July 10, 2018 — City Council Study Session

Transcript

Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.

[0:00] [Music] okay let's get started for the our first study session after council recess it is June July 10th and we have three matters before us tonight and the first one I know has to do with the retail study and Susan Connelly our interim director of community vitality is going to be starting us off but we have a great presentation with four awesome people so Susan good evening the apps for your do you need it tonight we talk about all things retail after a little bit of background on boulders retail context we're going to share with you the downtown Boulder retail and vibrancy study are you finding some recommendations from our esteemed consultants and the staff action plan what we're going to do as a result of that study the second part of the presentation is about the citywide

[1:00] retail study really previewing that sharing with you our proposed purpose statement and proposed focus areas to make sure that council is very comfortable as we are embarking on that study finally we want to brief you on the multiple conversations that have occurred both before and since your June 5th meeting regarding the hill retailers who spoke to you on June 5th so just a bit of background thank you Sarah so Boulder of course was the center of the universe for retail in the county and somewhat in the region in the 60s and and through the 80s and then we started to see redevelopment we started to see competition arising Flatiron crossing of course it's right down the road the 29th Street revitalization we've also experienced increased competition in our surrounding communities we're also of course

[2:02] experiencing really interesting changes in the retail industry and demographic changes in our community why do we care well retail affects our quality of life and it affects the city's fiscal condition the kinds of retail the mix of retail that we provide the accessibility to it and the affordability has to adapt as our community it evolves forty-two percent of the boulders the general fund budget is derived from sales and use tax very important and that funding is critical to basic services including police fire library and human services to name just a few our comp plan actually has an economy section and there is a policy specifically about retail because it is that important both to our community and to our fiscal condition and it makes a

[3:01] commitment to develop and implement our retail strategy so that's the foundation for all of the items to follow so with that I'm going to introduce Brad Siegel with progressive urban management associates it was the lead consultant on the study great thanks Susan and good evening council city manager city attorney my name is Brad Siegel I'm with a firm in Denver called progressive urban Management Associates we are economic and Community Development consultants well fortunately to have a relationship with Boulder going back almost 20 years so when Flatirons open we worked with the downtown business community to help form the Business Improvement District just before 29th Street open we work with the downtown and the city to create a strategic plan and we were delighted to be asked to come back and work on this effort over the past of six eight months so I'm going to talk about what

[4:03] we found and then jennifer is going to get into the implementation and what the city is going to take on in response to this work we're here in part because of changing dynamics in retail retail is one of those industries that's in disruption right now there are a lot of changes and cities all over the country are really coming to grips with the same type of dynamics that you have in Boulder and they're also officials are making a lot of hard decisions regarding retail as well across the country and some of these factors include the increase in e-commerce internet commerce which I'll tell you is a little deceiving even last year with all the internet sales internet sales accounted for about 8 percent nationally of all retail sales so brick-and-mortar is not dead but it is changing and it needs to adapt part of that is smaller footprints you're seeing larger national change go to smaller footprints interestingly I think it's next week target is opening a 28 thousand square foot store in downtown

[5:01] Denver and who knew that ten years ago the target would be looking at those types of things but that's indicative of this change as well demographic shifts and one of the things you'll find in the study as we looked at the demographics in Boulder and how downtown can best match the community as it changes and as as as different age groups come in and stay and flow there is a premium and this is good news for not only downtown Boulder but most of the downtown's we work with across the country a real premium on authentic experiences and fortunately the city leaders in in this town for the last 40 50 years have been forward-thinking and downtown Boulder really is a stellar environment in terms of the experience that it offers next slide please so I'm in control in terms of why we're here and the impetus for the project there was there were a variety of

[6:01] concerns and I'll say some of these are realities and some of these may maybe were more myths but some of the concerns that precipitated our work was a concern that the more national chains and franchises were taking space in downtown Boulder that there was more pressure on Independence and certainly several icons if you will stores that have been around for decades we're finding that they were closing for a variety of reasons a bank opened up on the Pearl Street Mall and that that created some anxiety we also found that locals were coming down here more but spending less and there was a concern that were we losing part of our peel was was Boulder losing what many of us told was the secret sauce of Boulder so was was that escaping us or was that just changing and as Susan mentioned in the intro real concerned with just slower sales tax growth overall and sales tax being such an important revenue engine for the city and providing for the services that

[7:02] residents of Boulder have really become accustomed to so when we looked around we did the analysis we did a couple things one is we we we looked at a lot of data so we looked at a lot of data on retail on demographics on store mix we also partnered with a gentleman by name a Mike Byrne Mike Byrne he has offices in California New York and he is a retail expert nationally so he was able to bring to us some of this perspective from a national point of view that we could apply to our work here but overall we found many strengths with with downtown Boulder still a high concentration of local independent stores in downtown 77 percent local when we worked with you back in 2005 13 years ago it was 83 percent local so there has been some shift but maybe not the complete wave of franchises and chains

[8:00] that some people fear 61% of your retail is shops 39% our restaurants and that's that's actually considered a very healthy balance so when we work in downtown's all over the country most of them honestly are more dominated by restaurants and entertainment so boulders consider to have a healthy concentration of retail within the downtown business district your vacancies are low and while sales tax may be not growing as as as much as we'd like downtown certainly is growing more than the rest of the city so downtown retail sales when you take out marijuana had grown 11% between 2013 and 2017 so it's fairly modest on an annual basis but it is the strongest sub market in til sales growth in the city at this point and while locals I mentioned earlier locals are spending less we find visitors are spending more and clearly Boulder is one of those must-see

[9:03] destinations along the Front Range and your visitor according to intercept surveys the concentration of visitors has gone up and also their propensity to spend has gone up as well downtown continues to get stronger as a place to work that certainly helps retail and locals well maybe not spending as much money are visiting at outstanding rates more than seven visits a month from locals that were surveyed and intercept surveys that's a high frequency of visitation if you're coming downtown for reasons other than other than work with with Mike Byrne with the retail consultant we we really looked at downtown and we dissected it in two sub districts not just one market so there's sub markets within downtown and then we also match these with demographic groups within downtown and of the entire study we did I think this this chart is

[10:01] something that we're pleased with because I think it really shows a nuanced understanding of how downtown works I am gonna do that right now so yup stirs yeah I'm gonna start I'm gonna I'm gonna define all those demographic groups and then what we found is where these demographic groups are gravitate to downtown and then you can do a truth check on all of that I'll start the up stirs you up stirs are boomers or people like myself they generally have high levels of disposable income a lot of yup stirs again like myself have been around for decades in a community I'm a native of Denver for example so I've been around for a while in Boulder yup stirs are boomers that oftentimes have been around very influential in the politics in the town so these are also people who vote and who are very active in certainly in your lives so yup stirs

[11:01] we found boomers were attracted certainly to the core of Pearl Street and also on both ends on the East End and on the west end that and and really it's because of yep stirs that you have the downtown that you have it was the vision of these boomers 30 40 years ago that helped create the downtown that we have now let's get a little more nuanced here a coastal new economy what that means that refers to tech workers primarily so younger demographic 20 to 35 a lot of the technology economy profiles and our retail expert found that they were gravitating a little bit more to the West End and part of where this is coming from is we're matching the store types with the demographics that those stores appeal to so there is some science here it's not just sitting on a street corner and looking at people there is some science here yeah there's

[12:00] some science here between the retail mix and the demographics that are naturally attracted to those retailers so we found that some of the newcomers the tech workers may be more in the Western and I'll talk about Neo hipsters last that's my favorite subgroup to talk about leisured middle that's really more our visitors so our visitors where our tourists are concentrating the types of stores that attract visitors a group again with fairly high levels of disposable income we learned we talked to many many property owners and businesses in this process we had focus groups we talked to more than 60 of the downtown stakeholders in putting this work together and we found that there's quite a bit of activity around college and when parents come to town parents weekends that type of thing that's what a lot of these trends are reinforced but leisured middle gets to to visitors primarily students is probably the most straightforward of all that those are students but the segments that downtown

[13:01] appeals to most tends to be the older student profiles so the the senior and the grad student is more attracted to downtown then maybe some of the the younger well the hill is a primary attraction and then the shopping center on on the way into town over baseline over on baseline shopping center over on baseline as an attraction for them as well alright hipsters hipsters are the pioneers these are the sort of artists the creatives what we found is because of cost of living in Boulder you don't necessarily have a high degree of struggling artists living in town but there is a concentration of creatives and they have strong influence in terms of trends and in terms of shopping and and and looking at different stores so from our vantage point our realtor

[14:01] retail experts vantage point East pearl was more of the hipster profile more of the pioneering type of retail more the local independent more of an area to take risks if you will and then last but not least the Neo hipster the Neo hipster is also young but is upwardly mobile so these people have money they have discretionary income but they have this hipster Sensibility they want to relate back to the creative and the artistic pursuit when you think of Neo hipsters think of right Rhino in Denver or Highlands if you will well your piece of neo hipster land and we thought and in downtown Boulder was more on the west end and and west pearl so again we can get into this in terms of whether whether this all makes sense or not but I think the main message here is is two messages one that downtown is complex it's not just one market there's a collection of sub markets and two there

[15:00] are many demographic groups that are patronizing and enjoying downtown there's a very broad age demographic that is is finding strong connections to downtown Boulder where do you go if you don't belong to any of those groups well I I I guess you're going to Flatirons I honestly these groups make up the vast majority of the population of the city so in terms of additional psychographics and demographics there wasn't much left this this was pretty much a complete profile from a psycho grin out psychographics are a little bit different than demographic because they get into these lifestyle issues and and and demographers make these judgments on what people do but us and our retail expert thought that this really captured the vast majority certainly a boulder rights you look at ethnicity or income I

[16:07] mean it seems like you've looked at income with students which don't have them any money and hipsters there's them but I guess you know we have a broad range of people who live in in Boulder and I guess maybe what Mary was asking is where where are those people that we know about but they're not downtown yeah well and perhaps you can help us with that as well I mean the the psychographics don't necessarily distinguish between ethnicities because that different ethnicities are embedded within these these different groups I mean yep stirs come in all shapes sizes and colors there is some income nuance you know the difference between the neo hipster and the regular hipster that type of thing I'll also qualify by saying this that

[17:02] that there are a variety of ways to slice and dice demographics and psychographics and what we're building off is a a proprietary database by our retail consultant and and this is sort of his way of segmenting different groups but I will emphasize he does this because he's a retail expert and what he's doing is segmenting different groups as it relates to the retail offerings so I go back to that original point based on what we have in downtown Boulder these are the demographic group psychographics that he feels would be most attracted if you looked at Flatirons if you looked at other shopping destinations around town you may see a different profile yeah and so where would like grocery stores fall into retail are they part of retail or is it just dry goods consumer goods what makes up the retail study that you were focused on cursory is definitely part of retail so retail is is all sorts of well

[18:01] in the study gives you a profile of all these different types of retail so it's a barrel it's furnishings its food its restaurants grocery would be included and the reason I asked that is I think you can get at some you know people who don't have as much disposable income might be spending higher fractions of it on you know and so I think Mary's pointed this question to me is is a bigger question how was this study funded this was not completely a City study right this part was this was funded I believe jointly by the city and right and so and I know that we're gonna go beyond downtown but that is one danger of just focusing on one part of the city is mmm there may be groups that aren't represented very well in any of these categories well correct and and I think one of the themes of this study is it's awfully difficult for downtown to be a place we want to have town to be

[19:00] the living room of the community we want it to be the place where everyone is welcome but on retail it's awfully hard for downtown retail to be all things to all people and part of that is driven by the real estate part of that is driven by the demographics so where we are today for better or worse is this palette of sub districts that we feel are dominated by these different subgroups and we can certainly build on that and strengthen that and we can also use this as a way to diversify downtown if that's something we want to do well I would imagine that the there's the the psychographics was not completely different if you looked at the employment side of it as opposed to the shopping side of yes absolutely absolutely that's probably where the people that aren't on the shopping side are on them absolutely and again and also this is driven by the retail mix so if we go to an outline if we go to a neighborhood center in Boulder it's gonna be a different

[20:01] palette of demographics because of the cause it may be more grocery oriented or more be maybe just just a different type of retail well and and just one more thought on that if you don't have a whole bunch of disposable income the activities you might choose to do in your leisure time might look different whereas if you have a lot of disposable activities maybe you go to a restaurant and and look for a new piece of clothing but when you don't have that disposable income then you find those folks gathering somewhere else and I think when we look more broadly I wonder if this is just my thought I want to think about activities and not just sales tax dollars like how are we providing for the entire community not just how are we making sure that our budgets are funded I'm gonna go ahead and move on I've got about three or four more slides I wanna make sure you get the full presentation tonight we did look at vulnerabilities

[21:00] with downtown retail and certainly high occupancy costs are the primary vulnerability and and and that really I think is one of the challenges moving forward is how do we retain what we'd like most about downtown but acknowledge that these increasing costs are pressuring many of the businesses that we may like the most as well so what's pushing these occupancy costs high tenant demand we got two to four percent vacancy rates downtown it's it's really very healthy and in some ways that's that's too low the healthiest markets tend to be about five percent vacant so you're about two to five two to four percent vacant increasing property taxes this is not just Boulder this is all of Colorado particularly the Front Range in particular right now commercial properties as you know a higher rate of tax because of calendar and this is happening up and down the Front Range where valuations are going up property because of this because of

[22:01] higher valuations the tax burdens going up and commercial tenants are feeling this so this is certainly a factor in occupancy costs there are barriers to entry for local independent concepts and when we get into our recommendations moving forward most of our plan and its recommendations do talk about how do we protect and how do we encourage local independence to enter the downtown market despite some of these barriers to entry and also because of these cost factors we've seen some traditional anchor tenants pressure on them to to be displaced so what sort of adaptations are we seeing downtown downtown is changing and I think that's another one of our messages of this study is as downtown's always are in flux and certainly downtown Boulder today is different than what we looked at 13 years ago and is different than what we found in 1999 and then what was here before and you're seeing this now so the expansion on Pearl those West and East nodes of Perot are really a direct

[23:00] result of demand and also costs and the higher costs are in the center of Pearl Street more on the mall the cost get a little bit lower as you go further west and particularly east consolidation of different niches over the 13 years since we last looked at downtown we've seen some clusters of like type stores really really build in frequency so for example I think apparel a much higher concentration of apparel than we did much lower concentration of home furnishings than we did and a higher concentration of restaurants so we look at these different changes and we look at how can the rest of downtown benefit from from these things our retail consultant tells us that actually his recommendation is we should double down on the concentrations of retail if we're strong on a parallel let's let's go with apparel that's something that attracts people it's something that for comparison shopping is

