October 20, 2022 — City Council Regular Meeting

Transcript

Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.

[0:00] [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music]

[1:08] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] [Music]

[2:18] thank you [Music] thank you

[3:02] [Music] thank you [Music] thank you [Music]

[4:05] thank you [Music] foreign [Music] ERS meeting October 20th 2022 meeting of Boulder City Council I want to note that our mayor Aaron Brockett is out today and Bob Yates who's another council member will be late so he will be here but in about an hour and I am mayor Pro tem Rachel friends so I will be leading the meeting tonight and we will start off with a couple of announcements and I think we have slides yeah so just

[5:01] a reminder on covid-19 testing and vaccinations um you can get more information for either of those things if you go to www.boco.org covet testing and we also still have the boulder site available for free drive through testing or bike through testing at stazio Drive number two is there also a slide yeah return to council chambers welcome back to public participation in Chambers with the public being back in Chambers beginning last week we wanted to reissue a couple of reminders that we are offering the public to participate both virtually and in person you were asked to indicate on the open comment and public hearing forms if you will be speaking virtually or in person in-person speakers will speak first virtual speakers will follow all speakers are listed in the order in which they signed up and speakers may change their location preference in needed by if needed by contacting the city clerk's office at city clerk's office at Boulder colorado.gov prior to

[6:00] the start of the meeting and I assume if someone is in this meeting and didn't have this announcement since it's so fresh and they were virtual they could come up to you right now well actually it's on the website and it has also been documented over the last few weeks but if anybody did want to change yes we would accommodate awesome thank you for that last minute game call um okay so now we will move into our regular meeting about Thursday October 20th and we will start with call to order and roll call thank you and good evening everyone we'll start the roll call with councilmember Benjamin present councilmember Falcons present mayor Pro tem friend here councilmember Joseph president speaker present Wallach here and Weiner president mayor Pro tem we have our quorum yay okay moving on um to agenda item 1A is an international stuttering Awareness

[7:01] Day declaration that is my pleasure to present so I will come up there and invite the guests in the audience who will receive it to stand up with me foreign let's be on TV okay thank you today we honor International stuttering awareness day which will be on October 22nd 2022 across the world that is the day along with being my anniversary that is recognized as International stuttering Awareness Day stuttering is a speech difference characterized by repetition of sounds syllables or words prolongation of sounds and interruptions in speech it is estimated that about one percent of the world's population stutters and roughly 3 million Americans stutter organizations dedicated to Bringing hope and empowerment to children and adults who stutter through

[8:00] support education and advocacy have locations here in Boulder top academics and researchers in the field of stuttering currently work at CU Boulder and have a long history of doing so many stutterers suffer frustration and embarrassment that can lead to harmful emotional stress stuttering is a form of verbal diversity and should be recognized as simply a different way of speaking when stuttering continues into adulthood a person may have difficulty communicating with other people and stuttering may affect a person's quality of life interpersonal relationships job opportunities and professional growth during the months surrounding International stuttering awareness day non-profits like my speech and lebsack speech therapy seek to raise awareness about communication disorders and the many ways that people with the daily challenges of stuttering can be supported by recognizing these challenges we can draw attention to the needs shine a light on these often invisible disabilities and help avoid the negative

[9:01] consequences of misunderstanding stuttering we the city council of the city of Boulder Colorado declare hereby to hereby declare October 22nd 2022 as International stuttering Awareness Day [Applause] and we would love for you to say a few words thank you there is a long-held narrow narrative that stuttering is a disorder that has to be overcome this narrative sets up as people who stutter to experience deep and painful shame when we work our tails off often as kids in speech therapy and we don't end up overcoming our stutter the advocacy movement in our community which is led by people who stutter is working to combat this damaging narrative and to replace it with a more humanistic and indeed realistic one

[10:01] our message can be distilled into five parts one stuttering is a form of neurotiversity not a disorder two stuttering when persisting into adulthood is incurable and does not need to be overcome three what does need to be overcome is actually the stigma that lives in all of us people who stutter included because we all grow up in the same environment and it's perpetuated by societal messages that depict normal as being fluent speech and anything else as being abnormal four when people who stutter and their list Sinners can practice just expecting communicative differences people who stutter will be more free to embrace their voices stutter and all and five a society comprised of people with less shame is a healthy Society

[11:05] people are better able to contribute to the great greater good when they aren't expending and and energy being a with themselves so on behalf of the entire stuttering Community thank you councilwoman friend and the whole Council um for helping us bring visibility to our Movement we are very grateful I'm Steph with LoveSac speech therapy and I just wanted to also say thank you to the council for bringing awareness to stuttering I want to tell you someone about somebody really quickly in my life that's very important my older brother who is in the audience Jasper he is pretty darn cool guys he is my hero and the person I have always looked up to

[12:00] he had the coolest clothes in high school he was in a National Honor Society and he was voted homecoming King by his graduating class but the coolest thing about him is he's been a person who stutters since the age of six in our hometown of Pagosa Springs Colorado embraced him for his resilience and his ability to do whatever he wanted regardless so thank you so much for recognizing that children in Boulder can grow up not needing to be bullied or shamed for the way they talk and to show that adults who stutter in the workforce in the city of Boulder can do just a good of job as anybody else and do any job that they want to so thank you so much for working with us [Applause]

[13:08] thanks again for those awesome and inspiring words and now we will move on to agenda item two open comment and I will turn it over to Brenda writtenauer to go over the public participation guidelines and slides thank you mayor Pro Tem and Emily if you'll bring up the slides please that would be helpful um I am not seeing them on oh there we go wonderful um and I'm just going to change the view to make sure no I'm not going to do that sorry learning my new little environment here that is slightly different um just going to Spotlight the slides so that everyone here on Zoom can also see them we know that some of you who join us

[14:01] often may have heard these before and we thank you for your patience while we share them with folks who may not be as familiar with the guidelines that we have created the city worked within with community members to co-create a vision for productive meaningful and inclusive Civic conversation this Vision supports the physical and emotional safety of community members staff and Council as well as some more supporting democracy for people of all ages identities lived experiences and political perspectives there's a lot of information about this vision and how we co-created it with the community online just go to our homepage bouldercolorado.gov and search productive atmospheres in the search box next slide please the following are examples of rules of decorum that are found in the boulder Revised Code and other guidelines that have been created to support this Vision these will be upheld during tonight's meeting all

[15:00] remarks and testimony shall be limited to matters related to City business no participant shall make threats or use other forms of intimidation against any person obscenity racial epithets and other speech and behavior that disrupts or otherwise impedes the ability to conduct a meeting are prohibited participants are required to sign up to speak using the name they're commonly known by and individuals must share their whole name or display their whole name before beginning to speak currently only audio testimony is permitted online if your name does not appear if you are testifying virtually tonight please reach out to me in the Q a box and I can help change that for you also we ask that in-person participants please refrain from expressing support or disagreement verbally that will help us keep this a welcoming space for all points of view traditionally in council chambers support has been shown through

[16:00] American Sign Language Applause like this sometimes people call it jazz hands so we encourage you to do that if you'd like to show support and thank you very much Emily we will move on if you can pull up the timer I am going to remove the spotlight for Council to be sure that people can see the timer as they are speaking and we will start with in-person testimony thanks so much Brenda okay I'll call the first couple people um just so that the people who are not number one but maybe two and three can start queuing up so we will start off with Keaton gray and on Deck will be Chris lauridson and Caroline consulman and I'm sorry in advance for any names I'm not getting right but first up Keaton gray please is this going to start automatically okay

[17:00] all right hello city council my name is Keaton gray I am a licensed social worker a full-time mental health therapist here in Boulder on November 8th coloradans will vote on proposition 122 which would create a state regulated access model to make it legal for people to receive psychedelic assisted treatment services at quote licensed Healing Centers and approved Health Care locations so I am very concerned about this initiative and I ask Boulder City Council to lead the way and restorative justice to decriminalize the use of psychedelic medicines for all adults over age 21 in this city so psychedelics have been categorized as a schedule one drug since 1970 and the War on Drugs has wreaked havoc and Trauma on communities who are disproportionately right black indigenous people of color so a state-regulated model for licensed professionals like myself to facilitate

[18:00] this treatment without allowing decriminalized usage for all would continue to enable these racist-based dangers this treatment is predicted to cost an individual around three thousand dollars and companies are already capitalizing and patenting psychedelics and preparation of its regulation so humans have been using entheogenic plants with intention for healing since prehistoric times and healing is our Birthright punishing this has been a deep trauma for our country so I ask that Boulder City Council decriminalized the personal use of enthiogenic plants and fungi for those over the age of 21 data shows minimal public health and safety risks in cities that have already done this so please come council do not let companies and licensed professionals like myself capitalize these medicines without allowing Equitable and safe access for all adults I ask Boulder City Council to lead the way and decriminalize natural medicines for all and uphold values of solidarity Mutual

[19:01] Aid Justice and equity for our community thank you thank you Keaton next up is Chris lauridson and then Caroline consulman and Holly Carlson hi my name is Chris lordson uh hi my name is Chris lordson I'm a fellow Boulder resident I attend the University of Colorado Boulder as a graduate student and I also completed my undergraduate studies here I'm speaking today also on behalf of the effort to make psychedelic medicines fully decriminalized here in Boulder I'd like to share my perspective as to why this issue is of high importance on campus I'm fortunate to serve as the co-president of the Psychedelic Club our club has a history of being a safe space for individuals in our community to share the experience that they have had with psychedelic medicines without fear we have consistently heard contrary to bad faith depictions of dangerous sensation seeking or escapism instead powerful personal accounts of overcoming

[20:00] trauma and addiction releasing emotions previously stuck perpetuating illnesses in the body gaining powerful personal insight and Direction and reclaiming a productive engagement with life I have had other experiences which inform me about the importance of us taking this action in the inpatient psychiatric unit at Boulder Community Hospital in my time as a mental health worker I have seen up close the plight of individuals in our community who are tremendously suffering and for whom any measure to address mental health concerns could be life-changing this change is already taking place we must act now we must be proactive and not reactive and we must use compassion to guide our decision I have a tremendous love for our community in Boulder we must preserve the strength of our home through being adaptive to this current change let me be clear we must change our policy to completely end the prohibition of our nature to be in relationship with nature and its medicines with the unwavering condition that our response promote Justice and equity

[21:01] thank you so much so much hi my name is Dr Caroline consulman I'm an associate teaching professor of anthropology at CU Boulder I have 25 years of research experience on the origins and impacts of the U.S War on Drugs both domestically and internationally I teach and publish and run run workshops on these topics and I organize the Cannabis and psychedelic Symposium that takes place every spring at CU collaborating with student leaders and engaged community members I'm also the mother of an 8th grader at Manhattan Middle School and so this issue is personal for me as well I want to make three key points in favor of decriminalization of entheogenic plants and fungi from an academic perspective drug prohibition policies in the U.S were rooted in racism against indigenous peoples immigrant communities and African Americans and they relied on punitive methods of social control the results were predictable decimated

[22:01] working class and inner city neighborhoods police corruption and racial profiling prisons filled with primarily black and brown people violence in our communities and no net reduction in drug use addiction or overdose deaths ending prohibition provides the opportunity to re-engage democracy and prioritize compassion and meaningful public education with the focus on social and racial Justice decriminalizing enthiogenic plants and fungi for Innovative psychedelic therapies and ceremonial uses will increase Community safety reduce racist policing bolster our local economy show respect for ancient indigenous knowledge honor interdisciplinary scientific research and prevent drug abuse and overdose deaths especially among our youth the city of Boulder has the opportunity to be on the right side of history and set an example for what harm reduction policies can look like after all prohibition laws have caused far more harm than psychedelics ever have or

[23:00] could thank you thanks so much Caroline Holly Carlson and Katie Moore and Sherry heck mayor and if I may just request that people speak into the mic we're getting notification that people in the back cannot hear so all right let's all clean in can you hear me now okay hello city council members I'm here once again to discuss Boulder's flawed affordable housing and housing first programs the slogan that Boulder's affordable housing is for everyone is inaccurate it is apparently not for families like mine I am a working single mother active Community member college student and a taxpayer I've lived at Depot Square an affordable housing property for five and a half years in fact I've recently been told by the staff of Boulders housing and Human Services Department that because my rent isn't paid through Section 8 or a voucher program I can be bullied and forced out of my apartment for a variety of reasons such as filing complaints about safety and criminal activity in my building my housing is not secure the

[24:01] message I'm getting is that unless I am an unhoused addict with a lengthy criminal record having a roof over my family's head isn't a priority for the city of Boulder's leadership our city is allowing slumlord property management companies to bully people like me to move out of their homes within 30 days and find new housing in the middle of a housing crisis and a market overloaded by victims of recent fires for the last two years I know this I'm in construction housing and Human Services and the majority of council members have been unresponsive to my ongoing reports of safety and building violations and to this current housing dilemma I am in however I would like to thank Tara weiner as well as Rachel friend because those two have gone above and beyond their Council duties for the rest of you shame on all of you because you all sat here and said you were here for us residents and you're not especially the men thank you thanks Holly Katie Moore Sherry hack and Donovan Smith are next mayor we've been

[25:02] notified that Katie is not present and will not be attending okay not virtual either not to my knowledge no man okay Sherry heck Donovan Smith and then Ari Al and can I just ask somebody in the back row if you can't hear um give me like a wave and I'll interrupt and ask people to speak up thank you I see an ad thank you Sherry hack longtime Boulder resident you know what usually when I come here I'm prepared with something to say can you speak a little closer we're getting the waves but tonight I don't really have anything prepared and I want to talk about crime I want to talk about CU South how you shove that down our throats to make us think it's a good thing when it's not it's inadequate flood protection and why in God's name this small town needs a third campus when wouldn't it be more Equitable if another CU built another campus that wasn't on the Front Range in a community that really needed it

[26:01] but as far as Public Safety I feel like you on public on city council you're you're not hearing people you're not listening or else you simply just don't care probably it's the latter you know a friend of mine told me go to city council and get really angry but you know it's just not my nature but um we've had lockdowns at both high schools this year Boulder High School in April the perpetrators of that lockdown haven't been were not locked up and then on October 12th we had a guy breaking windows at Fairview causing that school to go into a lockdown but he was at that school many other dates before that 9 24 9 26 9 30 he also showed up at Boulder high school and guess what he's not in custody now

[27:00] and you know what it's not my responsibility to find out why he's not in custody it's your responsibility you guys aren't doing your job there's a lot of safety deniers out there and I just want to say that I myself have been a victim of a crime where a panhandler threatened to shoot me when I wouldn't give him any money so I was encourage all voters vote across party lines and vote for Public Safety candidates thanks Sherry next Donovan Smith Ari what's up oh and just a reminder to please use your jazz hands um Donovan Smith Ari Al and then Travis Hugh Cully many of you have heard my story before but I'll be sharing it again to advocate for the decriminalization of psychedelics in Boulder I grew up in a house where my queerness wasn't celebrated but shamed because of religion I hid and I hated who I was I internalized the shame and by my young

[28:01] adulthood my life was filled with depression self-harm suicide attempts anxiety substance abuse and ultimately a methamphetamine addiction when I came out and left the church at 21 years old I'm 27 now my entire world view was shattered without religion what does life mean why am I here I was thrown into the wild to fend for myself I turned to existential philosophy cosmology Eastern religions and sociology for answers but I only found more questions I was really lost it wasn't until my first psychedelic experience in 2017 that I began my very messy healing journey through psychedelics I've learned to embrace the existentialism by reframing it as a curiosity for Life the vastness of the cosmos and connection psychedelics continue to change myself it has taken years of painful lessons therapy and the best support system that a human could ask for in order to stay alive in this body but integral to that healing over the last year in particular has been microdosing psilocybin mushrooms they have helped me create space between negative thinking and what

[29:01] is actually true about who I am love and be proud of my inner child and most authentic self heal from trauma and find real recovery from addiction most recently they helped me get back on track with recovery after a relapse mushrooms are a beautiful tool but they don't make me Invincible for my humanness and I still have bad days and weeks but recovery is progress not Perfection and mushrooms have taught me about Hope and given me the strength to ask for help when I need it I'm very grateful My Hope Is that anyone and everyone will soon be able to take part in these plant healing practices and feel empowered to do so without fearing the law I'm just one person on a rock falling through space trying to stay clean grounded and in community with people who love me and I firmly believe that such medicines like psilocybin can help other people in Boulder find Healing like I have and still am thank you thanks Donovan I'm sorry you didn't get the message that you're fabulous in your childhood but glad you're in December recovery now next Ari then Travis yukoli and Valerie love

[30:04] okay I want to thank Boulder City Council for your time and consideration my name is Dr Ari all I am a physician and psychiatrist working in Boulder Colorado I'm here to talk about decriminalization of psychedelics in the past 10 years research has shown that psychedelics can have profound effects on anxiety depression and Trauma a single dose of psilocybin has much higher emission rates for depression than the traditional antidepressants we currently use in psychiatry in that same line MDMA has been shown to have the highest efficacy of trauma and PTSD of any treatment tried so far as for safety Studies have shown that in terms of harm to society and harm to the person taking the drug alcohol heroin and cocaine cause the most harm while MDMA LSD and psilocybin have the least harm of any illicit drug a recent study from the Journal of psychopharmacology showed that those who use psychedelics are actually less likely to commit a crime

