To listen to the meeting alongside a transcript, please visit: https://otter.ai/s/8vRA3Ya1QzewWN5a3reSig
For a transcript of the meeting, please read below:
14:55
Here we are new digs new faces faces. new agenda, old topic. So let’s go ahead and get started. We have roll call please. Mayor Bagley here.
15:10
Councilmember Christiansen here.
15:12
Councilmember Hidalgo. fairing here. Councilmember Martin.
15:16
Here. Councilmember pack here. Councilmember Rodriguez
15:20
here. Councilmember waters.
15:23
Thank you. Let’s go and say the pledge.
15:33
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the
15:35
United States of America.
15:49
Alright, let’s go ahead and start.
15:52
Do we have any motions to direct the city manager to add agenda items?
15:56
Councillor pack? Thank you. I’d like to move to director at their convenience, to schedule a meeting outside of regular and study session meetings for the City Council with a facilitator to discuss and amend rules of procedures and ethical behavior.
16:12
Second,
16:16
there’s a motion on the floor. I think we’ve already voted on this, isn’t it on the agenda?
16:23
We were waiting for the outcome. And since we have that, we will look to schedule that. But I think there’s an added component to this that wasn’t on Alright, so let’s go ahead.
16:35
Can we clarify what the objectives we’re going to accomplish in this session,
16:40
to amend the rules procedure to look at them and decide any if there’s any ethical just so that we have a discussion among Council and what we do going forward?
16:53
Could you be more specific about what we would be the rules and procedures you think that we need to be specifically focused
17:00
What we need this session for us to discuss what what those would be, rather than to sit here in a meeting and take up the time to do that?
17:09
Well, I’m, I’ll support I’ll support a session. But But I want to be real clear on what we’re going to do with the session. So if it’s this, is this a tutorial on on on ethics?
17:24
What is? No, it is for council to look at our rules of procedure, which have not been looked at for 20 years, to see if we’re following and that we’re all on the same page. And that going forward, we all follow the same rules of procedure,
17:39
if so long as that translates into meeting the same standards for ethical behavior, I’m down with it.
17:45
Customer level fair.
17:47
So well, I just wanted to clarify, my understanding is that we would essentially come up with a consensus on how we would conduct ourselves during Council. So we all have an agreement. Yes. So it’s really not to amend or, or discuss or come up with different ideas it or ethics, it’s really just to look at what we have and come to consensus on how we want to execute these procedures during council meetings. Correct. Okay.
18:20
So this is during council meetings?
18:21
No? Oh, yes, yes. Well, I don’t know, you know what, the whole point is to discuss all of this as sitting down at a special session with the facilitator. And the we would come up with how outside Council, how council members should act with each other, and with the public.
18:46
That makes sense to me so long as it’s in a in a public venue, of course, at a time when the public can be here and we get a chance to do this. with everybody who cares about this topic, having a chance to, to observe and listen to
19:03
Alright, there’s motion on the floor. Little result. Nobody else is in the queue. Let’s vote. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? All right, motion passes unanimously.
19:15
No, it was unanimous.
19:19
thought we were raising our hands. That’s
19:22
okay. Sorry.
19:26
Alright, let’s go ahead and move on to public invited to be heard. We’ve got a short but powerful list of citizens tonight. Let’s go ahead and start reminder, we’ve got different format or same format, different venue. So you have three minutes and that three minutes will cut you off, no matter how awesome your comments are. So let’s go ahead and start with Lauren money.
19:51
I’m sorry, say again?
19:53
More. Oh, sorry. Lauren. Money would have been awesome.
19:57
I thought would be better. Right.
19:59
All right. And suddenly you start with your name and your address. That’ll be great.
20:03
All right. Mr. Mayor and board member of the Council. My name is Lauren Morley. I live at seven at divini Street, Golden, Colorado, easier 401. And I just wanted to talk briefly on the stance right now on Metro districts. So my family has been in the homebuilding and land development industry in Colorado for 30 years. We have a privately owned small local family company. And we have focused solely on single family homes, condominiums and townhomes for first time buyers, empty nesters. Affordable Housing is is our niche really. So our primary business like I just hadn’t always been first time housing. We’ve been utilizing Metro districts to assist in development financing since the 1980s. And we have been through several downturns our company was building in the 90s all the way through the early 2000s. We are right in the thick of it during the recession. And we have been for all the saturation special districts in laws. And we as we have also had several successful Metro districts that have turned over to homeowner control. So I just would like to give a couple of specific examples because I feel like that’s where our knowledge lays. One of the ones that I’m going to give actually both ones I’m gonna give her in commerce city. So I’m gonna focus here. I’m Eagle Creek, it’s a 383 home development of single family and duplex homes. It was formed in 1996, and it was issued approximately $4 million of debt to build infrastructure, and amenities. These townhomes were all aimed to be affordable housing. So at the time, most of them were built between 125,000 to $175,000 being that sale price of the home. And we’d like to note that we regularly reached out to homeowners I actually attend still to this day. I attend the HOA meeting every single year. trying to convince homeowners to join the board. We have three homeowners who are currently on the board and after not having been in the development for over 10 years, we’re finally getting it fully turned over to the board. We have
22:14
Sorry, I’m coming over a little cold right now. So I’m having some trouble here. Okay,
22:21
where am I? So at this particular Metro district, the bonds have been refinanced twice. The interest rates and abilities have been reduced. In the last two years not only have we read on the entire park, we breed on the playground and we’ve we’ve replaced the entire perimeter of all we’ve done all of this while we’ve also reduced the middle of these out this property letting taxes come down. This is because this was a metro district that was formed, fully sold out and was able to have a successful fine financials and taxes coming in over the years, which is how these special districts are supposed to work. I can’t say specifically this development couldn’t have happened without a metro district. I know one of the Said been sad is that developers have this endless amount of funds that they can fund this infrastructure without Metro districts. Well, that might be true for some national builder for a company. That might three minutes.
23:11
Yep. I did not do a good job there.
23:13
Great.
23:15
All right, your districts, that’s what we heard. Thank you.
23:19
All right. Ben Goldstein.
23:28
Goldstein,
23:30
Diane golden Stein 1707 Main Street. I’m on the board for the symphony orchestra in there for a few years and they designated me to the board for the landmark Performing Arts Initiative.
23:45
And I’m going to jump the gun a little bit because you’re going
23:48
to get a presentation in a few minutes. But I would just like to say that we wholeheartedly support the we wholeheartedly support the performing arts center. initiative and hopefully also a conference center to go along with that. And I think they will both be a great addition to the city a long month, it will put us on a cultural map. And we are in a central place between all of the universities and the other Front Range cities so that we would be able to attract a large audience from around not just our county, but adjacent counties, we would be able to do a lot more than we then we’re presently limited by the high school auditorium because we have to share while they have their events. So sometimes we have basketball conferences the same time as the symphony is putting on their performances. So I just encourage you all to support the Performing Arts Initiative. Thank you.
24:51
Thank you, Miss Mrs. Golden Stein.
24:57
Sorry, I just resetting things here. Alright, cool. All right, Kevin will shine.
25:09
Kevin motion 5139 old ranch drive resident of Longmont and the developer is solely focused on providing workforce and affordable housing in the city of Longmont. Obviously, I’m here to speak in favor of districts, but I wanted to bring up a couple of positive points. I was at an oledb meeting last week and they had a bunch of lot of representatives from corporations that have recently moved here never met them before. And they were asked what they liked about Longmont what brings them here, one of the one of the universal responses from them was the palpable invisible compassion in this town. How organized our charities are, how the first responders act. They were actually shocked when when we were asked to give a present quick overview of the fact that we’re about to become the first city to have a neighborhood that’s going to incorporate a campus for for the homeless, in a new home development, not in the state in the country not Los Angeles, not San Francisco, not Denver, not New York here. And it happened. Because it’s I’m very positive, which is seven of you gave very clear direction that you were wanting to solve this. This crisis, the home the the the both homeless, but also affordable housing crisis. And we still have the runway to make that happen because of the land that’s still left to develop that way. Now, what happened was we came together in 2018. And made it reality part was your direction. part was, frankly, your staff is very smart and hardworking, and very diligent at it. And so I took great, I took great pride in what we’re doing here. The second positive event, which I saw was, maybe was four weeks ago, five weeks ago was actually the mayor Pro Tem who said, let’s get this council back together on issues. Because every one of you have the same objective, which is providing more housing, at lower prices for working families, and frankly, for the homeless. And right now it’s right there for us. We have a great plan and Place. We shouldn’t be stopping and saying taking away tools. Frankly, I think where we missed it and we all missed it is we stopped talking after 2018. I still think there’s a lot of work to be done. So I challenge the Council on two items. One is putting a group together that with the sole mission of trying to enhance affordable housing. And I think it’s not only discussing Metro, it’s not only representative of the city and the community, we’re talking about Metro districts, and how high you have to jump to get a metro district and what your controls in that Metro district are. I think there’s also room to go over things such as, what role can manufactured housing play in solving our crisis, very important, when in my opinion, now that we’re building factories in Colorado for that, I think the second challenge I give is to come together on this issue, come up with a reasonable solution. We’re working together again, and frankly, I think it’ll be a lot easier to address a lot of other issues that have divided this council. So in a time of horrible national divisive politics, I’d love to see this council come together on the side and and move forward on affordable housing again,
28:00
Thank you. Thank you, Jim Marshall.
28:09
Jim Marshall
28:10
saw the one second. Sorry about that. Okay, my Time’s up. Yep.
28:16
Couple of people are probably be happy about that.
28:19
All right, go ahead.
28:20
Jim Marshall 9591. East didn’t know lane lonetree. Colorado. I’ve been developing for approximately 30 years, over 15,000 units all across the Front Range. There’s been a lot of negative press on districts recently. Specifically the Denver Post the orchestrated attack is absolutely unjustified. There’s been several misrepresentations and a lot of just outright lies, and people that believe what they read in the Denver Post these days, you might as well go pick up the National Enquirer because it’s probably just about as accurate. As far as districts go, districts work, and I, I reiterate everything that Kevin’s I think you guys have done a great job with your affordable housing initiatives. You’re, but I hear two sides here. I hear you say we want affordability. But yet you want to take districts away, which is, and I know some of you don’t agree with this, but districts do create affordability. The last few, several weeks, I’ve been amazed at how many experts have emerged on the topic of Metro districts. there’s not very many people that actually understand them. There’s very few people in the city of Longmont that I believe even live in them. So it’s it’s a it’s a complicated topic. The service plan is the key. They do work. And, and I would encourage you to continue to move down the road of exploring how they can work in your town, because it’s not, you know, it’s been mentioned many, many times. This is a tool in the toolbox. I’m here to tell you, it’s not just a tool in the toolbox. It is the toolbox. There’s not one deal that I’ve looked at in the last 10 years that I would have done if I didn’t have a metro district. Next
30:00
Thank you. All right, Lynette McLean.
