November 16, 2023 — City Council Regular Meeting

Transcript

Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.

[3:23] there we go all right well Channel 8 is ready and it is 6 p.m. so let's go ahead and get going here folks um I'm going to start us off with an announcement here so this is about the better public meetings project the city of Boulder is partnering with the national civic league on a nationwide effort to make Council meetings more engaging and satisfying for everyone who participates as part of this effort we want to hear about your experiences with our meetings so we invite community members who are either in person or online for Council meetings uh running through our December 7th meeting to rate your experience we

[4:01] have an online scorecard that takes about 2 minutes to fill out the link to it is on the screen now and for the online audience we're putting a link and a QR code in the chat you may complete this scorecard once for every time you participate in a council meeting over the next 3 months and with that I will go ahead and gabble to a start the Thursday November 16th regular and last meeting of the current Boulder City Council um no November 16th 2020 3 so if we could do a roll call please absolutely and good evening everyone we'll start tonight's roll call with council member Benjamin present mayor Brockett present council member Furs present virtually friend here Joseph right here thank you spear present mayor protm wallik here Wier present and Yates for

[5:00] the last time here thank you so much mayor we have our Quorum thanks very much so our first item is a small business Saturday declaration presented by mayor protm wallik and if folks who are going to receive this declaration could come up and join him on the Das please and jie did you want to say something right here okay good to see you this evening okay small business Saturday November 25 2023 the city of Boulder is committed to our local small businesses and appreciates the many contributions they make to our local economy and Community according to the United States small business administration the nation's small business provide nearly

[6:00] half of all private sector jobs and create more than 60% of new jobs small businesses are particularly important in Boulder where 90% of businesses have fewer than 20 employees Boulder recognizes the importance of small businesses in our community that provide essential goods and services create jobs and generate local sales taxes which help fund First Responders Human Services arts and culture Parks and Recreation facilities open space and much more as we approach Thanksgiving We join communities and organizations Across the Nation to celebrate and support small local businesses we the city council of the city of Boulder Colorado declare November 25 2023 the Saturday after Thanksgiving as small business Saturday and urge residents of our community to shop and and dine locally on that day and

[7:01] throughout the year thank you like to say anything on behalf of small businesses in Boulder and there are many kinds but especially the folks that will definitely benefit from having all of us go out and shop and uh vote with our dollars um we we just want to say thank you and to the city for its long-term support thanks very much sure that would be helpful so my name is Sharon King I'm the executive director of the boulder Small Business Development Center and we have Audrey Miller and irad Kosik they are program managers for our um our Main Street core local programs and for our more advanced science and engineering programs all kinds of small businesses thanks thank you for being here thank you

[8:00] [Applause] oh I haven't signed okay and we have another declaration which is the international day of persons with disabilities declar declaration presented by council member friend thank you mayor Brackett um if I am understanding correctly there is no one here to receive this declaration if anyone is here I will meet you in front of the dis otherwise I'm going to stay seated okay going once twice here we go International Day of persons with disabilities December 3rd 2023 in 1990 the federal government passed the Americans with Disabilities Act or the Ada which underscores the values of equal access and equal opportunity for people with disabilities and upholds that all people are entitled to a set of fundamental freedoms and protections regardless of ability status we acknowledge the long history of isolation and discrimination of people with disabilities and app applaud the Decades of activism and advocacy by the

[9:02] disability Community to combat systemic exclusion and Injustice these Champions have paved the way for more individuals with disabilities to pursue their full measure of happiness despite the Ada there are enduring challenges for this community that require ongoing support so that they may enjoy the same levels of protections and Service as others they face physical social and attitudinal barriers are more likely to exper experience co-occurring health challenges and higher healthare costs and as a result many live in poverty and are underemployed or unemployed the city of Boulder strives to exceed the requirements set forth in the Ada and to create a welcoming and supportive Community this is in line with the importance of the community places on being a city that supports those with disabilities as affirmed in the recent Parks and Recreation master plan where 92% of respondents said that serving our community members with disabilities is very important or essential to that end the city's expand program has been

[10:00] providing Recreation and leisure activities to promote inclusion health and connection since 1980 expands Mission creating a community of all abilities through Recreation is strengthened by a strong community of participants athletes parents caregivers partner agencies Boulders park and rec staff and the Boulder Community who continue to support programs and services for people with disabilities with over 100 programs three three camps and 2,000 participate participants in 2023 band continues to grow and change to best support the inclusion of people with disabilities so we the city council of the city of Boulder Colorado declar December 3rd 2023 as International Day of persons with disabilities and urge our city government and community members to commit to the ongoing work of advancing the experience in protection for people with disabilities get to know these Unique Individuals and their lived experiences so that we understand how our systems could better serve them share and listen to their stories of joy and Community significance lead with

[11:01] compassion and empathy so that we create a city for everyone to thrive thanks thanks so much for that Rachel we're now going to go to open comment and I believe Ryan Hansen is going to be sharing with us the public participation guidelines Ryan I think muted thank uh Ryan hon here serving the people of Boulder as Community engagement manager uh and grateful for everyone who's here tonight to speak and and share your perspectives and your experience we want to share that the city has created with community members a vision uh for productive and meaningful and inclusive Civic conversation this Vision supports physical and

[12:01] emotional safety for community members staff and Council as well as democracy for people of all ages identities lived experiences and political perspectives there's more information about this Vision on your screen and as we move to the next slide I want to share a few examples of rules of decorum found within the boulder Revised Code and other guidelines that do support this vision and we will be sure to uphold these during this meeting all 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 epets and other speech and behavior that disrupts or otherwise impedes the ability to conduct the meeting are prohibited participants are required to sign up to speak using the name they are commonly known by and individuals must display their whole name before being allowed to speak online currently only audio testimonies permitted

[13:00] online and we ask that in person uh participants refrain from expressing support or disagreement verbally or with Applause and traditionally uh in Council chamber support is is shown silently through an American Sign Language uh Applause or jazz hands thank you and thank you for being here tonight thank you Ryan we've got eight people signed up to speak in person and three online people will have 2 minutes to speak each and as I call your name if you can start moving down towards the front our first three speakers are Sarah Jane Cohen Michelle Rodriguez and Chrissy Smiley Sarah Jane it's all yours good evening my name is Sarah Jane Cohen I live in Boulder Colorado in 2016 Council appointed me to the balen NOA sister city working group to provide guidance about whether to approve an application from the balen NOA sister city project to make the Palestinian city of noas a sister city with Boulder and make BNP Boulder's representative and liaison in that relationship after

[14:02] months of work some of the members of the working group including me and many other members of the Boulder Community and Beyond expressed serious reservations about approving the application before Council voted BNP gave Council a statement of commitments in quotes a copy of that statement is attached to the remarks that you've been handed for me tonight BNP assured Council that it would be a strictly non-political organization that it would monitor its website official Communications and social media to conform to its commitments it was clear that Council relied on those commitments when it approved the application however since even before and especially since Hamas brutally attacked Israel on October 7th bncp has repeatedly posted and permitted statements on its Facebook page by links on its website and in its official Communications to its mailing list like the following quote a genocide is now unfolding before our eyes we are

[15:01] witness to a genocide an ethnic cleansing emailed to BN SCP mailing list the municipality of noas urges urgently calls upon the International Community to protect the Palestinian people from the threat of genocide we urge the people of the Free World to excuse me to put an end to the situation fueled by Israel's acts of genocide these are quotes in the noblis municipality statement posted on the bncp Facebook page these and other inflammatory political statements fly in the face of the bncp commitments yet it has taken no steps to remove them from its official Communications since I have one second left um Peter orstein will continue my remarks thank you so much thanks Sarah Jane now Michelle Rodriguez Christy Smiley and Brandon James Miller hi guys I wanted to congratulate all of y'all that won and I want you let to let you know that um it was the first

[16:01] time in my life I ever registered and voted um I also I don't know if that was good because I want to tell you something else it did um it triggered a jury duty summons but but you got but guys I know it's it's really funny and it was really funny to me too I was horrified by it actually um because you guys all know what I've been through and if anybody knows me they know that I was I was found not guilty by reason of self-defense by Sixers jury here in Boulder in 2019 in my situation and case that led to 2 years and 10 months in federal court of a lawsuit that I had no outcome with um I had a hard time trying to get up there and play God I did show up for my duty they said only a medical uh exemption and um or something else you know having somebody to take care of besides myself would uh would get me exempt from going in there and I showed up and I can't can't lie I was very glad he took a last minute plea deal who

[17:02] whoever it was but um so I didn't have to get up there and play God and I want you to know it's hard for me to believe that and Trust in my my own judgment because I'm trying to become not biased and more trusting um I have been declared disabled and allegedly it's because I don't trust and or respect authority figures I am learning to heal every day I did have conversation with Miss Dawn also my my case was never in my it was never reviewed by the police and the police thing you know I really I really am reaching to become whole I would satisfy for half but I I just want you to and I'm sad are you really going to be gone wow that's all thanks Michelle now we have Chrissy Smiley Brandon James Miller and Aiden Reed hi I'm Chrissy smiley I've lived in Boulder since 1985 and I run a small business

[18:02] for the last 19 years I'm here today for various things but mostly the a loophole in the dark sky ordinance I also just want to say I think we need to be more compassionate about the homeless people in town it's really upsetting me what's been going on um and a couple other things so the dark sky ordinance currently porch fixtures are compliant if the bulb is 900 or fewer lumens and 60 or fewer watts and they also must be within fixtures that aim light downward and Ure the view of the bulb by material that blocks or diffuses the light however the ordinance doesn't even regulate those string lights that everyone's getting at Home Depot those ones with the Edison bulbs um and they have anywhere from 9 to 24 bulbs on them none of them are shielded none of them are diffused can you please include string lights as part of the ordinance and change the ordinance among other benefits less light pollution is better for humans and for migrating birds um and another topic I'd like to ask that the council direct the police

[19:00] to patrol certain locations in town for two loud Vehicles Baseline Road between Foothills and Broadway is horrible I'm moving from living near there because I can't stand it and I've tried everything I've bought noise cancelling headphones it's a nightmare to live anywhere close to Baseline and people speed and there's it's just insane and I don't think the police are enforcing any of the laws related to any of that um another thing regarding the police is you know that they all idle their cars the whole time they're on duty all their whole entire shift and it just seems unjustifiable and I've talked to Cops about it and they give me a reason that doesn't make sense and also the cops that are hired by Whole Foods which officers do on overtime apparently I caught a guy idling his Boulder police car the whole time he was keeping whole fruits from shoplifters and that's not okay in my opinion um so yeah that's it thanks CH now we have Brandon James

[20:00] Miller and then Aiden Reed and Dennis Tilman good evening my name is Brandon James Miller Chief Executive Officer of Charity pictures the charity incorporation umbrella and charity law I have a gift here for the mayor on his newly re-election congratulations thank you for your time chamber members and the household uh viewers who are on the other side of the lens today I want to continue talking about the universal libertarian human rights life project I have a PowerPoint presentation basically the city ordinance that I'm trying to have initia or have ascertained an initiative is relative to an increase in city tax residuals from you can see uh employees getting a 20% increase in a sharing of the profit after cost of goods sold ordinance may ask the clerk to go to the next side please you can see that the

[21:00] sales tax and all the taxes that the city makes have a certain uh percentage when we get here and we see the consumer spending habits they spend anywhere between uh two and three times more the amount of money when they have an increase like a Christmas bonus check and they also uh spend frivolously and they spend onethird of their money on fund now this is the key for Boulder may have the next slide please clerk this is the money that comes from this one-third spending correlating the taxes that the city collects percentag you can see entertainment all of that with 100,000 citizens in in Boulder $80 increase just from this example of a Christmas bonus which is the average uh Colorado uh Boulder area uh salary and Christmas bonus annually by the way you can see that when it breaks into oneir one3 is

[22:02] entertainment fun one3 is retirement and the other third is debt I combined 66% for both of those you can see the residual increase on a monthly basis compounded thank you um yeah thanks so much for that BR and and I really apologize but we can't accept gifts this a very generous of you but um I apologize oh you oh yeah I didn't know yeah thanks for the offer um love it okay uh now we have Aiden Reed followed by Dennis Tilman and Joseph SE uh good evening Council my name is Aiden Reed my pronouns are Heim uh I learned recently that you will be discussing a complaint against Boulder NAA Cissy project uh which posted a Facebook status from the city of Naas in which it urged the world to take immediate and decisive action to protect the Palestinian population from the threat of of genocide and I wanted to urge you to uh