[31:01] than the general population Denver has decriminalized psilocybin and a review of Denver city council reported decriminalizing psilocybin mushrooms in the City and County of Denver has not since created any significant public health or public like issue safety issue in the city as for addiction Studies have shown that psychedelics have anti-addictive properties and can be used to treat diseases such as alcohol addiction for instance a study recently published in Jama Psychiatry showed that after a single dose of psilocybin patients who abuse alcohol had less binge drinking days over the following 32 weeks furthermore due to the high tolerance that occurs immediately after taking psychedelics traditional psychedelics such as LST and solocybin are extremely hard if not impossible to use every day thus lowering the risk of abuse I ask that Boulder City Council make decriminalization of psychedelics a priority in order to end arrests and match our policy with a prevailing science thank you for your time I think sorry next Travis then Valerie

[32:02] love and Clara Elizabeth hello council members most of my speech is going to be directed to miss Tara weiner um at our last meeting I called on Council to reconsider The Narrative around the Marshall fire and to request the sampling of the Marshall Mesa for hot spots from Rocky Flats this session I have something else that has come up on October 3rd Monday Halloween morning the rocky flat stewardship Stewardship Council will be electing two voices from the public to join them in the meetings slide um there is only one chance to make this election meaningful two seats are open three candidates are on the ballot to my left herb Fenster to

[33:02] my right Kim Griffiths today I bring you my commitment to serve the public on this Council Miss weiner as you are the director of the boulder chair on this Council I am urging you to elect herb Fenster and myself Boulder needs activists on the Stewardship Council the case against Kim Griffiths is clear slide Kim has a lot has long been a member of the rocky flat Stewardship Council if this election is a ruse she will be appointed the public stooge slide Miss weiner I urge you due to her conflicts of interest to choose me over Kim Griffith's slide [Music] the Rocky Flats Stewardship Council should no longer be able to operate like a set of horse blinders on our counties

[34:04] slide if there is a relationship between Rocky Flats and Marshall fire the Stewardship Council needs to have the ears to hear what that relationship is as a person from within your community I stand to represent Boulder there thank you Travis your time is up thank you next Valerie love Claire Elizabeth and Valerie Beltran is there a button to advance the slides okay okay thank you for letting me speak raise your hand everybody if you agree safety is our number one job

[35:00] yeah let's do it next current laws and weak consequences cause suffering we must break the cycle next in order to protect the kids invulnerable unhoused next we must separate the victims from the Predators we must break the cycle next easy access matters a child can walk out these doors and by Meth in five minutes next this is from Friday stolen property smoking meth zero consequences Boulder high school is only 400 yards away next current weak laws allow people to smoke meth in public and only get a ticket next by allowing this it enables addiction and suffering we must break the cycle next we have a mental health crisis that we are making worse with current laws in Boulder police officer told me there are four types of unhoused people those hit by hard times and want help those who

[36:00] have serious mental health and addiction issues those who are unhoused by choice and then the Predators and drug dealers who are taking advantage of all the vulnerable ones next Safety First kids are afraid and don't know where to safely walk around schools because there are random drug dealers and moving encampments with Predators hiding among the vulnerable unhoused make Boulder safe next the system is broken and we must fix easy access environment that allows addiction to thrive the vulnerable unhoused people need protection from predators too next make Boulder unattractive to Predators prevent easy access to deadly drugs and protect the vulnerable more mental health and Addiction Services ibogaine really works it saved my life stricter drug ban one mile from all schools a stricter camping ban one mile from all schools stricter laws around meth heroin Fentanyl and cocaine next safety actually your time is up you can

[37:00] we would love to have you email us the rest of it thank you I did okay next is Claire Elizabeth Valerie baltran and Bridget Mars hello everyone my name is Clara Elizabeth I am a third year PhD student here at CU in cognitive psychology and I've done a little bit of math modeling work using machine learning tools and other mathematics to model the cognitive effects of psychedelics I am also a survivor of childhood trauma I developed severe PTSD in high school to the point where if someone just said a certain word that was triggering to me I would go home and cry for three days having flashbacks um so I could tell you today how in undergrad

[38:00] um the use of a couple psychedelics including LSD MDMA and psilocybin mushrooms saved my life but instead I'm going to tell you about how the illegalization of psychedelics specifically LSD almost ended my life so consider my words that you hear today as the words of a ghost because I should not be speaking to you and I am incredibly grateful that I can when LSD was made illegal it was based upon the chemical structure so what happens when you draw a line in the sand is that the people on the bad side don't stop doing the thing they just get around the law whether that's good or bad and so people changed a little bit of the chemical structure got a little bit farther away from LSD but then that was made illegal and then they changed it again and that was outlawed and it kept going and going and going there were a couple other historical things too including a man named Alexander uh shugen who created a bunch of these chemicals as well but specifically it is this getting around

[39:00] the law process that created all these designer drugs so if you look at some studies that were done where people took samples of Street LSD before the ban of it uh it was generally okay I mean it wasn't the best you should still test it like if 15 of it might be adulterated with PCP or amphetamine but nowadays if you look at it there are hundreds of research chemicals sorry your time is up um I hope you have our email address and can email us the rest of your testimony thank you next up Valerie Beltran Bridget Mars and Malik s fear hello my name is Valerie Patron I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist I specialize in trauma and I did a year-long psychedelic assisted therapy training program at the California Institute of integral studies in San Francisco I'm also a supervisor at Academy and assisted Therapy Clinic where ketamine is legal and I also provide integration and preparation

[40:02] sessions for Veterans for a non-profit that allows the veterans to travel to countries where psychedelic assisted therapy is already legal and in this work I have seen incredible changes in people who have been utterly hopeless you've heard from a lot of the other my colleagues here tonight my friends here tonight who are sharing the incredible changes that they've experienced in themselves and I'd like to paint a little bit of a picture of some of the things that I've seen I've seen people who have been suicidal made multiple suicide attempts who have had absolutely no hope for a life who have been completely through every single type of therapy you could possibly imagine and who have gone through just one or sometimes two sessions of a psychedelic therapy and who no longer even meet the criteria for PTSD anymore to be able to have these kinds of opportunities is incredible and that's why I'm a huge proponent of legalizing and medicalizing the use of psychedelic assisted therapy and to begin I think we need to decriminalize so that nobody's

[41:01] going to jail for these substances I also want to make a distinction of how different these entheogens are from other substances like meth or other things that we're mentioning and how much healing potential there can be especially in other countries where they're already legalized drug crime has been reduced crime in general has been reduced because resources are able to be reallocated to harm reduction to therapy and so that people are actually getting healing and support so I'm here to speak to uh wait was that my last point one sec yes that's it just to decriminalize the use of psychedelics thank you thanks so much kudos to you for getting through almost the whole thing without having to look that's amazing hey next we have Bridget Mars hello I'm Brigitte Mars I'm the author of 14 books on natural medicine I've taught at herbal medicine at naropa University for 40 years I'm also a mother and grandmother of three

[42:01] teenagers I'm here to speak on the behalf of decriminalizing psychedelics I believe these substances to be so much safer than the drugs that are currently marketed to people I do believe when used in a safe sentence setting they can be transformational many respectable people are using them naropa has a department of psychedelic studies this is going to be the medicine of the future and the people that are learning about this should not be criminals the people that are going to be using these medicines are being transformed in my own work I seen that these substances can help people overcome addiction because there can be the opportunity for an epiphany how we are all connected how we are children of the Divine I've seen this help people with addiction with post-traumatic stress fear of death the creativity that can come from these experiences is

[43:01] unsurpassed when we think about the music that came out of the 60s but the possibility of truth beauty goodness we know that our planet is in Peril we so need something that's going to wake people up so we can be better stewards of this planet find ways that we can coexist together without creating Warfare I do believe that this is a an opportunity for evolution for our planet I do believe that psychedelics can transform the world when we think of things that came out of the earlier psychedelic Revolution that are still with us today things like yoga meditation organic farming natural childbirth alternative education these things have all been infiltrated into our society for the good and the Natural Foods movement thank you so much thank you thank you for sheet next we have Malik asphier Ramsay abueta and Patrick Murphy

[44:11] hi my name is Malik I migrated from the Middle East to the US at age 19 with a death sentence and life altering can you lean into the mic a bit I'm getting the waves from the back thank you back row foreign confinement to multiple attempts to end my life arriving to the U.S not known anyone speaking the language or having money I welcome the unwelcoming street and call them home for three months although I built a lie beyond that and lived the American dream from the white picket fence to the blue passport I was never able to escape the constant

[45:00] fear and pain my mind was imprisoned by the shackles of my past until psychedelic came into my life since then I've been able to close my eyes and not be haunted by the faces of those that raped me not hear the scream of those being tortured not smell the dry blood on the walls and not feel the pain in every cell of my body I've traveled a long long way to be here thank you to paint you a picture and watch people like me can have access to this medicine not only because we as a human deserve it to be frank we earned it but because it's the right thing to do thank you great great jazz hands Ramsay of Patrick Murphy and then Dell Jolly will be our last I think in in Chambers

[46:00] open commenter greetings Boulder City Council it feels good to be finally speaking to you in the flesh most of you know me by now and I'm grateful to have formed personal relationships with many of you but for the sake of the record I'll introduce myself my name is Ramsay abueda I have a degree in Neuroscience I've worked in clinical research and I'm a community organizer and a drug policy reform activist I'm here to speak to what so many have already spoken on today which is the necessity for Boulder to join to join 15 cities across the U.S in decriminalizing psychedelics and antiogenic substances the powerful testimonies that we've heard today speak for themselves for 10 months we have been having members of our local community your constituents putting themselves out on a limb and basically incriminating themselves to tell their stories of how psychedelics have impacted their lives it's evident that there's something deep something deeply powerful and profound

[47:00] Behind these stories this is not a small or Niche community this community is large and abundant and spans multiple domains of our society and culture representing a consilience of the Neuroscience Community the medical and therapy Community the University Research Community the art and music Community the indigenous community and so much more very rarely does something Inspire such a lively and vivacious movement Boulder has always been at The Cutting Edge of Health wellness and modern living psychedelics have passed every test of being safe and effective modalities for mental health spiritual transformation profound inner work and Community Building when I first started working in the clinical research industry and got certified in medical ethics a crucial principle we learned about was the principle of beneficence which states that if we know if something is good and we willingly keep it from people we are doing something unethical the criminalization of psychedelics is a crime against humanity and obstinence or

[48:00] inaction on ending the criminalization is complicity thank you thanks so much and very well timed and I it's just been it's been so long since we had the jazz hands and and have been here and it's just I love it next is Patrick Murphy and then Dell jolly my name is Patrick Murphy I've lived here 53 years 2A or not 2A 2B or not to be those are the climate action ballot questions a pair of no's are a good answer for me 2A triggers a responsive oh no not again fire mitigation is important but needs a separate department and budget 2B triggers the thought are you out of your mind 18 plus years and 80 plus million dollars of bondage to bad leadership bad logic and an employee-packed pay roster

[49:01] with no real cost benefit analysis climate inaction has the logic wrong Boulder government has electrified their own buildings and helped rich people Electrify their homes Boulder has electric vehicles and lots of chargers for them this is not Equity this is acting Rich electricity is the current carbon equivalent of burning 44 coal while the electric transmission grid is getting overloaded Boulders making the present climate worse unless you're tied to Renewables you're burning the carbon equivalent of 44 coal with heat pumps EVs and electric bikes we need to use Renewables more and electricity less more later but not now unless it's directly tied to solar or wind Boulder in action has a long list of good intentions in 2A plus collaboration hot air and zillions of trivial goals

[50:01] that fail the cost benefit analysis if one were ever to be done we all know the road paved with good intentions where it leads to fix what's broken you first have to see how to replace its broken parts next time how to fix the broken parts thank you Patrick next up Dell jolly hello thank you guys for having me I am a uh Colorado native born here in Boulder County resident for uh 10 years father of three wonderful children and just had my 15-year anniversary with my wife I'm the director of a research nonprofit called unlimited Sciences we've been working with Johns Hopkins University for the last three years on how the community uses psilocybin

[51:00] psychedelics have been showing to help improve with so many ailments such as obsessive-compulsive disorder anxiety Eating Disorders addiction pain and even stuttering Johns Hopkins has raised 17 million dollars for their University wing and multiple other universities are following suit this is a movement that is moving forward 15 cities have already decriminalized psychedelics Boulder needs to be next I want you to take a second to remember back to when you were a little kid things were so bright and exciting and you felt like the world was your oyster and you were just meant for so much more at least I did and now I do and while a lot of that has been lost over time each of you have haven't lost all of that and that's why I think that you're here you're making change in your community serving your community as City Council Members the community here is speaking tonight psychedelics have brought so much joy and hope back to me personally and you

[52:00] have the ability to make massive change in our community locally please I beg you to take action as soon as possible to decriminalize which is our right to take our cognitive Liberty back thank you guys for your time thanks so much about a lot of jazz hands um okay so now we're going to turn over to Virtual so I think that's over to Brenda or Brenda hi thank you Rachel um so we have three speakers signed up I am not seeing David dadone in our meeting at this moment so David if you are here and perhaps you're showing up under a different name please um go ahead and raise your hand or reach out to me in the Q a so that I know that you're here and can can change your name and get you in line in your turn otherwise we will start with Lynn Siegel second would be David if David is here

[53:02] and then we'll end on Lori Preston so um Lynn you should be able to unmute now will you let me know if there's a technical issue my audio and the video go out during the session today just so you know and if if it happens then let me jump back in again I'll log out and log back in thanks Brenda um yeah my comment I'd love to be less of a curmudgeon you know what council make me less of a curmudgeon make me see you South see you later on the boulder campus and the enrollment needs to be reduced so much further than just expansion we need

[54:01] to reduce the enrollment at CU the Harvest House the millennium is a takings of Cu from the city of Boulder 931 bedrooms for students that were income in our sales tax revenue for the city of Boulder all up and down 36 coming into Boulder every hotel's been turned in a student housing CU is like an octopus all over Boulder too much of a good thing stop already there's the hello Dill there's already congestion I couldn't go to Open Studios this weekend in El Dorado because I can't get there without going through a huge

[55:00] traffic jam on the hill webinar format is not fair it doesn't even allow me to ever see who else is at the meeting if I'm remote I'm not vaccinated I can't be down there if I if I'm remote I can't see the slideshow that's discrimination and the woman who spoke from the boulder Depot I don't know who her name was but that was horrible what she talked about thanks Lynn your time is up next we have David didon if he has arrived virtually I do not see David in the meeting at this time so um we will move on to Lori Preston Again David if you're here please reach out to me in the Q a so we can get you back in line Lori you should be able to unmute now thank you hi I am Lori Preston the proud

[56:02] executive director of the Museum of Boulder I love it that I get to go last tonight and speak on behalf of many Arts and Cultural organizations mostly so that I can emphasize our gratitude for the work that you do as city council representatives and co-lovers and promoters of Boulder and I also thank you as well for the opportunity to share at the Museum of Boulder whose mission is to highlight history happening we showcase inclusive community stories preserve them for the future and we inspire all of us to affect positive change we're here because of the continued support of the the city of Boulder and we need you now more than ever we share common denominators straight from your cultural plan cultural environment creativity well-being prosperity joy of everyone in the community like you we create a supportive environment for artists and creative professionals we Foster Innovative thinking and Leadership

[57:00] prioritize Civic dialogue about the ability of culture to positively contribute to the economy social offerings the environment and authentic expression of diversity but more than anything we seek to amplify the vibrancy of Boulder and because of each of you and many matching community members through a beautifully executed Capital Drive we receive initial support and funding to help purchase our building we remain grateful to you and our many contributors we must continuously educate people that we are an independent 501c3 and that we still owe on our building and more than ever we have a significant role to play related to the preservation of artifacts stories of bipod communities preserving photographs documents celebrating culture and providing a setting for all voices we'd like to be on the city's constant list of support unlike many local museums in La Loveland Greeley

[58:01] Fort Collins we don't gain a specific amount of our City's financial support we do receive grants and we're grateful thanks so much Lori thank you that brings us I believe to the end of open comment I don't know if we put Bob Yates on the naughty list for coming in right at the tail end but we we let's make sure he watches those open comments when he goes home um so with that I think we are on to the consent agenda no oh sorry I lied we're going to start first would Chris or City attorney or city manager's office have any response or questions on open comment nothing for me tonight but happy to answer any questions I appreciate everybody coming do you mind introducing yourself and maybe explaining why you're here tonight I'm happy too I'm Chris Mass check I'm the deputy city manager and I'm subbing in today for our city manager Maria Rivera vaynomide thank you anything from City attorney no I don't have anything to to add

[59:02] though again happy to answer questions and appreciate all the participation and vulnerability that was shown tonight yeah thanks any council members have questions or comments Nicole I just also wanted to say thank you to everybody who showed up to speak to us tonight really appreciate hearing from you all right with that thank you again for the jazz hands and the wonderful posters and for being here and now I believe we are on to consent agenda thank you ma'am our consent agenda tonight is item number three it contains items 3A through 3j Chris should I turn it over to you sure I think we uh we just wanted to walk uh Council in the community Through the the flow of many of the items on the consent agenda which are related to the budget which is our public hearing tonight so the council also serves as the board of