30:13
Hi, Mary backlinking cat City Council. My name is Lynette McLean and I am live on Sandy point, sand point drive. I just wanted to say, first I want to talk a little bit about constituents. And constituents to me are every all your citizens, all the citizens in the city, who you serve, not just people who voted for you, people who like you, it’s just it’s everyone, it’s and it’s also people who didn’t vote for you that didn’t vote for anybody. It’s the people who don’t have a voice. And that’s a big population that we really need to always keep in mind those people who can’t speak for themselves or maybe because they have two or three jobs, maybe because they aren’t, they aren’t interested but also maybe this because they are unable to be here. So I want you to listen to all your constituents. And you’ll see tonight, and every night, anybody who talks about Metro districts are developers. And I really want you to listen to your constituents. Because that’s why you were elected to do if you ask any developer, if he wants three more million dollars to build his to do his development, he’s going to say yes. If I was a developer, I’d say yes. So that’s, that’s a moot question to ask, oh, if you if you had a metro district, would you be able to do your job better? Yes, I’m sure they would be able to. They’re the only ones here who support Metro districts, and they’re the only ones that you’ll find who support Metro districts. They’ll they’ll also tell you that they’re very complicated with people of simple intelligence like me, can’t really understand them. And I think that’s really true. They are very complicated. They’re too complicated for city council to administer or service there too. They’re too complicated for the staff. They need. People who run Metro districts need to be attorneys. They need to be trained. And we don’t have that capability as if they’re just they’re just too complicated. And as long as they’re run by developers, they’re going to be serving developers. I’d really glad to hear that this the one person who from golden, who had boards taken over by the residence, but I know that’s really hard to do. We can and we will provide affordable housing without a metro district, and we can be palpable and have visible compassion. And I want to I want to talk about affordability for who. Okay, that’s all thank you.
32:41
Thank you. All right. That’s it for public invited to be heard.
32:47
All right. So let’s move on to spike or actually yeah, let’s move on to special reports and presentations. First, let’s start with the presentation on the 2020 presidential primary election and election security by Molly Fitzpatrick. The board county clerk recorder. Welcome, welcome.
33:04
So long and perfect.
33:08
Good evening council members and good evening community members. Thank you so much for having me tonight. My name is Molly Fitzpatrick, and I am the Boulder County corporate quarter. And I also wanted to start by thanking you for all of the wonderful service and the work that you do for our community. And thank you to our community members for being so engaged, it takes all of us to make to ensure that our community can thrive. And I’m happy to be in that doing that work with you all. So as you all know, 2020 is here. And we are seeing a lot of changes in the 2020 elections. And we also have a new election, which is the presidential primary election on March 3. And so given all these new changes, and given the year that we’re that we have and the discourse and the national narrative wanted to let you all know about these changes, since we know community members oftentimes look at you all, as reading sources for any and all information. So I wanted to start with an overview of the calendar. So as many of you know, we do have our presidential primary on March 3, and then we’ll have our primary election for the statewide races and congressional races in June. And then of course, we have our november election as well, the general election. So we haven’t had a presidential primary in 20 years. And this isn’t new for us. So in 2016, after the caucuses, voters initiated a presidential primary. And, you know, we look at what’s happening today and last night, and this is a really prime reason that we have presidential primaries in Colorado because our elections office runs elections all the time. And so this is a great service that we can provide for voters to nominate their choice for President. So when you get your balance And we do start mailing ballots next Monday, there’s only going to be one contest on the ballot. And that’s the fourth president. And the primaries are only held by the major political parties. So there will be a Democratic primary and then a Republican primary. This is still a new change for voters, unaffiliated voters may now participate in primaries. And the important thing to note is that they may only participate in one primary. And this is something that we again voters initiated in 2016. And this was in effect in 2018. But given that it’s still new and given that it is a presidential election year, we always want to remind unaffiliated voters that they can participate, but they can only vote on one party’s ballot. Another new change is that 17 year olds who will be 18 by the general election this year may participate in the primaries this year. And this also happens to be high school voter registration Awareness Week. That Our office initiated and we’re so proud that boulder Valley School District and St. grayned school district are formally partnering with us to ensure that high school students are aware of their options to participate in the presidential primary. So if you know a 17 year old in your life, please let them know that they are able to participate. And if they if you live in a household of the 17 year old, yes, they are supposed to receive that ballot if they will be 18 by November 3. And there are still party caucuses and the caucuses are going to continue to establish local leadership such as precinct CoC, precinct captains, and then delegates to go on to the county and state assembly. Here is an overview of some key dates the most important dates on their February 10. So next Monday, we will begin mailing ballots to voters and so look for your ballot in the in the mail next week. And then our voter service and polling centers open on February 24. And you may you can always go in and register and vote in person If you would like, there is no voter registration deadline in Colorado. And then March 3 is the last day to vote and return that mail ballot by 7pm. So wanted to just take a quick step back to sort of put into context what our election model is, given that there’s so much conversation going on nationally about elections and how we’re structured. here in Colorado, we are really known for having a very accessible and secure model, we have really an all options, we’re an all options state. So if you are registered to vote, you will automatically be sent a ballot in the mail. And then what you do with that ballot is your choice. You can mail it in, you can drop it off at a 24 hour Dropbox, or you can just go in person if that’s what you wish to do. And then the other thing that makes our state unique is that we do not have a voter registration deadline you can register up to and on election day. So
37:57
here the return options once Again.
38:02
And
38:04
the wanted to highlight quickly, security. So obviously security is a big topic of conversation nationally and also here in Colorado. And again, Colorado really is seen as a leader when it comes to cyber security and security efforts. wanted to highlight just a couple of things that were really baked into our Colorado election model that we really overhauled in 2013. So some key features is that we have same day voter registration so if an individual’s voter registration ever comes into question, they can always register to vote and cast a ballot that same day. We also have paper ballots, so every vote every voter again gets a ballot in the mail that they can fill out and drop off. And if they choose to come vote in person, they will be voting on paper, all of our 24 hour dropboxes have security cameras and all of our ballot processing operations where we actually you know, count the ballots are under camera 24 seven and also Members of the public are welcome, anytime. So if you’d like to see this work in action, we invite you to attend about processing tour all of the times and dates for those tours are going to be on our website. And then the other thing that makes Colorado really special is that we conduct a statewide risk limiting audit. And we’re the first state in order that has conducted this audit. And we’re the only state where it’s fully operationalized, meaning every county in Colorado is doing this audit. And essentially, what the audit does is compares the way that the scanner is reading your ballot, to your actual physical ballot to ensure that it’s accurate. And it we believe it’s based on statistics. So we’re auditing just enough balance to confirm that the outcome is actually correct. And so with that, I know you all have a packed agenda. I’m happy to take questions. Also here some resources, I want to just highlight one of them, which is ballot track. So ballot track is a service that our offer that our office provides to voters to let them know that we have printed their It that it’s in the mail that we received it that it’s been counted. And so it really does give voters a high degree of confidence that you know, where they’re valid is in the lifecycle of it being processed. So thank you all so much for the work that you do. And thank you everyone for being here. And I’m again, happy to take questions or you can get in touch with us through these channels. Thank you.
40:24
All right. Thank you very much for coming. Walmart is always welcome and open to county officials. So thank you. All right. Now, we are going to postpone this week’s conversation on the presentation, the performing arts feasibility study. I’m just kidding. Joe. Kidding.
40:43
Me? Yeah. Now we’re going to talk about these ability study.
40:49
shorty, I have to do this. Good evening Mayor Bagley and councilmembers. Can you hear me back there?
40:56
I am Kim manager. I’m the director at the llama museum. And I am also the city liaison on the steering committee for the feasibility study for the Performing Arts Center. Tonight, I’m here really to just introduce the speakers that will be presenting tonight. And Ryan and Charlie Johnson are here from Johnson consulting. They have a slide presentation that they’re going to provide for you, but they’re going to really just hit the highlights. So they will just go quickly through that slide presentation, and then be able to answer some questions for you. So Charlie and Ryan Johnson.
41:48
Good evening, Mr. Mayor, city council members, Charlie Johnson, six East Monroe Street, Chicago, Illinois. Today we’re going to present our information are related to phase one of our feasibility analysis and strategic planning for potential Performing Arts Center, a
42:15
performing arts center, an event center conference center, as well as a potential hotel. So we are finished with phase one work. And we’re going to just give you an interim report today, we will keep it sharp. Because this was already in your packet. I know you have a lot to
42:31
do today.
42:32
All right, on our team. Thank you.
42:40
Alright, so we on our team is our firm Johnson consulting. We also have MIT which has a very major presence in Denver, who’s doing kind of the site work analysis for us. And then we also have an architectural firm called DLR. They are not doing any design work. They’re just doing tests. Bits and concepting and giving us ranges of what costs will be. So we’re all participating in the client group has met with all of our team. So the market study these questions were summarized in the request for proposal. Then we also reviewed them with la pi and the client group stakeholder. So we are focused on these questions and our intent is to address all of them will do that, obviously, will provide summarization of that today.
43:40
This summarizes our
43:45
notes.
43:47
Were substantially complete with our market and fight for market analysis and strategy. We haven’t done site work but the market field we’re understanding the case studies and the Digital Marketing, how it operates, I think we have a very good grounding on that. And then we’ve also spent a tremendous amount of time with stakeholders. So understanding their perspectives and their desired outcomes for the project, also been talking to city management and trying to emulate integrate their ideas for the community. So we can integrate that into our findings as well. Face to this is really kind of the business planning for the project. We haven’t really started this yet. So this is kind of an interim steps. We’re ready to catch our breath, let everybody review all the material, and then we’ll engage in the second phase of the work. The real work here is a business plan. And we will be doing site assessments as well as a cost estimates. But we will be addressing all of these topics in our work in this what our firm does throughout the country.
44:59
Right I’m going to let we’ll talk about this one slide.
45:03
Now I’ll turn it back over to you.
45:04
First of all, we’ve looked at the economic and demographic characteristics of the market. It’s a lovely market, it’s growing nicely, you have a really good positioning on the front line Front Range. And the fact that is growing really provides an opportunity to allow you all to serve your citizens better, but also turn the tide a little bit to instead of people leaving Longmont to go to see arts and entertainment groups, you’ll be bringing people in. And you know, the fact of the matter is when we look at the nature of your population, the education levels, and income levels are just fit like a glove with the arts culture. And that’s really indicated by the presence of loci, which is an outstanding organization and then all the others Types of arts activities that we’ve been involved in exposed to what we’ve been here. So I think bottom line is there’s a high, high affinity for participation in arts. And people really do have a high incidence of participation, which is that what Ryan will talk about.
46:20
Mr. Mayor and members of the council, I’m going to walk you through is some of the stakeholder community engagement that was conducted. For the project we’ve met with over 50 had over 50 small group meetings and one on one meetings with some of the organizations presented here. We also conducted two surveys, one that was focused on the arts component of the project, and that received over 1000 responses and then also a another survey on the event center component that was directed towards meeting planners that are active here in Longmont in the community and also throughout the region. And some of the takeaways that we got from these stakeholders and community meetings, really focusing on the Arts Center First, there really is no capacity in the market right now the schools are used by the schools, and they don’t have the technological or capacities to support some of that program, programming opportunities. Also a pie you know that right there, six organizations that could serve in some form a role as potentially an anchor tenants for a project. And then again, booking congestion at the existing facilities in the area are, are very challenging. And then our survey really indicated the majority of people are participate in events, but they leave the market to do that. So by providing something here and into the future, you’d really help do a number of things to improve the quality of life. And also these types of facilities are really important in corporate recruitment. People that want to come work in this type of community want things to do. So there’s a lot of opportunity for the art center. And then also, you all have the planning stages a comprehensive plan for long month long month arts and culture, which our report can feed into, and that’ll help serve as a future roadmap. Focusing on the Event Center. Right now visit Longmont really can’t pursue any RFPs there’s really no request for proposals for events that want to come to the marketplace. There’s really nothing to sell. You have very limited meeting space at your hotels. People want to come here and have their events here that are here, but really nowhere to do it. Also, this Recaps of the different space types that the event planners are interested in. Then again, here is a recap of the two different surveys that were conducted. I don’t want to go point by point through all the next slides. But this was included in the package is available for download for people that want to read some of the key findings from the surveys. But we separated again, the art center survey, and then also the event center survey, and all very positive and all very interested in the market. So we think the market opportunity from a booking and user perspective is very positive. Then also there’s some infrastructure attributes that reinforce this thinking as well. So one of the questions you all asked, What is the arts venue inventory in this marketplace, so really 57 relevant art venues Within 35 miles, and if you look at the band of 500 seats to about 2000 seats, most of those are either affiliated with a school, college university, or also could be a church or place of worship. So they’re really not available for use. And when they are, it’s really at a constrained amount of time, and not conducive for the arts organizations, or other entertainment activities. So this looks complicated, but it’s really not. We’ve done here is plot all the event facilities focusing on conference in meetings in the marketplace, so the largest event space by slyke by contiguous space. So if you think of the fairgrounds, the Boulder County Fairgrounds, their expo hall, is just under 40,000 square feet, and they don’t really have any other meeting space. So that’s part of the top Right at the chart.
