Transcript

Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.

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[5:08] good evening everyone and welcome to the Thursday October 17th 2024 regular meeting of the Boulder City Council uh let's go ahead and get us started I am going to call us to order so I'll gav Us in again and ask if we can do a roll call please Elicia yes sir thank you and good evening everyone we'll start tonight's roll call as usual with council member Adams present council member Benjamin is absent mayor Brockett present council member fulkers present Marquis present shoard here mayor Pro Tim spear present council member wallik virtually present thank you sir and council member Wier present mayor we have our Cor

[6:00] thanks so much all right we're going to start tonight with item 1A which is a Colorado companies to watch month declaration to be presented by council member shuart right he's on okay good evening I'm going to say a short statement to give you some background and then invite uh some some folks come talk with us so small businesses play an important role in the boulder economy and and for the past several years we have taken time to recognize local small businesses that are named Colorado companies to watch Colorado companies to watch is a unique program that recognizes outstanding second stage companies which are defined as small small businesses with six to 99 employees that are past the startup stage which have demonstrated success and strong potential for growth

[7:00] exceptional entrepreneurial leadership Innovative products and processes and economic impact Community enrichment and a positive corporate culture the program is unique in that it recognizes businesses in a wide variety of industries from across the state and businesses may not receive the award more than once since the program began over a decade ago 800 businesses businesses have been recognized as Colorado companies to watch of those nearly 20% were located in bould Boulder reflecting the city's strength in Innovation and Entrepreneurship past Colorado companies to watch from Boulder include B chai Boulder excuse me Boulder Ice Cream chocol love cold quanta doc popcorn Eco products evolve Foods Justin's Nut Butter OZO coffee popsockets purely Elizabeth scratch Labs SPO walero Hat Company many more this year we are recognizing four small fast

[8:00] gror businesses that were named 2024 Colorado companies to watch I would like to invite representatives from one of them who can join us tonight to come forward now for a reading of a declaration recognizing their achievement so I'd like to invite Lee Rosen co-founder and CEO of think orbital and voch holb co-founder and chief Innovation officer up to the Das hello I want to the Declaration in 2009 the governor of Colorado initiated an annual annual Colorado companies to watch award program to recognize second stage companies with high potential for future growth each year for more than a thousand nominations only 50 small businesses in the state are selected for the award since the program began in 2009 133 of the businesses named Colorado companies to watch have been from Boulder reflecting the city's strength in Innovation and Entrepreneurship in 2024 Colorado companies to watch

[9:02] honors honores from Boulder include the Colorado women Center Ned talents to team and think orbital these four Boulder businesses represent a wide range of Industries and are among the most Visionary Innovative successful and impactful entrepreneurs in the state these businesses exemplify creativity Innovation and entrepreneurial spirit and support the community with the jobs and Economic Opportunity they provide expenditures they make and local taxes they pay the city council of the city of Boulder Colorado extends our gratitude for the many contributions these businesses make to the local community yeah you bet thank you so much uh it's really an honor to be here we really appreciate it um being recognized as one of Colorado's companies to watch is is truly an honor we're a brand new business uh who receiv received funding just a year ago and uh have already been into outer space uh we are an inspace

[10:01] construction company which kind of blows people's mind when you think about a small company in Boulder uh doing big things in outer space and building large infrastructure in outer space and um we had 15 full-time equivalent team members um many of us came from all over the country and all over the world to be here in Boulder we could have been anywhere and we chose to come here and we are appreciative of our great new city and our home so thank you very much for having us and we appreciate this honor thank you thanks for that Ryan and thanks so much for joining us think orbital folks uh I have the chance to visit their um facilities at a groundbreaking and they really are doing ground or space breaking work uh it it's really extraordinary the High Caliber of engineering that's going on there in our very City okay item number 1B is white

[11:02] cane Awareness Day declaration presented by council member Wier and we also have representatives from the Boulder Valley chapter of the national Federation of the blind if you all would like to join Tara on the DI that I like that even better I like that even better right here all right I'll start by reading the Declaration white cane Awareness Day October 17 2024 the white cane which every blind resident of Boulder has the right to carry demonstrates and symbolizes the ability to achieve a full and independent life and the capacity to work productively in competitive employment the white cane by allowing every every blind person to move freely

[12:01] and safely from place to place makes it possible for the blind to fully participate in and contribute to our society and to live the lives they want to live every Community member should be aware that the law requires that motorists and cyclists exercise appropriate caution When approaching a blind person carrying a white cane the city of bowler calls upon employers both public and private to be aware of and utilize the employment skills of our blind citizens by recognizing their worth as individuals and their productive capacities Boulder's commitment to Equitable opportunities for blind community members includes making City programs services and activities accessible for people with disabilities and enforcing the city's human rights ordinance which protects against discrimination and housing employment and public accommodation based on membership in a protected class we the

[13:01] city council of the city of Boulder Colorado declare October 17th 2024 as white cane Awareness Day in Boulder and do call upon our schools colleges and universities to support opportunities for training to Blind persons upon employers and the public to utilize the available skills of blind persons and to open new opportunities for the blind in our rapidly changing societ society and upon all community members to recognize the white can as a tool of Independence for blind pedestrians on our streets and highways signed by mayor Brockett would you guys like to any of you want to speak yeah sure thank you so much I am Maran milelli president of our national Federation of the blind Boulder Valley Chapter accompanied by Jim Walcott and Jordan casor who are strong members of

[14:04] our organization there are many blind people in Boulder and all of us like to be on the streets the sidewalks and the multi-use paths in safe manner there have been times where that has not been the case and so we are here raising awareness that we are among you we're not asking for more than common C but we are definitely asking for it and the understanding that blind people in Boulder are alive and well in contributing members of this Society just looking for the same opportunities and courtesies that everyone else has and in that vein one of the projects that we spoke to the mayor about was access to the streets of Boulder and so today we are passing

[15:01] along to council member Wier our recommendations for a series of intersections in Boulder that we've noticed either need audible pedestrian signals proper uh domes and or alignments and other needs that meet those for the Blind and other people with dis disabilities who live and work and otherwise visit Boulder thank you so much for your support and I know you will work with us in collaborative fashion to make Boulder a wonderful place for all people to [Applause] be my cane represents power represents confidence it represents freedom and I

[16:03] am I'm so proud to be a blind person and um proud to live in Boulder and I'm looking forward to working with you all to help make Boulder more inclusive and accessible place thank you so much this is really [Applause] exciting is a great opportunity and as a great privilege to be here in front of you us three and plus a few others have done a lot of work to identify areas that are unsafe need Improvement and with your help and we'll give you the help too we work together as a team to make this thing happen because we want to live here I was born here so I know I've been around a little bit about Boulder but

[17:00] it's takes everybody with a with uh a conscious courtesy to do everything together and I thank you thank you thank you so much you app it good well maryan Jordan and Jim thanks so much for being with us tonight and for those powerful words and for all of your work to make the city of Boulder accessible to Blind folks and to everyone and we are greatly appreciative for that list of intersections we will take a very close look at that make sure our transportation department gets them and see um how we can improve those ASAP thanks again all right um we are now going to go to open comment and so Elicia if you could share out the public participation guidelines please all right thank you

[18:04] sir thank you again mayor bronet and good evening everyone and thank you for joining us I will now review with you the public participation at city council meeting guidelines the city has engaged with community members to co-create a vision for productive meaningful and inclusive Civic conversations this Vision supports physical and emotional safety for community community members staff and Council as well as democracy for people of all ages identities lived experiences and political perspectives for more information about this vision and the community engagement processes we ask that you please visit our website at bouldercolorado.gov servicesproducts [Music] that support this Vision these will be

[19:01] upheld during the meeting 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 testimony is permitted online only one person at a time at the podium unless an accommodation like an interpreter is required all remarks and testimonies shall be limited to to matters related to City business no standing in or otherwise blocking the aisles no participant shall stand or hold items such as signs or Flags in a manner that would block the view of another person no participant shall make threats or use other forms of intimidation against any person we ask that you not affix items to the podium or deis or walls or other surfaces of the

[20:00] chambers signs Flags or other items used to communicate must be held by one person when displayed obscenity other epithets based on race gender or religion and other speech and behavior that disrupts or otherwise impedes the meeting will not be tolerated and lastly inperson participants are asked to refrain from expressing support or disagreement verbally or would sounds such as Applause or snapping with the exception of declarations and thank you for joining us and thank you for listening thanks so much for that Elicia all right everyone will have two minutes to speak I'll call three names at a time if you can come on down to the front after your name is called to get ready that would be greatly appreciated and I am going to uh in enforce that two-minute time frame for all equally uh so our first three speakers speakers are Davis Martis Patrick oror

[21:01] and Martha mcferson can you turn on the microphone there please there we go council members thank you for your service I like to offer perspective and ideas for engagement around the topic of vibrant neighborhoods though I wish the title did not imply that existing neighborhoods were not vibrant or familyfriendly my neighborhood I believe is both collectively the community survey delivered a statistically significant against the proposed changes with some questions two to one not in favor for instance in regard to rl1 changes many concerns were cited in comments and generally align with quality of life issues of the impacts on existing infrastructure for instance post the 2013 flood I recall how important it is to have permal soil to absorb rainfall the proposed changes would reduce the amount of perum land potentially leading to greater risk of flooding on the water supply side the city has published search citing concerns around future

[22:00] Supply due to climate change we get onethird of our water supply from Windy Gap project and only hold Junior rights increased density and expected climate change could exacerbate a shortage one area that wasn't mentioned is our awesome hospital I spoke to a senior member of bch management learned that our Hospital operates in the high 80s in terms of percentage capacity when that number gets to the low to mid 90s sand is thrown into the proverbial gears and quality of service serving patients can dramatically decrease the three cities in the US with the highest density New York San Francisco and Boston are also the top three for highest average rents so clearly density is not a great path to affordability if we ask the community question are you in favor of providing an increased level of affordability without dentifying the city I think the results would flip from two to one against to three or four to one in favor as one of the most educated communities in the nation we can collaborate and solve for this without significant and detrimental first and second order impacts that come from higher density in conclusion let's pause

[23:02] any significant changes and have a city-wide conversation on where we want to go and how we want to get there thank you I seed my nine seconds to whoever would like it thank you now we have Patrick oror Martha mcferson and Trish Emer thank you am I on thank you thank you um look before you you'll see a um a notice I sent to the city council last week and thank you mayor Brockett for responding to it uh I just wanted to make the community aware that the National Park Service Advisory Board is going to be reviewing And discussing the possibility of having the Boulder County Courthouse nominated for a National Historic Landmark which is its highest level of notification so so uh it has to do and

[24:00] I'm going to try to read it from here the the Boulder County Courthouse is the listed in the National register of historic places as part of the downtown Boulder historic district and in recognition of its role the Civil Rights struggle of the lesbi and gay bisexual transg gender and queer lgbtq people here in 1975 Boulder Court County Clerk CA Rox issued the first the first same sex marriage licenses in the country though roex was directed to stop by County Attorney General the six licenses she issued were never invalidated foreshadowing the eventual legalization of same-sex marriage by the US Supreme Court so um thank you mayor if you'll have that letter or add it to the council uh I'm a member of historic Boulder and I wanted to bring up two more things in my 32 seconds hastak Mountain was just sold um Boulder County

[25:01] um Open Space Mountain Parks bought it I think it's a fabulous opportunity to work with them when you're dealing with what's going on with the PO Farm in the chambers area and I'd like to revisit that and somehow tie it in uh thank you for trying to get to meet the spirits this year we had 950 people join us and so that was in collaboration with the open uh with the Parks and Recreation and then I'll save the rest for another time thank you thank you now we have Martha mcferson Trish Emer and Kristen Marshall if you can turn on the microphone there please there's a button thank you yes um hi I'm Martha mcferson I I appreciate this brief moment to voice my outrage at the Casual response of the city council has to the genocide of an entire people even infants and

[26:02] children the destruction this country is facilitating with its dystopian love affair with Israel is one of the most inhumane events in human history and how has the city council responded with indifference and even hostilities to calls for a ceasefire from citizens who believe in peace for all people not some people how is it that we can send over 17 billion doar to Israel and then feel uneasy at the atrocities it commits every day we feed Israel's demons and profit from their Madness at least those in the war making business the rest of us feel our social pillars crumbling through lack of support a common response from the city council is that its concerns extends to local matter matters only the obvious reality is that the

[27:01] local and the universal are connected your indifference allows Israel to get away with genocide our local coffers are constantly drained by the military boondoggle the refrain that Israel has a right to defend itself has been exposed for its inhumanity and cruelty by senseless killing of thousands Israel is a rogue monster state posturing as a victim of Arab aggression ever contemptuous of international law and failing in its surreal and untenable cries of victimhood we have become a nation of easily manipulated Minds 30 million Christian zionists welcome to your time is up but thank you for your testimony now we have Trish Emer Christen Marshall and Leslie glustrom

[28:00] it was already onone there you go oh no try again there we go there thank you Trish m are here thank you for the time tonight I trust you all received an email from me earlier today which included statistics on bike theft in Boulder I'm here tonight on behalf of a Grassroots advocacy group named bik bike Boulder but drop the U Don't Spell it that way it's biking with more confidence which is a term actually inspired by Ryan thank you our team's mission is to empower our community through more Equitable bike safety security and Recovery while promoting environmentally friendly transportation we B began about a year ago to reduce bike theft our mission was sparked by a few citizens who engaged with Community Cycles full cycle plus the Boulder and CU police departments we got together and said what can we do people are

[29:01] apathetic and I want you all to know that we very much appreciated the fact that you Mr Mayor as well as several other city council members have attended our bike theft awareness Expo we've had two of them this year one of them was at full cycle one at Community cycles and several of you even attended our booth and bike valet that we held at whats up Boulder in September we're most excited about the fact that the community is starting to really lean in and get interested on how to secure their bikes better and ebikes while enjoying the Fantastic paths that Boulder is famous for so I do have a prop here it's a light lock X1 $180 and during the demo that Dax tried to cut through it this was the only lock that couldn't be defeated because it's a very high composition uck so so thieves are much better than they used to be and

[30:02] will continue to educate and so my question tonight is will you please engage with us in an ongoing conversation so we can advate your is up and thank you very much for your testimony okay now we have Kristen Marshall Leslie glustrom and Aaron Brooks thank you thank you for your time and I was also h Ed and humbled by the first people this who showed this evening my advisor in grad school was blind and was a lot smarter than I was but in any case um two weeks ago a woman stood here and expressed her concern about walking alone and Boulder after dark I understand I have worn out the SES of my shoes on our dark streets I am all also concerned that more lighting

[31:00] will mean more light pollution light pollution is a significant and growing threat to Wildlife including migratory Birds but there might be some good news according to an October 9th article in the Camera Boulder City has taken over thousands of street lights from Excel to switch over to LEDs this article implied that Boulder will be able to increase the reliable of lighting along pedestrian Pathways while decreasing light pollution is this a tall order just look higher look at the birds flying over our heads birds don't wear shoes but they got so I now yield the rest the remainder of my time to

[32:01] silence silence for the children who die in war those without a a voice tell us the story thank you thank you thank you now we have Leslie glustrom Aaron Brooks and Alan Henry good evening Council uh my name is lese glustrom I live in Boulder many of you know I've spent a long time working at the Public Utilities Commission as a citizen Advocate and so here you are with the famous graph blue line is Excel sales last 20 years basically flat Red Line are their profits Gray Line is what would have happened with their their profits if they gone up at the rate of inflation um with 20 years of experience

[33:02] I have a lot to say and I'm working on a pu filing right now where excel's trying to gain the system again I've just spent 18 months and we finally got them on the the performance incentive mechanism waiting for the Pu decision now they're violating the law that Senator fenberg helped pass on discount rate discount rate's really important because if you discount future fuel costs you make them look really small and if you're deciding whether you're going to do fuel-free resources or fossil fuel resources if you discount them heavily you make those fossil fuel costs look really small we pay this much they model this much we've been working on this since 2008 and I'm just trying to give you some sense of what it's like to be down there and obviously price is important from an equity and an affordability point of view and it's also really important from an emissions point of view we can't expect people to Electrify if xl's going to buy WI solar in storage for under 4 cents a kilowatt