[23:02] realize that while there is a provision in the bncp agreement which prohibits which prohibits it from political speech as is a 501c3 no such provision exists for the Israeli sister city of Han grev and it seems to me that this is a double standard and while I realize that one is a nonprofit so it's bound by certain rules and the other uh it appears the agree ment is not through a nonprofit um I still think this is unfair if one city can engage in political speech I think it's acceptable that another city should be able to do so as well particularly if it's experiencing incursions from the IDF and settlers uh lastly I hope the council will not take any action uh to sanction or otherwise distance itself from the boulder NAA City c s sorry sister city project um as a result of this Facebook post and I hope it will think uh broadly about how doing so would look um as the

[24:02] war in Gaza uh continues thank you thanks Hayden now Dennis Tilman Joseph SE and Peter Ornstein is Dennis Tilman present not seeing anyone then Joseph sign hi all good evening my name is Joseph Stein I live in zip code 80305 I've lived in Boulder almost my entire life I am the treasur of the local chapter of the democratic socialists of America um and I'm also here to speak on the boulder sister city project um I would also like to note though it should not matter that I am Jewish um I speakes I'm very invested in the Jewish community and Jewish well-being and I'm here to urge you not to sanction the boulder SST the boulder anabis sister city project for three reasons

[25:00] the first is that as my colleague Aiden said it is unfair to hold one sister city to political neutrality and not another um I think Aiden made this point well I won't elaborate on it any further secondly and relatedly though I'd like to point out that every sister city relationship is an inherently political one and if you look at where our other sister cities are located I think this is pretty clear we have sister cities in Cuba in Nicaragua which was experiencing a genocide I believe when we made that sister city relationship in the former USSR which was part of the USSR in Duan Bay when we made that sister city relationship um and in Tibet which is like Palestine under occupation um sister cities are inherently political and it is I think unfair to pretend that one sister city should not be political in its speech and thirdly and most importantly a genocide is happening this has been made clear by numerous genocide Scholars most notably Ros seagull in the excellent publication Jewish current now is an excellent time to speak out

[26:00] the rabbi halel who is one of the most important progenitors of Jewish thought said that whosoever destroys a life it is as though he had destroyed the entire world and whosoever Saves a Life it is as though he had saved the entire world and H also said if not now when and our colleagues in nablas are asking for life and I do not think they should be sanctioned for asking for life thank you thanks Joseph our last person speaker is Peter Ornstein hello I'm Peter orstein a longtime resident of Boulder I am president of sustainable Israeli Palestinian projects a boulder-based nonprofit that Sarah Jane and I help found and which supports projects involving and benefiting Israelis and Palestinians I'm also a member of the bould raat Hana sister city board but tonight I am only representing myself I support the concept of a Palestinian

[27:00] cister City and I've contributed money to the nobl cister city to help purchase an ambulance as Sarah Jane pointed out the Balon Noble assist city project committed to guard against the use of its platforms for political advocacy and guard against messages that promote anti-israel or anti- Palestinian perspectives this is not a free speech issue this is what they committed to do in order to become an officially recognized sister city in contrast these type of statements have never appeared on the boulder ront hga sister City website or its platforms a single hateful statement by itself may not be harmful but many statements repeated by Balden obl's sister city project and by others add up they are a Thousand Cuts and they have real world implications these inflammatory statements in their aggregate create a hostile and threatening environment in Boulder when I attend Jewish events religious or cultural there is usually an armed guard how have

[28:00] we devolved where an armed guard is needed at Sabbath Gatherings how have we devolve where bulletproof windows are needed in houses of worship this is my reality what I ask is pretty simple I ask Council to ensure that the boulden no sister city project one stop posting and distributing inflammatory messages including messages generated by others two immediately retract those messages and three abide by the commitment it made to the Boulder Community in 2016 thank you thank you Peter we now have three uh virtual speakers and they are Lyn seagull Ryan Harwood and Molly art so Lynn you're up yeah um regarding Palestine I'm supportive regarding Israel I'm supportive it's because I love Israel and Israel is suicidal

[29:00] Israel attacked the USS Liberty in 1967 the United States was attacked by Israel we will be again they have gone Rogue I don't support ceasefire I don't support pause I support a solution which is end the occupation now um and of course no sanctions against noas it's one of the places West Bank that's attacked all the time um okay let's see regarding police there needs to be some major policing reform in Boulder um my computer bag was taken from the municipal building by an employe and it was all just a big mistake and the police got a hold of it and that's the worst thing that could have happened to you if I if someone takes a knife to my throat I will not call the police after this situation there needs to be Ma police reform now Nua knows um George Floyd so let's go

[30:04] with it um the the misrepresentation the misinterpretations were just spellbinding in the um in investigative report and this employee is probably psychically permanently scarred from this situation mentally he had a panic attack and this this never have happened this whole thing the police oulder are out of line completely um so far as I went out to the JCC today because I like to see both sides of everything and there was an update on Israel from Mark Holloway and on the way I go past what's now called Weather Vein it was called water view or something Lynn your time is up but thank you thank you for your testimony now we have Ryan Harwood and then Molly

[31:05] art hello Council can you hear me yes cool um I'd like to encourage your vocal support for our sister city of naist and the occupied West Bank as they endure increasing attacks from Israeli settlers last week Bal s was killed by Israeli settlers as he his family and friends Harve harvested olives as part of a family Festival the settlement where these killers came from is considered illegal by both the US and the UN nonetheless settlements like these have been rapidly and violently encroaching on Palestinian land and stealing people's home in the West Bank for decades Bal and his friends and family retreated when the armed settlers approached but Bal went back to retrieve his cell phone which he had left he was out of sight in the trees when his wife heard him shout and at least two gunshots sounded his friends and Rel relatives later found him with wounds to the chest and arm lacking first aid

[32:01] supplies they used a ladder as an improvised stretcher to carry him upill to the nearest Road he died in the presence of his wife and children his wife ichlas said my back was broken when she realized her husband was dead attacks like these are common either by Israeli occupation forces or by settlers and have escalated since the start of 2023 I've heard nothing from any of you about this but please correct me if I'm wrong members of our sister city are being killed in Cold Blood to steal their land and the city of Boulder is silent you all give a land acknowledgement for the land stolen by settlers that we now call Boulder and that you now control you should at least pay lip service to an active and ongoing attempt to colonize our sister city of nablas so no more land acknowledgements are required further the Naas sister city project should have every right to share statements from the city of Naas just as raat hanv s city project is allowed and utilizes without controversy

[33:01] especially against and this is especially true for uh people combating their own ethnic cleansing thank you thanks Ryan now we have Molly AR as the last speaker thank you to the Boulder City Council Members for the opportunity to speak and particular to council member Benjamin for bringing forward outstanding policy statements on Reproductive Rights my name is Molly AR I use she her and the them pronouns I a boulder resident and I am representing the Cobalt abortion fund as an intake coordinator for the fund I work directly with abortion Seekers every day it is an honor to do this work and I am grateful to live in a state that has enacted explicit protections for Reproductive healthare we have the opportunity and the obligation to do much more abortion is expensive and and even more so when you have to travel for it take time off work and still take care of your

[34:01] children we are lucky in Boulder and on the Front Range to have many clinics in our communities but many folks in the more rural regions of the state do not have this luxury Cobalt Works to remove the financial barriers that our community members face while trying to access reproductive care we help people pay for food gas Child Care hotel rooms and abortion procedures tonight you have the opportunity to help remove Colorado's largest barrier to reproductive Freedom Cobalt and our Coalition of Colorado's reproductive Health rights and Justice advocacy organizations are running a ballot Initiative for the 2024 general election to ask Colorado voters to establish abortion as a constitutional right thus eliminating the discriminatory ban on abortion insurance coverage for state and local public employees and people on government health insurance plans public opinion is overwhelmingly on our side our coalition's campaign work has has shown that Colorado voters want their neighbors on Medicaid and public

[35:00] servants like firefighters EMTs teachers and state county and city employees working diligently in our communities to have access to the care that they need thank you for your support of these life-saving reproductive Health policies thank you Molly with that I'll bring the open comment to a close I'll turn to staff Teresa Nery did you have any responses sure um I'll limit myself to those that are um op AAL I know you're going to have a policy discussion on uh some of this later on but um a I want to say Michelle I wish you well on your continued Journey thanks for sharing uh your experiences um to Chrissy I'll say that I want to follow up a bit on the idling cars and the Dark Skies ordinance um and I will say that as somebody who lives near Baseline I hear it as well and I know that PD is trying to do different interventions um to address as a lot of this happens in the in frankly in the we hours of the evening and so we will continue and explore uh what we can do to address um

[36:01] some of the racing that we have been seeing and the loud noises in the evening uh and I will say uh ly and I I know that we have talked a lot about the incident um to council members I'll say I'm happy to speak to you offline about the details but it was in fact um we believe a misunderstanding uh we are working with Lynn to make her whole uh in terms of her property and I appreciate her desire and her efforts as well as staff to make sure that there is some sort of restorative justice in um a space that was um really a misunderstanding but we are continuing to move forward and address uh thanks mayor for the opportunity to to give a response um Miss Rodriguez I'd just like to thank you for coming to serve your jury duty the justice system works best when we have all voices represented your voice is important and you bring a really

[37:01] important set of experiences I understand that that was a great personal cost to you and I just want to say thank you thanks for that Teresa I Echo those sentiments um and uh comments from Council I've got Lauren and then juny I just had one about the uh string lights um and I think that our code is maybe a little bit confusing because I believe they're referred to as catary lights um but that we do have code sections around illumination on those just if that was helpful I know there was a comment about that thanks Lauren juny yes thank you I do have questions about the sister city and most of them are process questions and I think it's relevant to the um the open comment that just happened and

[38:01] um I'm seeing myself double by the way think well yes juny I what I might say is we do have an agenda item for that tonight so we might push our questions and discussion on that to the agenda item or is there something that you you feel like we have to address right this moment well that's some complex question right because it for me that question came about based on some of the comments that was made by uh Mr Reed during his uh comments so that's why I wanted some clarification if you feel it's important go ahead yep yeah I think my question was whether all sister cities are created through a nonprofit I know last year and I was look someone asked me whether Haiti for instance wanted to create a sister city and I was looking into into that process and my understanding it has

[39:00] to be done through a nonprofit so maybe I understand that incorrectly so I wanted maybe some clarification from um from staff naria or um from our City attorney um I will say uh council member Joseph that I do not know offhand uh not having been in this city when all the sister cities were um approved but we can certainly get back to you um unless other folks know any of the responses to that I mean I will my understanding is it does require a nonprofit to create the sister city relationship yeah I know that I know that the Israeli sister city is also a nonprofit they both are yeah yeah that that was my impression as well and I have more comments and questions I'll save them for later so thank you for that okay thanks JY anything else on open comment seeing none thanks everyone for your test testimony We Appreciate You weighing in and Emily can we go to our consent agenda

[40:02] please of course um next we have our consent agenda and we have on the agenda items a through F questions or comments and the consent agenda uh Rachel just that I'll be recusing from F again okay on the design and construction standards well I'll I'll myself so um Mark you uh you sent out a hotline regarding the policy statement and um Carl Castillo responded this afternoon with a couple of proposed changes following up on that did you want to propose those um those changes for inclusion well I'm not going to read them but I certainly I I think he answered my requests perfectly um and I would be very supportive of the language that he um uh has proposed on those on those matters um so yes I would I would uh offer a uh

[41:02] a motion to amend the uh statement uh uh in accordance with the language that has been produced by call Cas on those items I raised in my hotline do do you mind moving the entire consent agenda with that amendment to Item B okay I will uh amend the uh entire consent agenda with that item B um or or move the entire consent agenda yes I will move the entire consent agenda then very good okay we got a motion and a second any discussion on that Emily can we do a roll call here yes yes um we'll start the roll call on tonight's consent agenda with mayor Brockett yes council member folur yes friend I'm going to recuse from F but

