that? No.

29:55
Okay, um,

29:59
and then

30:00
Did you I know that you’re going month to month in terms of being funded to do the coordinated entry process?

30:13
Did you ultimately apply for the 2020?

30:19
process or not for the 2020 Award or not? Yes, we did. And is that a competitive application? That is, is it going to be you or home? Or maybe somebody else that we don’t know about? Or what are the terms of that application? So yeah, basically, it is competitive, whoever applies whether it’s to 500 different vendors or community agencies, then it’s for them to score and determine who is the best fit for that RFP. So Excuse me. Yes, we did apply for that. All right. Thank you very much. No problem.

30:57
Thanks. I’m gonna ask you, if you don’t remember the answer.

31:00
I just, I just I just this is a great opportunity, it dawned on me turned up and might be a little uncomfortable. But the Julia rush is your chairman. Right? Correct. And so I just now that we’re here, there’s been looking at faces, and there’s a lot of mistrust right now on Council, right? is a result of the investigation, etc. But it sure counts for a pack.

31:28
Okay, then it’s actually a review or required, that’s fine. The, but whatever is going on is a lot of mistrust. So I want to ask it, how many times have you and I spoken to, you know, how many times you and I can can you count? I mean, just generally meeting you. How many times have we had any substantive interaction since your term here? I think, to that, I recall one, after a planning meeting, a public planning meeting. I approached you afterwards to just ask about a comment that you made to get some more insight and

32:00
Then we didn’t get a chance to finish and you invited me to call you back and just finish my, you know, my questions for you. And we had a quick car conversation over the phone where you answered some more of my questions. And I believe that’s been it. Okay. And so, do you remember the phone call when you talked about the topic of the email?

32:21
And the the concerns about the, the, the So yeah, that’s even that’s so I didn’t even mention that with the first two because I forgot. Yes. That reached out and asked about that as well. Okay, vaguely remember that conversation? Was that before or after the election? It was after? Okay. Who called Who?

32:44
I reached out to Okay. And then in a nutshell.

32:50
Would you tell me just a summary?

32:54
Well, basically, I just vaguely remembering that there was just concerned

33:00
Around correspondence that we had and was not sure, what was the, you know, what options we had? Where do we, you know, what can we possibly do with any concerns that we might have? So we knew what our what decision or what options we had in front of us so that we can make a decision from there. Okay. Do you remember what we what the next step was going to be when we had that conversation?

33:25
I did not recall that specifically off the top of my head. Sorry, it doesn’t sound about right that that we talked that Julie was going to give me a call.

33:34
Well, that would be about right, because I tried to also distance myself because again, I want to focus on the center. And this was a board concern. So yes, that would sound about correct, right. And then whether the call occurred or not, you remember the email that I got from Julia? Okay. And you were copied on that, right? Yep. And it went to my public address? I believe so. Yes. Alright. So that’s how I remember it. Okay. All right. Cool. Thank you. Nobody else is in the queue. Okay.

34:00
Thank you, Sheila.

34:02
All right, let’s go on to Norma figs.

34:17
He get the s on the end of fig. Just big

34:22
GG s or the figs. It’s written on my letter.

34:27
Good evening.

34:30
It’s kind of hard to hear but then I’m older than I used to be. And

34:37
I’ve listened to the disruptive noise created by planes over Longmont for years, the last 11 of which has seen an increase directly over my home. It has been disturbing to say the least a primary source of this noise is from the otters that fly Oh, fly skydivers. I have read comments from

35:00
Folks who feel that these planes and skydivers should be able to do what they want. If these flights were a necessary part of survival, that might lend a different view of what’s been allowed to occur over many years ignoring the fact of mile highs, blatant avoidance of paying their way for the rules and regs of the airport. As It Is this for property for profit enterprise of Mile High skydiving puts a negative spin on how this community chooses to operate. Do we allow the noise and confusion in spite of negative feedback from residents?

35:42
Do we continue to turn a blind eye to what we see happening? The disregard by folks wanting to do what they want, rather than what is beneficial and not discordant for the majority. I live in the south part of Longmont for 43 years. I have enjoyed my name.

36:00
hood my community. During this time that Mile High has been taking skydivers up. My family has been bombarded with noise by their planes. Having to run indoors when the planes fly is not conducive to enjoying the outdoors. disturbance of outdoor activities has been the norm and unfairly So, we’ve seen the news where deaths have occurred when the divers do not end up in the drop zone.

36:31
mile high has blatantly ignored the city’s rules that have been in place for a long time regarding payments to the city for use of city facilities at the airport. its citizens were to ignore city bills. How long could our community sustain itself? I want my elected officials to act responsibly and demand due diligence from everyone. This facet of a continuing problem

37:00
will not go away on its own.

37:09
It will take councils dedicated perseverance in assessing the damage that has been done and will continue without you’re taking a leadership role in dealing with this problem and eliminating the negative impact of planes that fly overhead, make horrendous noise and ignore these regulations. boulder has its own problems with the noise planes make taking off and landing. We are all connected. There needs to be restrictions and regulations that must be followed by all planes and pilots, regardless of who is flying them or where

37:48
Longmont can lead in this effort and be a guiding light for other communities. All around us we see increased air traffic and we most likely will see more

38:00
Colorado is a go to state for those leaving other states for various and sundry reasons. They come here because of what we are what we stand for, because residents care about our community and our state. If you do not become involved to a greater extent in creating harmony, peace, quiet, equitable behavior by everyone, then we will become a place no one wants to live. Some supporters of freedom to use the airwaves as they want think that residents don’t have rights as well. Please do what you can to remedy this situation. Make it equitable for all don’t disregard the input from citizens. Long mom will suffer if you do.

38:49
Kimberly Gibbs has worked tirelessly for resolution to this issue for years. Thank you, Kim. I’ve been involved spoken to previous council members about the issue

39:00
written letters to the paper. Many folks have put forth time and effort to find solutions, giving up time with their families to attend meetings, council meetings, trying to find a way to change this situation. Everyone involved with quiet skies has spent numerous hours trying to solve the dilemma. I still find lists and drawers listing the dates, times and sounds of the otters flying loud and low. Letting the airport no it has not done any good over all these years. And I don’t expect that it will change unless you make the change happen. Please open your minds and your hearts to hear and understand what has happened and will continue to happen unless something is done to change it.

39:49
I appreciate your time and the opportunity to speak about a very important issue. I speak for others who feel this way as well and a little caveat at the end

40:00
The pollution in rich created by the leaded fuel and these large otters should not be overlooked and must be a part of this discussion. Thank you.

40:12
Thank you. Actually. mistakes, mistakes. Yeah, come back. Come back. All right, Councilmember Martin.

40:23
Hi, Miss fix. See you. You’re welcome. I, I have already responded to your letter, actually. But

40:33
how did you do that on my email? Yeah. Good. Thank you. I’m glad I put it thankfully provided your email, and you’re most welcome. So, yeah, I was just wondering, are you aware of the extent to which a municipality may regulate planes in flight from its airport? I you could better repeat the question. First of all, I’m hard of hearing, but it’s a little convoluted. Yeah, I tried it. My first reaction was no

41:00
I don’t know all the MDX but if you would repeat that, okay, work on it. I was asking if you know what a city may do about some ways somewhat I am not as

41:14
well informed as Kim certainly is. No, I can’t say that.

41:20
Well, is that leading someplace that maybe something

41:24
Yeah, I want everybody to know that once the planes wheels leave the ground the city has no authority to regulate the noise it makes I don’t know that for sure. For sure know that for sure. Yeah, I do. I I was on the airport is surprised, but no, it’s true. Kim will probably confirm that.

41:45
But I do you have a little bit of information, just maybe here say

41:53
that they could cut back on the sound by doing certain things to the airplanes. Yes. The

42:00
Could but we don’t have any authority to require them to do that. You meaning Council, meaning the council, city, the city, airport management, none of us have it would be a nice way to get along with people it would like make it I hope that you will. You will take your requests to mile high because oh, I have over. We know I had to make a request you saw where I changed the eight years to 11 years. Kim, we were meeting earlier, her son walked in he was four years old. When I first met Kim got involved with this. And I wrote originally in my notes to that it was eight years and Time flies. I know probably more than everybody here because I’m older than everybody here. And not that that gives me any

42:53
push up foot up. I live in the knowledge department but Okay, any of us you’re older than me.

43:00
Everybody here. It’s It’s a great feeling, isn’t it? But so far,

43:07
the alternative is worse.

43:10
The Are you aware the city recently did a safety study and began enforcing safety infractions that were found against? Quite a deal high sky did it take so long? I mean, were they just things that were occurring most recently that they had to be corrected? There were Yeah, there were there were new practices that had come into play over the years, as the organization essentially tried to squeeze more and more and more and more flights out of the time that they they had, you know, the good you’re saying Mile High Mile High dig that? Yes. And as a consequence of our attempts to enforce those things,

43:57
mile high is Mr. Slater here.

44:01
He’s not here.

44:03
If you don’t, we don’t need to necessarily get in mind if you know the answer, Harold, what what was my highest response to our attempts at enforcement?

44:14
I just want everybody to to know where we stand on this.

44:19
But we’re also currently in litigation. Yeah. So yes, Mr. May, Mr. May, I’d like to invite you down to so you can muzzle the city manager if you need to. I in fact, only wanted him to tell me you can tell him to that’s okay. That’d be better. The name of the procedure that’s going on. Currently, we are in a part 16 which the way those issues are resolved with the FAA. They have two options they can go forward with a part 13 which is more of an informal procedure and a part 16 which is a formal procedure. We have engaged in that activity.

44:55
We are still in that process. The FAA has

45:00
extended their decision point in that, and we hope that we will hear from it by the end of February. But this is completely in the purview within the Federal Aviation Administration.

45:13
And that’s exactly an all I wanted to know. Because essentially, while that’s going on, we’re pursuing it, but we really can’t discuss it. Whatever you guys could do to make a change would really help. My daughter has tinnitus. She cannot be outside when those planes are flying.

45:32
Makes a mad dash for the door. Anybody else? Yeah, hold on Council. We’re back.

45:37
I guess what it is saying normal. I understand your frustrations and share them. But I also just want to tell the public that we are we are working on this issue. Unfortunately, it’s all in Executive Session at the moment, which means that there are legal issues and we can’t say anything about them. So my taking time to be here tonight. Me

46:00
And getting that response, or everybody’s a little bit more aware of the steps that

46:07
that are being taken. And that’s a positive. So thanks. And we have made progress we just kept talking about it is it’s very frustrating, because I do thank you for that verification. All right. Thank you. Oh, yeah. Great. Thank you. Anybody else? Nope. But thanks for your time. appreciate what you do. Thank you. Kimberly Gibbs speaking the legend.

46:33
Good evening, Mayor Bagley members of council I’m Kim Gibbs I live at 7468 mount Sherman road Longmont address located in gun barrel. Tonight I’m speaking about environmental quality and local control. But first just very briefly, a small correction piston engine aircraft use leaded aviation gasoline. The twin daughters are turboprops. They use jet fuel and it’s not let it so

47:00
Moving along. Just wanted to make that quick. Noted. Yeah.

47:06
Okay, so last week I attended a presentation on air quality hosted by sustainable resilient Longmont and the Longmont sunrise movement. Dr. Detlev helming presented his findings based on measurements of greenhouse gases and fine particulates collected from multiple Boulder County research sites. He explained that nearby oil and gas operations are significantly impacting air quality in Longmont and Boulder County. Air Quality studies examine what’s in the air. But how do we use that data to understand the health effects caused by these pollutants. Fortunately, those studies have already been done. In 1991, BYU Professor c Arden Pope published a landmark research paper titled respiratory hospital admissions associated with Pm 10 police

48:00
And Utah Salt Lake and cache valleys. Dr. Pope’s study showed that fine particulate emissions from Geneva steel were strongly correlated with increased respiratory hospital admissions.

48:14
During that time, I lived in Utah Valley and was able to meet with Dr. Pope. And while he acknowledged the importance of his research as the basis for policy decisions, he credited activists for the dead for their dedicated efforts, which eventually led to stricter air quality standards. Those activists were students and Mormon women, mothers

48:40
who were fighting to protect their children’s health.

48:43
Oftentimes, in defiance of the church’s pro industry stance, they knew that Geneva steel was poisoning the air despite the industry’s well funded propaganda campaign. Doctor Pope study and later research showed that fine particular

49:00
killing an ozone pollution harm public health, causing serious respiratory illness including asthma and premature death.

49:09
Once again, Longmont is taking a leadership role and supportive environmental quality, and I commend your pledge to transition to a clean energy economy.

49:22
Moving on to the airport. So today I’m speaking on behalf of many county and city dwellers who are routinely subjected to the abuse of noise nuisance created by mile high skydiving. How does skydiving an activity that is widely recognized as the worst sport for the environment align with the city’s climate goals? How are leaded aviation fuel emissions being addressed? By now we all understand that even though Longmont owns the airport, the FAA grants, not federal law, prevent any local control over noise, any missions. What

50:00
Can you do first urge congressman Ken buck to co sponsor the aircraft Noise Reduction Act, which is currently under consideration in the US House and would restore local control over noise at the Longmont airport. This bill is sponsored by Congressman amazing congressman Jonah goose, and was drafted in support of quiet skies.

50:26
We know that Ken buck does not value environmental quality. He won’t do it. But at least you can make it clear that you do. Second, restore local control over your airport by forgoing the heavy government subsidies, primarily FAA grant monies that explicitly prevent local control. Without the federal grants. How can you close that funding gap for capital improvements, because it’s the only way right now.

50:59
The air kit

51:00
The airport can become financially self sufficient by adopting landing fees

51:05
for airport users and installing a solar field on that undeveloped 40 acres of land at the airport. Other airports are doing this. And finally, you can support incentives for airport users to transition from the 1960s era, piston engine, leaded fuel fleet to cleaner electric planes that are being developed in Colorado at by aerospace down in Littleton.

51:34
For my part 2020 is going to be a great year.

51:39
We have a lot to look forward to. And I’m going to continue to support citizen groups who value environmental quality

51:48
and who are working to improve the quality of life and their communities. Thank you.

51:54
All right. Thank you, Miss Gibbs. Appreciate it. All right, Tessa hail

52:00
Actually, you know what let’s, I mean, obviously freecycle I see, I think I see a couple of kids in the audience and following the

52:09
I see a kid in the back. Are you going to be the kiddos in the very back? Or are you guys here to say something or with someone?

52:21
Okay, so why don’t we have you in your son come up first.

52:25
All right, come on up. And then I see some kids here. That’s from kids. Right. So you’ll go next, and the other kids in the audience to school tomorrow.

52:38
Good try, James. Good try.

52:44
That’s all right.

52:55
I spit out anything.

53:01
And that the newspapers already

53:03
the newspapers already pointing to their ears. So when you when you get ready to talk, just make sure you’re in that microphone. He but he wasn’t saying anything he was saying everything very important but nothing substantive pertaining to his comments, john. And since I have more time I’ll speak off topic just a little bit and

53:20
I was in I lived in Virginia before we moved here and I was in Richmond yesterday. And in spite of all the slanderous reports of white supremacy, then white nationalists and hate groups, I found nothing that love, I found love of country, love of freedom and liberty, and love for one another love for one another. can’t spit it out love for one another one another.

53:50
regardless of race or anything, that’s all I found there. I found I ran into a Nazi Hunter. And I told him I don’t know check up in Idaho.

54:00
There might be three I think there’s three of them in three Nazis up in Idaho in a cabin. But all the slanderous news is just ridiculous. I found nothing but love there. So just wanted to let y’all know that.

54:14
Oh, yeah, and I’m gonna Your name is James Nielsen. Yes, sir. Okay.

54:20
As you know, I’ve been speaking about the drinking water fluoridation. And last week when I was speaking afterwards, my son told me that somebody was in the back, kind of chuckling and what and we think he thinks it has occurred when I stated that fluoride is not even good for your teeth.

54:41
So I’ll explain that. fluoride is a killer poison. It’s used as a pesticide in farming, a principal ingredient in rap poisoning.

54:52
So of course, this killer substance kills bacteria on the surface of your teeth when applied topically when you breathe

55:00
Your teeth, thus is very useful in preventing cavities because it kills bacteria.

55:07
topically. So, so that’s topically swallowing it

55:13
does not really

55:15
Oh, swallowing it supposedly has the same effect by building up into your bones and making your enamel stronger, but brittle is not stronger. It makes your bones brittle.

55:32
In 2002, Colorado Springs ended fluoridation and at the time the mayor Mayor Lou make peace who voted in favor of continuing the fluoridation scolded the anti florid Pete fluoride people by breeding hysteria

55:50
while passing out petitions, and they talked to She said her quote they talked about and in terms of poison and toxic waste, she said

56:00
emotionalism got ahead of the data. So I have some data here tonight.

56:07
We all know that it’s a poison. It’s a toxic waste. It’s derived from toxic waste, literally, there’s nothing emotional about that. It’s fact.

56:18
And data. Here’s a chart that’s derived from data from the World Health Organization. It’s a chart directly from,

56:28
from showing data from 18 westernized countries over about a 35 year period from 1973 2005, roughly, showing a dramatic decrease in cavities and shut up which is an increase in oral health and teeth health. Right? See the dramatic decrease in cavities over from 1975 ish to 2003 2005 or so

56:58
dramatic decrease

57:00
Over a 30 year period of cavities and improved oral health over that period. Now 14 or so of the countries where I’m Florida dated

57:18
Can anyone explain that?

57:23
What contributed to the decline in cavities over the 35 year period in the countries that were not fluoridated?

57:31
any explanation

57:34
Thank you rushing with a poison that killer poison that kills bacteria

57:43
so there you go. There’s the data that I don’t know apparently Miss respectfully may or make peace didn’t know about

57:54
and about that’s about all I have.

57:58
Questions.

58:00
Not for you. Oh, thanks. Yeah. Alright, cool. Thanks.

58:05
All right.

58:08
Sorry, buddy. Gonna have to go to school tomorrow.

58:11
All right, let’s go on to violet and Christian hedstrom.

58:16
If your parents are speaking with you come up, but I assume they’re alone. Come on kids.

58:23
That sure that’s all right.

58:25
That’s the family needs to get out of here so the entire family can go and

58:31
all right.

58:40
Jaime Radley and city council. I just wanted to thank you so much again for proclaiming last Tuesday. Healthy drinks for kids day in Longmont. That’s really exciting. And it also kind of wanted to go into the background of how this all started with the proposed ordinance of making the default beverages and children’s many the healthy choices

59:00
So I’ve always been interested in wellness but after becoming a parent 10 years ago, I became really, really interested in kids health. So I co founded a nonprofit called St. brain healthy kids. And our goal is to elevate the health of kids here in the st. Green Valley School District, through education. For instance, we get grants from Boulder County farmers market, buy local produce, bring it in have taste testings with kids in the schools. funfact kids in long love beats, whether they’re raw or roasted with goat cheese, so good on them.

59:36
So we’ve done a lot of work with kids, but we also wanted to include parents. So we began having a series of potlucks for parents where they could get together and talk about concerns they had with children’s health.

59:48
And this is kind of where we started with all this is the overwhelming overarching response from parents was that they were really frustrated with trying to raise Healthy Kids in an environment that doesn’t necessarily help

1:00:00
With supporting those decisions.

1:00:04
So you know, as we all know, for instance, kids are bombarded with

1:00:08
advertisements from soda companies really makes educating kids on this an uphill battle. Parents also mentioned going to restaurants and having their kids see set on the menu. And having been in the difficult position of either getting into an argument and being the bad guy with their kids.

