May 22, 2025 — City Council Joint Session

Transcript

Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.

[5:18] But we are at six o'clock here. So Lauren, uh, welcome everyone to the Thursday, November, uh, no, no, not November 14th. What day is today? May 22nd. Uh, the Thursday, May 22nd special meeting of the city council. Um and it is a joint working session with the planning board. I am so pleased to have our amazing planning board members here joining us today as well as a very large quantity of our planning folks as well. There's the amount of talent in this room is incalculable. Um so let's go ahead. I will call the meeting to order. I'm going to gav us again and uh can we do

[6:02] the roll call for city council please? Yes sir. Thank you and good evening everyone and thank you for joining us. We'll start the night's roll call with council member Benjamin present. Mayor Brockett present. Mayor Pro Tim Folks present. Council member Marquis present. Shuhard here. Spear present. Wallik. And Winer present. Mayor we have our quorum. Very good. I would like to now pass it over to planning board chair Mark McIntyre. Okay. Welcome to the joint session with council and our planning board. Um shall I do the roll call or you do the roll call on Okay. All right. I believe we have I'll start with uh online. Laura, are you there

[7:01] online? And I don't know if any Laura is planning on being online. We're going to assume she's okay. Hi Mark, I'm here. Thank you. Great. Thank you. All right. Uh Claudia here. Hands I guess I'm supposed to do it by last name. Robels here. Roberts present. And um Oh, Kurt Nordback here. And is uh planning board member Boone with us online? Oh, he's not going to be. Okay. So, member Boone is absent and I'm present. Okay. Back to back to you, Mayor. A formal call to order. Uh, I call the planning board meeting to order. There we go. Thank you.

[8:00] All right. Well, uh, we are called to order. We are roll called and I will now hand it over to our staff um to do our joint work or Elicia, would you like to read this into the record for us so we get super formal about it? Yes, sir. Thank you. Item 1A on tonight's agenda is the joint working session with the planning board on the 2025 major updates to the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan. Thanks so much. I'll put it over to you, Nuria. Thank you so much, Mayor. And uh I will not take up time. Just want to thank you and appreciate everyone for joining us tonight. Uh I want to say that I was not the one supposed to open it up. Uh our director of planning and development services, Brad Mueller, uh was just here. uh and he has been called away for uh a family emergency. So I apologize that he has left us. Um and with that I'm going to pass it over to uh I believe Chris uh Sarah. Thank you Nuria. Um hello planning board

[9:00] and council members. Um I'm Sarah Horn, senior planner and the project manager for the comprehensive plan update. Um this evening we're happy to down there. Okay. This evening, we're happy to be here with you to give you a project update and have a conversation on how we move forward over the summer. Before we get started, I just want to say that I am really thrilled to be part of such an amazing core team. Um, and that includes um Amelia Harvey to my left, Vivian Castro Waldridge, Tess Shorn, Christopher Johnson. In the audience, we have Chris Wranglo and Tucker Horsch. and then um not here in person but in spirit, Kathleen King and Becca Heb. So um and many other colleagues, but the core team, they just um amaze me every day. So thank you guys. And then um I also want to recognize two fabulous colleagues from Housing and Human Services, Holly Hendrickson and Lauren Click from um Community Vitality, the Office of Arts and Culture. They're going to present on their projects here in just a minute. Um, and for people

[10:02] watching online, if you can look at the screen, these are all the city council and planning board members. A couple are absent today, but Tess on our team worked really hard to find all of your head shot, so we wanted to make sure we shared them. And while we and while we don't have their head shot, um I just want to mention that our county colleague Hannah Hipley um who we're working close closely with on the project met with um the county planning commission and board of county commissioners yesterday and KJ also attended that meeting. And now to the purpose of our special meeting tonight. We want to confirm the updated vision statement, community values, and areas of focus for community conversations with you tonight and identify concepts to be explored further over the summer. And as you can see on this slide, we have a lot of content to cover and import important discussions to have tonight. We'll need everyone's help to keep us on track and be respectful of the time we have together. So, buckle in. We have a presentation for you tonight broken into two parts. Part one

[11:01] will focus on complimentary projects, um, an engagement update and the vision, values, and focus areas for community conversations. Then we'll move to part two which focuses on the concepts we've prepared based on community feedback and staff input. These are the concept concepts our team intends to study over the summer um based on your feedback tonight. After the presentation we'll have a short break and then we'll dive into the discussion around these concepts. Then we'll close out the meeting with a look at next steps. So before we jump into all things comp plan update, we wanted to highlight a few other of the ongoing projects that are informing our work and tie into the comp plan. So Holly and Lauren will provide brief updates um on the first two projects, the Bloomberg Harvard city leadership initiative innovation track and the Boulder Arts blueprint. We won't go over the last two projects, the economic vitality strategy and improvement districts analysis and commercial areas blueprint because council recently received updates on these from the project's teams. Um, we