[24:00] would actually make downtown stronger we've seen actually a better fit among chains so there may be a few more chains than there were 13 years ago but some of them seem to match the the character of Boulder and that some of them don't even feel like chains so Patagonia is an example of one that really is something that's in sync with the outdoor lifestyle and and with with boulders strengths there are also smaller groups we call them chain let's where maybe there's three or four or five of these stores either in the front range or in selected cities we think there's opportunity and you've seen some of this on expensive real estate is actually to have multi-use or multi tenant stores and particularly some of the larger floor plates stores are getting smaller spaces sometimes or not so it's not uncommon to see two or three or four or more retail concepts sharing a space and then a continued alignment

[25:00] and mix and I think again maybe it's more visible on the edges on the east and the west that there's alignment with particularly the younger demographics whatever psychographic we want to call them but this whole twenty to thirty five-year-old demographic that is very highly concentrated in Boulder so last couple slides for me is that our work included an action plan which had a whole variety of recommendations Jennifer's going to go more into detail on the city side of this in terms of what the city plans city staff plans to do in response to this work we provided recommendations not only for the city but also for the downtown partnership so there's the opportunity for both organizations to work together and to leverage their resources and their their their connections with downtown so some of the points of emphasis really looking to strengthen local independence and again try to attract and preserve what we have more of an incentive based approach so there's carrots and there

[26:00] sticks and we're suggesting carrots particularly as it relates to local independent stores could be useful moving forward and thinking about these market segments and not only the market segments that we talked about the the psychographics but are there other market segments in Boulder that that we should be thinking of and connecting to and then lastly continually updating the experience downtown Pearl Street is a fantastic environment but you're in a more competitive environment than you've ever been and some of the the towns in Boulder County have emerged so whether it's its Louisville or Longmont or some of the others that are East County or in the vicinity we're in a more competitive market and also Denver I mean you look at Union Station you look at some of the festival marketplaces Stanly marketplaces these are all new competitors for Boulder so part of our message is sharpening competitive edge and looking at the physical and pass specs of Pearl Street and the

[27:01] programming the physical aspects it's common for those of us in cities maybe to look every 20 years at updating a public space we're suggesting well maybe not maybe we should be looking more often maybe we should be looking every 10 years or more to update these public spaces to keep them to keep them sparkling and the the programming are we programming these spaces to really reach the most segments that we can and part of this is a mostly a downtown partnership responsibility but we have programming recommendations within the report so with this the the plan it's it's fairly extensive document in terms of recommendations and they are segmented among different opportunity areas very specifically oriented to the city and the partnership with sequencing some of these are quick wins that they can be achieved quickly some of these are more longer-term improvements for both the city and the partnership to consider so at this point Jennifer is

[28:01] going to talk about the city's role in all this thank you so what I wanted to do is just quickly highlight what we proposed as an action plan and we are doing it in the same order as the report and looking at those six opportunity costs and opportunity areas Brad just mentioned so reframing the role Boulder has a lot of strengths and we want to continue to build on the unique strengths and characteristics and realize that downtown Boulder plays a very distinct role in the city's overall retail mix the report also identified an opportunity to provide more startup support we'd like to increase awareness of existing resources because we do have them maybe we have companies that aren't aren't aware that we also want to evaluate options for enhancing services and resources and explore the targeted use of city and caged owned spaces there

[29:01] may be a way to support startups using that space also identified an opportunity for providing more affordable retail spaces and want to explore options for looking at dividing large retail spaces or maybe creating and developing some alley facing retail in specific areas again there may be some opportunities for using city or caged adone spaces to support affordable retail type programs what those kinds of changes that you're describing required title 9 changes at this point what we're saying is we really need to do a lot of exploration take a look at identifying barriers and what might be up what might be options and what might be possible and then go from there yeah we also there may be some ideas for

[30:01] ways to just reduce the cost of doing business there may be ways that we can make energy efficiency programs benefit tenants there may be incentives we can offer to property owners to encourage them to offer below market leases so these are all things that we would want to explore but I'd mentioned kind of enhancing the environment and making sure that we maintain what's special about downtown Boulder and build on those strengths we'd like to continue to maintain that clean safe environment that happens with a lot of careful thoughtful management that's something we want to continue we want to implement the Kaija garage improvements and evaluate updates of public areas and features as they become you know there are opportunities and also consider some enhanced gateways and signage when we look at some of those sub districts like the East End in East Pearl sometimes the people don't always venture into those areas because they're

[31:01] not sure that there are restaurants or retailers there so there may be ways to invite more activity in those areas we also wanted to look at continuing to work with downtown Boulder partnership on on really supporting a very rich retail mix and doing that with an additional analytics and tracking we do gather some data now there may be other data that we can use to continue to monitor this as well as to help package and and help support a healthy retail mix the study also pointed out opportunities to do a little bit more connection and inviting people to come to downtown Boulder we can do that when we look at connections and wayfinding between downtown and specific area and Alpine balsam and other areas within the city there may be some ways to do some signage and wayfinding as well as connections and some cross promotion

[32:00] cross promotions as well as enhancing access through hop and other programs and you know very simple but something that can be very effective is continue to build awareness of the fact that there's free parking and city garages on weekends and holidays so what we did with the proposed action plan is we wanted to really build on the strengths and we wanted to address the opportunities for improvement as well and challenges as well as some of the opportunities that are are there in improving downtown Boulder so our question is whether or not council supports the proposed action plan from an implementation based on the downtown retail vibrancy study okay why don't you put up the summary slide I did have a

[33:01] question in some of the things like the I know many people in the city feel that a lot of these efforts are targeted more towards visitors the people who live in the city so things like wayfinding signs and that kind of thing and what's actually on the East End or the West End of Pearl Street are pretty well known to the people who live here and I think there is beginning to be some fatigue within the community itself about being the sort of an Events Ville and I've heard people refer to it as Disneyland which is a little dismay but if you're around on any of the I mean it's interesting is again to see where people are showing up on Pearl Street right who they are where they're coming from the local people are probably more if they're more at those other ends of Pearl Street it's because they're smaller places that cater more to them

[34:02] they're not as sort of touristy I guess is the word hmm so I'm curious as you push these or not you but as these things are moving forward who it is that we're really targeting here I mean because I would like to see more people coming downtown who actually live here and rather than saying I never go down there because right and I hear a lot of it I don't know if other council members do but there's a fair amount of that in terms of who is being served by these things and as Sam mentioned not just the retail dollar that we're after all right so that's a big kind of question or comment comment and question but mmm who is being served ice poses the question right right did you run I respond so as Brad mentioned there's opportunity to entice locals to do

[35:05] things that are more local based and then there's opportunity to respond to who is there now so there's always a balance sometimes you can bring a horse to water but you can't make them drink so with that it is a balance of how you how you spend resources and effort and how you program but certainly there's a desire as Brad said early on that downtown be the living room that is welcoming to all I think there's a reality though you need both you know the visitors are spending the money and as long as they you know don't take over the revenue is important and also it's that visitor appeal that in part hopefully again to the extent that it's not overrun that that visitor appeal should also appeal to locals we found it's really healthy healthy then the

[36:01] balance according to the data and again it's not qualitative it's not talking to to neighbors but but according to the data it's it's about as healthy as it gets and the boulder resident that's coming downtown they're coming more than seven times a month which is an incredibly high frequency and then the visitor what they're spending is a pretty high spend per visit from a visitor so I would I would argue that that that there's got to be a balance there and it's not easy to keep that balance but you kind of need both did you just to follow up on that did you do any sort of winnowing out of where the residents there's a high number of residents but they're also neighborhoods surrounding the downtown and so people who can walk do walk and so that could be accounting for a high I'm wondering and North Boulder now has it's sort of sub community up there except for the library which is coming

[37:02] and then you know there's Table Mesa in those places and then some of them have better bus service like Table Mesa can just head out to Broadway but so my question is are we when they're local people coming into the downtown are they coming from all over the city or is it a higher demographic of people who are just living which is a fairly dense neighborhood surrounding the town town including unique hills people I brought our data guru mr. Daniel Makela sitting behind me but I don't know if we have that granular detail we utilize intercept studies that have been done and we would have to go back and answer your question and see if we can cross tabulate and see where people are coming from I will say this though that when when you were making your statement I did think of Boulder having such a great

[38:00] opportunity with your neighborhood shopping districts - doesn't really have to be all for everybody because there are these neighborhood districts that people cherish in this town as well so I think that would be the next sort of frontier the next exciting thing to figure out is how does downtown position itself visa via the neighborhood districts and how do we build the best synergy so going back to your original point that that were first and foremost being responsive to the residents of Boulder and providing the environment that they want but also being realistic to know that we need some visitor dollars in order to keep keep the workings of the city going so one of the the things that I wanted to talk about is is how do we make sure that our downtown is vibrant in the face of change and retaining the elements that we think build community and are also reflected in a vibrant economy so things

[39:00] like you know we started to look at commercial affordable commercial and how do we foster that I think that that's an important element and these idea of splitting up larger places and focusing on incentivizing local independent businesses to share spaces I think is a really positive way to get at some of those values that we want to foster I also think you mentioned better use of city-owned space and so the parking garage the 15th in Pearl we own a parking garage and all that retail wrap and some of that goes to international genes as opposed to local independent stores and and I think that's something we would want to take a look at in terms of city kind of walking its talk since we have that opportunity to do that I guess I would underscore those couple

[40:00] things and then there's a couple other things that I think would be cool I think it would be fun to do a pilot project on at least one of the alley alleys that's particularly conducive and maybe we just bite off a block that is particularly conducive to that and try that out I think that would be intriguing on multiple levels to multiple demographics and then the last thing I'll say is we're investing a lot in public art and I would like to see the synergy between that and downtown come out more like more art on the corners and I'm not sure this whole notion of spending money inside the parking garages on art I think is a little misplaced but how about right outside on the street corners outside parking garages and have that let's use cajun money to have revolving sculptor sculptures on those corners and and help spur our public arts program that way

[41:00] I'm sure there's a way that we can figure out how to as the head of Cajun make that responsive to what those money and money should be spent for but I don't think unless we want to have our kids paint murals inside of the parking garages I think mostly we want outside the parking garages so there's a couple of ideas I have around creating that sense of community and vibrancy that goes with it okay I'm not sure which one of you had okay Lisa well let's go down so I like everything you said I I am NOT a big fan of the art in the garages I mean number one it really says something about drive your car and I think that really is not what we're trying to do here in Boulder and I think it's fine to let little children do their murals inside but I and I think that's how it should be spent but I would much prefer seeing art on the corners and and out in amongst people

[42:00] instead of a bunch of stupid cars I love the idea of the alleys and doing something in the alleys and taking a block and I mean you see that in Europe all the time and people are and basically you'd be rededicating it from a car dominated path to something that people are going to go on and and sit in and have a beer and have some lunch or you know something like that it could make it even more vibrant and I think our downtown sometimes I mean I'd love to walk the alleys in Boulder but I think our alleys downtown or lack a little bit and I think they could be cleaned up with you know people using them and that might be one way and we could do that up on the hill as well I'd love to see that but that would be one

[43:02] way maybe we can make more affordable space because it's not on the front right it's on the back I and I love the idea of locally owned businesses in our Cajun in our wraparound we shouldn't be running those two non-locals I did have a question I love the idea of incentives anything we can do to help our local businesses would be great I do have a question though about you know this whole history of from Boulder being boulder centric to now we have to share the pie right you know and so with other communities and I personally think that's a good thing because you want all those other communities to become much more self-contained and self-sufficient but I think people still like to go from Boulder to Lafayette to long line and

[44:02] there's this back and forth and so I'm wondering if if you guys have thought about working with the other business districts in Lafayette long Lions Lions is just hopping right now it's amazing and and are there other ways to coordinate or to collaborate in terms of how how can we work together to actually help you you know and and boost all of our economy so that you know anyway I'm just I think that would be really good and we should embrace that these other communities are becoming more self-sufficient and becoming their own communities but um that's that's it I think for right now and I guess I do share some of Cindy's sentiments about making there's a fine balance and I

[45:04] think it's not just downtown and it's not just retail but I think there's a lot of people from out of town that are coming in investing in properties and I think there's a lot of resentment by locals about that because it's really forcing jacking up the cost of living and a lot of these investment properties are second third fourth homes and I that's a subject for something else top it for another night but hey I'll agree with what's been said so far by Lisa and Cindy and I would just add to that too as we move forward with the analytics that as I understand it DB not TBI DB P is going to be looking at is to

[46:04] have a look at that other side of the psychographics the the employment side because one of the things that was mentioned in the report was that a lot of these businesses and interestingly enough I met with the vet Boden yesterday as she mentioned that parks is having a hard time finding employees so so that that piece of it is you can't have all these businesses if you don't have the employees so you have to keep that at the forefront so that's why I think it would be important to look at that other side of the psychographic plot I also think you mentioned Jennifer the criteria for available resources that you have available resources to revisit that criteria and make sure that that criteria is in line with what we want to be moving forward with and also in line with other community values as

[47:02] well right and let's see the other thing I noticed in the actions I think it was the staff actions there was a mention of providing bus passes for hotel clients and I would not support that bus passes for hotel visitors if you can afford a $300 a night hotel you can afford $2 to 60 cents to take the bus so yeah and I think that there are other folks that could use those buses more than a hotel visitor so I would not support that and you know and looking at the diversity of other businesses that could be added there is to look at the food carts I

[48:02] know that things like like the push carts were actually left off of the food truck ordinance so maybe consider adding that as as another option for a low-cost local business and that's all I have for now oh one more thing that I was just gonna put out there is as we move forward and DBP is focusing on looking at the actions and it would be I think really helpful to add some more lenses outside of DBP and just to have a little more input to to what the actions could be and you know I don't know the organization's maybe like bridge house say for example you know just a little bit more of a diversity in in deciding

[49:03] what those actions should be at least parts of what everyone has said here I I think I know that this was focused just on the retail and commercial corridor I think it's hard to have discussions like that that aren't contextual because other kinds of values that we've talked about downtown for a while that we've had mixed success and are getting more housing downtown you know to continue to both balance commercial and housing and I don't see much about housing here and I know again it's a retail study but I think for the city action plan it doesn't have to you know just lift from the retail study I'm gonna really emphasize what Mary said about data I think it's really interesting to know the answer to send these questions about where in town do people come from and where do they go to the other nodes and if we're trying to plan you know overall how do we serve our broad community well