1:00:29
And having to say no, or giving in to the pestering and feeling bad and guilty about making that decision for their kids. Georgia. The truth is that children’s menus are just for kids who are young enough or too young to be able to make really sound health decisions for themselves for the most part. In order to teach them healthy decision making. It helps a lot to have healthy choices readily available for children so that they learn that having soda or sugary drink is fine, as

1:01:00
an occasional treat but is not necessarily the best everyday beverage to consume and especially not as a proxy to water.

1:01:08
This became especially troubling to me and as I learned the facts that I mentioned to you last Tuesday regarding the disturbing trends in obesity and overweight and kids here in Boulder County and the assumed unseen

1:01:21
illnesses that they face. So we knew we had to make a difference in some way. So over two years ago, we started doing outreach and education here in Longmont. We hosted many different

1:01:32
get togethers with the community were invited the entire community at a youth center and the museum and the library and all different places, in addition to attending a lot of long line festivals like Cinco de Mayo and unity in the community. And really the overwhelming response that we’ve gotten when we’ve proposed the idea of just

1:01:54
putting the language of healthy beverages on kids menu but still allowing parents absolutely the choice to choose whatever

1:02:00
They want for their kids. And I will say I’ve talked to hundreds of people, and maybe two or three have been against it. It seems like something that’s really favorable with along that population.

1:02:14
I’ve lived in Longmont my whole life. I was born and raised here. I love Longmont more than anybody. I love this place. In fact, when all my high school friends were embarrassed to be from here, and said that they were from East Boulder County

1:02:26
instead of safe, you know, before this was kind of a cool place with breweries. I love this community and one of the reasons is that it’s always valued its residents and it’s done the right thing. And whether that’s bringing next light to our homes to fighting to make RTD keep its promise to bring the rail here to Longmont before I’m in a nursing home to helping our community.

1:02:52
Be free from the health effects of fracking as much as possible. We do the right thing and I really feel like this is the right thing to do, especially as a heel

1:03:00
community, and it just shows that we care about the health of our kids.

1:03:06
All right, thank you. Thank you. We want to get to the kids.

1:03:11
Come on Christian and violent.

1:03:18
Christian, don’t be nervous. You’re just on TV.

1:03:22
There’s only 100,000 people watching.

1:03:27
My name is Christian. Actually, you know what? Let’s do this. Could you Sorry, Christian, can we get him just could they stand at the managers podium?

1:03:38
Although it’s not a podium, but yeah, Harold’s chair. The seat of power guys. Here, why don’t you go stand over here so we can see it. Now? Yep. Stand right up there and talking to that microphone. Put it right up. Yep. My name is Christian. You’re gonna be all been there. You’re gonna we’re gonna get you on TV. Hold on a second. I think

1:04:00
So, there you go. All right. My name is Christian. And I think you know,

1:04:07
show you know that I’m the son of Nina. I’m basically talking about the same thing. So please help us pass the ordinance because kids eat 40 gallons of sugary drinks each year. And kids wanna be healthy when they’re grownups. When kids see a menu, they pick what’s on the menu. And if they see water, milk, they will choose water or milk. Not be picky.

1:04:33
All right, cool.

1:04:35
Violet, do you want to stand there at the podium? You’re a little taller.

1:04:41
And then could you get that microphone right up in front of your face. Um, my name is violet.

1:04:47
Sugar is not healthy. So

1:04:50
even when it’s not that good for you. Kids need to be healthier in our society. So we need you to help us provide a paradise for children. That’s also why we need you to please host

1:05:02
Awesome, you guys did great.

1:05:08
Tim, do you have anything to say?

1:05:12
peer pressure. I dare you to speak out against a sugary drinks ordinance. I dare you.

1:05:21
I wouldn’t look good at home for me.

1:05:25
And Good evening to you. And I just want to speak out on behalf of the same potential ordinance that would make the default option on menus for kids. Some of this on a sugary beverage. I’m going to get there by slightly secure this route, which is

1:05:39
when people come to my home, I typically ask them to remove their shoes. And the reason I do that is because as a male for almost 40 years, what I realize is that when you go into a male men’s bathroom and you go up to a urinal, there oftentimes is a puddle of urine right in front of it.

1:05:55
With the women may not realize here is that some of the urinals that men have have a little

1:06:00
Be picture that’s right above the drain. And for some reason us men love to aim right at that be. And apparently it’s prevent spillage by 80%. My point here is that there’s this concept of behavioral economics, which means we can just give people a slight nudge to change their behavior in the direction we think is positive. And this doesn’t necessarily mean we’re telling people what they can or cannot do. But we’re simply giving people a nudge. And these are this ideas that are endorsed by Richard Thaler, who’s the University of Chicago economist who’s also a Nobel laureate is the same concept, for example of employers who would have it as a default that you would put money into a retirement account with a specific with a specific rate already set. So the default is that which we encourage is positive behavior. And if you choose to get out of that, that is absolutely your choice. But in the same way that that the nudge theory works, is that we’re asking this city council we’re urging them to really seek out

1:07:00
Putting the default on a menu, something that’s on a sugary beverage because this is simply the city of Long money nudging certain behavior that we would think is up as a positive good. Essentially, this just makes it a lot easier for parents who are going out to restaurants to make a decision on behalf of their kids. That’s something that’s less healthy. Obviously, there’s a healthier choice, and preventing some of the issues that might occur such as having fights with kids over why they can’t pick the soft drink that’s listed already there. But again, just like the other other examples here, those parents who choose to give their kids soft drinks can still make that choice. At least the default option is an easier option for them. Simply we’re asking the city council to allow parents just give them the nudge that they need to allow the kids in Longmont to be healthier. Thank you. What do you want bees on urinals? I want bees on urinals Okay. All right. Thank you.

1:07:54
Dr. Waters.

1:07:56
Thanks Mayor Bagley just I don’t know if this would be better for you or

1:08:00
The rest of your family

1:08:02
and I don’t know question so much as just reflections.

1:08:08
We did ask for this to come back in an ordinance. I’m certain we’ll see it soon.

1:08:13
We’ve all received some correspondence since that motion

1:08:20
taking us to task I know because all of us are me for for turning Longmont city council or long man into a nanny state. You know, we’re not Boulder. We’re not New York City. This is Longmont let us be in make those decisions. So just a couple of reflections. One is

1:08:39
what what has been proposed and what we’ll see I’m certain

1:08:43
doesn’t take away options from parents if they want to order sugary drinks, simply makes the first choice the default on the menu. Healthy Choice, correct. That is correct. Then enforcement of that isn’t fault a code enforcement along with the county is going to assume responsibility

1:09:00
For code enforcement, and that’s my understanding. Yeah. And so just one last reflection. In a nap another chapter of my life, I was involved with funding from NIH National Institutes of Health Centers for Disease Control Scripps Institute.

1:09:16
In anticipation of what they saw

1:09:20
as the next huge economic and health crisis in this country, type two diabetes, and childhood obesity. That was a decade ago. Today, the very kids we were concerned about then are 10 years old. And we’re seeing the effects of those decisions that have been made over time. So the best time for us to have adopted for a long month to have adopted, the ordinates we’re talking about was 10 years ago.

1:09:48
The next best time is next Tuesday night, right? So parents can decide what they want to order for their kids.

1:09:55
But we’re going to make a statement about what we think are healthy choices.

1:10:00
As first choices on menus, so thanks for your leadership on this. Appreciate you.

1:10:06
Councillor Christiansen?

1:10:10
Yeah, I think it’s funny that you get stuck doing this.

1:10:14
One more question. I loved your comments. But So do you have any good ideas on how to make the default putting the lid down?

1:10:24
Don’t

1:10:26
be so happy. You know, I will start a committee to discuss this event.

1:10:33
Thank you. Thank you.

1:10:36
Awesome. All right, Tessa hail. Sorry for the delay. Well worth it.

1:10:49
Good evening. Mayor Bagley and city council. I’m Tessa Hale and with Boulder County Public Health. It’s a tough act to follow Tim and the urinal cakes.

1:11:00
But I’ll try. I’m here also to talk about the proposed ordinance on healthy drinks for children’s meals. And I just want to give some perspective from the public health perspective. So, in reading some of the comments I saw on the times call Facebook page and in the TC line, I feel like maybe not everyone had a chance to fully read the article. So this is just some clarifying comments. So first and foremost, as Councilmember waters just explained, this is not at all about taking anyone’s choice away. This is really just about nudging people into making a healthier choice. The reason we’re talking about sugary beverages is pretty straightforward. sugary beverages have no nutritional value and lead to a whole host of negative health outcomes, overweight and obesity leading to heart disease, stroke, cancer, type two diabetes, non alcoholic fatty liver disease, cavities, there’s really just no good to come

1:12:00
There’s no problem with people choosing to drink that, right? That’s great. But it shouldn’t be an everyday choice if you want to have a life where you’re not on meds, or having different kinds of medical interventions for the rest of your life, which is what we’re looking at for our children’s generation.

1:12:18
Additionally, it was good to hear, you know, some reference to the cost, just the last time this data was collected was in 2009. Colorado spent over $1.6 billion, treating diseases and conditions related to obesity. That was in 2009. And at that time, the prediction was made that a 5% reduction in the average BMI, or body mass index for cardio adults could say the state more than 10 billion by 2030. So I don’t know how that breaks down to long mom, but you can imagine that, you know, it would be a big cost savings overall. So from a health perspective, from an economic perspective, this makes a lot of sense.

1:13:00
We’re not taking choice away. I also think it’s important to look at the beverage industry spends 860 $6 million every year marketing primarily to children and communities of color. And they have a goal of increasing people consuming these beverages because it makes them money. So as much as we get out there, and we do education, and we do outreach, and we want the choice to be for parents and for kids and for individuals, we also know that if you go anywhere you go, now you’re going to see a sugary beverage, whether it’s the restaurant, the hardware store, the craft store, they’re everywhere, right? So if we’re trying to teach our kids how to make healthy choices for the rest of their lives, teach them that with a meal, you know, have have water and milk. And we know that this works, Disney decided to offer healthy default beverages people stick with it. 66% of the time you don’t even think about it. When you see a sugary drink, choosing something healthy, it becomes an upstream choice for families and for kids.

1:14:00
Kids also the average age of kid eating off a children’s menu, it’s five. They don’t know at that point the difference of what what they’re doing.

1:14:10
And I’ll just close with, you know, all the major health organizations, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Heart Association, American Academy of Child hood.

1:14:24
So pediatric dentistry, American Academy of dietetics, all came out and said kids five and under should not be drinking anything besides unflavored, milk and water. And so really all we’re doing is saying, let’s just make it really easy for parents and kids to do what we know is right and best. And to Tim’s point about nudging people in the right direction. If you have a recycling bin, people are more apt to recycle. If you don’t, people aren’t going to. So I think what we’re looking at doing is just creating an environment that makes it possible for our kids to live long healthy lives. And both

1:15:00
County Public Health can support the implementation of this policy.

1:15:04
Thank you. All right, that’s right back.

1:15:07
Thank you very badly. I just want to make a statement to kind of head off some TC comments that the

1:15:15
the statement about code enforcement was not code enforcement on parents to make sure that they are

1:15:24
choosing a healthy drink for their child off the menu. It is for the restaurants to make sure that they are putting that as the default drink for children because I can just in my head hear some of the things about oh no police are going to come after us to make sure that we ordered those healthy drinks. Right, thank you for clarifying. And just to be clear, the way that Boulder County Public Health would support this is as you all probably know, we already conduct regular inspections of restaurants. So this would just be we already look at menus for food safety. This will just be adding it in

1:15:59
great

1:16:00
Thank you. We’re gonna take a five minute break.

1:16:04
I’m sorry to have a motion.

1:16:07
Okay, we’re gonna take a break.

1:23:10
Alright, let’s go ahead and get started again.

1:23:13
So there has been a request. So tonight there are just so you know, there are

1:23:21
four or 31 requests to speak and we have gone through 11. So we jumped over 10 so that number 10 will be number, the 12th. But we’re gonna hear from Jody Padma who’s number 10. They’re going to pick up with marine show hot show Han or co Han, who’s 13 and 14 is Roxanne Hemel await.

1:23:45
And then we have

1:23:47
wrought Robin Denver Stevens who’s 15 and Laura Hickey, who’s 16 and Gordon Piedro who’s 17. So that’s where we’re at. So I assume you’re God. I am all right. That’s

1:24:03
Actually no gems can wear these 11 and 12. As as bad as I thought. Okay, yeah.

1:24:10
All right. Good evening Mayor Bagley and city council members. Thank you for this opportunity to speak. My name is Jody Padma, and I live on Eagle view circle in Longmont. I’ve been a resident for 20 years. I’m here this evening to show my support as well for the healthy beverage ordinance. When I became a parent 13 years ago, I had no idea the challenges I would face in suit ensuring my children ate a healthy diet. At the time, I worked as a project manager and a developer at IBM. I believed in eating local and cleanly as possible

1:24:46
after the birth of my second child Two years later, and his emergency surgery at five days old. His surgeon stress that he needed to stay away from a standard American diet.

1:24:57
It was then I took my

1:25:00
was then I took what I fed my children seriously. So seriously, I went back to school and became a holistic nutritionist.

1:25:08
I made this life change not only for my family but for my community.

1:25:12
As our children got older, I loved taking them to local restaurants. eating out is always a treat, but often became a battle. Even before food was ordered, a server would come to our table and say something like, and for kids, here’s the menu, coke products, chocolate milk and lemonade. As my children started to learn to read, that was the first thing they spied on menus and would say, Can I have a root beer?

1:25:38
Even though I knew better, I felt terribly guilty to say no. Typically, it was 6pm and root beer can have upwards of 45 grams of sugar. I brought a little sample, which is actually 11.25 teaspoons of sugar and one root beer 112 ounce root beer. I didn’t want my children’s belly full of sugar, less than

1:26:00
Two hours before bed. This conversation always made everyone grumpy. It was a terrible way to begin, which should have been a fun dinner. By the way, we still have these arguments and my kids are much older.

1:26:13
Today, I am a culinary trainer for the National Program Cooking Matters. I teach at the Art Center. One of our lessons in a six week program is on sugar. I am also the nutritional educator for efa in Boulder, which this is not a sugar tax we’re talking about but the sugar tax in Boulder pays for that salary for me. Every time we discuss sugar in any of these situations, it is shocking to parents how sugar is a health hazard when we discuss how sugar impacts children, and, and all of the statistics which you’ve already heard in detail. Parents finally get it. Then they share stories of walking into save a lot or Walmart or King soopers or Safeway and how they’re bombarded with a soda displays slash art. They begin sharing what they see online and on TV.

1:27:00
commercials and how it doesn’t seem fair that these conglomerates market to children. I am very optimistic about this ordinance because it is not a builder tax, like many people misunderstand. This puts the choice when going out to eat squarely on parents. Those who choose should oversee what their children drink anyway.

1:27:22
If we’re celebrating and my son wants a Shirley Temple, that is my choice, I am his mom. I would really like this. I would really like sorry. I really like how this ordinate puts the decisions parent on parents his hand, because 60% of the time, parents choose the default choice.

1:27:40
If McDonald’s and Disney can do this without losing revenue, restaurants in Longmont will see the same children need to need our help to support a healthy lifestyle. They are consistently bombarded with sugar in so many forms. not putting sugary beverages on children’s menu is a great way to support families.

1:28:00
And to make long, healthy city. Thank you.

1:28:05
My sugar

1:28:07
right James Kenworthy.

1:28:25
James camera the 107 curb replace

1:28:29
it figs he is the oldest person in the room. I’m up there in the top five. I’m a little harder hearing too. And I missed the connection between men’s journal habits and the sugar, the sugary drinks. I somehow I missed that. You don’t have to explain it.

1:28:50
There are 31 people here given comments.

1:28:55
And I was wondering this afternoon how many hours it takes for one

1:29:00
person to work their comments up.

1:29:03
And that’s probably two, two and a half to three hours. So we’re talking about 90 hours of effort here.

1:29:10
Plus,

1:29:12
we see if you’re listening to other people, that’s another two or three hours per person.

1:29:19
So this is a real

1:29:22
what I want to say respectful process. There’s a lot going on here.

1:29:28
And I just want to congratulate the Council on doing this. It’s it’s a good thing to do.

1:29:37
I’m going to weigh in on some of the things I heard

1:29:41
the sugar deal. That’s part of the corporate system.

1:29:47
The corporate system are attacking our children

1:29:50
and they’re attacking their health. They’re attacking our health and

1:29:57
we’re facing mass extinction because of the corporate

1:30:00
system. That’s how we got here. And that’s no joke.

1:30:07
The climate event last Thursday, we had 99 people there.

1:30:14
The people.

1:30:17
people I know dreamed up the event.

1:30:20
We arranged we arrange the publicity.

1:30:25
We went to the room in the afternoon and checked it out.

1:30:37
I think there was something else I was going to talk about hangout on air.

1:30:45
Oh,

1:30:47
little thing I missed is mass extinction.

1:30:51
We’re facing mass extinction because the corporate system

1:30:55
and we haven’t talked about that for a while. I talked about

1:31:00
carbon sequestration a few weeks ago. I’m going to talk about it again.

1:31:04
We need to plant native trees and shrubs, Navy flowers.

1:31:13
Nature, if we ignore nature, we will not make any progress on this

1:31:19
combat combating mass extinction. Okay.

1:31:24
Thanks for holding this. Thank you.

1:31:28
Thank you.

1:31:29
All right. Jeff, more number 12.

1:31:43
Getting there Bagley members of council. I’m here tonight to correct the record.

1:31:49
Last Tuesday night, a member of this council stated that we’d had a conversation about the warrantless searches at two suites. That statement accused me of having prior knowledge

1:32:00
The searches and and not reporting the problem.

1:32:04
This false statement is an assault on my integrity.

1:32:08
I value my reputation.

1:32:11
I value honesty and integrity above all else. This statement is nothing but slander.

1:32:18
I am owed a public returns traction and a public apology from the council member making this false statement.

1:32:26
So if you want to do that, don’t go ahead.

1:32:30
I yes. I apologize. I’m sorry. Councilmember Peck. Thank you. I apologize for making that statement. But I didn’t say assault on the sweets. You can look at the I that was not in my statement, but I do apologize for making the statement.

1:32:47
Well, it wasn’t. It’s whatever the problem was or with the long run Housing Authority button. warrantless searches at the sweet

1:32:57
there were problems with the board.

1:33:00
Excuse me, and with Michael Reese just internal problems. It didn’t have anything to do with the sweets.

1:33:08
Well, you can say what you will but reinterpreted thank you for apologizing. You’re welcome. Thank you

1:33:16
all right. Is it marine? I don’t have an actual last time I’m sorry. You’re gonna have helped me out show Han is good enough. What do you say how he said?

1:33:24
I say COO, coo.

1:33:28
fail me. Alright. Cool. Um, good evening. So my name is marine. And I am here tonight to support affordable housing as a member of the Boulder County Regional Housing Partnership, and the home wanted team. As you may know, in 2017, nine jurisdictions came together to form the partnership and work together to address the county’s housing challenges. They have collectively committed to tripled the number of affordable housing homes by 2035

1:34:00
means building 12,000 new units and preserving the existing 6000 units throughout the county. Through committed police policies, dedicated funding and creating creative partnerships. We were very impressed to see several long one council members at the East County Housing Coalition meeting last week and on behalf of the partnership we wanted to recognize the great work the city of Longmont has done to support and promote affordable housing in this community. We off we often hold long up as an example with our partner jurisdictions.