[34:00] hour and sell it to us for well above 13 cents a kilowatt hour that's why that red line keeps going up you give me 20 years I'll repeat all the 20 years I've experience I have but in two minutes I'm just trying to give you a sense of why we have to take a very hard look at this Monopoly just like we are looking at the Kroger and and um Safeway potential merger that's I get it we shouldn't probably allow that but it's actually nowhere near the Monopoly that XL has so the question becomes can a better deal be gotten and the answer is absolutely unless you're a community like Boulder that's served by Excel or the communities that are served by Black Hills those communities all over Colorado of much better deals thank you thank you now we have Aaron Brooks alen Henry and David enin first of all before I start I just want to say also I'm so proud to live in Boulder this was amazing today so thank you so much for doing means so much um

[35:01] good evening this evening I would like to respectfully address council member Adams the council member has consistently often several times a day posted posts to her Instagram stories that are either unvetted and or harmful to some members of our community it is important to note that Instagram stories disappear after 24 hours for someone who I know cares about everyone I'm sure she would not like to hear that these posts have been harmful to anybody in our community this includes a particular post from within in our lifetime which is an anti-israel group that has been protesting all over New York City this is a group that carries Hamas and Hezbollah Flags in their protests this post called to quote unquote flood New York City for Palestine on October 7th which was the one-year anniversary of the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust something we all know about and a day where Americans were also killed and taken hostage Hamas refers to this day as the quote unquote alaxa flood which was obviously a clear reference to October 7th amongst other things they have published they have published manuals encourage encouraging

[36:00] anti-israel to quote unquote learn how to build effective par barricades and what type of expanding foam works best on the kind of door knobs present in our universities end quote I certainly don't think it is appropriate for a public official to encourage these types of actions particularly on a day like October 7th unlike some who come to speak at these meetings I will not make demands and of course I will not call you any names because that makes no sense I am respectfully asking and we are respectfully asking for these posts to stop no one is forced into a public facing role and we all respect all of the work that you all do but those who choose to serve must do so thoughtfully and with respect and consideration for the community they they serve and that means everyone in the community and not just those with whom they personally agree again please take these comments as intended and with all due respect thanks so much thank you now we have Alan Henry David enzine and Lisa Spalding is alen Henry

[37:03] here uh not seeing alen Henry so we'll go to David nin good evening City Council Members I'm David enin and I live at 4020 Evans Drive in Boulder I'm a member of better Boulder a group of diverse and energetic community members who advocate for sustainable and smart development in this beautiful city our group sent this letter to you on September 9th voicing support for the familyfriendly vibrant neighborhoods work that Carl Gyer and staff will be presenting later tonight I'm here to briefly speak about this position on behalf of better Boulder Better B members are pleased by how well the proposal land use policies align with better Boulder's mission of fostering vibrant livable sustainable and connected communities the original motivation for this effort was Zoning for affordability a goal that we think these changes will help achieve but we also see progress here in moving towards

[38:01] true 15-minute neighborhoods that offer essential services for daily living that are accessible through means other than cars the changes proposed here will be foundational for working on a robust middle- inome housing strategy Boulder's inclusion area housing program does much to create opportunities for those households who are under 60% of area median income encouraging modest housing types will help Target those important community members making up to 120% of Ami who struggle to make ends meet in our expensive city timing of this project is Good from a VB bbcp perspective because it can inform the next revision which is underway and also aligned with addressing and affordability legislation being passed at the state house as is the case with any residential zoning initiatives residents may be alarmed if they feel there could be massive and rapid changes in their neighborhoods I hope the public can understand that the expected rate of change is gradual Boulders experience with relaxing Adu restrictions for instance has led to a

[39:00] measured rate of change as numerous factors influence residents decisions to reconfigure their living spaces better bould provides more detailed comments on tonight's proposal in our letter as well as some recommendations for future efforts thank you so much for your time thank you now we have Lisa Spalding uh Angel Davis and Lyn squl Lisa Spalding speaking for plan Boulder County any Fair evaluation of familyfriendly vibrant neighborhoods must begin with a review of its goals The Proposal before you this evening increases the number and type of housing units in order to reduce housing costs however there is no proof that simply adding more housing will reduce the cost in college towns with a limitless demand for housing from both students and non-students the changes to zoning in the five categories included in the current proposal do not take into consideration the value of the land in

[40:01] each Zone the effects on individual neighborhoods within each Zone and the opposition by up to 60% of respondents to the proposed changes in Old established neighborhoods the recent approval of 45 300t units each renting for about $2,500 only proves that smaller is not cheaper and that no one will voluntarily Supply a variety of familyfriendly missing middle housing we need regulated development not a free market that continues to squeeze out families above and beyond the immediate goals of creating more diverse and affordable housing the increase in density must be sustainable how will we expand Boulder's public transportation system how will we cope with our diminishing water resources and extreme fire hazards how will we preserve our valuable open space ecosystems from recreational overuse we appreciate the huge effort staff has put

[41:00] into meeting City council's demands but do not want it wasted on ideologically driven Concepts like eliminating established neighborhoods without any guarantee of affordability before moving forward with familyfriendly vibrant neighborhoods we as a community must use the boulder Valle comprehensive Plan update to develop policies that will ensure success thank you thank you now we have Angel Davis and then Lind seag will be testifying virtually and then Michelle Rodriguez will be our next in-person testifier good evening City Council Members my name is Angel Davis and I'm a graduate student in the Masters of the environment program at CU Boulder after graduation I plan to pursue a career in urban um planning law to advocate for and create sustainable permanent Supportive Housing for the unhoused I know that the city recently opened blue bird Apartments so I commend you for proposing the other affordable

[42:00] housing developments on the agenda tonight because Boulder is in dire need of housing as someone who volunteers with my church Second Baptist Church on Tuesdays in Boulder Creek Park I know there is a large unhoused population and many of them are dire many of them desire housing I know that there are nimes who don't want the UN House near them even in permanent Supportive Housing however we are all one decision or life circumstance from being unhoused therefore I would like to know that in addition to the development income housing like the diagonal Plaza and the Aline Boston redevelopments and the rally flat low income housing um does the city plan to incorporate more permanent Supportive Housing into future mixed income developments and construct more permanent Supportive Housing with wraparound services for the inous thank you for your time thank you now we have Michelle Rodriguez and then Rob smoke and then we'll go to our virtual

[43:09] speakers hi guys um you all know who I am anyway I wanted to speak on something I just realized was going on and this is something that was posted on the dailym m.com this was in regards to Darren oconor releasing parts of the recording that he so unlawfully recorded I guess to try and prove that he was being integral but it goes um from Cowboy buff to Darren oconor lawyer knowingly records meeting he signed NDA for Daren o Conor says nice try but I didn't even know the meeting was recorded keep assuming smarty pants Michael Bert says you're going to destroy Boer NAACP just like you destroyed feet forward you are corros and negative force and Boulder especially for the people you claim to

[44:00] advocate for I can't express this enough in that several times even though I relate as a person of color whatever color that be Peach purple um but um that I felt um violated and like I was I was being um racially discriminated against from NAACP and it was under the GU of Darren o Conor there were several times I tried to post on there regarding my issue with my lawsuit and things he claimed his success in winning that lawsuit for Samy Lawrence and they even had their little documentary on the anniversary of my incident they removed my picture of me standing next to Samy Lawrence from NAACP they took my badges away because um what my statement didn't lift people of color um same thing and I kind of felt and I I

[45:01] do appreciate your explanation as to what um the community coordinator said the other day when I tried to Define what I thought people of color was and that I felt like it was kind of oppressive his statement thank you all right last inperson speaker is Rob smoke good evening my name is Rob smoke um I've lived in Boulder more or less since uh since 1986 um sometimes it feels like I still just got here um the issues happening with Gaza right now um are just really unspeakable based on all the authenticated news that's available I mean it's clear to the humanitarian and human rights

[46:00] organizations of the world that genocide is occurring that people are being slaughtered that mass murder is simply the norm and for people not to speak out about it here when you know our weapons are being used you know and our tax money is going to this it's just well it it just causes a kind of moral injur injury and uh collectively when we read about uh some you know some college students there's just a story about CU and Propel protesters at CU being sanctioned and uh the problem is that you know that moral injury it really is a significant you know it it signifies a kind of a violation of the basic core values people have as humans against things like uh mass murder or murder of

[47:02] any kind and um you know I just have to say that I still think it's unacceptable this Council constantly issues uh declarations and support of things like indigenous people's day Etc but this is the reality of what's happening right now and in all those cases the people behind them uh behind that would want support for measures in support of Palestine thank you all right our first three online speakers are arum Bingham adelene Marquez and James Evans hello we can hear you okay thank you uh so I am back again today with a very simple request which is mainly that

[48:01] those of you that have not responded yet to my appr respond to my emails um that is at least seven of the city council and guess I haven't yet emailed the city manager but I would also like response from the city manager on this issue because her name is on the report that I have been waving in your faces where in the states the city's socially responsible investing policy says that the city does not invest in companies that produce weapons not used in National Defense and yet the last uh most current information that is available from Flor 2 shows that the city still holds $5.5 million in corporate bonds from Caterpillar Incorporated I sent uh all of the council numerous links showing the ways in which the armored bulldozers complete machine gun turrets and other weaponized improvements are being used um in

[49:02] illegal military occupation and invasion in West Bank in Gaza and most recently today there was an incident where bulldozzer was used to uh destroy a wall defending that was part of the bunker or defenses of the UN peacekeeping forces in southern Lebanon it's unifil so so I think it's all become clear over the past year how just Israel is using all of the weapons at its disposal to commit War Crime After War crime and direct flagrancy and violation of all International norms and human rights and it's clear that that it doesn't matter as long as the US is supporting them so the city needs to do the minimum the very least possible thing they could do to at least not have the city be profiting from these weapons of war and I would like your thoughts on this matter I haven't heard from thank you now we have adelene

[50:01] Marquez James Evans and Daniel Howard I do not see adelene online but I do have some other names adelene if you're here please let me know by using the raiseed hand function or reaching out in the Q&A box thanks in the meantime we'll move to James S hello can you hear me yes awesome okay um good evening members of the b b Boulder City Council my name is James Evans or as I'm commonly referred to in the community ragas the black and I have been a permanent resident of Boulder for two years though I've spent many Summers here before that I'm here to address the crucial issue of homelessness something I live with firsthand the boulder shelter for the homeless does not have enough beds to meet the needs of many individuals seeking Refuge as someone with limited mobility and disability I'm expected to pack up my belongings regularly which is which is simply not

[51:01] feasible I'm facing double hip replacement surgery and the physical strain of breaking down my Camp takes takes a heavy toll um the policies currently in place do not just affect me they criminalized homelessness across our community I've witnessed how these laws along with the lack of adequate services are deteriorating the mental and physical health of many of my fellow homeless individuals um in in in addition um Miss Zariah that was brutally murdered um she was homeless and there was just not enough services for her uh despite only being a permanent resident for two years I've seen how the well-being of of of some some of the long-term homeless has spiraled down for a city that Prides itself on compassion and Community it's devastating to see how little value is placed on our most vulnerable we need immediate actions but real solutions like sanction camping and improvements to the shelter system my group and I are more than willing to collaborate with you we have years of lived experience both here and other places navigating

[52:00] homelessness our insights can help can help make a sanctioned camping area or tiny home Community work and we want to work with you to find Humane Solutions criminalizing homelessness is not the answer providing support and tangible resources is Boulder can do better thank you now we have Daniel Howard laa Gonzalez and then puster Aguilera hi this is uh Daniel Howard um I'm calling in to speak about the uh family neighborhood initiative to we speak on later I'm generally supportive of these initiatives uh at least in terms of uh providing more housing options to our community by increasing um your ability for homeowners and uh developers to uh increase housing options and build new types of dwelling units in different parts of our town however uh I have one main issue with item number four within that list in terms of owner occupancy requirements that ask to enact an

[53:01] ordinance towards requiring owner occupancy requirements for additional units in the rr12 and rr1 Zoning districts uh I do not believe that is a Equitable and fair solution towards uh addressing uh FAL housing holistically towards all as uh people in our community as a renter and Boulder um I this this type of initiative to only allow owner occupancy does not serve our interest if the intention instead is a police owner owner occupancy so to speak in order to address uh sustainability and neighborhood character or other sort of uh issues in regards to why that uh provision might be enacted I believe there are alternatives in place to uh achieve that same goal there's a pretty uh uh relatively extensive report already done by bookings Institute about uh impacts of owner occupancy requirements on housing equ access equity and housing affordability and I encourage you to seek that out if you're interested uh some Main points to take away from that particular document just include the U how these efforts you know

[54:02] have several NE negative impacts on Equity efforts to build mul family out housing as well as negative externalities on overall housing Supply typically renters have lower income than than ownown homeowners and are racially more diverse and have owner owner owner occupancy requirements affect the economic and de demographic makeup of neighborhoods if by enforcing those owner occupy requirements you're basically limiting mentors such as myself and my uh peers to be able to uh enter into the neighborhoods of cross Boulder um there are additional Solutions in that space other cities have enacted that might terms your time is up but thank you for your testimony and our final three speakers are laa Gonzalez B Fuster Aguilera and Lyn seikel can you hear me yes okay so I am here ATM over week not to try to even convince you anym to cast ass this resolution which is long overdue and also turn the occupation of

[55:02] Israel but just honestly to put it on the record so your children and grandchildren are able to see these videos and know where you stood in the current Holocaust that the state of Israel is doing with the tax dollars of first city 1.6 million tax dollars last weekend Shaban alalo a 19 year old engineering student murder still connected to his IV he was burned and Li and she was burned alive with the bombs of the United States and with the $1.6 million that you guys need I'm also very upset to hear that you guys are investing in caterpillar caterpillar I have you ever been to the West Bank if you have never been to the West Bank you should go and you should learn and you should witness what occupation is I have been to the Westbank I have witnessed the demolition of H to the caterpillar golders shame on every single one of you except Taisha other than that shame every single one of you also I am S I am

[56:00] actually not just suggesting I am demanding that you stop investing or tax dollars city and county dollars that you guys invest in the Jewish Community Center the Jewish Community Center is a sist institution they pass donations they they they have a nonprofit status which you should remove because they send donations to the Friends of the I they send donations to an occupying force that is illegal the West Bel so you need to stop using with tax dollars to rent space there because I know you spent at least $4,000 for eight hours and also you need to tell Public Health to stop censoring their employees when wearing Tas and having watermelon slippers I don't know if you knew that but fer County Public Health the one institution that should be demanding that there is a poly epidemic that occupation it's it's illegal your time is up but thank you for your testimony morning and now we have P fer Aguilera and Lin

[57:02] SEO hi can you hear me yes okay my name is Dr P fer agilera I live and work in Boulder you keep saying that asking for a CE fire is not a local issue but you know very well that this is not true we have been giving you many reasons on why this is indeed a local issue and I cannot comprehend how you can go ahead with your life with the atrocious genocide that is being broadcasted and we can see every day how the lives of the indigenous peoples of Palestine and into and are dismissed every single day I work at the University of Colorado last semester Linda sharur a palestinian-american activist came to give a very inspirational speech at cuu Boulder a small group of Zionist students tried to stop her from coming to speak because they did not feel safe with her being on campus we are at the point that Palestinian voices are threatening this should sound familiar to you on how like black and brown

[58:01] voices are labeled as such the board of region at of the University of Colorado just recently condemned the word intifa which literally means Shake It Off in Arabic and it refers to the uising of the oppressed people I keep educating myself I keep reading but the world seems to not want to do that you all seem not to want to do that because of your silence two students on October 3D at from cuu Boulder were that were righteously using their First Amendment right protesting outside of the Locking Martin career fair at CU have been banned from the University yes our University invest in weapons that are used to do an ethnic cleansing of Palestinian people and the city so too please address the caterpillar issue that many people are open open comment are bringing up these students were banned because the attendees at this Fair claimed that they did not feel safe by their presence when know this argument like please do something this is only going to get worse free Palestine and