[42:00] otherwise yes f is and Frank if you need that great thank you so much Joseph yes council member Spar yes wallik uh yes um but with respect to article 22 of um uh the 2024 policy statement on regional state and federal issues uh I will decline to approve but only on that so actually I'm not sure that you can vote against one policy Mark I think you could register an objection to it but you probably have to vote yes or no on the whole thing and I will vote Yes and register an objection to article 22 as I have previously um I I do think that is a uh misguided policy fair enough did I get that right Teresa all right uh Winer yes you Yates yes and council member Benjamin

[43:01] yes the consent agenda with uh now including the amendment to 3B and the recusal the noted recusal from council member friend on 3F is hereby approved unanimously with a vote of 9 to Zero thanks so much can we go to our callup check-ins please absolutely next we have our callup check in item 4A on tonight's agenda and that is the consideration of a landmark alteration certificate application to construct a new 804 squ ft accessory building and modify existing non-historic garage at 703 11th Street an individual Landmark pursuant to section 9-11-18 of the boulder Revised Code any questions comments or interest in calling this up seeing none can we go to the next one please next we have item 4B and that is

[44:00] for the consideration of a use review for a non-residential uses at 3825 Iris Avenue within the residential high for zoning District this site is within the iris office plan unit development any questions comments or interest in calling this one up not seeing any then I think that finishes our call check-in so if we can go to our public hearing please absolutely next we have item five that is our public hearing we have item 5A that is our only public hearing for this evening and that is a second reading and consideration of a motion to approve 8590 amending Title 9 lanus code brc1 1981 to update the use table and use standards related to wable Neighborhood Center including changes to the standards for restaurants brute hubs and taverns within the BMS business Main Street District and University Hill General improvement district or second

[45:00] reading and consideration of a motion to approve ordinance 8605 amending Title 9 land use code to update the use table and use standards related to walkable neighborhood centers and setting forth related details all right it's a mouthful thanks uh I didn't even have to step in and buy some time for people to get settled so with that perhaps I'll go straight to our our director of planning and development services Brad Mueller thank you Nia yes Brad Mueller uh director of planning and development services uh just wanted to preface this item and say that we are very excited to bring this forward for a number of reasons uh it represents uh a long-standing work item that goes uh depending on the context you'd like to accept uh several years back uh it does also represent the last major work plan item um of council priorities for this last two years that you had set for our department so we're excited to be able to bring this to conclusion for you this evening uh

[46:01] fundamentally this is a uh proposal uh based on the study sessions and and feedback we've gotten from you uh in the last several months that addresses um a a a general theme you've provided for us of simplification and providing uh uh Grace and awareness of the needs of the business Community uh particularly restaurants this is designed to simplify things for restaurants and other commercial interests as well as provide for walkability which of course is another of uh the city's long-standing values as well so with that I'm turning it over to Lisa Hood who will take us on through thank you Brad good evening council members I'm also excited to bring forward this ordinance the final part of our use table and standards project before you tonight you might have notice through that very long intro that it's a bit of a unique one as we have two ordinances for your choice tonight essentially and I will walk through the differences between them but

[47:00] I wanted to start from the outset explaining that the two ordinances are identical except for their approach to how they treat um the restaurant standards on the hill so 8590 it would modify the standards that we currently have for restaurants on the hill um 8605 would not modify those standards otherwise they are exactly identical they both update the use allowances standards um to support walkable neighborhood centers and you can see on the slide there's a number of business types and even residential types that we've looked at through this ordinance so would impact a number of business types throughout the city this presentation might look a little familiar because we were here in or at a study session in July so there's going to be a little bit of repetition but just to refresh your mind and for people who might not have seen it before I will go through a background of the project like Brad said U multi year project and then I'll go into the scope background and public input for this

[48:01] specific module and then I will summarize the ordinance changes and the differences between the two ordinances so going back for our background the initial goals of the use table and standards project were really to simplify and streamline what was a really complex part of our land use code and make it more understandable and legible the use table and standards is what lays out where businesses can be allowed throughout the city um and what types of residents can residences can be allowed where um the changes are intended to create more predictability and certainty and really the the goal that aligns with this module is trying to get the Boulder Valley comprehensive plan policies and guidance to match up better with the regulations in the code so trying to understand what businesses and Residences people want to see um and align that with where we're actually allowing those throughout the city like Brad said the Ed table in standards project has been going on for a while so it was actually started in 2018 uh we completed phase one in 2019

[49:02] and we've been working through these three modules of phase 2 since 2022 you'll remember that you've seen several ordinances over the last two years related to this module one was functional fixes those were the technical updates that really reorganized that section of the code made it a lot easier to read um but didn't really make substantive changes at that time we started the substantive changes in module 2 and that was the focus on the div diversity of uses in the industrial areas so that was really focused on the industrial districts and Industrial uses in the city that was adopted back in February and now we're on module three the final part related to neighborhoods and neighborhood centers where we can also look at the the mix of uses that we're allowing there and the focus has really been for um for module 3 the walkable neighborhood centers you can see on this map that we have 12 neighborhood centers that are identified in the comprehensive plan and if you draw a 15-minute walk Shed from all of those neighborhood centers you can see that it really covers a a

[50:02] majority of the city of Boulder so it's really looking at um what types of uses and businesses should we allow in those neighborhood centers so that the people that live within a 15minute walk are able to access those services that they need on a daily basis and through all the public input which I'll go through on some later slides some of some Focus areas that came up as kind of the main topics for this module were restaurants duplexes in town homes and then some other Mis miscellaneous changes to businesses that would help support walkable neighborhoods and you'll remember that we talked through those at the study session in July a little further on walkable neighborhoods and why we're focusing on that we want to remove the barriers that are in the code for the uses that people want to have nearby that maybe the code is standing in the way of those uses or businesses opening up and it's really intended to support the 15minute neighborhood Hood idea so that people can access those daily Services by walking biking or Transit within 15

[51:01] minutes of where they live or work and going back to the initial goal of this project it's really trying to align the use table with those adopted comprehensive plan policies so this is really an OP an implementation of those um comprehensive plan guidance and also just building on the previous input that we've received over the many years of this project this is the the m from the Boulder Valley comprehensive plan that identifies the many different neighborhood centers that we have throughout the city you can tell there's many different characters and types of neighborhood centers throughout the city and that's really where the focus is on this ordinance or both of these ordinances tonight and it's kind of the translation of this planning guidance and how we apply that through zoning where we get to the focus on the changes in these zoning districts so these are the zoning districts where the neighborhood centers exist so the ordinances focus on changes in the business zones start with b downtown zones and mixed use

[52:01] zones there's a number of different goals and policies in the comprehensive plan that this ordinance helps support and implement but I wanted to highlight two main policies so the first being our neighborhood centers that's 2.19 and that really says that um the neighborhood centers should be where people gather and get their services um and are able to meet that they should meet the everyday needs of neighboring communities it also gives guidance in the comprehensive plan about ensuring that transition from the more intensive areas within the neighborhood centers to the less intensive single family areas um outside of them another important project goal or uh policy is 2.24 and that's the commitment to a walkable and accessible City that's where we talk about the 15minute neighborhood idea and making sure that the city is promoting the development of a walkable and accessible City by providing safe and easy access to places like these neighborhood centers so with those two policies that's where we're really trying to implement those changes through the land

[53:02] use code I have some summaries of the all of the public input that we've um heard throughout the the course of this project I won't go through this in detail because we did go through that in the study session but I just wanted to kind of go through a brief overview um we started engagement back in 2019 so we've heard we had inperson engagement in 2019 virtual engagement in 2020 where we specifically ask people what they would like to see in their neighborhood centers and all of this has really been building to the work and the two ordinances that are before you tonight um what we heard in that initial round of input was that people wanted to wanted to see more mixed uses more housing more neighborhood stores walkable places restaurants things like that less of the more vehicle Orient oriented things like parking um traffic ENT uh car dealerships grass stations things like that and we asked people if they were open to seeing a greater mix of uses in

[54:00] their neighborhood centers and we heard a lot of broad support for restaurants and coffee shops which are both classified as restaurants in our land use code retail uses and personal services we drilled down to more specific engagement this summer um so those had been kind of broad questions about what types of uses would you want to see and with our engagement this summer we presented what these changes could actually be we went through over several years with our planning board subcommittee um we went through what potential changes could eliminate those barriers that we were seeing in the code between the code and the plan and so to do that in our engagement we built the story map which I went over in the study session and a questionnaire we also did in-person promotion we popped up at several of the neighborhood centers and just chatted with people about they what they would like to see we were at fairs and events in the summer and we also sent mailings to all of the neighborhood center business business and Property Owners so that they were aware that this engagement opportunity existed and they could share their input about what

[55:01] they'd like to see in the neighborhood center the story map and questionnaire was open for about three three weeks in July we got about 250 responses uh hopefully you're able to check it out it was a really great engagement tool where people could look at all of the different neighborhood centers see what zonings there what um businesses are there what use types are there and what the potential changes could be um and many of those potential changes are reflected in both of the ordinances tonight we also had the questionnaire asking PE people what their concerns were or what businesses they were support above and what we heard was a lot of support for seeing more restaurants grocery stores small retail shops um other things that would also be classified as restaurants like coffee shops and ice cream shops um post offices really an emphasis on supporting local businesses was something we heard a lot about more concerns about kind of similar to the earlier engagement efforts concerns about Auto oriented uses like gas stations and drive-throughs and also um just kind of

[56:01] non-local stores so big box stores things like that in addition to the general um public input that we got I mentioned we had a planning board subcommittee um that guided the work in the initial years of the project um but we also had a public working group which was a group of about 20 stakeholders and interested residents who met throughout the last couple of years to guide uh modle two and module 3 um so we met with them three times this year to talk about the module 3 changes they helped with the public engagement we've also been working with um two members of the planning board who have provided guidance and we met with the community connectors back in July and we talked about that at the study session so that's kind of a summary of the public inut input for this project um now I'll get into the summary of the changes that are reflected in both of the ordinances so I'm going to focus probably the most on restaurants but there are changes to other businesses as well um but because uh restaurants has

[57:00] been kind of the most common topic of conversation related to this ordinance I'm going to focus on that um so starting with some background on restaurants restaurants from the outside of the Ed table project before even module one were one of the most complex parts of the used table before we reorganized it there were eight different lines in the Ed table for different types of restaurants and restaurant rules we reorganize that it looks a lot better in after module one but there's still um because we didn't make substantive changes there's still a really complex Patchwork of different restaurant requirements in our code so there's a lot of opportunity to streamline and simplify that in the code right now generally all these different flavors of restaurant requirements uh are usually around what the size of the restaurant can be the size of the patio can be and what their hours of operation can be um I will highlight the the specific standards for the University Hill General improvement district since that was uh a common Topic in the public comment that we got so the University Hill General improvement district is

[58:00] located in the BMS zoning District that's the business Main Street zoning district and in that area a conditional use approval is required a good neighbor meeting and management plan is required uh restaurants can only be a s uh under 4,000 square ft and they must close before 11 unless they don't have a liquor license um they also have some standards related to the percentage of income that has to be from food and some other standards related to having a food prep area and if they're a brew pub or Tavern um they have to provide snacks so some of those are unique requirements that we don't have in other places other than the kind of overall size Patio hours of operation types of things um and the proposal in the ordinance or the ordinances before you tonight kind of differ in how the approach is taken for different types of zoning districts and the first the first option or the first um set of regulations is related to

[59:02] interface areas and so those are the areas of the city where you can see on the map it's our BT Zone zones our mixed use zones our BMS district and our dt12 and 3 districts and those are really where the residential and Commercial areas interface the most um and so it's kind of those transition areas between residential and Commercial and in those areas we did want to retain kind of more protective standards to ensure that there's more protection for those residents that are in close proximity to um any potential impacts that would happen from those restaurants so the proposal here is to um but the intent is also to streamline the approval process for restaurants so right now in most districts in the city if a restaurant is larger than 1500 square feet they get kicked into a use review which is a discretionary review process and so the intent with these changes is to open up that um approval by right process to more of those restaurants and so in both

[60:00] of the ordinances in the interface area that would the standards would allow byright restaurants up to 4,000 square F feet as long as they close by 11 and so that hours of operation we thought was important to retain because the way our use table works we group restaurants brew pubs and taverns into the same use type and so there's not a difference between restaurants and bars in in our use table um so that hours of operation we think works as um an important delineation between what a restaurant is and what a bar is and so in those interface zones we thought that it was p.m. close um but there is an option in both of the ordinances to if a restaurant wants to be open later or be larger than 4,000 square feet they can pursue a use review so that like I said is the discretionary R review process um it's reviewed by staff first planning board can call it up um but retaining giving that option and then this is where the two ordinances