51:02
So this next slide reduces out, we have basically taken out all the facilities with 10,000 square feet or less space, and then rank the facilities by class type. So Class A facilities would be like conference spaces, ballroom type spaces. Class B would be kind of in between the fairgrounds and like the real life conference center. And so as you plot these facilities, you’re able to see an area of opportunity that emerges that’s not being served currently in the market. Then one of the other questions that was asked of us, well, what about the existing facilities in the marketplace and how are they being used? So you really, primary ones are the fairgrounds, the D bar and reception hall. Vance brand, the former Plaza convention center and then Stewart auditorium, at the Longmont museum. And again, some of the common limitations are insufficient capacity, food and beverage limitations, bookie congestions other primary users configuration challenges and also infrastructure limitations like back of house, orchestra pit, dressing room, green rooms, etc.
52:25
pick back up. We also are analyzing the hotel. We have looked at the market. And you know, at this juncture, the preponderance of hotels are what we would characterize as limited service where they don’t have a lot of restaurants and ball ballroom space and meeting space. You know, typical property would be 100 to 120 rooms and maybe 1000 square foot meeting space that is just not going to be allowing that just restricts you from being able to serve businesses that are here. We talked to Seagate they said, we’ll be anchor tenant if you get us something into a dock, a venue like that. So I’m not going to hold them to that. But you know, that’s the level of interest that we had experienced when we discussed that the average daily rate and the occupancy in this market are struggling. So diversification of demand is helpful. Obviously, as the market grows and businesses come in, that’ll raise the marketplace. But at this juncture you can afford we would characterize a mid service. I made it to be a full service hotel like a Marriott or Hyatt until it matures a little bit more, and there’s some more demand generators that come into the market. And the capital budget for that hotel would be no it’s about $325,000 a room and then that requires a room rate that’s higher that’s being achieved in the marketplace. So it’s certainly something that belongs in the equation, and we will be giving you a strategy and a Community Plan. To help you visualize how to execute hotel if this project moves forward. We also are preparing a variety of case studies. We’re looking at some national ones, Federal Way Bellevue and Durham. Some of these are integrated conference centers and performing arts centers. Others are exclusively hotel conference centers. And then we’ve looked at Performing Arts centers, and we’re developing operational data demand data. And the next slide kind of looks at the attributes that we’re evaluating for each of these case studies. And that will serve as a wonderful resource to the overall environment here that they can understand what the reality is operating buildings, demand size, revenues, expenses, etc, and how also they dealt with the scheduling conflicts that happened in these types of venues because people want to have rehearsal dates. And they also need to be able to do their productions. So there’s conflict is happening. And I think that’s revealed. This summarizes First, the attributes of all those points that I had in the prior slide, evolve the case study cities. And the darker the numbers are, the more positive they are. So right now, that tells you that the population at the immediate area of 30 miles is smaller than a lot of the case studies. But you’re growing faster than many of these communities. And I think that those you’re going to grow into the market. So I think one of the most important things we think about is future proofing. So we build something a day. What’s it going to look like tomorrow after some dynamics have happened in the marketplace. So we’re trying to be respectful of that dynamic but big picture You all have an outstanding setting, and you compete fairly well, especially when you get to the 60 minute drive time you’re right in the cohorts of the best upper quartile performance. As we look at start presenting our demand projections, we really looked at all the activity that’s being booked by the pie. And you can see almost every weekend during the fall, etc, the darker the color illustrates, there’s conflict happening so there’s multiple events happening on those same dates. That’s exactly what happens. layer on top of that, the fact that many of the the larger venues are used for high schools etc. You really are struggling with to get a date availability and this is an outstanding baby Slide to start with when you have a facility like that, and given the organizational structure, and I think the intellectual thought that’s gone into the pie is absolutely a market leader in that area. So organizationally, I think you’ve got a good starting point you got a head of steam to start with.
57:20
This illustrates the top venues in the country. It really in the size capacities that we’ve kind of identified as the range and this tells you the volume of tickets sold that so that number will we do our business planning comes back into play. I think the most important thing from the slide is in Boulder, it ranked 16th. So it’s of all the particular venues for performing arts centers in this size category. You’re already penetrating serving this area. I think it provides an opportunity. That’s the university’s venue, and it is absolutely unavailable in large measure For outside uses. So it’s a real opportunity here actually to take advantage of the fact that this is full. So I think you’d be able to double duty in terms of serving markets. This helps size the venue, we really looked at various sizes. And there’s pros and cons to each size. But I think it’s really important to help you understand what the range when we got to the all green column, demand, a pie, etc. That’s really the helped us size, the range. And you know, we would kind of encourage analyzing towards the upper end of the range, just a future preview because we really think you’re going to be growing a lot. So this kind of gives us our direction of what will start modeling in our next phase of work. Same thing, same philosophy for the conference. center element, we want to make sure that the conference center matches the attendance at the conference center has the capacity to match the attendance at the performing arts center because it could be used jointly, you could have a, a let’s let’s appeal to the millennials, we could have an Esports venue happening, and they could do a food function and have an entertainment venue, arts venues, etc, etc. We’d like to be able to have the capability to be able to do eat, and then entertain at the same time. So the capacities have to match and that’s what we have arrived that year. We also think it’s appropriate for the market and the dynamics that are happening. We will caution you that expansion of these types of venues is possible. So you don’t have a future proof. You don’t have that capability with Performing Arts Center. So it’s something to be aware of as we do our planning. On this strategically, we recommending we will be advancing these into our next phase of work. We’d like to see the we’re going to be testing a co located facility, because there’s a lot of synergies that can be gained by adjacencies, of hotel conference center Performing Arts Center, you really make a project that has some stature to it, and also matches what audiences are looking for. So these are the size categories that will be testing, we do indicate a desire and a need for having a black box, probably about 300. It could be basically it’s a specialized ballroom space, that it has the same stage size as the main stage where the rehearsals can happen and they can really routine eyes, their performances that mimic on the stage. So that’s something that actually use quite a bit. Parker has has one for example, and it’s a common element, it could be phased in, or it could be provided mmediately depending on the capital availability, we also the conference center element 25,000 square feet, we also need to have breakout space. So a small meeting room Junior ballroom component with that. And then all the principles of good operations need to be reflected in here so we could keep the lifecycle costs for the facility in within capability to manage and optimally. So this just is a little information on our firm, and we’d be pleased to answer any questions you all may have.
1:01:54
Customer back, I’m just probably for staff. I cannot picture 25,000 to 35 thousand square feet
1:02:03
is similar to that. Half the
1:02:05
expo hall at the boulder fairgrounds, that’s 50,000 square feet 55. So, but the minimization in the appearance, that’s a solid good Class B facility and it plays a role for consumer shows. This is more for business, things of that nature. But that’s gives you a sense so the aesthetics will be completely different of course with exercise and it seats. That’ll see it about 3000 people for a a theater type of activity, sitting in seats watching a presentation on stage, but it could also be broken down it can do at consumer shows and a variety of festivals and things of that nature. So could be a real attractive amenity to. What we like to say is airport is the welcome mat and the convention center is a community Living Room. And that’s a great way to kind of visualize this. This is where you want people to socialize and enjoy themselves as long as they’re as well as visiting all the amenities other activities in the region.
1:03:14
Okay. And with the Parker Event Center, did you talk to them about how often they keep events there is there are they fall Is it working?
1:03:26
Well, maybe they have taken we we know that they are have incur a large deficit. They have taken a very strong, talented person from the Denver Performing Arts group, that’s the manager and they have taken a model that is high risk, higher risk, where they are putting on their own stage performances. So they actually locally create those and bring rather than us a touring show, so that the causes of that’s a lot more money. Management a lot more risk, and it takes a lot of work. So that does incur a fairly large operating deficit. And I don’t know if they put other social service, I don’t know how the accounting is for the state of the chart of accounts. So it may be loaded in with some other departmental charges, etc. I think overall, it they’ve been very happy with the level of business and the attendance. It is not not as high as you’ve seen in the other ones. And it’s a smaller venue. But I think it’s been an amenity that’s been very well received socially.
1:04:36
And how large is their event center is 25,000 square feet group.
1:04:40
They don’t have an event center per se, as a performing arts just Performing Arts. Yes, ma’am. And they do have an art gallery that’s integrated to it. It’s about 5000 square feet. So it’s a lovely setting. They took the train and took the thematic sense of the historical train activity and made it into the aesthetics of the building. So communicates with Parker is.
1:05:01
Okay. Thank you,
1:05:03
Dr. Waters
1:05:05
on the full service hotel. Question or, or context, right in the population room rights. In your in your work. Did you? Was there any investigation of what post secondary institutions in Colorado have hospitality programs?
1:05:25
haven’t put that together but that’s a good question. And we’ve seen some inner like Cornell obviously is the famous one where they actually own and operate a hotel.
1:05:33
I just I know. I visited the metro, the Marriott facility on the campus at Metro State, which is a teaching institution but it’s also a first full service hotel. It’s in Denver, so obviously their populations but just to walk around was was fascinating in terms of what you saw from room to room. Students delivering services all part of their instructional program, but high end program. I just wonder whether or not we’re in conversations with institutions, you’re aware of that building steam project that we had absolute conversations with post secondary institutions about what their levels of interest is, might be just curious whether or not any of those either have hospitality programs, or with we knew, who did had more information, who might be interested in what we’re doing here and whether or not that institution and that program would come together with, you know, what our vision is for that piece of property or that part of the city. And whether or not that would change the equation on the potential for a full service hotel. The Economics would be very different than a just a standalone operation. It would be very conducive to the kind of programming that you’d want to see in a conference center. And with a performing arts center, just saying so it’s not that bandwidth. It would be an interesting question.
1:06:53
It’s not a crazy idea. Ryan and I are working in Trinidad now where there’s a brand new performing arts center there. They put Whole performing arts training school as part of that Yeah, so there’s quite a few that’s what we call creative in the creative and that’s where we get to as we start going on workshops with our architectural communities.
1:07:13
I notice from range of hospitality program. I am I am a hospitality person I think D you is probably the most I know they do have a first rate program. Yeah. Which certainly
1:07:24
in a way if if we’ll take that under advisement.
1:07:29
deltora Christianson.
1:07:31
Okay. I do think I think Councilman waters has a very good idea with we we are working with trying to get some synergy between MCU and Front Range Community Colleges and some other things and see you already has a museum and people who are involved in learning how to run museums and art galleries and things like that and hotel and Hotel Management. would also fit in very well with the business school. But my question was, I was a little confused about whether as part of this, you are thinking there will be an onsite hotel, or whether people will be commuting to this.