1:34:39
Tonight, I wanted to express our commitment to continue to be a partner with long monks and everyone who lives or desires to live here. We are here to support you and to help facilitate regional funding and policy solutions for the long run community and beyond.

1:34:56
We are looking we’re looking for community members.

1:35:00
leaders, elected officials, business owners, and anyone who cares about housing to join our home team. By joining the home team, you will be part of the solution to take sustain and courageous action in your community. We need your passions skills and energy to help build the incredible resilient and thriving community we know we can be with access to affordable housing for all at our core.

1:35:28
Now I’d like to show you a three minute video with some of the stories we have heard in the community about affordable housing needs and solutions. I look forward to answering any questions and working with all of you in the coming year and I do have signs. I know some of you have seen I have seen them before Council. She’s going to be about 15 or 20 seconds over. Do we have any objection to that? Okay, perfect. Let’s go ahead.

1:35:56
Don’t want to play favorites for the homeless.

1:36:28
With $5,000 in my pocket, I was not able to get a six months so please don’t get my son back in my life.

1:36:35
For a long time, it was years before I got stable. What I felt really different about this workshop that I was in was that it centered voices and stories narrative that we don’t typically hear around the affordable housing crisis. Oftentimes, it’s centered on just price and people are being squeezed out. There’s all these other

1:37:00
stories that make certain folks have an even harder time. We need to elevate those stories.

1:37:12
I am single parent, I am a party student. I have two children, that they have disabilities mean yourselves and I am a hair salon now and I did that because I know how to teach myself and you know how to survive. Currently I work as a mental health professional. So I’ll use my lived experience with alcohol and mental illness to to become certified and help other people in a clinical setting. I was a 25 year hospice worker, I am involved in helping those that do not have voices to be heard. I run an organization here called the rescue. We do LGBT redistribution, I was able to work 30 year k 12 position as a teacher and administrator

1:38:06
elevate the voice of the Latino migrant community power faith based communities and activate there’s somebody in our group who’s going to create a community land trust pilot, learning share stories and personalized issues. advocate for the right people in the right roles. What kind of society are we if we don’t care for each other? By putting myself out there I including a more positive face on the struggle by gentrifying our communities Hey, economy cannot be sustained because we are essential.

1:39:00
Cool, Dr. Waters.

1:39:05
Thanks Mayor Bagley.

1:39:08
So I was one of the one of those who attended the meeting the other evening. And it was it was good to see people come together in solidarity around this need to reduce housing insecurity and how’s those without homes? And I do have I want to raise some questions tonight.

1:39:29
I don’t know whether I’ll stay with that effort.

1:39:32
Because I wouldn’t want to be a drag on it. But I but there’s some questions I think that I’d like as a council member, whether I’m in that involved in that experience or not.

1:39:44
But I want to start with letting people know that today. We moved the first new residents into the Fall River apartments 50, permanently affordable housing units, constructed by la hdc managed by la che and supported by the city.

1:40:00
Long Island. So we have a we have new residents moving in today. And just for whatever it’s worth residents from one of our other la properties formed a welcoming committee. And they were there to greet them as they walk through the door.

1:40:14
I think that maybe was for reason, but I’ll get it wrong.

1:40:19
offered a gift bag. So new resident showing up in this property. It was a it was a cool example of

1:40:26
folks in subsidized housing, reaching out to welcome folks into a larger community. We also dlh a board meeting today the board passed a resolution that’s going to come to this council

1:40:41
as part of a partnership to advance conversations we’ve had around the suites, which will be substantially more additional permanently affordable homes for families around this week. So we’re making progress on those fronts.

1:40:57
Here’s what here’s what I was puzzled.

1:41:00
Bye as we left the other evening, I heard the data or the data point. there right now there are 54,000 residents in the in the county of Boulder, who are paying more than 50% of their income for housing.

1:41:17
Anybody who understands the economics of household income and in surprises knows just how housing insecure anybody would be. I didn’t get it. I raised my hand, I didn’t get a chance to ask the question, what number or percentage of that 54,000 would be people who would not qualify for subsidized housing, teachers, first responders, hospitality industry, you know, you could line them up.

1:41:45
I’m just speculating. I’m guessing a signet and I don’t have to I’m not expecting the answer to this. But I’m guessing that a substantial number of the 54,000 would be working class families who are as stressed as

1:42:01
Making somewhere between 80 to 100 and 110% area median income, because we know living wages are so relative to the cost of housing and childcare, right. So what that number is just kind of an artificial one if we don’t have attainable housing and affordable health care for those families. But the other night, what I heard was, that segment of the population would not be part of the focus for this effort. It would only be focused on folks below 60 a 60%. Am I in below?

1:42:37
And I just want to say I think that’s short sighted. And I’m not being critical of you. I’m saying to the to the that effort, the better we do with folks from from 80 to 100% of am I, the more user units that might end up for folks at 60% and below. This seems to me we should be we should be framing all of this as both and not either or, right

1:43:01
One last observation and I would like your reflection on this because this is the other question I would have asked but time ran out.

1:43:10
I’ve spoken sitting in this chair on more than one occasion. I’ve said it in other places. I think we’re headed toward an interesting moment in Longmont and not just long mind. I think every county along the front range where we’re going to have to come to grips with our frustrations with growth and quality of life. For those who have it and housing a quality of life for those who don’t. Right.

1:43:37
I keep hearing and reading about concerns in in our local media about out of control growth Longmont City Council’s stop the growth. I had a conversation with a friend not long ago about the 1%. The ballot measure that’s being circulated this being the petition that’s being circulated to replicate in 12 counties in Colorado. What Lakewood is done

1:44:00
To limit growth to 1%

1:44:02
all the data I’ve seen, if that were to be successful, all the data on the effects on housing are devastating. If we want to rapidly increase housing insecurity and create a larger homeless population, that would be a surefire way to do it.

1:44:17
But that happened in Longmont or Longmont that happened in Lakewood. And this ballot measure is being circulated because folks with quality of life who who are not housing insecure, would like to see a slow down the growth and I understand that has to be smart. We have to be district strategic about where we grow. We can’t sprawl density, we’re gonna have to do Warthen city all the things we know from urban urban, the new kind of new urban ism.

1:44:45
But it seems to me that that was the way this conversation got framed up the other night sounded to me like either or,

1:44:54
rather than both hand and I don’t know how we how we how we stay

1:45:00
And solidarity on housing, if this becomes exclusive, so if you want to comment on any of that, maybe I’ll way back in or I’ll just listen. Yeah, I can try it. Um,

1:45:13
I, our goal is to be inclusive.

1:45:17
First of all, and I do believe that we are using the 18,000 unit goal in 2035 as a data point, because it’s something that we can measure.

1:45:30
It is not exclusive of finding solutions for middle income housing.

1:45:37
So that’s to answer that I think your first

1:45:41
comment, the second comment and growth

1:45:48
is is is a difficult question to answer.

1:45:53
I would say I would say that we are

1:45:57
trying to invite everybody at the table

1:46:00
To find creative solutions so that we don’t oppose growth, open space, affordable housing, and so on. And so we’re really opening up to the community

1:46:16
through this year and beyond,

1:46:19
to

1:46:21
try and figure out ways that we can all live together. And that people who work in Boulder in Longmont and Boulder County in general are able to live here because it goes beyond

1:46:38
just quality of life. It is also the health of those people that the health of the community that that is at stake, the health of the children. There are many data points to showing that

1:46:54
housing stability

1:46:57
creates better

1:47:00
Health people better education, life circumstances. Yeah. When they’re stable housing. As it moves forward, I’d like to be I want to be a champion of the cause.

1:47:13
But we need to keep drawing circles rather than lines, right? We’re all in this together. And it’s not at the expense of the quality of life. But we’ve got to be we’ve got to be able to have it I think the end Yes, we can do this and maintain quality life or protect quality of life and our, our natural wonders. I’m just I get nervous. The more I read in here that we’re headed towards an interesting Flashpoint or increasing tension in this community.

1:47:38
If we if we don’t want to, you know, clear it up, and maybe I’m wrong, I’m willing to listen, or I’ve got it wrong, but

1:47:46
but it does make me nervous with some of what I heard the other night.

1:47:50
Thank you for your comments. I would

1:47:53
please invite you to keep joining those meetings and voice your concerns because we need to hear

1:48:01
To hear all of them and we need to find solutions. Right? You’re not excused yet. Okay. kelmer Martin.

1:48:15
Thank you Mayor Bagley and I apologize for my phone which forgot to silence itself. It’s supposed to know that that happens every Tuesday evening at seven and somehow it forgot.

1:48:30
I agree with what Dr. Waters said.

1:48:34
And but I also have another take on it. Of course, please, everyone should decline to sign any growth limitation ordinances because you are

1:48:46
destroying the hopes of people who are housing challenged, who are homeless but seeking to be homed, especially the unemployed homeless, are rather the employed homeless.

1:49:00
Who are, you know, trying, trying to get back on a footing of normalcy and failing because there’s no place for them to go. It just so happens that I’m closely engaged with four constituent families that are in that position. Three who have approached me for help,

1:49:25
just as their council member and one single parent with a child who is living with me and can’t find a place to go, she doesn’t want to raise her daughter in an upstairs bedroom with a loft and a shower. But that’s the best she can find in Longmont right now.

1:49:49
Because can’t pay the rent

1:49:52
and she works full time and she makes $14 and 50 cents an hour and

1:49:59
I’m not

1:50:00
not even sure where that stands with regard to the AMI for a family of two she’s right on the cusp of maybe she qualifies for subsidies and maybe she doesn’t. But I have been helping her look and the lines that she can get into our years long. There’s your warm ups doing really well in terms of producing affordable and attainable units with our current affordable inclusionary housing ordinance. As as you pointed out, you know, we’re kind of leading the pack in terms of getting those things built, but 15 years

1:50:40
is not going to handle it because there are people today that are in a state of emergency and have no place to go.

1:50:51
And I would like to produce you know, propose that we declare a housing emergency the way we have declared a climate

1:51:00
Emergency, you know, what can we do? Karen, I, I have been talking to other constituents who aren’t housing challenged about this too. And one of them surprisingly asked a question that I had not thought to ask. And maybe you can answer it off the top of your head and if not, I’m going to keep a promise to ask you right here and now, which is how many

1:51:24
livable units in Longmont are owned by absentees? Or who are

1:51:34
you know, in some other way owned by by people who aren’t living in them? And can we have a housing drive where even temporarily transitionally we can scare up all of those places to live and somehow put people in them to give them a decent life.

1:51:55
You know, there must be something that we can do that we can that we can

1:52:01
Find ways to house people in in, in three months, six months a year, because

1:52:09
the impact on on the lives of families with children especially, is just too devastating.

1:52:18
to even think in terms of we’ve got a 15 year plan for it. That child is grown up and didn’t go to college, because it’s a 15 year plan.

1:52:31
mayor and city council members Well, the answer is I cannot answer that question. But but certainly we can, you know, we can look into what information we might have available in that regard. But that is not something that we have. We have a ready answer for and I would say that

1:52:51
while I am at the mic, so I do I do just want to clarify for Councilmember waters that the Eco coalition meeting that many of us

1:53:00
attended last week. So so that is different from the home wanted campaign. And so, so when they indicated that their focus was really on folks who needed subsidized housing, so folks at the lower end of the Am I that that certainly is something that is there is their focus. That is not the focus. The focus of the homeland and campaign for Boulder County is a broad range of affordable and attainable housing. And certainly, I think our interest with the home one campaign is how do we engage, you know, members of the community. So certainly, the voices from that echo coalition, we would want them to figure out, you know, to be voices for housing, the need for housing, what are solutions, how to address some of the things that Councilmember Martin talked about? But but certainly the home whining campaign is a is a broader range of

1:54:00
affordable and attainable housing. So I just wanted to clarify that. Thank you, Councillor Peck.

1:54:09
Studio. Thank you, Mayor bakley. I just wanted to piggyback a little bit on what Councilman Tim water said about the cap on growth. At the dark chicag meeting last week, we always have updates from the lobbyists as far as what bills are going to be presented, etc. And the conversation did turn to tapping growth because there are many municipalities along the front range that are interested in it, but but I don’t think it’s just going to be petitions. I think there are elected officials in the legislator and legislature that are looking at that issue.

1:54:47
So Dr. Cox just going to monitor it at this point. Nothing’s been presented. No bills have been written. But it is a Colorado conversation not just long not

1:54:59
like waters.

1:55:00
Thanks, I mean that we that’s we need to be paying real close attention to what happens with us. So, Karen, the so the meeting that you refer to the meeting that Maureen referred to, is something different than the meeting I attended, apparently, because the help because the home wanted sign. Several of us silver council members were in the meeting that I was referring to the home wanted sign was shared in that meeting. So these are two different meetings, sharing a, a kind of signs in common or

1:55:31
mayor and council. So yes, so the, the echo coalition is it’s a separate group, and they invited

1:55:40
no McKenzie selkie, who is one of the staff members on the home on campaign to really talk about what is the home one campaign just as they also invited someone from the hoc

1:55:55
Broomfield housing opportunities coalition, I believe is what that acronym stands for. Just

1:56:00
Inform the group about what activities are happening right now in Boulder and Broomfield County, but it is it is a separate campaign and I think our interests we haven’t had a meeting of the whole mining campaign since that meeting, I think we are really looking for where there are opportunities for intersection for collaboration because when you looked at many things that they had listed on the on the on the whiteboard in terms of data collection, and a variety of other things, we already have that data for for for Boulder County so we’re really looking for the opportunity to collaborate and and really to work together toward some common interest around affordable and attainable Thank you Maureen. If I put you on the spot I apologize. I wasn’t trying to find you but it’s but can I pass some signs so you can oh I

1:56:54
the the number that some of the big data, the big data points that were thrown out in this other media

1:57:01
are very important. It’s just that that meeting kind of turned exclusive and I didn’t quite understand why. And if if echo is not, then right on, so, thanks.

1:57:14
All right number 14 Roxanne Hummel, or Himmel probably Himmel

1:57:22
and then Laura Hickey is next 16 Rob Robin that said it seemed like his cluster name off the list. That’s not true. Robin throw something. My name is Roxanne Roxanne Himmel. I live on Elliott street in Longmont and I am here on behalf of the 2020 census. I’m here because I am a recruiting associate. And I have been working in long bond with the library, our center, the workforce, older workforce, and we diligently need those to help us census tech count. We don’t have

1:58:00
Enough census takers. And I’m sure you all know how important it is and this little flyer that I think Carmen was the one who actually put this one together, it’s great because it really points out how important it is for us to get the funding. And if we don’t, we can’t support places like the library, our center, and many other facilities.

1:58:21
So I’m here just asking for everybody to put the word out. We have some posters, which we were we’re trying to find places where there’s a lot of traffic and be able to have people

1:58:36
apply its $20 and 50 cents an hour, they’re now giving for census takers plus mileage. So we’re also going to be at Front Range Community College next week, trying to hire students who may need extra income. So I did put together some little flyers and booklets so that maybe you can take a look at it and see if somebody

1:59:00
needs extra income or they can help our community. We’ve had a lot of negative responses. A lot of people do not want to knock on people’s doors, asking them to complete their questionnaire or as we call it an invitation.

1:59:15
All right, thank you. Thank you. Can I give you guys each one of these? Yeah, thank you.

1:59:20
All right, number 16 Laura Hickey

1:59:25
All right.

1:59:27
17 Gordon Piedro

1:59:40
Gordon Piedro 2639 Falcon drive in Longmont. And first off, I’d like to congratulate everybody that was involved in the celebrating of Dr. Martin Luther King Day yesterday at

1:59:53
Silver Creek High School. It was a great event and one that made this resident proud of our city

2:00:00
second item I’d like to talk about is Plan B.

2:00:03
Last November, and majority of the previous city council members encourage Longmont voters to approve ballot issue three B, which would have the authorized $45.5 million in bonds to construct a competitive swimming facility in a nice rank. The ballot issue also involved the sales tax increase to pay for the bonds and to support the operations and maintenance of the pool in the US Frank. Approximately 63% of the voters said no to this proposal. I do not believe the defeat of valid issue three B means that residents will not support bombs and attacks increased to construct additional recreation facilities in Longmont. I believe voters rejected the facilities the city council placed on the ballot because they did not meet the needs of most residents. Immediately after the election, the times call interviewed several of you regarding Plan B for meeting the needs of the community. For additional recreational opportunities. Most of the performance

2:01:00
Three be had no plan B. One comment was very direct. If the public wants to redo of this, they’re going to have to tell us.

2:01:09
I’m here on your night devoted to listening to say that it’s time that you work with residents to develop a plan B.

2:01:19
I’m one of the residents who actively oppose ballot issue three be because it did not meet the community’s recreational needs. I did and do believe we need an additional full service recreation center similar to the one at quail campus with expanded swim lanes. I’m asking you to demonstrate leadership in this matter and move past your disappointment in last year’s election. I believe the key to success involves extensive community involvement to ascertain the recreational needs of the many resident who will have to vote yes for this to succeed

2:01:56
if residents are actively involved early in the process,

2:02:00
We will understand and support the project before it becomes a valid issue.

2:02:05
I mean, I think the location where the facility will be built should be designated as part of the planning process. And before the next ballot

2:02:15
if the new facility must replace Centennial pool for the long run, explain why and trust that as voters, we are able to understand complex issues.

2:02:28
I hope the next time additional recreational facilities are on the ballot. I can be an enthusiastic supporter.

2:02:35
I know I will be if an approach similar to the one I just outlined, is used.

2:02:41
And I have a couple of comments on things I’ve heard tonight.

2:02:48
I would like to encourage the council to take the same approach as I outlined on several of the important issues that we were facing as a community and that means involve the citizens intensely

2:03:00
affordable housing, homelessness, homelessness and rapid growth.

2:03:07
I believe, listening to residence in Lakewood, that they went for the limit on housing development, because they did not think the city council was listening. And I believe that when you don’t listen and you don’t involve your residence, you get reactions that are not good for anybody. Thank you.

2:03:30
Hold on.

2:03:34
Yes, thank you, Mr. Pedro. I took very careful account of of my constituents and

2:03:44
what would have made them vote for three B. And it seems like they were about equally divided among residents who would only vote for a facility if it was to be located in the south.

2:04:00
west corner of the city and residents who were only going to vote for the facility if

2:04:07
it was going to be located in the north east corner of the city. So tell me, Which do you think is the best idea for those residents for the council to to place that facility? And

2:04:22
I’m saying I think the best thing is to tell the citizens honestly what is at

2:04:29
stake, and let them make the right decision, because by leaving it up in the air, no one knows what your plans are. And if you have hidden plans or whatever, so I’m saying be straight with your residents, get them involved early. And let us be a part of the solution, as opposed to being told

2:04:48
our community deserves this so you should vote for it. That is not a way of involving your citizens.

2:04:56
dark waters

2:04:58
thanks, mare.

2:05:01
Gordon, you and I’ve this conversation in all kinds of different settings in terms of listening, so

2:05:09
it will help me with what I should be hearing, not from not from you, but maybe from you but from the larger from the community. Because I cuz sometimes here’s here’s my frustration, sometimes it feels like, it feels like I’m listening, you know, regardless what it looks like, you know, or, you know, and I understand I, I should listen more than I talk. But sometimes what I, the message I hear is do something about reducing housing insecurity and do something about homelessness and, you know, in responding to our most vulnerable residents, and then, and then it sounds to me like sometimes it’s the same people, right? It’s the same

2:05:52
collection of community members who are saying but not a hand but slow down growth.