[50:01] with our commercial spaces I think we need to know their motion patterns a little bit as well and when I talk about broadening I think of the downtown I don't think of I'm just going down to Pearl Street you know I'll end up in the Civic Center Park quite frequently and other people who visit here from out of town are going for Edmund G fine Park but they may pass through downtown on the way either in the car on foot and so I think it needs to be really contextual the way that we measure these things so when we get to the data I'm not really just interested in which visitors came from where to the mall I'd like to know more broadly how are people moving in downtown and in the other areas I loved the idea of having downtown Boulder partners being a master lessor and figure out how to you know select with different criteria how businesses are chosen right if your landlord you may

[51:01] just select based on who's gonna give you the most rent and you know what kind of business you want in your location because of that but if you are a semi nonprofit or I think our hook and to all this is the bid right we have a bid it's a pseudo governmental organization that gets six officio council members sitting on it I mean I think the bid it pretty integrated with downtown Boulder partners but I think that's a way that we the people can put our desires into that process so anyway those are my kind of big picture ones I also like the alleys so I just want to come back to those because I'm planning board once there was a building being put in and it was causing a fight between some people whom one building and people who wanted to expand another building and the people who wanted people looking differently than just a big blocky building did a whole like architectural

[52:01] rendering of the alley space there between walnut and Pearl and it was cool I mean it was a great presentation and it really kind of opened up thinking about it and so I think there's a lot we could do and we could go block by block it wouldn't have to be everything at once I think there's opportunities to do that and I guess the last thing is mmm you know I have been lucky to travel to a few different Colorado towns in the last few weeks on our break and one of them looks like Disneyland and I can tell you it's very unappealing not thinking things wrong with Disneyland please don't sue me but you know it becomes focused not on the heart of the activities of the town it becomes driving people from one commercial destination to another and that is just not a fully satisfying experience there's another Colorado town that has a five square block historic downtown and has really remained dedicated to that and I think I would

[53:01] like Boulder to continue on towards the historical whatever funky we can preserve by creating spaces for people and focus on making sure that people in Boulder also want to go there and it's not just tourists I just wanted to make a comment following up on the alley thoughts is that back in the day there was a lot of discussion around that and Cajon had fun a pot of money and whenever anyone redeveloped on the downtown alleys they had to put into it and take down those horrific transformers or whatever they are with the poles and which really made a difference in terms of being able to start to make something that looked a little more than just the place where people are dropping off and picking up stuff for the store that's on the front of the street but they might I'm well

[54:00] I'm not talking about Excel doing this but we might look at something like that as places to start I want just a couple more things out there and one of them is this idea of expanding the bid to include more of East Pearl maybe a little more of West Pearl I to me that there's some that's worth speaking about I also like looking at the downtown as a whole I'll note I'm gonna give you a little grief about the bank mark remark there are 22 a growing number of banks downtown whole corners beautiful corners rendered pretty much non used because of banks and it there's more and more happening all the time so I think we can do better so I do think the idea of looking nothing against banks but but I'm on the second story this idea of looking at downtown more as a whole in addition to the mall and also making sure we have

[55:01] lively uses on the first floor and we can do mixed-use upstairs you know office upstairs we do more housing upstairs but on the first floor instead of rising yet driving that working with the Downtown Partnership to make that happen but I do think that we should insist on that because it is creeping on all the side streets it's kind of towards the middle so anyhow I would throw that out there and I would also just note we looked at this a little bit on East Pearl but I'll just put it we you know making sure that our regulations our zoning is getting us what we want but I still think we haven't we haven't totally finished that for downtown and when we look at three at the used tables or whatever maybe it'll be the next council but stuff like the parking requirements on East Pearl it my understanding is that it really it limits the ability for what kind of retail or restaurant size you can get

[56:00] there and so again that's one thing especially in restricted monetary times that we have as tools is how do we incentivize and regulate things to get what we want so I do think as part of the vitality piece for downtown that we need to review existing regulations to help support what we want and and work each year we improve a little bit but we should there's more we could do there so I just throw that out there's there's other things we could look at I just wanted to pick up on two things one and Mary kind of referred to it but we have a whole bunch of employees downtown and and growing around and talking with some of them some of them worked quite late at night and and I get concerned about them in with respect to some of the parking and I think we really and I know Mary made some efforts but I think we

[57:02] could do a lot better at at fine identifying some parking that is not so far away for these employees or I don't know I mean I was talking to this one waitress and she was saying that they get their tips in cash so they're carrying a lot of money and that they she sometimes well a lot of times she'll wait for some other people and then they walk all the way down to the street parking where the where the courthouse is and me a little bit nervous you know and I just think that's that's taking a lot of risk and is there a way that we could I don't know open up some of these parking garages that are by the st. Julian or on 15th Street or something so

[58:01] that our employees that are working at night could maybe move their car and so it would be a little bit closer I mean we also have a parking lot that we own and I still haven't fully figured this out why we're not using it or maybe we're starting to use it and that is up at the hospital site and I'll just mention that that that should be used or available to our workers who have limited income and really don't have a lot of funds and a lot of these people are coming from outside of Boulder so well I I said something about stupid parking garages there there's a reason for some of those and and we need to make sure that our workers feel like they can come here feel like they can be safe feel like they're welcome that they don't have to put

[59:01] their life at risk when they go home at night so I think we could do a lot better in that and I don't know it's just in talking with people and then I'll just bring up the whole issue of housing and I know we didn't get a great opportunity on 11th and parole in my opinion where we could have had housing instead of a big giant building and I know the original people who had wanted to buy that property the old daily camera had had thought about putting housing on for the workers on second and third maybe fourth stories so I guess I'm just invoke Tom Eldridge here and you know he and I worked pretty hard to get housing the first point and I'm wondering if there's some more

[60:02] opportunities that it doesn't have to be 2 million dollar housing I'm talking about worker housing and I know people say oh that's downtime you can't do that to me it's a matter of a will you know if you want to do it you can do it and people used to live on the second floor above Pearl Street and I sometimes wonder what is going on on these second and third stories I think it's mostly just two stories but and I assume some of them are offices but if there's any way that we could incorporate some housing downtown that isn't giant and it isn't ridiculously expensive and is more suited for the employee I think it becomes a more vibrant place I am very concerned that at some point the people who come here to work are gonna say look you don't pay us enough and I can get

[61:01] these jobs it's the same thing I can get these same jobs in downtown Louisville downtown Lafayette and I have better quality of life I don't have to come into Boulder so I think it's a really strategic move as well as kind of one of equity and fairness okay we and then as soon as we any last thoughts on this and then we'll go to the next segment yeah so I'll agree with what Lisa just said and I think one of the reasons that we haven't been getting housing was the downtown density bonus for office space so just wanted to point that out and one thing I would like to get an update on is the nighttime pass and parking pass and how that's working out so that's one thing and then I wanted to just pick up on something that Sam said about not that

[62:01] there's anything wrong with Disneyland but to not create things that are like you're going here and now you're going to this next stop and now you're going to this next stop kind of thing where the kinds of businesses that happen are more kind of evolutionary and organic so that it doesn't feel that way and that's it I just want to say I also have heard complaints around about events and the number and where they happen so you know I know it's great for the city to have these events and some of them are beloved like to Boulder Boulder and becoming beloved like the triathalon but you know having them all cluster around downtown can lead to that fatigue not just on the mall but also you know if they're in the Civic space so is there a

[63:01] way we could host more of these City events where you know people want to be close to where people are going to come but they're in the other community centers so is there a way that we could think about doing something so that if we're gonna have the number that we're having and it seems to be growing that they not always be stirred around the same spot or have fewer events okay yeah all right and that leads right into the larger retail okay so as Susan mentioned earlier the comprehensive plan asked us to develop a retail strategy we are pursuing that in two ways one is the downtown of the we're pursuing it in two ways one is the downtown Boulder vibrancy study and the

[64:02] action plan that Jennifer previewed and the second way is with a citywide retail study what we're presenting here tonight is the purpose statement as well as the focus areas and we welcome your feedback on that the purpose of the study is to take proactive and strategic measures to ensure the city remains a sustainable community where residents workers and visitors of all income levels can meet their retail needs the study will also provide information critical to the development of a strategy enhancing bowlders retail performance and contribution to community quality of life staff recommends that the focus areas of the retail study follow closely the direction from the comprehensive plan to focus on emerging trends market opportunities in retail mix and improving the overall retail base community vitality staff coordinated with members of other city departments including Human Services Planning

[65:00] Housing and sustainability and community engagement to both test the to define the focus areas and to test the focus areas with community organizations such as ephah and the boulder Chamber of Commerce the first focus area is an examination of emerging trends looking at changing demographics and shifts in consumer and business behavior the information gathered during this phase of the study will form the basis and the assumptions of the ultimate retail strategy the second focus area aligns with council comments the April 24th study session to understand in what market segments Boulder may have an oversupply of retailers and where opportunities exist to capitalize on gaps and competitive advantages lastly the third focus area we'll explore in depth of physical retail base in Boulder the cost of operating a retail business in Boulder and what might be the city's role in strategically promoting retail development and targeted and or

[66:00] underserved locations including the federal opportunities owned east of 28th Street and north of Arapaho you can you just pause and tell us what that is a federal author uppity we actually have a map of it okay and if you want to see it but Jennifer would you like to well you could any you can wait till the map yeah the study will result in a set of strategic recommendations as well as a phasing and implementation plan it will clearly define which entities are responsible for each plan element and include recommendations for how to monitor performance with how we are achieving the retail strategy essential to the deliverables is a communications plan how to engage the public in developing the study and how to communicate the resulting vision to the broader community so starting off there's two questions one is does counsel agree with the proposed purpose statement and secondly discounsel have any revisions to the proposed focus

[67:01] areas and they're both reiterated on this slide would you like to go ahead to that yeah we're gonna have to go ahead a little bit so an opportunity zone is something that was just recently passed by the federal government back in like late 2017 and it's a way of really encouraging investment in distressed areas both whorl and urban and it goes by census tracts and census tracts are developed by the government and they're based on approximately 4,000 people so this is one of older census tracts and when this came out we talked to the state and they were talking about how they were they were looking at a number of opportunities and not just looking at rural areas but looking at urban areas as well including Boulder and so we

[68:02] looked at census tracts around the city and came up with this one as being something that we submitted for consideration and we ended up getting a designation they're still working on the rules for this so we're not quite sure what its gonna mean but we're certainly working on getting getting more information we chose this because of the diagonal Plaza is in here and there are another a number of other areas and we feel like this might be a tool that we could use for affordable commercial it may be something that could be used in affordable housing there a number of ways that this might be a useful tool and including when we look at the citywide retail strategy that's okay why don't you go back to the question then why don't we start with the purpose statement yep so okay the one thing I

[69:05] would just throw out there I'm sorry I'm just jumping in first here is to me that this is helpful but it is needs to be closely related to kind of some themes that you guys were talking about in terms of placemaking and our other community values that we are you know that we called out in a comp plan the it needs to be synergistic with us and we might want to have a conversation about are we serious about 15 minutes later hoods and what that means I know we have nodes around town we just talked about what if we had events that were in different nodes not all town and what does that look like so I guess to me that you know having a retail study that that tells us more about retails great but not out of context with these other goals which get

[70:02] at how we how we make good use of our land and create enhanced neighborhood character and those other pieces that are really essential yeah and I just want to add to that I mean I think if we're gonna have a purpose statement like this it should have a few more modifiers right so it's not just retail performance and contribution to community quality of life that's a phrase we can all project a whole bunch of things onto so I think I would like to see it have something about serving all different types of people and income levels so that we're you know expressly stating that we will consider those things as a key part of how we're doing it it's not just redeveloping a shopping mall of some kind so that it's got better amenities it is also about making sure that we don't displace say small businesses that might be there because in that census tract that you've got drawn there there are a whole bunch of funky small businesses right there's

[71:01] conscious coffee and there's just a whole lot of them if we just go through and do a wholesale redevelopment in there with some extra government funds I will notice to have our purpose statement call out wanting to retain opportunities for all different kinds of people and so anyway on the purpose statement I think it goes along with Suzanne but it's saying I know it's easier to focus if you just say retail but with that census block you drew and you mentioned affordable housing that's got way way way more I mean there's two major reasons and there's a shopping mall and then two major retail centers and a whole bunch of businesses so I would yeah I would say that would go along nicely with the sub community plan I would agree with Suzanne and Sam and you know I think that that again understanding that it's a retail study

[72:02] let's not let ourselves get too siloed and keeping in mind again that when you're thinking about retail retail generally creates low-wage jobs and we have a housing issue and how how do all those things play together and that's not lose sight of that because you know as was said in the in the retail city for downtown businesses are having a hard time finding workers so you can't lose sight of that reality and I would just tag on to these statements and say to be sure that the retail itself doesn't increase gentrification of older which is the the thing that that seems to be happening that I think is everyone's how do we stop this right so that it actually is a livable community for all of these groups of people that

[73:02] that everyone's been talking about here at the table any other I'll just say let's make sure that it is within folders values and that with all of this consumerism that we're careful about our waste and that may be a special effort is in this study is put into you know making sure that we're not generating a whole lot of materials that we don't want to see in the waste stream great thank you so Susan will circle back to next steps at the very end for all three parts of this but we're going to turn now to the comments made at the City Council meeting on June 5th wait a minute what was the second part of that question when they're two part sorry let's talk about the focus areas I think

[74:02] you have the three right there okay you can go back to each individual one yep it seems to me like some of the comments that you heard broadly about the purpose statement applied focus areas and you can figure out how to lay those out I would just make sure that you're also focused on the data because we like to ask about that and some of the questions Cindy asked I think would be great to know as if we know where people are coming from in neighborhoods to shop for food and we kind of generally get a sense right but if you get some metrics on it and you know that can form how you would redo it you know how big does it need to be should it have housing as part of it you know what what can you think of in those metrics don't inform just and form the developer about how they can also make a project that's gonna pay off better so during the site review during the site

[75:03] review yeah well and the part of this on retail since it's just one of the things that was said earlier was the side notion of authentic and experience is really important which to me gets back to place and sense of community and so I guess I guess I would not lose sight of that or I would underpin that because these are other goals that this retail should help not take away from those goals and so I guess I'm not sure how I'd word that but I do think that that's important and that's where thing yeah enough said but that's where it lines up with some other comp plan goals okay yeah I also think we need to do figure out the larger context the Supreme Court sales tax ruling kind of where the heck

[76:00] is retail going both nationally you know yeah we might as well figure out where the tides going and not fight that tide but ride the tide so I presume I think here is a place to bring in kind of both the placemaking that you mentioned but also the concentration on having a be responsible development as far as waste reduction and so on sorry anybody those bullets seem to fit improving it in what way and you mentioned before the commercial affordability but I think that that will be a part okay anything else on this okay sorry I jumped the gun earlier just emphasize again on the citywide retail study to make sure that when you look at those psychographics you're looking at both sides okay so the third part of our presentation is as I