1:08:18
Our hope is we’ll be able to find a site that allows the kind of a campus to evolve, where we could have the that facility, maybe some other monetization, maybe some retail, so we’d like to see something happen where it’s a has a vitality to it, rather than being placed to the place where at that can exist.
1:08:40
Yeah, I was a little worried about what the effect might be with cannibalization on the business. You know, the hotels that we already have and things like that. Because of course, the idea is to goals, our businesses healthier rather than bring in new businesses that will destroy somebody.
1:09:01
Okay, thank you.
1:09:03
All right. Thank you for your work. We look forward, I’m looking forward to seeing how much this costs. So I look forward to phase two, because right now, we you said we all want a Ferrari. And I’m and we can’t afford the biggest engine, but it’s still a pretty big one. Exactly. And I’d like to see the cost. So I’m looking forward to the next presentation. Yes, sir. All right. Thank you. All right. Well, let’s take a let’s take a four minute break, five minute break, and then we’ll come back to the metro to district discussion and the meat of our president or meat of our meeting. So
1:19:57
You’re not sneaky may see we know we know Yes. Alright, so let’s go ahead and continue with our agenda. So let’s go ahead and move on to study session. Item number five, a metro district ordinance revisions. Hold on mic up. There we go. Get some feedback. All right. So let’s go ahead and the process for tonight. We’re going to go ahead and follow the good old tried and true method of if there’s a make a motion, it needs to be seconded. And then we’ll have debate. Everybody gets the opportunity to speak twice, maximum of 10 minutes. And you you have to wait till everybody goes through the queue before you have your second turn. And we’ll just do that until we go home. So if you want to be recognized, raise your hand. Councilmember mayor, Councilmember Christiansen
1:20:51
I move that we restore. What is this now? Well, there’s a big hole here. Where I shouldn’t say with this is the ordinance that we had prior to our change in it last February. And I, as I say the hole is punched out of it. So I would I would move that we restore the ordinance that we had whatever number that is.
1:21:24
Do I have a second?
1:21:26
Second?
1:21:28
It’s been moved and seconded. And so I just to reiterate, the motion is not to pass the ordinance that’s in our packet. The motion is to restore the ordinance as it was prior to the previous councils vote which allowed for Metro districts, you know,
1:21:48
this is the motion that was in our in our packet and this is the right so when it allowed residential dis dis not did not allow residential is districts except in the case of a mixed use residential district,
1:22:05
so this is this. Is this the exact ordinance that was in the in the city
1:22:11
ordinances before
1:22:15
can we get the mic? A hot mic on? Eugene May. Man council? Yep. Eugene Mae city attorney. So yes, the ordinance in the packet is the one before this council amended it to take out the residential probation. Okay, so it’s exactly as written prior. Yeah. Okay. Then the motions the same. So cool. Any discussion?
1:22:37
All right. Alright. Let’s go ahead and start with Councillor Martin.
1:22:42
Thank you, Mr. Bagley.
1:22:45
I would like to offer an amendment. I think that that a lot of things need to be discussed about this ordinance. There are some outright falsehoods in it in terms of the justification for it. And I think that it sets the limits on what counts as a myth. What kind of mixed use of a metro to a metro district must contain in the wrong place. So I won’t vote for this unamended. But what I would like to do is instead move that we are, I guess, if you have my friendly amendment is a replacement. I think we should discuss alterations to this, because many of the restrictions that it puts on Metro on on Metro districts are the right ones. It’s just too restrictive in terms of the of the kind of districts that it allows.
1:23:56
All right. Councilmember
1:23:58
Peck, thank you very much. I’m going to support it because for two reasons, first of all, when we Okay, the first Metro district Mayor badly made the suggestion that we do this first one, and see how it turns out. So I think that’s a good idea. And we can always bring this back if this first Metro district turns out to work the way we say and we can actually look at the service plan and make sure it works, that we know what we’re doing, and that we hold the district accountable. Then we can always bring back the ordinance and say, Yep, if this works for our city. The other reason is that I think that there is some misinformation about special districts. If we want a special district for preschools, if we want a special district for
1:24:53
library districts,
1:24:54
that can be a totally separate ordinance that we can put in place and Have that voted on. So this would not actually get rid of any special district like library preschool, or any other special district that we have walked in our city.
1:25:13
All right, thank you.
1:25:17
Councilmember Christiansen
1:25:20
you forgotten my name. I’m
1:25:21
trying. I’m trying to figure out I’m trying to keep track of who’s talked and who’s going in order. I know this is a little different from in the dark ages
1:25:29
here. This this ordinance. It is not now nor has it ever been against the law to have special districts or Metro districts in the city was only against the law to have residential special districts. We have already have a regional transportation district. If you look up on the city finance page, you can see what we pay in sales tax, and exactly what special districts we have. We have to we have the science and culture Facilities district and we have the Regional Transportation district, we could easily add a early childhood education district, there’s nothing in this that would prevent any of that. The only thing in here that would be different would be that we would not allow residential special districts unless they are mixed use and that would be with the approval of the city. And this was our policy from 2004 until 2018. And I don’t you know, this is very carefully reviewed by numerous lawyers. So that’s what men would be.
1:26:51
Alright, great. Thank you. Councilmember waters.
1:26:55
Thanks for your Bagley.
1:26:57
It was interesting to me as we as I went through This amendment. When we, when we dealt with this back in February, we made the decision simply to, to appeal to repeal this ordinance. We didn’t go through this or that. I wish at that time we had but we were like, there was housing policy fatigue, as I recall, was like one more thing, because there’s a lot of good. There’s a lot to to agree with in this ordinance. There are also some things that for me would be non starters in this orbit. But before I get to those would be helpful to me to understand just big picture, why there was a prohibition why this ordinance included a prohibition against the use of special districts for residential development. Can somebody informed me enlighten me why the city passed an ordinance to create a prohibition
1:28:04
Let us turn to the archives.
1:28:07
The city historian Jim golden.
1:28:10
Tell us a story. Very Council, Jim golden Chief Financial Officer. Got it a strong voice here, or a good memory, but no actually. So it is ties back to
1:28:23
the
1:28:25
clover basin Metro district, the fire
1:28:28
district fire district that was put into place in the mid 90s. For our ability to put a fire station in place to service the Southwest area as it developed in Longmont. It was a lot of opposition to that. And eventually in 2008, it was repealed by the City Council at that point in time. I think the council that was dealing with the special district ordinance in 2004. At that point, we’re not entering Did inhabiting Metro districts with residential and they were really looking for mixed use development and trying to inset mixed use development.
1:29:09
I want to get to the mixed use development. That’s one of the things in here that makes that the 50% number makes no sense to me in terms of mixed use developments make sense. But the constraint at 50%, and the mixed use development makes you sit back come back to that. What was it that caused the council in 2004? Or 2007? It was it 2004 seven when the council was 2007, I think when they passed the prohibition,
1:29:36
right. 2004 is when that ordinance was passed and for bad for the special districts and
1:29:43
in what provoked that. What what became controversial because I see a reference in here to controversy.
1:29:50
So Councilmember, what is to the best of my knowledge, what I recall is the reason that we adopted a special district ordinance is because we were trying to To develop the harvest a junction district and it was a commercial district. And so at that point in time only the state statutes was addressing how special districts would be used in the city. And so this the city council wanted to address the use of special districts in the city with an intention to put the excuse to put to put the harvest junction commercial district in place. And at that point, there was discussion of should this be allowed for anything for residential, and there was opposition to that residential, they were only willing to allow it in a mixed use development. I
1:30:40
want to drill down on what happened in clover basin that caused the council to create a prohibition against the use of special districts for residential development. It was okay in 1997, or it was at 97 was approved in 94 began to collect taxes and 97 is that right? That’s correct. The 2004 wasn’t okay. What happened in those seven years? Why did it become controversial?
1:31:08
Because the homeowners began to have to pay that special district tax and realize that they were paying a different tax rate for their services that they were receiving in that area compared to the rest of the city.
1:31:23
What here’s what my understanding is that so you just correct me with this, that there were some residents in the fire district who were paying this tax, while others were not who were living in the fire district. itself. So I’m paying my neighbor across the street around the corner.
1:31:42
So
1:31:44
they are badly members council just to still let me explain that within the district itself, the actual special district, they were all paying the tax. They were areas that were being served by the fire station that was built that did not fall within the district because they pre existed before the district was created. And so I think that’s
1:32:04
what you’re referring to the fire district was serving residents outside the fire district.
1:32:10
That’s correct.
1:32:14
Okay, but everybody inside the special district was paying the tax.
1:32:18
That’s correct as it was designed, and when it was, when it was created by the developers, it was to to to tax those individuals within those homes being built within that area to offset the costs of building an operating fire station number five.
1:32:40
So the controversy was somebody not in the fire district getting serviced and not paying whatever that mill levy was, that was the basis for creating the prohibition.
1:32:53
That was the controversy. Those same those same members in outside the district will already receiving coverage. from other fire stations before fire station was built, got it. So they weren’t receiving anything different only was coming from a different station. So
1:33:08
that was that an abuse of the fire district? Excuse me, was that an abuse of the fire district?
1:33:15
Wasn’t it an abuse of the fire district?
1:33:18
was it was it a flaw in the fire district in the in the way that whole district was created?
1:33:26
subject of opinion, I guess.
1:33:33
The fire district was was created specifically so that that
1:33:37
the
1:33:38
clover base in development could build out
1:33:41
is the reason why was was required. I’m not trying to put you on the spot I’m trying to understand. Honestly, I’m not just trying to see if there’s a specific reference in here to a controversy with no specifics. So I just would like to know more about the controversy in it. And whether or not the problem was it was an ill conceived Special district for residential development, or what the problem was, it was implemented in a way that created a controversy, not the problem of the district. The problem, the implementation, that’s what I’m trying to get at. So understand, we try and that’s, you’re the historian, I apologize. I’m not trying to.
1:34:17
So I’m going to try to also jump in based on some of the history that I’ve received on this. So part of what happened is is endzone, you can help me if you remember, Ah, no, the reality is, we weren’t here and Johnny wasn’t in the position, but it when when developments come in, they go through an analysis in terms of what you can do in terms of fire protection. And I think the one that came in basically on that analysis said, we don’t have the ability to provide for fire protection under our current structure. We need a new fire station in order to for that development to come in. I think the solution then was for the metro district within the boundaries, to then construct The fire station, or was it the operations of the first station
1:35:04
was both But
1:35:05
what happened is the council had response time requirements in place for the fire station. So in order to meet that response time, they will do it any further outside the reach of the existing station. I get all that I think that was the mitigation. They require
1:35:19
the time it was conceptualized and improved, to 97 to 19 53,004. Something changed what changed his residence got grumpy and brought it to the council, as I recall, or as I understand, because some are paying for service in some word. And I’m just trying to understand how does that How did that happen? And is that the problem of the district because there’s a reference in the ordinance about the district creating controversy, or was it the way that the district was implemented, which isn’t the fault of the district. It would be how was implemented that’s all I’m trying to get an understanding of because if There’s a reference here that if we have a footnote, we have the language in here to define what the controversy was or specify. Now I’ll yield. I have a bunch of other stuff. But that’s just understanding where you know what that issue is. But I’m going to be left with the understanding that some people were paying some people weren’t. It wasn’t the fault of the district that that was the case. All right.
1:36:30
I don’t have a question,
1:36:31
Jim. Jim’s like, Uh huh.