[60:01] directors of many General Improvement districts and so I'm going to welcome our finance team up here our CFO Cara Skinner as well as our senior budget manager Mark Wolfe who's going to give a quick just overview to the district budgets before we consider the consent agenda so Mark take it away thank you Chris good evening Council markwell senior budget manager good to be back with you again later this evening we will discuss the second reading of the 2023 budget but first as Chris described you'll consider the budget Mill Levy in certain circumstances and appropriation for several districts under your purview is part of tonight's consent agenda this short presentation will provide that explanation and why we are presenting this under consent the recommended budget as presented in September does include all district related Affairs and Associated expenditures you'll remember the recommended budget was presented as a

[61:00] 513.5 million dollar package and as amended is now a five 515 million point 515.4 million dollar recommended budget so that that budget which doesn't include duplications for um expenditures made out of funds and then um the activities are represented in another fund um that's how we present the whole package so you've seen that in your recommended budget District Affairs are a part of that package the formal mechanism to appropriate the dollars is brought through the annual budget Mill Levy and appropriation ordinances the ordinances cover all funds that are directly under the authority of City Council separately Council considers other annual budgets Mill levies and Appropriations for districts under your purview Council reviews and approves these actions as the board of directors for all General Improvement districts and the boulder Municipal property Authority or bumpa Council also has statute authority to

[62:02] review and approve the budget of business Improvement districts and because we have to switch between acting Council acting as different bodies to take these actions we have presented this for the last couple years I believe under consent so it's just easier from an efficiency standpoint to work through the various different resolutions all right and so these are the various different uh resolutions that you're approving uh for the starting with the general Improvement districts uh the Central Area General improvement district or cajid the University Hill General improvement district or eugid the two Boulder Junction access District gids Beach at parking and bjab TDM and Forest Glen General improvement district which is an Eco Pass Program in Forest Glenn so for these you're operating as the board of directors also for the

[63:00] boulder Municipal property Authority which is a non-profit Corporation instrumentally a part of the city it is it is administered by city council and you are acting in as the board of directors in that case as well the Appropriations made by bumpa is subject to annual renewal during the budget process so that's why we need a resolution this evening and then lastly the downtown Boulder business Improvement District uh this is a little bit different statute which says that they must submit an annual operating plan and budget to the city which city council reviews and approves so that's why it's on your agenda as well all right last slide here is just to show you the numbers behind all these various different entities and just to clarify as posted to hotline this afternoon you have a revised item 3D to clarify the dollar amount we had some old numbers in there so apologies for that the rest are as posted in your

[64:03] agenda and just to clarify one last piece some information that was shared at CAC on Monday so if Council would be able to change any of these individual budgets without impacting the appropriation ordinances later the exception is if there is an influence on one of those funds so if you were to increase let's say the general fund support of one of the general Improvement districts we would need to increase the appropriation of the general fund which would impact the ordinances and the resolutions but if you were just to increase the budget for one of the districts without that relationship you could do that during the resolution approval process so I know that was a question that came up and wanted to clarify the answer to that I believe that's it yes that's it until we talk about the budget thanks so much Mark and Cara any questions on that presentation mark

[65:02] what is the particular benefit of having all of these as separate entities and could any of them actually be folded into the general governance of the by the city and and funded out of the general fund as every other department is that's a good question I would say for the the general Improvement districts those are specific taxing mechanisms so it allows us within a certain geographical area to impose an additional Mill Levy to carry out operations there are several different options for municipalities to create these essentially Special Districts it's a different title on under State Statute we certainly could do a more a broader Mill Levy I think the idea behind these was to focus on a specific thing generally these are related to Transportation demand but they can be

[66:00] broader than that what about bumpa I mean is that necessarily something that has to operate as a city governed but separate instrumentality yes bumpa is put in place um strictly for the purposes of acquiring property and being able to um for the city to issue certificates of participation so if the city wants to issue certificates participation it must have a property Authority okay thank you thanks Mark any other presentation from staff on the consent agenda any other questions or comments I guess from Council on the consent agenda before we get a motion so I have um one it's on Jay the amendments to council I don't know decorum I think it's called and I just want to make sure it looks to me like it says it's new

[67:02] language on number six focus on the issue being discussed rather than disagreement of ideas by using I statements and avoiding personal attacks or assuming motives of another and then it adds language both in the meeting and Beyond and then number seven is news speak about colleagues and issues with accuracy and truthfulness in all forms I just want to understand like for number six if I am um complaining to my husband about a council meeting I'm I'm this is saying that I cannot assume motives or say something about a colleague because I'm in the Beyond at my house is that true and it's a I think I'm going to violate the rule I'm just gonna like I I love all of you but you know sometimes it's frustrating here um mayor Pro tem friend you bring up an excellent point uh would that violate the spirit or the letter of of that

[68:00] certainly um and if your husband routed you out then then then there would be uh you know he would never well um uh but but you're right that by by a strict reading um it it would say that you should not include a infer motives um in any conversation that you're having okay thank you so I would just preview for colleagues I'm going to vote against the the amendments to the rules of decorum because I I don't I don't want to commit to complying with them as written Nicole good question about this is there a way to edit it because where this came up right was in a conversation about how we're talking uh when we're in a public forum like this um or sending out an email newsletter or something like that to a bunch of people right that those are the kinds of situations like I don't think in our discussion at least on the July 14th I

[69:02] don't think it was ever intended that that we wouldn't talk to you know smaller groups people friends spouses whoever um so I think you know is there a way to modify it at all and I recognize that I'm asking you to kind of change on on the Fly which I know we don't like to do so I don't know if there's a way to kind of think about it offline or something like that yes Council and council member spear certainly the the council could vote to continue that particular item uh to get some additional to give some additional Direction and get some additional Clarity and and perhaps a change in language alternatively a council member could make a motion to amend um and and if you have proposed language you could propose that here tonight um uh the third alternative of course is that it could move forward tonight uh as

[70:01] written and um you all could vote on it as is can I um call away and propose that maybe we move to continue it and ask for language maybe we could do notify for a language change that that limits it to sort of when when speaking in or or communicating in in more public forms however that could look so I understand newsletters but if I'm if I'm having drinks with friends or chatting with my husband like that's I don't think that's the spirit of this and and if we can change it to be more applying to you know statements almost as if from the dice that you were communicating to a wide you know body or a lot of people that are members of the public I don't have the language so I'm not going to propose that tonight Matt well can we um or just for an out of five on that do you mean yes I think do we need an out of five to to ask you to rewrite it or can we just make a motion and can we include do we make that

[71:01] motion in do we need to discuss it everybody okay with us carrying forward okay and then does the motion need to be just part of the motion um to pass this consent agenda you can make that motion separately okay so I'd like to make a motion to pass the consent agenda a through I and continue item J second Alicia is this a roll call yes it is thank you we'll start this item roll call with council member folkerts yes mayor Pro tem friend yes council member Joseph yes yes spear yes Wallach yes Winer yes Yates yes

[72:01] and Benjamin yes the consent agenda items a through I are hereby approved and item J is continued thanks for the flexibility there Teresa do we need an out of five now yes if Council would like to provide some direction about what they would like to see in a in item J next time that would be helpful great would anyone like to take a stab at it other than me I was I'll just say that I like where Rachel was going so if that helps add two people in that direction outside of the private conversation public forum social media newsletters speaking at events anything that's in sort of a public record uh in that capacity should be where this focuses on not in the private sector um a second where Rachel's at thanks Matt anyone else want to speak to it Tara great that's three do you need a show of hands or let's just do a a quick not a

[73:00] five everyone agree that we'll get rewriting in that direction great thank you thank you for that clear Direction thanks thanks for rolling with that uh to everyone back over to Elisha to take us to the next agenda item yes ma'am thank you next on tonight's agenda we have item number five which is our public hearing it's item 5A is the consideration of the following items related to the 2023 recommended budget our first item is the second reading of an emotion to adopt ordinance 8535 and that adopts the budget for the city of Boulder our second item is the second reading and a motion to adopt ordinance 8536 that ordinance establishes the 2021 city of Boulder property Mill levees item number three is the second reading and the motion to adopt ordinance 8537 that appropriates money to defray expenses and liabilities and the last item on that public hearing

[74:00] list is item number four the second reading and consideration of a motion to adopt ordinance 8538 and that amends the chapters related to fees and changing those fees thank you so much Elisha Chris over to you to kick off this public hearing happy to kick it off and we're gonna send it straight back to Mark and we did a much further in-depth presentation at first reading so we have just a very brief presentation and follow-up from first reading so Mark it's all yours thanks Chris Mark Wolfe senior budget manager all right we do have a shorter presentation this evening because we have shared so much information as Chris mentioned back in September at our recommended budget study session we received feedback from Council at that session brought forward additional information and some changes for the first reading on October 6th Council made those changes which will briefly review and here we are again for what

[75:01] could be final adoption of the budget this evening second public hearing and you already took care of the district resolutions so again just to summarize the the total appropriation across all funds is now at 582.1 million dollars that includes a general fund of 188.4 that is with the changes noted um last meeting uh in trash management and the contract related to the CVB related to Accommodations Tax projections Community culture safety tax fund is now at a little over 30 million 30 and a half million that includes the additional funds to complete fire station three and correcting the Boulder Junction Improvement fund the total 2023 budget as amended as I mentioned earlier is at that 515.4 million dollars the budget does include a number of exciting Investments we've heard these many times

[76:00] but it's always nice to remember what is in that large package which includes a continuation of many core services our investments in City staff Wildfire resilience efforts and emergency response piloting a new behavioral health health response program many homelessness services including piloting our new new day Services Center safe and managed spaces Investments and advancing key infrastructure Investments including major ccrs projects and the facilities master plan you've seen this slide several times but this is to remind everybody that we are in the three-year process Improvement for our budgeting to get better in terms of articulating our outcomes and measuring our our investments and the impact of those Investments so again the implementation of opengov or new transparency tool is a big part of that in year one we have begun to talk about outcomes

[77:01] within our budgeting process and will continue to implement that as we move into year two and begin to talk more about what measurements we need to really determine our progress to make decisions based off of that data and information I bring that up because that was a highlight of October 6 in talking through our various different Investments especially as we were talking about our safe and managed spaces program we did provide a hotline a post on this but just to for for Council and Community to hear a little bit more about this we have done some work to summarize the activities in this area especially in refining what we mean by outcomes it's a little bit convoluted but here is a good example of of looking at the program and what we intend to measure in terms of Effectiveness so our outputs would be something like the pounds of trash removed our outcomes would be more strategic in this example

[78:00] would be campsite resident engagement with services so again a little bit more towards what we're intending to accomplish with our investments so the work that is has started and will continue over the next several months we'll consider items like harm reduction in public spaces maximize our service connections through all City touch points look at Innovative approaches that go beyond our current programming to support Collective Citywide efforts and all of this will come back to council as a part of the February 2023 program update on safe and managed public spaces uh to to Really dive into those enhanced metrics and so this is a really good example of what we intend to do across our many program Investments throughout the city and then the other item that received a lot of attention we we started to have our um our arpa conversation a bit uh two weeks ago and so we just wanted to

[79:01] provide a little bit of a preview of what that conversation may look like so as Council remembers we have had a conversation around initial arpa goals then we talked about initial investments in what we call tranche one then we had a little bit longer conversation about tranche 2 Appropriations or Investments and and we we previewed or I suppose we made recommendations on tranche 3 or what would be the last group of initiatives that we would fund through arpa so that's what we intend to discuss at our next touch point we do appreciate the flexibility in pushing that out two weeks so we're currently scheduled to have that full discussion on December 1st I believe where we'll be revisiting the prioritization criteria and original goals so again to help us make decisions about what those Investments might be review our previous Appropriations and update progress on where the dollars have gone and some of the successes that we've seen we will discuss the repurposing of the available dollars

[80:00] under the public health Reserve so that was about five hundred thousand dollars that we talked about that would be available for some type of other investment and then review previous tranche 3 spending recommendations so you provided some initial Direction back in February March time frame and so that's what we're bringing back is to confirm that those are the Investments and obviously receive Direction on the rest of the dollars and we'll have a recommendation on what needs to be appropriated versus what might be subject to Future conversations and so on and so forth sorry I'll stay in front of the mic so a lot to discuss we'll probably we will try to put as much information as possible into the upcoming memo and tee up that discussion for December 1st for our next round of arpa funding which will include a number of different items but but certainly those items that were discussed two weeks ago related to looking at additional Arts Investments there was a lot of

[81:01] discussion about basic needs in the Human Services realm of those types of conversations would be what we're planning on diving into in a bit more detail when we get to December 1st as a part of that arpa tranche 3 discussion and that is the end of the presentation hand it back over to Rachel thanks so much Mark any questions on the presentation we're going to go right into the public comment then okay do we um will Brenda reread or did we tell that good for the night do you reread the the your unmute sorry we can we have had quite a few people join us for this portion who we're not here earlier online but I see but I do imagine that many of the names I'm seeing are familiar with our guidelines so I think we might be okay

[82:00] awesome let me just do a quick show of hands did anybody in here not listen or was not here to hear the the sort of rules of decorum for public comment I think I think everybody in the room got it so maybe you could just drop it in the chat online and then we'd be good uh I wasn't there for it um that we don't have a chat box activated for the general click-in webinar we're gonna hope for the best please please be nice in your um comments to you know avoid uh well I I can't even summarize it so let's hope for the best okay we're gonna start with our our in-chamber speakers now so first three will be Elaine Don Miller Emily Reynolds and Shayna Larson and you don't have to be nice that would be against your first amendment rights so say what you're here to say please there goes my speech all right hello Council I'm here once again asking you to recognize the critical importance of the camping ban for the safety of everyone in the community I urge you to

[83:02] support the additional funding needed to make these cleanups happen as a community we create rules for shared public spaces we heard the rules earlier for this shared public space two minutes use your real name don't use expletives don't go on the dice if I feel like taking five or ten minutes I'm fairly certain that I will be cut off and asked to respect everyone else's opportunity to speak and if I were to hop up on the dice to use rude language braid your hair I would be escorted from this building and boy did we see earlier how quickly that was enforced right and it should be as it should be because it's for your safety and for the order of this shared public space so we need to start enforcing uh these rules for our community for shared public spaces um Boulder has become a destination for illegal camping due to lacks enforcement of our camping ban as well as a lack of consequences for criminal acts some of

[84:02] our worst serial offenders have no local addresses but their IDs come from North Dakota Florida Texas Kentucky California they literally and I mean literally tell the Boulder Police I'm here for the camping those teenagers camping on the roof of the library over the summer were here for the camping uh some of them say they're here for the quality of the drugs and they can do these things and steal all right out in public there seems to be a shifting ability to even see encampments some people can see them when they want to solicit more millions of dollars but when a Community member shares their harmful experience suddenly those same solicitors are saying encampments what encampments I don't see them so the denial that encampments exist that they cause Community harm and the denial of the huge role of dangerous meth and Fentanyl to all populations within our community are obstacles to finding a solution but the role of the camping ban is not to solve homelessness it's to keep our public spaces Clean safe and managed thank you thanks so

[85:01] much Elaine and the jazz hands next up is Emily Reynolds and Elaine I want to thank you for really going over our rules of decorum within your speech so that was perfect Emily Reynolds and Shayna Larson and Mary Horrocks good evening Council great to see you um I'd like to thank the majority of council the seven members who supported the expansion of the encampment cleanup Crews at the first public hearing and vote on October 6th as stated in our city website the city council holds public meetings to gather feedback from community members so at least seven members of council heard our feedback we heard speaker after speaker talk about how their children feel safer biking on Arapahoe rather than taking a bike path for a few hundred yards where there will be intimidated yelled at threatened

[86:01] lunged at [Music] um um we heard how residents no longer feel safe downtown on Pearl Street at the Band Shell walking the creek path going to the farmers market to sum up you heard about residents that no longer feels safe in their own town downtown we're no longer able to enjoy our own City tourists don't fare a lot better consider the older couple walking in Central Park a few weeks ago where the woman was thrown to the ground by her hair by some glassy-eyed camper consider the two shootouts on the hill recently city government already receives half a billion dollars from taxes and fees on Boulder rights and of course there are the gigantic increases you intend for us on this year's ballot

[87:01] yet we hear that the paltry amount to clean up the illegal encampments is at risk can't you agree to do the bare minimum in keeping Boulder safe and clean thank you thanks Emily next Shayna Larson Mary Horrocks and Sherry hack and again if the if the undead people could move towards the front that just helps keep the flow moving good evening my name is Shayna Larson and I'd like to First say thank you to the council for supporting the Arts I'm here tonight not only to encourage you to increase funding for the Arts but to show you a real life example of what happens with your support my husband and I relocated our young family to Boulder 10 years ago in 2014 I noticed a neighbor had a yellow Open studio sign in her yard new in town we didn't know any of our neighbors but decided to walk in we were blown away by the paintings and drawings

[88:01] on every square inch of Bobby's home studio from that day forward my daughter and I have spent hours every fall touring local artists Studios after a third year of touring I found myself yearning to go back to creating and pick up a paintbrush myself I'll never forget that moment the world seemed to pause around me like a scene from a movie I'm meant to paint just one year after I picked up my brush my eight-year-old daughter discovered encaustic painting on the Open Studios tour she said to me Mama this is what kind of art I want to make I promptly signed her up for Marco's class and she's been painting every week since and this year for the first time I was an artist on the tour from the sweet story two impactful things have happened first I had no idea how therapeutic painting was going to be for my daughter and I during the hardest chapter of Our Lives when we're all locked down and my father died from covid we were feeling like the world was ending and we painted our Art became our Touchstone and gave