[59:02] from The River To The Sea Palestine will be free free Palestine thank you our final speaker is Lynn seagull fre Palestine um you know what Netanyahu said this week uh because he was being accused of attacking the UN in unifil in Le he said it's exactly the opposite I'm saving them from Harm's Way yet of course he's the one who's producing the harm can you believe the logic of this person seriously um we need to we own the airport but how do we own the airport I've St talked to you in many

[60:00] emails I have never gotten an answer do we have you know our investment now we're spending a pile of cash on on a an FAA lawsuit about what the word perpetuity means um they have these rights and we're spending my tax dollar this way and we actually own the airport I mean we and we're not getting the grants now so that we can kind of Unown it what the heck how does this work I want to understand it I really do and I've asked you and you don't say um let's see red fern this I don't feel safe in Boulder um he changed the dispatch code he told me that was the only way that he could get evidence you know what happened Phil Weiser didn't want another George Floyd

[61:01] so he got Redfern the job in Boulder in exchange for testifying don't do that to me Mark for testifying against his fellow workers this is unacceptable I don't feel safe in Boulder done thank you all right that brings open comment to a close I want to thank everybody for coming out and speaking to us tonight and sharing your thoughts I'll turn to City staff to see if there are any responses thank you so much mayor just a few things and as always thank you everyone for coming out and sharing their thoughts uh I wanted to share that there is Staff currently working on a support letter for the national landmark of the um courthouse so know that that is happening uh I did want to say to um Trish let me make sure I have the name right um from bike Boulder uh that are I shared your letter with our interim director transportation and mobility and she would be very much happy to meet with you um I know that you've been

[62:01] meeting with our uh police department but um our transportation Mobility staff would be very much interested in that continued partnership uh and uh angel I don't know if you have an interest but I know that we are uh continuing to build more permanent Supportive Housing in the city and if you have that interest I'd be very happy to connect you with our um housing and human services staff they do such amazing work in that area and if you're interested to learn more I can reach out to you and get that connection that is all mayor thanks Teresa nothing from me mayor thank you great I'll check to see if any council members have anything actually should I was going to ask something but n you covered both of the things I was going to ask about so thanks for that anybody Lauren um I guess I just wanted to add to the perative support of housing conversation that not only are we working to continue to support that in our community but also through our regional homeless through the County's Regional homelessness group we're also

[63:02] working to advocate for that um Beyond City boundaries as well very good anybody else yep and then Ryan you as well okay so after ta awesome thank you um I have three items the first is um somebody made reference to the community survey um and I just wanted to again lift up the limits to that survey and my initial concern around referencing that survey because of um some of the inequitable um I don't know just lack of reliability and and validity as it relates to um racially and ethnically diverse people who are are chronically underrepresented in that survey um as well as you know I think there were opportunities to increase rental responses as well so um just a general comment on it is essential that that survey is as equitably administered and

[64:00] designed as possible because people reference it for everything so just wanted to um lift that up and ask when when the next survey is going to be administered so that we can um ensure that there is sufficient representation and that it is not um European American homeowners over here and racially and ethically diverse people over there with the community connectors which is currently how I've been told remember in our conversation before that oh no no don't worry Community connectors have been talking with racially NE diverse community members and they have a report over there so I just want to lift that up as something I'm hopeful that we can revisit um on another issue I wanted to lift up um the hospital piece and not So Much from the concern uh around our topic today um but more so just um I noticed as a stakeholder group that's not necessarily one that we have engaged with as um as a council and when I busted my face a couple of months ago um

[65:02] they had indicated that they had seen an uptick in bike ebike and Scoot e scooter injuries um and so I was just curious if there were opportunities for or uh for our Council um to connect or um meet with some of the hospital leadership um again just to determine if there's any Trends or anything that would impact the work that we're doing here in our community just a general question um and then lastly um thank you for um again those who are coming to speak um on the request for a ceasefire um and Council movement on that I continue to be to advocate for that and want to clarify that any of the messages and I I post almost every single day uh about this issue um and again just wanted to reiterate that please don't let anything distract from the next things I'm getting ready to say say which are uh I'm seeking a immediate ceasefire self-determination for all and the end

[66:01] of any kind of aparti policies and in arms embargo until us laws are properly um followed just like we have policing and rules here um those should be applied everywhere I also believe uh we just went through the E we're in the budgeting process and it's Crystal Clear that um the drying up of the arpa funds when they say arpa funds PS that's federal funds uh and those are drying up and you see that in the reduction of the County's um efforts uh around Health and Human Services and um the work that we are trying to do here in our city so it is disingenuous to say that there is no connection between Federal and local um so I will continue to use my personal platforms to lift that up and call for those things and hopeful uh that the majority of our Council um has a willingness to to act collectively um and also want to urge us all um to contact our Colorado Senators who have

[67:02] the votes to be able to block an arms embargo um I also invite anyone who's interested to join us at the boulder nobla sister city project uh where we have direct relationships with Palestinian people who are trying to preserve land language uh their past their present and their future you're welcome to email me at Adam bouldercolorado.gov for more information on ways that you could participate um and then lastly as a member of the NAACP of Boulder County I was very excited about the mediation that was to take place it has been disappointing to see the breach in confidentiality and yet I am hopeful for a future where um our staff and Leadership and um council at the city um have meaningful uh relationships and in a collaborative Spirit uh with the NAACP of polar County with grounded in mutual respect and understanding thank you thanks TAA

[68:01] Ryan thank you uh two things first I would like to acknowledge uh Aram Bingham um Aram you requested that we pursue divestment and caterpillar because of its role with the violence in and around Gaza U forgive me if I'm if that's paraphrase um but in any case um I just want to give you my position I'm I'm not in favor of council taking action on this for similar reasons that I'm not in favor of taking action um with other elements of the crisis uh in short um given where the community is I'm just not convinced that we have the resources uh both the expertise and the bandwidth to do this well uh and in a way that doesn't lead to new problems and in the context that we are having to make serious trade-offs today tonight next week um with respect to having the resources to resolve uh immediate local direct problems including sufficient and available housing uh and afford that's

[69:00] affordable homelessness and um a lot of other issues um I'm sorry not to give you a more affirmative answer but I do think it's um a fair question and I wanted to acknowledge it and thank you for um um keeping us apprised um second item I wanted to acknowledge both Tri excuse me Trish Emer and lesie glustrom both for coming and talking both about um the critical issue of bike parking which um I think is a lot more important than people might intuitively think it is um for a lot of reasons regarding uh our actual Mobility options our climate action um accessibility and a number of other things and I look forward to um there's a number of proceedings we have coming up including uh thinking about our excuse me developing our next demand management um set of policies and our climate update and I think you um both of those perspectives have an important role to play and I look forward to picking up with you all there thanks thanks that's s right I think that's it I didn't see Nei Nia in regards to uh what you wanted

[70:00] to say to Trish Emer she wasn't in the room at the time so right Trish you still here right so if you could maybe write to her or tell me and I'll tell her or something like that I'd be happy to thank you okay great um and with that we can now move to our consent agenda please Elicia yes yes sir thank you our consent agenda is item number three on okay quiet quiet in the room please quiet in the room please okay quiet quiet in the room please right Elicia our consent agenda is item number three on tonight's agenda and it consists of items 3 a through 3 J anybody have any questions or comments on the consent

[71:03] agenda or a motion quiet tonight I will move to approve the consent agenda second we've got a motion in a second can we do a roll call please Elicia yes sir thank you we'll start to roll call for the consent agenda items 3A which through 3j with council member marus yes shuart yes mayor protim spear yes council member wallik yes Wier yes Adams yes mayor bronet yes and council member vuler yes the consent agenda items 3A through 3 J are hereby approved unanimously thanks so much if you can

[72:00] take us to our first callup check-in please yes sir thank you our call of check-ins are item number four on tonight's agenda 4 a is the call of consideration for the following items related to the proposed Alpine Balsam Redevelopment project at 1100 Balsam Avenue and 1155 Alpine Avenue first item to be considered is the form-based code review view for site and infrastructure improvements for the Pham Bas for based code area generally located at 1100 Balsam Avenue and Redevelopment of the site with 217 new housing units split between seven buildings with a total of 157 permanently affordable units and 60 market rate units as well as 2100 square feet of new commercial space this is reviewed under case numbers l 2023-24 L 2023

[73:01] o42 and LU 2024 0017 these applications include a request for an amendment to the Alpine bosam area plan connections plan to relocate a Mobility hub from the west side of the 9th Alpine connector Street on the Southwest corner of site to the east side of the street and to allow for 11th Street to be a private Drive instead of a public Street the second item to be reviewed under this call up is the site review and use review application to amend Boulder Community Hospital PUD that's referenced L 202315546 55 Broadway to allow for for renovations and a fourth story addition to the existing Pavilion building and renovation of the city parking garage

[74:02] including a request for height modification to allow for building Heights of 55 ft this application also seeks to extend the Pud to include the properties located at 1125 and 1136 North Street and 1136 Alpine Avenue the use review is to allow a principal parking facility use at 2650 5 Broadway as proposed on the ground floor in the bc-2 zoning District along the parking structures Broadway Frontage proposed to replace existing commercial space and again it is referenced under lur 20235 3 thanks for getting all the way through that Elisha and if anyone in the audience thought that was long you should look at the packet for this item um any questions or comments or desire to to call this item up let check on Mark here all right I

[75:02] don't see anybody's hand raised um so I'll just uh call on myself I I don't have a desire to see this called up but I would like to call out this Milestone um this project has been underway since 2015 um and it's really exciting to see us get to this point where we have an actual site plan and form based code um for so much affordable housing uh as well as some much needed market rate housing as well and a new home for city offices also so huge thanks to the I think it's dozens of Staff members who've been working on this for as much as a decade um and really exciting to see us hit this major Milestone and looking forward to the work to come and with that if we could go to our other call up item please yes sir and this one's not as long so thank you for listening everyone item four on tonight's agenda is the callup consideration of the following items the first item is the site review approval

[76:01] for the Redevelopment of a 2.33 Acre Site including the properties generally known as 2504 2506 2536 and 2546 Spruce Street 2055 26 Street and 2537 Pearl Street with 52 residential units and 10 new four-story buildings up to 49 feet 7 Ines in height the project provides 97 parking spaces where 129 spaces are required this is a 25% parking reduction it is reviewed under case number l224 D2 the second item to be considered is an amendment to the Boulder Valley Regional Center Transportation connections plan to remove of the East West secondary Street connection and the northsite multi-use path connection through the properties generally known as 2504

[77:01] 2506 2536 2546 Spruce Street 2055 26 Street and 2537 Pearl Street thank you any questions or comments or desire to call this one up Tina yeah I just uh wanted to appreciate the thought that was put into this project by um the person who designed it and also the comments from planning board um the only comment I would say which would not change my opinion would just to be to look at the connectivity of the development with the park that's across uh fulam um that can be a great amenity for families so just looking at how those can be um just a logical place for people to spend time as we continue to hope to attract people with children there are a lot of three and four bedroom units I think it's exclusively those and it will be um exciting to see see if it does bring some families into that Central Area anybody

[78:00] else um I will just uh speak out again here and also do not have a desire to call this one up but um this project has taken a number of twists and turns it's been a very complicated Road um I think it's ended up in a good place I appreciate the on-site affordable units and congratulations to the the designers on this um and the site review approval and moving it forward looking forward to seeing some more housing in town in a great spot for it all right and with that we can go to our public hearing yes sir our public hearings are item number five on tonight's agenda 5A is the consideration of the following items relating to the 2025 budget we have first second reading and consideration of a motion to adopt ordinance 8660 which is adopting a budget for the city of Boulder for the fiscal year commencing on the first day of January 2025 the next item to be considered is the second reading and consideration of a motion to adopt ordinance

[79:02] 8661 which is establishing the 2024 city of Boulder property Mill levies which are to be collected by the county of Boulder the third item is the second reading and consideration of a motion to adopt ordinance 8662 which is appropriating money to defay expenses and liabilities of the city of boder and the last item is item number four which is the second reading and consideration of a motion to adopt ordinance 8656 which is amending the sections listed which is changing certain fees and taxes thank you Alicia and what I believe may be the shortest presentation staff has ever made to council uh we W go to um the uh a quick uh a quick slide or two I think it's just one on the um budget but before I uh send it over to Charlotte I just once again want to um thank Council for their

[80:00] thoughtfulness this whole budget uh season you have um challenged us with good questions you have been thoughtful um about your inquiries and your um you have been so present in wanting to dive into the D budget process um and challenge us with what is we know a constrained budget I hope at some point I will retire that phrase um as we move forward and see better times but have really been thoughtful about um how we go about thinking about our priorities so just want to again thank you with that Charlotte send it to you thanks naria good evening Council uh good to be here this evening Charlotte husky budget officer for the city we will I will be doing a very brief presentation as naria mentioned so just one slide to cover the overview of the 2025 recommended budget for second hearing this evening so our 2025 budget is naria mentioned was one that was developed in a constrained environment we shared earlier on in our uh Financial forecast

[81:02] that this represents one year that uh We've identified flattening of our and uncertainty of our Citywide major Revenue sources including sales and use tax and property tax so our budget direction for this year really focused on uh realignments toward prioritize program outcomes utilizing our third year of budgeting for resilience and equity with this we were able to perform realignments of existing dollars towards prioritized program Services we utilized one-time funding that we found available to support one-time strategic Investments and Community priorities city-wide goals and much needed uh un underfunded City uh facility maintenance we were able to identify and support key areas of the city-wide strategic plan such as supporting livability and safety efforts through investments in affordable housing Human Services and rental assistance funding

[82:02] as well as the urban Rangers uh program we were also available a able to advance and uplift city council priorities such as the Boulder Valley comprehensive plan and the economic Vitality strategies as we look ahead we recognize that we have significant unfunded and underfunded needs um we have shared earlier in uh our forecast in our financial forecast earlier this year that um we have limited ongoing funding availability and limited ongoing revenues and so what this means is really pointing and looking to a longterm Financial strategy and we look forward to bringing this forward to city council uh in 2025 and engaging the community uh and providing Council updates in 2025 as well so with that I'll turn it over for

[83:00] Council questions okay thanks so much Charlotte I think you did just set a record for the most concise and shortest presentation so congratulations appreciate that um and reasonable given the depth into which we've already gone into this at a study session in a previous public hearing so thanks for being responsive to that uh any questions for city stff um I actually have one which is uh we got an email from our transportation Advisory Board as well as from Community Cycles asking about the reduction in um transportation Improvement program uh Dr Cog Grant matching funds and uh Charlotte you wrote us an excellent email today uh kind of talking about why that's happening I just wonder if we could highlight that on the Das here and at the meeting as well for the Public's benefit sure thank you for the uh thank you for the question mayor uh mayor Brockett so we received a our council members received a letter from the Transportation Advisory Board we shared a note to uh City Council Members

[84:02] earlier this morning addressing the line item funding levels for the transportation Improvement program or tip funding levels and uh help to clarify the reallocation uh of those dollars towards supporting Transportation projects uh really that line item uh is intended to support uh local match for Grants and so what we see in the 2025 budget is largely the majority of that funding is a reallocation of dollars towards supporting uh local match for Safe Streets for all for example um one of the other items that we pointed to in the uh Council uh response this morning was that we are looking forward to incorporating uh this in our unfunded and underfunded uh needs and identifying uh uh uh funding levels and Transportation maintenances Incorporated into uh that as well for the long-term

[85:00] Financial strategy efforts that were uh moving forward with in 2025 thanks so much for that Charlotte so so to paraphrase the in the 2020 by budget we actually still still are allocating a similar amount of money towards matching funds for grants for uh our vision zero and can program is just being matched against other grants the Federal grant rather than the tip grants that's correct great thanks so much any other questions seeing none to check on Mark again uh no Mark Mark doesn't have any here hi Mark um seeing no other questions I'll go ahead and open the public hearing we have one speaker um so Lynn seagull you have three minutes to speak I'm not speaking but thank you okay um thanks for that I will close the public hearing and bring it back to city council for discussion or perhaps and I can't say a motion because if