2:06:00
Protect our quality of life even if it means you can address that this is I’m adding these words that you can’t address the quality of life of this group over here because you’re going to have to build things in order to house them. I mean it’s the dissonance that’s really frustrating to me. Just Just talk to me What about what how should we be listening differently and what messages should we be hearing not on 3d I’m down with I wish we had done an after action review in December and you know been actively involved in a conversation right now about what the new you know, Plan B is I’m with you. But I’m I’m a second part of your comments about you know, how we I thought in the affordable housing mix in I thought we listened then I thought we I you know, we have these kinds of sessions

2:06:47
what what what what should we be hearing and who should we be hearing it from? on the on the issue of homelessness, housing and security and, and the tensions with growth. I don’t have the magic solution, but I do

2:07:00
Know that when we have all these tensions, and we have division, and we’re not making any progress, not significant progress and finding the solution that’s serving all of us, it means we need to be more in dialogue. Because if we’re not in dialogue, we’re not listening to each other at all. And sometimes be honest with you.

2:07:21
I citizens come down and they make their three minutes tonight it’s five minutes and then we have this interaction, which I think is great.

2:07:30
And then they don’t feel like they’ve really been listened to they feel like they leave here being lectured. And therefore they say, Well, okay, they don’t want to hear from us. So I’m just encourage you to engage the full fledge involvement, the citizen involvement process that the city has had for years, and really reach out there and listen, and engage the citizens and let us be part of bringing things forward. I mean,

2:08:00
Three be would have been a different story if there had been a lot more dialogue with residents who were not necessarily involved in it, or thought that that was the right approach. If we’d have been listened to earlier, I mean, I maybe it wouldn’t, but I think that I think I heard a lot of people say, we need a full service Recreation Center. We didn’t need what was being proposed. So in the housing, affordable housing and homelessness, and this issue of whether or not a

2:08:31
moratorium or a limit on growth is going to be imposed. If anyone ever told me Lakewood was going to do that. I just said, Not a chance. Well, Lakewood did do it. And then I talked to several residents down there, and they said, this is not listening. So

2:08:48
what so just what are the messages that we should be hearing

2:08:54
about growth, in quality of life and homelessness? That combination

2:09:00
issues. Is there. Is there a single message or,

2:09:03
you know, if you think about

2:09:06
amping up signal to noise, right, think about frequency? Well, there’s a lot of noise, what’s the signal we should be hearing?

2:09:15
Well, I think that

2:09:18
as much as it doesn’t reflect what most of us would like to believe this is good sis and input because there’s no name attached to it. When people say in the times in the TC line, isn’t that about girls and congestion and all the stuff that’s going on?

2:09:37
It’s not just coming out of their ears or their mouths for no reason. They have a concern. So let’s figure out what those concerns are. Thanks,

2:09:48
Kelsey. Mr. Christiansen.

2:09:52
Thank you, Mr. Pedro.

2:09:54
I agree with a lot of what you’re saying. I I do think we we did a fairly active

2:10:00
Expensive survey. I think it costs $80,000. And many people responded more positively than anything else to a

2:10:12
rec center that had a full service rec center that also had various other community aspects like a library annex, and child care. And yet we sort of

2:10:25
eliminated that. So I mean, I do think that, you know, we listen a little, but then Not really. So I do. I do appreciate what you’re saying. I think

2:10:39
all of us could listen a lot more deeply.

2:10:44
And nobody’s in here. I guess the reason I appreciate coming tonight and raising this topic, the, the, I guess, part of my part of my confusion, right, is that so we’ve got 100,000 people in this town.

2:10:58
31% of the vote is required.

2:11:00
Looking 38% are democrat 31% are unaffiliated, right? So I mean, I’m not saying that because we’re supposed to be nonpartisan, etc. But it just goes to show that Longmont is a you know, I mean, we have all kinds of different views, right. And so a lot of times I’m stuck asking myself, who do you listen to? Right? Because we did do a survey, the only reason I got behind the ice rink was because the survey indicated that it would be more likely to pass if we included the ice rink. The and so, uh, and

2:11:31
and

2:11:33
on what I, we my opinion has not changed. We still need I agree with you a full service rec center and expand swimlanes. Right, I mean, that the need still exists regardless, in my opinion, one of 100,000 and if syndic tennille pool is going to go haywire in the next 10 years, and it needed more than ever, and so and so, and again, there. I mean, I think there’s a lack of I mean, I mentioned earlier lack of trust on council at the moment, but also, there’s a

2:12:00
Obviously a lack between the council and some members of the community. Right. And so, but as far as three B goes, the reason why the location wasn’t on there is because literally, I don’t think this council could agree at any time where it should go. Right. Like my opinion. Yeah, you know, which I was pretty vocal with is I would have put it right where Centennial is now, you know, partnered with the YMCA and put it right in the middle. Right. I don’t know if that would have passed if we would have told people but that’s what I want. But I never heard from anybody else on Council. That’s what they wanted, you know. And so, and the other thing is that the, the other reality is, even though there’s 100,000, and it’s a third, a third, third, not all citizens voices are equal, some are louder than others. Right? And so you got to be careful who you listen to.

2:12:50
And, and

2:12:53
if we’re gonna do it again, right, you know, this job pays 1000 bucks for each of my colleagues, Mr.

2:13:00
thousand bucks. You know, 1500 for mayor, I got a full time job. You know, I have kids I’ve got I mean, I mean, if we’re going to do it again, right, then those people who are most vocal in the community, and when I say vocal I mean that, right? I mean, they, you know, I mean, the people who are vocal right, looking right at me, I know. Yes, cuz I write letters. Yeah. So, yeah, and that’s okay. Right. But, but I personally am exhausted. In legislating, I’m exhausted, you know, of the, I hate politics. The irony is that I just hate it, you know? And so if we’re going to do it again, just tell me what you want, you know, and let’s, let’s make sure we get the swim pool and the facility and because I don’t, I wasn’t expecting a campaign against it or a war or this or that. I’m just I speak I speak for most of us up it. We’re just trying to do what’s best for the city. And so, so I I have a good solution. I

2:14:00
I think the council’s to direct a very competent staff that knows about facilities and knows about citizen participation and engagement and tell them to do a full job of involving the people in figuring out what we need to put on the belt and next time and the council all you have to slam dunk it because you’re already have those of us who didn’t like the last proposal. You already have us with you. That’s a good that’s a great idea. It is. So Councillor Martin.

2:14:32
Thank you very badly. I’m not sure I do think it’s a good idea.

2:14:37
See what I mean, go.

2:14:40
Watch me. Yeah, I’d like to see a citizen petition because, you know, we did listen to a lot of people coming to the public invited to be heard. And we did do I think a pretty thorough job of pulling the public. And then from where I sit, Mr. P

2:15:00
dro I think that some and you’re not the only one. But some organizations who oppose the pool and ice rink, who had been pretty quiet beforehand, came out with messaging that wasn’t really quite accurate. You know, so because what we had was essentially a full service recreation center that also had an ice rink. And

2:15:26
and yet, so many people that I talked to thought it wasn’t thought that it was only an ice rink in an Olympic pool, and it was only going to be used for outside events, and it wasn’t really going to alleviate the shortage of recreational facilities for the people which I mean nothing could be further from the truth. And and so I’m not sure that

2:15:55
I think that

2:15:58
if I think that

2:16:00
that the people who want to influence in the city should always do so with the best interests of the city at heart, and maybe watch how thoroughly they judge the best interests of the city

2:16:16
for themselves? Well, I would like to comment on that. I think that’s a pretty prejudicial statement, you’re basically saying that the citizens the 63% of the citizens who voted against this issue, were either deceptive, or uninformed or not able to understand things and I disagree with you to not only can say is if you decide to pump this and force us to take a petition, then I can almost guarantee that when you come forward with an art center proposal and a convention center proposed in the Library District proposal, all things I’ve heard this council talk about, I can guarantee you, they’re going to go down because the citizens are not going to put up with it. That would be my suggestion that you don’t

2:17:00
take that approach. We elected us leaders.

2:17:06
All right. Counselor pack.

2:17:09
I

2:17:11
Oh, sorry. Sorry. No, no, no.

2:17:16
Counselor back. Oh, sorry. Hold on. Sorry.

2:17:21
I don’t think that this that the citizens were deceptive. I don’t think the voters were deceptive. I think that many of them were deceived. And I take a lot of the fault for that onto the city because I don’t think that we did an adequate job of explaining to people and messaging and that’s why we need as Dr. Water said, and after action review.

2:17:49
But

2:17:51
I also feel like the public debate from the opposition to this

2:18:02
did take a deceptive approach, and nobody ever says that because of that approach. The people get nothing for another year.

2:18:14
And I think at some point we should remember that we live in a representative democracy. And rather than saying our leaders aren’t listening, maybe we should say our leaders are not trusted.

2:18:28
I’m willing to sit down with every every message I wrote on this matter and go through it with you line by line and see for you think that was deceptive.

2:18:39
Elsewhere back,

2:18:41
thank you. I’m madly The one thing that you said I think is part of the messaging that you said you knew where you wanted the pool to go. But it isn’t where we want it to go. It’s where the residents want it to go. And that is where we didn’t pay attention.

2:19:00
We just didn’t they came up several times saying they’ve been promised for 20 years that they and we didn’t listen. We just didn’t listen. So or take action on that.

2:19:13
That was just one tiny part of what happened. And I do you think we should discuss it? Because it is their city they pay us they elected us. We work for them.

2:19:25
With the

2:19:27
with the staff has done very good job in the past with having community meetings, we did it about marijuana. We had a huge thing about marijuana. We met about gun control, we did it about

2:19:42
homelessness huge two or three meetings. We even this summer had three meetings about homelessness and the service that is provided around that. So we do have interested community members who will give us input but I don’t think we listened on

2:20:00
One subject. Well, I just don’t think we did. And obviously, I mean, the data support your opinion. Right. I mean, meaning that your statement the date, I mean, last, however, but the but then again, I mean, Southwest Longmont, you know, again, they’re, they’re, I mean, they’re just one quadrant. Right. You know, and so and so I mean, and plus the other thing is, yeah, so I mean, my point was that I didn’t get to pick where we where we put it. My point was that, so, I mean, everybody wants the Rec Center within not next door, because that would be too much traffic, but they want it just far enough away, they can get to walking, and then everybody wants it in their location is my point. And I mean, you’re right, maybe maybe we should have but then again,

2:20:43
I mean, I’m exhausted the topic and the thought of going out again, and starting again, when there’s so many different opinions and viewpoints. If it’s not going to pass, you know, it’s I really, really, really

2:21:00
Really want the facility? Right? Yes, it’s not going to pass. It’s just wasted time to go ahead. Um, I agree with you, everybody wants it in a different place. But that is where council takes in the input, and then makes plans. So the first one that we would do is over here and then in maybe five to 10 years or when the bond is paid off, we would put one in another place. And that is how we plan for the future. The you know, we were not even going to put a new bond out. We were going to be we were going to reauthorize the bonding for the Rec Center in the museum that came due in May of 29. That fell through so we ended up with with having to figure out a new funding concept.

2:21:48
So it turned out to be a different conversation in my then in 2015 because the the money issue was different if we could have used that bonding and reauthorized it and

2:22:00
Just continue those payments and put in a rec center, I think that would have made a big difference. That was a good plan.

2:22:08
And it fell through. So I agree with you if we if we get community input. And as a council, we say this is what we can do today. This is where the majority wanted. But in 10 years, when this bond is paid off in 20 years, we’ll put one over here and stick to it. Don’t deviate, because that’s the frustration of the people. From my point of view, point. All right. Councilmember Rodriguez? Sorry, Mayor Pro Tem Rodriguez. Thank you very badly. I appreciate the dialogue back and forth on this issue. But I would just like to request that we move forward with the public forum and, and try to keep our dialogue amongst council members to a minimum and more interaction with the public go. That’s just a request, please.

2:22:57
All right. The customer

2:23:01
I just wanted to clarify that when I

2:23:04
asked the staff why there was no location on the ballot measure, it was because unless we knew it was funded, we would not spend the money on the extensive study to find out where it would get a facility would get the most use. So,

2:23:21
you know, it wasn’t some kind of a deceptive thing, and I do want everybody to know that but I’m not going to talk about it anymore.

2:23:28
All right, let’s go to the next one. So, Steven Weber, you’re 18 Paul finger Berg. You’re 19 Brenda Holden and Carla Blakely. You’re 20. So Mr. Steve Weber.

2:23:41
What?

2:23:43
No, no, these are so there’s a total of 30 I was asked that break that there’s a total of 31 people on the list and they want to know where we’re at just human nature wants to know who Magus how much time we got left. They were they were vaguely member of the Council.

2:24:00
Steven Weber live 11 Live long speak Ave long month appreciate this today having this full of people come up and speak. I think we need to do more often. so much stuff that gets covered here tonight just to talk about three things

2:24:17
quality of his quality of life issues and

2:24:21
and I grew up here in Longmont and stuff you guys are dealing with with the growth and all the other problems is not new just along monitor whole Front Range. Colorado’s changing,

2:24:35
being a native and being raised here I have a little bit different perspective than some of you might have. I represent a lot of population in Longmont that was raised here, grew up here and I represent fixed income people, people that don’t like the growth and don’t like the things that come with it. I understand that we have a lot of issues with homelessness and building

2:25:00
houses and all that. And it has to be a balance. Nobody said this was going to be easy. This is what you guys are here for. Well, I had chance to sit down and sitting back there. I had a chance to reminisce 20 years ago when I used to come here, and we used to discuss things back then. And I remember being on the committee or some kind of a get together we had on vision 2020 we’re allama one to look like, well, we’re here. And Lamarr talked about capping out at 100,000 people. I don’t think it’s going to happen. I think things change. And I think we’re going to have to be smart about growth. We’re going to have to be you know, balancing it and I my mic concerns is you know, three things that concern me tonight is traffic, open space and safety. Traffic as you know, if you drive around town now it’s it’s a mess. And you might have new people coming here that don’t think it is because they compare it to other places. And that’s okay, but people that have grown

2:26:00
raised here grew up here we don’t like it and it’s it’s it’s a hassle goes down the YMCA to ninth Avenue and go to Old Town west part of Longmont on Main Street. They have to take that long and traffic jams on Main Street in just about every street you go and that’s one of the things that I think Lamont put the cart before the horse. I mean we should have planned out this development as much as they have to realize that the streets can handle all the volume and that’s that’s something that you know, I think I think we have to come together and people have to have that dialogue the dialogue like we like Gordon talked about sometimes I think that the the people that are represented here tonight, I think they don’t have a voice and I want them to know they do have a voice and I want you guys to know that there’s people out there that care about Longmont, you know and some of the stuff that’s making the noise not not appealing to us. The other thing you know you worry about

2:27:00
All the time and deal with is rude drivers. I mean that’s that’s it’s just part of the problem we’re having more people more problems. But another thing I’m concerned about is I think we need more of his open space. What made la much special and what living here all these years I took for granted when I was younger but I, the older I get, I realize how important it is we don’t lose it. But we need open space. We need wildlife habitat save we need areas that that that have that because we lose that we’re just another city and law manzara has been been known to have farms and St. Rain river going through it keep it wild. You know, and some of the things that made Longmont special. I don’t know if you guys saw the paper a couple weeks ago about that study where they had the Audubon Society doing their bird count and had six year in a row six year in a row that the colorado state bird wasn’t even found. And you know, the last six years, you know how much growth we’ve

2:28:00
How much stuff we got to protect these areas, we’re going to lose all that, you know, and that’s, that’s something that’s important to a lot of people. You know, this is it’s ridiculous that we have to, you know, not be able to talk about it in that I don’t wanna get sidetracked. But

2:28:16
the other thing was safety. Okay, there’s a lot of issue with crime. I talked a lot of people I know a lot of people. I know people that are concerned about safety. I know that, you know, we have to be able to take care of people here and make them people need to feel safe. And if they’re not feeling safe, and there’s something that’s causing it. So I don’t know what the council thinks about with people wanting to move because I talked to people that are having to move because they can’t afford to live here. And in this stuff that we have to talk about with that, I mean, services keep increasing and sometimes I hear from people in the paper they’re writing

2:29:00
writing stories that well, this disc, this county or this state, or this area has higher rates, and we do. So we always kind of compared what other people are. And I think we need to think about what long Monday is and what makes long lumineer special. So we need to keep that under control to nobody’s in the queue, but I don’t know if I agree.

2:29:21
I agree. And the question is, a lot of times, maybe I’m in the same traffic, right? And I’m always thinking myself, what can you do? What can you do? And it

2:29:34
it’s an interesting quandary. Yes, that’s why it’s an interesting quandary and I don’t know what’s causing it but

2:29:43
I know what’s causing it one wants a great place to live. You know, if you were to Colorado is a great place and I think we’re living loving Colorado the death I mean, no, it’s, it’s, it’s something we’re gonna have to deal with. And I just think if we the more open space, we can acquire more wildlife here.

2:30:00
more things that make long less special. I think we’d be ahead of the game. I mean, the other communities have to do what they have to do in our own places, but long we need to take care of Longmont agreed customer, Martin.

2:30:11
Thank you. I just like to quick clarification when you say we’re concerned about safety. Are you specifically asking about traffic safety? Or are you concerned about crime? Because safety is a pretty broad subject? Well, I don’t think I don’t think the Longmont Police Department really puts out in the paper how many things are really going on in Longmont? I think sometimes it’s kind of hidden, that people need to know what’s going on. And I think a lot more crime than people think. And I have talked people that have been affected by crime. And I’m talking about trying to people and

2:30:43
different things like that and something that bothers me, and I think I need to bring it out is a is a is a gentleman who died in just July that was murdered in his house. And I want to know if policy and loglines

2:31:00
has a policy that keeps people from knowing if the illegal alien was part of the crime? And I want to know if that’s something that comes from you guys a policy or that from the police department. So I’ll take that one. So right now

2:31:15
all in so there’s two issues here. One is reporting facts of a crime. And so the paper the police, and I think the paper do a great job of open being open and transparent. But here in Longmont, we do not report or even ask someone’s documentation or immigration status. Don’t Don’t citizens have a right to know though. So the question is that, so can I see your papers?

2:31:45
Now? No, right, right, right now, can I see your papers? What papers, your immigration papers? No. Why not? Because I don’t have them. Are you illegal? You know what, let’s just let’s just as a side track, and the whole point is

2:32:00
My point is somebody I’ve been I’ve been an attorney now for 20 years. Right. And so, and not once. I mean that, I mean, it never even comes up in console’s, you know, so when someone’s arrested, you know, we don’t the police department, Boulder County, they don’t typically ask a person’s immigration status is not relevant. You say crimes have committed by illegal aliens.