[89:01] us hope connected us to the community and gave us a way to grieve secondly my artwork has turned into a successful little small business in Boulder I shop locally at galleries for my supplies I work with two Boulder Woodworkers to make custom panels and frames and I've sold dozens of paintings to people around Boulder County and around the world funding the Arts may seem small but my daughter and I demonstrate the positive impact that art can have on our community thank you in advance for your support thanks Shayna and I'm sorry for your loss next Mary horaks Sherry hack and then both Karen akata and Michael Nicely will just need to raise his hand to show that he's here Mary hi excuse me I'm Mary Horrocks I'm the executive director for Open Studios and I also served at the dairy Arts Center as curator for visual art for seven years we appreciate your hard work and financial support the work of the Arts

[90:00] Commissioners and the Arts and cultures staff at the theory in 2014 we produced an ambitious program called Veterans speak it gave voice to military veterans from World War II Vietnam Desert Storm in Afghanistan through ART veterans speak was one of my most powerful and profound experiences we changed lives with that program I listened to the last council meeting to stories of problems with the homeless thinking about Open Studios Outreach programs and what they might offer to help we run seven programs the studio tour is a free educational program for all members of the public with 8 000 people attending each year 20 percent come from outside of Boulder including neighboring states people buy art than in restaurants shops stay in hotels all raising sales tax revenues our community outreach programs serve disadvantaged residents and school kids paying artists to provide services helping them to make a living art helps people take pride in who they are art provides income for artists in 2016 we

[91:00] were receiving twenty thousand dollars per year from New York Arts commission the program has changed since then because of funding and we now qualify just for ten thousand dollars each year half of what we once could get not because we do less or we're smaller we have grown and we do more but rent amounts have changed in 2016 we had two employees now we can afford only one we support artists with opportunities to make a living we support the public encouraging creativity essentially essential to a healthy Community our artists are generous with their time and talent they donated art for fundraisers netting five thousand dollars for the king supers victims fund and foreground for Marshall Fire Relief additional funding from the city would give an exponential Roi enabling us to hire project managers to leverage volunteers get more done with less stress and burnout of our precious human capital with more funding we'll find creative ways to solve problems that's what artists do thanks Mary

[92:00] next up Sherry hack and then Karen ocata and then Elia Garcia Grell hi I support the budget for continuing the um cleanup for the encampments and I want to point out that now you're hearing from High School parents you're hearing from high school kids and don't you think these kids have something better to do than come to a city council meeting to tell you how they feel unsafe and how the parents I mean you have parents who are telling you their kids are affected by the camps that are right behind Boulder High you know it's just it's it's sad and you know it's ironic because you um try to protect us from sugary drinks with beverage tax like if I want to buy a Gatorade in Boulder I have to pay

[93:00] extra but you won't protect us from the crime and the filth and the toxic waste that surrounds these encampments I think it's disgraceful your lack of caring for the kids and for the parents and for the whole Community regarding these public safety issues you know I had this boss a long time ago she was great and she had the same she used to say when something wasn't working out at work she'd say what's the damn deal and I'm going to say that to you tonight I know it sounds a little corny but it's like I want to say something stronger but the rules of decorum won't let me but um you just need to step up and do your

[94:01] jobs thank you thanks Sherry next we have Karen okada who um looks to be pooling with Michael please please use your jazz hands Michael that hand raise nicely sorry um okay so Karen you will have five minutes with the pool time staff please correct me if I got that wrong thank you Boulder and let me just say Michael you're welcome to stand there but you don't have to I just needed to confirm your presence thank you thank you Boulder City Council my name is Karen okada I am an artist and I also am a newer member of make sure you're speaking into the mic I'm getting the waves from the background thank you okay I'm a newer member of Open Studios um I haven't joined there maybe in June of 2021 but honestly I can tell you that

[95:01] for myself it has changed just everything about how I feel about myself and my own art I participate as I said as an artist and as a staff member and what I wanted to do if you haven't already been to our pop-up Gallery I kind of wanted to take you on a little tour of our Gallery because it's it's pretty interesting because you see all types of art and every type of the discipline it's a gallery that's open to all and rage ranges in ages as artists from 19 to 94. your experience our beloved flat irons our Aspens the Chautauqua Park that we all love and the wildlife and the bears that we kind of are seeing everywhere now and I just want to say that you view the practice professionalism in

[96:01] every type of Art there are casual customers that are very curious from the Saint Regis um CU students with their families professionals visiting that have oh probably working here for a few days they are a lot of them are very familiar with their Open Studios tour and what we do I like to thank our Open Studios like our Boulder Farmers Market we are all homegrown and we are very very we make art for all of us to share and it is all about our Bolder Life Experiences we become all ambassadors for Boulder we live our city we tell everybody about the restaurants to go to when they come in the gallery we're proud of our plane Air event our of course our Open studio tour we have mobile Labs we have the Ed

[97:01] link to our Public Schools we always make an appearance to any of the boulder festivals helping and any of the crafts for kids and we have sales training um and of course when the unfortunate circumstances happen as the Marshall fire we are there to hope all of this is a labor love this is what we all we're doing it for I think to you as council members know that very very well um getting back to what I do is I look at everything as a magnifying glass this past weekends I just want to explain to you that our Open Studios tour we had 164 artists participating that's amazing um we we I can honestly say that their return on their investment you know this is the conversation we have as artists when they come back into our pop gallery and

[98:01] I think for myself I am grateful for that Community I'm grateful for this teaching community and I I feel like it is something that we all can share our dedicated director and our board members I know are Vigilant to serve our community as well as all of us artists I just want to ask you to consider funding for Open Studios for 2023 thank you thanks so much Karen maybe you can send us a comment form with the information on a possible Gallery tour I I would be interested I can't speak for colleagues thanks okay next up we have Elijah Garcia Grau and then Valerie love and Mary Madera oh well that was the I had that for Karen and Michael Nicely

[99:00] and it was pooled time so you collectively had five minutes and I that that's pooled please yeah sorry about that oh oh okay good evening um I would first like to thank you for listening for your time and for your consideration um Elia and I are musicians can you move into the mic yeah you can hear me back thanks okay um Alia and I are musicians in the greater Boulder youth orchestras which is a organization here in Boulder that provides supportive orchestral experience for young musicians um at first learning to work with such a large group of people and to be in harmony with them was really hard for me because like it was hard to listen across the section and like to the Rhythm and the cellos that would keep me as a violinist study and um

[100:00] I generally relied on my own sense of pulse which was sometimes fluctuate so um that didn't go very well at the first rehearsal but as I attended rehearsals um I let myself trust in the community that surrounded me so I trusted that if I fell off for them they would bring me back to the correct one um I also established empathy with the people that were struggling there who weren't like who were having trouble maybe expressing themselves a little bit musically artistically and because I'd been there too right I'd been there um as an orchestration as well and um for me I guess delving into the arts created environment of safety in a world where middle and high school age students spend so much of their time online and kind of disconnected so thank you just to follow up on that I'm also a member of duio I'm a cellist um I think make sure you're right into them sorry um the Arts have taught me so much I

[101:01] think I've been I've played the cello since I was six years old the Arts have told me skills of discipline and how to be in a community with other members of an orchestra and an ensemble I've played with gu I've played in orchestras all my life so I'm just here to say how important the Arts are to us youth and to so many people in Boulder Colorado so I would appreciate funding for the Arts thank you so much thank you both Valerie love then Mary Madeira and Tim Thomas hi thanks again for letting me speak so I think we can all agree Boulder needs way more cleanup have you ever had success bribing a teen to keep their room clean next it is so frustrating it doesn't work next because of current laws and poor Mental Health Care access our city has turned into an unsafe filthy mess next we cannot expect those who are suffering to keep it clean and safe

[102:01] it's the responsibility of the city to keep the city clean and safe next when a city is filthy and unsafe it loses valuable tax dollars businesses and residents leave next when a city is filthy and unsafe it attracts Predators next when a city is filthy and unsafe vulnerable people get hurt next when a city is filthy and unsafe it means the city is not doing its job next have you ever missed a day of brushing your teeth next what about seven days it creates an environment for rot and Decay next the city needs to pass more funding for daily comprehensive professional cleanup next so the tax dollars from businesses residents and students stay next otherwise I heard there's something called a recall that taxpayers can do next [Music] the city is responsible to keep Boulder clean please pass more funding safe for safe and manage public spaces next

[103:01] until we can solve the mental health and addiction crisis we need to at least keep Boulder safe and clean for everyone especially the vulnerable populations so sorry these slides were a little off because I did canva but the whole point is when we have the safe beautiful environment it promotes people feeling good and wanting to stay here and get better when it's dirty and gross that's how we all feel so if we do not have a clean environment for everybody including the vulnerable populations we are not going to be able to have success because they're going to keep going back into a yucky unsafe filthy environment and they're going to feel filthy about themselves so please pass more funding to keep older clean thanks thanks Valerie next Mary Madera Tim Thomas and then Michael hammers we we really ask that you not uh make noise in in affirmation or against people who are speaking things good evening hi city council thank you for all the

[104:00] support you've given the Arts in the past and I hope it continues to grow I was here two weeks ago and did not succeed so I'm back again to ask you to support the Arts my name is Mari Madera and I run a music education program for the under resource children in Boulder um and BAC has supported us since our Inception in 2015 and so thank you we're very grateful for that our program provides music education to the underprivileged overlooked minority of this town we all know how important studying music is to Young Minds both academically and developmentally this helped create successful members of our society I wish you could see the looks on these students faces when they see and hold a violin or a saxophone or a cello for the very first time then for them to continue and have lessons

[105:00] learned to play and make beautiful sounds is truly an enlightening experience for everyone without our program these kids would be deprived of yet another opportunity although we've been blessed with the gos Grant and additional funding from other Boulder foundations we definitely need more funding for the Arts to employ artists create more venues for performances and displaying art for Muse costs keep increasing for such thing as paying teachers who struggled to live in Boulder because of rents being so high or owning a home and purchasing and repairing instruments I implore you to increase funding for the Arts so that our program and others can create a Level Playing Field for all children we believe that all children have the right to study music and art regardless of their socioeconomic status thank you for your time tonight thanks so much Mary next Tim Thomas and

[106:01] then Michael Hammers and the next person on the list is Catherine Muller who I should have confirmed was pooling with Karen okada so Catherine you won't have to step up now because that's my mistake Tim Thomas you're up uh the importance of these budget discussions is one of the main reasons why I'm opposed to even your elections please read my op-ed piece post on The Daily Camera I a Justice and sustainability Advocate receive text from a planned Boulder representative and a prominent member of the business Community today joining joining me in opposition to moving local elections um to even yours I also want to thank each and every one of you for meeting with me one-on-one over the past year or so well I believe there's several changes that need to be made to the budget process I would start with this I would start by sending an independently administered survey to all residents of the city of Boulders Housing Authority Boulder housing partners

[107:00] and then hire an independent auditor to examine their operations my newest public hero is Tim O'Brien the city auditor of Denver the auditor website says the independent audit function serves as a tool for good government transparency and accountability in the city this year's audit plan incorporates risk-based performances uh performance financial information technology cyber security complex contract compliance and audit analytics that's what this Denver does we do not BHP under operates under the lacks rules and flex flexible financial model called moving to work they have very little oversight at the federal and state level all residents such as myself can hope for is that the city council instructs staff to send out a survey to see their level level of satisfaction and concerns that they have

[108:00] well I have time left uh so it's just very important we don't do zero-based budgeting we don't do performance audits no disrespect to the different department head but the budget process is one of this is what I got last year you add some more money to it and that is our budget processes it's unsustainable thank you thanks Tim next up Michael hammers Jennifer Rhodes and Georgia Schmid I'm Mike hamers and I've been an artist for 47 years a passion for art I was concerned early that one couldn't Thrive financially as an artist so I earned a degree in commercial art from there I worked as a tech illustrator to the manufacturing sector for 20 years then the computer and digital revolutions came CAD systems ended traditional Tech artist positions so I learned how to use computers and founded Lightspeed commercial arts in 1992. today I'm still self-employed as

[109:01] Lightspeed hard hit by the recession in 2009 I struggled to stay solvent I slid into a suicidal depression and started to self-medicate with vodka and attempt to feel normal again three years later I joined AA where I met many artists poets and musicians through this Fellowship I rediscovered the joy of poetry music and making Fine Art again I experienced a creative Renaissance that I'm still enjoying 10 years later grateful for my rebirth I created a series of artisan Recovery Group art shows venues included the firehouse Arts Center ncar and eventually the dairy Arts Center with the art as medicine show artist statements included openly shared how art was part of their recovery a local reporter stated how this show was one of the best you'd ever seen and how she had never cried at an art show before art is power is powerful medicine and directly tied to the health of a community research has proven that a trip to an art gallery or Museum can positively

[110:01] impact your health and well-being lowering anxiety and depression boosting critical thinking skills and increased satisfaction with life they've shown that looking at art gets those exact same health benefits as those making the art it challenges though is that most artists are Starving Artists too many living hand to mouth artists need help with housing and work opportunities we're not out of the pandemic yet while there's still so many suffering with isolation depression addiction and suicide funding the Arts is an investment in the mental health of the whole Community it's good medicine for the hearts minds and Souls of all Michael your time's up okay thank you next Jennifer Rhodes Georgia Schmid and Holland Shannon hi I come to this meeting as a concerned member of the community I'm a mom and a psychiatrist with years of experience treating mental illness drug addiction and advocating for women's rights I moved here because I thought it was a

[111:01] safe clean and outdoor oriented Community I wanted my kids to grow up riding their bikes to school or hanging out by the creek the lifestyle I and so many others want for their families is rapidly slipping away by not supporting the police and not supporting the removal of illegal camping in our public spaces you are turning your backs on our children saying safety is not a priority in Boulder the safety of our kids is at risk laws are not enforced our public spaces are being taken over camping in the city is illegal but it is not enforced using drugs is illegal but this law is not enforced vandalism is illegal but nothing is done we no longer live in a safe City kids get chased all the time near Boulder High a girl was assaulted just last week while waiting for the bus another one chased with a knife my own children both of them have been harassed multiple times Boulder High has so many encampments surrounding it and so many adults abusing drugs swarming just outside school premises teens get pulled

[112:01] into the downward spiral of drugs when drugs are all around them a 14 year old girl who recently went missing had unfettered access to drugs and a safe place to do them within the encampments just outside her school I am all for helping people who are unhoused who want Services I wish taxes were increased so we could offer more effective services but giving people the right to Camp illegally and continue to use drugs on our streets is not supporting their human rights it is condoning illegal Behavior speeding up their own deterioration within Society isolating them further into poverty to a point of no return and they are taking the city and our children down with them whatever this approach is it is not working enforce the laws clean up the encampments offer real services to people experiencing homelessness and let's have a safe Community again for our children thanks Jennifer I sure loved the jazz hands guys um next will be Georgia Schmid and then

[113:00] Holland Shannon and Isabelle Rhodes Wallen hi um I'm Georgia Schmid I am the vice chair on the boulder Arts commission I'm also a dance instructor and programs coordinator at Boulder ballet first I want to thank you for your past and future funds for Boulder Arts commission also on behalf of Boulder ballet I would like to say thank you for the funds that we have received um I am here to ask to increase funds for the boulder Arts commission Georgia make sure you're speaking right into the mic please okay is this better it's great I don't want to get my lip gloss on it so um I grew up here in Boulder um I was exposed to the Arts through city-funded programs this really made Boulder a fun place to grow up in I was taught by people who

[114:00] cared for me I was taught by people who inspired me as an adult I love being a dance teacher I get to teach The Littles at Boulder ballet and I get out to public schools and do Outreach programs there I considered an honor and a privilege I love caring for and inspiring the people in our community the way I was cared for as a child and I know the other artists in the community feel the same way um and I believe that funding our artist is an essential component to create a caring and Vibrant Community we create safe spaces and experiences that allow us to heal Express and draw in tourists boosting economic longevity so I like to be really specific and bold and dream big so I want to ask that you would consider five hundred thousand dollars or more um and if you're interested in how we allocate that income to Arts commission meeting anytime um aside from living in Boulder I've lived in many different places and my

[115:01] favorite places to live were places that had vibrant art scenes I found them the most healthy communities and I met the most interesting people doing the most great work in their communities and I believe older to be one of those places and thank you for listening thanks Georgia thanks for your service on our commission next Holland Shannon Isabelle Rhodes Wallen and Deborah Mauldin okay hello Council I'm Holland Shannon I'm a junior at Boulder High School when I was 14 on two separate days back to back in broad daylight my friend and I were chased by a man with a knife on Pearl Street the second day this happened to me I was passing out lunches to people asking for money there were good lunches too that I made with my own money when we called the police they said they knew who it was and that this had been happening to other people as well they

[116:01] filed a case and took no further action after this happened I was terrified to walk in public places without a trusted boy or adult with me I assumed the adults in this city would do something to protect us kids but it only got worse and I feel more scared than ever even my high school is not safe I have found syringes and needles on my school property most of my friends have had scary experiences with one of these people in Boulder but feel hopeless speaking up because the adults don't do anything about it even one of my taller guy friends got a death threat on the bus going to school walking around Boulder High School to get to the hill with my friends after class we always walk past these angry looking men and it scares us on Sunday I showed my friend's mom the spot and she and I were chased and threatened directly behind my own school where I'm supposed to be safe I've lived here almost my whole life and when I was little I felt safe here I