[86:00] you'll remember I think we need four motions to get this done right I'm looking over it elu always keeps us honest yeah Ryan just just a short comment um I uh also want to acknowledge that um what we heard from Transportation Advisory Board I agree with staff's perspective now and I also just want to um underline that I that I hear that one reason transp funding can be so important is that we get match funding for it sometimes 5x I think maybe even more um so it's incredibly high value investment that's one reason why um and tena's point about our our current constraint budget and maybe a future of a of a more liberated budget I do think transportation is a prime candidate for Innovation and the way we do Financial strategies and that is something we're um this council is addressing over the next year we beg to address and then we'll do more of so uh I look forward to discussions to come on how we can create more with less in the

[87:01] way that we um value price spend and um understand how our financial flows work in the transportation system so thanks everybody and thank you against that thanks Ryan if I could just cqu with you there on there I appreciate you bringing that that up and I just wanted to thank our transportation Advisory board for raising this issue because of course we do want to make sure that we're leveraging our grant funding as much as we can but I was glad to hear that we are in fact doing that is just going in a slightly different bucket but to similar purposes so I appreciate their advocacy and others in the community on this topic I got Mark and then Tina uh at at the um risk perhaps the certainty of being redundant um I I want to thank um the finance staff once again for their efforts in creating this budget and in a climate of great difficulty and financial constraint um and I I think they've done a fantastic job uh in making U decisions

[88:01] that would be worthy of uh Solomon um uh this was not an easy budget to u to produce uh and the choices were very very difficult and I think they did an excellent excellent job and I want to recognize them um again so thank you appreciate that Tina yeah I also just want to thank staff and also really appreciate um the focus and discipline to fund our infrastructure um when we don't fund infrastructure we get really expensive repairs really quickly and I hope that this will be a continued theme um so that we can uh enjoy things that we take for granted infrastructure doesn't necessarily land on the city council top 10 priorities very often it's not super exciting um but that's something that I think we should be particularly proud of as we take care of our city for the daily experience of the people who live here so I appreciate that thank so much

[89:02] thanks cool I was just gonna make a motion if we're ready for that Lauren did you want to throw in a comment before we get a motion in yeah I just um wanted to also appreciate staff for the difficult work that it took to get this budget to us um and I look forward to our moving forward with outcome based budgeting and your creative ideas on how we get Council involved earlier in the budgeting process next year thank you thanks Nicole go for it one at a time right okay motion to adopt ordinance 8660 adopting a budget for the city of Boulder Colorado for the fiscal year commencing on the first day of January 2025 and ending on the last day of December 2025 and setting forth related details second got a motion to second we have a roll call please yes sir we'll start that roll

[90:02] call for ordinance 866 8660 with council member shuart yes mayor Pro Tim spear yes council member wall I Winer yes Adams yes mayor bronet yes council member fols yes and maras yes ordinance 8660 is hereby adopted unanimously all right I'll keep rolling unless anybody else wants to do this motion to adopt ordinance 8661 establishing the 2024 city of Boulder property tax Mill levies which are to be collected by the county of Boulder state of Colorado within the city of Boulder in 2025 for payment of expenditures by the city of Boulder County of Boulder state of Colorado and setting forth related

[91:00] details I'll second that do you mind just phrasing at the very beginning I I move that I move that great thank you got a motion in second roll call please Elicia yes s oops the roll call for ordinance 8661 we'll start with mayor Pro Tim spear yes council member wallet yes Wier yes Adams yes mayor bronet yes council member Folts yes Marquis yes and shuart yes ordinance 8661 is hereby adopted unanimously I can do that I move to adopt ordinance 8662 appropriating money to defay expenses and liabilities of the city of Boulder Colorado for the 2025 fiscal year of the city of Boulder

[92:00] commencing on the first day of January 2025 and ending on the last day of December 2025 and setting forth related details second motion a second roll call please Elicia yes sir the roll call for 8662 or is it 8656 8662 I believe that's what I thought I had a note anyway thank you ordinance 8662 will begin with council member wallet yes Wier yes Adams yes mayor Brockett yes council member fols yes Marquis yes shoe hard yes mayor Pro Tim spear yes ordinance 8662 is hereby adopted unanimously and I move move to adopt ordinance 8656 amending section 3-83 tax imposed on non-residential and

[93:00] residential development section 3-20 D2 imposition and rate of tax and chapter 4-20 fees brc1 1981 changing certain fees and taxes and setting forth related details second got a motion in a second roll call please Alicia yes sir or this roll call for ordinance 86 656 we'll start with council member Wier yes Adams yes mayor Brockett yes council member VTS yes Marquis yes shuart yes mayor Pro Tim spear yes and council member wallik yes ordinance 86 56 is hereby adopted unanimously congratulations Team all right thanks so much to the finance

[94:00] and budgeting team really appreciate your extraordinary work on this budget and to all the city staff which is many many many of them who contributed to the effort appreciate it very very much okay uh the last item on our agenda is our medius item longest one uh it's our matter item 8A Elicia if you could read that into the record please yes sir all right next item on tonight's agenda is item number six Matters from the city manager and that 6A is the update on familyfriendly vibrant neighborhoods Council priority and just to confirm I've got it as a day but it seems like it probably is 6a you have 6A okay it's just my script okay great 6A thank you mayor and while we have had an evening of many firsts that have been short I will say I I wonder if this memo has put five questions to you as the opposite direction of uh many questions but it is a council priority that we are

[95:01] excited to come forward with uh and get your feedback on so with that I will send it over to Brad with our family friend familyfriendly vibrant neighborhood's presentation thank you Nua I'm happy to be here in a familyfriendly vibrant capacity for this evening um we are excited I'm Brad Mueller director of planning and development services and we are indeed happy to bring forward this complex set of discussion points uh I want to just preview before uh Carl does the presentation and as he gets set set up the Continuum really of uh looking at different ways we can uh fulfill some of the longer term goals that the city has had towards uh stabilizing uh Reinventing reimagining neighborhoods densifying in some cases creating activity centers uh this follows up on some of the work uh from uh the past in terms of Zoning for affordability and

[96:00] really takes a next step towards um looking at the neighborhoods even more holistically and I do want to preview that this um does provide a stepping stone to the comprehensive Plan update which I know we've talked about in the past um as uh an important opportunity in milstone for additional conversations uh and additional analysis by staff uh ation with you conversations with the community so with that Carl is almost ready he in the bullpen and ready to go thank you thank you Brad uh good evening council members I'm Carl Gyer uh planning and development services tonight we're going to talk about the familyfriendly vibrant neighborhoods project which is a 2024 city council work uh plan priority item uh this has evolved out of the prior uh Zoning for affordable housing project that was done in 2023 uh you'll recall that we discussed the scope of this project uh at an April um city council

[97:02] meeting uh where we got feedback on some of the suggestions from Council that we've been analyzing and vetting with the public over the last few months uh we've been uh doing more analysis we've been doing a number of different ways of Outreach and we also spoke to planning board on this project on September 17th uh so we're here tonight to basically give an update and get direction on this project before we move forward with an ordinance so as I note uh the purpose of tonight is to have just a discussion on this um get more specific feedback uh before we we step forward so there's a lot to cover tonight obviously so I've created this slide to kind of break down the the components of this presentation so starting off with just an introduction really about how the Boulder Valley Comfort of plan uh talks about housing and the housing needs and Boulder uh touching on also the state's involvement in housing uh in Colorado and then I'm going to move into

[98:02] background and then engagement so uh just reminding Council about the problem statement uh for the project uh talk about the project goals uh a summary of the Zoning for affordable housing project that was done last year um then the city council suggestions that have become the core of this project and and how we've analyzed those as well as in community engagement which is related to the Zoning for affordable housing project and it's kind of blended into this project on the topic uh then we'll get into the analysis of the options I know it's been some time since we discussed this in April so it's a little bit of a refresher of what the analysis has been but it has evolved um through the course of the project and then we'll get to the conclusion and next steps oh the one thing I want to mention too in the analysis section is that I'm going to stop after each topic so that there can be questions and actual feedback given on that topic so

[99:01] it'll be chopped up that way just to be a little bit more efficient so we don't have a whole bunch of stuff uh at the end so as with anything with planning uh the starting point is the Boulder Valley comprensive plan this is the guiding document for the city it sets the vision um it's at the top you have the sustainability equity and resilience framework and then you have the Boulder Valley com a plan and then uh the things related to land use um get implemented through our land use code um so what we are proposing tonight again are using the current Boulder Valley comprehensive plan as that framework as the guidance for the changes and the changes that uh we are recommending on are uh what we've found to be consistent with the current version of the bbcp so in terms of land use this is the land use map just as a reminder it's a colorful map that shows all the different uh areas and typologies in the

[100:00] city um residential commercial business all of this gets described uh pretty uh in in detail in the bbcp in terms of the characteristics of the area the vision for the area the uses that are allowed in those areas as well as the maximum density so that's a maximum dwelling units per acre that exists in in many of the the residential areas of the city so when you look at the bbcp the the update that was done in 2015 it's housing is obviously a big issue now it was also a big issue back then it's the pretty much the number one priority of the 2015 bbcp so we've been over these past few years doing a number of different projects to implement the bbcp uh even before we move into the next update so uh we're still working on those those implementation steps so you know part of that is you know the the changes that we did last year with the Zoning for affordable housing as well as

[101:00] the the changes to adus the changes to occupancy all are things related to housing so as far as State uh the state's gotten into the game as far as um uh putting out bills that relate to housing uh Statewide um so I'm just going to touch on these really briefly but just there's been a lot of bills to monitor this year um there's proposition 123 which was last year and this actually is a bill that requires expedited review of of of permanently affordable housing projects or actually is a kind of like a shot clock or a timeline that these projects have to be um reviewed and if they're not uh decided upon in a certain period of time they're deemed approved so we're looking at how how that would have to be met I I think the way the proposition is set up is it requires cities and municipalities to comply with it in um in 2027 so there's also the residential growth management Bill uh that was from

[102:01] last year so the council will recall that we brought an ordinance through in February of this year uh to remove the growth management system to uh comply with that state law uh the other state laws that we're looking at are ones related to uh prohibiting residential occupancy limits um and as well as uh accessory dwelling units um these are uh ordinance that we're drafting now and will be bringing before Council in the next couple months uh in response to those State bills um looking into the future there's the housing and Transit oriented communities bill which um talks about uh increasing density in certain areas along Transit corridors um that are that are have a certain frequency we'll get into the details of that um next year uh and then there's the sustainable affordable housing uh bill that talks about updating housing elements and determining housing need as part of compreh comprehensive plan

[103:00] updates and we're looking into that as well so moving into the background uh and engagement uh that's been done with this project I just wanted to talk about the the bridge from you know Zoning for affordable housing to the familyfriendly vibrant neighborhoods project so just a reminder the problem statement that is pretty much the same as the Zoning for affordable housing project that you know we are dealing with with housing challenges and increasing costs and trying to you know look at it from a number of different ways to um help with with those Rising costs the project goals um relate to expanding housing choice in Boulder and supporting Transit use by allowing more missing middle housing uh in the community um as we've presented in the past uh only 9% of the housing types in b are considered middle housing so again just a reminder that U Middle housing is a housing type it's not an income range or price point we're talking more about

[104:02] kind of smaller more modest sized uh units um that are not single family homes or could they could be small single family homes um but mostly duplexes triplexes fourplexes tow houses um are those types of housing types um what we see in Boulder and the United States broadly is mostly single family and mostly apartment or condo building so we're trying to fill in that Gap to try to get comparatively more affordable uh housing types within the city so just loosening up zoning to allow those types of housing types types that are currently restricted in some areas uh and looking at other areas for removing zoning barriers so just a reminder of the the feedback that we got um in our community engagement for the Zoning for affordable housing project I'm not going to read through all these because we we've gone through this before but there's obviously um mixed opinions on the topic

[105:00] and there um are housing proponents there there are folks that are concerned about uh adding intensity into their neighborhoods for like parking and traffic impacts uh we did do a a questionnaire last year again as we've said before it's not a statistically valid survey um but it does enable us one of the tools that we use to gauge where the public is on a number of different issues uh when we asked questions about adding housing particularly duplexes and triplexes uh last year there there was a slight majority that were in support of it uh but we also you know have to point out that at that time we weren't looking at adjustments to the density calculations in low density residential areas and most of the housing was focused in highdensity residential areas commercial areas and Industrial areas so the scope of this particular project has kind of looked more at areas around neighborhood centers along

[106:00] corridors and some of those areas are low density residential areas uh again I'm not going to read through this whole slide but this just covers the changes that were done last year um so some site review thresholds were changed that were based on dwelling units so we didn't want to discourage people from moving forward with adding housing um a lot of planning Board review processes and public hearings for adding additional units were removed from the code um a lot of form and bulk standards were changed and updated to be more loose for tow houses to allow them bu right and not push them all into site review um duplexes and triplexes were allowed by WR in the low density areas but at current uh density uh requirements uh the use review process was eliminated for elus but largely a lot of the caps in density in the business industrial and high density residential areas were removed uh and were replaced with an F cap rather to try to get more um smaller modest siiz

[107:01] housing units rather than the large types of units that the the zoning was dictating so when we brought that ordinance to council and I think it was in September of last year these are the seven suggestions that Council uh asked staff to explore further as um future work on uh working on housing so these are what we're going to talk about tonight um because city council largely supported um the sixth and seventh suggestions related to working on the site review thresholds and uh looking at the industrial zones again for the incentives for residential the fact that also that planning board supported those as well um for the sake of brevity as much as I can I'm trying to keep this presentation a little bit slim we're not going to talk about six and seven tonight rather we're going to focus on one through five so I I'll go into the details of one through five which really relate to the rmx1 Zone The rm1 Zone the RR zones The rl1 Zone the r the and then

[108:03] looking at uh owner occupancy restrictions as well as um an exemption for permanently affordable housing projects from site review that'll be the focus of the discussion tonight so I'm going to touch on the engagement that we've uh gotten just over the summer and through the course of this year um again a lot of this is a continuation of what was done with the Zoning for affordable housing project uh we've had this at a a level of consult since the changes are meant to implement the current bbcp uh which has policies on increasing housing along uh Transit corridors and around neighborhood centers um particularly in line with uh bbcp policy 2.16 mixed use and high density uh development um we've heard from different we've presented different groups on this issue on both sides of the issue to hear their perspectives and we've summarized that in the memo and up on the slide here um a lot of the issues

[109:01] is you know things we've heard before from both uh sides of it we've also uh been presenting to um affordable housing residents uh as part of this project and using the racial Equity instrument as as part of it as well uh again as a continuation from the prior project um we We Have Heard on both sides you know that more housing will help solve the cost problem and mitigate the jobs housing imbalance um we've heard from a number of folks that we should go farther um make make more bolt changes uh to address the housing challenges of the community um more housing even if it's not deed restricted does contribute to the affordable housing fund so that's just a a reminder and then uh support for for putting housing along bus corridors around downtown and neighborhood centers to support the goals that the city has on 15minute neighborhoods for instance uh We've also been hearing concerns uh and caution from certain elements of the community

[110:00] that you know the affordable housing that should be added should be deed restricted and that um if we add housing it may not uh be affordable and there's uh concerns about what those impacts would be to neighborhoods um we we did I read a lot of comments in the responses that said we need to stop the amount of building that Boulder is doing and that it's it's impacting the whole community so we've been hearing a lot of those concerns as well and that's also attached to the packet so like the the previous project we did do a uh we did a questionnaire this year I did put a beard Boulder questionnaire it's actually a story map qu questionnaire um which is different from beard Boulder but um they're both it's not a statistically valid survey again like the prior one it's it's just one tool that we use um to get uh feedback on this we we didn't get as many responses as we did on the project from last year where we got over a thousand uh responses I think may maybe even more than that uh in this case it