[61:00] split um because they for these interface zones and you can see kind of the um 8590 and 8605 on the slide this is where they they differ for um the University Hill area so in 8590 it groups the University Hill area into all the other similar interface zoning districts um so that those standards would apply um as well and that would eliminate those unique standards that I mentioned on the last slide 8605 does not make any changes to those current University Hill standards and then one other thing I wanted to note um right now we have uh the patio size I mentioned often plays into to whether what type of review process uh restaurants have to go through um and as we looked at into previous approvals and what standards are applied there's a lot of really similar standards and so we came to the conclusion that rather than requiring a different approval process we could just come up with a set of General standards for when a patio is near a residential area here's the noise trash and um things like that kind of

[62:01] standards that they should comply with but it doesn't kick them into a different type of approval process so we kind of end up at the same result without having to modify the review process so that's that's kind of the bulk of the the this is the most complicated slide so we um getting past that um regarding restaurants as well um in our more intensive commercial zoning districts right now many restaurants are approved by or appr uh Allowed by right however if they have a patio and they're um close to residential that will kick them into a use review um and so the proposal in both of the ordinances tonight is to remove that use review requirement and instead rely on those General um General outdoor seating standards essentially so then all restaurants in these intensive commercial zones where you kind of expect that Tye type of activity would be allowed by R finally the only other place in the city where restaurants are are allowed are in a couple of our highdensity residential zoning districts are rh3 and rh7 districts and the proposal in both

[63:01] of the ordinances is to increase the maximum size of Allowed by right restaurants from 1,000 sare feet to 2,000 square feet otherwise they're prohibited and that's not proposed to change um but similarly the outdoor seating standards would apply just going back to the public input what we've heard on restaurants as I've mentioned is a lot of support So during our summer um our engagement this summer we heard a lot of support for more restaurants and neighborhood centers we asked specifically if people were open to streamlining that approval process for restaurants and got a lot of support there and just heard a lot of people wanting to see more outdoor seating throughout the city obviously that was something that became really important during the last few years um so we heard a lot about that our public working group was also supportive there were some split opinions where some people saw the a few of the members of the working group saw the benefit in having consistency in those interface zoning districts and how they're they're treated throughout the city and then

[64:00] some members of our working group thought that perhaps there needed to be some more input on the specific changes to the hill our planning board Liaisons were supportive of the changes when we talked to them a few months ago and then also the community connectors were supportive of more restaurants throughout the community and just supporting local businesses and small businesses I'll just talk briefly we talked about duplexes and town homes in the study session and um the initial proposal that we brought to you at study session was to uh make it easier for duplexes and town homes to be allowed in both the BR and BT zones after our discussion at study session uh the ordinances the ordinance just reflects changes in the BT business transitional zones so it removes a barrier for duplexes and town homes in those transitional zones [Music] only and then again what we've heard related to that was broad support for additional housing types and kind of that transition of intensity in the

[65:01] neighborhood centers finally this is the kind of miscellaneous but also very important changes the proposed use allowances or standards changes so I mentioned that our planning board our planning board subcommittee in 2019 and 2020 I think met 20 times going through every line of the use table every column of the Ed table trying to identify where we could eliminate barriers so this really reflects their work and also the work um that we heard or just all of the input that we heard in those initial years of this project of places where we could open things up to make sure that the businesses that people want to see are near where they live um so there's a number of these changes that we went through in the study session um which would be easier to get an easier approval process throughout the city and we heard broad support for all of these changes throughout all of our input as well this is one of my last slides but just kind of to go back to the fact that there's two ordinances I wanted to explain kind of the rationale for that

[66:01] so we brought um or we came to for study session on July 27th um with the um with the a very similar presentation to this and what we heard from Council at that time was support for streamlining the standards and review process for restaurants as well as encouragement for staff to streamline the regulations on the hill similarly to The Proposal for downtown and so that's what led to ordinance 8590 and that's the ordinance that we took to planning board and we took it to planning board on August 15th we had a public hearing with eight speakers um many of them were in support of the changes but a few were concerned about the changes on the hill and planning board ultimately recommended approval of or ordinance 8590 but not with any changes to the the University Hill General improvement district so that's where ordinance 8605 came from is essentially a reflection of the planning board recommendation which makes all of the same changes but does not make any changes to the hill and they recommended

[67:01] having a separate process I did want to um at this point in addition to speaking about board and Council feedback give a little bit of context to the uh Council about interdepartmental coordination on this as well um it can be easy to look at these activity centers and imagine them as only a land use uh effort but uh it really does represent the work also Transportation Community Vitality um Parks and Recreation adjacent um and also police and fire and we know that those are important considerations and and I want to give the board the context of the ongoing discussion we have with those different departments uh when these types of land use uh changes are being uh contemplated and put into effect on the hill in particular we know that there um are the potential for Public Safety impacts uh as there are anytime there's more uh intensification um we've been in contact with police and we uh recognize given

[68:00] the history and some of the special initiatives that are ongoing for Code Compliance code enforcement coordination with UNCC the fraternity um IFC on the hill uh the neighborhood association on the hill all of those different component parts uh that that would be in particular an area where we would really want to Monitor and adjust um based on any policy changes uh which is really part of a bigger framework as I say of of um what is not just one departmental uh impact for any of these policy changes but an ongoing one um so I do want to acknowledge um that issue that's been raised in our internal discussions um and daylight that and also um point to the fact that each of these individual land use decisions are brought forward as individual um use review uh with their own possibility for conditions and such um but again just putting it in the context of other conversations that we've had uh

[69:00] regarding uh larger code enforcement and Code Compliance and and and uh coordination with uh that community and all the activity centers so just wanted to add that before our final slide thanks Brad the final slide is just the suggested motion of either either or ordinance essentially um so either ordinance 8590 or or ordinance 8605 and I'm happy to take any questions great thanks that was exceptionally clear appreciate that presentation uh questions for Staff Mark um I I don't want to ask you really to to uh try to represent planning board but can you speak to why their recommendation was unanimous for one ordinance over the other and and because that's not that's not the normal recommendation we receive from planning board yeah I can try to do that um Brad if anybody else's memory is better than

[70:01] mine but they had I think they the discussion really focused on um you know whether the public input had been sufficient because it had been General to the city like Citywide about restaurants and not specific to those unique standards that are in the Hills such as the 50% requirement of um income from food and things like that and so I think that they were just concerned that the because the input had been Broad and Citywide um it hadn't been quite targeted enough on those specific line items that apply to the hill and so they thought that there should be a separate process that focused on that and how would you all want to respond to that um yeah just to add to that I think Lisa's characterization is right uh I think the timing and recognition of evolution of uh the broader Community um uh input on this kind of plays into

[71:00] that so at the time that it was going to planning board um some of the discussions which I will say really uh took place as part of these broader conversations that I that I characterized just a moment ago um caused folks uh from the University Hill Community to be more specific in their comments at that hearing I would say much of that input subsequently has been um um uh ripened if you will and people have um had additional discussions about that um so I I don't want to speak for planning uh board as as Lisa indicated uh but I don't know that uh they would be in the same space today recognizing that those con those discussions continued on but again I can't speak for them at this point okay um with respect to the the um decrease in distance from 500 ft to 300 ft um in terms of outdoor space adjacent to residential

[72:03] um what was the what was the basis for the for the 300 ft I mean was it arbitrary was there a thought process behind it a a any data behind it was it yeah thanks for the opportunity to point that out so the 300t is a typical block width from east to west okay so that's what we thought that the that would be kind of where the impacts might um end and the 500 foot in the in the um Spirit of trying to streamline approval processes the 500 foot really catches a lot of people um into a lot of restaurants into the higher approval process of of use review and so the 300 foot would allow for more streamlining and more restaurants to have a more uh streamlined process and um 8605 requires Good Neighbor meetings and management plans when when a use review is conducted does um 8605 have

[73:02] that in it if if you're going for later 00 hours or uh larger space yes so exactly that that standard is in both ordinances so if they if a restaurant were to pursue a use review in those interface zoning districts they would still have to do the Good Neighbor meeting and management plan in either ordinance okay thank you oh um uh did you solicit the Viewpoint of um the university with respect to the restaurant changes on the hill um not specifically but we were at the hill Merchant Business Association meeting hope hopefully I'm saying that right um just a few weeks ago and there are representatives from CU there so in kind of broader discussions we we did speak with them okay thank you any other questions seeing none let's go to our our public hearing we've got six people signed up to speak two in person and four virtually our each of you will have three minutes to speak our two inperson

[74:01] speakers are Ted Rockwell and Mark heinritz Ted good evening it's great to see you all um first time caller longtime fan my name is Ted Rockwell I'm a 25y year resident of the city of Boulder a homeowner a university uh employee a parent and I'm a commissioner on the UK campy commission but I'm speaking to you tonight as a resident of Boulder and someone who has worked on the hill for the last 18 years I've seen firsthand the changes that have occurred since 2006 in that commercial area district and I'm speaking in support of ordinance 8590 the Hill Hotel project will be complete in March of 24 and the CU Conference Center will be ready in the year after that these two Hospitality projects will attract a variety of

[75:00] visitors to our town and to the hill they're going to include scientists and parents of Cu students and tourists these new visitors will represent a unique opportunity to change the boom or bust cycle Hill businesses currently suffer because of an overreliance on student foot traffic in order to give business is a chance to attract th those Hotel visitors to the hill we need to ensure the regulatory environment is consistent with the rest of the city the reality is increased barriers to opening businesses cost new businesses time and money onor and complicated regulatory conditions favor chains and large corporate interests make by making regulations consistent we move the needle towards giving local and smaller businesses a shot at helping the hill become a vibrant center of the boulder commercial Community I thank you for your time today and for your service

[76:01] to Boulder thanks Ted Mark hritz good evening I'm Mark hinitz I've been an owner of the sink since 1992 and we've owned our property since 2000 so sort of on both sides of the equation on the the uh Merchant property owner role and I'm here to support 8590 um so 8590 does not restore the hill business district to its pre 20103 status it does not allow to aim liquor licenses by right it does not allow p.m by right which did exist in 2012 for instance what it does accomplish is it allows potential businesses to consider the district in the same zoning terms as any other District in Boulder uh this is a move towards a healthy business district according to Brad seagull of Puma this is the most studied District

[77:00] in Colorado Brad has been paid well to do 11 studies of the Hill he actually said there is nothing more to say he will not do another study of the Hill it's over right so in regards to studying the subject more as a practical matter more study about this issue kicks the can of it Council decision to 2026 so this means that trying to attract a new business under these changes would not take effect until 2027 so the time is now to set the hill up for success to allow the hill to meet a new future to build upon all the years of work of getting new anchor tenants for the hill the time is now not in three or four years the current measures do not work they succeed in repelling the very businesses that the ordinance sought to attract they are a failure to date the conversation around the hill has been a detraction to Boulder's appeal let's make conversation about the

[78:00] hill a contributor to Boulder's appeal I ask you to vote in favor of 8590 which will put the hill zoning on an equal footing with all the other similar neighborhood centers in the city thank you thank you Mark Mark do you mind uh mayor Brocket may ask a question you uh emailed us I think earlier today or yesterday uh about the some history on the hill we have that right Y and um one of the things that I think you talked about was the the history of of Hill riots and whether they happened residential versus commercial sort of where their Origins were can you just confirm that I understood that correctly that your understanding of the history is that the riots that have happened on the Hill emanated from residential spots yeah my recollection is there was and it's a contentious point of course there was one Riot that happened when and the I think it was Chief Kobe at the time thought the best way to disperse all the closing time patrons

[79:00] coming out was the lineup police and riot gear across the street and then so that one was provoked on the hill the rest I think there's six others throughout a fiveyear period there that happened in the neighborhoods and and passed through the Hill district thanks for clarifying that yeah thanks very good we'll go to our virtual speakers the first three are Jake Hudson Humphrey Lynn seagull and Jonathan singer hello can you hear me we can hear you all right good evening um I want to start off by saying thank you to Lisa and everyone who's worked super hard on this um on all this land use uh review uh it's obviously been a lot of work work and we really appreciate all all the hard work you've done so my name is Jake Hudson Humphrey I'm been in Boulder for about five years now I'm speaking on