2:32:24
Not all but some, some

2:32:27
haven’t been all over the country. So So my point is, so my point is that if you were to look right, if you were to take 100 people, both people who are documented and undocumented, white, brown, black, etc. Right, you’re going to find that there’s a proportion, I mean, discounting the act of entering the country without documentation, right. You do have some people who enter this country who are committing crime is that who killed Gary haka, Dale, so I don’t

2:33:00
I’ll tell you the truth. I think they have a right to know. And so, so again, I don’t know that answer. So as the mayor, I don’t know, I don’t know if anybody up here knows. Right. I don’t even know if the police know. So but the point is that we have a policy not to report to the federal government, someone’s status because we don’t so for example, right, I was married 25 years to a Mexican citizen who became a natural so my best friends are, right. So my I’ve got three adopted Latino kids. I’ve got one daughter, who’s biologically Latina. I don’t want anyone asking for the documentation, because they were all born here. I understand. I’ve heard that. Yeah. So so let’s suppose that my boy who’s about turn 16 gets picked up for DUI, right? I don’t want that cop going. Let me see your papers. He would respond just like you did. You’re distracting. It’s like, What do you mean? What does it have to do with anything? You know? So it’s when people’s lives are in danger. And it’s proven fact that someone could be

2:34:00
By that, I think any one of them would be enough to be able to question that. This is, you know, it’s a long one, the sanctuary city where we don’t we don’t let people know. We know we are not we are not a labeled sanctuary city, but we certainly act like one.

2:34:15
Although, wait, hold on, hold on, hold on. Hold on, hold on. Hold on one second. Miss Hinton you’re gonna have to sit down. Okay. I know you’re upset, but that’s okay. So I know yard But still, hey, but still, it’s a Hey, hey, hey, hey. I understand people are upset. Right? I understand it, but we’re not going to start a mob. That is right. thing. So Alright, so the so we don’t report. Right. Miss hidden. If I hear one more word, I’m going to have to ask you to leave. I mean, okay, y’all every time you’re here and I can’t do that anymore. Okay. Please don’t.

2:34:56
You know, I’m representing some people along on and I and I talked a lot

2:35:00
People and it’s nothing that is nothing ever comes up of discrimination or anything like that. It’s it’s a thing that’s going on in our country and in our city. And, you know, I’m just asking, and so so you are. So statistically speaking that this is true, right? And I understand that you might have this concern. Statistically speaking, you are more at risk being in your home with your partner than you are with someone who is undocumented. Meaning the crime in this community. First and foremost is domestic violence and crime within the home. Yep. And to his art is not homelessness, not poverty, but the transient population in town. So those are the two categories. You would rarely most people who are here are trying to stay below radar who are undocumented or trying to stay below radar contributing, working, struggling, not wanting to drive

2:36:00
attention to themselves, which if you were arrested, whoo. Then Then you have problems, then you have to spend $10,000 for an immigration attorney and all that stuff. So, so we’re not going to cover it all tonight. Yeah, this is something that people are going to talk about. And it’s not like, we can talk about this another time and be able to come together and to have dialogue. Right. So but I appreciate your concern, and we’re going to move on now. Right. All right. Thank you.

2:36:28
All right, Paul Feinberg.

2:36:37
Good evening. It’s just my luck to follow that guy.

2:36:41
My name is Paul Feinberg. I’m a resident of long month. I’d like to present to you a hypothetical quote from a politician. Nobody is trying to take away your right to an abortion. We just want common sense abortion safety laws. Before you can get an abortion. You have to undergo a background check. There’s a waiting

2:37:00
period two, and we’re only banning certain types of abortions, not all of them. Now, if a politician said that, Would any of you believe them? Of course you wouldn’t, because you know what they really want to do. Now, I’m not here to take a stand on that very, very volatile topic. Instead, I want to help you empathize with gun owners. Senator Feinstein says common sense gun safety laws, but gun owners can only hear her famous quote, Mr. And Mrs. America, turn them all in.

2:37:31
I am strongly in favor of common sense gun laws, but they have to actually make sense. Colorado already has universal background checks. In 2017, there were over 7200 failed background checks in Colorado. These included 31 people convicted of homicide, over 1300 people who were either under indictment for or already convicted of assault, and 252 people with active warrants for their arrest. A little over 200

2:38:00
of those people were arrested. So less than 3% of the people who illegally tried to buy a gun. California has had universal background checks for decades. But they are one of 10 states, According to USA today that does not investigate or prosecute people who lie on their background check forms. Where is the common sense in that? we absolutely need to keep guns out of the hands of the wrong people. Unfortunately, there are certain politicians who have decided that pretty much everyone is the wrong people. So you’ll forgive me if I don’t trust them to implement any common sense gun safety laws. After every mass shooting, we hear the common refrain. People have died. thoughts and prayers are not enough. Do something. 3000 people died on September 11 2001. Our country did something all right. This is what we did.

2:38:55
We have TSA molesting travelers. We have the famous and naked X ray scam

2:39:00
racial and religious profiling and incredibly expensive war. This produce no real and lasting benefit wholesale surveillance of American citizens with no regard for the Fourth Amendment and the nearly unlimited expansion of presidential power. Do something indeed, our country would be better off today if we done nothing but offer our thoughts and prayers.

2:39:23
One of the common things that I hear is that nobody needs an assault weapon and a 30 round magazine for self defense. During the LA riots of 1992. Police did not respond to the areas where the riots were active. The news showed pictures of people defending their homes, their businesses and their families with guns. pictures like this. This man is holding the Daewoo k one a one which is very similar to the much maligned ar 15. It has a pistol grip. It has a collapsible stock. It has a flash hider and a 30 round magazine. Those are the very features that made it useful for self defense in

2:40:00
First place. Don’t tell me Nobody needs an assault weapon to defend themselves. Don’t tell me Nobody needs a gun to defend themselves. I got my first concealed weapons permit in the middle of 2001. A few years later, I was in another city didn’t know the area. I made the best of a bunch of bad choices to walk between the restaurant my hotel, two men came up to me and they were about to attack me. If you’ve ever heard the saying, Don’t bring a knife to a gunfight. These men had also heard that saying, because as soon as I pulled my jacket back and put my hand on my pistol, they were no longer interested in stabbing me for my wallet. I didn’t have to draw my weapon. I didn’t have to pointed anybody. I didn’t have to shoot anybody. Thank God. I’m so grateful for that. But I have no doubt that if I had not been armed if I had not had a gun to defend myself, and by the way, that gun had a magazine that was more than 10 rounds, actually it was 17 rounds. So even under Colorado’s law, that magazine would

2:41:00
Illegal today. If I hadn’t had that weapon to defend myself, I have no doubt that that encounter would have turned out much differently. And I wouldn’t be standing here today. I think we should always be wary of people who gather power to themselves or they seek to legislate against groups. They disfavor like gun owners. It shouldn’t matter whether we agree with their philosophy or not. shoes have a way of ending up on the other foot.

2:41:24
Thank you. All right. Thank you. All right. Brenda Holden, and Carla Blakely, your number 20.

2:41:39
gotta ask. What’s the dog’s name?

2:41:42
Jordan.

2:41:50
I’m Brenda Holton. I live at 1446 Mayfield’s circle. Good evening to all of you. I’m talking today for representing grand metal a property

2:42:00
I’m a property manager at Grand metal mobile home park.

2:42:08
Can you just just speak into the mic they knew they didn’t want to hear you also role reset your time. So just get up there real close so everybody can hear. I’m a property manager at a senior mobile home park on a 21st 17th Avenue. I’m here to represent the residents of the park. My questions are about the application on the property of a 33 15th Avenue owned by the faith Baptist Church. There’s an application right now by Scott McFadden that is looking to buy it for five apartment complexes and 156 parking spaces. The unfortunate thing is that they back up right against the mobile home park their property or want to Proposition A 16th Street Avenue at this time they’re not putting it in. But our concern is when they do decide to put it in that it’s going

2:43:00
Gonna take 14 to 11 mobile homes away from seniors, bats and disabled people. So we’re just trying to get jumped ahead of the game that you know that this would be do and they say that this person is dedicating 30 feet of land for the next for the road, which is ridiculous. That’s maybe a sidewalk. So you’re losing quite a bit of our our mobile home park, which most of these people are an extreme fixed incomes they talk about low income housing and all of that these people can’t even afford a $900 one bedroom apartment because they’re on about 870 a month period. So right now the land is continually going up that they’re having to pay rent on, which is going up considerably because it is owned by a corporation. So every year it goes up. So I mean, we’re talking about Oh, the homeless

2:44:00
People of low income when do we talk about our seniors? our vets are disabled people that are on very, very fixed incomes, when are they taken care of or seem to? I mean, maybe long mon, which should be one of the first cities to have a senior cap. I mean, what would be wrong with that Colorado is one of the few states in the United States that does not have a senior cap. So I mean, our seniors need to be taken care of they’ve already been senior cap, I’m Senior cap for rent cap. Okay, I

2:44:32
see, yeah, we have that so

2:44:34
I can get them all. Just Just making sure.

2:44:38
But I’m just saying that I mean, we don’t take really good enough care of our seniors, our vets who are disabled, they’re not taking care of their push to the side, because they’re not going to live much longer. Well, they’re our history. Our librarians, they’re everything. And they’ve worked hard all their lives, too, and they don’t have 401k they didn’t have a way back when so now

2:45:00
They’re set with this amount of money. So what we’re concerned about is 16th Avenue going in taking on one of Carla’s homes and quite a few other ones. I mean, that’s a lot of people losing homes and there’s no place for him because they can’t afford the apartment complex. I know that they’re getting 900 for one bedroom. So how are these people going to afford that and having no income? I mean, it’s just it does. It’s absurd. So I’m wanting the burden possibly to go on the landowner. Why is it not going on him he’s building it and the congestion and traffic will be completely caused by him with five giant complexes 156 parking places. So and then on top of it, when they’re backed up with all this construction, all of the dust that’s going to be coming into the seniors, the noise that everything else, and we already have a problem with people using the park is a thorough way to get to

2:46:00
17th Avenue through the park, which is private, a lot of people go from that park jumped the fence and come through to 17th Avenue. Because I work there. I know I see him every day. And we’re getting people that are siphoning gas stealing things. And when you ask them, this is private property you need to leave. They don’t do it. I did talk to the police officers, they gave me great ideas to put no trespassing signs up that were fixed that then we could call them that it was private property. But there’s been a lot of problems with that. And I think there’s going to be more problems with that complex going in. And then people trying to jump the fence to cut through to get 17th Avenue. So I mean, I just think that there’s some issues with this that maybe should be looked at before it’s completely past.

2:46:54
Yeah.

2:46:55
I’m Carla Blakely. I live at 831 17th Avenue.

2:47:00
My mobile home will be taken out by 16th Street. I live on Social Security. I can’t afford $900 a month. So I’d like to know where am I going to go? Let’s ask him, are they? Are we making a 16th? street? Let’s let’s get that answered first. Right.

2:47:20
The you can keep I mean, let’s keep you can keep talking, but I just want to make sure that there’s an issue. Let’s talk about it. Right. So this is in the development review process right now. And we have an interesting situation there, in that there is right of way that the city had, and they built on the right of way in some places and other places we don’t. And so what I would say at this point is is we are looking at this and we understand the impact that this has on on the people that live in that area.

2:47:52
This frankly is not unlike this, the situations that we’ve run into as a product of the flood and how we look

2:48:00
at the Royal mobile home park, or we looked at the other mobile home park that’s north of the same brain north of left hand when we had to do this. What I will say and what I’ve said to them is, it is not, nor will it ever be our desire to display someone and not have an option for them. If it were to come to that case, we don’t know that we’re going to hit there yet. We’re still working with the engineers to figure out how we can design that road.

2:48:30
If for some reason, and I’ve said this to council members who’ve asked this question,

2:48:35
we would approach this just like we did, and those homes that were impacted by the flood, and find a solution that takes into account the individual circumstances and how we move forward. It is a firm policy that the council has set for us and that we have for ourselves as you don’t take someone that’s housed and make them homeless. That’s not what we want to do. And that’s not where we’re going to go

2:49:00
So what I will say is we’re working to find solutions on this. There is no definitive answer at this point. Okay, so let’s jump in here. Thank you so much. My name is Chris. This is my client. And I did talk to the housing department or the

2:49:18
get at the market. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Sorry about that. I did talk to the the planning department. And

2:49:26
basically, what we’re just asking is, is kind of a guarantee to make sure that they will have housing if this goes through. So I did I just heard it from the city manager and we haven’t taken a vote but I’m pretty sure that you got seven council members who were going to make sure that you’re not homeless Miss Blakely.

2:49:48
Thank you. I appreciate it. All right. Just real quick question for you is, is the right away on our our side of it because I don’t think that when we were looking at the map

2:50:00
It did not look it looked like it was on this side of us and the other side of this but not that there is some right of way where they built on as part of the park into the right away now and I have also heard that that there was actually that the church owns some of the places that mobile homes are at this time. I think right away there’s some land issues there and that’s what we have to look at to really work on but you know that I just looked at the map with some of the right away we own the mobile home park did build on that right away. Okay, but is there still a thing called in Colorado squatter rights? I mean, she’s been there 18 years. So isn’t it kind of weird that all of a sudden, you now have a right away because you you deem the land necessary for 16th Avenue, but it wasn’t way back when so I don’t know how does that work? I did just that kind of this. Yeah, this you know, this developed the way it did. I

2:51:00
I don’t know exactly when we’ve had the right of way but we’ve had the right away for some time right but you didn’t access the right away or didn’t try to take it at any time so at some point there I thought there is a squatter right kind of thing in the state of Colorado after so many years you’re talking about your your you’re taking talking about adverse possession right I met that’s that’s a little complicated depends on a lot of facts. Yeah, but what what I would do is desire it’s rare right people come to counsel and be able you can say that I left with a when you’re leaving with a win meet me meaning you meet me meaning that you just I have heard stories where somebody sat on a piece of land long enough that bone and that and I don’t know if your client your realtor attorney or what but but I mean that you can always go talk to an attorney and find that out but even if you don’t, it sounds like city city staff is going to follow is they’re going to make real I mean with the Royal mobile home park. Yeah, baby

2:52:00
Did not displace people without making sure that they had a better options affordable that for Yeah, and a lot of these people are on 870 a month. Yeah, it really so honestly, the way this would work in the way that we work through these issues is we would bring our neighbor, Karen’s group with Kathy viddler, and Carmen, and we would work it in multiple ways. The first thing that we’re going to look at is really work with the engineers in terms of design and see what that looks like. We’re we’re not at the point to say unequivocally Yes, that has to happen. We’re also not at the point to say that we can come up with a different alternative. What I can say is, anytime we go through this,

2:52:41
my expectation and all of our expectation is is that we do everything we can to avoid a negative impact. And if there is one, we will work with the individual to assure we will not

2:52:54
my goal in anything we do is if we do anything, we have somebody in a better

2:53:00
position after this versus in a position that is more negative?

2:53:05
Well,

2:53:07
no, that’s great if if the city council can guarantee that won’t happen as far as

2:53:14
you know, the

2:53:16
men many times individuals like this, as you all know,

2:53:21
on housing lists and things like that, there’s a certain amount of,

2:53:26
of the income that they they can spend on housing usually about 33%. So if it’s possible, that can be worked into that too. I mean, if you guys can guarantee that this is not going to happen wonderful. I’m, you know, I’m grateful for that. At the same time, as long as

2:53:46
I put it this way I can get I can personally guarantee that Miss Blakely is going to be fine. Wonderful at the rate at 33%. Yep. Wonderful. We went through all of those issues. Cool. Alright, appreciate it personally. Alright. Cool.

2:54:00
Thanks. I would like to ask, why won’t planning contact me when there are meetings and all of that? That I don’t know? But I’m betting that if that guy right there, that guy right there, he’ll make sure that your your responded to and if not call any one of us and we’ll make sure that he does. Okay, thank you very much. You all have a great evening. Thanks. Oh, I’m sorry, gossamer Christianson.

2:54:25
Come back. Okay.

2:54:28
Miss Blakely, we’ve talked before and I know you’ve talked to Councilman Hidalgo foreign and

2:54:36
I just like to point out that Miss Blakely has lived there a very long time and she doesn’t just live in her trailer, it’s her community. So it’s not just a matter of finding her another place to live. That’s her community and that whole

2:54:54
mobile home parks are the largest unsubsidized low income housing in

2:55:00
in the country, and we should do whatever we can to

2:55:05
make that a little easier.

2:55:10
Representative Ed hooten has done a lot for trying to get some issues solidified for mobile home parks statewide.

2:55:21
But

2:55:23
I’m just curious why we would put 16th Street through anyway.

2:55:29
So so maybe they’ll just came up and gave me more information in terms of this project. This projects not recording 16th Street, okay, InVision Longmont is recording 16th Street. These are the things that we need to go through

2:55:43
in terms of why things were allowed to be built where they were and how that developed.

2:55:50
happened many years ago, and so that’s why we’re, we’re saying in winning vision says it needs to be here. We’re saying

2:56:00
We want to evaluate it to find other options and to see what we can do. Yeah. And because it’s supposed to be about creating neighborhoods and preserving neighborhoods.

2:56:10
And I just said until we get through all of this, what I can say let’s go ahead and take a five minute break, please. But that doesn’t give people let’s go ahead and let’s go ahead and break okay.

Part 2:

1:07
sucralose aspartame there’s no ordinance

1:12
on aspartame

1:20
bear came down you know I’ll say it right here Alright.

1:36
Let’s go ahead and keep going. We are two thirds done. So the next ones are Bob Norton. So 21 is Bob Norris 22 is Joan Hollins and 23 is Sherry Malloy.

1:48
Okay, I’m Bob Norris. petition my neighbors are

2:02
Okay, so I’m Bob Norris 532. Writer rich. Dr. Let me tell you, I can’t tell you how disappointed I was when that element came up and talked about illegal aliens and none of you responded correctly. None of you and I offer bring somebody and train the Council on how to talk about immigration issues, and how immigrants that come in are four times less to commit a crime. And those of us born here, in the safest cities in the United States are those with the highest immigrant, please learn how to talk. Okay, I hope I haven’t wasted all my time. I want to thank the City Council for their interest in early childhood education. We’ve had a number of events. There’s a growing number of people who even allow tall bald men at our group. Let’s say who But anyway, I’ve been on the board of Colorado statewide parent coalition, we trained home daycare providers. And I’ll tell you in the last several months, I’ve learned a lot more. I thought I knew what I was doing. And I’m still learning but so let me tell you some of the things that I’ve discovered and, and done and I’ve, you’ll get a copy of this. So here are benefits of quality early childhood education for all. Children are more likely to arrive in kindergarten, classroom school, ready, when, which means gaps in vocabulary and background knowledge or reduce. They’re more likely to graduate from high school in secondary school, which are associated with greater housing security and reduced homelessness. They’re more likely to attend college and graduate from college. They’re gonna enjoy it as a substantially higher lifetime earnings, and they’re going to pay more taxes as adults and that’s where I kind of knew a few months ago but now, I began to realize that there’s an increase in career earnings and an estimated $2.6 billion in federal income tax collected if we’ve provided everyone with early childhood education. And by the way, the biggest impact is zero to three years. Parents will have a better opportunity to purchase a home in their family, they’ll not lose social benefits, they will not they will pay more taxes, and they are less likely to need benefits. So when we invest some money in early childhood education, there is payback from that because there will be more people working. Just to add a comment. Longmont Economic Development Partnership says the two biggest problems they have bringing in businesses are housing. We talked a lot about that early childhood education and take care. We don’t talk about that. We don’t invest enough money although I’m rural. thankful for what the city council is putting into that this year. Businesses would recruit and employ more talented employees, they would lose less employee time as working parents often stay home with their sick children. The US Chamber of Commerce estimates that’s about 20% loss of time of employees higher than I thought, but I’m going to believe, and parents would spend more money in the community. The community could attract new businesses and talented employees. So one of the things that struck me too, and one of the discussions I read, you know, the people that work in daycares, I know some of you who’ve been involved in that are paid very well. Yet, they have to charge a lot. If we could get around that. These people that were paid more, they would maybe be able to buy houses, maybe and they would be paying more taxes. So it’s a very complicated thing. We need to make the public realize what an issue we have here impacts 40% of the kids in their parents. And in fact, all the rest of us, it actually impacts a lot more people than homeless. If you look out now, kids that were to go through a program, where they have called the early childhood education, by the time they get high school, and maybe on college, they’re going to keep Mike Butler a lot less busy. Okay, so there’s just so many benefits to that. So I would appreciate it. And I would also mentioned that the other thing that’s being done and needs to be done is bringing the parents and the teachers together. The parent coalition has a program that brings teachers and parents and the principles together, because the parents need to know more about how to educate their children. We need more interaction between parents in the school district.