[111:00] was 375 plus responses uh again mostly mixed results where we saw more positivity towards as adding housing last time I think that's kind of gone down in the sense because the focus has gone on low density residential areas so the level of support when we look at the questionnaire results is more like 30 to 40% whereas it was about 50 to 60 % that were not in support of some of the changes um in particularly in the low density residential areas um when we asked the community through this questionnaire um if there was support for owner occupancy restrictions and also just through some of the discussions we had with members of the public we did hear a pretty high level of support for that just because of the concerns about investment properties coming in and buying up properties I think people on both sides of the issue kind of share that concern so I'm going to jump into the analysis of options again some of this is just a little bit of a

[112:01] refresher so how does Boulder regulate density obviously in the the lower density residential areas which are more the focus of this uh the RR zones only are permitted to have less than two dwelling units per acre uh in the the RL zones it's two to six dwelling units per acre so six dwelling units per acre is the cap um and we also list on the slide what the land use code says to to get those results from the bbcp so in the RR Zone the minimum lot area uh per dwelling unit is 30,000 square feet uh in the re Zone uh which is not a subject of this particular project but it's 7500 square feet and then rl1 is is 7,000 square feet of lot area per dwelling unit so when we started this project the things that were pointed out to us uh by by members of council is that obviously the bbcp is a Visionary document and it it's more high level and it doesn't necessarily quantify density in the same

[113:01] way that the land use code does you can see that there are some references to averaging that the way the the the bbcp is written is it looks more at kind of the holistic what is the overall density for a whole land area rather than by parcel by parcel like the land use code does um so we were prompted to kind of look at it through the lens of what if we were to look at these polygons of of density of land use designations as a full polygon as gross density and that would include you know School properties public properties open space properties rights of way things of that nature which is not uh how it's done through the the net density calculation which is parcel by parcel so in looking at that we did an analysis of a number of the different zones and then we talked about this in April but basically what we found is that even the gross in net densities were actually quite a bit below the maximums um even when you

[114:01] looked at it from a gross density lens so that spoke to that there is some room for allowing additional housing and still being consistent with the bbcp so starting on with suggestion one which focuses on rmx1 and again I'll stop after this each suggestion to get to answer questions and get feedback um in this case we're looking at rmx1 which you know only really covers 2% of of the city but it is an important part of the city it's a number of neighborhoods that are old older historic neighborhoods that surround downtown like parts of the gos Grove neighborhood parts of University Hill parts of um uh Whittier uh are and nor just north of downtowns in in the purple as shown here so this has an interesting uh description in the bbcp that relates to kind of the the complicated history of of of the Zone which I also talked about in briefly in

[115:02] in the hotline response that you know it's got It's had a number of different zoning districts over the years ranging from you know lower density up to higher density and then back to low again you know it had high density residential which allowed 27 dwelling units per acre for a time and then changed back to a low density so we have basically a mix of sing single family and apartment buildings in this part of the city and it's um now it's under 6,000 squ foot uh of lot area per dwelling unit which is pretty similar to rl1 so when we're doing the analysis for compliance you know with the bbcp we have to look at the characteristic description which talks about you know an intentional uh look at this area that it has been impacted by traffic and parking um and then we also have to look at the density range which is 6 to 20 20 units per acre to determine whether changes are consistent so when you walk around you

[116:00] know these zones it has a variety of different sized buildings a lot of historic housing stock um you can see there's some large single family homes what we've tried to clearly communicate to the public through the story map questionnaire are these images to show that the overall intent of this whole project is to not increase intensity in terms of massing and F or height things like that it's to keep and maintain the setbacks this maintain the height maintain bulk plane all the restrictions that apply to these buildings but just allow more units to be within uh those structures so not a big visual change in terms of you know the massing of buildings but just encouraging the option that a what could only be a single family house today could actually be broken up into perhaps uh like a Triplex and again that would help us at getting at that missing middle housing that we need in the community so we we've offered this analysis in the past that there is some caution with this Zone in the sense that

[117:02] um in the past we we use the terms established and developing in the land use code that's no longer in the land use code and it's not in the plan but these this is kind of where rmx grew out of is that it's a mixed density Zone that has a mix of housing types generally rmx1 was an area where they didn't foresee a lot of change and RM x 2 and North Boulder was an area where you would see more housing units um but also recognizing that it is it is an area that's surrounding downtown it's a walkable area it has a lot of access to Transit does it make sense to keep it as a low density designation so these are all the things that we have to kind of Bear in mind our recommendation when we talked in in April was to change the the density calculation from 6,000 square feet of lot area per dwelling unit to 3,000 and we're we're still uh recommending that tonight uh Council Direction was to look at maybe changing that to 2500 or, 1500 so I wanted to

[118:01] follow up on that we did an analysis of the parcels in the rmx zone and you can see in this this was also in the hotline response is that all the properties that are in orange are those that are over 20 dwelling units per acre um so that these properties wouldn't be adding any units the ones that are in Gray are in a range of of densities and as we noted in that you know 18% of the parcels would exceed that 20 dwelling units per acre and about 80% of the parcels actually exceed the current density um of 6,000 square feet per per uh per unit so there is some room for allowing housing here um with the 3,000 as we're recommending that could over time uh yield about 2500 units if it was to go lower to say 20 2500 U by maxing out you potentially get 3500 units again these are numbers that are just theoretical if like every

[119:00] single property were to decide all at once to add units that's what it would look like in the long term these are changes that would play out ever over long periods of time and that applies to all the changes we're talking about tonight so we took this analysis to planning board planning board was generally supportive of the change um some members noted that the parking requirements in this Zone were too high because it was calculated by bedroom um but that was something that we'll be looking at through the parking project uh one board member was skeptical that more smaller units would be comparatively cheaper uh and there were two board members that felt that staff you know should suggest going farther and going to that 2500 square feet of lot area per dwell dwelling unit again we're uh continuing to recommend the 3000 just to be cognitive of the the impacts of of the traffic and congestion that have come up in the past so that's that's what's kind of holding our uh our recommendation at 3,000 so that

[120:01] concludes that particular item happy to answer any questions on that and then hear the feedback of Council on rmx1 great thanks for that Carl just uh to frame our discussion I think the way that we're going to structure it tonight is uh Carl's going over each of the five main items will ask clarifying questions and then go to discussion and my plan is just to start with the Pres assion that we agree with the staff recommendation and then people can opine on if they would like to be different from the staff recommendation and that's very that's totally okay and welcome but just we'll start from a starting point of the staff recommendation and then just to reiterate something you said before Carl that the missing middle that you're talking about here is a unit type it's a housing type it's not about price per se cor people are welcome to talk about price if they would like to but the missing middle that we're talking about tonight is really about the housing type rather than the price that's right great with all those things in mind I'll see if we have any clarifying questions yeah Tara and Tina hey Carl thanks thanks for that

[121:00] great presentation um tell me in the University Hill area is it all um m m sorry rmx1 or is it partially rmx1 and then partially it's partially rmx1 other parts of the hill or um rl1 so do you know about where that is in terms of streets is there a map somewhere that I could see that only because I'm concerned about the uncon the properties that AR unconforming that's the on this if you look at the southern part of the zones that's where a lot of the oranges along Broadway I don't know if I can I don't think my cursor is visible but like Grand View and Marine Street are rmx1 um but the other streets are are a lot of the streets are r l one thank you so much this

[122:00] is this is aill this is mar street right here this is Broadway this is Grand View University so when you get into you can see there's a couple blocks University Pennsylvania this is going to be um BMS in this area there's there's rh5 like high density residential like in this area but this is where your rl1 largely is so this is like uh is that six street is the boundary there and then just north of university is the boundary does that help great and I I'll just read a little bit of that into the record there because you're off mic Ju Just the point being that that the rmx area a lot of it is along arapo and Marine and a little bit along Grand View and a little bit to further points further south but as you get West closer to the Foothills it's rl1 that's right and then BMS Zone um in the commercial

[123:01] area that answer your question yeah I um thank you for all the visuals and the great overview um when I would one of the likely outcomes with this adoption be that you'd see more single family homes convert into a multiple unit Home potentially yes it depends on the size of the lot obviously I think um we did a we we looked at a number of the Lots out there and a lot of the lots are you know 6,000 square feet so that that that could be a lot of single family homes that could switch to a duplex for instance but as you get to per the staff recommendation you'd have to have a you know a 9,000 foot lot to have a Triplex for instance Okay so then I mean is it likely that that would be a duplex that would appeal to families or do you think it would like for instance in the University hell Hill would be

[124:01] mostly um divided into units for more student housing I mean what I mean what do you think might happen I I think it depends on the area obviously like a lot of the hill is already well p over the density so I don't see a lot of the change in that area it's more like Wittier where you can see the gray and the the upper part of the arm rmx Zone where I think that would be a a familyfriendly type area like where you could have small families being able to locate in you know starter homes that could be like in a duplex for so that would be where they would take a larger home and then put it into a duplex where you think it might be able to accommodate two families yeah okay um and then there was a I appreciated the part of the packet that talked about how to think about conversion rather than demolition are there any incentives that we've used in the past to strongly create that rather than going through a demolition

[125:01] exercise yeah I don't know if that we have any you know incentives obviously a lot of the housing stock in this zone is historic so there there would be a landmarks board or a landmarks alteration certificate required for changes so there's a lot of incentives to you know Landmark Homes or protect homes through that process um and so our hope is that that you it would encourage people to preserve a building and do internal conversion we have seen that you know in like gos Grove where they've been able to keep you know the outside of the building but do changes on the inside to get more units okay I mean one thing I mean what I'm interested truly is the title of this project with which is for families and um because we've done we've been really successful at building high density student housing and student housing for one person or two individuals um and many of these are located in parks and amenities I I just wonder if there's any

[126:00] way to create incentives and even tax credits or you know you know permit uh waving permits for work that yields to places that are likely to appeal to two families instead of one rather than multiple units for single people which we seem to be addressing in other ways not that they not not that they don't matter or anything but I mean that would be sort of My Hope out of most of these options I think I think we'd have to look in into that in a little bit more depth and it might be something that we take on as part of the bbcp update as well okay thank you did did you have a followup yeah just okay and then I got Nicole and Ryan a quick followup to Tina's question Carl so as you know I also called you to ask a lot of questions just so I can understand you're saying that in the RX one zone in on University Hill there would be little difference because it's already over densified I mean that's our

[127:01] sense and also the fact that I mean it might make some more Pro properties less non-conforming maybe a few might become conforming but we're not anticipating a lot of changes on there just because you can see all the orange in that area thank you thanks so much for the presentation so far um I uh one of the things that I just wonder about when we see results from convenience sample surveys is what should we take away from that um because especially in the absence of other kind of feedback it really is a very selective sample um and I'm not quite sure what to make of it well again it's it's one tool you know where we did I will say that you know we had a very broad email list uh the same list that we used for Zoning

[128:00] for affordable housing uh it was sent to all those emails so we tried to keep it as broad as as we could um to get feedback yeah and I'll just uh add council member U mayor protim uh this Brad Mueller director of Planning and Zoning you know I think back to earlier in my career where kind of the only tool we had at our at our fingertips were open houses and there were natural limits to those too and we we always um you know strive to find other ways to expand um our understanding of community interest in this um but at the end of the day it uh we we think that some some kind of input at Le at least informs the discussion uh we simply can't afford to do a statistically valid survey on everything which comes C you know costs tens of thousands of dollars typically to do um but we do also temper that information with our own

[129:01] professional um you know understanding of the issue and the previous under the previous conversations that have been had with uh you planning board and others uh as part of that too so we recognize its limitations but also see it as as a mechanism for getting uh a way to understand some of the issues um I have a comment around that but should I make it later I have a couple more questions okay can I come back to a comment for that oh no just out of curiosity for the Boulder Valley comp plan um engagement surveys without be a statistically uh oh my gosh the word is escaping me valid yeah yeah I I can speak to that we've currently have planned two statistically valid surveys as part of that again that's just one of a whole Suite of ways to get input including uh this is a chance for me to plug Saturday's uh kickoff event uh which

[130:00] will be another mechanism for that and that is this coming Saturday from 1 o'clock to 4 o'c at the dairy Art Center the Boulder Valley comprehensive plan kickoff event come one come all please um thank you and um I think one of the other uh questions that I have have is just thinking about all the state legislation it's obviously you know we're working in this world where the state legislation is evolving is there any sort of um math involved in terms of how we are meeting those requirements like would we need to do potentially do all of the recommended staff changes in order to have a chance at getting to that like can we mix and match like have do we have any information on that yet and it's okay if we don't just wondering we don't really have a direct Nexus between the state bills and this particular project um I think we found with with the transit oriented communities one for instance we've talked about how um that's kind of a separate area of the

[131:00] city and areas that we'd have to designate for potential additional density it's not really these are not those areas so we're not seeing that Nexus okay thank you um and then just just one question I just want to clarify um for the record um when we talk about families our definition is broader than a man a woman and two children right Abol okay just just wanted to be clear for that and um I would just ask uh colleagues as well to be mindful of this as we're talking about it that um especially with demographics um showing that household sizes are going to get smaller that fewer households will have children that we just really expand our thinking about what a family is and who's living together it's not always going to involve a child a child or children and that will probably be more true as as we head into the coming decades so um sorry moment of personal privilege but uh just wanted to ask for that um thank you Ryan and then Lauren

[132:00] and then Taisha okay this is either a basic question or something I should have asked on a hotline um so we per the first bullet here and this is a question across a few of the the the proposals we'll get to I'm just thinking about the interplay between the the current decisions at hand versus the bbcp which we will address soon and thinking about how we have um you know this this this this Con a constraint um in a sense on us now that we will have a chance to address with with the bbcp update I'm just wondering if there's a way to think about um like making sure what we're doing is consistent with the current bbcp and not presupposing any changes but then also expressing it should we wish to express doing something outside of what the bbcp currently allows should that

[133:00] become available to us is there a way to do that now or or is it is it just like all we can do really is if it's let's for example say it's a density limit get go as far as we want towards within the bbcp and then we have to then we need to address the bbcp and then we would just need to come back to this later I guess I'm just thinking about the sequencing of all that is there a more simple way to think about it well I I think the way we've tried to frame it is that there's a number of different things that have to be looked at from the policy level as to whether it's consistent with the bbcp it's the bvc Pol bbcp policies the land use designations the characteristics and use description and the the density limit so I think all those have to be weighed I think the density limit is more of a hard thing you know it's a hard number that's easy to say yes or no to it's more the is it consistent with the character of the neighborhood or the how the characteristics are described and I think that's what is before

[134:01] Council to decide um so we're presenting to council what our analysis shows what we think is consistent with the bbcp looking at all those things um but yeah if there are parts that kind of are more than just the the density limits um that's something that's probably going have to be looked at through the the next update whether the vision for an area needs to change or an area is designated for more housing um things like that I don't know if that answers your question thank thank you maybe just a followup um I'm just thinking then um would it make sense that if if if council members now wish to express that if the BBC sorry bbcp limit were to change that there would be a desire for our family-friendly zoning policy to change in accordance and to say that now so that after we address the bbcp

[135:01] updates which is going to happen within the next year or so um with with this body that it would simplify the process of you know kind of twing up with our our desire now I I don't think it hurts um I I think you know we this is really phase one of a two-phase project so phase one will cease when this ordinance you know uh is acted on and then phase two will then begin and that'll run alongside the the bbcp update so I think you could provide feedback I think tonight on your thoughts for the future I guess you know and just to add to that so I think um you know adding that and and providing all that context as part of this discussion is what we're certainly hearing but I do also want to point out that we uh are aiming towards trying to bring a specific ordinance to the Council actually by the end of the year yet and it wouldn't be appropriate to try to incorporate in that context so you know we'll take all of this in but but that's where we'll have to you know

[136:01] make those kind of distinctions and if I can chime in from a facilitation standpoint if you don't mind Ryan that what I you know if you want to uh put out a comment or two about how you might think about the broader future that's fine but I wouldn't want to try to set up a a phase two target before we've gotten to bbcp just from a probably it's not um it would be hard to craft in it would not have regulatory Authority is that right thank you yeah thank you thanks all Lauren mine's more of a um comment than a question I've decided we we'll come back to you then com question TAA so mine was very much aligned with what are the what are the authorities that we have now versus what we will have with the Boulder Valley comp plan update and basically are there things is there anything that we would do now that could negatively impact the update to the bbsd um the Boulder Valley comp sorry acronym