[80:02] behalf of the University Hill Merchants Association um I I emailed a letter to um the city councilors a couple days ago I'm gonna read what I can of that in my uh two minutes here so we are the University Hill Merchants Association representing 70 plus businesses at University Hill General Improvement District we are writing this letter urging you to vote to adopt ordinance 8590 as originally recommended by City staff ordinance 8590 would simplify the process of opening a business on the hill and remove the burden of excessive use review processes from small business owners this would make it much easier and more attractive to open a business on the hill and will help reduce vacancy rates when longtime Hill business albums on the hill closed last year illegal pets wanted to expand into the vacant space but chose not to due to the additional liquor regulations the space remains vacant similar stories exist for many vacant businesses on the hill

[81:01] ordinance 8590 would give Hill businesses with liquor licenses the ability to to apply for a use review to many businesses will but having the option to stay open past 11 allows us the flexibility to accommodate changing consumer preferences and stability in a very challenging business neighborhood this option should be available to all businesses ordinance 8590 would remove the 50% of income food from food sales requirement Hill restaurants with liquor licenses approved after the new ordinance will only need 25% of their sales to come from food like the rest of Boulder this will make it easier for a restaurant to sell a customer an expensive bottle of wine at dinner without worrying that they might not meet their 50% requirement for example the strict land use standards that currently exist for the hill commercial District do not apply anywhere else in the city we're not asking you to show special treatment to the Hill district we're asking you to level the playing field and apply the same land use

[82:01] standards to all neighborhood centers zoned dt1 dt2 dt3 and BMS the Hill district has been unfairly overregulation and give the hill a Fighting Chance sincerely the University Hill Merchants Association and this signed by tell Jones the sink Mark heinritz the sink bonnie doll the fitter Dakota soyer Cafe ion Jason HEB property owner Peter Hower the corner Ashley bot the waffle lab Bradley Raya the waffle lab Rachel romaya the the waffle lab Fred Campos that's all my time but there's a few more signatures all right thank you all thanks Jake now we have a Lyn seagull Jonathan singer and Pete Turner I support grape juice over wine I don't think that boozing up

[83:03] improves Society I think it detracts from society I don't think people need booze I think they escape to booze and their escape costs me a lot of money um it's not cheap to clean up about people that have dumbed themselves down that's what I think booze is dumbing yourself down why do people do it I have no idea I have a madori sour every 10 years um so I guess I'm saying I want 8605 I'm presuming planning board went for $ 8590 and mostly what I want to say about this growth and expansion issue because what you de side here depends on you know how you're going to promote business and what you think

[84:01] business needs and how business doesn't pay for its the cost of having people boozing up and dumbing down and um what I support overall is a much better Boulder Valley comp plan that the youth taes are set up underneath um that has a population plan in in effect that balances jobs housing and promotes Healthy Growth um I'm happy that HH failed I voted against it even though I'm a senior um I don't like being tricked into you know getting one thing the Taber stuff in exchange for property tax and I also don't really don't understand

[85:01] and I really think there need to be some workshops for people either that or I'm just too stupid and you can forget about me because my voice doesn't matter and that's fine too um but I feel like when my I'm paying more property taxes and my value is going up Skyhigh $3,000 a year um I don't see why the schools need that that extra elevated value of my house transferred to them other than the fact that it's promoting growth overall and there's going to be more kids in the school and I don't support that I support a managed population I'm just an old Al Bartlett type you know but you younger folks probably don't even know who the guy is but pop population needs to pay its way impact needs to pay its way and it doesn't thank you Lynn I have Jonathan

[86:01] singer and then Pete Turner good evening I'm Jonathan singer I'm the senior director of policy programs with Boulder chamber and I'm here today to support uh 8590 uh you've already heard really compelling testimony from both um Ted and Mark and I'm not sure I can top it but I do want to start by thanking uh Lisa Brad and and the entire staff for the work that they've put in um but also I I want you to all take a look at the letters that you've received from the boulder chapter of the Colorado Restaurant Association as well as the downtown Boulder partnership and the reason that I want you to focus on those letters um in addition to hearing support from the boulder chamber today is because 8590 represents the beginning of parody of leveling the playing field for businesses uh we hear from businesses outside of the Hill area today that they

[87:01] would like to see their competitors geographically with a similar uh a similar road to move forward so last thing that I'll mention here is you know there is a time and a place for a conversation on what is and isn't appropriate the conditional use review does that what doesn't do that is continued study uh Mark and I were talking about this a little while ago and if you were able to Mr H and I were talking about this a little while ago if you were to look at the amount of time that we have taken to study this issue um the studies themselves would now not only be old enough to vote um but they would probably be renting cars and having kids um it's been decades and and it's time to move forward so in the spirit of moving forward I'm going to send back the remainder of my time and encourage you all to support 859 thank you thanks Jonathan our last speaker is Pete

[88:05] Turner hello youall hear me yes uh Council thanks for having uh allowing me to speak tonight and uh I want to I'm here to speak in my support of 8590 as well um I my business I started uh a year and a half two years out of um CU graduated in 1993 opened in August 1995 so I'm 28 years old um and I've L you know I've started my business before any of this regulation um and um have kind of lived and grown through um grown my business um to you know we took additional space and the existing our original location then moved around the corner um to our current location and and um we you know as the hill Merchants Association said it was less um they said it was you know we did consider

[89:00] taking over the album space and it was less about the liquor license restriction it was more about the size restriction right um we have the opportunity um in the liquor license that we own at um at our current location across from the Fox Theater to 30 a.m. uh we actually don't choose to do that at this point um we haven't done that since Co and that's a business decision so um but really we would love to expand our business to give us more space for our patrons we just uh you know it's really difficult to do business with the amount of business that we've done in 28 years we've grown to 12 locations in 10 in Colorado two in Arizona and we've grown our footprint to you know anywhere from you know we we've got locations that are over 4,000 square feet um and I guess I just want to say you know it it all along um a couple things this this the current legis uh restrictions seem have always seemed arbitrary unjust and

[90:00] unfair to me um they don't seem supported by actual study um I also want to say um you know you know I had heard sort of the recommendation that if you know you know these changes were done to all the other um areas of the city uh in proposal 8590 that you know it was brought up that maybe we should do a separate study or you know for the hill itself um I just questioned when when these proposal when these restrictions were put in place I think it was only about the hill and the entire city wasn't taken into account so that seems unfair first of all I also have always felt that you know uh University Hill which you know again a lot of students live up there obviously a lot of residents but you know it is you know the sort of foot of uh CU Boulder uh 40,000 students I mean it's really a big part of the character of the city so I think to not um allow it to play with the same rules as the rest of the city just seems really uh misguided and I've always just

[91:00] questioned that so again I I've seen the character of the hill and business on the hill change in the 28 years I've been doing business and I know this would help to improve and invigorate it thanks very much Pete and uh with that I will close the public hearing thanks everyone for your testimony and bring it back to city council for discussion Bob kick us off maybe um first I want to uh compliment uh staff particularly Carl guy it only took five years to get the use tables um into shape and some congratulations on that car you're probably ready to retire now right no no no no no no don't take de baate well and I'm really impressed I have to say that when I sat through the the retreat in January two years ago and we stuffed so much stuff at you and I thought there's no way these guys are going to be able to complete this and you did wow the last item on the last

[92:01] day of of of this Council so congratulations to all of you for all the hard work over the last two years and for accomplishing everything we threw at you I suspect the next Council will just want to throw more work at you so you better staff upbring um I also was taken by uh by Mark's comment about um uh the consultant Brad seagull with Puma I I've known Brad for many many years and and I've never seen Brad seagull turn down uh a Consulting gig and when Brad seagull says this has been studied so much even I won't study it anymore you you know that really means something uh I think the hill has been been over studied as Pete also mentioned um I think the speakers spoke to the right point which is we need to get parity we need to get Equity here we need to be fair to all parts of our town we can't single out one um part of town for a different set of rules and I think that's going to be particularly true as as the tuno hotels open on the hill and we want them to be successful in addition to the success of our smaller businesses on the hill and I say that on the night that we honor our small

[93:00] businesses throughout town and finally I want to um compliment the residential neighbors of the Hill it would have been very easy for them to oppose 8590 and and could have turned this into a very binary decision um with the the neighbors the residential neighbors pitted on one side and uh against the the merchants and and while I know that the not all the residents are happy with 8590 um I compliment the U University Hill neighborhood association for sitting down with the merchants understanding some of their needs and wanting the greater good of success um of all all members of our community whether they're in the business world or residents and we still have work to do on the hill there's no doubt about that but but I think this move towards parody is the right thing and so for all those reasons I'll be supporting 8590 Bob while you have the floor are you interested in making a motion um um does anybody else have comments I want to give people I'd love to make since this will be my last motion I'd love to make the motion when the time comes but we'll give comment opportunities right after the motion okay well then I will

[94:00] thank you for that opportunity here I move um the approval of ordinance 8590 emitting Title 9 land use code BRC 1981 to update the use table and use standards finally related to the walkable neighborhood centers including changes to the standards for restaurants brew pubs taverns within the BMS business Main Street district and University Hill General improvement district and setting forth lots of related details can I see if juny wants to like do a simultaneous second with me since we're also getting our last moment here on the count of three no one two three I second that motion u city clerk are we allowed to have a dual dual second we allowed this one time sure why not not would uh would either of you like to speak to your second to your the motion Bob said it very well nothing to

[95:00] add I ditto Bob I I'll ditto Bob as well does anybody want to add additional comments CH I just want is T Turner still in the room because I want to say I'm pretty excited to meet the owner of legal pets right now that's the truth he's a cele to me so thank you Pete for speaking that was awesome I am so excited about 8590 which I will never forget those numbers by the way I've been thinking about them so much for the past week um and it's I want to say that we are committed I know that I'm committed in my in our next couple of years to do even more for the hill and for the hill commercial District especially in regards to safety and lighting so I'm going to be there for you I sure we all are mat I appreciate that um it's worth I think reflecting on this a little bit that this isn't going to

[96:00] change everything overnight this just starts the clock and so I think for the concern of you know what this may do it's been 10 years since the 2013 ordinance has slowly withered the hill down to to a to a stub and it's going to take time to get it back um but this is an opportunity for us to reset the clock and start the Ascension uh of the Hill appropriately and and I'm just excited that this Council uh will get to sort of kick that down kick that go uh that ball and hopefully you know some of our Business Leaders on the hill um like Mark and others um and certainly with with Ted and his work in you campy can help us uh uh take the wind behind the sales here and really move us forward with the additions of the hotel and and stuff like that and so I think this is um long time coming and uh just great great that we're at this point so thanks for all your patience and and certainly for everybody else on the hill uh for taking taking it on the chin for so long and um and here we are to to move us forward so uh looking forward to celebrating that and and uh prosperity in front of

[97:02] us and I'll just call on myself um Echo those comments I just had uh dinner at Cafe Aon and reminded me of how wonderful the hill is but also how much um how much better it could be and so hopefully this will be a good step in that direction and I just want to really commend uh staff has been a huge amount of work um over five years now plus um and this is coming to a close of this this 5year cycle but also the incredible amount of work that we threw at you um over these last two years and and like Bob it you know some time ago I thought well we probably won't make it through all of this but in fact we're getting through all of it absolutely all of it it's just extraordinary work on all of your parts um here we are at the the last meeting and we're finishing out the work plan so uh really deeply grateful for all the incredibly hard and high quality work that the department has done and this is a great step forward we hear all the time s from our business owners and restaurant about how challenging the regulatory environment can be in our town so appreciate you bringing these ideas forward and us getting this done and also a shout out

[98:00] to the use table subcommittee uh who PE our members did hours of grueling work um to get us to this spot so excited to take this step and and move on uh for the betterment of the city any other comments before we go to a vote not seeing any Emily if we could please all right we'll start the roll call vote on tonight's public hearing with council member ferz yes friend yes Joseph yes council member spear yes mayor proam wallik I Wier yes Yates yes council member Benjamin enthusiastic yes and mayor Brockett yes ordinance 8590 is hereby adopted unanimously right on okay thanks again for all your amazing