[77:02] mentioned responding to comments from the June 5th City Council meeting and councils request that staff return as soon as possible with an update for the last four years since we've had the Hillary investment strategy we have been infrequent and consistent communication with Hill stakeholders including newsletters that go out once a month to anyone who provides an email address to the city we also have an in-person meeting with every business in the district every summer for the annual Hill Business Survey and we provide updates as needed whenever there are plans or policies that may affect their businesses tonight we'll report back on additional outreach that has taken place since that June 5th meeting and respect you know the outcomes of those meetings as well as how the landlord and the potential developer of the site have responded and we'll finish with next steps for what we'll do going forward some of the concerns expressed on June 5th were confusion with the timeline and

[78:01] notification requirements for the proposed hill hotel and public parking garage project potential language barriers that might contribute to that confusion obstacles to relocating into existing spaces on the hill such as rents types of spaces and market saturation and requests for city assistance to help offset relocation costs or higher rents for those that may be unfamiliar with the proposed project site it consists of four parcels located on the southwest corner of Broadway and University Avenue the to northern parcels make up what is known as the University Hill University Hill Plaza shopping center which houses 13 of the 15 active businesses on the project site including the three businesses that spoke at the city council meeting since June 5th the city has contacted all 15 active businesses on the site and in a reflection of the challenges faced by the businesses on

[79:01] the hill two of those businesses have actually closed since the drafting of the memo so if the math is a little different from the memo to this that's why seven in-person meetings have taken place so far including translation services in Nepalese Spanish and Vietnamese and we have an additional meeting scheduled for next week the city provided current listings for comparably affordable rents citywide as an example of what staff can provide again when and if the project moves forward staff also obtained detailed lease provisions from the landlord to help the tenants understand how the timing of the proposed project would impact them including information from the landlord that five leases extend beyond the proposed construction start date and all of those would include a hundred and eighty day notification requirement all the remaining tenants would be allowed to remain on a month-to-month lease

[80:01] until the anticipated construction start staff was also able to understand from these meetings that many tenants were unclear on the basics of the project the translators were a huge benefit towards this we were able to explain who owns the land who would benefit and why the city is considering participation a majority of the tenants we've met with so far expressed that they understood why it was necessary to redevelop the project and they pointed to the aging infrastructure of the building but they were mostly concerned about losing their student customer base that they have built up for many years in the course of the conversations many of the tenants also expressed anxiety over the unpredictability of the timing of the project the developer is also responded in two ways first they heard the tenants suggestion at the June 5th meeting to create smaller spaces that would be more affordable by virtue of being smaller they have agreed to incorporate multiple spaces of a

[81:00] thousand square feet or less and they also have agreed that they will engage a bolder broker to lease the spaces someone who's familiar with local independent retailers to reinforce that character of the hill I think the one other thing that people who spoke on June 5th brought up was that they thought and I don't know but that they thought that the developer was planning on bringing in franchises or national type venues and so at this point there are no leases signed for the building because the developer does not control the building so if a joint development agreement is adopted then the developer would take control of the property through a ground lease and they would then be in control of the leasing at this point leases are held by the property owners and no leases have been signed for the property and their

[82:00] intention is I heard mentioned in that meeting of TGI Fridays and other things none of that is under discussion you know no that way none of that is being discussed they are committed to having local and independent retailers working with the boulder broker next steps there have been some changes recently so we would plan on returning to Council on September 4th with a presentation on the hill hotel garage financials originally it was going to be the presentation of the joint development agreement for a public hearing but we felt that a lot of work has been done since the March fifteenth public presentation of the concept design and work has been done to reduce the costs of the project and the financials have shifted slightly so we would start with presenting that to Council and making sure that everyone understood the cost of the project with that said if the JTA is eventually

[83:01] approved that's when the developer would assume control of those leases and staff is committed to also beginning to work with the tenants and developer at that time to actively assist with the relocation planning I think we I have questions about timing good yep yeah my question is more about from a hundred thousand foot view this project has a huge component of the city involved right we're gonna build and operate a parking garage that is going to serve this hotel and be part of you know hopefully doing good for the businesses on the hill it seems like in those situations that are similar to land banking situations that we can take a different role than we would take it was just arms-length commercial meeting site plan review and being done so what came to my mind as I was hearing all this is I mean one of the major concerns is this displacement and it does not make me

[84:01] feel 100% confident that there's gonna be some boulder base broker making the choice of how to lease it out because they could have their own interests involved in one way or another I would like us to think about is there a creative third way that we could have a group which has some city people on some private people and Tom will have to help see if this is even possible but have a kind of a tenants association to make sure that these folks are local right and that if that's what we want you know whatever the tenants association decides and that rents are reasonable I just see this as being that's one of the key components of turn with this is displacing local neighborhood serving small businesses to put in a big swanky hotel that's gonna have TGI Fridays and snooze in it and it might be fine if it but that's something that I think the local community should decide I don't know if it's an outreach

[85:00] to this hill reinvestment working group that we've got going but I think we'll get a lot more traction if we're not simply trusting in the private market to make all the decisions we having some participation in that so not control it's not a city-owned deal but is there some way that we can form a group that's gonna give me more assurance that that particular problem may have a solution so that in a way is a question to Tom but it doesn't need to be answered right now necessarily and we're gonna can you just tell us where you are in your presentation that was the last slide okay so it's excellent so we're not okay how about in it Mary those last comment I just want to make is that in all those outreach meetings we have been taking very careful notes of what each tenant relocation needs are people have been very specific and very helpful the biggest request was just for

[86:01] financial assistance and trying to stay on the hill if they could I forgot what my initial question was but but in lieu of that question I'm just gonna support what Sam just said to try and think of a third way I know that when the Ponderosa mobile home park came before us we said several of us on council said we're not interested in any annexation if you have any dist displacement and staff came back with this amazing plan that we now have before us so I guess with that I would like to put the same challenge out there and I'm not interested in this hotel if it's going to if displacement is going to occur yeah I would just like to

[87:00] second what Mary said I think that this is a group of retailers who serve a very distinct population and who have been working hard to make it go so I would say also I'm not interested in this hotel if there's any displacement happening and even then there's some ifs because of the subsidies that we won't be giving yeah can you speak to this idea I mean we are the survivors right they've proven themselves and it seems like we would want to help preserve them and given that we have this major role we're playing and preserve they're transitioning and there's plenty of I don't know if there's plenty of vacant seats but there are vacancies on the hill now and I guess what are the odds can you talk a little bit about people said specific needs there are some vacancies some presumably could transition maybe a few would be appropriate to be in this swanky hotel

[88:02] to talk us through this what kind of legs is this idea have so there is a mix of potential opportunities I think we're trying to send the message that we don't know if the hotel is going forward so we don't want anyone to break their lease and suffer a financial penalty and that's the anxiety of not understanding the timing so as we sit down we do walk them through that there are some businesses that could definitely relocate within the hill historic core and we have eight to ten vacancies at any given time the challenge is matching them up one-to-one with the businesses making sure that those spaces fit their needs but there are spaces that would suit some of them there are two businesses that have already let us know they don't need to meet with me because they have already made their relocation plans so we're seeing a mixed bag of where people are in that process of planning I think the biggest concern is from that business that can't relocate on the hill because there are four other convenience

[89:02] stores for example and a convenience store maybe it could be a part of a hotel you know it depends on kind of the the way it could work but you know where is the best location for that business so we've been thinking creatively and looking citywide at these you know as we look at the citywide retail study where they're underserved retail locations where a convenience store would be a very welcomed business you know we have office parks we have places where people are getting in their car to go get a toothbrush in the middle of the day maybe they could just go to that store so we're trying to think really big picture about it and the timing of it with the citywide study is good that we're thinking about all these things and retail affordability but there are it's very specific to each business exactly what will work and what won't and then there would be the loss though of the convenience store to the Hill residence so there's party for work further up but

[90:00] you know just not to say right bovis has its own special coin right so I'm trying not to speak about one particular business using that as a case that it's really hard to even conceive of leaving a place that you've been for 10 years 15 years 12 years for yeah for that particular operator but but there are opportunities I think citywide that may work for some and we're trying to just work through each individual businesses case and what might be the best fit can you also just explain you had a timing thing that said so this in September with this comes before us if we're gonna have a public hearing on this if we say ok this is looking good let's proceed what is the timing aspect so that's what I've been going through yet with each of the owners so what we anticipate right

[91:02] now is if the JTA is approved that starts about an 18-month clock of getting into design approvals construction documents per and then the anticipated construction start would be after the 18 months but you had in there did the developer takes over leases right so the developer would start from what I understand they would take over the leases on the site because they would sign a ground lease and these are the specifics we can get into on September 4th so that everyone understands the details of this but they would then be able to negotiate with the tenants on that site right now they are actually they're reaching out a meeting with people but they aren't able to negotiate anything with the tenants because they are not the landlord so I think it's in the context of that maybe the September meeting we can add a little more thinking about what other structures could be because I see a structure that I would want to see lasts

[92:00] for a while I don't know be forever but like a tenants association so that during the transition the needs were kind of formally acknowledged by the city I mean I think we're doing a good job here I'm Sarah with your outreach so that's fantastic I think if there can be a little bit more teeth we have in the past done some joint development agreements where we did not get everything that we thought we were going to get and so this would be one where I would want to be more sure I remembered what my question was going to be on the at the September 4th meeting when you come forward with the whole financial picture if it could also be done in the context of all of the other certificates of participation that the city is currently involved in and I just want to say I agree with everything that's been said here tonight just to weigh in yeah

[93:02] because one fear I have is that were that if we're not careful I don't say nicely will strangle the hill while we're during this process of trying to do this project to bring new life to the hill and that would be a name dang shame so I guess trying to figure out this notion of let's since we are putting a lot of skin in this game one of our requirements could be hey the developer needs to commit to helping with relocation or ensuring no discipline I don't know how we can say no displacement cuz obviously physically people will be displaced but that concept of finding homes for those businesses so that's where I think we've made a lot of progress so it will be will report back on that as well at the September 4th meeting we good thank you

[94:10] with your helpful input we will now be diving into the various implementation opportunities that we've identified for the downtown retail and vibrancy study we will be with your input fleshing out a detailed scope of work for the citywide retail study schedule to share that with you in an IP in about a month and as Sara reported we'll be coming back to you in early September with more progress on the hill retailers thank you one more offhand remark that I was going to mention we got an email from snarfs about their consideration for one of our city-owned properties and I've already written to counsel about this today we

[95:02] had advertised this site and received 74 applications for potential retailers the staff did a really great job of creating some very specific criteria about the kind of business that would be appropriate they are focusing on local boulder businesses based on the criteria we've narrowed it down to six different retailers that have different concepts and we're gonna be preparing a report for council that hopefully you'll receive by the end of the week and which will give our recommendation and then give you a period of time to comment on it but the the email that you received from one of the six finalists is not the only finalist that exists and all of these applications are very compelling and they are all local and

[96:02] small businesses thank you for that clarification okay great Oh a real quick question on the on the kiosk it and that that's city-owned is that correct yeah and so they get a reduced kind of they're not getting they're gonna it's going to be market rate and what I'm gonna have Susan jump in and Jennifer jump even if I'm saying anything wrong but our goal here is with regard to the follow up on the downtown retail strategy and in the citywide strategy to be understanding based upon the work that we'll be doing in the next few years may be more appropriate ways to lease our space and so we have reduced the length of time for this lease to three years would and normally we offer longer leases and

[97:02] we're going to rent it at a market rate at this point and we aren't actually moving on the rate that we're gonna rent at because we want to focus on local boltor businesses that want to be there and then as we develop the studies that we're working on we possibly can come up with other criteria in the future for how we would release the space so we want to do our background work Before we jump in one direction or another and that's what we're offering only a three year lease without I think without a renewal without a renewal right that because we want to see what develops in the studies that we do it could turn out at the end of it that we love whichever one is selected and that we want to continue on that particular location in that way but we don't want to tie our hands we want flexibility would have an option if it was just successful what we'll see and we'll see yeah okay questions great

[98:05] hey thank you so much

[99:59] I'm sorry when he said we could start

[100:02] without her good evening mayor and council my name is Steve Quebec on the electric utility development director tonight we're here to discuss a very important aspect of our work plan as we move forward last fall we received direction from Council and certainly heard it from the community that they wanted us to increase the level of communication about our development of a locally owned electric utility we took that to heart and one of the first steps we undertook in order to do that was the formation of a energy future communications and engagement working group and the intent of that group was to help guide how best to communicate with the community and also what the community really wanted to learn and understand about our formation of a

[101:00] utility tonight we're here to discuss that working groups recommendations and the timing is actually very good we're in the process of identifying key components such as the cost of acquiring the utility what it's going to cost to separate the utilities from one system to two what our power supply potential is and also what it's going to cost to end up the utility so as we move forward with developing those facts the foundation that this working group has really laid for us it will be critical as we start to communicate all of that information to the community so with that I'm going to turn it over to Sarah Hundley and Emeli sandé of all to talk about the recommendations of the group and Patrick Kaiser Ling is also here and he and I will also be available to answer questions thank you Steve

[102:00] I'm Sarah Huntley Engagement Manager I'm joined here tonight by Emily sand of all who's a communications specialist who's been working on this project for a number of years together we're excited to I had no review of the working group process to talk a little bit how it about how it did its work in the process itself that have followed and most importantly to share some of its key recommendations after the presentation we have a few questions to guide counsels discussion the feedback we received this evening is very important to us because the recommendations from counsel and the working group together will form a key basis for us to create a strategic communications and engagement plan which we hope to have back out to the public and council within the next few weeks as you may recall we formed a communications and engagement working group at the direction of counsel this group of individuals was chosen to get a deeper sense of what the community needs in terms of understanding the issues around municipal ization we

[103:02] intentionally selected members who represented a wide range of views about the topics you may recall that we had quite a few applicants we ended up trying to winnow it down to a workable group size and we met by the end of the process had 17 volunteers who stuck with us and really participated in a meaningful way these volunteers also had a mix of familiarity with communications and engagement as a discipline so some of them were able to really lend some professional expertise while others provided valuable insight as community members themselves the group's work was supported by a facilitator who utilized a consensus seeking approach so that all members had a chance to provide feedback this was an incredibly collaborative process and for those of you who know how I feel about the levels of engagement you know I don't use collaborative as a light word but this was a process where the group really took ownership of the final outcome and