[137:02] challenged I mean it really kind of depends on how far Council word a stray from what's recommended but I I'd say what we're recommending is safely you know within the framework of of the bbcp um it's it's the more that I don't I don't I can't see where it would jeopardize like future actions I guess if that's what you're asking okay um and then aide a different question than that um so just like habitat impacts of this was that considered I think one of the the you know appreciated all the analysis very helpful um but I did have questions around you know one of the benefit benefits um of you know single family is is that there's more landscaping and and habitat and I heard you on trying to stay within the existing footprint as much as possible

[138:01] uh but when they're not able to do that and it spreads out I was just curious if there was any considerations or consultation with the climate initiatives team around yeah there wasn't any um discussions of that nature relative to to habitats because of the fact that we are not proposing any changes to the footprint of buildings or size of buildings F bulk plane it's really all going to be the same parameters on a building as part of this proposal it's just allowing more units if you're talking about like expansion beyond what we currently allow that could affect a habitat that's not in the scope of this okay and then um to that to the question of the existing footprint um just water and energy considerations are there any significant differences in water and energy use deter based on we did talk to our our utility staff about this uh they were comfortable with these particular changes I think as we go into the bbcp

[139:00] update they're going to have to look at whatever you know path uh the city chooses to go down and whether there's capacity uh but generally you know in this case it's just I think the findings that they have found is that like even higher density tends to actually use less water in some regards because there's not um Lawns you know in certain areas um where there's higher density versus a single family house for instance so they didn't have any concerns uh with this particular phase of the project okay and then climate initiatives um we didn't have any direct conversations with them again we weren't anticipating any environmental changes again the only Zone where there is a change in in like the the footprint of buildings potentially is rm1 which we'll get to next um but we've not talked to climate initiatives about this particular project okay oh thank

[140:00] you okay yeah I'm sorry um and I I did ask some questions about um SP sp24 174 because I actually appreciated a lot of the elements they look at when doing the housing assessment that included the the jobs housing balance the water supply element um the prevention of spar and mandatory long and short-term affordability strategies and one of the strategies was around displacement and um I was also appreciative of the report on the um the housing consol Consolidated housing plan that Kurt sent and one of the remarks they made is how quickly our affordable private rental market has deteriorated and when we look at a project like this would we anticipate that I I'm assuming it will be a lot of rentals um in this case I don't know if this the idea is to incentivize condo condation but would we expect overall rents to increase because people would be investing more and it would be a

[141:00] bigger investment opportunity and are there any mitigation strategies we could think about for people who are displaced into the higher rent units I don't know that I have a great answer for that um I mean I think our sense was just that you know allowing more units there's going to be a mix of rental and ownership I don't know that we were thinking that that the these changes would increase rents um I think that's something we'd have to look into more all right I think we've exhausted our questions um so can you go to the question for us sure Carl great so should staff move forward with an ordinance to revise the density calculation rmx1 to permit one dwelling unit per 3,000 squ ft of lot area any alternative suggestions for changes to this zone so as I said before I'm going to I'm going to start from saying we agree with you but any thoughts on ways

[142:00] that we we would prefer to do something different Lauren thank you um and thank you for all of the wonderful maps and thought that has gone into this um for me part of I think I pushed fairly hard for us to consider this rmx1 Zone um and for me that's partially because of what the um of what I've seen in my work so it's anecdotal at this point I know I asked about how many units have been added or removed in this um area but for me personally I through my work have been asked to remove more housing units in this Zone than any other Zone in town because um as Kurt said 80% of the parcels in this Zone do not comply with their underlying zoning so when people want to expand their closet in a historic

[143:03] house that um typically has a tiny closet that little change in square footage is not allowed those kinds of things um people don't have access to and what I find in my line of work is that this often means making them in making things that were not single family homes into single family homes so that people can do the remodels that they would like um and through that I think that we are that our current zoning doesn't keep us in line with the Boulder Valley comprehensive plan I think that we are losing the diversity of housing types that the comprehensive plan says that we should be protecting and so because because of that um I think there is such Variety in this Zone we cannot um go to the extent

[144:00] that we would be allowing everything that currently exists but um I would like to see us uh change the um lot area requirements to 2500 square feet so that we can maintain as much try and allow as many of the existing structures as possible to become compliant with the underlying zoning while still staying um within the uh bounds of the unit calculations in the comprehensive plan that's a nice solid and concrete proposal there thanks Lorden and my my memory from reading the packet is that while that wasn't the staff recommendation it was still within the broad unit limits is that correct it's with yeah it wouldn't put like theoretically if everything were to develop at that rate it wouldn't go over the 20 dwelling UNS per acre considering the existing non-conformities as well however again it's those other parts

[145:00] it's beyond just the metric cap that has to be looked at in the bbcp relative to the you know the impacts in that area so that's that's why we kind of stayed with the with the 3,000 but you you could go to 2 200 and not go over that density Max got it okay thanks for that um so I'll I I want to stick on this then and get the the will of Council in terms of whether this is something people are interested in if anybody wants to address this specific question feel free Ryan I just wanted to agree with council member Furs I think um in addition per the bbcp we are um entrusted with um with traffic and parking and a modern transport planning approach would tell you that when we have housing near the core of downtown that's walkable if we get let more people do that then we will reduce our need for for cars so per person we're going to be um improving uh on the um probabilistically on the

[146:02] traffic situation and giving our ourselves more greater resources per household to fund public transportation amenities so I think that's another reason to um to stretch a little bit so leave at that great and I'll just call on myself real quick and say that I I like this proposal as well I think you'd see just a very a modest of additional units but within the same footprint of the building to the discussion we had before so no no not that the buildings would be larger but there would be you know here and there one additional unit perhaps and another opportunity for a family of whatever kind U to live there so I'm gonna STW oh yeah Tina good sure um so when you say that there would be an additional unit then would you expect that to be like a two-bedroom unit is that kind of from a like a five like two two bedrooms and one one bedroom or and and and I and I really respect the definition of family is being very Broad and personally had some issues

[147:01] with the name change because it when people say the word family while we have an inclusive definition of that and we also put in the description of this project a goal to increase the number of children people with children because of the bbsd enrollment changes so not only we sort of self find it in a way that there might be a community expectation if we're just going to I think it's great to just do housing for people and that's fine and we may want to go back to that so that we're more consistent with what we're talking about but my concern would be and I and I really am not opposed to this idea at all but if we break it into lots of into smaller units are we creating environments for people with children um whether it's one person or whether it's you know whe one person one child or not and that would be my only you know question I mean I guess I might just say that that it's unknowable exactly what types how many bedrooms you would get

[148:01] and so um but this would be a relatively small incremental change so I don't think it would wholesale switch it from three bedrooms to one bedroom but Nicole did you have something to do oh okay um I just wanted to make a broader comment about the U Middle housing type and how this sort of plays in right so um right now there's a lot of folks who um may prefer to be in a smaller like a two-bedroom versus the three or four bedroom that they were in when you know they had kids and everything and I think that part of creating more of this midle housing type is to create a healthier ecosystem where people are kind of moving through so it may not be that these are the exact areas where we would get more families with children but as people are moving um as they have a little bit more choice in terms of the housing type they have um they may move into this which would then free up you know a three or four bedroom home um

[149:01] somewhere else so um anyway just wanted to note that too so my my only thought would be if there's a way um one of the things you sent out um mayor Pam was the Dr Cog survey and how nine out of 10 units need to be affordable moving forward for to meet The increased demand so if there are any um tools we have and I want to ask this really broadly about how can we create the conditions to bring down the price of this type of renovation or whatever we could do I would just be interested in that um as well as um you know any any ideas that you all learn from your colleagues across the country that are doing the same work and dealing with these same problems y would it be valid to say though that the staff came to their conclusion because of reasons I mean shouldn't we

[150:00] wait be till we have Community input on the Boulder Valley comp plan before we push so much the community is going to get aggravated because we're not listening to them um so isn't 3,000 isn't it 6,000 now mhm okay isn't 3,000 half of 6,000 so now we're going even more than that so well I appreciate the FOC amendment that was a joke not one of those again I think it's valid and reasonable to say let's just do half and listen to staff instead of push the envelope before we have the BB CP plus I don't feel like crowded is necessarily better well I'm a big believer in more housing I feel we really should be thinking about those types of things as well that's

[151:01] it TAA um I uh would be interested in the 25 100 and just exploring that since this is still you're asking for feedback and and I would be interested in knowing what the difference is between three 3,000 ft and 2500 thank you and I'll make the caveat that we have heard recently about other ordinances that this is an initial Direction but of course at the public hearing and when we have an ordinance in front of us we can make a different decision at that time um so I'll go ahead and straple this um how many people raise your hand if you'd be interested in a 2500 foot for lot area I got six a five five five yeah I was subtracting three but we don't have nine people here tonight thanks for that okay so that there's a 5 to3 majority interested in the 2500 number any other

[152:02] uh suggestions for change to the staff proposal seeing none then I think we can go to the next one please call okay we're gonna excuse me shift to rm1 so that's what's shown in the the orange color uh on the zoning map relative to our rmx is you can see rm1 is a medium density Zone that's found in a number of areas in in the city um along 28 Street uh particularly around our neighborhood centers uh and this is a Zone that's based on open space so the current calculation is 3,000 square feet of open space per dwelling unit um and then we obviously have our um the bbcp description and and the maximum of 14 dwelling units per acre which applies to this own this is some of the imagery that we sent out to the community of the types of housing that you often see and in rm1 it can be apartment buildings it can be

[153:01] single family homes it can be tow houses just at that Medium density which is six to 14 dwelling units per acre the the graphics are showing you could have a you know under today's rules have a a single unit that looks like on the left and then potentially again we'd have the same um parameters except in this case there' be uh Less open space that's proposed per the staff recommendation but you could get an additional unit potentially um by adding that flexibility so again adding more to the missing metal housing so we did an an analysis of this I think 300 square feet of open space per duing unit versus lot area it's hard to determine like what the difference is but we've looked at um allowing like a 23% % increase in this Zone since there's a number of properties that are already kind of locked in with a lot of um uh HOAs and condos and everything so

[154:00] based on that we pushed a little bit further to get to like you could potentially add 800 units like hypothetically over the long term um city council when we talked about this in April was largely supportive of the change but there was some um differences on whether it should be lot area or open space uh when we talked to planning board there was more of a preference to do to change it to just to 2,000 square feet of lot area per dwelling unit just because it's more straightforward uh but we've also been hearing in the community a number of folks that are concerned about reducing open space and we're not using open space just based on the character of some of these developments and for instance like the rl2 areas of the city they're a low density Zone that's based on open space they do have a slightly different character than rl1 so I think based on that staff is holding to our recommendation that it should be 2, squ feet of open space per dwelling unit you would it would still

[155:01] add some flexibility and would still kind of hold true to how the Zone uh was put in place uh at first um I think the planning board wasn't as concerned about that just because there was one board member that that didn't support it but just that a lot of the developments in these particular areas it's a you know lawn space that counts as open space that's not necessarily functional so they felt like maybe a lot area calculation just might be simpler so um that's pretty much all there is for rm1 so we're recommending the 2,000 squ feet of open space from the 3,000 squ feet of open space thanks uh clarifying questions Ty sh then I'm going to come back to the habitat question on this one yeah I mean we we didn't have conversation was a clim initiatives about this obviously it would it could impact you know the amount of open space on a property I don't know that there's a lot of sensitive habitats in these areas

[156:00] they're largely all built out um it would really you'd probably see some some properties redevelop that are already developed that just had a lot of lawn and and green spaces like that I don't know I can't think of examples where there's you know Wetlands obviously if there's like Wetlands things like that we already have other regulations that protect those and buffer Wetlands so I think from our from where we're sitting we're we're not so concerned about that just since a lot of these places are already kind of built out already and just want to clarify though on your team though is there somebody with expertise around habitat and that kind of thing yeah I mean we we certainly could have that I want make sure you know mean you said you didn't connect with the climate teams I'm like whoa so that does um make me feel better um about that although going back to the rmx1 if we're increasing that many people and we're not increasing there's not a requirement to increase there um so if there's increased density there

[157:00] there's still increased density so I guess I'm just my questions are just around the the intersect and um the assumption that you know a lot of those dwellings may already have you know natural habitat and part of the pollinator program and all these things so they are a part of our connectivity which we know is a continuing is issue so thank you for um the answers to those questions Nicole yeah I just had a couple of questions um one I just want to clarify that when we're talking about um open space per dwelling unit it could be that there is no plant or tree or anything involved in that but it's just like a deck or a patio or something like that is that yeah open space has there's a whole list of what counts as open space in the code it could be lawn it could be a Hardscape area that you sit in it could be trees a grow trees it could be it could actually be a little landscape area 2 feet in width like it gets really detailed um so it's not all necessarily functional open space but it's all meant

[158:01] to provide relief to density that's the way it was developed in the 1970s but yeah it does include decks balconies but to a limited extent okay thank you um oh sorry yeah thank you um does the city have a biodiversity index that lets us know what types of how these Open Spaces are being used and how they're contributing to our biodiversity efforts that I'm not sure of I can check okay thank you okay um then the other question that I had is just uh looking at this so my neighborhood is one of the bigger ones on this map here and um we're right next to a park a giant park right and and I'm looking at some of these other places and it seems like they are um right next to some city parks and space too um and so I guess my question is is that is that observation correct that many of these neighborhoods are very near um and

[159:03] possibly even some of our larger Parks yeah I would say just from driving around and going to some of these areas I I would agree with that observation no no other questions okay all right so we'll again start with the staff recommendation should staff move forward with an ordinance to revise the density calculation and rm1 to permit one dwelling unit per 2,000 square feet of open space or there any alternative suggestions does anybody have any interest in doing something different I see no hands raised I don't have any alternative recommendations at this time but I do have just a general interest in the bio diversity indicators or index information um and again just and would love to revisit the open space definitions at some time maybe that's at

[160:01] the Boulder Valley comp plan update but um I'm just you know even though there are parks nearby you know in the 12 years I've lived here there has been a significant increase in population I mean uh but we haven't seen a significant increase in our open space programs and so we are seeing a significant decrease in air quality there is a direct correlation to that it's not just emissions reduction uh but it is habitat loss by construction and of commercial and residential which I have seen an extension of so uh it's just a general concern um and although I appreciate there are members of the team that have that expertise on habitat and um wildlife and Corridor uh Wildlife corridors Etc um I'm hopeful for uh deeper um inter interde departmental collaboration thank you thanks I'm supportive I just have uh I think this is the last chance for um for comments about this one in general so I wanted to pick up on the same topic I'm

[161:00] I'm now hearing that sometimes open space might be taken as a proxy for Native biodiversity or that's my what I might think of it as that's actually not necessarily what what's happening with open space and um as well as I'm I'm agreeing in a way with council member Adams that I'd be interested in the future whether it's the BBC or it's whatever the time is to um isolate for that a little bit more or at least have a conversation about isolating for what are we trying to solve and what and if it's biodiverse um you know native pollinators and plants then that's probably something we'd want to talk about at least being direct about um so this is for later I'm supportive of of the measure thanks yeah and I'm again interested in any kind of um way to create affordability and to create ownership opportunities laen yeah I appreciated planning board's recommendation on moving this to um lot

[162:02] area um but I in the interest of keeping things compliant with their underlying zoning um I think that continuing to measure it in the same way helps ensure that the things that are there are still compliant and we don't shift away from that um although I will Echo a lot of what has been said already um by Ryan and Taisha I do think that open space sounds very different than what right we have different kinds of open space and in this context of zoning I think it leads to a lot of confusion because a werf street and a balcony on someone's apartment both technically qualify as open space but they might not have native plantings nor are they accessible to the public in a way that kind of that designation might sound to some people so I hope that we will continue looking