1:36:32
Yes. The question. The last was a state All right.
1:36:35
Great. All right.
1:36:37
Councilmember Martin.
1:36:40
Thank you, Mayor Bagley. It feels really strange not to push a button before I start talking
1:36:44
or you’re put you’re going to push buttons, Marcia, I know you will.
1:36:47
I know.
1:36:49
We’re leaving the room here. The people I was going to talk to
1:36:55
can answer but let’s all hear it.
1:37:01
So there’s a lot of development out there in the clover basement basin area. And there’s language in that clover basin service plan that says it’s anticipated that other developments as they occur, will join into the district. Where is it true that there were absolutely no additional developments or annexations that were that were served by fire station number four, after the creation of firestein, out after Fire Fire Station Number Five was built in the original Metro district came into existence.
1:37:45
They have bank members accounts. I don’t know the answer to that question. If it was any,
1:37:49
it seems essential that we know that.
1:37:52
So the quite the question, just just so the question is, were there additional developments that were built subsequent to the formation The Metro district that were not included in the metro district, and they receive service by that fire station, in other words was the clover basin development. They put in the bill and then subsequent developments didn’t fit the bill, or were all the people being served by the by the fire station, previous developments to the metro district. But for clover basin, is that the
1:38:22
right that’s the question? Yes. Why is why did no other developments join that
1:38:30
we’ll get to is jumping is National
1:38:31
dismantling council member Martin. So my recollection as a planner who processed applications starting in 2001, and certainly in the clever basin neighborhood is, I don’t recall ever Anik scene or requesting as part of an annexation or a final plat asking someone to annex into the clover base and fire district frequently. We did have exclusions from the hygiene fire district and As well as the Mountain View fire district that are associated with annexation, but I personally don’t recall adding anything into that. That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. But I don’t recall a process for that.
1:39:10
Well, that’s exactly my question for Miss Marsh is that it seems to me that if they were served by that fire station, they should have been asked to annex into the district and share the cost of paying for the fire station and the services. So that’s why what I’m asking is, were there new developments served by that fire station that were not asked to join the metro district because the service plan suggests that they should have been before permits were issued.
1:39:52
And I think what we’ve heard is that they were, there were new developments that were built that were served. By that fire station that were not brought into the to the fire district,
1:40:06
okay. So then that means that the
1:40:11
fire district itself was not necessarily conflict
1:40:16
was not necessarily controversial what was controversial was the way it was administered to give other new development of freeride.
1:40:30
Councilmember Christiansen
1:40:33
Well, if other if other places had joined in that they that would have been a material change in the in the special district and they would have had to council would have had to re examine that it seems to me. If you look at this, it states quite clearly why this was put forth in it. While it is useful to Talk about clover basin we have been talking about clever basin for about two years now. It’s also just in general, a good idea to examine policy since that’s what we’re supposed to be doing. And this is a policy document and a legal document and it says quite clearly four through seven. preserve the financial integrity of the city and its citizens prevent the shift of development risks. Non developers minimize and insulate the city from risks meaning lawsuits, and controversies that may arise in relation to special districts minimize excessive tax burdens upon city residents and city districts.
Also, all existing Longmont residential development was funded without districts so the lack of these districts will not adversely affect Longmont residential development, creation of a residential district case the differential property tax structure Monday Similar resident developments, and the district residents would pay significantly more property tax without any commensurate public benefit. The higher mill levy and districts project projects may make these residents less inclined to support other city property tax increases. And buyers in homes of tax projects are often unaware of the higher property taxes in their development, and may become upset when property taxes increase. residents may be surprised to find out the price of their home did not include the price of streets and utilities and their development. And then they must pay for this over a 3030 or year 30 or more year period through their property taxes. So I do think that this we basically went through and crossed out four pages of city law and I would like to just uncross out those four pages and restore it. I think this is very sensible document. There are plenty of developers who are currently building developments all over town. Nice developments and varied developments, varied price points, and now they’re all. Also building affordable housing. So I don’t see a need for this. It’s complex. And it takes up city staff time it takes up our time. And it isn’t really of any benefit to the citizens of this town. There are good tools and there are bad tools. As I have said before, people put forth the subprime mortgages as a critical tool for affordable housing. And while partly well meaning that has turned into quite the disaster along with credit default swaps. So those were not good tools, and I don’t believe that Residential special and Metro districts are very often a good tool I think they can be, but I think they rarely are and I don’t think that Longmont needs them.
1:44:14
So, Marsha, I see you’ve already spoken twice. upali there’s customer Christiansen and customer Martin, you’ve already spoken twice on this motion. They’re such good emotions will will. Let’s chime in.
1:44:24
I’m going to way back in, but
1:44:26
I guess the I guess the I guess my only thought is i have i’ve not said a lot next. I’ve said nothing on this particular issue, you know, over the last couple weeks, but I have read Councilmember Christus and I left a message today saying that you had I thought your editorial today was well written lots of good points. Councillor Martin, I thought you had two part one part two piece. And the one one observer that I thought was, again, very, very well researched and very well thought out. Councilmember waters. I’ve heard your comments for the last few months and have found them to be very insightful, very deep and very, you know, I find everybody’s comments correct. My only my is my question on this is i guess i guess i’m not understanding why is it okay to have commercial? I mean, all the fears and all the bad things that written about the Denver Post articles, all the things that that I hear brought up that were that make Metro districts and special districts as well, so bad and scary. The same arguments apply to residential, commercial and mixed use. There’s nothing special about a mixed use development that all of a sudden eliminates, you know, the, the, I don’t see I don’t see how it would eliminate the risks. I think the risks are. If we put I think we put Dr. waters in charge of preparing and drafting the metro district if the city wants to hire him. I think that we would be, I mean, he thinks about it a lot. Whereas I think that if others such as whoever created the the clover base and fire district, you know, that was some Something happened there that led to inequity and unfairness. And so if it’s done properly, I think this is a great tool if it’s not done properly, I think that it can be a disaster. And so I guess my only question in this is, as we restore it, I guess my question is why are we restoring it and not saying that we shouldn’t have any met any Metro special districts at all? Because I’ll vote for it but on the next round of amendments and discussions that that that that’s what I’m gonna want that that’s my question. So
1:46:48
my computer just went off up now. It’s bad customer Peck.
1:46:52
Thank you very badly. I do have a question for our city attorney under 11 C on on the document that you get It says the district shall not exercise any power of eminent domain without the prior written consent to the city council. Do we have the right to do that? Do we have the right to limit the power of eminent domain from a district?
1:47:20
mayor and council? Fortunately with us tonight is special council Carolyn white. And if I may, I’m going to defer to her to answer this question.
1:47:28
Thank you.
1:47:31
Mayor, Councilmember Carolyn white, your special Council on development and redevelopment issues? To answer your question, I would say you have the legal authority to limit the use of eminent domain in the service plan, or in the intergovernmental agreement with any new district that you approve. The question of what that impact might be, is a different question. Yeah. But legally, do you have the authority to do it? Yes. I believe you
1:48:02
Okay, and the reason I’m asking is that from the research that I’ve done, some of the lawsuits that have been brought against the city are because of the limits on the eminent domain, that districts that cities have put on districts. So to me, that was a sketchy area, that what are the limits? And at what point during the, during the development, are those limits excessive? And so that’s just a very gray area for me when I looked at it, but I do want to answer when Mayor Bagley you had said you don’t know something about why we are limiting the special districts we are not from my perspective. As I said earlier, we are not limiting the possibility of special districts Within our city, they can be under a new ordinance for, for example, the Library District. The Early Childhood preschool district and the commercial districts. For me the board is what the difference is all of those commercial properties. They have owners of those of those properties that usually are on the board. So it is the difference between who is on the board of the special district just from my perspective, whereas residents aren’t usually on the boards because they don’t understand them and they don’t apply. So and I’m going to go back to the cities that I have talked to to the city council people, four out of six of them have said they wish they had never done it. And until the statutes on the state are changed and there’s some regulatory authority I just won’t vote. I will vote in favor of the motion.
1:50:07
Thank you.
1:50:10
Mayor Pro Tem.
1:50:12
Thank you Mayor Bagley.
1:50:15
I think this kind of our council members packs comments and questions segue a little bit to my concerns. I think it’s been clear ever since we began this conversation last year that I’ve been worried about what is loud as far as oversight and regulation and enforcement from a municipal level, considering especially a metropolitan special district is a quasi governmental entity. And that is decided by the state statute, which I believe is the special district act as such, in this ordinance that was provided in our packet under at 4.10 point 140. The failure to comply with policies and procedures, they all seem somewhat vague in the sense that that says Exercise any applicable remedy exercise any legal remedy exercise any other legal remedy, you know, in each section here, but it doesn’t specify what legal remedy would be into me insinuates that this exercising of remedy would be pretty much purely litigious in nature. Would you say that that’s generally speaking, the legal remedy that would have to be taken if there’s a failure to comply with an intergovernmental agreement or the agreement made through the service plan.
1:51:31
Mayor, council member again, Carolyn white.
1:51:35
One point of clarification I just would like to mention is technically, these districts are not quasi governmental. They are governmental or quasi municipal, meaning that they don’t have the full complement of police powers that a municipality does. They only have the specific limited powers granted to them in the statute on their service plan. So there was a municipal but they are fully governmental. And and that sort of also goes to the Answer of your to your question which is what are your remedies? There are there are some remedies in the statute? I don’t think anyone’s mentioned here or discussed the Quinn Quinn quinquennium review, which is one option that a city has when it believes that a district is not complying with certain specific requirements in the service plan. Also through the inter governmental agreement, you can negotiate in the district can agree to other types of remedies besides litigation, if you so choose to and so desire. But the other response I would make to both your question and the earlier question is that it is legal for you to impose a whole variety of constraints on new Metro districts when you approve their formation. However, there does come a point at which it may be in advisable to do so, only because at some point you are so constraining the entity that it no longer can truly be considered an independent governmental entity at which point it may not satisfy the requirements for the Internal Revenue Service to issue tax exempt municipal debt, at which point the whole benefit of having a district is is essentially dissipated. And so that’s a fine line. And I’m not an expert on IRS regulations. But some of those things are some of the fundamental governmental powers are the power to tax, the power to issue debt and the power to use eminent domain. So if you impose a great deal of constraints on all three of those powers, there is some risk that a district may be found not to be a truly independent governmental entity once it is been created, and may be wrist down the road, that the bonds would be held to be taxable, not tax exempt.
1:53:48
So in concept that would render the financing mechanisms somewhat moot in this in the sense that they are not the government employee and do not qualify for the tax free bonds are bonding authority for taxi bonds. And therefore, as you said that the bonds can be taxed, which again would not defeat the purpose of the metro district in and of itself.
1:54:10
I mean, the principal benefit of using a metro district to finance infrastructure is that a metro district like a city or a county can take advantage of a lower interest rate associated with tax free municipal bonds. So, yes, if it was found not to be a true governmental entity, it was and the bonds were held by the IRS to be taxable non tax exempt, it would eliminate one of the primary benefits of using a metro district.