[99:01] work all right well that brings us to the end of our public hearings and our next going to our Matters from the mayor and members of council and while we're adjusting here I'll just give a shout out to um Mark hritz in the room for all the s Burgers over the years years good see you again with one third less alcohol okay so if we could go to our item 8 a please absolutely next on our agenda we have our Matters from the mayor and members of council and first we have item 8A and that is the boulder noas sister city discussion Rachel do you mind if I turn to you since this was an agenda item that you originally requested sure um so we got some emails from community members um complaining that the sister city project for naous was um

[100:02] in violation of its commitments to the city when it uh formed as a sister city and so I asked staff is that something that uh we can just ask staff to look at and I was told no that's something that that Council needs to take up so I asked CAC to schedule time so we could discuss um whether we uh I think care about uh the whether we think the commitments have been violated whether we care if they've been violated and then what to do if they have been thanks for that does anyone want to respond to that with a thought on how we we might proceed um with this question can I just one more thing to add uh that this is not um my request was not to look at the international conflict that's happening this is not going into um what's happening in the Middle East or or condemning uh any Ci's in the Middle East it's just talking about what's happening here in Boulder like on a Facebook page that's operated out of Boulder yeah and maybe I can just thanks for that Rachel frame the discussion is

[101:01] is purely kind of a processed question of whether we want to give feedback to the boulder NAA sister city project nonprofit and regardless of how people feel about the current situation in the Middle East and what I might actually ask Teresa um so there are uh specific agreements that that um organization agreed to upon the formation of the sisters City relationship but we also uh like one of the public comment speakers earlier mentioned how come uh other sister cities don't have to abide by similar rules but we actually do have general rules that all of our sister cities are required to abide by do I have that correct uh yes mayor I believe that that's right uh I will say however that um you know there was a a reference to 501c3's and the prohibition on political speech for 501c t3s that would be a state and federal matter and and we don't enforce state and federal tax provisions and that's what those Provisions um revolve around and so that

[102:02] actually would not be particularly applicable here but the general rules would and any particular understandings with respect to how a relationship might go for example the commitments made when this Sor city of navis was approved um would also be applicable okay thanks and but I think the just to I think our general guidelines include uh dealing with cross with cultural uh um matters uh rather than political matters do do I have that correct yes that's right um specifically in the resolution um outlining our sister city participation uh it says that each City relationship shall emphasize people-to-people exchanges and projects especially those of a primarily humanitarian concern which address human needs environmental

[103:02] concerns human rights and the enrichment of people in the respective cities very good thank you for that I got Genie's got her hand up thank you that's exactly where I was heading um along the same line thank you very much mayor Brocket along the same line concerning uh why are some sister cities allowed to make political statements um While others are restricted whether I have that correctly or not that's what one of at least one of our um speakers mentioned to earlier who was aen Reed so I do get a sense and I understand um nonprofits have to follow a taxable guideline that they're not allowed to um 501 c3s are not allowed to make political statements um but my

[104:00] understanding as well based on what you just said is that there must be some type of an agreement between or sister cities in the city itself in order for them to become a sister city is that correct well I think they're all expected to abide by our guiding regulations for sister city uh relationships which include the ones that Teresa just read okay so I I I I feel like we're parsing forwards here there there is expectation and there are also agreements you can expect things from me but if there are written agreements and it appears based on the conversation that it's not very clear so maybe let me just make my comment okay please that I hope moving forward because I'm no longer going to be a member of this Council if is that we have clear guidelines and clear rules for all sister cities right because ultimately I

[105:02] think as a community or as a council who deal with sister cities or community members right is that we want people to feel welcome and that part of inclusive and Equitable way of being in the world is that we engage in a manner that make that doesn't make that make people feel that they're on the same level so that means having clear guideline for all sister cities that says hey you're not allowed to partake or participate in political speech and that should be a guideline that is required by the city as opposed to hey your 501c3 already DET determine that you're not allowed to participate in these type of speeches so again for me it's we have community members reaching out to us and asking us to make decisions or to uh offer guidance in to our sister cities in

[106:02] having clear guideline would be really helpful thank you that's a great Point Jannie thanks um I think I had Nicole and then Tara sure um yeah I just had a question which is has any anybody talked to the boulder NOA sister city project people okay and I'm just because I guess I guess what I'm wondering is did anybody let them know that this was something that was causing a little bit of concern and and how you know what happened there and so it sounds like tar and Bob have both spoken do you all want to speak to your conversations with them thanks for that Nicole um I'll let terara speak for for her conversation uh yes I I did give the um when this keep up came up um via Rachel and and CAC put this on the calendar I did reach out to the because I am the liaison to each council member is a liaison to at least one sister city I am the liaison to novelist and so I did reach out to the board chair for novelist and um alert

[107:02] her to the fact that we were going to have this discussion tonight um and uh she was confirming with her colleagues on the board as a matter of fact they're literally having a board meeting as we speak uh about uh removing some of the language which we heard from some of our speakers earlier tonight from some of their post I don't want to make that commitment on their behalf um and she was still speaking with some of her board colleagues but at least with respect to the board chair there was an interest in um uh to um remove the offending language and and um as the liais on to uh the sister city uh project if it is the will of council that um I have a followup conversation after tonight's discussion I'd be happy to do that and and um report back to Council on whether um the offending language is going to be removed or if there is a resistance to that in which case Council may want to have a further discussion ter did you want to talk about your conversation um no actually what I was going to say

[108:01] was um for those of you that don't know I'm the president of the Israeli sister city and why I started the sister city was because of the sister city International's goal its mission is to promote peace through mutual respect understanding and cooperation one individual one community at a time so that is the mission of should be the mission of all sister cities that's the purpose of a sister city it's it's not supposed to be political it is really you're supposed to be there for them they're supposed to be there for you I take them on a hike we go to Pearl Street Etc so I just wanted to make that clear and I I do agree that the other thing I want to say is the BN SCP commitments that was um signed by sria is really a good document that any sister city would agree with because it has all good things to it there are some favorites of

[109:00] mine I won't bother maybe I'll read them later my favorites but I'm not going to read them now so I just want to I did have a great conversation with Brenda today and um but it was a felt like a long time ago so now I can't even remember it is that okay um but I think both of you heard some openness to folks there at at looking at the agreement and and adjusting post and communication based on that okay that's great to hear uh Lauren thank you Erin um I think let's see having read both of these commitments my concerns sort of go farther than just you know is novelist upholding this commitment or not but I I think it is really problematic that that the the agreements between our sister cities are so different right like um our palis andan sister city and our Israeli sister

[110:00] city Agreements are significantly different and I think that that's in and of itself is something that to me that this brought to light for me and is something that I would like to see us address um I've spoken to some of you about it and there's been sort of a suggestion that maybe we should make this um have other sister cities agree to not making political speech as well but I really don't think that as I we should think really hard about whether as a council body we want to be making decisions about whether or not any particular speech is based in fact or is political speech I think that that is a an area that I certainly don't want to be weighing into regularly and I think that it's likely to come up um this will

[111:01] not be the last time I imagine that an issue like this comes up partic particularly if we expand those rules so I would ask us to I mean I think reaching out to the sister to um naous makes sense or to the sister city organization and to speak to them about what's been posted but um I wouldn't want to see us weighed too heavily into trying to restrict their speech I think it plays into like I know that we're trying to keep this conversation focused but that couldn't do anything but weigh into um sort of a larger discussion and I um and I think that as we try to I mean our our sister city cities are

[112:03] supposed to be sort of about this um exchange of ideas and I think that if we limit all political speech that we um curtail their ability to do that thank you thanks for that Martin Mark and I and then Matt I got thoughts of my own as well okay first I I think it's important to remember the context in which all of this arose in 2013 I believe the first application by nais was rejected and in 2016 it was accepted because they offered these commitments to us so this is not as much a free speech issue it's a uh an issue of keeping the commitments that they free freely made I think juny raises a good point maybe we should have a uniform commitments for all sister cities but I think that the the the lesson has to be um any sister city is

[113:05] as free as they want uh to exercise their rights to political speech and they are free to be our sister city but not at the same time you get to choose one of those uh the other and that's what was done here with these commitments and I you know I regard this simply as are you going to uphold the commitments that you made to us or not um and in the context of being our sister city that is an obligation that you freely undertook um and it is not the the appropriate thing to do to say well that doesn't suit us anymore um so we don't want to do that you can do that but it's not consistent with being our sister city and the terms on which we admitted nais as a sister city but juny does have a good point we should probably look at

[114:01] this in the next Council and see if there's a uniform set of standards that we want to impose on all sister cities thanks for that Mark if I if I may maybe offer a path forward here because I'm U hearing General um interest in taking Bob up on his offer as the leison with Anis sister city to discuss with the board kind of the because those commitments were agreed to it's been seven years now right so I'm not sure that everyone who's currently uh working there is deeply familiar with them so if you're willing to reach out to them and talk that over with them and send send that feedback it sounds like potentially Council would support that but also hearing interest which I agree with in establishing some uh clear standards for our sister cities in general um about what the guidelines are in terms of what is the the purview and what kinds of things would um sister city nonprofit be addressing and not be addressing so I wonder if we could say um say to staff can we put a note to come back to this to maybe put something together that we might send out to our

[115:00] sister city organizations um sometime before too long not right away probably and just building on on aon's Final comment there to staff um about um uniform standards um sister cities International which is based in Washington does have a set of standards that it suggests that cities that do adopt sister cities um Undertake and it does um speak to a political commentary as a matter of fact I I seem to recall Aaron that when we were considering the novel sister city um uh sanction back in 2016 there was a young man who flew out from Washington from sister cities International who talk to us about this very point and I think that they would be a very good resource to staff if they want to reach out to sister cities International and talk about standards that they recommend um that cities adopt around because this is not the first time this has happened either in Boulder or in other cities and and it is a it is a tough issue and I think juny makes a great point about having um parody and uniformity across all of our our our sister city relationships um and we don't have to reinvent the wheel since

[116:00] sister city sister cities International has already done a lot of that work for us and they actually have a a full-time uh employee in Denver who's come up here once or twice before I'm forgetting her name but she's a lovely woman who I'm sure would be happy to help us with that we'd be happy to look into that and and um depending on what we find we'd be happy to come back to council and share for your approval very good is this acceptable to folks Matt and Rachel you had your hand I still have comments that I'm just gonna share so I'll go it um I like jun's idea of parody as well and and I will note like as I recall the um the decision to create the sister city relationship was was fraught and I think that we did make a commitment to the community that we would monitor it um you know the the speech you know on Facebook pages and newsletters and stuff and we obviously didn't do that and so that's a failing on this council's part

[117:00] in my opinion not any individual council member but um you know that I think we sort of we breached a commitment as well so and you know I don't think that should happen again so I I um when I first reach out to Teresa Nuri I was like you know I don't think any of us really know much about sister cities or what we're doing here and so I think that um when I started in 2019 we were getting ready to have a dinner and sort of learn about them and then Co happen and and I just think whatever was in place prior to 2019 never got got up to speed during my four years and so I think there needs to be some sort of uh staff attachment and point person for sister cities because it you know this is obviously a a something that that I think would is is not ideal for us to receive complaints from community members we ought to be having conversations when a staff member or somebody is seeing that um and and taking it out of of you know confusion in community members hands

[118:00] um and I I think that if to Lauren's um point if we don't like the commitments I don't think we can just disregard them because there was so much Community um heated discussion there that I think we would have to go back and engage again um and that that would be a I imagine even um a more laid in uh discussion at this point than it was in 2016 so that that's up to you all but just flagging I don't I don't think we can just decide not to care about the agreements that we as a body agree to because I think that again that's a commitment that we we make to the community as well good luck everyone thanks Rachel please stop reminding us that it's up to us um so I I have a question for Teresa that sort of will maybe frame my comments um if I recall it's I think in the council procedures um that this body is generally prohibited from weighing in on

[119:01] International politics Andor diplomacy related issues if I recall um I I just remember that from my Council training that there's sort of a limit to there's a boundary to which this body weighs into things and that was deliberate and intentionally so uh that that's that that is somewhat accurate um it is a a Prohibition on waiting into those Waters without appropriate staff time and information and so arguably with the sister cities there has been information and time put um into it and um the general relationship with Council would be an appropriate topic I would agree with you that any International matter that is em of an emerging nature we we would not yet have had direction to study or or the opportunity or time to do that true