[163:00] at that and moving away from that I heard some interesting things around East Boulder subc Community Plan and some of the things planning board was asking for there around um actually having o public open space potential requirements and I think that that is very intriguing so I look forward to hearing how some of those things progress thank you great and I agree with everything that you just said that was very very well said uh not seeing any any other hands raised I think we got the thumbs up for the staff recommendation and we can move to the next item okay great all right so suggestion number three this is probably the medi one um and the one that applies to the the broadest part of the city so this map shows um what's basically three zones um that are on our very low residential and low residential so rl1 uh rr1 and rr2 you can see there's a variety of

[164:00] pockets uh throughout the city they cover a good chunk of the city and and largely contain detached dwelling units so when we're looking at this uh in terms of compliance with the bbcp uh you can see the very low density residential is two dwelling units per acre or less and then the low density residential is 2 to six doings per acre but we also have the you know the characteristics which is predominantly single family as it's written in the the comp plan right now that we've tried to honor through our analysis this is some of the imagery of you know different parts of the city every single family or detached delling unit neighborhood has a different slightly different context they were built at different times um you know like rl2 is not in the scope of this because it's already a zone that allows a different a whole bunch of different types of housing types but for the most part it's detached dwelling units for most of these areas so we've been trying

[165:01] to communicate through the the questionnaires you know in this case again all the height bulk plane F setbacks all that would remain the same it's just the ability to uh potentially split or or build a duplex um on certain lots and I I think what we looked at through the analysis is um trying to stick to that predominantly single family so only allowing you know no more than 50% of the lots to be eligible for duplexes to be consistent with that even though the the net and gross density analysis actually showed you could actually add you know even more housing units we do we do feel like it's important to stick to stay true to that um as it's in the bbcp so in this case we've been kind of floating around you know a 40% increase uh it would happen over a very long time potentially decades so it would stay predominantly single family we're not going to see

[166:01] properties transform into a duplex overnight when an ordinance gets P um so that's where we're kind of looking at that range of there's there's about like 10,000 properties in these zones it'd be allowing around 4,000 or more more than 4,000 to be eligible so when we talk to Council about this last time we suggested a number of tweaks to the the lot area per dwelling unit um to get to that 40% uh I think there was more interest in taking that amount of increase and just focusing it along bus corridors basically in the city so that's what we've really focused on in our analysis since we spoke uh in April so in this case um we looked at a number of different scenarios and what that would look like if you took that 4,300 number of lots and you spread it over all the bus corridors in these zones this is kind of what it looks like on here that basically you have a number

[167:01] of just depending on the the amount of increase determines what the buffer the distance from the the the bus quarter should be so we looked at number one was 250 ft would be about a 30% increase uh 300 ft would be 35% and then uh 350 ft would would match that 40% that I was talking about so as part of the hotline response we actually got a a Citywide map then it's also on the dis in front of you where you can get a a sense of the areas that basically shows 450 on each side and the reason we did 450 is because that's that's basically what most of the planning board was recommending like push it up to almost 50% that would be 450 so this this slide just kind of shows you know the the dis the three different distances you can see it's just in 50 foot increments this is a map that we had

[168:01] produced before the hotline that just kind of shows where all the active bus routes are and we're looking at bus routes on major streets that we would expect to continue to have bus routes uh so this allowing them along those corridors you know by allowing those lots to be eligible no matter the lot size size would still fit within that two to six dwelling units per acre acre and would also again over time would be predominantly single family in those areas um so our our recommendation has been the 350 feet which is at that 40% uh when we talked to planning board about it um several board members were pushing why not make it you know since this is going to be gradual over time why not bring it up to like 49% for instance so that would be basically making over 5,000 Lots eligible so that would be that 450t distance so when you look at the materials in front of you it shows what 450 would look like on either side of the of the of the corridor

[169:02] there's a dotted line that shows the staff recommendation which is the 350 um there was one board member that was against this change is finding that um it would drive up land costs create more luxury duplexes and would remove existing housing stock so that brings us to the KY isue question again the staff recommendation is 350 fet because it aligns with that 40% increase great thanks for that CW uh clarifying questions on this item Tina yeah um I have a couple questions um the first is for the area that's up on spine and 63rd um what do does that area look like now I'm not as familiar there and has there been engagement specifically in that Community oh up in Gun Barrel yeah I mean I've driven through that neighborhood I I think I even took

[170:01] pictures it's very pretty large Lots pretty large homes right up there um we have sent out the questionnaire via next door which hits all of those those zones I haven't looked specifically about you know respondents from that area but um hoping that the awareness got but to clarify I mean there's only the tiniest SLI sliver of rl1 in Gun Barrel is that I'm looking at the zoning there right yeah it's just south of of U yeah SP is it it's not spine it's a oh because it doesn't overlap with the bus I see what you're saying so it's not yeah yeah there's that little bit to the bottom left right in the materials you can see it's just a small sliver okay and end did the survey we sent out did it talk about this option specifically about the transit one okay all right um and then are there when we think about the whole wildfire

[171:00] and permeable land in some of the areas like Lehi Road or up um the Boulder Canyon whichever part that is do we need to think about treating those areas any differently if they're or if they're near a flood conveyance Zone I know that the the map does show that that's just because that those are the the streets that are eligible a lot some of those areas that are shown on there are actually in the county so it's just the areas that are highlighted with the rl1 zone and RR zones right like the Lehi in South Boulder would we treat that differently because of the fire danger there or uh we're not proposing to Tre that okay um okay let me think about that for a sec other questions uh not not proposing any changes to certain areas based on their potential Wildfire risk that might or might not be present I guess I just wanted to point

[172:00] out from the enlarged map on the Shanahan Ridge area that a lot of the like my neighborhood which is already quite dense um but is a PUD and is um zoned different like a lot of the edge is actually zoned differently and isn't um RL one or is it zoned rl1 but subject to a PUD that wouldn't allow the kind of same kind of development standards I think it's actually zoned differently but I can't remember entirely off the top of my head okay I'm not seeing any other questions I um so in terms of feedback I I'll just call on myself here and say I think the the staff recommendation is going in the right direction and I know we we've had some um we've had a lot of uh Communications in support but also concerned about this one and just a couple points like I someone in open

[173:00] comment was talking about the potential loss of open space areas um or wetlands and things like that but as we've reiterated a few times the buildings can't be any bigger um they just would be allowed to potentially have two units instead of one unit in the same footprint um and just also the point this was made in the memo that I thought was was good is that um the character of these neighborhoods have been changing gradually over time with the scrapes of older homes and rebuilding U and building a very large single family homes to replace them so it's not that these areas have been frozen in time and had no change but instead the change is going just in the direction of one very large and then very expensive house so this seems like a a a modest um move movement forward and I I do think it's modest because um per to Lauren's question um we enabled duplexes and triplexes on larger Lots by right a while back and we've so far gotten one permit uh filed for that so I think we would be looking at a pace of change

[174:00] that would be modest here but it would be targeted in those areas where you can walk to a bus line so it feels to me like a good incremental step in terms of allowing more middle housing types smaller units um they're not wouldn't necessarily be cheap but um cheaper than the very large home that we're seeing built now so I'm supportive of this as a small incremental step as we move towards the comprehensive Plan update yeah wasn't the reason one of the reasons why we only had one duplex because you needed 14,000 square feet or was I misunderstanding that yeah under current regulations a duplex would have to have 14,000 in the rl1 and it would have to have 60,000 in the RR that's a lot yeah it only applies to larger Lots but there's still quite a lot of those large Lots 1,200 of those lots other thoughts

[175:01] sir yeah I I think my biggest concern and one that I've heard in my community and it's it's actually there's a lot of interest in duplexes and a lot of support there's not a lot of interest in converting the properties to rentals through investors and that that's been really consistent and I think there is a is a hope that there's a way we can do this through incentives or types of taxes or any kind of structure where we're expanding ownership opportunities and not really investment opportunities so if there's a way to get that balance so that um I think it would be great to have these options and but I wouldn't want to see us increase the number of rental units we're already at 53% and I could see that being one outcome of this change um but I don't know what we've seen in other communities that have done this if they've seen an increase in rentals or if they've maintained the home ownership element organically

[176:02] without any kind of intervention through the city and if you if you can speak to that that'd be great yeah I mean I actually did try to reach out to a number of communities Unfortunately they they've not responded there were there's a number of um communities in California that have done things of this nature but they've not responded Mark um yeah this one is frankly a bridge too far for me um reducing lot size from minimum of 7,000 to a minimum of 5,000 I thought was uh reasonable and the increase in the rl1 zone uh would be 19% um doing it reducing it down to 4,000 uh Square fet um potentially a densification equal to 39% and that is contrary to a couple of

[177:00] things one it is contrary to the uh results of the community outreach that we did and and the results on that were pretty clear and I I don't think we can continue to do community outreach and then simply dismiss it by saying well it's not statistically valid this was 375 responses uh and we it was pretty clear people were unhappy with what we were proposing um and you know if we're not going to give weight to that then let's not bother with the uh community outreach um in addition by your by the language of Staff itself the um rl1 uh zone is considered an established Zone and um you know quoting your own memo uh that you've been cautious about proposing wholesale changes to the low density areas of the city without a broader Community engagement process

[178:02] associated with a comprehensive planning update staff believes that the bvc update would be the best approach to engaging the community on changes that may impact the intensity and character of the rl1 and RR neighborhoods by the way I I I I don't have a problem with your with staff's recommendations for the RR um given the size of the Lots um but that that wording cannot possibly be consistent with the proposal to uh increase the density of the rl1 zones by 39% I'm sorry that's just not um that's not how language works and that's what not what words are supposed to mean something and if um you mean what you say in the staff memo it is simply inconsistent with a more aggressive approach uh on the rl1 to go from a 19% increase to 39%

[179:03] increase and to ignore substantial um community outreach and the results thereof that indicate that this is a very unpopular concept the will of council May simply say we don't care we want to do it anyway but I think a more moderate approach um should be taken and this should be discussed again in terms of the um dvcp update um this is this is way to aggressive uh for my taste um and it's only on the RL one that I'm making thank you thanks for that Mark Carl can you clarify there I think previously you had a slide that said what the 350 ft width what how many units that would allow oh the 3 it's it's that 4,325 we we took that that increase and we spread that throughout the city so that's what get gave us that 350

[180:03] feet so but there a couple slides later I think you address it directly um that was there was that 40% right so similar to that 39% yep and and so Mark I got a couple other people want to speak but did you want to propose a different buffer zone around bus bus zones around bus routes that would result in a smaller number of allowed units I I would I would look to the to the buffer zone based upon a reduction in lot size to 5,000 square feet rather than 4,000 square feet I think one is a a more reasonable approach to uh adding units to the rl1 Zone than the other um and before we do that we ought have very substantial community outreach uh assuming we're simply going to ignore the community outreach that we've already done um but we don't find satisfactory because it disagrees with our

[181:00] conclusion got it thanks for that all right I got um Ryan and uh Lauren queued up I think Ryan also has a cqu okay go ahead Mark I just wanted to clarify what you said um because there's kind of two different ways we're looking at determining lots that could have duplexes one is by the actual lot size and the other is by the lot location and so you're saying that you would prefer us to do it by the lot size and not by the lot location is that true well I I I think we could do both if we reduce it to 5,000 square feet that that implies a certain number of parcels eligible um for uh for duplexes and if we want to spread those out on the um Transit corridors uh it might make those corridors a little narrower and and and

[182:00] less um intrusive into the surrounding residential neighborhoods so Mark maybe what I'm hearing from you then is a desire to have um a buffer zone around bus corridors of of the amount that would result in an increase of 19% in additional units precisely okay so we're not sure exactly how many feet that would be but whatever feet would result 19% units 200 300 400 whatever it ends up as um okay Ryan did you want to speak to this thank you uh I have three things the first two were replies to things colleagues have said um on the bbcp I I I'm I'm glad Mark raised it and I think it's it's really important that we are being differential to the current bbcp and respect respectful of the process ahead of us and uh I understand that we're within that by definition the the things that we're talking about um as we've have been analyzed for uh whether they'll get outside of

[183:01] those bounds so my read on the be on our current um Place Visa V the B bbcp is the bbcp um uh what's the word I don't know if it encourages but it it certainly opens the door to to what we're contemplating so that's the first thing second thing I agree with um with Tina on being concerned about the F the current and future market for short-term rentals and what that does to housing displacement this is such an important issue that HOAs are taking it up and you know they don't have the power and they don't have the process that we do and so I I do think this is something we should look at more seriously as we go alongside the the building itself um okay and then my third point this was my my uh my primary Point uh I I do support the proposal and um I'm just thinking about how if you have a 4,000 foot house big house in one of these whatever locations turn that into two 2,000 square foot

[184:02] houses um that's great for families however you define families that's great for more people to have Transit ridership and and basically in general to create more economies of scale to get more for Less with our shed infrastructure also on a on a more more traditional perhaps sort of picture of a family I have two small kids and every time another family with small kids moves in within a half a mile it's a blessing and families we want with small kids we I can't speak for all of us but we tend to like other small kids and this is this is this is It's a Blessing when when we make this happen so I I um as as a parent in one of these one of these districts I I I think this is very exciting um and then yeah I think I'll leave it at that thanks right Lauren did you have something else to add yeah go ahead and thanks um so yeah I really appreciate um these great maps

[185:01] and this the staff's recommendation for this targeted approach focusing on our more Transit Rich environments um I don't think this is a wholesale change I find that this to me feels very in line with the BBC in terms of keeping the majority of um the zones single family but still allowing for um [Music] reasonable A diversity of housing types and um helping us move away from car dependency I uh agree with what Tina brought up in terms of I think it's important for us to look at um ways we can disincentivize investor ownership and try and um preserve the ability for um owner occupancy in these areas and I don't know that our next

[186:01] item is the way to do that but I do want us to continue um looking at that I also in terms of looking at how this could at one point we talked about um an inclusionary housing fee for additional square footage and I also look forward to um that piece coming back to us I believe it does at some point I can't remember where that is but um just various ways to try and make sure that the new housing or any density that is added one that we're allowing this duplexing instead of just mega mansions but also if there is additional square footage that we are um using that to help our affordable housing um

[187:00] overall yeah thanks Nicole yeah um so just just a couple of comments uh one is um I think this may be the place to mention it I really would prefer not to do convenient surveys if that's our only real form of Engagement and Outreach that we're doing um it isn't sufficient for me to consider that uh Outreach um when the the samples that we're getting are very different from our population and just looking at the uh demographics of the survey respondents who responded um we only had about it it wasn't even quite 11% renters who responded to that um there the number of people making under $100,000 a year which is about the AR remedan income was 20% um half of the people were over um 35 with the bulk even over 55 um so I I

[188:03] think that you know we get feedback from the folks who have the the time and ability and the knowhow to email us or you know come and speak um at the public hearing but I think we lead ourselves into a trap where we are focused on this as if it aligns with the engagement that we're doing in other areas that are more thorough like with the Boulder Valley comprehensive plan that are more inclusive of the many different people um within within our community um I I really don't I don't want to leave people out and and when we're referring to this as um as Outreach um technically it is but it shouldn't be the whole the whole thing that we're doing um and uh just generally agree with Lauren um the 350 foot proposal aligns um with the Boulder Valley comprehensive plan um and that I I really don't see this being a huge change in the coming decades I

[189:00] think it will be um incremental it will be slow um and lifting up Tina's comments and and Lauren's plus one about um how we finding other ways to incentivize affordability and I think that some of our long-term Financial strategy discussions are a great place for us to be doing that given that we've already um talked about some options there for how we can uh prevent private um or kind of investment ownership and and some of the new properties and things so thank you thanks TAA awesome thank you so much excuse me um I agree with um mayor protim Spear's comments about our um qualitative um um information gathering um it yeah it it uh and in the interim if there is interest to continue to use statistically invalid um um survey methods I would strongly recommend a limitation section

[190:00] that just outlines and recognizes where there may be under representation or over representation more so I mean in addition it will be helpful for us but also uh for all of those who are reading the packet so I just again want to lift up in the interim that one mechanism is to incl include the limitation section um and then just in general wanting to um lift up the need for a deeper collaboration between um water and energy use and housing and planning um I can give that there may be similar water use as it relates to their you know not using so much for lawns and they're would be using it for people I can accept that uh but to generate energy also takes water um and having more people definitely increases energy demand I am all for density uh but I would love us to make sure that we are keeping an eye on um energy water and