[117:00] don't anymore I lived with my mom in Florida for a few months last year and it was beautiful because everyone took care of the community there was no encampments or people doing drugs in the open nobody wanted to mess with the place that looked so clean I can't say the same about Boulder you know when you drive past a police officer when you're speeding and then you go the speed limit we should do the same thing in Boulder with police officers around my school so it can have the same effect please fund a lot more cleanup please do your number one job and make Boulder safe and clean thank you thank you Helen Isabel Rose Wallen Deborah Mauldin and Jonathan singer my name is Isabelle Roswell and I'm a 12 year old girl sometimes when going home from school I'm out of breath because I run so fast on the bike path from the bus stop because I'm scared people have come up to me asking me about drugs and

[118:01] I've been I've seen people yelling and being aggressive and who sounds scary and maybe are doing drugs do you think a 12 year old girl should be scared to walk through a park during the day do you think a 12 year old girl should be running home because she's afraid someone is going to hurt her walking to school should feel safe Park should feel safe it shouldn't feel unsafe for kids can you imagine being a parent in the situation getting a call that something happened to your child while they walked home from school now people won't use the bike paths or Parks you don't want your kids in these places and then less and less people use these spaces because they are scared so the bike path becomes more of a problem because the dangerous people are winning now ask again do you think a 12 year old and lots of other people should not feel safe on a bike path in other public spaces because if we don't feel safe what is the point of having a bike path at all what is the point of having a bike path that students don't feel comfortable using what is the point of a bike path if we're not going to take care of it what is the point if we let it be wittered on

[119:00] if we don't take care of our spaces and make them feel safe again if these spaces were for a community community but our community feels in danger what is the point of these spaces at all thank you for your time thanks Isabelle Deborah Malden Jonathan singer and Sarah Parkinson hi I'm here on behalf of crepe Boulder we respectfully request an additional three hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the 2023 arts and culture budget the bulk of which would bolster the grants program this additional funding would bridge the gap between the funding outlined in the cultural plan and what is truly needed today we are deeply grateful that Council has supported the funding targets of the cultural plan but the world has changed since 2016 and arts organizations and artists like their colleagues in other sectors cannot operate successfully based on plans made over six years ago

[120:00] the Arts are continuing to recover from the pandemic while also struggling to manage the impacts of inflation working to rebuild organizations faced pressure to maintain low or in some cases free ticket and class prices so they remain accessible at the same time operating costs have increased significantly in real dollars the city's Arts grants program provides 23 percent less than in 2016. Decades of research show that the Arts are an investment that returns economic social and educational benefits because of these proven benefits competition for Arts artists and arts offerings is growing as communities across the state prioritize and make prioritize the Arts and make investments at unprecedented levels to build a thriving Arts ecosystem these communities include Loveland Grand Junction Colorado Springs Trinidad Ridgeway Basalt and Crested Butte

[121:03] in closing an additional 350 000 is needed now and would be deeply meaningful to the numerous Arts organizations artists and arts Educators that improve our community in ways that are both tangible and immeasurable and are very much needed thank you thanks so much Deborah next we'll have Jonathan singer and then wrapping up our in-chambers testimony will be Sarah Parkinson and Sam you all right good evening city council I'm Jonathan singer and I'm the senior policy program director with the boulder chamber uh before I begin I just want to thank all the youth that have come out to speak today it's inspiring to hear from you and also the all the advocates for our art community as well um with that being said Boulder chamber is working intensively right now with our business Community to ensure the safety and public health of our entire

[122:00] Community our business owners are struggling to hire retain and keep their workers in part because of concerns around Public Safety at the same time we realize that we need to be fiscally responsible with the dollars that you have this budget is a moral document it's a contract you sign with every single Community member to say that you are prioritizing their well-being the physical and economic health of this community with that being said we advocate for strategies that enable long-term Housing Solutions Innovative programs including safe and managed spaces and at the same time we need to make sure that dangerous criminal illegal Behavior is responded to and enforced this is a two-pronged approach that's going to require a lot of Blood Sweat and Tears the money in your budget is insufficient and that's not your fault it's because our County and our federal government have abdicated their responsibility so

[123:00] we now need to do find a way to work together to find a fair two-pronged solution I know I mentioned a couple weeks ago that the state has 300 million dollars that they are going to be focusing on affordable housing and also to ameliorate the homeless issue as that program moves forward we stand ready to work with you community members here and law enforcement Community to solve this problem and do the right thing for everybody thank you for your time thanks so much Jonathan Sarah Parkinson and then Sam you good evening my name is Sarah Parkinson I'm the executive director of the boulder Philharmonic Orchestra I'm speaking tonight on behalf of our organization and in support of funding for all Arts organizations in Boulder I would like to thank the hard-working staff in the office of arts and culture and for their steadfast commitment to all of us and thanks to Mr Yates especially in Mr Benjamin for their recent support voicing their support of funding through the Arts in the

[124:00] budgetary process on October 8th the boulder Phil celebrated opening night of its 65th anniversary season and Governor Jared Polis provided opening remarks on stage with us and I quote it's a great honor to kick off the 22-23 season of the boulder Philharmonic after all of the tragedies that are currently that the our community has faced in the past two and a half years it is and was the Arts and Music that have given us comfort and joy in very challenging times music is a tool for inspiration and creation storytelling and Asian an Agent of Change end quote not only did Governor paulus join us but the city of Boulder's own Jonathan Cohen spoke about actionable steps to combat climate change that was the topic of the of the of the event it was truly a collaborative event between arts and government now a lesson to learn from Governor polis is that he backs up his words with budgetary decisions that positively impact the lives of Arts organizations as you have done in the past the scfd and Colorado creative Industries have

[125:01] been and continue to be a strong and stable source of funding for many of us and the boulder Phil has seen a steady increase of support from both of those entities on an annual basis unfortunately that is not the case of us this year from the city of Boulder as your Orchestra the boulder fill was left out of the most recent round of gos grants from the boulder Arts commission for the next three years and the Arts commission made it clear that it wasn't because of our worthiness of funding it's because there aren't enough funds to to um to support our vibrant Arts community so even though you have already made your decision about the budget you can still make it right and keep your campaign promises thank you thanks so much Sarah Sam you and then we will move to um virtual testimony hi Council and thank you for having me and uh my name is uh samyu and 30 years ago I came from Taiwan and uh currently

[126:02] I'm the owner of the Rose Hill Wine and Spirit uh up at the University Hill since 2007. uh today I'm last time I'm here I'll talk about safety and this time I'm here still talk about safety and uh anyway uh our our store uh you know the high strengths Double Glass Door got broke two months ago this is first time happening 15 years and this month my neighbor you know gas station the entrance got broken so I feel like I I do need to say something or do you know try to do something to you know to make it better so uh I try to provide the information and one maybe uh naive Solutions you know so uh the information is these homeless people

[127:00] they come in groups and they are not from Colorado they're from other states and they fought they fought for the territory so that's why like we have a constantly a lot of fightings you know for these groups sometimes they have more than 20 homeless people they fought they fought and you know what one day the uh you know one of them they come to come to me and say you know hey same I'm going to move I'm gonna I'm going to the uh San Francisco I say wow that's great it's good for you I was so happy for for these these homeless going to move away and you know what and they he said don't get too excited I can't I you know the next group is coming from Texas it's more aggressive now so it's kind of pretty sad and now you know I I my solution is this okay why don't we use part of a you know the fundings to give feed them up give them the tickets and send them to the San Francisco

[128:02] your time is up um thank you we are going to move now to Virtual so I'll um look to Brenda and and we'll say again to audience members like I think what I'm hearing is that we would really like people to to comply with societal rules and the rule that we have in here is that we please don't don't make audible noises and responses to people's testimony thanks thank you mayor Pro tem that does really support our atmosphere of keeping things welcoming and inclusive of all political perspectives so um I also offer that reminder as well as reminders about um obscenities and particularly racial epithets and other types of speech that might disrupt the meeting tonight so we will start with Connie Brenton followed by Jan Burton followed by Lynn Siegel so Connie you should be able to unmute now

[129:03] hi I'm Connie Brent and I was born and raised in Boulder I have owned a small business on the downtown mall for the last 25 years I am shocked by the seeming disregard for Public Safety by the current city council this is a topic rarely mentioned or even responded to in meetings it's dangerous to be on the Pearl Street Mall as we've heard tonight the bike paths and many areas of our community the majority of the city councils seem to prioritize those coming here from out of the area and residing in illegal encampments beyond the consideration of our children our community members local businesses and tourists my young staff were faced with crime and safety issues on a regular basis including threatening behavior within the store and while getting to public transportation or their vehicles recently our store manager returned to her car to find the back windshield smashed in

[130:00] her car was one of four that night that the perfect and the perpetrator was a woman who the Boulder Police Knew by name another employee a boulder high school student left the store in broad daylight and was a threatened and assaulted by a man at a nearby bus stop he grabbed her by her hair and her throat and she rebuffed his sexual advances she doesn't want to report the incident because she knows what will happen nothing within the past week numerous local businesses have experienced break-ins theft vandalism smashed storefront windows some for the third and fourth time including us this is becoming the norm and seemingly accepted way of life with no consequences for criminals I encourage Council to start making policy decisions that promote better safety for everyone approving this budget tonight will help facilitate the hiring of more police

[131:01] officers and encampment cleanup staff which is critically needed these efforts are necessary to keep our community safe which really should be your number one priority thanks thank you Connie next we have Jan Burton followed by Lynn Siegel followed by Elizabeth McGuire I do have a name on my list I am not yet seeing in the meeting Kim smells you would be our fifth virtual speaker if you are here please reach out to me in the Q a so I can get your name changed and we can get you in the right spot in line but now we will go to Jan Burton good evening Council I'm Jan Burton from create Boulder Boulder City Council approved the cultural plan when I was on Council in 2016. it was a great first step for improving cultural life in this city and

[132:02] city funding has improved since that time however one mistake we made was not building in inflation adjustments for organizational grants surely Council would have approved that if it had been recommended we now see what a big issue it is as salaries production and other costs for cultural organizations are skyrocketing and city funding has not changed and in some cases has been lowered performing arts and visual arts organizations are suffering because ticket sales have not recovered from pre-covered levels they also struggle from the lack of affordable performing and workspace and some organizations find it more difficult to raise money due to other unique circumstances like the Marshall fire the boulder operating budget is increasing at 18 percent with inflation adjustments to take care of your staff salaries and cost escalations but other than public art line item the arts and

[133:00] culture budget is flat some of our foundational Arts organizations like you just heard from from the Boulder Field many with a history of more than 30 or even 60 years were not even funded for General operating support grants impacting them for three years arts and culture artists and musicians can help Boulder as we emerge from covid fires mental challenges and more you've heard from many of them tonight many of you on Council have said you support the Arts we'd love to see leadership by Matt and Bob who mentioned support for the Arts and More Of You by funding finding more money in the 2023 budget arpa funding and future funding opportunities We Stand ready to support you thank you for your service and for your consideration thanks Jan thank you Jan next we have Lynn Siegel

[134:00] followed by Elizabeth McGuire and then Kim smells who is here hi Lynn um you know the budget is like in the winter opening the front door and turning up the heat now I'd be ready to support this budget if I saw less subsidy to the developers that caused the wealth inequality that you've heard rampant discussion at with open comment and a budget and it's going probably into the drought discussion tonight because it's all connected you can't continue on this course you know I don't support this Council you know I don't support you policy but I'm going to say it again and again and maybe so the public can understand

[135:01] that that the increased inflation for the Arts for the budget with Jen Burton right now is not there because you're not directing the funds the right way you're subsidizing the developer I know I follow eight City boards I see it all the time another third Story another giveaway to see you just like with see yourself another giveaway the Hill Hotel there's got to be a hotel across the street too for see you with a 15 000 square foot Ballroom growth creates greater inequality creates the trash need for trash cleanup and all the expense and that expense will be endless and you will keep on hearing these discussions over and over and over again like you always do what are you doing shame on you

[136:01] you heard it from the public there's a solution and it's not giving more funding it's stopping the demand for homeless with your well thank you inequality policy thank you and um please if you have further comments Lynn please send them into city council using the online form um Elizabeth McGuire followed by Kim Smouse followed by Ben Needham wood Elizabeth you should be able to unmute good evening I am Elizabeth McGuire I'm the executive director of the Colorado music festival and Center for musical arts as well as a member of the Boulder County Arts Alliance board of directors you may recognize the Colorado Music Festival as an internationally renowned Performing Arts organization if you're

[137:01] not familiar we were recently featured in the cover story of the Sunday Arts edition of The New York Times in BBC Music Magazine and a story that highlighted the city of Boulder prominently and on national public radio's performance today for our groundbreaking World premier performances of works created and performed by a diverse cast of world-class musicians we are in lockstep with Boulder's cultural plan and hopefully a source of great pride in our community we run an incredibly efficient organization our festival with the artistic quality that can stand up to any Festival of its type in the world operates on a comparative shoestring I've spent 25 years in arts management approximately six of those in Boulder and I can assuredly tell you that all of the Arts organizations in Boulder provide well above our budget class in this way and offerings to the community we bring so much and really do receive

[138:00] very little comparatively our Arts organizations are currently in crisis while we're pinched by the rising costs still experiencing some pandemic related attendance issues we still have to meet the demand of living wages and exponential increase in venue costs in our case a venue owned by the city of Boulder itself many of us have to decide how we can cut back in order to remain solvent this is the time these Rising venue costs resonate throughout the boulder Arts community and threaten our very health and ability to provide our life-changing and Community Building programs supporting Arts venue operations is proven to be a great financial investment for cities due to spending and tax revenues associated with Arts audiences I ask that you consider increasing support today to match today's needs thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight and for your work thank you Elizabeth and next we will have Kim smells

[139:02] followed by Ben Needham and then Katie Elliott him you should be able to unmute now hi my name is Kim Smouse I'm a boulder resident and a board member of Open Studios thank you Council for supporting the Arts and thank you to the office of arts and culture for your excellent work Boulder Arts organizations provide exemplary programming and are in desperate need of additional funding in the last few years Open Studios has faced challenges fundraising not only due to coveted shutdowns but more recently by the Marshall fire Open Studios has been struggling to keep our programs afloat thank you for funding the amounts specified in the 2016 Community cultural plan that the Arts need more funding we are not out of the woods from the pandemic and coveted relief funding is no longer available funding Arts organizations is a proven success in Boulder the Open Studios tour

[140:02] and Plein Air Art Festival are both extremely popular Boulder art events bringing together a significant number of artists and art patrons the current resources both events are executed on a shoestring with a group of Open Studios volunteers Community donations and skeleton Staffing we would use additional funding to bolster project management for these events in order to assure patrons of a positive experience while reducing stress and burnout of our human resources Arts programming is incredibly important to the health of our community it has the transformative power to heal the teen and tween populations in Boulder are clearly suffering from mental health and drug issues Open Studios has two programs specifically designed to reach students and at-risk teens the mobile art lab brings art making to community Gatherings and festivals and Ed links provides Visual Arts programming to the public schools for free these programs build community and cross barriers of

[141:01] socioeconomic status race and age Kim my apologies we did not start the timer when you began to speak so if you could just close out your remarks um that would be helpful I think we started the timer about a minute in okay thank you please consider advocating a portion of the remaining arpa funds to Boulder Arts organizations and when the 2023 budget is adjusted next year please consider allocating your end reserves to our Arts organizations thank you very much thank you Kim and again my apologies for not accurately giving you your time next we have Ben followed by Katie Elliott and then we'll close out with Kathleen McCormick and Travis Laberge so Ben you should be able to unmute now thank you so much uh good evening everyone my name is Ben Needham wood and I'm the newly appointed artistic director for Boulder ballet and thank you for giving me space to speak tonight

[142:01] and I'm here to advocate for additional funding for the Arts this is a hard conversation to have because we're essentially trying to put value on paper to something that can't be fully measured and that's the impact of the Arts we know that we can track tourism dollars we can track job creation but what we can track is the moment when inspiration leads to innovation coming out of this pandemic we are in a moment where Innovation is necessary for us to navigate the challenges that we face in our communities some of these challenges that I'd like to highlight tonight are Community disconnect social anxiety and mental health I myself am someone who can speak directly to the value of Art in supporting mental health I'm an adult Survivor of childhood sexual abuse and it was through the Art of Dance that I was able to reclaim myself that I was able to reclaim my body and find a path towards healing that allowed me to become a functional member of society and what we have shown recently through

[143:00] Studies by Mental Health America is that Colorado is currently experiencing some of the most severe cases of mental illness in the United States with that we can recognize that this is a moment where we need Innovation we need the Arts to help those who are struggling to find their personal path towards healing well the Arts can help just to support us through our traumas they can also be a source of Celebration and this is what I would love to highlight tonight the yards are part of every major Ceremony be it a wedding or something else that's truly spectacular with dance and music and is through the Arts that were able to celebrate personally in a moment that is going to resonate with us for the rest of our lives I hope that this Council will consider increasing the funding for the Arts for the city of Boulder so that we can continue to find celebrations that allow us to celebrate the progress we make as we look for healing in this very complicated time thank you all for the work you do thank you and thank you for sharing your story