6:57
So thank you

7:00
Remember you dog suffering?

7:04
So first of all

7:07
I wanted to respond to so I had been as the man was speaking, I had been looking through trying to find any evidence that and I know what crime he was talking about.

7:19
It looked like this individual was a transplant. He was not undocumented. So there was no evidence. So that was clearly an offensive racist remark based on assumptions because this individual is Hispanic.

7:38
The term is undocumented. It’s not that mean that it was definitely a point of being derogatory and being racist. I was planning instead of carrying into dialogue and going back and forth with an individual who was clearly not at a space to listen and comprehend and even understand what I’m getting at And it would have gotten us nowhere. I do intend on speaking with Jon Cryer at the end and giving my point of view

8:08
in dialogue that I’ve had with educators, with legislators, with community folks who are on different walks of life, there, there is a time to discuss and then there’s a time to take it in and voice voices in another outlet if you understand what I’m what I’m getting at.

8:33
I just felt that this this forum this

8:37
to talk to him face to face like that, I was not in a space either I was I was really heated and I was not ready to articulate what I wanted to say in

8:49
a calm manner. So if that I mean, you know, we have to respond to in a degree that where we where we feel as as representatives We feel we can be most impactful. And I felt for me I couldn’t plus I was trying to find any documentation or any evidence that this person was undocumented and there was none. He’s just spent, he’s Hispanic. So I found that truly offensive.

9:16
The other thing is, and I do appreciate the work that you’re doing with the early childhood education. For 10 years, I taught preschool

9:28
started with the two year olds. And then once I had my degree, my teaching license, I moved up to the four and five year olds, and the importance of educating and having those

9:42
quality opportunities or quality education for our youth, especially our infants. Research has shown time and time again, when you read to your to your infant, the likelihood of them attaining a high school degree and or college degree, just it skyrockets. The data shows that it is it is important to have those opportunities. What is the because I know the school district is working, we have spark in the school district for four and five year olds. So is there what kind of collaboration is being done between the school district to handle the four and five, the three and four year olds? As to put so the city can put more effort and put more effort on the Zero to Three? Is there any kind of discussion around we really haven’t

10:27
had much dialogue with the school district? Yeah.

10:32
Well, let me go back to what you were first saying. It’s important to make comments back of what that guy says and correct it. You’re not going to change him one iota. No, no, I’m what there are people listening? Yes. And that’s just like what and that’s

10:48
why I intended to speak I’m sorry to interrupt so to speak with the newspaper about this, but I was not enough space. I was really mad. I was really heated and I Wanted to refrain from saying anything that I might regret on public record?

11:04
Well, that’s why that’s why I offer to find somebody to talk to the council about how to respond to these things. Every response, don’t get, you know, there I get angry, too easy as I get older. But I’ll give you an example of something that really disturbs me. I listen to NPR. And they interview somebody and the person’s obviously lying. And then the interviewer doesn’t say anything. Now somebody says, Ah, that must be true. I heard it on NPR. So I think we have to be careful that we respond appropriately. And not just to the person that’s talking but to the community as a whole.

11:43
And I’ve been calling cows for Christmas and except that there’s one difference here, right and it was going through my head. I wanted to respond like you guys, but when somebody that that dies, it sucks, but Welcome to America. Get a Say what you want and

12:01
I mean, we can respond. But I mean, we we can’t we can’t stop, if that makes sense.

12:06
Well, I understand you couldn’t stop. But you could say, please understand that this is the truth of the matter. The matter is immigrant men in all age groups commit crimes at one fourth the rate of what

12:21
I’d want. I tried. I did the best I could, but going from traffic, open space and

12:27
yeah, okay.

12:29
Just like what what?

12:31
Just sundresses understand that try to come up with an argument on the spot is difficult. That’s why I’m offering to bring somebody to council to say when you hear this, this is what you need to say. We appreciate it if it’s difficult otherwise, because you’re just talking from your gut and your anger. All right, Councilmember Christiansen?

12:56
I Bob. So I appreciate all you’re doing with Well, I put All your comments, but given that this would be investing in early childhood education would be enormously helpful for businesses. Yes, we know how how much it helps them. And yet they don’t. This could be a benefit. They could get together as groups and invest in one per block or one per mile or something. This would be an incredible benefit to their employees who would not have to drive forever to get to their kids. And yet, they don’t they don’t seem to think it has anything to do with them. So what I would ask you to do is to go around and talk to some businesses, talk to the chamber, talk to the Rotary Clubs, and just point out to them that it is their responsibility as citizens and as members of this community to have something to do with the children and not just stick it on those parents who aren’t probably not being paid enough to actually afford childcare for their children.

14:10
Yeah, we are working now we met with Jeff Nagel, who’s the plant manager at smuckers. I asked him is because some companies have their own daycare. Yeah. He said that their corporate does, but they’re not ready to do it there. No, but he said he would help us anyway. We can. We’ve met with Morgan Smith of the llama, economic partnership, Development Partnership. I don’t know why I have trouble with that. It’s okay. So anyway, he’s part really contributing into it. And we’re trying to create an event with the chambers. We’ve already talked to the chambers. Councilman waters has been heavily involved in that and we met with the cabinet member of The governor’s office and we’re trying to get the governor to come in that kind of the meeting because the governor comes that draws a lot more people than even Tim does.

15:11
Speaking of which, Tim,

15:16
thanks very badly. So just building on on what Bob’s talking about there, you know, there’s just a ton of momentum that’s materializing around the goal that we set as a council. I think the interest is broader than just long line. But Scott’s last name is groundskeepers. insky guns on ski I ski is the whole carries the governor’s portfolio on at least early childhood, I think probably a variety of other topics as well.

15:46
But he’s indicated the governor would be interested in are willing

15:51
to meet with business, both small business chamber members as well as primary employers. So Both our local chamber and lldp are both stepped up to say they’d be willing to co sponsor a breakfast or reception of some kind. The governor’s indicated and interested in meeting with them. executives, epic, I’ll miss the acronym EP IC executives. For pri. There’s a business, a business coalition that developed just google epic Denver preschool business coalition that started in Denver. I knew nothing about epic until you know, a few months ago, and a woman by the name of Gloria Higgins, who was one of the co founders and now does consulting work, sometimes through epic and sometimes parallel with to Epic but is in partnership. She was instrumental as my understanding and bringing together Business, Business owners biking small employers in Denver. That’s going into according to her a statewide coalition She’s willing to be part of whatever event occurs and and bring what she can from what’s happening around the state. And in the both the investments and the benefits that have occurred to big and small employers, right, in terms of increased productivity, decrease absenteeism, etc, because of the investments they’re making in in early childhood programming. So along with the screening that Councilmember Peck mentioned on the 30th, right, I mean that I want to reinforce I think that’ll be a really important in in significant opportunity. I think closely on the heels of that will be something specifically with the business community and I’m, you know, I’m pleased that our business leaders have stepped up on this. So

17:47
thanks. This is gone from for somebody called old guys I prefer youth was experienced. But anyway, to about 40 people and coming in and we’re going to have some podcasts, you might mention that

18:01
So the backstory podcast, I’ve had a chance that and the good fortune to do as a volunteer with the long run observer on a variety of topics, but we got queued up three podcasts in this month and see in series one in the big picture of childcare and early childhood education challenges. With an all star panel, Bob is part of that along with Danielle Butler, Richard Garcia, and Jessica Erickson. We’re gonna have a second right on the heels of it. on early childhood education, what would we doing or not for four and five year olds, and we’ve got we’ve got a variety of providers, while plum, Matt Eldridge from TLC, Amy Ogilvy from wild plum, actually and maka, who’s running our informal education program to the museum.

18:50
And

18:52
who am I forgetting? Oh, Christina, Christina Sims is a panel and then we’ll do a third one on childcare. You know, what? what are the needs? I have to say across the board. We have a long way to go. And we’re way ahead of an awful lot of other communities. So there’s a bob discovered just recently from the Economic Policy Institute, a couple of studies that he was pulling from his comments tonight, it would be good to get that to all of us are I’m happy to share it’s there’s some really powerful data in part of the data are that it’s a big ticket, the kind of investment we need to make everywhere, right, to position early chip employment in the early childhood care space, to be competitive with other employment opportunities, like a huge number. But part of the analysis of what at least is in this set of studies is that within 20 years, whatever that cost is, is earned back through additional tax revenues. And in every year afterwards, it’s a surplus, but we’ve got it. We’ve got to start if we if we’re serious about how Quality. We’re not going to get high quality, reliable childcare and early childhood education if we don’t compensate those folks working in that space in ways that are comparable with their k 12. counterparts.

20:13
All right, thanks, Bob. All right. Okay, john Hollins true just be

20:34
lifted and sprayed right into it. I’m

20:37
so Joe Hollins. And this is my husband came 1400 Third Avenue. And

20:45
I talked to a couple of you guys before in the police in several past council members over the years, several years. About the traffic on third and Francis and I’ve I said I’ve reached out several times. And I’ve been told various things that it’s going to be taken care of, or we have plans down the road or whatever. But while everyone’s trying to figure out what to do next, it’s getting really horrendous. And it feels like we live on a Speedway. We live on the corner third and Francis. Speed is 25 miles an hour, the weight limit is 7000 pounds, empty on trucks. But every day, especially, you know, when people are commuting to and from work, we deal with massive amount of speeding. There’s a stretch between gay Street and sunset, that’s just a straight away and human nature. I guess you just can’t help but floor it going through there. It’s really as simple as that. Holding people to the law, perhaps and I have talked to the police and they will usually respond momentarily. But I don’t think I’ve ever seen a speed trap or seen someone get a ticket out there at all. see a lot of accidents, especially where the restaurant is now with all the cars parked on the side there and everyone flying through there.

22:29
And

22:31
we are Boomtown. And traffic is getting worse and worse, but I don’t know what we’re waiting for to mitigate. We’re just going to keep waiting. But in the meantime, we’re talking about sustainability and quality of life and coping with growth tonight.

22:50
And we’re not asking for anything other than

22:54
a little mitigation with the speeding, which like I said, is horrendous and Maybe some pedestrian walkways right now it is almost impossible to cross that street to go visit neighbors. I had a friend who tried to come over the other day, and it took her five minutes to be able to get across the street. So once again, I’m appealing to you guys to please give us something to improve the quality of life and not make it get worse.

23:30
And also just like to say that

23:33
because it is a high traffic area, it is an ambulance and fire route, that

23:42
it’s zoned residential, and if it’s zoned residential, then it should comply with those residential restrictions. As soon as it’s zone something else, then I think you could raise the speed limit or whatever that is going to happen there. But as long as it’s residential Our property values dictate those residential values and those zoning laws than they should be abide by. So, you know, a crosswalk, a speed bump, a stop sign around about something there that’s going to slow people down just a bit so that it can continue to be a residential area and a pedestrian friendly neighborhood. It’s the old neighborhood, so it’s not well returned

24:27
to it. Yeah, at least. All right, Counselor. I’m sorry. Do you have anything else I didn’t mean to cut you

24:33
off. I was just to say,

24:36
hang out a no.

24:40
like seven to 9pm or am rather or in the afternoon and see what it looks like. It’s horrifying. And it sounds like a like a racetrack on some almost every day. The other thing is after my Market modifications to engines and mufflers are out of control too, and really unpleasant. And again, I if it’s illegal to modify them, I don’t know why I could go down on Main Street and get that taken care of and making them noxious

25:19
car to drive around town where?

25:22
I don’t know. Anyways,

25:25
thank you. One second Councilmember. Councilmember Peck.

25:29
Thank you very Actually, I am on tap the transportation advisory board and I have brought up with them a crosswalk they’re at that restaurant, because I, I agree with you. So I’ll bring it up again at the next meeting, and if I can get your contact information, which is on the sheet, and I’ll let you know, but the speed bumps are a problem. Because as you mentioned, fire engines and ambulances, etc. Go down there. They can handle those speed bumps. There. They have to slow down for them.

26:05
So that that might be a problem with that, but I’ll definitely ask it the next tab meeting what we can do about this. I agree with you i live there as well in that area.

26:15
It just gets worse and worse. I know. I’ve talked to all the neighbors within, you know, several blocks up and down. Third. I don’t think I’ve talked to anyone who doesn’t agree with that everyone’s in and agrees that it is just gotten really bad.

26:29
It has I agree.

26:30
Did you write down your contact info? It’s not on the list. If you could hand it to Councilmember Peck, that’d be

26:34
okay. Yeah. All right. I can just email you. I’ll send you an email. All right.

26:40
Councilmember Christiansen

26:45
I just live up on fourth and Jetson so I can appreciate the problem. And I think a lot of it on Third Avenue comes from fact that until you get to Main Street if you’re east of Main Street. It’s a lot faster. And then they hit main and they don’t slow down. And when they come off of hover, and they’re going 45 miles an hour, and they turn and they don’t slow down, we have put a couple of those big signs up. The guy, there’s a guy who lives down on just south of the golf course, or just west of the golf course. He says that has helped a lot in his neighborhood. But then they forget by the time they get up to sunset and they’re just barreling along so Yeah, it is. I do have a lot of sympathy for the situation. It’s and I worried because there are a lot of kids crossing over a lot of dogs get loose, and

27:41
I’ve seen seven get hit out there. Yeah, I know. Fortunately, I always say fortunately, dogs and not children. But

27:49
yeah, yeah. So it is a concern that we need to try to do something where

27:54
it’s it’s dangerous for me to work on the yard out there. And the though we’ve appealed before to the city for some kind of mitigation, the city never really took but one day to come out and tell me and give me a notice that those branches are overhanging the road need to come down. That was pretty expeditious on the city’s part that I needed to take action. And so if that, if that’s the kind of action I need to take, perhaps the city could respond as efficiently as well. Awesome.

28:30
Thank you. I’m the ward representative for that straight at least on one side of the street, I’m pretty sure I’ve corresponded with you a number of times, and a number of your neighbors as well. And every time that happens, I have a conversation with jimang stead or, or Tyler stay me, and they tell me what they can do, what they can’t do, where you are in the queue. And they seem to be operating with the best will In the world, and there are limited resources, but I understand your frustration completely because it doesn’t ever seem to turn into concrete action.

29:12
I am going to suggest tomorrow you’re that guys

29:19
of that

29:24
in terms of the plans for

29:28
traffic mitigations that we need to make the queue for that kind of mitigations public. So people understand what the known problem areas are and why they are prioritized the way they are. And maybe even how much the mitigation that is, that is suggested will cost because I know we can’t do all the mitigations at once all the things that are needed. I know that some of the things that would really help a lot or just completely out of the financial range of the city, but you have a right to know. And we do have a right. We need to make everybody understand what the traffic science is, and, and how how we can really work together to address things. Maybe if this is public will understand the patterns better. And so that’s that’s my suggestion, because I’m, I am with you. I you know, we keep going back and asking the same questions and getting the same answers. And I don’t want to overcommit the city, and I do try to understand both sides of the question, but you can’t just keep asking We need we need to, we need to fix our traffic problems. And there’s gotta be a better solution than just widening all the roads, because we’ve been hearing earlier that, you know, the problems that that causes. We got to get smarter. I do want to say, we are discussing that at our city council retreat to, and so that’ll be a good thing to hope for.

31:26
I have had responses by drivers to slow down by standing on the street with a hairdryer and they seem to think that’s a

31:39
didn’t cost a dime.

31:41
Like that idea.

31:43
We’ve been asking for mitigation for over time. And we get nowhere and I think if the answer here is it’s a major artery, so there’s an end it’s the major artery and if that’s the case, it should be a priority. It’s If you’re gonna keep telling us like, there’s no way through town but third, then something has to be done. And we can budget in a crosswalk or something to try to just make it a little more pedestrian friendly. I know.

32:18
Yeah. All right.

32:19
We turned our branches right away by the way. Thank you. Thank you

32:22
for your comments and your branch to me. Thank you. All right. cherimoya.

32:31
Good evening. Good evening Mayor Bagley and members of the city council sharing the light 2113 rain to be lane. I’m here to address four important issues. My theme is please keep it simple and protect long months quality of life. My first remarks are about our our long are about long months waste services. In February staff will be doing a presentation about where we’re at in terms of landfill diversion costs etc. You will be given options to To improve service to residents were incredibly fortunate along mine to have municipal services for waste, giving us not only some of the lowest rates in the whole state and region, but a lot of control regarding flow goals accountability and transparency transparency, most of which are not available with the rest of Boulder County and the state, which are privatized. Having municipal services keeps things simple. It also affords quality of life protections because residents have input in service options. Next month, you will have a huge opportunity to improve services to residents reduce our trash, trash production, and greenhouse gas emissions. Some simple ways we can help do this include one, provide universal composting like recycling and embed the cost of compost in all trash and recycling subscriptions number to require that all multifamily kind Plexus privately contracted trash haulers provide both recycling and composting for the residents. Three, create more options for hard to recycle items, and especially electronic waste. One might use to partner with eco cycle to have to hard to recycle events per year in Longmont. These were hugely successful and need to be brought back. There are many other suggestions our SRL Zero Waste group will be suggesting that next month, so stay tuned. My second subject is residential Metro districts. As you know, Metro districts are Tabor work around designed so developers can make more money and set up financing that’s non traditional by passing their upfront infrastructure costs to future residents. Metro districts do not keep things simple for anyone, not for future residents. Not for this or future councils and not for city staff. Especially as a couple of you are advocating for very narrow and specific, specific criteria. The complex service agreements and the necessary oversight enforcement of these agreements is the antithesis of keeping it simple. We have a perfectly good system and process in place for development in Longmont. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Please protect future and current residents quality of life in Longmont by removing the ordinance the former city council approved last February and reinstating our previous ordinance. My next subject is a second Recreation Center. The Ice Arena and aquatic facility failed last November. I was strongly opposed to this person proposal for several reasons, but mostly because it would only serve a small fraction of our community. Longmont needs a second rec a second full service recreation center with additional swimlanes as I’ve said before, My dream is for long my to have a second record Creation center. And like Denver Public Schools that all long months student students be given a free summer pass to use both rec centers. When the library master plan is completed, perhaps another library branch could be included with this. It would be pretty cool for kids to access a recreation center and library side by side. This is a simple solution to an overcrowded Rec Center, a serious lack of swimlanes and a beyond capacity library that was built for 60,000 people. This would improve quality of life for Longmont residents, please consider putting this on the November ballot. I’ll personally commit to supporting that campaign. Finally, I’ll end with applying these two themes as they pertain to the land development code updates. This spring you should be revisiting the recommendations that consultant Clarion is incorporating from the wildlife management plan per Council’s direction. This has been a long and challenging journey and The end is finally insight to protect our quality of life in Longmont by providing safeguards for our wildlife and habitat. The sustainability evaluation system or SDS continues to be reviewed and refined by planning and and our staff and the city attorney. The original intention of developing nscs was admirable, with the purpose being to identify things that are important by looking through the lens of economic, social and environmental impacts of proposed development. Unfortunately, it’s gotten very complicated with legal concerns severely constraining the application of this tool in the spirit of keeping it simple. I’d like to suggest that if you want the higher standards, the MCs was attempting to address these values be identified and codified into the long life development code at a time, thank you. All right. Hold on. There’s nobody in the queue, but thank you.