[120:00] but our relationship with these sister cities weren't necessarily as geopolitics changes necessarily governed by Andor informed by the situations that we are in right now since some of these existed predating the current situations so what really what I'm getting at is by extension for us as a city citing we aren't weighing in on those geopolitical stuff isn't that by extension also a way in which we want to carry forth those sister city relationships so that we aren't put in that position to be sort of forced to weigh in on that International Diplomat and geopolitics stuff uh because I I worry otherwise we're sort of reverse flowing that back in to where here we are and we're sort of skirting around the issue but to focus on the issue with our sister city so that's I'm just trying to frame our own rules by extension with our sister cities and how that actually informs us of how we maybe move forward um in this situation if that makes sense it does make sense and I think when you pair that with the purpose of the sister city

[121:03] relationship at all um it it would Council that geopolitical interests um and political interests are are not a part of the uh um are not a a part of what we're dealing with when we're talking about a sister city okay well I appreciate that so so I'll also sort of come to Erin's recommendation I um I appreciate that Bob's already reached out and that there's an opportunity to follow up I do think that just given what we've heard from community and the sensitivity of the issue that um Beyond and also you know you know uh we're going to be you know saying goodbye to Bob here pretty soon and then and then who then who carries that mantle thereafter and so not knowing what the time is or when there's resolution to this if there is I'm wondering that in this instance just because of the nature of Bob being the representative and him timing off does it make sense for the city to have a letter so that there's some formality to it only not not that we're severing or

[122:00] doing anything but just of the specific rules of what we're sort of hey here's the rules here's a reminder we'd like we'd like for the stuff to be reconciled so that it's in record but more importantly it allows a baseline for whoever does take over for Bob and that representation to kind of have a very consistent platform to continue that conversation should it continue on into 2024 uh if that's the will of council we can certainly do that I would also say that these um meeting minutes would serve as a record that would be uh sufficient and appropriate so either is acceptable and it's just whatever Council would would desire okay appreciate that no and I'll just note real I the word smithing a letter could be a little complic I wasn't looking for us I was going to more defer to Teresa since this is a binding document and let that be the uh and her team a more appropriate way if there was a letter not having us Wordsmith because I think that would be uh much more appropriate uh I understand that desire and I appreciate the confidence I do I

[123:00] don't see this as a legal matter actually um I see this instead as a a set of commitments about how the relationship would be governed uh certainly legal would be happy to to help we're very good at drafting things and and great at letters um but I just would note that I don't see it as particularly a legal matter and sometimes when the lawyers are writing it makes people nervous I don't know why Nicole um so I think one of the things that makes me just a little bit nervous about this is that you know we've been having conversation kind of about the boulder Nea sister city um Pro program without um kind of hearing back from them and since they're discussing it tonight I think what I would prefer I I would appreciate Bob you know you're you're kind of reaching out and and hearing what what they have to say um but just having that conversation first and I don't know Bob if you could sort of report back maybe on hotline would be appropriate um and then you know we can kind of go from there because I mean at

[124:00] this point I think they've based on an email we got earlier today they just kind of realize that this was something that was um hurting people in the community and and I don't I don't get the sense that most people in the community are out to hurt each other um this is just a really challenging topic where we have a lot of um a lot of people are hurting in the community and and I think it's just a sensitive one but um I think one of the beautiful things about the sister city project is that um it really encourages communication especially when things are hard especially when when we're hurting and I think those are um ideals that we should strive for and as we're thinking about parody and the sister city agreements um I think maybe we could just ask that if if something is happening with one of the sister city um programs to reach out to the liaison maybe you know in the interim we can with with any of those sister cities um we can just you know as counil acknowledge that that liaison will go and have a conversation um and we can we

[125:02] can bring it back if needed but I think generally with folks in our community having that conversation is is a good starting point so thank you Bob for being willing to do that and um letting us know and I I expect that will be a very um fruitful conversation can it cqu on that a little only in the sense of what are we asking Bob to communicate are we just trusting Bob to have that conversation on his own or are we saying hey as a body we would like Bob to ask them to remove that stuff or whatever I'm just trying to understand what's the charge here since we're having this conversation yeah I mean I you know Bob as my colleague I trust you to go and have a conversation but really I think it's just about understanding you know sharing information making sure that everybody is on the same page um and then hearing you know how how they responded maybe that you know they're saying oh my gosh I you know we didn't we didn't realize we didn't know you know we're going to change things I heard um either you or terara say that they were talking about changing or removing um some of the language so I I

[126:01] think until we we know what the response is there's it's really just a conversation yeah I'm not going to communicate anything on behalf of council they're watching right now they're gathered um in in somebody's home around a kitchen table with the laptop on and watching this right now so they're listening right now to what we're we're talking about and so what I'll simply do is is talk to them tomorrow and hear what they they as a a board decided to do and I'll report that dutifully back to council and it'll either be adequate to council or it won't be and if it's not then you you could take it up further yeah and and just to be clear this is an organization that's working on a lot of great projects I mean the current one is fundraising for uh to purchase an ambulance for a refugee camp right so um so that so are we comfortable then with with send sending Bob to to have that conversation then report back are people good with that very good and then we're also carrying the message to to to Nua to look at how we can have um common standards right for our sister city relationships and so something that we

[127:01] can come back to before too long

[137:16] okay I think we are uh we are back up testing testing hello hello testing one two three we can hear you and thanks

[138:06] Ryan folks who are watching from home uh we're just on a recess here cu the technology cut out and we're just waiting for a couple council members to come back I hear the technology is back we will come out of our we will end our recess and come back in from the playground once we have everybody at the Das again give us a moment

[139:16] e okay so um bring our recess to a close and we'll recommence the meeting apologies everyone for the technical difficulties coming back in and I understand that the the feed cut out before we were finished with the discussion of the nas uh sister city conversation so if folks don't mind I'll just mention that uh the outcome just uh to recap the outcome of that uh conversation was to ask um uh Bob is our navala sister city Lees on to speak with the the board members of the nais um sister city project about the need to um look at the commitments and make sure that they are being uh complied with um and we've uh heard preliminary information that that is something that

[140:00] they're um willing to do so hopefully that'll be a productive discussion and so we'll you'll report back to us Bob I think VI a hotline about the results of those discussions y yeah I agree I think what's very important to me is that the commitments are upheld because if we go back back to 2016 that's what we all decided to do and I think it's important for us to keep that very good and the other thank you for that and the other thing is that we are going to um be clear about the expectations for all of our sister cities about um sticking to crosscultural and humanitarian um items okay so that that was what we talked about there we are now uh moving back into why don't we reread into the record uh 8B of course so we have item 8B and that is the outgoing council member declar ations so Mark do you want to Mark do you want to go up and do it in we don't have much of an audience out here but let's make it a little more give a little more oomph um you all are individually each

[141:02] of you very important it is just the number of people out there isn't very large as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted it is my great privilege and honor to read this declaration for my friend Bob Yates and it's a declaration honoring Bob Yates service on the Boulder City Council dated November 16 2023 Bobby Yates was elected to the his first of two four-year terms on the Boulder City Council in 2015 his service has consistently focused on increasing access to affordable housing economic vitality and ensuring government accountability and in transparency he was selected by his peers to serve as mayor proem from November 2019 to November 20120 Bob his wife Katie and their two sons moved to Boulder in

[142:01] 2001 when he retired in 2011 Bob immersed himself in service to Boulder volunteering with the city and more than a dozen Civic and nonprofit organizations including serving as a member of the city's capital investment strategy stakeholder committee chair of the city's Parks and Recreation Advisory Board treasurer of the Colorado shiaka Association and Secretary of the dairy Arts Center one of Bob's proudest accomplishments was serving for four years as president of the boulder History Museum leading the 75-year-old organization in its transition to the Museum of Boulder with the construction of a new Museum downtown showcasing Boulder's history of innovation while a member of city council Bob served on many committees including Financial strategy Community engagement Charter and retreat planning he was one of the city's representatives to the National

[143:00] League of cities and was the council liaison to the boulder convention and visitors bureau and multiple sister city committees in parallel with his service on the city council Bob continues to be active in Civic and nonprofit organizations including serving as chairman of the board of nonprofit downtown Boulder Community initiatives which presents dozens of events and programs in downtown Boulder with an emphasis on inclusivity in 2019 Bob and his wife Katie launched rainbows over Pearl an initiative to ensure that lgbtq people feel welcomed downtown this initiative has grown into an annual event that now includes the whole city we the city council of the city of Boulder Colorado recognize honor and appreciate the service on Council and the significant contributions made to the city and Community by Bob

[144:01] [Applause] Yates all right Rachel we're up next okay here we go this is tough can't believe you're leaving this is a declaration honoring my good friend Rachel friends service on the Boulder City Council in November 16th 2023 so Rachel friend was elected to the Boulder City Council in 2019 throughout her four years on Council Rachel has used her voice to amplify issues ranging

[145:00] from flood mitigation to social justice to pandemic recovery she was selected by her peers to serve as mayor proem from November 2021 to 22 Rachel began building her Legacy of local action before ever running for city council as an advocate for improved blood mitigation solutions for CU South and as a volunteer for Colorado Mom's demand action a group dedicated to ending gun violence I can vouch for this was the calls I used to get from Rachel before she was on Council on these issues during her time on city council Rachel helped Foster an environment supporting physical and emotional safety for community members staff and Council as well as enhancing government processes for people of all ages identities lived experiences and political perspectives she was instrumental in the passage of the city's passage of six gun violence prevention measures in 2022 Rachel is also a champion for advancing racial Equity she drove the adoption of council resolution

[146:00] 1275 which committed City Council Members to participate in the city's racial Equity trainings and workshops along with strengthening the city's commitment to promote racial equity in City relationships programs services and policies in addition as a member of the city's racial equity guiding Coalition she provided valuable input leading to successful adoption of the city's first racial Equity plan Rachel also provided valuable guidance and expertise to develop ideas and Innovations for the reimagine policing plan along with directly assisting City staff to connect with Community Partners and Achieve greater public input for the reimagine policing plan her support both for better policing and for the existing members of the Boulder Police Department was exemplary particularly through her personal support and encouragement following the tragedy of king supers in 2021 while her Council term comes to an end the Boulder Community will continue to benefit from her contributions long into the future so we the city council

[147:00] of the city of Boulder Colorado recognize honor and appreciate the contributions to the City by outgoing council member Rachel friend Nicole do you want to come up and do jinny's you can do it from there okay very good juny I wish you were here but me too I know juny I'm just gonna stay sitting since my vaccines I had this morning are starting to kick in and you're sitting too um I just want to take a moment of personal privilege and say um council member Joseph first you were my colleague then you were my mentor and now I am so honored to call you my friend and thank you for being a source of support and learning and laughter I'm really going to miss your presence here but I'm glad we'll still get to work together in your role as our um house District representative um so now I will begin

[148:01] the official declaration juny Joseph was elected to the Boulder City Council in 2019 throughout her four years on Council juny has used her voice to amplify issues ranging from housing access to City Financial strength strategy she was selected by her peers to serve as mayor protm from November 2020 to 2021 council member Joseph was born in Porto Prince Haiti and moved to the United States at the age of 14 years old after spending her early career as an international human rights Champion she became a resident of Boulder to pursue her jurist doctor at the University of Colorado law school and ran for city council as a student as a member of Boulder City Council C council member Joseph has consistently advocated for Budget transparency occupancy reform and Equity she advocated for bringing open gov to the city to make the city's half billion dollar budget more accessible to community members and as the city's

[149:01] liaison to the mile high flood District she advocated for flood mitigation funding during the covid-19 pandemic she helped the city get a grant from the national league of cities to do bus ads and Outreach to the Latino community and when the bilingual emergency alert system was at risk of elimination she was a strong advocate for keeping it in place as a member of the financial strategy committee council member Joseph advocated for city funding to support CU laws immigration Clinic which assists non-citizens in navigating the immigration legal system further as a member of the racial Equity guiding Coalition she advocated for a collaborative CU Boulder City of Boulder internship program in order to retain young people in Boulder and to create a Workforce p pipeline she also was the first member of Boulder City Council to propose bringing an altern alternative responder program to the city which Boulder is now implementing Boulder City Council to be