[144:01] with us Ben next we have Katie Elliott Kathleen McCormick and Travis LaBarge Katie you should be able to unmute Elliott and I am the artistic director of Third Law Dance Theater we've been creating work in our community for over 20 years and I'm here to advocate for more funding for the Arts in our community we are grateful for city funding crucial to continue our dance for Parkinson's program that serves people living with Parkinson's and other Mobility considerations city funding is integral to keeping classes these classes free and making it available to everyone City support increased our accessibility to other classes in Spanish steady Community programs like this have significant Collective impact and are a unique opportunity to mitigate the

[145:00] adverse Health impacts of social isolation in older adults our program is unique as it is offered alongside a professional dance company that connects participants to the cultural landscape of their community and movement through the doorway of artistic expression last year the National Endowment for the Arts released a report with this important finding place-based Arts and Cultural practices grow Community well-being which is not restricted to mental and physical health but encompasses individual business benefits such as happiness and communal creative responses to trauma that translates directly to the health and vibrancy of a city making it a desirable region for people to live grow create and spend their recreational time and resources all Arts organizations play a role in this I hope you will increase the gos

[146:01] grants budget to strengthen the ark's ecosystem of our city thank you for your service and thank you Katie next we have Kathleen McCormick and then we will close out with Travis LaBarge um Kathleen you should be able to unmute good evening and thank you for this opportunity and for your support for arts and culture in the 2023 City budget I'm Kathleen McCormick and I'm a member of the boulder Arts commission a proud member of the boulder Arts commission I want to thank our arts and culture staff uh for the wonderful job that they do I appreciate your funding for public art and the American Rescue plan act funds for covid-19 related impacts on Arts organizations which the Arts commission a couple months ago used for Grants to rehire administrators and artists employing More arts administrators and

[147:00] artists will help our Arts Community recover and will support many local families and businesses however we do have some gaps in current funding I hope you will consider providing at least three hundred thousand dollars in additional support from the arpa funds for critical purposes examples of how this funding could be used for example 192 000 would provide two years of General operating support grants for five Boulder Arts organizations such as the nationally recognized Boulder Philharmonic and the boulder ballet which qualified for but did not receive grants in our three-year 2022 cycle because of funding constraints another example would be a hundred and eighteen thousand dollars which would provide rental subsidies for performing and visual arts organizations facing acute space affordability challenges as well as youth programs and artist relief projects

[148:01] research shows that every dollar invested in the Arts generates multiple dollars for its City in economic impact a thriving arts and culture sector drives residents workers and visitors to Boulder stores restaurants and hotels and is critical to attracting and retaining the creative Talent needed for our Boulder businesses in addition vibrant arts and cultures activities are key to meeting the city's diversity equity and inclusion goals arts and culture are the backbone of a healthy inclusive and resilient community and I ask that you consider more funding for 2023 as a statement of our City's values again thank you so much thank you Kathleen and our final speaker of this evening is Travis LaBarge who I've probably pronounced your name incorrectly this entire time Travis my apologies you should be able to unmute thank you very much my name is Travis Laberge I've been called a lot worse

[149:01] than Travis LaBarge I'm the executive director and founder of parlando school of musical arts parlando has been providing Outreach in Boulder for almost 20 years and we've been offering music lessons and classes in the dairy Arts Center for over 15 years Orlando recently received the general operating support Grant from the boulder Arts commission thank you for supporting this program and I trust you know that your office of arts and culture is quite simply excellent I love data and here are some I'd like to share Londo employs over 50 musicians from Boulder and surrounding communities we provide lessons and classes to over 550 weekly students down from nearly 800 pre-covered we provide tuition assistance to over 100 students per year and since Inception have provided over six hundred thousand dollars in support to more than 1700 students including free lessons for victims of the Marshall fire we also provide programming for senior citizens Early Childhood students and neurodiverse members of our community last year we worked with 22 different

[150:00] schools in bvsd DPS and Jeffco providing support to over 1600 music classes creating nearly 50 000 student interactions these students have an 11 higher attendance rate their GPA is almost a full letter grade higher and their graduation rate is 24 percent higher compared to their non-musical peers because of inflation we made the decision not to raise tuition this year while simultaneously increasing compensation for our teachers by as much as 25 percent because we were able to retain our staff during the pandemic we did not qualify for the recent administrative rehiring grants and because we rent space at the Dairy Center we did not qualify for shuttered venue funding this has made gos support all the more valuable to parlando weird city council to fund the Gap that Deborah Malden outlined so that Arts organizations like parlando can continue to contribute to Boulder's artistic educational and economic vitality simply put Arts organizations need more funding to continue this vital programming that otherwise does not

[151:00] happen gos is the Catalyst that makes this possible thank you for your time and consideration thank you Travis and with that we come to the close of the public hearing mayor mayor Pro Tem I mean you can call me mayor if you want to I'm kidding um thank you so much for your help with that Brenda um okay so let's move on and first see if there are any follow-up questions to staff flowing from the public hearing public testimony anyone have questions to staff Nicole yeah thanks again everyone who took time to speak to us tonight I just had a couple questions for our police department and I was just wondering um there were a couple of comments that folks made saying that we're not enforcing the camping ban somebody said that we're not enforcing drug possession and I was just wondering if if you could speak to that I think the other comment that was raised was someone had been

[152:01] chased with a knife and that was a situation that had been known but they were saying that nothing had been done about that so I just wonder if you could speak to that a little bit absolutely thank you for the question Steve Redford Deputy police chief uh good evening and uh I think I got I think there's about three in there I'll try to address so the first one is we do enforce the camping ban and there are there are separate entities within the police department that deal with uh camping so a patrol officer out on patrol May encounter an unsaturation camping and may take enforcement action that's in their purview just like it would be if they were to write a traffic ticket or not our hot team our homeless Outreach team their goal is not enforcement their goal is and I know many of you have have met them on cleanups their goal is to is more Outreach and then we have uh our recently we've added more to our encampment team that specifically go out with our our partners and do and do the cleanup they're there mostly for safety they're obviously police officers and will take action but really on those on those

[153:00] occasions the the majority of that work is to get people into services and things like that so we do enforce it I don't have the number of of summonses in front of me that we have written but it is it does get enforced it's not always our top priority depending on who is doing that uh the second question there was a concerning uh statement that was mentioned on the uh public call about an incident that occurred where someone was attacked and they didn't report that to the police and I will just say very clearly is those instances of violence we take very seriously and traditionally as you've seen recently we've had several high-profile cases that we have the perpetrator in custody very quickly and so if there is a narrative out there that that nothing will get done about that that is false I can tell you every day I'm down in our detective Bureau and it's incredible group of men and women working those cases if someone is physically attacked we take that very seriously and we will investigate that to our fullest potential we have a great partnership with the District Attorney's office and we are we are seeing very successful prosecutions of of those persons crimes I think drug possession

[154:00] was your third question ma'am so on the drug possession we do enforce drug possession it is still illegal some of the comments that we've we've we've heard and we've had conversation with the community over is exactly what recourse we do have for drug possession and in 2014 many uh a simple possession of things like cocaine methamphetamine they were lowered the the state legislature lowered possession where uh on simple possession we do write a ticket in many cases now whereas prior to that it would be a physical arrest and somebody would go uh to jail in addition with covid and some of the jail restrictions we just haven't been able to even on more felony cases necessarily take people to jail those coveted restrictions at the jail have been lessened and so we commonly do make arrests for drug possession it just kind of depends on the quantity and the scenario there and just one follow-up question um have the covid restrictions at the jail been lessened or are they gone so there are

[155:00] no code restrictions currently in the jail is is was the last update I got from the sheriff uh he did share with me this morning in a meeting though they are very very full and so um they there are there are still restrictions on what they will take based on seriousness of the crime color well thanks Nicole for those good questions my question is is I think a few of the students brought up the fact that there were a lot of drugs around the schools remember back in the day when there was drug drug-free zones for schools where are we with that so there are still laws for drug dealing in I think it's 100 feet of a school that is something that obviously if we arrest someone selling drugs we are we have in our in our toolbox there isn't an additional enhancement for somebody that might just be using

[156:00] drugs in and around the school obviously Insight is different but if someone's nearby a school and just you getting high for a lack of a better term that is the same as if they were doing it out out here there's no harsher penalty just for someone using drugs near near a school now obviously if they're giving drugs to students that's a whole other scenario that we'll deal with that it Tara any other questions for deputy chief Redfern thank you so much all right thank you all right any other questions for staff Tara we heard some moving testimony from the Arts people today so can you remind me Matt's idea from was that a few weeks ago what we planned to do for the Arts people sure thanks for the question uh so last or two weeks ago we shared a little bit of information of how the 2023 budget

[157:02] Compares in terms of the targets within the community cultural plan and then what we discussed was the potential of revisiting the public health Reserve dollars within arpa that we've appropriated but not yet spent so that was about five hundred thousand dollars that we had discussed so that that is a part of the conversation for for arpa and then any of the other um initiatives that were a part of tranche 3 that we haven't yet finalized and so again there's other opportunity for Council feedback and Direction on how to spend those funds including the the 500 or so as a part of the public health Reserve that we could repurpose can I call a queen Lauren and then you can ask your question too if you'd like um so one of the comments that was made was that the budget in the cultural or the funding laid out in the cultural plan wasn't adjusted for inflation could you

[158:01] also give us an estimate of what that would be or speak to that is inflation taken into account and if not what would the budget you know what's sort of the difference in the budget that we're talking about yeah I appreciate that question and I I think that it's true that we would um we would see quite a large increase across the board if we were adjusting our entire budget by inflation and we shared a couple slides I think it was all the way back at recommended budget maybe last week or two weeks ago as well uh that the overall City budget is still not keeping up with the pace of inflation compared to pre-pandemic levels and and so I think it just gets at that it's really difficult to put together a budget that reflects all of our community values and goals and Council priorities and so we've made some significant investments in the 23 budget as it relates to arts and not to diminish the need and certainly the the

[159:00] need is is there as we've heard this evening and so I think part of that conversation is just how do we approach that I think we're recommending that Council moves forward on the budget as proposed but acknowledges that we have this upcoming arpa conversation that we could could certainly have additional conversation about funding and then there's also future opportunities whether it's through revisiting those targets through the community cultural plan looking at updating those funding targets based on inflation and I'm sure Matt and his team have thoughts on how to approach that process as well so I would say the conversation would just be beginning not not ending as you're considering the budget this evening Lauren do you have another question Gina you have a question yes thank you I feel like we're talking about budget and also we're answering asking questions about the public hearing that just happened it's a great question so I I think I'll open it up to discussion of the whole budget after we just follow up with questions that kind

[160:00] of flowed from public comment comment and we have Mr team Thomas who's been coming here for a very long time and his questions often surround BHP and I was the representative the council representative for one year but I do think his question at least married some kind of explanation uh he talked about an audit process for BHP and I wonder if that's something that Council can do what type of oversight do we have so I think that's been part of his question since he's been coming here for a year and even as a member I remember a representative I feel like a lot of times we don't brief counsel afterward I mean you've taken over right and we still you know we don't get updates so I think part of the

[161:00] question is there any oversight or is there something we can do there's a Board of Commissioners that has oversight um and as you probably know Juni um I would characterize BHP as perhaps no offense to any other component of our city government but they may well be the best run Department in the entire city government it needs to we need to remember for instance that during the pandemic they evicted absolutely no one on the basis of economic hardship they try to work with their tenants as best they can to avoid eviction I met with Mr Thomas this last weekend and I appreciate his View and his comments but a performance audit of the kind that he is suggesting obviously costs a fair bit of money it's an independent process not conducted either by our regular Auditors

[162:00] or by anyone in the city and although there are a couple of insistent voices and I know who they are and we know who they are through emails who have suggested that there is something going on at BHP that is untoward um I I would challenge anybody to go down there and talk to them and and discover um what that might be because they are run uh sensitively they are run efficiently they are astonishingly good in terms of the their ability to finance their projects and with almost 1600 units under management you are always going to get a couple of people who are unhappy one of the things they're trying to Grapple with now is the fact that when they House High utilizers it often causes strife and concern on the part of their neighbors and they're trying to deal with that and that's part of what we're hearing is is you know you see

[163:01] pictures of units that are clearly being used as chop shops some of them are being used as flop houses for large groups of people and some of them are being used as um by people who are utilizing meth um and that you know I will tell you that that's an issue that is of great concern they are effectively not insured for the damages that come from meth use and Remediation costs forty to fifty thousand dollars per unit they have had 10 units over the course of time that have had to be remediated and it only is as low as forty to fifty thousand dollars because they've been fortunate and there's been no collateral um contamination of hallways and other neighboring units so I you know I'm fairly um Mark can I pause you there yeah council member Wallach yeah I'm afraid that we

[164:01] might be getting outside of the direct budget discussion and I was wondering if either you or it's not that I disagree or want to cut you off but if um you or Juni might want to just send something into CAC asking that we schedule some time to discuss I'm happy to BHP and or an audit of uh I'm happy to do that and I was concluded by saying uh you're not going to find a lot of there there okay appreciate it junior did you ask all your questions and then we didn't really get staff to weigh in there but thank you well will a CAC request be sufficient to From staff's perspective on that yep that works great um okay so more questions good the microphone tipped up so I think that was good okay now uh let's open it up to discussion on the whole budget and at some point we're going to need a motion in possibly four parts to pass a budget for the city of Boulder this year who'd like to kick off discussion

[165:00] I like Bobby Yates for it thanks um well I I just want to reiterate what um we talked about two weeks ago and I think we started to talk about tonight um I'll give you Matt the credit for the idea but I think there's a lot of support on Council for um uh looking at the arpa funding when we come back in a few weeks I think it's November that you guys going to come back and talk to us about what we might use some of the remaining funds for and and um it occurs to me that um some of our Industries in in this community have recovered very quickly from covid um others as we heard tonight are more slow to recover and I think the Arts communities have been among those that have been very slowly recovered and that's exactly what arpa is for right arpa is to help industries and people who are struggling to recover from the setbacks economic setbacks and social setbacks of coveted so I think this is the the appropriate use of these funds I know there's competing uses for these funds I know you guys will come with a list that's probably longer than the funds we have available and we'll have

[166:00] to make some difficult decisions but I would encourage staff when they do come back in November with some alternatives for us and I would encourage you to work with Matt chazanski and the Arts commission about how um how much is appropriate and how those funds could be best used to help Arts organizations and artists recover from this very difficult time that they've had over the last two or three years thanks to staff in advance for doing that thanks Bob do we have a colloquy Nicole kinkalkway uh this is just really quick but I had a chance to talk with Elizabeth crow in our HHS um recently and um one of the things that I had mentioned kind of that the need for more basic needs funding that's basically where those arba funds are targeted for already so I just wanted to raise that to people's awareness and I really encourage everybody to talk to HHS staff and learn a little bit more about what some of the plans are maybe before that discussion so I think it could be could

[167:00] be helpful okay Matt and then Mark thanks Rachel um so a couple things I certainly did piggyback on what we've been hearing certainly from the community and certainly my colleagues up here um and as we discussed two weeks ago so I think sir just Bears putting it out there so it raises out above maybe the noise um as we go forth on more conversations um that indeed we need to do more to support the Arts and and I think outside of this budget so Mark you and care you don't need to sweat I'm like that's going to touch tonight's budget so so you guys are feeling safe you're not in the hot seat on that uh but but immediately sort of after as we deal with arpa atps you know uh those sorts of things I think is where we can really um put some meat on the bone to really support them and hearing that the boulder fill is not eligible for a grant I mean one of our long-standing art organizations is being left out because of a lack of funding is that's a clear barometer uh for us that we're not quite hitting the Mark um so I think we can we can do better and we have the money to do so

[168:01] um and and you know one of the important things as Bob mentioned it is absolutely where arpa is meant for right the Arts Community much like restaurants were disproportionately hurt by baikova this is where the money should be going so I think we have a safe case for that and also realizing that that we know that the Arts Community is a financial and economic Force multiplier and so I think we know that we're gonna get that money back in spades so I think that's a where the investment really plays out and I think that's an important thing for us to focus on so I'll be focusing on the arpa funds um and certainly maybe ATVs as we come up to to do that with regards to the 500 000 that was mentioned um sure that that that may have been previously put in HHS for some of those basic services but at the end of the day the core use of arpa was for those disproportionately impacted communities and I think we can do a little bit of both given that there's 500 000 and we can sort of help a few different groups rather than putting all our eggs in one basket and I think that's a conversation for all of us to have as to how we want to split that pot up if indeed that's the case so thanks

[169:00] Mark um Matt mentioned atbs which leads me to the question of how are sales taxes trending obviously it's a couple of months before the beginning of the new fiscal year but Trends or Trends and uh one source of funding for the Arts and any other program would be if there is an unanticipated increase in sales tax so how are we looking generally we're looking good on the sales tax front I would say that the process that we usually follow for adjustments in looking at excess revenues to close out the books and we typically recommend some one-time use of funds so that would be the one-time excess that goes to the fund balance in the general fund so that typically happens in the spring time frame that your second adjustment of this year will come as a part of the arpa conversation so I will provide all

[170:00] of that information as we close out 2022 I think the caution that we just talked about is that we are seeing some inflationary impact in the in the positive for our revenues as well so we'll just keep that in mind for ongoing costs but certainly for one time uses that would be another source essentially and let's keep an eye on it thank you foreign this might or might not have anything to do with the budget I'll try to cut you off quickly if it doesn't Okay one of the people brought up how there was not affordable space and so I'm wondering if in the future we can find some affordable space maybe that the city owns it have we talked about that recently or is that nothing to do with this Council what so are you referring to um lease spaces for for Arts organizations yeah so I know that we talked uh a bit