[104:00] its product the group has selected two members who can speak on its behalf tonight if you have any questions that you would like to get the perspective of the group on and just like to welcome them and thank them for their service we've got Carol Couder and Julie's Anheuser in the front row here thank you so now Emily's going to walk you through the process and some of the key findings Thanks so as Sarah mentioned that's really was a collaborative group from the very beginning and I just want to highlight two pieces of the process that demonstrate that collaborative nature the first was that in the first couple meetings they worked together to define the purpose the expectations and the roles for themselves and that's at the foundation that got this group off to a great start and I think made it a very effective process they also recognized the importance of seeking wider input this is a huge effort that if it happens will impact every single Boulder resident and every single builder business and so they sought the perspectives of a wider group and what they did was design a set of questions

[105:01] to ask other community members and each member of the group actually went out to interview two or three other members many of whom were strangers to them and many of whom actually held different viewpoints on this topic and the results of those interviews laid the foundation for the recommendations which are going to get into now so this list here represents one of the most exciting pieces of the group the group's report from my perspective it's what people want to know about this and this is rooted again in that interview process and so I think the costs and timeline more or less speak for themselves we know that those are what questions people have most of the time but the group picked up on some other topics as well for instance how the utility will be run there were a bunch of questions about you know ranging from what will my bill look like who was gonna run the utility where where were you higher alignment from those sorts of questions there were also questions that were more technical in nature so trying to

[106:01] understand what would the power supply mix of the utility be on day one how would the utility achieve some of the energy goals that we've laid out and finally there were a number of folks who are interested in some of the alternative strategies the city is either taking on in parallel to mean in civilization or might consider as an alternative again these are all key pieces that I think as communicators we'll be focusing on quite a bit between now and that 2020 vote that Steve mentioned so in addition to the research that the group did itself the group also rec knives that they needed to have a fair amount of education about what's been done in the past and what some of the complexities are of this issue so the group took on the question of what's been challenging about communicating and engaging around municipal ization head-on and they came up with some specific challenges that they think are very helpful both for people who have been involved in this process for a while as a reminder and also as we

[107:01] consider new innovative exciting ideas so I just want to quickly run through some of the tensions or challenges that they identified one of the things they said is that the potential creation of a local electric utility is a long-term goal so you have different people coming into the process with different sets of information some residents still know very little about this project others who know more might kind of be getting fatigued so we have to be able to strike the right balance between welcoming newcomers to the process and helping to continue to engage people who have long been longtime participants the topic is technical and complex which makes it more difficult to communicate about while many in Boulder agree that we need to address climate change we've seen over the last couple of years that there are disagreements among reasonable people about whether a local electric utility is the right solution or the only solution viewpoints differ about the role of city staff as visionaries versus providers of fact-based information in general civic discourse

[108:00] is very polarized so that poses its own challenges we know that if we create an electric utility they're going to be customers throughout our entire community so reaching all of them is important particularly our underrepresented communities who are going to be significant stakeholders but there are challenges associated with that lastly this project requires significant resources across a lot of fronts and some may question spending related to communications or engagement especially if they see it as spin or public relations so from the information that they gleaned both from their own experiences with this project and the experiences of others and after taking into account the challenges the group worked together to find common ground about the attributes or outcomes they'd like to see during the next phase of communications and engagement as we know we're anticipating having an election between in 2020 and so we know we have about 18 months to really have a robust period of

[109:02] communications and engagement and these are the attributes they believe will be important if we're going to say that at the end of that process we were successful the first is inclusivity the group felt strongly that we need to involve a diverse set of audiences including people who might typically not interact with city projects for a variety of reasons the second alluding to the challenge they talked about about the different views on the role of the city they said it was important for the city to balance visionary communication and objective communication they even suggested the use of possible labels to differentiate the type of communications were participating in so for example if we're sharing the city's vision we could say this is a vision statement if we're sharing a consultants report analyzing a couple of different possibilities we might frame that as analysis and then of course one of the roles staff often has at the end of these types of engagement and analysis periods is to make a recommendation so we would have to be

[110:02] clear if we were making a staff recommendation so people at least knew what to expect when they read the information or heard the information that was being presented to them the next attribute they talked about is transparency the group did generally feel like after 9 years of working on this project there's a lot of information available to the public but it can be difficult to find and staff actually concurs with that we occasionally have difficulty finding some of that information the group recommended that the city update its website and and provide brief digests for long documents as counsel well knows many of the memos on this project had been hundreds of pages long and it would be helpful for members of the community to be able to get a sense of what they're diving into before they look at a memo that's maybe marked only by the date the group also said it was important to be upfront about uncertainties and disagreements they briefly discussed a technique the city has been using on this project on its frequently asked question page

[111:02] acknowledging when there's disagreements about so for example under the cost section for energy future some members of the community would like us to include some additional cost that they think are pertinent to this project to give people a sense of the scope of the project so the city has provided its accounting of the costs based on how we typically frame costs for a project but then we have a question underneath it that says why have I heard a larger number and the city has explained what that larger number is about and who's adding or how people are adding additional aspects in so the group felt like that goes a long way towards increasing credibility and clearing up any confusion there might be in the community lastly on the issue of transparency they felt very strongly that we need to be more clear in the future about periods where we might have more limited communications whether it's because of litigation and ongoing regulatory actions where a decision is being made by a body of people or because of an upcoming election the next

[112:03] attribute as as Emily alluded to there's lots of questions about okay I understand the goal and the vision but how would this utility function so there's a real thirst for substantive information the project team is going to be working on creating a lot of that information they want the input from the community members when we can have such input available and they also it's going to be important for communications to then share that operations plan with the community one of the key questions under substantive I'll just mention is is how and when would a city utility be different from Xcel Energy and that's a key question that would have to be covered in that operations plan the next attribute I think is fairly self-evident they really supported the idea of timely place-based communications and encouraged the city to make information digestible and make it available in

[113:01] other languages than just English whenever possible they also talked about the value of having a mix of in-person and online opportunities so that's the multi-faceted aspect the last desired outcome is one that the group really developed on its own and had some very interesting conversation about through its dialogue the working group really developed a new appreciation for the power of shared learning around this topic some members pointed out that if the city begins providing electricity we are offering the potential for customers to interact with their utility in a whole new way and it would be really valuable for the city to begin to model what this new form of engagement could look like so people would be prepared to be active and engaged customers they also said even if we don't end up operating utility and the community votes against that in 2020 some of the capacity-building that we can do during this process will help other difficult decisions in the future and help our

[114:00] community be more engaged and more able to participate in controversial and complex topics and discussions so building off of those desired attributes of successful communications and engagement the group also drove in to creating a really robust list of possible techniques we could take on in attachment a you'll see it's almost three pages of possible techniques tonight we've boiled it down to a few just to discuss with you tonight some of which sarah has already mentioned I want to also mention that we have organized this slightly differently than the group has stealing directly from Sarah's engagement framework we've got the engagement spectrum here and for them to collaborate and I'll just expand on a few of these like Sarah mentioned the website refresh the group totally appreciates this as our centerpiece for communications but wants to remind us to optimize it for today's web user so making content brief and visual and engaging and make sure that it's updated

[115:00] timely and condensing that 9 years of information into something that is really usable for the web user I can still access a little document yes exactly that's the crazy you still have that is the challenge yeah so I want to jump to this idea of the election guide it's something the bolder energy future team has done in previous election years we've pushed out information about what will be on the ballot and some of the key project miles stones that we've achieved to date the working group had this interesting idea to kind of figure out a way to make this a more engaging process they asked questions like would it be possible to make this may give a set of community members the ability to perhaps submit some content for that election guide which is a new approach that we haven't taken on before like Sara mentioned they wanted to focus on both in person and online engagement and we're excited about the potential of our online platform be heard bolder but again

[116:02] appreciated in-person engagement as well and those are represented in the last three bullets those represent an opportunity according to the group to both have the communities began to shape some of the utilities so thinking about policies and programs what engagement can we do around that and starting soon as well as an opportunity to talk about other alternative strategies to reach our energy goals how do we bring folks who have different perspectives into a collaborative community dialogue and potentially help heal some of the perceived community divided on this issue and with that Sierra's going to talk about how we use all those information so as the working group comes to its end we are definitely spending a lot of time analyzing their report staff intends to incorporate feedback we receive this evening from Council and then we'll be working on a communications and engagement plan as I mentioned we are hopeful to have that plan out to the public into Council by

[117:02] the end of August because we feel like we have a lot of work to do we want to get started on implementing some of the suggestions I would like to mention that staff really has attempted to make improvements to communications engagement along the way as well the frequent updates that Steve cat nack and Tom Carr had been providing had been very well received as an example of something that we're trying differently so we didn't just simply sit back and wait for this group we wanted to initiate some change and then get the insights of our community members and so as companions those have worked really well for us we hope to have the plan made available through an information packet and again we'd like to have it by the end of August we do think there will be certain areas from this report that will definitely make it into the final plan as we said we were very pleased with this process and with the outcome of the group the information needs will likely frame our key communication goals what information do we need to share our desired outcomes

[118:01] will probably become guiding principles or what the values are that will guide our work as the city as we continue to communicate about this project and lastly if the techniques will be evaluated by staff based on resources and other factors the working group fully acknowledged that they came up with a lengthy list of ideas some of them are things we've been doing but they had nuances or ideas on how to enhance that others are new approaches and we have to balance that with staff resources community's ability to participate and not get too fatigued and all of that so we'll be trying to look at that through a strategic lens will then include all that information and the communications plan so that was our presentation we have three specific questions we also of course want to open up the floor to any thoughts or feedback council has more generally on the process of the report I thought maybe I just quickly say the three pieces of three questions that we're really looking for feedback on and then I'll hand it over to the mayor to decide how

[119:01] you best would like to have that that conversation flow so one of the questions is does City Council have items to lit to add to the list of information needs and we've because you might not remember from several slides ago we put those the list the existing list up on that slide for you to look at the second question is does Council have feedback regarding how staff might address some of the challenges the working group identified and again we've put a little reminder there what those were and lastly just council have feedback about the working groups desired outcomes and potential techniques so mayor Jones I don't know if you would prefer to just let people make comments thinking of these three questions or if you'd like to go through them question by question whatever's the preferences of council I think question by question I guess maybe can we pause and hear from our working group members briefly does that work you guys want to come up and there's plenty of room just join the

[120:00] group you don't have to displace squeeze I guess do you have anything you'd like to add so my name is julissa ionizer and I was I really enjoyed working on the group and particularly because I worked with people who have polar opposite views and we found common ground it was very it was very interesting really surprising actually so that that would be the first thing I would like to acknowledge that from my point of view how much work staff did to kind of gel the information that the group generated and kind of keep us on track that main thing I'd like to say can I ask you one question about what you thought was a secret sauce having participated in many groups with polar opposite they don't always come together I think well at the very beginning there was a request for

[121:02] people to commit to working collaboratively and it was pretty much if you don't want to do that don't be here it was not like you can be here and be a grouch or not not go along with the group it was was it felt like it was this is a primary agreement you're gonna make and I felt that people pretty much did I think I'll add to that I'm Carole counter-ied loved being a part of this group it was a really gratifying process and it's great to see it all still down very nicely here but it was medicinal with its own municipality we didn't actually that wasn't on the table like that wasn't and we were constantly reminded like we're not talking about that we're talking about how we communicate all these issues so we have that common focus that sort of put aside our personal views because we have this common goal of yeah we all want communication to be better about these things in the future so excellent in

[122:03] equal well thank you for doing that I think actually modeling the kind of civil discourse we're trying to achieve it's really important so appreciate your time doing that the people of other questions I don't have questions so much as comments I would just like to say I thought the work was excellent I mean it was really wonderful to see how the group came together and my any contribution for me would be to be specific and transparent which it seems that you are achieving in terms of doing that and that the piece Sara talked about the group and concluded successful what successful communications and engagement contains the being inclusive transparent substantive accessible and multifaceted I mean it seems that you really honed it down and got to it and also I specifically like this piece

[123:02] about sharing a credible set of facts that voters can consider prior to the elections and that the group advocated that the part of this guide pro and con statements be developed by community members as opposed to the city I think that's really important so you know that just it was in addition to the city so it was a supplement I think then it would be in it and it does not like the voter guide but it was it yeah yeah is it not I don't think that that my impression was what is the planet but to be part of it to be to be included but not to be the whole thing right excellent I just think that that's a really great idea that people need to hear from persons in the community as well as from the staff mm-hmm just get more credible so you you guys hang around we might have more questions thoughts and so don't go anyway but we're gonna answer starting with

[124:00] question one okay information needs yeah so I'll probably have a lot of bullet points to throw in here just having worked on this a little bit one of the things that you know this was from the perspective of what questions do people ask coming in to it when they don't know a ton about it right they're asking cost and time line and I agree with all of those but there are some things that most people don't even know to ask about a power system one of those being for example reliability and so I think one of when I look at information needs I want to think about okay what are the common questions going to be and then what are some of the uncommon pieces of information that could be given to people that might change their thinking one way or another and so I wrote down a few of the merit and reliability as it's just typically thought of you know does the tree line come down on it and the snowstorm and take my power out but

[125:02] there's also the resilience component you know the kind of the new like did you Egret can we island neighborhoods you know hospitals already have to do this but are there other non-critical structures that could do that and that's something that I think is an emerging kind of power discussion the other is obviously the power mix you know I think that's a key component and I that might really be part of technical information the way you have it up here but I think that's critical for everybody it's like how fast are we going to get there and when's it going to look a lot different than in Excel if ever and then the last piece like that is alternative business models you know the ability to make local decisions to manage your system differently than typical investor owned utilities are managed and so those were four things that came to mind on this slide I'm sure you talked about some or all of those but at least a few of them

[126:02] I didn't need to be thought of as not just what are the questions people will first ask but as they have a conversation with someone more knowledgeable what might they end up talking about so that was my thoughts for this one I might also add the a lot of discussions out there about well under technical information alternative strategies those are so broad that it's hard to remember what those mean but so I just wanna make sure included in that is we have pursued multiple strategies and are pursuing them and so I think that's what's under alternative strategies there's also separate different other cities are looking at different strategies too including some with Excel there's a lot of discussion about like what is Denver's plan and what kind of deal did they get from Excel and is there T's to that and so I guess I would include that as well but that's different but one

[127:01] could consider that an alternative strategy so anyhow I just want to make sure those elements are captured you know because the other thing is just to put in as things are evolving all right and so updating that with you know we may have a new we will have a new legislature and a new governor and then a new PUC and yeah so keeping current with that I think will also help with credibility yeah yeah I was just gonna say you could include Minneapolis that's an example of brokering a deal with Excel and it's out them and then the other thing which I know I'm sure you've talked about is the idea that there are certain strategies that would be great but we can't do under the current system current regulatory I think keeping that on the table this is part of the discussion is the limitations and also the possibilities and then finally this