[150:02] oh something is missing here sorry all right um let me try to figure out what it's supposed to say uh oh um council member Joseph was the first member of Boulder City Council to be appointed to chair the Colorado Municipal leagues policy committee which develops the League's legislative program as a member of the National League of Cities human development committee and the real Council she has influenced National policy positions and been a steadfast advocate for social and economic policies that impact people in Boulder and all across the state while her service to city council comes to an end council member Joseph's political career remains strong juny Joseph will continue to serve the people of Boulder in the Colorado State Legislature as the representative of district 10 we the city council of the city of Boulder Colorado recognize honor and appreciate the contribution to the City by outgoing council member juny

[151:05] Joseph thank you thank you so much wow that was very powerful we're going to miss you all um so now it's a chance for 8C to I'll let Emily get us going there thank you so much um yes we'll move along to item 8 C and that is the outgoing council member recommended improvements so Rachel juny Bob this is your chance if you want to share some insights from your many years of service to the city and talk about all the things we do a terrible job at and what we could do better ready to take notes I vote by Bob goes first and then like juny and I can clean up because he's got twice the the length of time right and now anything that no okay juny you're up then you know what I feel like the two

[152:00] of you cllean [Laughter] this sure I'll go first I want to start by saying it has been a real pleasure serving on Boulder City Council I want to thank Maria for all the work she has done and I also want to thank City attorney Teresa Tate um two people who I consider powerhouses I'm deeply honored to have been part of their hiring process thank you is an incomplete word but thank you anyway so with all the all these nice words I have just expressed I just want to give some high level feedback based on what I hear from the community some community members wish Council was better at articulating their homelessness strategies and plan to and plan to the rest of the community also some felt that the city's climate plan and strategies are not in PL English so it's too

[153:00] academic therefore I would appreciate if the city would express its climate strategies in ordinary plan English that is accessible to all as part of the city's Equity plan further the city needs to do a better job announcing boards and commission and give enough time for community members to apply I have heard that the timeline for board and commission is not inclusive for all community members especially the working class once again thank you so much to All City staff to all my council members it has been an honor serving with this Council and I look forward to our continued partnership through my role as a state representative and some of you have really gotten to know as real friends and I hope to keep all of you as friends as well and I look forward to this you know alternative different way of engaging

[154:01] each other but nonetheless we we are community members which is actually the most important part of what it means to be in this community together so thank you thanks so much for that juny we've been benefited enormously from your your wisdom uh over the years and look forward to continuing to work together in your other capacity over the during the years to come juny if we had planned that it couldn't have gone better so like I feel like maybe you know you subliminally planted that idea well done um I also want to say it's been uh an honor to serve and much as I have made light of you know my uh desire to to come to a very Speedy conclusion here uh I'm always mindful that it is a privilege and an honor to be entrusted by the community to do the work we do and so um I than the community and staff for supporting our work and and being so

[155:00] outstanding uh and all of my colleagues who are going to especially those of you who are going to continue to do the good work um thank you and I I I was thinking on the way over like how would I how would I describe these four years and maybe it's because it's four years but I was thinking it is a little like high school you come in your freshman year you're like all lit up and enthusiastic and you know like everything's wow and then like you know you you you really get into like a a very studious learning mode uh you know maybe end a freshman year through I'm going to go with beginning a senior year and then by the end like you're wearing pajamas like don't want to open the calculus book like it is it is a hard you know by by this exact moment in high school so I appreciate you all putting up with my um immense senioritis and that does not diminish how much I am grateful for the opportunity um I I don't have a ton for the recommendations I did want to just

[156:01] flag a couple of um policy things that I hope will move forward one is on the core arterial Network which we just got an update from staff just for oncoming council members and you know maybe staff who weren't here for that it was you know the goal was protected bike lanes and and you know and to be on these streets that we're going to um we picked because that's where the a sizable number of accidents were happening so I just wanted to reiterate as someone who was um heavily involved with that that um is is a what the intent was um also want to flag that it took a long time to get uh approval for a safe outdoor space sanctioned Campground I do hope that um that people will decide to give that a try because I really think it might help people who are suffering outside um and could be a a big deal for the city and could work really well so those are the the policy ones just generally speaking I I think

[157:02] it's helpful when we don't reinvent wheels and like you all will have so much in the next Council work to do that like opening up cans of worms you know we discussed a little bit earlier tonight like it is time intensive to do work that's already been done so just having watched a lot of the work or participated in it it's um just something to bear in mind that there are always going to be trade-offs if you if you go back on things that are kind of at a good enough um status then um you know instead of improving from where they are it can take a lot of time um a couple things that that maybe just didn't occur I I I think we had agreed at one point to ditch hotline come up with something that was going to replace that so we'll flag that I think that that is very outmoded form of communication with community members nobody you know and genz is checking their emails to find out what city council's doing so we we are we uh

[158:01] sometimes abuse hotline and you know we we um uh in that I think it's it's got like very minuscule you know allowed allowed uses and I think all of us have been guilty of like going out side of that so just um maybe revisit that I don't know January 2021 maybe or 2022 think it was 2021 um might have been 2020 discussion on like we're we're going to phase out hotline and I think we were going to maybe do like a council memb corner like if you wanted to you know explain why you voted a certain way then that was going to be on the city's website something like that so just said you know final final request to you know put a put a fork in the hotline um I think it's good to we we also talked about moving the retreat out I think that staff's already going to do that but it is hard as a new incoming council member to understand how critical that Retreat is and formative

[159:00] and and it's going to you know bite you in the rear end for two years if if you go in like I did my first year and ask for 70,000 things and you get zero you just help people to understand what what the retreat is and and it's great if everybody gets some things that they care about uh on the work plan and that that is um uh there are common ground things that hopefully everybody has something that they are passionate about in the two years that you are doing this Joy filled work um for any any any work plan tenure um and uh just that I think that process matters a lot the the charter matters the work rules matter our our words to the Community needs to ma need to matter so just a a gentle lift up of um I think that we need to operate with integrity and and if we do want to go back and change things um or or relitigate any number of things that

[160:01] that um you know councils a year five 10 years ago did you know it needs to be um transparent and and involving the people who participated the first time with that it's it's been a joy thank you all thanks so much Rachel we'll miss your expertise and passion for making the world a better place but don't be a stranger those who know me know that um I like at the very beginning of each counsel me I like to predict what time we're going to end at and this evening 45 so I've got six minutes to kill here what do you mean it's 939 that clock is wrong that clock is wrong for 6 Months 0 39 and and and I'm 45 one way or the other a I um I I'm not going to offer any recommendations right now Nicole and I have had some good conversations about some process recommendations so and we will have some more conversations before

[161:00] the retreat and so I'll leave it to Nicole to to carry forward uh some joint suggestions from the two of us around those so I would take to take my remaining six and a half minutes to um talk a little bit about uh just more of a retrospective of of my eight years on councel uh Aaron and I were first elected to City Council in November 2015 and our very first vote after being sworn in and electing Suzanne Jones as our mayor was to approve the city's first cultural master plan laying out a decade long path to significantly increasing funding for arts and culture in our community next year Council will update that plan as it approaches its 10year anniversary Aon will recall that in our early months on Council we were embroiled in a community debate over the pro pros and cons of liberalizing Boulders laws on co-ops like so many other policy considerations that we participated in during those eight years on Council the co-op discussion we tried to balance the interests of those seeking more opportunities for

[162:00] affordable housing against the character of our community that had developed over the decades often the fears and prognostications on both sides of the community debate that we were not going far enough or that we were going too far proved wrong while we were in fact changing our town we were not destroying it during the late teens before the 2020 pandemic this tension in our community was reflected in other policy considerations by city council some of the community wanted us to do more to improve our little world and others wanted us to slow down and reflect before acting in addition to the co-op debate during the 2016 2019 period we approved commercial linkage fees for new commercial buildings that would pay for for affordable housing we updated our comprehensive plan we voted on cannabis regulation flood mitigation and prairie dog removal we held hearings on residential developments on North Broadway at 30th and Pearl at Hogan pancost on the hill and at the former

[163:01] Boulder Community Hospital site we approved a high-end Senior Living facility on Mapleton and a less fancy place for homeless youth on Pine we voted on franking height limits broadband ebikes vaping gun violence prevention hate crimes and racial Equity we created a middle-income down payment assistance program we approved a guaranteed income program we launched an eviction prevention program we made it easier for homeowners to host accessory dwelling units we added sister cities in Palestine Israel and Nepal we struggled with homelessness we still do perhaps the dominant topic during those pre-pandemic years was municipalization that decade long Boulder Civil War about whether the city would take over the EXL Energy electric distribution Network in the name of more aggressive climate action or whether we would cajo Exel into getting greener in other ways going back to 2010 our

[164:02] community was split down the middle on the right approach with exactly half voting in a series of Elections to pursue municipalization and the other half firmly opposed it finally took Co along with some legal and financial setbacks to break the Log Jam on municipalization allowing for a negotiated settlement in the summer of 2020 which the voters approved that fall the covid pandemic hit us without warning and it hit us hard it's as if someone flipped a switch there was the normal world and then suddenly we entered the co World a whole new planet hotels and restaurants were shuttered planes stopped flying hospitals filled up our little city city government so tremendously dependent on sales tax virtually came to a standstill rec centers and libraries closed and hundreds of city employees were furloughed only the fire and police departments carried on albeit with their own health and safety constraints like everyone else city

[165:01] council moved to Virtual meetings through 2020 and 2021 City governments proceeded down the parall paths of dealing with the health and financial crisis while also trying to maintain some semblance of normality knowing hoping that someday the pandemic would be over when not slashing budgets in Municipal Services the city council got a surprising amount of work done over zoom in addition to setting settling the municipalization fight during the pandemic we dealt with neighborhood speed mitigation created a police oversight panel expanded the camp expanded the camping ban launched a downtown ambassador program and redeveloped diagonal Plaza we appointed Sam Weaver and then Aaron Brockett as our mayor May s to lead us and represent us we hired a new police chief we hired a new City attorney we hired a new city manager and we hired about 14 planning directors I think we finally found a good

[166:02] one Chris enjoyed Chris was one of them with the help of the voters we approved the CU South annexation we shifted to evene elections we approved taxes we created a new Library District and we set up direct election of our mayor I agreed with some of those choices and not others but the important thing was that our voters made the final decisions and of course there was the horrific King Super shooting on March 22 2021 in which 10 of our friends and neighbors were lost that was followed a few months later by a horrific fire in our neighboring towns where more than 1,000 homes were destroyed with the end of the pandemic these last two years have seen a return to our long-standing community discussions over what we want our town to be there is a natural tension between representation and leadership as we listen then lead we

[167:00] consider policies that every Community struggles with how do we ensure affordability while maintaining existing Community character how do we protect neighborhoods at risk from floods and fires while not damaging nearby neighborhoods to which homeless people do we owe a duty of assistance what more can we do to prevent gun violence without Crossing legal lines should we prioritize cars or bikes how do we do our part to combat climate change what is the right role for police in our community should we build a Broadband Network should we keep our airport should Colorado cities seed some land use control to the state in the name of increased housing affordability what should our minimum wage be and when should we change it has EXL done enough to reduce carbon emissions or should we resume municipalization are we happy with the mix of the city's revenues between sales

[168:01] taxes and property taxes are we applying the right priorities as we budget those revenues for municipal Services where will the next big Housing Development go or should there even be one as we look forward these questions will be discussed and debated over and over none of us has all the answers opinions will differ Visions will diverge priorities will shift this is healthy this is democracy this is what community is all about diverse people with diverse views conversing about how they can live together I have been privileged to have been one one of the facilitators of these Community discussions during 350 City Council meetings over the last8 years I will miss it I will miss you but the city is in good hands under your

[169:00] leadership and I'm not going anywhere as I discover my next opportunities to serve this community I will be only a phone call away call me anytime that was great Bob we'll we'll miss your hard work and creativity and passion for the job and institutional knowledge but you won't be far juny yes I have part two okay I you have part two no uh did you want to read a poem no no I think I thank you is enough thanks okay well and with that any final thoughts before we bring our last council meeting of this term to an end I want to say Bob Yates that was that was lovely you're also like that that kid in high school who like the bell

[170:00] rang you you held us over by five minutes all right and and with that I'll I'll gel our uh last Council business 46 p.m. thanks everyone for all your [Applause] service oh that