[171:02] potentially about looking at arpa or other sources of funds ccrs is another so as we look at the non-profit support program it's also worth mentioning that council did approve that General framework as well Matt do you want to add to that I was going to add Matt you you knew going into the way back you were going to get summoned up again so you know that's the case exercises uh match zanski with the office of arts and culture I just want to add that we do have a program that addresses affordability Matt can you lean in yeah thank you guilty um Matt justanski with the office of arts and culture I did want to mention that we do have a program with the boulder Arts commission uh grants to address affordability of venues uh rental assistance grants um and uh that's been a very well used program and so um it is something that's in discussion and something that's going to be extremely important for the next cultural plan so that discussion will start up next year as well foreign

[172:01] good question um okay well let's see if somebody would like to make a motion then and we can discuss oh okay mark read them all or staff do we need to what do we need to read here all of it yep every word you were the speed reader I speed read let's see if you can beat it I hope somebody timed it yeah it what's in the memo is what's written here on the screen as well so if you want to reference that the full motion languages in the memo that is part of the official record s all right I will move the various uh motions that are set forth um in uh our agenda for this evening

[173:00] including uh adopting ordinance 8535 and the three following Provisions that are set forth therein to adopt our 2023 budget I said second I second the motion mark would you like to speak to your motion yes uh very briefly I think it's a well-balanced budget I think it is addressing a number of critical needs we've identified a need that may have been a little bit underfunded in terms of the Arts but we have ways of addressing that as well and I I think this is a budget that is worthy of adoption thanks Tara would you like to speak to your second there is no pressure great all right Nicole thank you just gonna explain myself first I just want to say thanks to all

[174:00] the Departments and all the work that you all put in over the last two weeks to begin these discussions about how to align our cleanup strategy with our overall homelessness approach just really appreciate that that was I know a lot of work in talking with the team from utilities we're really doing a lot on our trash management approach that's aligned with what I would consider best practices around trust building especially and coming up with some Innovative and creative strategies that keep our public spaces safe and accessible for all the proposed approach to metrics and Alignment across departments will I think help highlight these successes and one of the things I've been most impressed by is how the trash cleanup folks and utilities have worked to build relationships and trust with people who are living in our public spaces they're creating a strategy for trash management that focuses on harm reduction and coexistence and I appreciate that they're giving out sharks containers for a needle disposal they're teaching people which areas of our public spaces are most at risk from flood and they're involving the homeless community and trash pickup I see our utilities

[175:00] department elevating lived experience and giving people who have experience with homelessness a seat at the problem-solving table and not just in a way that checks boxes they're really treating people with lived experience as true partners and leaders in this work it's commendable and something that I hope will emulate in a lot of different departments still going to vote no because I'm still left with a concern that our camping van is not the right approach to helping people exit homelessness and creating the safety that all of us want with next year's investment we will have spent six million dollars on the safe and managed basis program and I don't have any evidence that this investment has moved the needle on addressing the fundamental problem of homelessness that's creating the need for this program we put a lot of Staff time into ticketing people or threatening people with tickets and then moving them around in a punitive way when the need continues to outpace our service capacity we don't have the permanent housing Mental Health Services and Addiction Services needed to make a dent in homelessness the proposed budget commits us to spending more money to

[176:00] enforce an ordinance that has no indicators of success and that has not moved the needle on homelessness in our community research shows that camping Bans are a failed approach to homelessness because when we disincentivize people from letting service providers know where they are we're disrupting their connection with services and making Services harder to access we all want to end homelessness in our city but we don't have the regional state and federal support that we need to achieve this goal I want to see us focus our limited funding to move people from encampment settings in a way that connects them with housing opportunities and other services the situation that housed in a house workers residents and students are experiencing right now due to homelessness is unacceptable period but investing in an encampment cleanup solution that involves a camping van component is not one I can support we've had a ban in place for six years now how has the encampment situation better today than in 2016 don't the impacts of encampments seem worse today

[177:00] we need to look at a different solution to keep everyone safe and I know I'm in the minority at least I think I do but I do look forward to seeing more Innovations with our utilities team more alignment with our homelessness strategy and some of these metrics of success in the coming months thanks again to everybody who worked so hard to put this together thanks Nicole anyone else Bob I think it's um I think this is my seventh Budget on city council and I think it's a tribute to the um great work that staff did not just the two of you but I think all your partners throughout all the organizations over the last six or nine months I mean I think you guys like start tomorrow morning on the next 2024 budget don't you it's just a it's a year-long process and um I think as I reflect back on the the six prior budgets that I've worked on on Council this is the one that's probably received the least amount of of input we got some good input tonight I'm not

[178:00] saying that we didn't have input and by my account there was a nine nine people spoke tonight on on the on the uh increasing the funding for the encampment cleanup which is what staff had recommended and um six another 16 people spoke on increasing funding for the Arts which I think we've talked about well it won't be in this specific budget I think you heard from several members of us that we would like to hear about how we might do that at least on a one-off basis in the arpa funding next when we talk about next month um and so I think the fact that we um that there was so little commentary outside of those two areas is probably an indication that you guys did a really really good job of putting the other a budget that the community supports I mean I didn't hear six areas or 12 areas or 20 areas of ejection I just heard two areas both of which I think were actually addressing today one were I think well it depends on what the majority does tonight but I think the staff recommendation which which the majority of council May support in increasing the funding for academic cleanups that's responsive to what the community has asked for and I think we're being responsive to the Arts community and what they're looking for so I I feel good about this budget I'm

[179:00] going to support it I'm going to um and I really commend um the finance team but also the the entire city staff that had a hand in the in the budget in putting together a budget that I think the community can Embrace and I think is Council will and should embrace thank you thanks Bob Lauren and then Juni foreign thanks Rachel um I'm gonna Echo many of the comments that Nicole made I agree that this is generally a well-balanced budget and I appreciate all the effort that went into this um I I do hear a lot of the public concern over Public Safety um I I Bike by Boulder High almost every day but I've seen a an improvement in this area I think that the safe and managed spaces team is doing difficult work in a very compassionate manner and yet um I

[180:00] it was mentioned earlier that budgets are moral documents and I cannot support the expansion of this team when I don't see it solving the underlying issues that create this need I'm stuck I'm skeptical that this increased funding will make students feel safer and I'm skeptical that it will reduce some of the other inconveniences that we have downtown related to people being to not having their basic needs met and for this reason I will not support this budget thank you Juni and Tara yeah thank you for that and I think um I think hearing from Nicole and also Lauren broke my heart because I will be supporting the budget today but I hear everything that you said and and I know you it's coming from a place of trying to bring everyone to the table and

[181:00] ensuring that everyone have a fair shake so I really appreciate your commentaries and um and I've been working with the budget team as well for almost since I've been on Council for almost two years now and I've seen the work you know I've seen the sausage made behind closed door and I've seen all the hard work that's being put into this and [Music] um and I do think it's it's it's a good and decent budget but I'm hearing where Nicole is coming from and where Lauren is coming from and the need for improvement and I wonder maybe this Improvement can still be part of the process moving forward thank you Judy Tara I agree Lauren there definitely has been an improvement as I ride my bike around it's definitely looking the um the team Sam's team is doing a really good job took my weekly ride today in Goose Creek Tunnel was filled with furniture

[182:02] and it was dark and I could not see my way through that tunnel it was just wait so there was way too many um obstacles obstructions and then on Foothills Parkway there's a giant amount of trash sitting there if you ever rode from from Pearl Street down back to the Boulder Creek path you just have to look and see a growing a growing pile of trash so I'm not the team is doing a great job but I feel like there's plenty more to do to keep our city environmentally friendly and to keep from degradation environmentally so I'm looking forward to the increase in the trash because I know it's not going to it's not the purpose of it is isn't too uh isn't too and homelessness is really to pick up the trash so that we can have it environmentally uh clean City

[183:01] but I do appreciate what you guys say because really honestly the underlying Solutions are we have to do something about mental health and we have to do something about uh substance abuse issues and we don't without the county pitching in we're just not going to get anywhere so we need to have that meeting for sure with them and get them to see things our way so again I go back to my very terrible metaphor about pizza pies in the budget was such a bad metaphor but I'm going to bring it up yet again that that budget was so great because it just gave some things for everything it was a lot of different topics on that Pizza Pizza Pie budget that I appreciate Matt all right I think I'll try to round this out um I am I I hear exactly what Nicole and Lauren are saying and they they bring up good points about what has to be done and

[184:01] where we can do better with regards to our unhoused um but but where I I quickly differ is um objecting to one tenth of one percent of a half a billion dollar budget and using that as justification to say no to all the good that the rest of that money does so so that I I'm struggling with how to reconcile that and hopefully in time we can all work together to figure out how we can move forward with that but in light of this budget um I will be supporting it because of all the good that it does and I see a bunch of department heads out in the audience and I just want to commend to each and every one of them not just for the work and the budget but be willing to adapt to this Council and the Dynamics that we've brought forward and the thoughts that we've had and adjust in very short time and so I think that speaks to staff it speaks to their work and certainly how that's folded in so um for such a large budget and a large city that's that's that's a lot of agility in

[185:00] a lot in in with a lot of moving parts so credit to all of you so thank you for that um and so yeah I will be supporting this but I do think um largely we have to think about what is more deeply rooted where we can't get behind a budget to support the function of the city um and and really sink into what those issues are because a budget like this with this process should be unanimously supported um so hopefully we can reconcile those differences but I will be supporting it thanks Matt um I'll just add that I I appreciate that and and I remember Jane brought again I think used to say this is a a document that that does express your values this is the embodiment of a city's values and I agree and respect that and and don't think we're nailing our homelessness strategy and don't think it's helpful to Bob people around and we have not expressed a different value as a council then we have a camping ban um so I think it's a it's a difficult thing there are a lot of things like there's some things in the transportation department I disagree

[186:01] with there are things I don't I don't I would I would eliminate single-family zoning in a lot of Boulder and so we're going to improve budget for planning that's going to be implementing things that I don't necessarily agree with so I think where I would put the energy to doing something different with camping is the midterm Retreat or are asking for for us to look at it separately but as as as it is now I think the budget's a a difficult place to to have a large camping ban discussion and and um I don't know how we would get there in in this evening to to accomplish that so I appreciate and agree with a lot of the concerns and and think that we should look harder at that and um and it should be an articulated priority and value if we if we want to move forward in that way um so with that I think I will uh say it's time for a vote and turn to Elisha unless please let me know if I've missed something Christmas Chuck no I think you've covered it all thank

[187:01] you all right let me put my vote sheet up here all right we'll start the vote on the four ordinances related to the budget with mayor Pro tem friend I mean yes councilmember Joseph yes spear no walek aye Winer yes Yates yes Benjamin yes Focus no the four ordinances related to the budget is hereby adopted with a vote of seven to one on my apologies I thought I had out that down time Miss Folker it's my apologies I had it recorded wrong that is true six

[188:00] two thank you thanks Elisha we have a second public hearing tonight thank you Mark and Cara and the whole budget team and all staff who contribute which I think is everyone to the budget thank you yes ma'am you ready to read the second public Hearing in all right that is item 5B the second reading and consideration of a motion to adopt ordinance 8547 amending chapter 11-1 water utility BRC 1981 to implement policies and procedures in the event of a drought and setting forth related details thanks Elisha Chris yeah we get folks settled here uh with a little change out I'm going to turn it over first to Joe tadayucci our director of utilities who's going to kick this presentation off uh when they're ready

[189:01] is it on and can you hear me sounds good uh so yeah thanks Chris I'm Joe tediuchi director of utilities and uh this is a second reading for ordinances associated with the city's drought plan uh you might recall in early September we put together an information item on water resilience and um this plan is definitely connected to resilience and how we think about climate change and with more frequent natural disasters like droughts this updating this plan will position us well for that so it's a very important operational plan and the the approval of it is actually under the city manager's approval and what the plan does is it sets forth procedures that we would use to implement restrictions or things like that if we found ourselves in a drought

[190:02] and so council's role uh related to the drought plan is a approval of the amendments to ordinances associated with the plan um and while the plan is really an operational type of plan that deals with the mechanics of implementing water use restrictions we also know that there is a lot of public interest in the multi-year drought on the Colorado River and which is one of Boulder's three water sources and there's also a lot of interest in water conservation and the drought plan again is an operational plan it's it's not the planning document to deal directly with those things um but Kim will touch on in her presentation how we're monitoring and addressing those items and so Kim Hutton is here with me she is our water resources manager and she'll she's got a real brief presentation five or six

[191:01] slides I think and she'll give an overview of the plan and then the last thing I'll mention before turning it over to her is uh maybe a month ago you saw the Flood Master Plan and heard about the how the racial Equity work was integrated into that plan this is another planning document where we have done that and where we have realized we've previously relied on on price triggers that maybe excluded certain people and so we Revisited that and and thought about that in the update of this plan so with that I'll turn it over to Kim thanks there we go can you hear me okay thanks Joe yeah so so I'm going to give a high level summary of the drought planned and an overview of the process and we went through to update this plan and this is just to give you some context for the

[192:00] code changes that you're being asked to approve tonight we go as Joe mentioned the drought plan is an operations plan and it provides guidance for recognizing droughts that will affect the city's water supply and also responding to a drought or droughts in such a way that we can ensure water availability to protect Public Safety Health and Welfare the drought plan in conjunction with the city code which you're considering tonight and a city manager rule provides a framework for making a formal drought declaration and implementing drought response measures so our response to Drought is a staged response and what that means depending on the severity of the drought classified the classification of the drought um different water demand reduction goals and response strategies will be

[193:00] implemented so as an example in a serious drought which we call drought alert stage one we may seek up to a 20 reduction in water use by placing limitations on Lower priority water outdoor water uses such as watering Lawns and in more severe droughts we may seek additional water savings through implementing different response measures uh so how do we decide which water uses to maintain or to limit during a drought it's done through these guiding principles we developed these guiding principles during the update process through which which included both internal and external engagement and these guiding principles help us prioritize decisions related to water use during times when water supply is limited The Guiding principles include Equity ecosystem climate and local food production considerations

[194:02] and these again came out of this Outreach effort or stakeholder process that represents some of our Community Values so in the next few slides I wanted they illustrate how The Guiding principles are integrated into our drought response um once a drought alert stage has been declared and that's done by the city manager staff implements drought response measurements to try to achieve water savings goals the primary focus in drought response would be reducing outdoor water use and the reason for that is outdoor water use tends to be more discretionary than other water uses Indoor Water use in addition we can really see more there's more savings potential in outdoor water use and we can achieve these these water

[195:02] savings goals through a variety of means including education and Outreach water budget modifications modifications to rates applying surcharges and also implementing water use limitations you know how the The Guiding principles tie back into these is those top two categories education and Outreach and maybe modifications to budgets or rates we would we would Implement some considerations Equity considerations in in those before we actually do anything we'd also reflect back on the racial Equity instrument that we developed through this process to inform some of the our approaches to to those measures and then within water use limitations in itself um there there are how do we prioritize even in the outdoor sector uh how we're

[196:00] reducing water use tying back to the guiding principles this is a table that's in the drought plan um I'm gonna go over it word for word no okay what it what it's doing is it shows kind of the options of drought response measurement measures that we can draw from when we're trying to achieve these water use reductions and I have an excerpt right here to to help you out so uh during a drought we've got two lines there you're um the category being existing irrigated turf grass or Lawns and annual flowers and existing trees so not new trees there's another line item for new plantings but we may Place limitations on the frequency that Lawns and flowers can be watered and that frequency varies depending on the severity of the drought and as we approach a more extreme or more severe drought stage what we're doing is

[197:01] prioritizing the maintenance of trees over the maintenance of Lawns due to the cooling effects the benefits from a tree canopy in our in in the city so that this is just an example of the prioritization of different outdoor water uses so so that was my summary of the drought plan uh and this slide is just a summary of the the process that we are going through to update the plan we've been working on the update for the last two years we've included RAB internal stakeholder and Community engagement and I mentioned this briefly we also used the racial Equity instrument to develop an Adaptive approach to Drought response implementation in may we received unanimous approval or a unanimous recommendation from RAB to approve the drought plan

[198:00] and so now we're at the stage here with city council considering the adoption of ordinances that support drought declaration and implementation of drought response measures and from here the next stage would be city manager approval of the drought plan as well as approval of city manager rules that's my quick overview of the draw plan Joe mentioned these other water supply issues that may be of interest there's a lot of attention in the media about these three issues and they are not covered in the drought plan so we just wanted to take this opportunity to make a plug for them in the work that we're doing around them so the first being climate change the city engages in long-range water supply planning and we also include climate change assessments and those planning efforts and we use that information to help inform our water rights and

[199:01] infrastructure Investments so some of that actually kind of kind of through in the budget there through our Capital Improvement program second there's been a lot of attention on the drought on the Colorado River lately the city receives about one-third of its annual water supply or drinking water supply from the Colorado River through projects operated by the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District and we are monitoring the situation on the Colorado River and have options to manage a reduction of that Source if need be and then finally while the drought plan addresses short term management of water use long-range management is done through water conservation every seven years we update a water efficiency plan and that plan describes water use and efficiency goals and informs our water conservation program we are kicking off