1:54:34
Thank you. And so again, this harkens back to my point about the oversight and regulation by the municipal government being Longmont over the quasi municipal government being saved mountain Brook or any other future quasi municipal governments. Mountain Brook or any future Metropolitan District and I’ve had that concern from day one as far as how this is all setup statutory Because I reviewed the proposed regulations by council members, Martin and waters, and a lot of them made a lot of sense, but would drastically impose on the ability for a metro district to act as a governmental entity. As far as being able to issue the kind of bonds that we were just speaking about. I was fully prepared to come in here and offer amendments on ways that I thought that we could allow for exceptional benefits to be worked into this, such as you know, meeting a threshold for the middle tier housing options that we talked about so often in our missing housing stock or in above and beyond percentage of affordable housing, the capital A affordable housing being provided in the district, but without the legal remedies or legal ability. That would, the legal ability that I feel would be necessary to regulate and have oversight and enforcement of the Metropolitan District. I don’t think I can support them. based on the fact that I would want to regulate them too harshly for them to really exist in any sort of efficacy. And so that’s why I seconded the motion of council member Christians, like
1:56:12
Alright, so I guess the, I guess, I guess one more thing that I want to point out that in the definition the definition section, the definition of mixed use means a single building containing more than one principle of one, I’m sorry, a single building containing more than one principle permitted land use, or a single development of more than one building containing more than one principle permitted land use. And the mixed use development the different types of land uses are in close proximity plan as a unified, complimentary whole and functionally integrated to the use of vehicular and pedestrian access and parking areas. I guess I’m still confused. Why going back to the old way is going to protect us from all the ills of the metro district Because a mixed use could have I mean, what what is what is the percentage allowed before? It’s no longer mixed use? That’s a legal question. I mean, is it could it be 90% residential and 10%? commercial? Could be 99% residential and in like, have a little coffee shop and it’s still mixed use.
1:57:23
Mayor is the question that under the previous ordinance, yeah, under the previous ordinance, it stated Is he a
1:57:31
50%. So 50%. If we if we have 50% of the units built a residential, we could have a metro district square square footage. So So even with that, I still don’t see how those 50% I just don’t see mathematically how it still protects those residents. From the ills of the metro district that I’ve heard argued Over the last few months, I could understand going back to something else. I just don’t understand why we’re re implementing what what existed before. And I’m asking that because some of the arguments hit home with me. And so but anyway, let’s, you get actually, when we’re all done, you still have time left. So you as the person who made the motion get the opportunity to have last word.
1:58:24
Last Word, no, no, no, no,
1:58:27
no, no, no when she’s not now, but when she’s got time left, if the person who made the motion has 20 minutes left, or if she hasn’t used her whole 20 minutes, she can use the remainder of her time to get the last last word, but Dr. Waters or who else is in the queue?
1:58:44
So
1:58:46
So I guess my biggest concern was really the impact on the individual homebuyer. So in regard to the question of the mixed use, do we have any mixed use Metro district where we have 50% residential. So have we had any? And have we had any applications come in for any kind of use like that over the years?
1:59:18
Mayor maglin Councilmember doggo farion. So we do not currently have any mixed use Metro districts in this city. I believe we have two commercial Metro districts and one residential HMS pending that council recently approved. We do have a application attempting to be submitted for a project that would likely include residential, I could not say at this time if it would meet the 50% threshold, however.
1:59:45
Okay, so and if it didn’t meet that 50% threshold, that would be a project that would be moving forward.
1:59:53
Correct? Correct. The next stage for that would be a referral to city council. Okay.
1:59:57
So so as
2:00:01
So I know that we have villages, the peaks and harvest junction, which are big commercial Metro districts. And I know we have, we have those pieces. My biggest concern is primarily for our individual home buyers, especially with people who have limited income or like as the majority of us we’re living paycheck to paycheck. So any kind of differing amount in our property taxes would have great impact grave impact on on a big chunk of our home homeowners. So there was that piece the other pieces I was looking at the metro district for the mountain Brook and looking at the ballot issues. So right away, you know, I see ballot issue five a, where they’re wanting to vote to increase taxes for 2 million annually. lessor for operations and maintenance. So a mill levy and other one is in relation to a duru scene. So I think about proposition CC, that was voted down, overwhelmingly, people don’t don’t want to go after Tabor. So I’m looking at this piece. So right away people will be coming into this to this development with these if they pass with these valid issues of WC and increased bonds and mill levy overrides or melodies. So that was that was a big concern for me. The other the other thing and I don’t know if I
2:01:44
have all my notes everywhere, I’m sorry.
2:01:47
So I guess my biggest concern would be or if we were to amend this, I would really want to see restrictions on the amount of taxes that would be imposed. And it sounds like we couldn’t do that.
2:02:07
Mayor county Councilmember Carolyn white again,
2:02:12
know you can limit the maximum mill levy that can be imposed. And you have and you do there is a maximum limit on Meadowbrook and most jurisdictions impose some type of maximum cap on the total mill levy that can be imposed and on the maximum debt that can be issued. Okay. Those are two key components of most service plans. Okay. And I would add that if the district subsequently wanted to change those things, before they could go to the voters to ask for approval, they would have to come to Council and seek a substantial modification of the service plan.
2:02:46
Okay. Okay.
2:02:47
So and I guess for me, it’s I’m not in a hurry to approve more, especially since knowing that our staff who’s already pretty, pretty strained 135 hours of sleep hours to put together the packet for review for the mountain Brook. I would really like to see what this particular Metro district does for our community and how it impacts the people who live there. I’d like to see that first before we start putting in more applications to our city staff to to put together packets to just bring before us so I there there are a couple of things that I am kind of that are my reasons for approving to return back to the 2017 coordinates.
2:03:35
Dr. Waters, thanks for your back loose.
2:03:39
Let me just say I should I should I start myself on my clock watcher, my timer,
2:03:44
you get 10 minutes I’ll let you know when you’re okay.
2:03:49
It would have been I’m not certain how we’re how we’re supposed to be going at this big ideas or, you know, trying to amend the ordinance. So it’s a little gonna be a little random here but I’m going to go quickly Because our number of points I’d like to make and then see where this goes. I’m just going to just every week, we hear statements being made, we don’t get a chance to challenge one another and say, could you just provide some evidence here? So I’m going to make statements like others have made that I think are true, just like others think their statements are true. I don’t think we have discussed the clover basin experience near enough. There were some things to learn from the clover basin experience that we simply have chosen not to learn. We have had, we were given the materials, we had zero discussion that I recall of substance with the question, What happened, what could we learn? And if you’re going to do this, how would you apply it to get better going forward? So that hangs out there is a black box as far as I’m concerned? I don’t know there was a statement made about in that particular case whether or not requiring districts to other districts, other developments to become part of the district would be a material change. I think not. That’s a statement that was made. I think it’s not an accurate statement, but I would be corrected, CA corrected. I think it would require for Meeting developments within the within the within the fire district to be conditional upon their decision to join the fire district. Right. That’s the way it would work. It wouldn’t be a material change, it would be totally consistent with the plan, but an expectation prior to a development being permitted, which I wonder if that’s what happened from 19. Well after 2000, but since we haven’t talked about it enough or drill down, we haven’t learned from that experience.
2:05:27
I would say in the in the interest.
2:05:31
Me, Rebecca, you talked about, you know, how do you protect the interest of somebody in a metro district where it’s 50 per mixed use district towards 50%? Yeah, I would ask the other question. If we regulate this properly, we would we would have we would protect the residents of the mixed use district or at least in terms of what their cost of homeownership would be. The bigger question is for me is why would you ignore the people living in a development quarters 51% The homes are in a mixed use development, or 55% or 60% or 70%. And let’s assume they’re all teachers. And in that district, those teachers are going to take a higher cost of housing than the teachers in this district at 50%. How do we protect them? Right. That’s a that’s as relevant a question. And that was part of the question. I think you were asking, what’s the magic of 50%? There’s no magic and 50%. With all due respect the statement the business owners would be more willing to serve on boards I question and not that we don’t all have opinions. But what what’s the basis for presuming that a business owner knows more about a metro district or is more willing to serve who has their hands full running a business? But it seems to me if if business owners or homeowners are willing to transition to a metro District Board in a mixed use development, why we’d assume the residents in a 51% mixed use development wouldn’t someone’s going to have to explain To me, that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. I’ve heard council members talk about the other council members with whom we have spoken. I have also spoken with council members in other cities who said we wouldn’t leave home without a metro district. It’s been key to our success as a as a as a community. And not that there haven’t been horror stories in other places. I get that. But to paint them all with the same brush is like saying every elected officials align scoundrel. Well, there’s seven of us sitting up here. And I guess I take exception to be a painted that way. But that’s how we’re painting developers and how we’re painting Metro districts in it. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. It seems to me that if we’re going to go through the language in this ordinance, language, like something may result in controversy, or may lessen the prospect of people in a metro district voting for other tax initiatives. I want to say okay, let’s amend it and say, and it may not, because it’s pure speculation. It’s somebody else’s opinion based on a clover based experience from 2007 that shows up in this ordinance in language that simply I could not possibly vote for an ordinance that has an arbitrary number 50% and language and that like like that that’s, that is a product of somebody’s experience with no definition. And it would be equally as valid for my opinion to be here about what’s possible as opposed as opposed to what’s what’s not possible. So, on the rant here, the cost of ownership, if there’s a question about the cost of ownership, inside and outside a district now we can take the side by side analysis, you’re looking at the the, the mountain Brook plan, you can take the analysis we got and call it Bs, and say it’s just not true. But I challenge any any council member to stand behind that claim. that these are the data that are available to time in terms of actual interest rates. The cost of Construction loans, how it translate into the cost of a home. So Councilmember fairing if you’d like to see that, I have a copy of the analysis resulted not only in the lower cost of owning a home in the district, which which allows residents to become eligible, who would not have been eligible to purchase a home. So they qualify number one, their initial cost of entry is lower. In this analysis, the cost of homeownership over the life of the of the mortgage, the savings is $42,000 by being inside a district, so teachers, firemen, first responders, hospitality industry members, employees qualify for a home that they wouldn’t otherwise qualify for, and pay less for the cost of homeownership inside the district than outside the district. Now you can you can call it false, but I would like to see somebody then do their own side by side comparison to refute what we’re looking at here. So at the end of the day, If we’re gonna if we were if we wanted to take a systematic approach here and talk about objectives through the first section on this as objectives, I’d love to take that section and talk about what are what are our objectives for housing affordability, from zero to 100% of ami, or hundred and 10% of ami. Because this constituents I have an obligation to are not just the ones between zero and 60, I have an obligation to the residents between 60 and 110.
2:10:28
am
2:10:29
and I have an obligation to listen to our residents constituents who are who would like to buy a home and can’t buy a home in this town, because the former policy in under this, this, this ordinance priced young families out along one and we still don’t have housing stock available for so we can, we can talk all we want but until we get clear on what we’re trying to accomplish, and get real with the data. We aren’t going to sit here and simply do what I’ve done, I guess go on rants and other opinions. But I have to say this There’s a lot of good to be in it to be Captain or Captain this ordinance. But there are some some changes to make. And somebody ought to start with explaining the magic between 50 and 51%. And the definition of what is the next juice because it’s a pretty broad definition of yield.
2:11:18
You had another two and a half minutes.
2:11:19
I’ll use those students minutes later.
2:11:23
All right. So we have a motion on the floor. Councillor Christiansen? Nobody else is in the queue. Would you like to say your you’ll be the last word before we vote?