[191:01] habitat thank you thanks all right I don't see any other hands raised I'd like to straw pull uh Mark's proposal so the staff recommendation is a a buffer zone of 350 ft around bus quds where duplexes would be allowed and Mark's proposal is is to instead have a buffer zone that would allow for a 19% increase in the number of units and the back of the envelope map says that might be around 150 feet but staff would need to do that calculation Tina you could suggest something different if you'd like but you should turn your microphone off sorry um I want to propose so in in my ideal world we would have some tools to um promote affordability and ownership um um and dissuade this is an investment vehicle at the same time that we make the ordinance I would like those things to happen simultaneously um I'm concerned about we don't have our long-term Financial

[192:00] strategies meeting until Q2 I think it's going to be in April of next year um and I'm um less excited to pass the ordinance without having that in place um and I also I'm alternatively open to doing this change through the bbcp where we would have statistically valid surveys if we don't feel that we've really done engagement on this that has any meaning so Tina what I might do is take that as a separate proposal that I'll check on so as I understood your proposal is that you would want measures in place to assure affordability and say that again encourage and encourage ownership yeah encourage both I I can't assure okay yeah so you'd like measures in place to encourage affordability and ownership um simultaneously with the passage of this ordinance um yeah go ahead and ask a question um I just have a staff question in relation to what Tina just mentioned I know there's no exact

[193:01] science and you do not have a crystal ball so want to start with that um if you were to Envision when people in the in the neighborhoods in these areas would start seeing noticeable changes noticeable increases and you know the number of people there um the you know how houses single family homes being converted to duplexes how how far out would you sort of estimate that understanding it is an estimate but based on your professional expertise I mean we we've discussed it internally it be years to decades is kind of our our thinking on it yep okay so it's not like um things would would change within a year or two if we were working on these other things too so they sort of making the change and then as you know we're waiting the decades for things to happen um that that's that's a time when we could be working on some of the other affordability constraints okay thank

[194:01] you and and I'll just call myself a team just to respond to your proposal I'm I'm definitely interested in exploring those things but we're so much further along with these very specific proposals than the more kind of general what would we do to incentivize affordability and ownership that I would like to pursue those things but I wouldn't make this effort contingent on those things so that's just my personal thinking on it but happy to strole the proposal so yeah go ahead T um I think 19 was that 19% that Mark said was that what he said 19% okay so I'm of course always looking for the middle ground and so I was wondering I don't I know I don't have the votes but I'm if my perfect world would be to do a slower measured change so that the community comes along with us versus gets aggravated and starts screaming so I'm going to suggest 300 feet so just

[195:01] taking it down a little bit for no other reason other than trying to get community to go with us all right I got a 300 feet I got a 300 have a 250 ft 250 ft um could can I ask can I ask a question when we say 350 ft how many blocks is that put part of the city I think that's kind of like a standard block a little bit more than a standard block which is which is about a block I think it's like around 200 feet to 250 feet is about a block and Nicole's got to come in and then I'm going to do a whole bunch of straw pulling for all this stuff we've been talking about I mean a block varies we were saying 200 250 feet maybe something like that all right I'm going to start with I'm going to start with Tina in case the results of that changes anybody else's Minds so Tina's proposal is that we um not pass

[196:01] an ordinance around this until we have also included the measures to um encourage affordability and ownership all in favor of tying those two together 100% raise your hand I got I got two two hands okay uh all in so okay so two there were two votes for that so not majority support on that one better than my last okay um now I think I'm going to go to Marx and if markx is unsuccessful I'm going to go to yours okay ter so Mark's proposal was to reduce the buffer amount so that it would increase result in an increase of 19% allowed units maybe around 100 50 ft staff would have to have to do the calculation raise your hand if you're in favor of that I got I got one on that one and then um Tera you got um 300 feet

[197:01] tera's proposal is 300 feet instead of the staff recommendation of 350 ft so all in favor of a 300 feet buffer instead of a 350 fet buffer raise your hand right I got two so yeah Mark Mark did as well um so by process of elimination I think we've ended back on the staff recommendation uh to proceed forward with great thank you do we Teresa did you want maybe we could still pull that I could still straw pull that yeah yeah I'm I'm if I'm counting votes correctly I'm still not seeing a majority yet okay let's give it a try all right um thanks that and you're right I should be straw pulling that that's an excellent point all in favor of moving forward with the staff recommendation um raise your hand three four five I got I got five oh six we got six okay glad we clarified that thank

[198:01] you all right well moving on and I'll note that we're at time for the item in the meeting so maybe we can move through the last two fairly quickly okay so suggestion four relates to um the owner occupancy piece um so our analysis this is pretty similar to what we had presented in April um we we certainly understand the concerns about investment properties and we've already been hearing that in the discussion tonight um as far as you know our our job as staff is to you know make recommendations based on um how how something meets the project goals or not I'd say based on meeting the project goals we're recommending against the owner occupancy piece just based on the fact that that would be a pretty big barrier to people adding units um there's also the concern about Staffing on this one because monitoring owner occupancy on a very large part of the city would actually probably necessitate additional staff having to be hired to

[199:01] monitor this um so it does cause some concern there that said we do understand the concern and and and don't disagree that maybe there are other uh methods to um discourage investor uh properties from propagating as a result of this change change uh Council previously had requested that we move forward with this particular option to get uh Community feedback and as we talked about there was uh quite a bit of support for it when we went to planning board with this they unanimously did not support the owner occupancy requirement because it would be a disincentive to creating new housing and that it does create um pretty significant administrative challenges within our department um they did all again acknowledge uh the the the concern as you are tonight and uh did want to look at maybe other methods to um to deal with this other than zoning so that brings us back to the staff recommendation of not recommending owner occupancy through zoning at this time

[200:01] look at other methods thanks Carl clarifying questions for Carl I yeah Lauren partially because I want to bring this to light but so if if a person who owned a property and built a duplex then relocated but still owned the property what would they be required to do in order to meet an owner occupancy requirement because the unit would already be built we're not entirely sure about that it's kind of a difficult thing I we we do something similar to this now with an Adu where there's a declaration of use that gets recorded with the property so basically requires at least one person who owns the property to to live on the property so I think it would be something along the lines of that and I know with an Adu you typically have to

[201:00] if if you can't comply with it you have to like remove what makes it a dwelling unit typically and so it just seems like that would potentially lead us to a strange place where we would have a second housing unit that would be not have a kitchen or a showering facility and sitting potentially vacant and I just the unintended consequences seem difficult to deal with yeah thanks great Point um not seeing any other questions so we have a staff recommendation of not requiring owner occupancy uh does anyone disagree with that recommendation wants to speak to a difference I am seeing no hand hands raised so looks like we got agreement with you all to not move forward with an owner occupancy requirement okay all right and then uh the last suggestion relates to exempting out projects that are 100% permanently affordable from the

[202:02] site review process to encourage more affordable units to streamline the review for those project and uh in lie of that uh have them go through an administrative review for design review that's reviewed um with our our housing department that has a lot of qualitative criteria that are similar to site review so Council was in support of this um last time we discussed it so we've moved forward with this proposal we just want to make clear that this would be 100% permanently affordable project that does not require like a height bonus or a height modification we're not recommending that since that would require site review you know to get planning board approval and it also for the community benefit requirements that apply to those projects we wouldn't want to lose that um when we took this to planning board there was the reception on the topic was mixed um there were there was concern that they would these projects that generally would benefit

[203:00] from comments from planning board either through concept plan or through site review would be lost um so there was there was more um mixed reception on this topic not a lot of support that we sensed from planning board on uh exempting them out uh from site view uh we're we're continuing to uh recommend that we we think that there's a mechanism to qualitatively review these projects through the design review process and we'll stand by that great questions for step on this one CH well I'm I'm not really sure what are the cons why would planning board feel this way can you give us the list of conss that you think for us in other words say that we don't want to do this part of it is I think they they wanted to get more information about whether it was what what like what was the benefit to the City by doing this and what's the benefit to BHP I think we didn't have a clear understanding of what BHP thought

[204:00] at that time we've since followed up with BHP and they've indicated to us that they would be supportive of of not having to go through like the callup process or having a planning board hearing because there would be some Savings in time um by not going to planning board um a lot of the expense is still going to be there because they'd have to produce materials that are analogous to a site review but BHP did Express support when we talked to them about it my only concern would be like design element because we have such pretty designs right now in our BHP properties in our so you're saying though that I don't need to worry about that I mean again a lot of the criteria that apply through the design review is very similar to site it's not exactly the same um part of part of our thinking is we've already been doing this for certain projects like offsite projects so there's been several years of of of this going on it's just it would put all

[205:00] of the affordable projects except for the ones you know at four or five stories into that process Tina ran you can quate I just I think this is an an appropriate sequence but T I wanted to just mention um I I did talk to one of the planning board members who um had concerns about this and the uh part of excuse me part of the thinking from PL at least one planning board member that had concerns about this is that um some of the the um the compliments you just paid to recent work is in the city is in part coming from Innovations improvements that the planning board has made in the way that it um gives guidance on site design and placemaking and um so that was a perspective I heard and I think it's a good perspective and I'd like to

[206:00] acknowledge it I think I'm still probably gonna go with the staff proposal but I I think it's it's not easy but yeah um do we give other is there anything else that we can give affordable developments I mean do they have to pay permit fees if they do 100% affordable or they do but I I think there's some subsidies from housing that go for those projects am I saying that wrong I I mean I can I can speak to that we charged them all the same fees yeah but the city's affordable housing fund is off is usually kicking in a large quantity of money to enable those projects yeah and then there's also going to be the expedited review that is going to apply in the next few years too and a version of it already exists that the affordable is the only type of uh land use review that we put at the top of the list right now and then as Carl's alluding to the state requirement is coming up to so we do expedite them anyway yeah okay and um yeah I mean I I

[207:01] think any incentives would be great um I wouldn't want to limit ourselves to that TAA and then Lauren can you speak more to the concerns that were lifted by the center for people with disabilities and mentioned that there were workarounds to ensure um that the housing that it per 100% permanent Supportive Housing um that there are other mechanisms and strategies to ensure that we're not only meeting Ada but we're exceeding Ada yeah that part of the memo was part of the analysis that we had sent Council in April and that was more on the topic of whether we should incentivize missing middle projects not permanently affordable projects by exempting them out of site review so uh we were asked by one council member to talk to the center of for people with disabilities to see if they felt that that was a housing type that should be incentivized in that manner and there was some concern that um some of those housing

[208:00] types may not be the greatest for Ada accessibility and therefore we already are incentivizing it through a number of other things that we've talked about tonight that maybe we shouldn't do it through site review so that's how it evolved to let's look at just permanently affordable projects let's incentivize that by exempting it out thank you I really like the direction of this I'm someone who you know I think our um permanently affordable projects face a lot of challenges with funding and risk always adds substantially to that and so when you go through a site review process you're increasing risk I do however also get where planning is coming from and I think there might be a size threshold here that potentially projects that you know where you're talking about multiple buildings and a big site that that has a

[209:00] lot more things that you might need to adjust around how it's interfacing with trans with other you know transportation systems and community space and all of that I think they're that for those much larger projects where they can Al spread the risk and and the cost of that risk out over more units I think it still makes sense for them to go through a site review process so I think there's and I don't know what that number is I'm hoping you can recommend something for us but to me there is a limit to where I feel comfortable with exempting 100% affordable projects so it sounds like we're getting into comments here oh sorry um so I but I I haven't seen any other questions so I think we're in the comments phase now Lauren's got an idea of of only doing this for projects up to a certain size and I said Tara and then Mark are interested in saying something about that yeah I agree with that first

[210:00] of all not all permanently affordable not all psh uh developers are fashion forward should I say some of them aren't as their properties aren't as pretty so I think that because it's such a large mass that we're talking about with some of these that I agree with Lauren that we should do that I agree with you Lauren can we call that the Wier folen Amendment or what and just to clarify we're talking about permanently affordable not permanent Supportive Housing so not psh but permanently affordable uh Mark yeah I'm gonna go with the staff recommendation on this look in in development uh time is money and we want our housing authority to be able to develop at the least possible cost um and being able to uh avoid a site review um has a direct monetary

[211:02] consequence um to BHP and uh if you've taken a tour of their properties they they're very welld designed I don't think that you know this is not an agency that um um just the fundamentals of design to you know to do whatever they want um but accelerating their development process by whether it's a few weeks or or a couple of months uh is an important uh is is important to them and will enable them to save a substantial amount of money um as they you know bring these projects uh along so I'm going to go with the staff recommendation on this I think it's um we have an extremely extremely responsible um uh housing authority and uh I'd like to be supportive of their

[212:01] efforts thanks Mark Nicole and then I'll call on myself yeah um I'm gonna agree uh with Mark on this one um Tina you brought up the do Cog study a little bit earlier and talking about how you know the bulk of what we're going to need is permanently affordable um uh or affordable housing in um the coming decades and so um I I do support the staff recommendation here um I think even even just a little bit of extra speed is going to make a difference when we're trying to um just reconcile the Deep need we have for more affordable housing uh in the community and I would be willing to sacri this may this I may get stuff thrown at me at the next meeting but I would be willing to sacrifice um a little bit of control over the design in order to get a slightly faster um build on these permanently affordable projects yeah I'll chime in and uh agree with Mark and Nicole here on this one um I think most of our 100% permanently

[213:00] affordable developments by far the most are from Boulder housing partners and Mark appreciate your service as our Council Le is on to BHP and so you know very well how incredibly Well they um work and the high quality of the projects that they produce and also it's an incentive it so it will save um some time and some money for these projects but also it would be an incentive a developer might look at a project and be like um I think I could make 100% affordable work and you know what if I do that I remove the risk from the project and move through more quickly and so my hope would be we'd get an occasional extra one with this incentive as well um any other comments on this before we go to straw pole seeing none um so uh Lauren has a proposal to um only exempt uh certain projects of larger s of smaller size from the site review process and larger ones would still be subject the threshold TBD all in favor uh of that please raise your hand I got

[214:02] three um so then and then how about all in favor of the staff recommendation to exempt all permanently affordable all right all right so after the amendment failed everybody's still in favor of the staff recommendation um so so appreciate you bringing that forward I was very excited to see this by the way I've always wanted to do something like this so when I saw that recommendation I really appreciated it coming forward Co all right do you need anything else from us uh just have the conclusion so um as we've noted throughout the presentation we find that these recommendations from staff are consistent with the goals set out for the project uh if you add all the things up through all the changes this would add the potential for 7500 housing units again over the long term we're talking years and decades like we were talking about um other changes that go beyond the bbcp would be considered as part of phase two of this project so that's looking at other opportunities for

[215:00] missing middle looking at other housing types like tow houses Cottage courts things like that and and maybe other areas for housing throughout the city but is also looking at um limited mixed juice maybe in poent potential areas along corridors to to add to 15-minute neighborhood goals um and exploring with the community what um the appetite is for those uh and then as far as next steps we're going to move forward with drafting the ordinance our goal is to get it uh to and through the process uh through by February 2025 uh we we are looking to do office hours to get more input on on the actual technical language in the ordinances this is our tenative schedule I I think since a lot of these changes aren't deviating too much from the recommendation I think we can try try to hold to them uh right now we have a November date for planning board uh housing Advisory board on November 20th and then we would be coming back to council for first reading on December 19th uh and then second reading on January 9th that's the current schedule

[216:00] we have yeah Tina which which reading would be the public hearing the second reading on January 9th okay great well I guess that wraps us up uh Carl just want to Express an immense amount of gratitude to your extraordinary work on this you're sitting there all by yourself and all this incredibly technical stuff and uh just the analysis and the explanation is truly remarkable I do get a lot of help from people behind me on the mapping and and data and all that too but thank you right and thanks to other uh planning department staff for being here tonight as well and supporting all right that brings us to the end of our agenda any final thoughts before I G's closed not seeing 32 p.m. thanks everybody you're all in two weeks see you

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