[200:00] the the update this fall to that water efficiency plan with a Target completion date of the end of 2023. and we are looking forward to working with RAB and the community on that as well thank you we are available for thanks so much who's got questions Lauren thank you so as this mentioned in some stages of the drought restriction um there's we're trying to get people to not do new Landscaping because of the watering requirements how will this for certain kinds of building permits Landscaping standards are required and often are have to be in past inspection before building occupancy is allowed it does this how would that affect those kinds of requirements

[201:00] yeah I I don't know that we've fully developed um new Landscaping requirements we understand not only that part of it is code so we if we wanted to make some adjustments to that we would have to be changing code as well but also recognizing that without planting you've got a potential for a dust bowl you know a Barren land so those are discussions we've had about how to address it and that we will continue those conversations with our planning department thank you I'm going to colloquy on that and then turn to Matt on the same um part of the memo about new landscape installations it talks about watering restrictions on new landscape installations is there are there also restrictions on existing landscaping or is it just targeting you the the it says imposing temporary restrictions on new landscape installation so you can't install them and then watering restrictions on the irrigation of new landscape installations as deemed appropriate by city manager

[202:01] yeah so I think in terms of new plantings um that would get at kind of the seasonality of it and can anything wait um to a to a better period Wellness I'm assuming if it's watering new landscape like it's already in the ground yeah so then that that specific line or you know why we pulled that out separately was to give us the flexibility to if we are making restrictions on um lawn watering we could have an exception for new plantings and so that there would be some weird to promote survival of new plantings okay so I think I read it the other way I thought that it was going to be more restrictive for new plantings but you're saying it would be more generous watering for I it's really to give us some flexibility in doing an analysis or determination okay thanks for that Matt thank you Rachel

[203:00] um well for one I I like that we're Forward Thinking drought is a inevitability for where we are and um so I think this is a really important thing to do and I like the changes where we're at one thing that this conversation sort of begs is a little bit like Forward Thinking in terms of are there conversations about um you know ongoing and permanent code changes that get at the conservation now ahead of having to then be declaring any sort of stages of drought and so we can kind of get ahead of the storm more or less I think is the is really where it's at is you know are things regarding you know codes around xeriscape I mean what are we doing what are we doing proactively before we start issuing a stage thing so that when we do get to a drought we're more resilient at the time that we arrive at that drought um so that's what I'm kind of wondering is how do we set the runway um so that when we do get into a drought we're in the best shape possible with

[204:00] regards to some of that conservation stuff and then I have a different question yeah and I think that that's a mix of both our long term planning as well as our water conservation program um so long-term planning we're looking at um under build out conditions various climate scenarios can we meet our demands with our existing supplies and if not what do we need to do to change that do we build out the supply or do we reduce demand so those conversations are happening on that level uh and then with in terms of the efficiency plan that that's kind of the efficiency plan which I mentioned we're starting this year we'll take a closer look at what are our demands and I the conversation that you just you think that that you would like to happen will be happening through the efficiency planning process um what can we do now to meet some

[205:03] reduction goals Target reduction goals term in terms of overall water use long-range reductions which could include code changes um Landscaping requirements are a big part of that um so that's where that would happen The Forum would be the efficiency plan I appreciate that my second question kind of goes in a similar Direction but references sort of the fact that one third of our water comes from a basin that is virtually evaporating before our eyes and so you know obviously you know the comments is well we need to address that if need be I'm not a water expert but I would say that that we we need to I mean we're already seeing California take a cut on their 4.4 million acre feet that they're guaranteed in the Colorado uh River pact so we're already seeing the massive Cuts now I don't want to have that conversation about water rights here because that's obviously not the place

[206:00] for it but I but I do think again from a resiliency perspective um it's do we build out more Supply or do we do the conservation so it kind of It kind of circles back to that piece and so I know that it sounds like you're gonna work on it this next year when do you think that conversation or or that work will come back to us where we'll get to sort of see what those pieces are and then fold that into some of our other work because I know we're having a conversation about planning stuff coming up soon so I'm sort of curious where that all folds in now and into the next year yeah I'm I'm not do you want to answer this one I'm not sure that of what of council's role in this uh the efficiency plan it may be approval yeah and I'm not okay I turned my mic on not off that's good um just to just to reiterate what Kim was just saying the the the land use questions are great questions and the the efficiency plan and then you you just uh approved the Flood Master Plan we have two other utilities water and and Wastewater we'll have future Master

[207:02] plans or whatever we're going to call them in the future and those are the places that we will look at those things and currently like what we're doing now I know Kim and the team and the Consultants are modeling scenarios where there's less water from the Colorado River or there's a climate change scenario that really dries things up there the team is really applying the science to that and looking at all sorts of different scenarios and so we have plans in place with how we'll adapt to that when the time comes if and when the time comes and it's it's probably when thanks mark I'm reading this ordinance correctly it seems to me that the only body that that's not really involved in this process is the city council this this is an ordinance of a do I

[208:00] correctly understand that this is an ordinance that that grants a great deal of discretionary power to the city manager without any approval At All by the elected because we're already right up isn't that why because we're already dried up no well no no my my you know um I mean am I wrong on that I see a provision that says after the Declaration will be notified um even during the pandemic when we granted emergency Powers it was pursuant to an authorization by the the elected legislative body of of Boulder why is that not the case and that doesn't apply to us because I don't think it's going to happen in the next year but it applies to a future Council and I am very reluctant to at least have a basic approval of the Declaration

[209:01] um because people sitting here or sitting here in a couple of years are people who've been elected to do this and and um you know we've we've done very well with a uh a model of weak Council Strong City Manager but I don't think that ought to imply invisible Council Strong City manager and and so that am I reading it correctly or or have I misinterpreted Mark I appreciate your question and uh I would look to Joe to see if uh he or if Kim knows some of the history around why that construct is created the same the way that it is I'm not sure I know that history but they're nodding so I I can take a crack at that I think it's really because it's it's operations and and it's an important operational decision that we would need to make but honestly I I would never see a scenario where we

[210:02] would staff would just go into a vacuum and and make a major decision like that and not bring the council along and and and advise and get feedback on what we're doing I I hear you but that's not what it says and when I read an ordinance I'm looking to see what it says not what the you know good intentions are and and if I'm wrong you know please correct me in my understanding that's the way the construct is set up but I think as as Joe mentioned a lot of the uh there's many things that the city does from an operational standpoint and when there are those big operational decisions there are there is uh typically then conversation here with Council uh to discuss that further so I I hear the concern and and I uh and and I don't think it's there uh and it's not set up

[211:00] as a construct of anything of of lack of trust or uh or about power I think it's really about trying to focus that balance of uh the operational pivot that an or we would need to make as a as an organization from a water supply standpoint so Theresa I don't know if there's anything else to add from hmm you know I'll get a little bit down to brass tacks here which is um what Joe said but said very nicely this is a separation of powers issue and this is vested with the city manager as an operational issue and and so that's that's why it appears this way and so the city manager can exercise the discretion to consult counsel and certainly that's the practice but it is discretionary when you look at the the scope of the powers that are being granted it's not just your typical operations this is control over everyone's Behavior with respect to the

[212:00] most fundamental commodity we have which is water and to not have this body uh have at least some approval right um I don't have a problem with with the scope that we're giving the city manager I don't have a problem with with the aggressiveness with which the city manager is permitted to act um but that act should be pursuant to Council authorization this this is this is qualitatively different than most sort of operational issues where we leave that to the discretion of the city manager this is control over all everybody's Behavior with respect to water that's not just operational I'm going to call away and then maybe Junior well to two also it so it reminds me a bit of covid like Jane Jane made those orders I think they were considered emergency orders for health and safety and so I'm wondering is this in line with that sort of

[213:01] practice and and I would just make a pitch maybe to my colleagues that was okay by me like Jane you know one person was able to quickly make a a decision and also she took a lot of public heat for it and you would hate for council members to be you know needing to respond to an emergency drought situation and being tugged by voters in a way that I think city managers are a bit insulated from so the question to staff is and and then I'll turn to Juni is this is this like the the emergency Health protocols is that what you're talking about Teresa in terms of the uh administrative separation of powers or uh yes mayor Pro tem that's accurate and the other thing I would add here is um you know of course Council sets policy and um and so adoption of these ordinances is the policy Direction and then staff is charged with carrying out that policy

[214:04] as well before you ask the question about emergency this a drought is a more slowly developing scenario than like a Wildland fire or something like that but it is still an emergency and and having a plan that we can Implement and do it nimbly and quickly is still really important you can imagine if if we had to then have a policy discussion of choices we were going to make that could go on for weeks or months when when we have to react so I I I definitely hear what what you're saying Mark but I think there there is some logic behind it I hear you but it this is not a question of weeks and months this is a question of a week come to us you tell us that you're going to declare a drought emergency if you want you can tell us what you want to do in that drought emergency and and ask for the council to

[215:00] support it um that that's that's sort of our job um this is not you know policy with respect to you know leave you know for employees this is qualitatively different and the scope of those Powers is really quite extraordinary Mark I'm going to suggest maybe um you will want to make a a counter motion when we have a moment for motions on this and propose that change Junie do you still have a calicoy I just had a question and I don't know if you know who you have the answers to that question at this time uh what is huge the usual standards in as part of this process in other cities or I mean I understand where uh Mark is coming from again we are the legislative body but at the same time we don't want to slow things down knowing if there's an emergency situation and we

[216:01] also want to ensure that the city manager can do her job that if that's her job why take it away from her but I would imagine part of it would require that you know she walk with us as part of the process because Jane has done the work so why can't she do the same work so my question is more related to what is the standard if there's such a thing I'm gonna look to lay Layla is a project manager on this one just to confirm what I'm saying but we did uh an assessment of what other communities are doing and I think there's a mix of approval processes um is that fair to say Layla some include board approval or Council approval others do not Layla would you like to just introduce yourself for the record since we did we did get some info from you yes hi I'm Layla Parker Water Resources project manager thank you

[217:01] okay um so I think if we are done with questions let's turn to the public hearing over to Elisha we have one in-person person to speak at the public hearing if they're still here that is China Larson Shayna Larson Shayna Larson come on down if you're still here does not look promising so we've also won virtual speaker and maybe um Shayna also is online Brenda I do not see Shayna online all right Shayna if you're nearby we'll come back to you after we'll give you another chance after virtual if you are out of their Chambers over to you Retta so for our virtual hearing tonight we have one speaker um and so Lynn Siegel I am activating your microphone now you should be able to unmute

[218:01] by far water is our most important asset you know that's stating the obvious um this should have been part of the budget well it is in a way um it certainly is with CU cell with expansion of population it's so fundamental and it's so sad that there was a secret negotiation put up with CU and that the land back in 1996 was over was inflated in value from 9 to 16 million and the city couldn't buy it then so now oh that's all forgotten no time happens but that happened and that shouldn't have happened and now we're in a dilemma the two people that were killed were not in South Boulder you know there's 15 other drainages

[219:00] and this is a giveaway of our water resources and all the growth that comes with cu no way no way and all every developer subsidy that you support in this Council that comes through from planning board every single one depletes our water supply with Colorado River in the state that it is and yet I'm not hearing that from Joe tariuchi I'm not hearing that from anyone and I'm hearing no response when I speak about water my my daughter is a is a artist okay she's a water artist she's in the space of data physicalization she takes Geographic data and shows three-dimensionally what water is used what we're actually using she has a piece in San Francisco and the Capital One Bank building that's

[220:02] three stories high with all these necklaces of each necklace represents you know in this big Lobby atrium each necklace represents a different water permit holder in the state of California and their use and each bead on the necklace is 360 some acre feet of water you know like that's what people need to see and how do you apply that when you see that you shut down the population you lower the enrollment at CU certainly not expanded certainly not offer third stories and you guys put your vote on it each time it's like okay another story that's fine okay more see you Invasion into Boulder's land down on you know at Liquor Mart

[221:00] it's so revolting I mean dick starts getting the application when your time is up feel free to email us any further comments with that I'm gonna open it up to council for follow-up questions and discussion and we'll try and move through this pretty quickly I'm gonna just poach the first question because I forgot to ask one earlier which is just under 11 149 C variances um the city manager May Grant variances and and then it says in in cases of undue hardship such as extreme economic impacts health and safety considerations or religious objections and I don't understand what the religious objections could be to like Landscaping needs or drought conditions like why is that in there one okay one option that we have um that we may Implement are specific days of week for watering and so if the day of week of your

[222:03] watering Falls maybe on a religious date for you and you you can ask for a variance that that's really what that one gets to okay um yeah I um I'm gonna turn first to Bob and then Matt I was gonna make a question a comment do you have a question okay before we make the motion I want to try to call my esteem try to talk my esteemed colleague Mark Wallach out of an alternative motion um Mark Here's my thought on this as Teresa said um you know there is a separation of powers here and and we do need to trust our city manager just as we did during pandemic when she made a lot of emergency decisions she had access to a lot of information we didn't have and oftentimes had to move very quickly I understand droughts are a little bit more slow moving I trust the city manager to make the right decisions and to control with Council I have no doubt whatsoever that the city manager I realized that the the ordinance doesn't

[223:00] require her to do that I know we have a lot of lawyers on the south of the end of the diocese that all can read the same thing and I know that she's not required to um but on the other hand I'd hate to tie your hands the other direction and require her to confer with us and then also turn the decision into a political decision which it should never be it should be a science-based decision that she makes um and so I'm confident that this city manager would confer with us consult with us probably quite frankly ask us and of course we don't know what future city managers might do we don't know what future councils might do at the end of the day the city manager works at our pleasure so if she were P they were to make a decision um that a majority and Council was strongly opposed to we always have a certain amount of Leverage I'll just say it that way and so I I'm confident that we're not going to have a city manager who's going to go off and do something that um is out of sync with either this Council or future Council so I would support the motion as written and I hope that you would not make an alternative one of you let me colloquy on that I'm not going to

[224:00] make an alternative motion I'm simply going to vote against this one okay I was hoping to get I was hoping that you vote for it but that's okay um so that's where I'm going to support it Nicole I just wanted to agree with councilman Marie it's there um I I it captures it very well the only thing I would add to that is having seen the Watershed and had a chance to spend the day with some of our water folks and utility staff I just could not be more impressed with how well you all manage the intricacy of of our water supply and I cannot imagine a council like us that does not have that expertise trying to make some game time decisions during an emergency so just know that I just want to make it clear you know I don't think this is coming out of a lack of respect for the expertise of Staff or anything like that just just want you to know that we really do respect that it's it's quite um it's

[225:00] quite a lot to manage thanks Nicole Matt well said Bob and Nicole at Leeds uh well and greases the wheels for the motion I make a motion to pass ordinance 85 47. second Matt would you like to speak to your motion Bob and Nicole pretty much did all the speaking on why this is a good thing and why we're doing the right thing so I won't waste any more oxygen on that Tara any accident you'd like to waste um anyone else have a comment I just have one one concern always which is again with their religious exemption like I can imagine that um if you're a wedding venue or a you know Sports field or something you may have the same issue like Saturday morning doesn't work for us so I don't understand why we would specifically give religious entities it seems like we could have language in there that is um just more broad like the the city manager could have discretion based on specific

[226:00] organizational needs that you know can't can't water on a certain day or whatever just water it I don't think I would limit it to religious or and I'd make it a little bit crisper like you know if if they're not able to comply for some reason due to their business needs we can will allow a different day or something like that Teresa I'd like to provide a clarification this exemption is not meant for religious institutions um and what works for their convenience or not it's instead aimed at things like if someone observes the Sabbath such that they aren't able to go turn on their water and that's their watering day then they could get a variance so that they could do a different day okay that that sort of sounds like it falls under undue hardship to me but um okay that's all I'll say on it thanks Alicia would you like to take us through a roll call vote yes ma'am we'll start this roll call with

[227:00] councilmember Joseph yes spear yes Wallach well the reason stated no weiner yes Yates yes Benjamin yes vulcers yes and mayor Pro Tim friend yes ordinance 85 47 is hereby adopted with a vote of seven to one I was this close I'm going to turn really quickly thank you for that presentation um under Matters from city manager there's nothing scheduled but Chris would you like to give us a brief update on the the fire that was burning before we got to meeting sure I'm happy to just give a really quick recap about 2 30 this afternoon there was a report of a fire north of Boulder in the area of the Lake of the Pines

[228:00] kind of Highway 36 and Nelson Road um the fire itself grew to about 19 acres and as of about 5 30 p.m today it was 100 contained so they moved very quickly on that there were Crews on the ground there was also a single air tanker as well as one helicopter that assisted in the support of the fire they did close Highway 36 briefly due to smoke and visibility and there was the subdivision in that area that was put in on an evacuation warning I do want to thank our Boulder fire staff who helped respond from a mutual Aid standpoint as well as many of our department staff that when Fire gets set out loud they pivot their jobs as well as our staff in the office of disaster management and just a PSA reminder for everyone tomorrow is another Red Flag Day from

[229:01] noon to 6 p.m winds potentially up from 25 to 35 miles an hour with low humidity so be safe out there tomorrow and no open burning please and that's the update we're happy to answer any questions great reminder Matt uh for the few that are still listening I'll take this reminder to vote Yes on 2A for our climate tax and also the County ballot measure that also supports Wildfire resiliency we need it as you can see any time of year is fire season in this community so vote on those two we can Advocate until we're blue in the face so I will go blue in the face advocating for Wildfire resiliency in the climate tax thanks Matt um any other matters from mayor members of council City attorney or discussion items anyone want to debrief going once twice I get to do it done at 9 45 pm

[230:06] [Music]