2:11:34
Yeah, I have a few questions for Carolyn white. First of all, you said that it was possible for us to restrict eminent domain. Well, the Colorado Supreme Court overturned a previous District Court ruling and granted the right of eminent domain in the carousel forum is Metropolitan District versus woodcrest homes. Which was a suit brought about by homeowners who didn’t want eminent domain. And it went through the district court who, who said, No, they can’t have eminent domain, then it went to the Supreme Court where they said that it can. So it seems to me that we cannot do that. You let’s see, we also talked about the military and how we could restrict that. But when they refinance, it seems to me that all bets are off after that. Is that true? Councilman waters showed a developer chart showing that that I’ve seen many times showing how people do much better under Metro districts. If you look at the numbers provided by Larimer County, which shows that the average homeowner Who is in a metro district pays about 40% higher. Someone who’s in a van than someone who is not in a, either a metro district or a homeowner’s association, somebody who’s in a homeowner’s association pays, somewhere in between there. So that’s the difference between Larimer County statistics and the developers statistics. So you can you know, we all have different sources. We’ve discussed this before. So here’s the question between I’m not a big fan of special districts for commercial either because if you look at them, you don’t see any mom and pop stores and those you see only national chains. They’re the only ones who can pay the extra taxes. They likewise are paying extra taxes on They’re on their business. And that cuts down on their profit. So it’s not a particularly wonderful thing and it certainly isn’t good or supportive of small businesses and local businesses, but that’s their choice. And furthermore, somebody who’s in a commercial district at least has a chart chance to make money in that district. If you are a resident in a residential district, you don’t have a chance to make money off your house. So that is the big difference. That’s the difference in allowing. I’m not a big fan of have mixed use developments used as Metro districts either that is the compromise this in this that I’m willing to leave in, we put it in for a long time and that was to forward our goals of creating mixed, mixed use. Housing and mixed use developments, which are really quite hard to make a go of it as we can see with prospect and with other things when it’s a retail store, not so easy. What some places have done is they put a library in the bottom that works or some business, something that isn’t retail because that is a harder year business that is a little easier to keep going. It’s a little more stable. Anyway. So because we are not able to regulate these on the statewide basis. Dola, as I’ve said before, is a repository of the service plans. And supposedly of the transparency plans and although seemingly they only send them to the small the Special Districts Association, which is a private organization because we can’t regulate them on that basis and because Miss mccrady who spoke, said that and said you have to regulate them on a city by city basis. And yet, we can’t really do that either without being sued because or creating a situation where they don’t actually serve as a municipal. I mean, as as a standalone government. Because we so restricted them. So as Councilman Rodriguez said,
you know, there were some good suggestions, but they’re also in here as well as to ways that we could regulate them, but that wouldn’t restrict them to the point where it would not be possible and that would put the city at risk of being sued for creating something that can’t be used and having the sort of frivolous kind of law going on. So anyway, I I would suggest we go ahead and call the question.
2:17:06
Right. We don’t need to call the question the debates over. So let’s go ahead. So we’re going to go ahead and vote point of personal privilege,
2:17:11
please. Can I clear Can I clarify one statement that was made? Sure. Because it was reference to what to be.
2:17:19
statement was made that waters talked about Metro districts. I talked about a, the metro district we approved the mountain Brook development. That was the analysis. I didn’t make a general statement. Okay. All right.
2:17:31
Oh, yeah. One
2:17:32
more thing. I noticed here that the statement was made that regard to the fire station under material modifications. Number two, it says any change of district boundaries would recall would be qualified as a material modification. So if they got people to got other districts from without the boundaries, they would have to bring it back to city call. It would mean to City Council would be constitute a material modification.
2:18:04
All right, thank you. Alright. So what we’re going to do is we’re going to think about, so the motion is to basically remove the current ordinance and replace it with 4.10 point oh, one O, as in our packet, which is identical to the previous ordinance would come back for two readings, then it will come back for this is to put it on for first first reading. And so we’re going to vote and then I’m going to propose a change in Council procedure to make it a little easier as we deal with the first reading. But let’s vote first. So, all in favor, say aye. Aye. All opposed nay. Yay. All right, then that’s an A for me too. So I believe it was Councilmember Christiansen Councilmember Peck Mayor Pro Tem Rodriguez and Councilmember Iago fairing voting for in council members, waters Council and Martin and myself again So what I would propose is that council members now that we’ve given staff clear direction, what I would propose is anyone. So this is a motion I move that we change the rules of council or the operating rules of council. So that next time, rather than making motions, willy nilly use the term of art. What we do is put it in, put it in an email, and your suggested changes to the ordinance and send it to the city manager and myself prior to the meeting. So that we have an idea of what amendments are going to be suggested, rather than so we can organize, discuss, put it in the packet prior to coming to the meeting and having a free for all. Because I imagine there will be tweaks and whatnot to the amendment or do you want to do that now, to even do what I’m saying to the order. So we did we’re putting it on this just as going on for first reading. This is just direction of staff. This doesn’t mean anything tonight other than what we’re putting on the agenda, we still have to go through a first and second reading, which means motions will be allowed to make amendments, both at the first and second reading. So rather than having a big long meeting, I’m proposing that we actually put in our motions for amendments now. And that way we can deal with them in an organized orderly fashion will allow us to it will force us to think through things rather than like I said, just just bring it up. That makes sense.
2:20:35
Councilmember Christiansen
2:20:40
you’re suggesting that the amendments be put in the ordinance?
2:20:44
No, no, what I’m saying is that we have them list. What I’m saying is if no one suggests that amendment, between now and the first ordinance, we’re just going to vote on this, okay? What it means is that if you have an amendment that you’d like to make needs to be done in advance with bought in provided to the city manager myself so that we can convey it to the rest of council. So we have an opportunity to review the amendments rather than showing up and saying Oh, hey, by the way, I want to change this or Hey, by the way, I want to change this. I just like to see you know, some organization results. Maybe nobody else has amendments, but I’m assuming that people will be offering amendments to the to the ordinance on the first and then also second reading. I’m just trying to think of next time what’s going to happen What do you guys think of that idea, Councilmember back I’m sorry, it gets my back.
2:21:35
Um, so Mayor Bagley, if we are offering suggestions to Harold and you for changing the ordinance. How is that going to be transparent so the public knows what it is we
2:21:48
are that’s what I mean, it will go in the packet. So what we’ll do is what we’ll do it we’ll do a packet update. So that for example, let’s suppose that
2:21:59
it’s says,
2:22:03
In general, the city will consider the formation of commercial districts. Let’s suppose that amendment is to be offered says that committed the city will consider the formation of commercial districts so long as there is an extraordinary benefit found by city council to the city. That would be suggested to the city manager. I’m not I don’t plan on making that amendment By the way, I just looking at my throwing that as an example. And if I don’t make it before council meeting, that means that I can’t make it. I just want to I’m trying to instill a little bit of discipline if we want to change the ordinance, the amendment would be made prior to the next meeting. So that we have an opportunity to reflect, think and prepare comments rather than just all of us. What about this? What about this? What about this Councilmember
2:22:46
waters, so it would be we would have done that work prior to the packet being placed in her Dropbox
2:22:54
was the first order that’s coming out next Tuesday, right?
2:23:00
weeks from now,
2:23:00
the next regular session is on the 25th of February. So we would have a week to get our if you wanted to do that we would need that by the 14th. So a week went week and a half
2:23:15
so So in response
2:23:20
I’m willing to do that. So some of us going to spend a little more time getting
2:23:26
her I’m willing to do that. But what I do but I what I need, then I need a calendar that shows me that the you know, the deadline or due date for if I assume we’re doing this not just for this ordinance, but going forward.
2:23:39
No, no, just just right now just on this not not forever, just on the between this ordinance will be presented as on, on on on first reading on February, two weeks from now.
2:23:53
So just this is
2:23:54
a one off, this is a one off the next the next meeting on Tuesday city Myself and Harold meet for the agenda for the next agenda comes out the day after or that next next week. So that gives us this week to make any proposed amendments to this ordinance. What I’m trying to avoid is having a six hour council meeting where we just start throwing out amendments, it would force us to think, discuss, review,
2:24:22
I get it. That’s fine. I just want to know my my deadline for getting my ex to hack a job or I
2:24:27
listed on Wednesday.
2:24:31
The packet for the 18th is we try to get that out on the 12th. Right, so this is a 25th meeting. So we will try to get the packet out two weeks from now on the 19th which is why I said if council wants to do this, the 14th would be the deadline to lease and that would give me I’d rather have the 13th but I can live with the 14th which would give me the 17th and the 18th to kind of put it together So it can then be placed in the packet that goes out on the 19th. For the meeting on the 25th.
2:25:05
I’m happy for I just wanted to know, my my deadline. The only other comment I would make is badly It seems to me that then Another possibility is to say the six hour meeting would be to do what somebody suggested here tonight. And that is if we if we wanted to put the we wanted to bring there’s, as I’ve said, there’s a lot to agree with in this ordinance. If we want to bring an ordinance together that we could all agree on. There’s there was a way there’s a way to do that. But it doesn’t, you’re not going to push it to the next regular meeting. It would be to bring a group together and find out where the common ground is. And in find a place we could all stand to gather around the objectives we’re trying to accomplish but if we’re going to just amend it to death, I’ll submit my are peppered with amendments. I’ll prepare by packet
2:25:53
customer barn.
2:25:56
two things. First of all, I prefer Dr. Walters suggestion that we have a session where we discuss potential amendments and compromises rather than do us conventional first reading, where all the amendments have been submitted in advance. I think that makes more sense. I feel like I need to point out that most of the suggestions for making Metro district safer that Mayor Pro Tem Rodriguez initially liked, and then began to fear that they would invalidate the metro districts. Most of those are in this ordinance that we’re considering now. Almost all of them are already there as protections and they’re they’re just they’re they’re not that different that from the from the suggestions that I made the only difference is they only apply to mixed use districts that have at least 50% non residential? Okay. Let’s bargain over that percentage if we’re going to have a bargain and it’d be a lot simpler, but I’m not finished.
2:27:19
The other thing, excuse me,
2:27:25
Councilmember? Well, before
2:27:26
I do still have the floor.
2:27:29
And the other suggestion that I would like to make, if we’re going to have your first reading procedure, Mr. Mayor, is, is that we have to also dispense with this. Two rounds in your out, because what’s happening a lot here. I went through this in advance and did the math on all of the letters submitted on the statements made in the ordinance Red, the clover base and Metro district service plan about 18 times. And yet, what happens is that if somebody speaks after me and says something false that I can’t, can refute, I can’t refute it, because it’s not going to be my turn to speak again. And if we’re going to have a substantive debate, then we have to be able to rebut. Because otherwise, people can say anything they want, and the council will act as it run it as if it’s true. Well, what if it’s not true?
2:28:43
Welcome to politics.
2:28:46
I’d like to fix that, sir.
2:28:48
All right, Kelsey, are you done?
2:28:50
Yeah, but I want you to answer me. Well, we’ll talk to Councillor Peck.
2:28:54
I just want to remind you that we’ve already voted on this. It is going to first ordinance is we are not voting on whether we’re going to have another debate, but we’re voting on on
2:29:07
the floor that’s been practiced.
2:29:08
And Mayor Bagley, did you get a second for your
2:29:10
motion? Do I didn’t know. So second?
2:29:15
I call the question.
2:29:18
Yeah, that was Joe. Second. Second. Second. All right, let’s go ahead and vote. It’s not debatable. You need a supermajority of council in order to call the question. So all in favor of having a vote on my motion, which was, we are going to require proposed amendments be prepared in advance rather than just coming to Council on first ordinance and presenting and then
2:29:42
say aye.
2:29:43
Aye.
2:29:46
Opposed, nay.
2:29:48
All right. So we’ll call the question. Let’s go ahead and vote. So all in favor of my motion, say aye. Aye. Opposed. All right. So basically, go ahead. And
2:30:01
I’ve got a request, go ahead. If we use the 14th as a deadline, I would appreciate it if you do that you put it in a Word document, and and attach that word document and send it to me because it will be easier to then aggregate and attached to the agenda. I will send this out via email.