[128:02] notion I think there's been put out there that this idea that somehow we've been standing still and we have I don't think we have but how we've been doing a lot and so I think talking about what has been accomplished to date on renewable energy on an energy efficiency and that sort of stuff is also relevant and important and I agree with that I was gonna say think some of those can be on the next slide as well because if we look at the next slide it's something about challenges right and so like how's the conversation down that's gotten us into a corner and I think sometimes you you break that that deadlock by talking about what you can and can't do legally right so what is controlled at the state level and has been really hard to do what the Public Utilities Commission you know how it works I don't think most people want to know that but it is the kind of thing where if you can briefly

[129:01] say you know these decisions are controlled at the state level in a broad sense not the PUC in a narrow sense and it doesn't allow the discussions to proceed in the same way they would in the Municipal Utility whether that's good or bad you don't have to say but it's it's a distinction that you can make I think another challenge that I didn't see here but I think we want to hit head-on is what has happened legally like legitimately what has happened and what hasn't we haven't won every fight but we've won some really important outcomes that didn't get quite the headlines that the losses did but it's still important I believe for us to say there's a PUC ruling then the PUC rouen stipulates that these agreements will happen and so that is a place we had never been before that happened so I kind of feel like here that legal component is really big both where the decisions are made in the

[130:01] absence of having one and then you know what's been our scorecard so far you know as far as wins and losses and why because we still have you know there's still an outstanding scorecard where we're being challenged for the formation of the utility well if we lost that it might not be the end of the world as far as making a utility and so I think it helps people who want to follow the progress understand it better if there's some kind of interpretation I don't know if that's the city's job to do I mean Tom will read us a memo and say you know here the outcomes and we just share that publicly could I just piggyback on piggyback onto that this is and that's the transparency and I'll given it just as an example it says this is in the background here it's talking about things being quiet or not much information coming forward this feedback followed a period of less frequent

[131:01] communications and limited engagement about the project and if it went on to say because of ongoing legal issues between the city and I think we need to be as transparent as possible and giving explanatory reasons for things rather than pulling back keeping them short specific back to number one we said we'll start haven't moved to number two right no I just one of the things that I didn't see talked about that I think would be useful especially in terms of Sara mentioned the the newcomers you know how do you balance the newcomers with the people that are already seeing fatigue around the project a glossary just a simple glossary of terms somewhere in the website somewhere so that people you know so that kind of thing and then again with respect to

[132:01] welcoming newcomers and and reaching a diverse set of community members is how does it affect you personally and we talked a lot about climate change and we talked about carbon emissions but how is this going to affect you personally so that that's how people engage with something so if we can distill it into something that's visceral I think it will engage more people I think that's a great comment and I would also note this idea of short term and long term this notion of how will this affect me and my race tomorrow how is this going to affect the city over the next 50 years and my grandkids can live here you know that you know that that these decisions have big ramifications both and then your term ends in the long term I think that was part of the reason for the thirst around some substantive information people are looking for

[133:01] concrete like okay well what kind of cool programs could we participate in if we have this utility you know would I still be able to use the PVD that I put on my roof they want concrete information because it then becomes more real to people and easier for them to see how the impact would be for them and their families because I agree that's a key motivation for engagement anything on this slide okay if we go to to the one thing that I get someone to piggyback on what Sam said is explaining the costs are impermissible especially when people are lobbying sort of snarky things back and forth about how totally wrong or this is totally wrong it it's impossible so I think the person that isn't know it doesn't know what's going on to access that so I do think this notion of agreed-upon facts about costs with thee and some people think this and some people think that about this set if you know I think that's hopeful and I

[134:01] also think sort of the legal flow sheet flow chart we found this this is what happened some people think this some people think that we did this you know I think there's some things that are agreed upon that are just facts and we shouldn't shy away from stating the facts there are some things that are open to interpretation and I think we should be able to clearly discern the difference and those are the ones where you do a poll in a corner whatever you don't have to do and everything some facts are not disputed nor should they be I'm just gonna add on really like your idea about making the costs accessible because 200 million dollars doesn't you gotta have some context for that and so what it would mean as far as an annual cost to you know any end user so if separation costs and all in start-up costs are here your bill would be this compared to what it is today and if they were here where

[135:02] somebody else thinks they should be that's what the outcome would be then your bill will be here and compared to what it is now and so that gives them a range that's in the you know $5 a month so that they can think about that okay is this the possible upside worth the $5 a month risk or whatever so I think you hit the nail on the head but it's some weight - same with Mary you know some way to bring it down - what will the impact be that I'm gonna be taxed for and I think given these challenges the better we can do this the sooner before the ridiculousness of elections kick in the better so this inevitably it's dry and city staff scrambling because I have to go silent in August and that's just the worst time to be doing anything so to me

[136:01] all of this stuff should be to be done in the spring you know way before the election so it's a build up so that when things go silent it's for the city staff it's nothing misses a beat because the city the populace is already engaged and then the pro/con and then the you know all that stuff can take over but everybody's operating from an elevated set of facts and capacity I guess okay do we have any more challenges we want to point out could I make a comment yeah I think one of the things the group acknowledged and Carol can corroborate this or not was that we don't want to wait too much longer I know that you've got the election coming but we had a giant black hole when we had the legal proceedings last year and people came up with their own

[137:01] conclusions about why there was no information and they made assumptions and so I I wouldn't want to wait I mean I think the group would want to i if I'm reflecting from the group to you know there are some timelines that mr. kanack has developed and there are some there is some information is my impression that's available and so trying to make what is known available sooner what is don't wait and for sure don't get caught up in a year and a half from now selection yeah yeah yeah I totally agree with that yeah okay okay so everybody's like tomorrow already yesterday yesterday yeah and if I may add to that that was

[138:00] certainly our plan there's information that we have but also there's the activity that we're undertaking that it's important it's important for people to know what we're doing today in order to inform them in 2020 good anything else on it three let's just tap desired outcomes first the you already spoke to what those seemed right on there yeah right on the money are there any ones to add yeah I think to the extent that we can build common ground up until the point we disagree that that would be a desired outcome like I think most people in this city I agree on the vision or at least

[139:01] portions of the vision and then it's just what's the best way to get there and I think the more we can reinforce the common ground the better off we'll be okay potential techniques yeah so I had a few thoughts here you know one of them was Steve Kath knack used to run the municipal utility in Fort Collins wouldn't it be interesting to bring down the current head of the Fort Collins municipal utility and talk about how you know I asked this question of some four columns folks have nationally de cities what role did having a electric utility play in your broadband or not right and just have them be a speaker series where they present 20 minutes on something and then they answer questions from the audience and you could have speakers from I think Longmont and Fort Collins

[140:00] but you could have Excel send a speaker and you know it would just be a series of speakers and you're giving people the opportunity to learn facts and ask questions of experts you know people who have run these systems and seen the pros and the cons and can tell you what the con will be for 15 years you know how hard was it for a long long to break free from Excel in the 1920s they had to pay and then it got better for them and so I there once was a historian who did a talk to see you about long long history of municipal Eisen who's fascinating the paper headlines looked just like the paper headlines involved at the time so anyway I was gonna suggest a speaker series and one there's the functional speakers who I think can get people reassurance that this isn't rocket science that you know a few facts 15% of every of the US populations under a Municipal Utility name is ten but their rates are

[141:01] 15% Larry just some facts and so but have those facts come with people who can answer the questions on the fly because they have command and the other is one of the main reasons we talk about doing this is because of climate change obviously and so there's a lot of work coming out about the philosophy of dealing with climate change it's from as simple as your solutions have to be additional you know in other words yrx brokers problematic well because not all recs are created equal and so having some discussion about that from people who don't even know where the rec broker is right there in the room and and somebody talks about this component of climate change solutions and then there's obviously the energy mix looking at current solutions and emerging solutions and then there's this great website I just want to promote the heck out of called drawdown org and it's taken some of the leading couple hundred academics and had them come up with and

[142:01] analyze the top 80 climate solutions available to the planet and it's shocking what's up and what's not you know food waste is high and wind power is just after that so you know transition to a certain level so I just think there's a whole bunch of you know opportunity to engage the people who you know both opponents and proponents and undecided I think all of those folks would legitimately like to hear good information could I say something not about the content of what you said but about the fact that it's just been so hard to get to more than a certain number of people or a certain group and so that when every speaker series are available or whatnot they need to be videotaped they need you need to be able to YouTube them anybody can go when they feel like it

[143:00] Milla Knight middle of morning so that would been what we're about to get out there and so just wanted to throw that out yeah I mean chopping up a talk into two minute sections yeah it's exactly right yeah well I also think to challenge we end up with the same 150 people going to all the other things and I guess to I don't know whether we need to take it on the road and have a you know a few pro con people who are can civilly debate approaches go on to and go speak at the rotary and go speak at the chamber and go speak to go out to folks who need to a whole lot of other audience carts or the big churches whatever whatever it is to engage people that would normally pay attention I

[144:01] really think we need to do that because what we want to do is penetrate beyond the people that are really engaged to the people that are interested but not engaged and I think we want to think really creatively about how to do that again before the election yep no I think I think the idea of debating and getting it out there I think that would also be a really great video again to Julie's point about having it be available on demand basically whenever people have the time to watch it I think is a real important piece of it and the other thing I was going to mention in terms of you know techniques there's always the use of analogy that brings things to to real understanding there's this really great video that I've actually done hotline a couple of times that explains how table and Gallagher crash and it does it in a really graphic and simple

[145:02] manner and for about the next two minutes after I watch it I understand it and then but something that is graphic and engaging and it's not two talking heads debating which i think is useful for some folks but I think again getting down to you know the visceral piece where you're trying to engage new people why does this matter to you and to do it in a graphical fun manner would be I think helpful I guess we should not keep going on this too long but the other ways to accomplish something like that is to also engage you know I carried on the Civic area plan we got the kids involved we got CLC a business school come down and they did a class project on different models for developing each book and we I mean we kind of really you

[146:03] know we did the video flyover we tried to access people in so many different ways and deliberately engage different audiences and actually presenting their ideas and I know this is a little different but I do think the more we can engage like see you there should be some Cu classes that are actively engaged in this civil discourse or make a cartoon that explains what they think are the key elements or you know like and yeah we just need to engage people in more of these mental forms and the creative part of that the interesting part I'll just add in the interviews that we did it seemed to be a common theme that people were kind of interested and felt like they should know more and almost felt bad for not knowing more about the issue than they do but then like I'm not going to some meeting at 6 o'clock I have kids or you know that kind of thing so all of that just spoke to what we're talking about now about and we didn't even come

[147:02] up with the idea of like going to things like the Rotary clubs or churches or you but somewhere that they will already be like the farmers market was one that we did come up with but okay well that's a part of this I think is that we don't have to you know you're gonna do this report in August but it's not like okay we better have thought of every technique by then right right you know what they say about best laid plans they have to be nimble and flexible okay any other thoughts last comments I just say you know it's kind of I know this working group has been working on this stuff since November but I think it's important to get this issue back center stage into the communities dialog and it's kind of absent right now and I know everybody's been busy but it needs to be more in

[148:02] front of people I think I agree the memo said something about remind people that something really important is happening I think that's true and it kind of leading up to our big decision in 2020 whatever that is right I mean for lack of it I don't know just so that we have an endpoint at which people need to be prepared for right where they're going to be asked to make an important choice yeah I think really framing it around that election you asked about the secret sauce and I definitely think that the feedback Julie gave about being very clear that this was going to be a collaborative process and you're agreeing to that from the get-go but the other thing that I think helped bring people with different viewpoints together is that there is going to be a community decision and that everybody who has a viewpoint on this will be invited to participate in the voting booth process and so I think even people who have been skeptical or opposed to

[149:02] this project feel as if this next 18 months will be very critical as well so there was some some common ground and appreciation around that and I think that also sort of helped soothe any sort of adversarial nature because we're so far away from the election I think as we move closer to the election you're right we'll get into some of that craziness and we want to far ahead of that if we can I think you know and it's good I think if people remember I don't know if it was 2011 or 2012 maybe it was 13 I'm trying to think when I went to nice but there was this really cool video that we had made and it was this child in a star t-shirt with the cape on it and when you watched that video and I presented it when I went to smart cities in France in Nice people

[150:00] were really excited about it there was just a certain rhythm in that video that was very exciting and it just made you go wow we can really do this and and I know we were gonna have a discussion and stuff but I wouldn't lose the excitement of what we're trying to achieve and in our message and so I think we could go a long way with starting off with some kind of a video that kind of explains things and gets people on board and excited and I gotta go find out more about that because I'm gonna have to make a decision but anyway that was a really cool video in that videos now five years old or so right I just want to make it better comment here not about the subject of the working group but this working group seemed to work really

[151:01] well and we're you know trying to convene working groups regularly now and we'll be having discussion with another working group here in just a little bit so I think one thing that would be good would be to debrief the lessons learned like that agreement thing because working groups generally have a few different perspectives on things and so if we can kind of regularize that process because we have this nice public process and that we put together and now we've seen a few work since we've developed that kind of philosophy so it sounds like you guys did great you we did talk about doing that wouldn't that be interesting up on our website we had our different here's how this one worked here's on this one one oh yeah we did say we were gonna try to do that I know you is that the thinking okay you is the is the working group not going to review the product that comes

[152:01] out it will certainly share it with you can see the results of their work in the final plan we also have developed really great relationships with many a members of this group will offer to be a sounding board to us as individuals when we need on both sides of the issue and so will certainly be leveraging those valuable relationships one last thing I would just say is is building off of what Lisa said about the kid in the Cape you guys noticed the difference between balancing vision and objectivity and I think that's a wise statement and the city is allowed to be visionary and inspiring around these goals and indeed should be and not a bash it about that duly noted thank you yeah okay well we good on this

[153:02] thank you very much service yeah so but see it work yeah okay working groups are yes number three there this is the democracy and this is what democracy looks like yeah okay and our third topic and final topic for tonight is the marijuana working why is it called map Advisory Panel okay it's not a working group an advisory panel yeah okay okay we hand it over to you guys I think

[154:07] we should offer an incentive prize for anybody who get the hvac to actually be comfortable in this building it is an eco cycle because of their work too well so it feels right I'll go ahead and start talking gotta grab the mic I'm Kathy haddock from the City Attorney's Office and with me is Michonne cook I'll let her tell you her title Sean cook Licensing Manager with the finance department of the city of Boulder tonight we get to tell you about the mapped fulfillment of the 2016 Charter that you gave to them that was amended for 2017 and just to let you know at