37:51
All right. 24 Lynette McLean.

38:04
Mayor Bagley and council.

38:09
I just want to talk about Metro districts. Again, I have a little more time. I just want to say for people who don’t know, not for the council because I know you are all well aware, but just Metro districts, and you can correct me if I’m wrong because I’ve, I’ve studied your the handout that you had last last council meeting. And I’ve done some research just on my own, but I get what I’m hearing is developers loan themselves, money to develop their, their, their, their, their development, each project. And then they set up this very complex set of rules so that to form a tax District, which they govern themselves and the residents who are not involved in setting this up. who haven’t bought the their homes yet, because they aren’t built, they’re going to pay a monthly tax to pay back the debt. And usually this tax follows the residence when it is sold. And the tax district is managed by the developers a board of directors usually and it’s there’s some effort to get residents to work on that to serve on the board. So that’s just kind of in a very, very small nutshell what it is, but it’s very complicated. So I just want to ask a couple of questions. Some are rhetorical, and others I really like an answer. My first rhetorical one is what is the fight here for the metro district? Why What’s it really about? It feels like there’s just a lot of energy and a lot of passion. And I just wonder if it’s really about Metro districts or through some promises have been made or if there’s something going on behind the scenes it makes that’s where there’s some lack of trust here and I just wonder what why it’s such a big deal. I wanted to know on this thing that you that was said that, Marcia and and Mr. Waters Dr. Waters wrote, If any developers helped you write it because it felt like maybe there might be some developers that helped put this together? And if so, I wish that there would be some names on the developer naming the developers. But I want to ask that question. And then I wanted to ask why you weren’t working with your council in working with the developers. So it feels like much more closely. And I really wish that you’d work with your counsel to try to figure this out. Questions, but I wanted to see if we could answer that I just really had some questions about a metro district is what is the percentage? I mean, I know that Tim likes the data. So what’s the percentage of Metro districts that build luxury homes, I’d like to really know that and then On the other side, what percentage of Metro districts include affordable homes? I really like to know the answer to that question, because I think that we’d probably find that most of the metro districts are from big luxury homes, because and also because people who are able to pay those taxes would be people who have, you know, a lot of income. And the other question is, what do you think the perception is of residents in the metro districts who are living in affordable homes, so people who are making not making very much money who live in Metro districts, I’d like to hear what they think about living a metro district and what I’ve heard from people who are living on a fixed income as they avoid Metro districts at all costs. They they won’t buy a house if they know there’s a metro district

41:51
also, so those are the questions I have, but in a

41:56
metro districts are really expensive. There’s a huge cost setting it up regulating it, managing it. And even after the metro logistics paid off, it has to be managed it has to be, it’s still attack. It’s still a metro district, even though the debt the debt has been served, there’s still fees to run it. And then you’re argue that you should get residents to be on the board. And that’s not feasible, because nobody really wants to be on that. When you get on an HOA board, you get on it because you know, you’re going to get to pick the color of your house, you’re going to get to make sure you get a new roof, you’re going to get to be involved in the landscaping, but when you’re on a board of a metro district, it’s already been done. It’s a done deal. It’s a it’s a debt that was encouraged before you Wherever around, nobody’s going to want to be on that. So it’s not that doesn’t, that’s not feasible and really not a feasible suggestion and I and they were telling us that residents don’t like to serve them they have a hard time finding residents. The other thing is a fight can really be costly things are being done right. It costs a lot of money to fight and residents have to come up with that cost. And of course, the metro district you saw the 10 lawyers that were here. They have a huge cadre of legal experts to fight any, any. Any fight there’s going to be Lama doesn’t want our city council to spend their time we really want you to do other things are so many things to work on. And we just don’t want you to spend the time on these Metro districts. There’s regulating the oversight and all that so we don’t want to can you guarantee to us that the members of the metro district board are going to be fair that they’re going to be skill that they’re going to have the knowledge to develop these I don’t think you can unless it unless the developer themselves and then the word in your paper here was called deplorable. There’s more than enough risk to refuse to use this flawed tool so I hope that you will really not use it. Thank you.

43:51
I forgot to start it so I start I started it for you have anything else to say

43:56
have one more little thing once you go ahead and say

43:58
okay, I forgot. I was gonna say There were two problems with Meadowbrook already the first one that you did. One was that they indicated they were going to eliminate term limits, which was already a problem. And two is that you were going to build infrastructure and they’re going to have a pool. So we’re going to fund a pool. That’s going to be not for our Longmont residents, we need a pool but it’s going to be an exclusive and people are going to have to pay memberships. So the flood principle of of, of loaning yourself money and passing that debt on to underrepresented future residents is an untenable model and no matter how many rules and regulations, it’s just not tenable. That’s all I have. Here we go.

44:47
You don’t have to answer any of my questions today.

44:48
We can talk a lot of people in the queue Okay, no,

44:51
I got I got it. I just

44:54
want to keep everybody who told me

44:55
no, no, no, no,

44:56
no, it’s it’s a it’s about time we have some real meat Let’s move on.

45:02
Thank you Mayor Bagley. Lynette if you don’t want to keep in it, but everybody here all night, I’d suggest that you make fewer unfounded assertions.

45:10
Yeah. So this one had a lot of unfounded assertions in it, too.

45:13
I think it didn’t. So to answer your first question, wrote every word of it myself, didn’t consult with anybody, except a lot of information that was online, the statutes, a number of other publications. And I can tell you, that while we consulted with a lot of developers when we were developing the affordable housing ordinance, which has been tremendously successful, and the we can, we consulted with the loman Economic Development Partnership, when we as well as a number of other Oregon When we looked at this the package of incentives and cost saving measures for developers so that they could build the things that we wanted. We didn’t do it specifically. I didn’t do it when I was regarding this paper. But what I did do was I watched what happened after we passed the development, the the affordable housing, incentive and ordinance package. And what happened was that developers started coming to us with proposals that aligned with the city’s vision instead of just being what they always did. And I think that’s a real good thing. I bet you’re not against the Zero Energy, zero carbon all electric neighborhoods. And that was one of the proposals that came to us when the city of Longmont allowed Metro districts. You said last time you spoke about this at Council, that mountain Brook was for rich people. Do you know the value of your own house that you live in? Now say Do you know the Zillow appraised value of your house? How are you willing to tell us how much it is? I think it’s about 460,000. Uh huh. Okay, and the average price of a projected price of a mountain broke home is less than 350,000. And it does include transitional housing for veterans, and it includes mountain habitat homes that are not taxed. So again, unfounded assertions Meadowbrook mountain Brook rather is is not for rich people. And so we really shouldn’t go around saying that just because it sounds good.

48:10
Well, I think that project could have been done without Metro district. I think it was planned and it could have been it could have

48:16
happened with Well, actually, that’s not the same. The same builder has another project with about the same housing mix on the other side of town that doesn’t have a metro district. Exactly. But that other how that other development, not exactly the same. It doesn’t build a reliever road to address the traffic on Hoover. It doesn’t include habitat, home donations, it doesn’t include the veterans community project. So there are a lot of differences it doesn’t it doesn’t include completing a new envision long not planned Greenway. So Again, because there’s a metro district. Some of these things that needed to be done in the area where mountain Brook exists that didn’t need to be done out east could get done. And what happens instead of the developer getting more money is that the developer makes the same margin he would and sells the houses competitively, but does more for the city. And I am convinced and if you had read that document clear, without prejudice, I think you would be convinced that

49:40
no, that’s really admitting to a prejudice because what if you’re wrong? You’re sure I’m wrong? No, I

49:46
think the other way around. I don’t think I’m going to convince you of anything.

49:53
Well, I’m apparently not going to convince you of anything either. But nevertheless, I think That factually. The horrors that you were presenting can be can be prevented in Longmont, you made the argument that most Metro districts are for high end housing. But one of the suggestions in my paper was that we only allow Metro districts when the average home price is below a certain threshold. You can’t just get a metro district that pops up out of thin air, the City Council has to approve it. And if we write ordinances that put limitations on Metro district, then the city council can’t improve a metro district that doesn’t

50:50
match those ordinance. You won’t be here in 10 years and they’ll be a different city

50:54
council well in 10 years as the city council wants to change that they would have to repeal all of the ordinances, which would be kind of a towel, because they were trying that they were going to, they were trying to get back in the pockets of the evil developers, because they’d have to repeal all those ordinances first. Yeah, be hard to do. It’d be hard to do. And that’s why I want to put in the safety ordinances now. So I’d really would like to at least have you give it a shot. And if

51:26
I would, like, let’s try this one. And then we’ll see

51:30
we’ve got this, you know, we’ve got this one away, and let’s wait. Let’s In the meantime, not say anything bad about it.

51:40
The people who are who buy their houses for you said 350,000 is the average.

51:45
Yeah. And

51:46
that so that means the bank said, well, you can afford a house that would cost 350,000 Uh huh. But the bank didn’t say plus a metro district. So these people are buying their houses and they’re going to have an extra dollars a month.

51:58
Actually. The People who the end the bank knows this, by the way, maybe

52:04
maybe not

52:07
my bank when I was buying a house that I was buying a house in a metro district, they didn’t

52:12
know that well, you should probably use a more competent banker. Okay. But

52:18
But if it but they know if it was in Longmont because because the disclosures are there, you know, I was talking to a developer. Not about it was after writing that paper. But I would like to say that the developer was talking about putting the metro district in the brochures for selling the house, because the one of the things that they could tell the homebuyer was that their entry price for that home was $40,000 less $50,000 less than it would have been, if there were no Metro district. And that while the Property taxes would be higher for a while that that would end. And and at the end of the taxation period, they would have paid $40,000 less on their mortgage plus their taxes than they would have if they had had no Metro district, but had the house the house cost $50,000 more. Now, that’s pretty hard to argue with. I don’t know. I mean, why are you laughing?

53:29
Because it’s not pretty hard to argue. What’s the view and if you do if you do the math and do 200 I don’t know what the metric taxes but if you do $200 a month, times 30 years, plus the interest, it’s a lot. Well, it’s not it’s it’s

53:45
a lot. So you’re saying them? I’m lying about them. Now. I’m

53:48
not saying you’re lying. It’s just a lot more than $40,000

53:51
No, no, no, it’s you save $40,000

53:54
but I’m saying if you pay an extra $200 a month for your Metro text Gonna be, then it’s going to be more than

54:02
yours. Here’s the deal.

54:05
The interest rate on the house, okay, on the mortgage, which is 50,000, the home mortgage is going to be $50,000 less than if you didn’t have the metro district. So the interest rate is four to 5%. Now, okay, the mill Levy, even if it when it’s at its maximum is far less than 5% on the house. So if if you figure it that way, then you see that your overall cost of the money that you’re paying for your house is lower. And don’t look at me like that. Don’t look telling some story. I really don’t want to take anybody but

54:51
I’m gonna I’m gonna jump in just because we’re gonna have I mean, we could literally this particular topic starting start starting our metric district conversation. 11 o’clock at night is back. It’s coming up. We’re gonna we’re gonna all have a chance and we still have

55:08
12345 more citizens to go through.

55:12
Well, that’s fine. Mayor Begley, but I have been challenged. I have been called a liar. I didn’t

55:18
hire you alive. You told me that I didn’t write the paper. And I

55:21
told me I

55:22
was not how are you that I haven’t done the math? I asked you.

55:27
And

55:31
I didn’t tell you that you didn’t write the paper. I asked you who wrote it? I didn’t tell you that. I didn’t say that. You are a liar. I said that you have if you did, we have to sit down and do the math because I don’t know the interest rate. I don’t know how much month there’s a lot of unknowns here.

55:45
Well, the unknown.

55:47
You’re lecturing me and as I don’t really I don’t.

55:51
I don’t appreciate you saying things that aren’t true either.

55:54
All right. Well, with that note with that, do you have anything you want? No. All right. So Dr. Why? And I’m sorry Dr. waters and Councillor Christiansen you’re both in the queue. Dr. Waters. Again.

56:09
Thanks. I’m gonna move that we extend the meeting past 11 o’clock

56:14
a second. Let’s vote.

56:23
Michelle’s like dope.

56:28
All right. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? that passes unanimously.

56:34
I do want to try to respond to some of those are their fair questions and I want to try to respond respond as thank you as as transparently as I can.

56:43
The

56:45
the question, I don’t remember exactly how you framed it was about you know, is there a deal made somewhere in terms of positioning on this? The best I can reconstruct the whole flow of conversation? Is it when we when we can serious about inclusionary zoning ordinance. And, and I am one of the council members who was willing to listen to developers on if you want us to stay in the game, you know, we want you to hear these kinds of things. Because the Met part of the message was there are things, you wouldn’t have to take $1 less as a city, if you just did a few things. If you’re going to if you’re going to charge these fees, and one example was paying the sewer and water fees at the time, it’s at the certificate of occupancy as opposed to when it was permitted. Because now they carry the cost of that money for two years or whatever. And in the example was we pay you a buck and a half. You pay we pay you a buck and it costs us a buck and a half to pay you the dollar. Right? So help us with the cost of money, right in terms of when we pay fees. What made sense? Yeah. So things like I mean, we don’t collect any less money and it costs them less and they If they pass along the cost or the savings, right, that’s critical that they pass along the savings. So that was one of them. There was a conversation about credits. Why would we allow a credit? And why wouldn’t we control control or constrain what a developer could do with a credit? At the end of the day for me, it’s like, well, if somebody builds gives us 20% of a development 8% above the the goal of 12%. And we give them a credit, well, I don’t care what they do with that credit personally, as long as we get the affordable housing, we get more affordable housing sooner, if we if we factor in a credit provision. So with that, there was that kind of conversation. One of the Convert, one of the number of things was, you have Lamont has a prohibition on the use of a metro district for residential development. If you if you lift that prohibition or amend that ordinance, we can finance the cost of construction. differently than we’re financing it right now. So here’s the example. And I and if I’m wrong on this, I’m willing to be educated. But I’ve, I think I’ve seen it play out in terms of the numbers that you two were talking about a minute ago. So what? whatever the cost of infrastructure, ultimately, homeowners are going to pay for it. Right? I mean, whether they borrow the money in a construction loan at 9%, or they create a metro district sell bonds and the bonds or the interest is paid at 4%. That spread is pretty expensive over the over the cost of, you know, building their development. So the least the argument is, that if I can finance my development, and I can pay less for the cost of money, right, I can rather than me borrowing money or taking my money out and investing at the end, at the end of the day, the same homeowners are going to pay for the cost of that development. So the question is, what does it cost them to pay for the cost of development or what is it Me as the developer. So in in moving forward with this a threshold for me, is if you’re going to use that tool, you can, I will, I won’t support a tool that the use of that tool if it doesn’t help us advance our housing objectives, right. I was explicit from day one. So when the mountain Brook development came forward, among our housing development among our housing goals are number one, every development will have at least 12% of the units constructed as permanently affordable. Or people going to write us checks for fee in lieu right. So in this case, they did for if you go back and look at the numbers of units in that development, they exceeded the 12% go through the veterans village in the eight units. Yeah. What they did part of the part of part of the reality for us in terms of housing inventory. And this goes back a little bit, I think to something that Sherry said and in terms of what’s perfectly good, historically, what we’ve done is probably perfectly good if you don’t care about attainable housing, for working families, for police officers, firemen, teachers, etc. So when I went as a candidate, I made a big deal but we have got to do something not just not misstated. Definitely, both and for our are our most challenged economically, residents, those who qualify for subsidized housing, and those who don’t.

1:01:42
The point was made to me waters, you know, you know what you’re talking about. Teachers don’t qualify, policemen don’t qualify for subsidized housing, you know, so, I’m not suggesting that they shouldn’t. But what we ended up with when we got into our just when we got into the objectives we were trying to accomplish and this is The reason why, for me it’s I don’t care. I don’t I don’t have a big investment in Metro districts, I do have a big investment in the kind of how’s it not coming psychologically and politically, and the kind of housing stock that’s available for people earning zero to 60% of ami. But I also care about those who are 60 to 110% of am I and there just wasn’t housing stock here. So if you go back, and I’d be happy to sit down with over a cup of coffee, we went back to the metro to to the mountain Brook development. One of the requirements that we stipulated they brought was a side by side comparison of the cost of those homes, especially those that were getting the mid tier exception, right. We, we wrote into our ordinance, if you put market rate homes, so they’re not permanently affordable, but we don’t want him to be we want the families that qualify and could afford the home we want them to earn, start to earn their you know, lifetime wealth like we did, right i mean, i my wife and I Started in a condo, offer mid tier housing. Right? You don’t have to pay us a fee, the developer, you’re not subject to the payment in lieu, if you’ll deliver market rate homes that are priced for folks earning 80 to 100% of ami. And then graduate we graduate we stage, the fee there, they do start paying a fee for homes from 100 210% hundred 10%, hundred and 20%. But if you go back and look at those mid tier homes in the mountain Brook development, and you do the math, which is what they did, I could go back and check the math I looked at at the time, but I happy to be happy to sit and look at at the at the cost the estimated cost of those homes at $30,000 more $30,000 more per unit than bettan. And back to this conversation. Calculate the mortgage rate the mortgage rate pcit I that’s this includes the property tax over the 30 years of a mortgage do the same House $30,000. Yes, same same numbers, right? Add on the the melody rate, run it out 30 years, the numbers came out where the the mid tier homes in the metro district cost less the home ownership, the cost of ownership over that period of time. Just the numbers I’m

1:04:20
now the expense of paying for all the feasibility studies and setting it up. And

1:04:24
when you’re talking with the staff work,

1:04:26
no, I’m not talking about your staff. I’m talking about the developer, the developers setting up doing all the paying their lawyers and

1:04:33
Well, that’s all factored into into the whatever their cost of money is. That’s all factored in. One of the one of the criticisms that we heard was how much time this the staff spend reviewing that metric that mountain Brook puzzle, part of what Councilmember Martin tried to do and we went back and forth on this. What we were trying to do was take what we thought we had learned in the run up to that first time And we all studied, you know, we all learned a lot. I didn’t know anything about Metro districts. But we all learned some things as we went along. And she and I were kind of trading. Thought you asked why we didn’t have other council members involved. I would love to do that. But not everybody was equally as enthused about engaging in, right. So, so we ended up thinking, I thought we had a pretty good checklist, right? She turned it to a narrative. And it’s not perfect, but I just kind of as a sideline, you guys might want to make this wager on the gun violence resolution. Few months ago, one of my critics for bringing that resolution claimed that I that someone had written that for me, in fact, said wanted to meet me face to face a you know, I want to know who wrote that because I’m gonna I’m gonna find you know, and I said, I’ll tell you what, what my I’ll make this wager with you. If you find that resolution anywhere in the world. But on this agenda, I’ll sign over my house to you know, I Was I was I was serious. But you know, I believe

1:06:02
you. I just think there’s some data in here that I would like to know where it came from. And that’s fair, I believe you I’m not. So

1:06:10
in the in the backs to the back of the conversation wasn’t a backroom conversation. In fact, your your question about that raises a question for me in the in the in that we in public discussions in this room and in the in the library, we talked about, in fact, it was smack dab in the middle of the LDP, and the chamber recommendations, we talked about their 12 recommendations to amend that ordinance. So when we, when we got to the package, the ordinance plus other things. For me, it was a it was a matter of principle I thought we had agreed. Now, obviously, not everybody shared this, but for Tim waters. It was a matter of principle that I sat here with other folks and said, we’ll make that work, but there’s going to be a high standard, right you’re not going to get escape. So It was a matter of principle I would have caught, you know, call it whatever you want. The fact that there’s so much us Why is there so much energy around this? I don’t know. I mean, I’m puzzled by that, why there’s so much any energy around it. We all care. We’re all trying to get to a bottom line. That’s, that’s more better, diverse, affordable and attainable housing stock for one month. Residents. If this is a tool to get us there, and we can do it with no harm. And obviously, that requires a lot of scrutiny. Why? For me, it just why wouldn’t we want to do it?