2:30:18
Can we make it? Let’s let’s do noon on the 14th. Yeah, I assume you have a date that night. Well,
2:30:24
right. So so it’s getting his wisdom teeth out. So
2:30:26
yeah, I’m just saying I mean, let’s don’t make it midnight. Let’s make it noon to be respectful to staff. If we can get it in
2:30:31
early in the morning in a Word document then that lets me do what I need to quickly. Okay. All right. Cool. I will send out in calendar appointment with that. It’ll be early on the 14th on that appointment.
2:30:46
All right. Let’s move on. Let’s move on to five be 2020 legislative bills recommended for city council position.
2:31:02
Mayor Bagley members of council Sandy cedar assistant city manager and I have five bills for your consideration tonight. If you like as I did last week, I’ll just read through them as well as what the recommendation is and then you’re welcome to vote on them all or bifurcate them whichever you’d like to do. So the first one is House Bill 20 1162. concerning a prohibit
2:31:24
prohibition
2:31:28
against retail food establishments distribution of an expanded palace pyre, polystyrene product for use as a container for ready to eat food. So as you all asked our legislators during our legislative dinner polystyrene is styrofoam. And this basically phases in a prohibition of Styrofoam. It is I want for you to note that while this bill does support the sustainability plan, it might put an undue burden on our local retail restaurants. And so we are suggesting back to the legislators that there’s some level of relief in that to be able to help Small businesses be able to purchase different types of containers. So because nonetheless staff still recommends that the city council support hospital 20 1162 Hospital 20 1163 concerning the management of single use products very similar. So this is a similar prohibition of single use products like straws, plastic bags, and we have the same concerns about people needing to purchase alternative types of containers but still because it’s supports our sustainability efforts, staff recommends the city council support hospital 20 1163. Senate Bill 20 zero 17 concerning requirement that the high performance transportation enterprise include information about public private partnerships and its annual report, the legislative committee basically requires additional transparency for these types of organizations. And since that is, I think a good thing as far as us making sure that what’s happening in the transportation enterprise funds are trying its parent and above board. The city. Staff recommends that city council supports Senate Bill 2017. Senate Bill 2151. This is the administration of the Regional Transportation district at this time staff is not finished analyzing all the impacts of the bill. So we are not asking for a position but once the staff is finished with that analysis, will be bringing that forward to you. I wanted you to know it’s on the radar. We are looking at it. Phil is reading it and trying to figure out what would be the best course of action. So as soon as he is able to do that, then I’ll get back to you. And then senate joint resolution 2003 concerning the approval of water project revolving fund eligibility list. This is something that the council has supported every year for the last 10 years. There are some water projects that are long my projects, and this does obviously help the the furthering of clean water in our state, which is a good thing. So the staff recommends city council support SJR 20 003
2:34:00
actually moved that we instruct staff to notify our state representatives that we support all of these but for Senate Bill 2151 which staff is still analyzing
2:34:13
any debate discussion on the issues customer Christianson
2:34:18
since I’m the representative I
2:34:22
I am a little
2:34:25
concerned about the the growth of RTD thing Regional Transportation districts and encouraging those I considering wait a minute
2:34:44
we’re leaving that one off.
2:34:46
Oh, that’s right. We did this is a different thing. Nevermind.
2:34:49
Nevermind.
2:34:52
Alright, see no one else in the queue. Let’s go ahead and vote supporting all of these but Senate Bill 2151. All in favor. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed say nay. All right, motion passes unanimously. And then also I forgot to just so you know, on the just see I’m sorry, Michelle, but on the motion before, I did not read on the motion to call the question, Councilmember pecks question. It was six of us for with Councillor Martin against and it was I believe it was a unanimous vote on requiring a proposed amendment coming back. Alright, sorry. Okay, cool. Good job, Sandy. All right. Time for Marion counts comments with these cool new microphones. compliments of
2:35:41
probably Scott Converse and not anyway.
2:35:45
But anyway, thank you, Scott. All right. Casper Christiansen.
2:35:53
Tomorrow. Fred Wilson will be laid to rest and read will I was on City Council for I believe, 13 years. And then he was married for four years. He was probably the most interesting guy who’s ever City Council. He had lots of different jobs. He loved people. He has many different skills and hobbies. And what I really liked about him, which inspired me is some somebody interviewed him once and is he said, I have walked every block of this city. And I thought, what a guy, you know, I think he really loved one, one. And so audio is Fred, you did a good job.
2:36:47
All right. Anyone else? Any comments? Yes. That’s where Martin
2:36:52
Thank you. I have two things. One, I would like to reiterate that Our debates are not functional, because we cannot refute one another’s arguments. And I want to call upon the mayor to seriously consider a pro, a procedural change that will fix that. Because as it is now, people can make unfounded assertions, and they are accepted, often by other council members, and almost always by the public as fat. And I think it’s only fair that at least other council members should have a shot at presenting the other side of the argument. And if it draws out the debate, it draws out the debate and maybe we people will get smarter about making statements that can be easily refutable in
2:37:51
an end,
2:37:53
and I do have another thing to say, but if you’d like to address
2:37:55
that, I’m just gonna say so as mayor, believe it or not, I think Try to follow the rules. And so oftentimes I let us get a little loosey goosey. You know, but when there’s a topic of I mean, I could tell I didn’t need to come tonight, I could have set a meme. I could have spent five minutes typed up a memo. And I could have told you exactly what was going to happen tonight, given everybody’s previous comments, talks. I mean, it was pretty, pretty predictive. And so Robert’s rule says, if you want to make a motion, and and, you know, I can make a motion and propose an alternative. process, you know, we could alter that as a council. It’s just that I figure when we’re dealing with issues that are substantive and high conflict, I find safety and just going back to Robert’s Rules and saying, you know, the process is, everybody gets a chance to speak before you get a chance to speak first, and then everybody gets a chance to speak before your second chance. Because we all might have something to say. And then also it says we get a total of 20 minutes, but you only get two. And the person who makes the motion gets last word so long as they do not use their full 20 minutes. And so it’s that that’s kind of the I mean, that that’s the,
2:39:15
I’ve read
2:39:16
it. I mean, I’d rather I’d rather I’d rather have it shorter than 10. But But I don’t change it. Because that’s not my prerogative. And so if somebody on Council has a better way of doing it, then, Mr. Roberts, then we can change. And I can even and again, I do try to be loose. I mean, I do allow is the chair conversation like now, you know, there’s conversation that occurs, but when we’re dealing with, I mean, everybody on this council, I think, has an opinion on Metro districts, you know, in facts that we differ with each other
2:39:51
facts don’t differ, sir.
2:39:54
I’m just saying or interpretation. I’m saying, but the so I’m not disagreeing with You I don’t like the format. It’s just that it’s the format that this city decided back 100 years ago to follow, which if somebody wants to change, bring forth emotion, and we’ll talk about it, but I as the mayor, I’m one of seven.
2:40:14
I was hoping that as the mayor, we could confer on what would be a workable motion to
2:40:22
bring forward and if you want to bring forward emotion, I’m sure we would talk about I just don’t know of a better way to do it. Because if we said, okay, well, if you want to say and you would never end it, we would literally never end. But I know.
2:40:37
Marcia,
2:40:39
I feel for you. I hear you.
2:40:40
So what else you’re still the floor?
2:40:41
Well, I think the alternative is that we fact check publicly after every council meeting. That’d be fun. So maybe I’ll do that. There you go. Yeah. The other thing is that I would like to see the staff bring forward a report on the sequence of events. That followed the adoption of the clover basin service plan, including the annexations, the subsequent permitting of buildings and developments that fell under the fire station five surface area and what was considered and what was not in terms of of annexing those new developments into the fire protection district, if there were any, because there’s language in the service plan, that assumes that that will happen. And I was not satisfied.
2:41:48
I was not satisfied with the answers that the staff gave I usually am but tonight I was very much not. So I’d like to see some more detail about that.
2:42:02
So I guess my question. So let’s talk to mark, we talked tomorrow about putting that on the agenda. And the question I’m going to have is how much staff time will that take in would it detract from, we have to take from other we don’t need to vote. I have the pride to put it on. I’m not putting on unless the city manager says that. That’s like so during this section, Mayor council comments, were not permitted to make motions. If you want it on the if you want on the agenda, the appropriate times do at the beginning of the meeting. I can do it on my own prerogative. I’m going to ask tomorrow, let Harold have the opportunity to talk to staff, if that’s something that’s going to take, I mean, if they can pull up something and do it in an hour or two, that’s one thing, but if they’re gonna have if it’s gonna take weeks then no, so I mean,
2:42:51
so we’re just talking about one hour to it. stated this evening instead
2:42:55
of Yeah, I know, I know to me, so we’ll just talk about tomorrow. That’s okay. Hello. Just heads up. Cool.
2:43:03
We’re back.
2:43:04
Thank you. I would like to thank staff specifically Karen Roni, Olga Bermudez, Christina Sims and Jenny Diaz, for putting on the no small matter event. It was a success. And it was a great segue into our discussion that we’re going to have at the retreat
2:43:22
about the
2:43:27
I just lost my train of thought
2:43:29
you were saying thank you to everyone. I love you, everyone. Thank you.
2:43:34
Our preschool and early education, visions for the city. So thank you.
2:43:42
Yes, it’s time for comment.
2:43:45
I do have something to say. So in regard to this, preschool to no small matter. One thing I noticed is the people in attendance are all in the preschool profession. But we have many constituents with preschool age child. And so I would really encourage the public to get involved with.
2:44:05
With the was the organization
2:44:09
LLC, LLC, the LLC, the neighborhood Leadership Council. Is that right? No. National League of Cities LLC that would hit nobody who put on this movie in lC lC Okay, well, sorry, it’s late.
2:44:26
I think the movie was produced by an LC
2:44:28
No, but who was the organization that
2:44:31
city city of LA City?
2:44:34
Because Olga had presented it. I’m sorry, I’m very tired. But, but yeah, so I would encourage the public to really get involved in what’s happening with early childhood education. And we really want to hear from our young parents and what they need, what our constituents need. So thanks.
2:44:52
All right, anybody, anything else? Okay.
2:44:58
I just thought of one other event that What happened this week, there was a really wonderfully well attended forum by some of the candidates running for Senate. And it was sponsored by the Latino community. And it had too many questions were asked about, of these candidates, how they would support the Latino community and, you know, is incredibly well attended. And that shows how much enormous enthusiasm there is in this town for issues regarding the Latino community. So I thought it was terrific. Thanks. All right.
2:45:43
Great.
2:45:46
Anything? No, no words of wisdom as we conclude. All right, great. All right, everybody, all in all a pretty good meeting. So thank you. All right.
2:45:55
32nd video on the census. We’re trying to keep it out for the cool
2:46:03
In America,
2:46:04
we all count, no matter where we call home,
2:46:07
how the worship.
2:46:10
And the 2020 census is how that great promises kept. Because this is the count that informs where hundreds of billions and funding will go to cheer
2:46:18
for things like education, health care.
2:46:27
Start Here, Learn more at 2020 census.gov.
2:46:34
I believe that was less than 30 seconds of the job.
2:46:44
No comments. Oh, that was nice. All right. Would you like to make a motion counselor?
2:46:50
I move that we adjourn.
2:46:51
All right.
2:46:52
All right. Anybody? All in favor of a journey? I opposed. We’re adjourned.