[155:00] Sandra Yanis in our office that actually advised map I advised on marijuana enforcement and all those types of issues but she's on vacation so I got the good straw right the thank you the marijuana panel here are their names but first I have to thank them they really did an incredible amount of work it was an enormous effort and it took a lot of time by all of these members and staff the meetings that we had over the past year which there were over 15 of them were three to four hours long with lots of materials done between meetings by staff that the members had to review and there were also several subcommittees that were formed also a few people were invaluable particularly Kate Thompson in reading through the code changes to make sure that we have so I just have to give my real thanks to them counsel originally determined to

[156:01] regulate marijuana like alcohol and prevent negative impact on other businesses and residents at this stage marijuana businesses and Boulder is a mature and successful industry and the businesses are experienced and high-quality and I think we can say we're very proud of them the Charter originally was formed because marijuana businesses were coming directly to counsel requesting changes to city regulations and council wanted a more more input before things actually got to them so the council and the city manager assembled a group of various interests that to give community input and staff research and to request two changes before they came to council this is the direction that was in the original map Charter that at the time there were some perceptions that the differences between city and state law were a bad thing I think that what everybody came to

[157:00] understand is that the city and state laws regulate different things and so there's a purpose and necessity for them both but that we did have to constantly look at as things change in the state law or the city law so that we weren't making marijuana businesses do one thing when the state was making them do something else and exactly the same thing an example is labeling of marijuana products the state didn't license or didn't give instructions for how to do labeling of marijuana products I believe it was until 2016 so Boulder had it in its code and Kelvin and when the state adopted labeling requirements we just took it out of our code another emphasis in that Charter was to balance the desires of marijuana businesses with the effect on others particularly youth the results were pretty astounding there were 30 35 recommended concha code changes that were reached by consensus of the of map

[158:01] no one got everything they wanted but all of the issues were addressed and the consensus on the issues that could be reached was reached and adopted by council the exception of the title nine changes and these are the changes that would increase the size and number of businesses by making changes to zoning density size of businesses those types of thing the marijuana panel and chamber sent it to you again today did a letter outlining the request that they wanted for that it's a pretty labor-intensive thing for the Planning Department it's been on proposals to be on the work plan for planning in 2017 but in 2018 but council has not done that yet Kathy could you clarify that letter came from everybody it was a consensus letter the attachment to the chamber letter was what was the that I guess is everybody saying hey council you should do title nine stuff in that

[159:02] so they were asking for it to be looked at yes good and they do I mean we did explain the Planning has only 20% other than regular stuff and that you guys have a few priorities for council so the and then in 2017 there wasn't a city manager had us do two more meetings to one check to see if there are unintended consequences that came from the 2016 changes that we wanted to tweak and to to see whether there were any changes at the state level that we wanted to address we expected the state to a deal with things like social clubs and they were not able to come to an agreement so we expected it to be a big legislative session and it wasn't but the were suggested changes by city staff and marijuana businesses that came into 20 consensus recommendations and you have adopted those map gave recommendations for future addition for future work in

[160:01] addition to the title nine changes one with social clubs but the group decided we don't want to invent the wheel we want the state to do it first and then the city should look at it and then Public Safety and community health is a big issue advertising and youth exposure is the area of greatest concern for representative schools and health and the subcommittee made recommendations to amplify the state programs and deal with impaired driving the staff made there's several initiatives that came out of this from staff that we noticed that we needed to do more the first is quarterly meetings with all the marijuana businesses we had done this piratical ii as there were code changes or something changed where we were getting a lot of the same questions and I shouldn't say we because Michonne organizes all this with other staff people and I only come in infrequently but now they have made them quarterly to

[161:02] make sure that there's an ongoing time for the businesses and the city staff to talk because there's a lot of issues that have to do just with those two people they're not things that have an effect on the community but they have a big effect on the businesses or a big effect on the city's enforcement so Kathy can I just ask do so all of these businesses come together quarterly they're all invited for sure we have a routing email blast group of about a 150 email addresses and all of them are informed of when the quarterly meeting wit will be when it is you know where it is we usually hold them in chambers and these are just the businesses this doesn't include like PTSD or boulder county health or see you or he actually include anybody that he's requested to have their email on blast group so it's

[162:01] primarily businesses and also the chamber okay and how many people generally attend if it's full I mean last time there probably were maybe 55 people in attendance before the one immediately before probably the first quarter of this year we probably add 90 95 people come so it's well-attended so the other thing that we did is adopt a form for people to suggest code changes that ask for you know the effect on the public the effect on other people and we adapted this from a form the state uses for people to make recommendations to the liquor laws the other thing we did is that I think most of you know that the biggest complaint we get about marijuana is the odor complaints that come from marijuana businesses particularly grows they were being reported through the police department through the building department through licensing so created

[163:00] a centralized place for odor complaints to be made and then the marijuana enforcement team reviews those to see who should respond but it also allows us to keep track of those complaints better and also I have to mention that Jon burglar and code enforcement manager Rebecca boss tracker the police department have done a lot of research for best practices to control marijuana odor because it's a problem all over the place and they're working with businesses as renewals come up to help them with doing the right filters and that they maintain them properly some of them need to be shaken every week or something like that I mean it's complicated but the odor can be controlled and then the last one is what we've done since 2009 is to follow the legislature and their changes that they may make in rules or legislation to see if there's changes that we need to make at our with the local code and those are also brought up during the quarterly meetings in case the businesses have anything to raise for changes I want to

[164:03] understand something in the that was in the memo you were mentioning the odor and trying to enforce to the enforcement on that and there was in the table that had all the title nine changes specifically relating to density it was stated that increasing the density would make it more difficult to pinpoint the the sources of the odors and I wanted to understand that because it I didn't understand how could be it could be difficult to pinpoint if you have the address and you go to the place that's generating the order so I wanted to understand that okay a lot of the warehouses where that have light industrial zoning have several different marijuana businesses in the same building so when you go to the venting system for the building for what's coming outside it doesn't necessarily all come just from one of the marijuana places it can come from

[165:01] the building itself so it's a it's a detective work type thing that the building inspector crimes on a lot of roofs and and tries to check the source and checks their filters to see what they're doing sometimes it's obvious because it's coming out of event or you can see event doesn't have a filter on it at all but a lot of times it's hard when you have three or four businesses in a place what the best practices have done is that we can have kind of a prima facie level of this is the minimum that's required to control the odor and if you don't do it you're going to be presumed to be one of the people causing the odor so the work that they have done is really helped but yeah when they're all in the same area it's tough what would be the case Ennis if you increase the density there would be more presumably more businesses within one building making it more difficult to right yes the last thing is questions

[166:03] for counsel so we had CAC asked for a couple things to be addressed so maybe let me just so one of the things that you wanted to talk about were the $50,000 that we put aside every year for education yeah the idea being that okay well let me just help friendís we have we need to give them put on there some outstanding issues and do we want to address some we're going to have somebody address them and then a mechanism you know do we want an ongoing way to that one of the issues that was raised was that recommendations outstanding recommendations a couple slides ago was about public education and so CAC was like well we we pay money for a public education campaign what is the status of

[167:00] that so I have received a report that Mats Sundin who's in the audience from Human Services put together and I'm gonna go through this and if you have more questions I'm gonna make Matt come up here and answer them so fifty thousand dollars annually from the recreational marijuana revenues and in 2016 the city executed a five-year contract with Boulder County Community Services to implement a substance education and awareness program focusing basic goals through there which is following widespread community distribution and awareness of information and programs that are being developed to shifting community perceptions of risk associated with substance abuse three prevent and reduce youth abuse of alcohol and recreational drugs including marijuana and four reduce accidental ingestion of marijuana

[168:02] and other drugs since 2016 the Boulder County Community Services Group have engaged in numerous activities to disseminate information about substance abuse educate youth and adult influencers and provide opportunities for target populations to participate in alternative activities to date these funded programs have directly reached 2100 Boulder youth and media campaigns have made an estimated six million impressions in the boulder market we currently are in discussions with community stakeholders to leverage other unspent recreational marijuana revenue that was collected from 2014 to 2016 to further this program goals and we're developing a specific proposal that the one-time funds be used to strengthen substance abuse prevention activities enhanced community capacity for substance abuse intervention and patient treatment services such as

[169:00] emerging issues like opioid addiction so we have I think spent the dollars wisely and made a lot of impressions in the community but if you want more direct information Matt is here to answer that so I have a question and that is is there baseline data so do we have something from where we're starting in 2014 or 2016 and answers and and with this all of the I mean that's a lot of money to be going into these programs I guess instead of and I know you were just reading it's okay but it would be really much stronger if we could see if there is some progress being made in terms of youth delaying when they first have a drink or smoke pot or not doing

[170:01] it at all or choosing I mean what kind of metrics metrics do we have things so council members I'm Mats Sundin the community programs manager with human services and we actually do have an evaluation attached to the program with Boulder County Community Services so we're working with an independent evaluator who's looking at some of the short-term medium-term and long-term outcomes of the program and so they're able to not only look at the specific work that the grantee and the subcontractors are doing but we'll then in the long-term attach those to existing datasets that are out there so there are things like the healthy kids colorado survey where you can go and look at the long-term of how things are transpiring in our schools and how kids are being affected affected by substance use and then try to make some of the links between the work that we're doing

[171:01] with this project and the outcomes from those surveys some of that is a little challenging given the that's being invested the number of kids you know trying to make that specific connection between one activity and outcomes for kids are being affected by a lot of different issues in their lives but we do have an evaluation underway and we'll be reporting results out from that that that's good yeah what would you say I presume that they produce an annual report the deal is we can't see this we don't see this and I would think I have use of my life that I would see I would interact in some way with this and Sony have a report that shows yeah we did here's what we did here's the ads we ran or here's here's what we're doing would be useful maybe because we don't hang out significant so many that's going in to this and I guess it would be nice to see some kind of a report

[172:01] instead of just hearing about it and really see some metrics and the sooner that could happen well presumably they do that every year or something right the contract right I don't know specifically what the contract does but they should be doing it and what I'm asking Matt to do and I know you you'll do this is go back find out their latest report we can provide that with counsel and then make sure that they're going to be giving us annual reports on it we actually do have annual reports written into their contract and the first year of the project was a lot of sort of process establishing with the subcontractors but now we're getting more real-time information about what's going on with the sub contracts and so we'll be able to report that out pretty quickly and then they have also set up a data dashboard that we'll be putting on our website and we're just working to make sure that's up-to-date with information but I think that'll be going

[173:00] up fairly soon and will that be Boulder City specific Boulder County specific its Boulder City specific although the activities that the main contractor and the subcontractor the main contractors the county so they obviously work countywide and the subcontractors include BB SD YMCA in Boulder County Public Health so they all work countywide but the work that they're doing with our funding is city specific great so it's outreach that's specific to Boulder City kids and then the report that you think you'll be able to generate annually will be about Elise's asked about for Boulder City youth it'll be for the project that's correct okay great okay so I just wanted to that was one of the recommendations is that this group need to keep to look at that and I just if that's happening that hold enough okay so there's another issue out there which

[174:02] is the energy offset impact fund and I guess just to start off you know do we agree the map has completed as work as they did maybe but I would like to continue this group I'd like to continue at working I see I mean after reading the letter that we got from the chamber today and they have a whole bunch of issues which I think need to be addressed and need to continue we've had a lot of these work a lot of success with these working groups and the thing that I was a little nervous about but I was very happy to support it back in 2016 was could all these people the various positions of people could they really come to consensus and come work on something and and give us good recommendations and now this working

[175:01] group has gelled it seems to me and has worked very successfully I also in somewhat comes we've gotten some of us have gotten emails about the energy impact offset fund and whether it should be applied the way it is or not as well as I think I mean we just Oklahoma and I think was the 30 state to legalize Nicolle marijuana just in the last few weeks so and that's Oklahoma I mean it is totally mainstream so from my perspective I think we need to keep this group together I know there's additional expenses in the memo you mentioned something about that the facilitator was really good and that in order for this

[176:01] group to continue working you would need to keep the facilitator going and so it seems to me that the taxes that we get out of marijuana to pay for for this facilitator and it seems like at least in this letter everybody who's on this group would like to continue to work together so I don't know why we would stop the group at this point in time when I think they're still good I just I'm not sure Kathy could you Kerr I'm not sure that that last bit is true if there's an assumption that everybody on the group supports it continuing is that true Kathy would it's I don't believe that it's true and not to say that but I don't think that that maybe you have all the information we are how do you the people that are not marijuana businesses the people that are marijuana businesses are the ones that want changes and want mm-hmm you know when you look at the

[177:00] list it's it's more exposure and more things and the other people that are on the community members that are on have limited resources and limited ability to participate in these things so if it's always gonna be I mean if you wanted to continue map we probably need a new charter about what you want us to do and if it is just to push more on the regulations we're exhausting the community members and they at least have told me they cannot continue to participate at the pace that it's been going so I think what council has to decide is you know you've heard about they're trying to do statistics trying to figure out the effect on youth and all that kind of stuff but we don't have anything yet so does counsel want to direct that there be changes to licensing exposure of marijuana business as there's all those kinds of things before having

[178:01] those results and then I think it will be I don't know how many community members that will actually get to do that if that's counsels direction because of the council's direction that would be against what they represented their most important part is so so we've got a natural tension between the people that are trying to protect youth and protect health and everything and want these statistics that have been talked about and the businesses that do want to advertise more and do want it out there more so how we deal with that tension and what you require as a council to justify making changes or not I think it's the issue okay so let's just pause and think there again it's useful to think about those sort of issues that are out there that we may or may want to prioritize or not and so far I think it has to do with the youth impacts but we

[179:00] just talked a little bit about that this new energy impact offset fun stuff we just heard about there's title 9 stuff and then I don't know there's some other issues but those are those are the three Biggie's so we should think about that we we did not prioritize title 9 stuff and I'm not I guess one question is we still this is anybody's mind it changed on that no I think land-use issues I mean what we're we're trying to get done in this council the things we've committed to you stable review and you know site plan review changes and and parking standards those things those are going to eat up the rest of the council term if we try and throw in marijuana changes to title line I just don't think it's appropriate I also I'm not sure that we had the information yet to do that does anybody just I'm kind of inclined on at least of the three that one to me is not a top priority yep question