1:07:34
You’re just not you’re just not young enough to see this. 30 more years?

1:07:38
Well, you know, you were you

1:07:40
asked, I don’t I don’t know. My Hoa

1:07:46
has their annual meeting tomorrow night. I’ve never gone to our Hoa meeting. I’m gonna go tomorrow night because I remember that goes on my calendar. I don’t have time to serve on the HOA board, but I know it’s hard to get people to serve on a job boards. But in what’s here’s what’s interesting is you think about what you’re able to do. I don’t know all the constraints, if I was a member of a metro District Board, and you didn’t, I don’t know what the relationship would be between Metro District Board, an HOA board, but we will have a lot more control over it over a metro district than we will over an HOA board. They’re not accountable to us at all. I know.

1:08:29
My Hoa And trust me, it’s very difficult because you never know who you’re going to get voted in. So we

1:08:34
are experiencing accountability. You have more of both with a metro district than we do then you do with an HOA you actually know now who wants to serve on them and how long they serve. fair question about about I asked a question in page 235, or whatever it was of their application. Why are there no term limits here? And their answer was, well, we’re not certain how soon residents are going to want to serve on The board. And if we’re if the original directors are turned out, we can end up with no one on the board. Okay, that makes

1:09:06
it make sense.

1:09:09
But But in that case, the very first resident has if they want has the opportunity to be elected to the board. I’ll be anxious to see. So

1:09:18
I’d like to see it go. That’s what I’d like to see before you do another one. Can you get residents on the board? You know, I’d like to see them.

1:09:25
Well, I just want you to know this. The at the end of the day, this is not about anything sinister. If there’s no backroom deals here. There’s been more back. I suspect there’s been more conversation about Metro districts that I’ve been excluded from then I’ve been included in so I don’t know who’s in the back room in eight me. I’ve had my conversations right here in public.

1:09:49
Well, thank you very much. I appreciate it.

1:09:51
Hold on Councillor Christiansen. Mike, Mike.

1:10:02
Thank you Mr. McClain for your comments. I would like us to return to actually listening to the people that came here to talk tonight. So we can leave. I know, I know. I know. But we’ve spent a lot of time, more time and you’re going to spend a lot more talking about Metro district if you do. Yes, I know. I would also like to set the record straight on the package of incentives, which was developed at least two and a half years before. Either councilmembers Martin or waters were on the board and in that two and a half or three years, according to Kathy sedlar. We did not with all the incentives that we gave and we were far more generous than anyone in the county. We did not get one single unit of affordable housing and According to Kathy Fiddler so that’s why we had to create a mandate. I also would like to point out that there are statistics provided by developers. A very different than from this just statistics provided by for instance, Larimer County government. Yeah. Which shows that the average person in a metro district pays about 40% more than the average person. Not in a metro test.

1:11:35
Yeah, I’m not calling

1:11:39
Marcia a liar. I’m just saying I’d like to see the data because I it might be from one source or another source and I, I think you’re going to be different. Yeah.

1:11:49
Okay, thank you so much.

1:11:51
Hold on. Oh, okay.

1:11:57
Councillor Martin?

1:12:01
So Councilmember Christensen, I believe you’re referring to a different set of incentives. You are speaking about the set of incentives that was put in place when the old affordable housing ordinance was was repealed. And there was a new incentive package that was put in place at the same time as the new affordable housing ordinance was there and so it apples and oranges. This set of incentives was made to dovetail with the new affordable housing ordinance and they are different than the whole package of incentives. The only other thing that I want to say is that while some Metro districts were allowed with no mill levy cap, no debt cap, no restriction against Adding debt afterwards and stuff like that. Yeah, some of those Metro districts got totally out of control, and it took him 11 years. I understand I understand that. But you know, this is the baby bathwater kind of a thing. What we want to do is regulate against that kind of abuse. You wouldn’t want to not be able to have mortgages because we had a mortgage crisis 10 years ago, it’s not the same. It’s it’s exactly the same thing.

1:13:36
And I’m speaking now, Councilmember Christensen

1:13:41
so it’s just, it’s it’s an amazing prejudice that we can’t we have to throw away a perfectly valid friends financial tool to get the things this city needs because somebody was scared by him. Metro district when they were in the womb, I mean,

1:14:03
its representation without taxation. That’s what it is. And it’s wrong.

1:14:08
I mean, it’s taxation without representation. Sorry. It’s late. I gotta go, but I’m gonna let you go.

1:14:13
So so I’m sorry, I’m gonna move on. I’m not gonna talk about Metro districts, but okay, but you asked the question, why? Why do people get so energetic? Yeah. Right. And so, and so. There’s been a lot of energy on this council lately. Lots of energy. And I think I think that I wrote down. I’ve been, I wrote down three points that I think that that it goes to, and sometimes, you know, it’s not sometimes it’s not about the metro district. And now my fellow council members might disagree but but first of all, just because council members meet with people does not not mean that you’re in their pockets like so for example, over my I mean, just a few developers I’ve met with over the last eight years Kevin mole shine Dale Bruns, Scott McFadden, Steve hebo Dave check Nova Roger groves. Oh, I’ve had meetings, one on one, right and they’ve presented to me what they wanted but I’ve also had meetings. Gordon Piedro Teddy Benjamin. Don had Brandon Schaefer governor polis Stan Jones of eco cycle, Michael Belmont and Judith and Kate this ginger and I’ve listened to them too. Right so I mean, it just because you meet with someone a lot of times the language lately has been accusatory of, if you are meeting with people or if you do not agree with me, there is a subtle allegations the wrong word. There’s a hint of if you do not agree with me, there’s dishonesty dishonesty, a lack of integrity, you must be cheating. You must be planning or scheming when really what it is, is just a difference of opinion right now. Now that’s usually what it is with me with the people who usually show up in this room. Right meaning it’s just Hey, I just disagree with you. We’re on off I mean, we’re either on different sides of the aisle are different. And so I get passionate, but then you add on one extra layer, which is, you know, there are members of this council that just do not like to feel as if they’re being controlled, meaning

1:16:18
nobody probably likes that.

1:16:19
Right. So, so I’m one of them. So, um, so one of the people that helped get me elected originally and I have much respect for her frannie follow Could I respect frannie she helped me get elected. I don’t talk to Franny much anymore. I remember I got a phone call back during the oil and gas wars. She asked me to do something I did not believe it. And I said no. And the way certain members of this council are in the interacting with you and the other group that got them elected reminds me very much of that. And so I think there’s a there’s a there’s a conflict of values where I mean, I’ve heard it from from you, Miss McClain, don’t forget who got you elected. And so you You can either look at that is we got you elected, you will do what we say or we got you elected. And from then on, you just got to trust this. You know, I mean, it’s no secret that Gordon Piedro and Tim waters are best friends. Right. And so it’s it’s I think that there’s a lot of personal conflict going on in this council, where it’s not sometimes a metro district district isn’t always about a metro district. It’s about I’m seeing a lot of power struggle, you know, a lot of conflict that has to do with personalities. So anyway, that’s just my two cents. So let’s go on.

1:17:33
Very much. All right, Wayne kostina.

1:17:36
Congratulations. You have survived the night and you have arrived to your turn.

1:17:46
Thank you. My name is a wink of Siena. La bit 633 Stonebridge drive. And I am excited to be a Longmont resident, not as excited as I was before tonight. clock but I’m excited anyhow, we we moved in on December 30 into our home, which was built by dream finders homes. And also they built clover basin, which is another development to the southwest of us. And just as a side note, the HOA over bass and has filed a suit against stream finder homes, over construction issues which kind of goes on to what I want to talk about, of many, many, many issues. I want to focus on one and it’s a heating issue because there is in our home which is a two level home about a 25 to 30 degree differential between upstairs and the main level. So we have the the thermostat set at 68 upstairs, it’s 84 mid 80s and downstairs. It’s 58 to 59 degrees. So constantly downstairs we have to run heating units and the different bedrooms and different rooms and upstairs, we got to leave our window open from 12 to 18 inches and run a fan in there to circulate air so we can sleep and be comfortable.

1:19:22
Now

1:19:25
the builder has come out and we identified this fact on on our orientation walkthrough, which was on December 26. Two, Thomas Romero, who is the superintendent of this subdivision, so he was aware of it at that point in time, and then on our pre closing walkthrough. The problem still existed. And he said that they were aware of the issue and their warranty department. We working on it. So I mean, they close they forced us into closing on this home, because there were huge penalties if we didn’t, which we signed a contract which I’m not a lawyer. I wish I had had a lawyer there looking at it and I, I wouldn’t have signed that contract Had I known that, but they forced us into closing on this home, knowing that that was an issue and not having it resolved. Now, when they start looking at this Oh, and so they came in on the 10th. Right, Ah Fat guy came in on the 10th of January, and they put to 50% baffles and the returns upstairs. And on the 11th where we shut up the house, we we turned off the heaters downstairs. We weren’t letting in any more cold air, and it returned to the same issue. The same problem set at 68 on the thermostat is 59 downstairs, and it was 8283 84 degrees upstairs. And so on the 11th. I emailed Tom and I said the problem exists in here word from them until the 20th. When I emailed him again, he says, Well, we need data. I said, Well, I leave your ranges. I told you what it was what No, we need exact data. So I said, Okay, the day after you guys did this repair, we measured and this is what it was. So it comes back to me It says now, I need pictures of the thermometer. The house has to be closed up for 48 hours. And you got to show me pictures of the Thermometer readings at that point. So I mean, he’s changed his tune three times, three times. The issue I have is rounding inspection. specters came in and and I’ve been told it passed everything. And to me, this is a health and safety issue. I mean, you got to consider elderly, infants, and people that are challenged health wise. My family cannot live in that house with that temperature variation. For 48 hours, we can’t do it, our health would be compromised. So, I don’t know what to do about this. And I can’t understand how an inspector could come in there and overlook this type of health and safety issue. And there are many other homes in the air I’ve talked to. Well, there’s five of us that I know of personally, that I’ve talked to neighbors that have had the same issue, and I’m sure there’s others. I put out a deal on next door. I’m out of time. I put out a deal on next door. And within an hour I got 20 responses from people in a bunch of them from clover base and that says you ought to know what happened here. So, to me, there was a rush to close. And it’s obvious why they wanted to retire their construction debt. I interest construction debt, and they didn’t care what it did to the homebuyers at all. I went in and I catalog 249 construction defects in our house. Most of them were painting problems. But when the painters finally came in the two guys I walked and they thought they were going to be there maybe 30 minutes. They were in there for six hours fixing the problems. There were holes in the sheetrock that had to be filled and patched. There was a spot on the stairwell wall that was bowed out, because they had put the sheet rock up over a water drain pipe. A joint in it. And rather than cutting a hole and then filling it up, they just put it over there and left it that way. So to me it was greed on the part of the the builder that they would go in and unethical that they would go in and actually forces into closing with all these issues and problems, right. All right, well,

1:24:26
that sucks.

1:24:27
I got one request my request. And unless these people are challenged financially, nothing’s going to change. And what I would request is that your inspectors do not issue any more certificates of occupancy to this builder until they resolve this problem on all the existing units.

1:24:49
Okay, we’ll talk with legal counsel and our staff about it.

1:24:51
Okay. All right.

1:24:52
Okay, and I would like to invite any of you to come out to my neighborhood, I’d be glad to take you around of my neighbors. Let you see my house.

1:25:02
not sleeping there though, man, that’s too cold too hot.

1:25:05
So thank you very much for your time. I’ll sleep on the stairwell. Right?

1:25:08
Right where it’s Councilmember Peck.

1:25:12
I’m Wayne, who’s the builder?

1:25:14
The builders dream finder homes. developer. I don’t know who the developer was specifically.

1:25:29
Hmm.

1:25:31
Interesting.

1:25:34
Any other questions?

1:25:38
look like it. Thank

1:25:39
you very much. Thank you. Mayor. Just so you know.

1:25:44
That email was forwarded me to today by think Councilmember Martin. And so we’re interacting with the building officials and everyone else to look at it and understand what that situation is. I’ll probably know more within the next two days night. We should probably look at it. Yep. You

1:26:01
All right, Peter long stalder

1:26:05
I get that right.

1:26:10
If you live at 113 31 Walden. All right.

1:26:16
We should have like the Hunger Games theme when we lose people, you know. Anyway, you haven’t seen Hunger Games, I guess I’m sorry. All right, Margaret. halsy.

1:26:29
All right.

1:26:30
And in the right, I do know they’re here. Scott Stewart.

1:26:46
Here we go.

1:26:52
Let’s get this thing started here.

1:26:59
Mere Bagley Members council Scott Stewart two to nine Grant Street, Longmont What a great place. l just read something real quick. I consider myself very lucky to have found Longmont 20 plus years ago, my wife and I raised a family here. We’ve tried to be good neighbors in order to build a better community with our in our area of influence. And I must say that my neighbors are awesome. I don’t know if you guys live in a great neighborhood, but I do. I started coming to council meeting some time ago because of changes in how the airport operations affected my home. Increased operations have a large impact on the quality of life of those of us being affected. Over time I’ve come to understand a lot more about the airport than I ever thought I would. serious look at the airport and how it is operated as needed. The airport lacks financial sustainability plan. The lack of a financial financial sustainability plan seems Problem problematic. The airport master plan is often referenced as the plan. The master plan talks about the what the airport could be not about what the airport should be. The future of the airport development and the control is the choice is a choice that the city can make. Increasing airport growth in air traffic will not improve the operational or financial challenges that the airport already has. The current airport size already serves long money aviation community Well, the rates and fees need to be addressed to allow for a more sustainable operation. Avoiding FAA funding should be the first step to allow Longmont to take control of the airport. Long on is currently looking at sites to install solar farms. take a serious look at the undeveloped property on the south side of the airport. Allowing the airport fund to keep the revenue from the solar farm could help with its long term financial plan. And it could be a win win the airport gets the funding it needs and the city gets the clean energy at once. That’s it. I appreciate you guys so much in the dedication, it’s really difficult to keep up with all of the issues and you know, I don’t think you get paid enough for what you do and the level of commitment that you have to the city and it’s greatly appreciated from this citizen. Thank you.

1:29:41
Thank you. You’re welcome. Appreciate that. You You stuck around all night just to say that that’s awesome. Alright Strider, don’t blow it. Okay.

1:29:51
pressures on my friend.

1:29:55
Makes it easier on you guys.

1:30:06
Hello once I get to the get to the microphone so that the papers can walk around a little sign

1:30:11
that carry I had to put directions because some people don’t read accurately. kangaroos have joys and trials have evidence and witnesses. So

1:30:36
I thank you This is been going on about six or eight years. It’s really good. I appreciate the inner interchange. Some people get it, some don’t some needed, some don’t. But man, everything keeps coming up our center Atlanta’s good friend of mine and Eat there quite often, not real often, but I can get food. You know, when you can afford food, it’s good to have access to food. I was always hungry as a child. And here we get into the sugar thing if you can’t get enough food and you hear sugars, energy food, well back then in the 50s that’s when they cokes wherever you were in candy bars wherever you were. So you don’t have enough date. You eat candy and cokes because then you gotta let their little energy for a while. Well, when I was my last two years in high school, they took me out in the middle of track season because I had a series of heart attacks, which was partly no food, no sleep, too much salt and too much sugar. A dead set a record in my county that lasted for 10 years, and I have Now but I could have been five or six seconds faster I could have set a record that would probably still hold but life does whatever it does. I appreciate Mayor Pro Tem Rodriguez two weeks ago conducted a meeting at the previous one was very contentious with the developers and and such and out that Win Win very simple and this one tonight there’s more issues to work out. But I instinctively win against Metro districts because of my knowledge about opportunity zones, you create a special thing that laws don’t apply to and then you know, that creates more similarities. And here I think the ordinate says we have had in terms of scrutiny over I’ve gone from instinctively against two but Absolutely neutral. I need to learn more. And but I think discussion tonight there’s a lot of back and forth that really moved in the right direction. A whole lot of other things my church long might use as a belt to Michael homes, which are just opening up right now. But half the church activists are in Puerto Rico rebuilding homes from the from the hurricane. Today, the United States Senate put itself on trial. You know, they’re gonna quit the president. He’s only been documented with 15,000 lies since he’s been president, and infinite number of crimes, but it’s a kangaroo court. And they already declared in advance that, hey, you know, everything is cool, and he can do anything they’ve make him a god not a person. And I know about kangaroo courts first time ever walked into a courtroom was in Selma, Alabama, and I was immediately convicted for setting on the wrong side. We moved from the black side over to the white side and I was then convicted for setting on the white side. The sheriff came in and passed out weapons to seven Ku Klux Klan prisoners to beat me up while I was there. I’d only been in town about a week. Oh my gosh, that’s well skip that through. On on my 21st birthday.

1:34:48
Race Jonathan Daniels was murdered. Right next door announced county by deputy sheriff Tom Coleman right in broad daylight point blank with a shotgun. Well, kangaroo court, a jury of his peers. He never spent an hour in jail. I haven’t heard that all night. He never spent an hour in jail. And they had a trial A month later and his peers said, hey, you’re great guy. And Nicole, your sister is the head of the school board on eyewitness says we’re not allowed many eyewitnesses. I’m killed the priests with a shotgun disclose. But that’s okay. Because he was on their side. That’s how kangaroo courts work. And he’d never spent an hour in jail. And he was he was declared innocent by a jury of kangaroo courts, no witnesses, no documents, no evidence, and I thank you and let me one one other thing. The person who Coulson self President spoke yesterday at Davos World Economic Forum and he said nature is stupid and he proved it by speaking. He was followed by a world later, a little girl from Sweden credit Turnberry who just turned 17 she said nature is brilliant and beautiful and she proved it by speaking. And Trump said the children cause are causing it. Children speaking panic about nature are dangerous. Nature, cut it, burn it, dig it, drill it, sell it, kill it. gratis said, Our world is burning now. Our home is on fire do something now. Thank you.

1:36:56
Thank you straighter. So that concludes our forum and forget Forgive me For I didn’t cut people off tonight so I figure

1:37:04
I mean, so alright. counts, comments, anything.

1:37:11
Assume nothing from city staff. So all right, we have motion jump back

1:37:16
are doing well sorry. Go ahead comment.

1:37:19
I’m asking everybody when you’re walking at night, please wear some light colored clothing.

1:37:25
We have.

1:37:27
Everybody’s wearing dark hoodies and jeans. And it’s really, really hard from dusk on to see people crossing the street. So that’s just a personal request. Put on some lighter clothing.

1:37:42
All right, any objection to journey?

1:37:47
All right, I’ll second that anybody object? All right. We’re journey.