[180:01] about the title nine recommendations which was I remember when the 35 the set of 35 recommendations came from map and we separated out the the 10 9 but we never there hasn't been any analysis and council conversation about specifically about the title 9 I don't remember having that not have we had that you guys are teaching me how to use the microphone to reach it well the only analysis if you want to put it that way was we did charts in the last several packets that have been in and we can send it to you again if you'd like that describes the change that was desired like removing the density restrictions right now you can't have more than three marijuana businesses within 500 feet and it's a little that was on the effect right yeah there was one that was just for the title nine changes okay so I just wanted to be clear on that and I I agree with Sam it there's just a lot

[181:01] already on the table having to do with title nine and and the analysis hasn't been done so perhaps the next council could talk about that because we're not gonna have a retreat right well but so anyway if so did we aren't inclined it sounds like so so anyway so the title nine I to the list that you mentioned Suzanne I think the social clubs was part of it but and that's not ripe yet no no but it seems to me that the the map could be kept together on kind of an ad hoc in an ad hoc way what is there any reason that we couldn't do it that way and I asked a question it's related to that so it's kind of a colloquy it seemed to me that what staff was trying to do was have a pathway for code changes to come forward and if that's going to be meaningful

[182:02] that could be an alternative to map because we would get calls from the industry folks and there would be this code change they'd be submitting to staff how does it go beyond that so what has staff do these go into the round file and never get looked at or do they get reviewed I mean did they you know if it was if this was alcohol I'd ask about the BL a do they go to the BL a before we would see them so how would these forms which may be a pathway for the industry to get the energy issue in front of us for example how would they be used and what's how would they get to us to make the code changes the way that we have been doing it is that they come through staff because they come through City email so the staff presents it at the quarterly meetings with whatever staff input that there may be you know if it's an issue that's going to affect the police department then they include their part and it's talked about at that

[183:02] meeting is that a fair way to say it for the input of the businesses related to the interaction with math I mean we were primarily using the quarterly meetings to solicit the suggestion forms and so we have a specific form that people need to fill out as far as you know what what code would change what would be the benefit to industry to community members to you know so that they sort of do more of their own analysis what the benefit to these different constituencies are originally the way that map was sort of doing their work as they would wait until the state legislature and rulemaking was sort of out of session to figure out what was coming forward from a state perspective and then we would go to council but so are people filling out

[184:03] forms is there a stack somewhere or is it just a been a few and and then what do you do with them they they there really have just been a few the the ones that are in your staff packet from Jeff guards guard law firm those were submitted after the the map had already sort of concluded their work and packaged their work to go to citycam okay but if we get rid of map what will happen to the forms then they go to these quarterly meetings for input from staff and input from the businesses if there's some kind of consensus there and it doesn't affect other parts of the community then they'd be brought to you and and historically staff has brought changes to the marijuana code to you I think basically on an annual basis what about if it affected the community I mean the value of map at the moment seems to me

[185:01] is you've got industry members and you've got community members and they're working on consensus building and we're getting consensus recommendations which is very helpful if we dissolved the map we will no longer get consensus recommendations but one of the ideas being tossed around here is that the community members won't be participating in the map anymore and I think at least a couple of those are professional health people right and I can't imagine that they would actually drop off and so I mean I guess I just want this function to remain a little longer it's really calmed things down when I first got on council there was lots and lots of caulking and it wasn't very well managed and it was piecemeal and now it's become regularized and you know a process that we go through like once a year after the legislative session is over so I mean I'm kind of ambivalent to be honest with you but I want the function

[186:01] to be there where if these are getting submitted the pieces of paper I want some community feedback on them and if there's some consensus I'd like to see them come forward and if the map is the only easy way to do that then let's keep the map around and I and then you know so we go back to the question I was asking is there any reason why we couldn't keep the map together kind of in the same way as we appoint the Urban Renewal Authority and usually they have nothing to do and and times something comes up and then they convene so if we kept it together from that standpoint and created a charter that covered things in a general sense that said shall convene if and only after the state legislature creates something that affects or there are no suggested code changes that need to be

[187:04] reviewed something like that I didn't I thought she was looking for an answer go ahead and I was just gonna add this youth report does Boulder County social services or whatever that group is called I would hope they're not waiting for long before we see something and so I think it would be very port from how this money has been spent and and successes metrics with this program and I would want to take that report back to the math group and and have them talk about okay what are you going to do about this we don't know what those results are and so this group has been working together for two years or year and a half something like that and so I'm hoping that this report comes back and that they have a crack at it and an

[188:01] ability to look at it and make some recommendations or changes you know in in how they're operating or whatever but I I see it as a very good thing and as Sam said you know yeah it was pretty chaotic and we were spending a lot of time you know every few months coming up with something new I think the whole social clubs thing they were very clear they want to wait till the state does something so it sounds like we all want some kind of mechanism rather than stuff dribbling up at us and then I still there is the the issue of this report and yet and making sure we're monitoring the youth piece of it and then there's an energy offset fund which we may or may not that needs to be addressed so maybe did you want us I know that you I get the sense that you'd like us to say yeah this map is done and if we're gonna do

[189:00] something else to re-up it or come up with another mechanism we need some kind of mechanism that's what I'm thinking I'm hearing some kind of mechanism is unclear to me because what's going on with this map is they've done amazing work but people essentially that are on the marijuana advisory panel right now have permanent positions we they've been on it for three years I think that it's been at least three years that this is existed it's not rotating like any of your other boards and commissions are they were all appointed by the city manager if this is to be a council Standing Committee then we need to think about it like really differently than what we have the we establish working groups the intent is that they will do a particular job and then they will end and and if what I'm hearing today is no you want to have a continuing group then

[190:00] we need to decide what kind of a continuing group we want do we want it appointed by the city manager and they have lifetime ten years until they get bored and get off or do we want rotating ten years how many people do we want lots more work would need to be done to recreate the group so another alternative would be to take what the chamber said which is let's just keep this group going they're doing a great job until the end of 2019 and at that point we need to have a very serious conversation about whether or not we need it to continue or we need to completely change it so that's a council Advisory Committee and and that would give us plenty of time to talk about the structure of this group I mean I do think eventually we will need a marijuana Advisory Board just like we have liquor or beverages yay BLM and whether whether that goes with

[191:04] liquor I don't know you know but that's those are options that I think counsel might want to consider so I guess for right now I'd like to continue till the end of 2019 with this group I think there's some big things that are going to come up on the horizon that we need to address sooner than later and to have this group take the first crack at this stuff I think would be very helpful to us and so anyway that's uncomfortable keeping it going just like that I mean so it'll be ad hoc through 19 we'll get the few items that we still have maybe dealt with right which would be shops social clubs and the energy thing and to me I think we can almost deal with the energy thing sooner because it doesn't seem like such a big deal to well I'm not saying well we've got is here to answer your questions

[192:06] tonight the letter was clear enough and the distinction that I would make about the letter is you know it's saying that dispensaries in particular may be nips are getting a bad rap but I don't see an argument against having Grows have to do the same energy stuff in the city that they always have so I looked at the letter and said yeah I think there's a point here and maybe we need to talk about it more maybe the map can do it for us but whatever consensus they come up with might be fine but I think people were quite intentional when they wanted you know the energy to be renewable which I would translate though that attorney doesn't agree with me into reducing greenhouse gas emissions so if you look at the relative energy consumption the grows are big and

[193:00] dispensaries are likely small so if that was the fix that's great I found out later a little more threat not so any up but that okay so that could go in the bucket with the map yeah okay so are we agreeing that we'd like to go ahead and just keep the map going through 2019 and then but but then say it ends then and some other mechanism would would say that we want the charter to be different right because a bunch of Charter things get done so you could take all the ones that got done out and you could add in the ones that we've just made this short list of and title mine can hang around as far as I'm concerned until we do something with it and I would add I would add to the Charter maybe to have a conversation about how this might move forward have them recommend about very how this might rupture they get long term how the structure might look so I was with you

[194:03] until you said leave title 9 on the list we've made it clear that we don't I say leave it on the list I feel like we're putting a list of potential items forward right add to the map and we don't have to accept everything that they say we just say you know because maybe the next council would take it up and that would be the if we want them going to 2019 they can make an election issue you know the people who want a change to tighten mine the only reason I'm quibbling is simply that we're asking staff to staff them right and so I think some clarity around title and I would be helpful just so that they don't end up seeing a lot of time on something we have known in in the least right now we don't think we're gonna take up at least until 2020 the next council can figure that out so yeah some clarity around that just so we don't waste their time with that

[195:00] could I just make a suggestion about the title nine I think maybe what Sam is that so we've got the title nine recommendations from the map those are done those will consider at some point when it gets on the work plan so that's off the list but that's not to say that there won't be any more title nine issues that come up so I think that's what it was part of it and so I think you've said it right Mary and they said that we will end up continuing the map for a little bit and then figuring out some charter change that's gonna codify the map and at that point they can kind of take up anything they want and so I'm I'm not so blessed about what's on the list right now but yeah I don't want to take up title mine I think I've been clear it would get in our way okay I could just say something I was in reading the memo the thing that kind of surprised me is and maybe I misread it

[196:01] but that in planning their workload is broken up to into eighty percent is for people's applications and twenty percent is kind of what we want to do on work plan type things is that correct inside our organization when we talk about the work that we do what we say to ourselves is that 80% of the work that we do is core services which is for our planning department it's dealing with landscape plans it's working with the building department on zoning issues it's it's stuff that the council and the people that are worried about the higher level comprehensive plan type things aren't really seeing it's the day-to-day work of the organization and in every part of our organization eighty percent of the work is work that the community rarely sees unless they're coming to get a

[197:01] permit for something the twenty percent that is very visible the top of the iceberg if you will is the work that we've been given by City Council and so we are fully booked in the planning department on that twenty percent and maybe for planning it's 40 percent but but the metaphor is that we do a lot of work you don't see the work that we do see is fully booked and we can't add any no that's helpful yes just okay yeah I was just gonna suggest if I can for saying and following up on on times coming and the understanding of what people will do one of the things that people talk to me about is before I agree to re-up I want to know what I'm reopen for so if when you say continue map I think that a lot of people think okay we get to rehash all the issues that we did before and try to get a further try to get less forward and that we have for our meetings at least once a

[198:02] month or whatever so that's I think why we're suggesting maybe a new charter if there was some guidance so that people knew I'm being asked to commit to basically eight hours a month in preparation and meetings or I'm being asked to come on a quarterly basis or twice a year to review suggested changes to give input on how it will impact the area that I represent that those are two very different things for people to decide what I'm gonna just jump into here because I feel like after the first map report when they came up with the thirty five things that counsel mostly adopted we informally changed the Charter and at that point we said they're going to meet about twice a year after the legislature to look at new changes in law or in the way that the world is working around marijuana and that has been the informal direction that I feel like we've gotten from counsel and that you all have carried

[199:00] out since then and so if counsel feels differently speak now because I think maybe we could change the Charter to be maybe more formally state that yeah I think the heavy water has been or the heavy load has been done but I think there's need to keep this group together just as we've spoken and maybe the frequency doesn't need to be like once a month maybe the same twice oh yeah yeah maybe it'd just be twice a year or I mean as needed or something like that so I'm fine with that with the caveat that that they meet soon to help figure out this energy issue mm-hmm and that at some point whenever it's appropriate that they take a look at the report of how the education program is going and give us feedback on that and then it sounds like after the state legislature meets again three

[200:01] things I would see and if the third thing in your third thing is is what's going on in the state legislature and correct you know you want to be able to you know be able to do that to me those are the three things that are you know okay and so as needed to do those things over the next year and a half Elizabeth to make a comment about the energy impact offset fund that's been up and running we've had two invoices and we've planned a pretty robust stakeholder engagement process just around that topic we invoice the license marijuana facilities to pay into the photo so it's up and running we're collecting funds and how we're spending those funds we're doing an engagement process around that and so but not with map we have not been part of map we've

[201:02] been doing this engagement with all of the license facilities on a one by one on one basis and then meetings and we've climate and sustainability has hired a consultant that's going to do a representative sample of interviews because our goal is to give them more options to offset their energy because some of the complaint is the fund is the only feasible option for them since installing solar PV on their leased warehouses isn't very viable and then community solar gardens aren't really available to them because of their federal status and because solar Gardens requested your contract so that some of the complaints we've gotten that the fund is really our only option well I've also heard you know linking it

[202:01] to having some of these funds pay for affordable housing energy I think there's a nexus that I questioned that was we don't ask that for any other business and so what I think ideal is the program is being threatened and we want to make sure that we work out exactly okay and so that's the concern here so speak to how that will be addressed it sounds like you're coming up with options but that's only a part of the solution yeah so so some of the issues that were brought up in the forums that I believe you receive via we got a letter from a lawyer oh right yes and that was sent to Deb Kalish who is representing Clemen sustainability as our attorney on that right so I think that's what's prompted us to go you know what we need to sit down and work this LA businesses to come to some right so

[203:01] that's what we're talking yes how do I having some and I apologize I didn't know you receive that so we are working through those issues and we have some resolution with some of them and the issue with the affordable housing was if we cannot we're just talking process now yeah okay yeah I don't want to get in the way yes I think it's a perfect thing to punt a map the way it was delivered to me was with the coveri that said this is not a threat of litigation this is just an issue to be aware of and so I just think we need to see what the business community can come up with I mean I don't think the employer wants to take boulder to court over not wanting to have energy offsets for pot I mean they want to be green both ways so I'm gonna be treated fairly though right no and I think I mean that's why I would like map to review it because they think we had done something that maybe wasn't

[204:02] completely thought through but I don't want it could be imprinted be improves right could be maybe it was thought to right and there's Nexus that may not be there I think Lisa is right so I would hope we just passed it to map that's what we were thinking we are telling you correct and that one Carolinian with climate and sustainability and I'm managing the the contractor that we have to implement the offset funds and so with map with the decision tonight to continue map will certainly include them in that stakeholder process I think what Elizabeth is conveying is we don't believe that that the membership here is totally sufficient of what we need to do from a stakeholder engagement to make sure that anything we come up with is applicable across the community I think those are why we're having some of the one-on-one conversations because we have some who own their facilities some who don't and maybe not in a group

[205:02] conversation of what would they sign up to from a contract so that's that's all we remaining I think as long as the map is continuing their vital role in in how we I could review dress how we will use the fund as well as some of these issues that have come up around you know given the small usage from our retailers and standalone MIPS do we want to continue to charge them this offset fund I think part of that is if we can benefit them and help them be greener in a cost parity way maybe we don't exclude them and so I think it I think that's where we really want to engage the map in if they can benefit do we want to exclude them now do we want to wait I really look to this group it's giving us a little bit of feedback on that as well sounds good okay we good on this the answer to your questions we think we

[206:00] have okay all right okay then I think we're going to adjourn unless anybody has anything else awesome great thank you we're adjourned [Music]