[12:01] recognize that planning board um hasn't gotten those updates, but you're welcome to look at the memos online and or we're happy to send those to you if you'd like. Um, so I'm going to now pass it over to Holly to talk about the first project. Great. Thank you so much. Um, so I'm What' you say? You're right in there. Okay, we'll do ma'am. Um, so I'm Holly Hendrickson. I'm with Housing and Human Services. I'm a senior project manager for housing and human services, but I am the project manager for this Bloomberg Harvard city leadership innovation track. Um, so I'll just uh I'm going to just quickly review the purpose, what we're doing in this innovation track to give you a better idea of kind of the goals here and our timeline. Um, so this is a year-long leadership management program where we're led by a team from the Bloomberg Philanthropies, this Bloomberg city leadership team that facilitates this

[13:00] this year-long process. So, it's like a very intentional, very specific process that we're going through that these facilitators are leading us through. Um, we have a cross departmental team. Uh, there's nine of us that are working really closely on this project. So there's three of us from housing and human services. There's one from planning and development services. Um utilities, human uh community vitality and innovation and technology. Um so we have like this great cross departmental team that's that's diving into this work. Um so like I said, I'm going to walk you so there's four phases to this project uh or this program. So I'm just going to walk you through the phases and kind of where what we've done so far and what we're going going to do. Um so the first phase is the aim phase. So if you want to advance the slide it'll help. Okay. So the aim of this program the aim is stands for the ambitious impact impactful mission. And the ambitious impactful mission that was identified back in October uh is the

[14:01] following. By 2035, we will expand and sustain innovative, attainable housing options so that Boulder becomes a more vibrant and inclusive community reflecting people from all backgrounds. Um, so this is kind of our north star in the process. We we ca the team came up with it back in October or the end of last year and we kind of keep this as like the north star. we keep looking at this as the thing we're trying to achieve through this process. Um so after that was established the team was the team was established we dove in to the design or the research design phase. So it's this light purple phase which was a a lot kind of like the bulk of the work that we've done so far has been in designing research. So with the program facilitator, we designed a research plan um and it was a very intentionally designed research plan with a lot with

[15:00] you know a whole team of um people from John's Hopkins and you know a whole a whole team of us. Um so after the research plan was established we dove into what we called our research sprint. So we identified the affected parties within our community that this aim involved. Um and then we conducted lots and lots of interviews. We gathered lots of feedback from the community. Um and we then therefore synthesized the data and identified like highle research insights. So I'm kind of leading you through this like long process that we went through with the research design. Um just recently in the past few weeks we held four ideiation sessions. So these were essentially brainstorm sessions and we through these brainstorm sessions we gathered over 800 ideas from different um these these four different groups and we just completed that. Um so like there's a little yellow star at the bottom uh indicated that we're we are

[16:00] just entering in our activate sta phase. Uh, and in this phase, we're taking we're prioritizing all of these ideas that came, pulling out our top like I think there's eight to 10 that we're looking for and we're going to start testing some of these ideas to this program calls them prototyping, but we're essentially testing these ideas to see if there's any legs, see if we can actually do anything with these ideas in our community. Um everything wraps up in July and in July we're going to be identifying so we'll have tested two ideas um we'll have a portfolio of 10 total ideas um that we can kind of further after the program ends. Uh and then um what else was I going to say about that? One of the problems with this program is we know exactly how much they've told us so far. And so where we are in this yellow, I'm kind of guessing exactly how what what the future looks like here. Um

[17:02] so our goal I will say ultimately we're going to have these ideas. We'll end in about July or August and we believe the timing here is ideal because we'll have this portfolio of ideas that we can kind of somehow feed into this comprehensive planning process. So there's a timing there's a timing that works with all of this. Um, and hopefully those ideas will kind of be beneficial to how this process goes forward. Okay, so I'll leave it at that. Hi everyone, my name is Lauren Click. I manage your office of arts and culture in the community vitality department. I am so excited to share a very brief three slide update on the Boulder Arts Blueprint. This will be the new plan to guide arts and culture policy, programs, and funding. So, what is the arts blueprint? It is a long-term initiative

[18:02] with a broad focus on strengthening Boulder's entire cultural ecosystem. This will translate highlevel policies from the comprehensive plan into concrete tactics and work plans for our office. It'll also help inform citywide cultural policies and priorities and establish a shared vision for departments and leaders and help us steward the arts, culture, and heritage tax. Next, please. Thank you. We began this in late 2024 and we have intentionally aligned to the comprehensive plan. We are in phase one now and phase two will run through early 2026. The planning horizon for our last oh why and why now? The planning horizon for the last cultural plan was reached in 2024. Voters passed the 20-year arts, culture, and heritage tax, which runs from this year until 2045. Our creative community is still navigating challenges from uh postcoid.

[19:00] And at the same time, opportunities like hosting the Sundance Film Festival has elevated the importance of cultural investment and planning. And thank you to all of you who are involved in bringing the bid and bringing Sundance Film Festival to our community. Next, please. Progress to date. Um, here's what we have accomplished so far. For phase one, we've conducted extensive research, benchmarking, and engagement with the community, often overlapping with the comprehensive plans. Excellent events. Thank you so much for partnering with us on all of these. We've also used the RA race equity rapid response tool to begin assessing early recommendations for any unintended impacts. We've also reviewed the engagement activities with our city expert staff to ensure that phase two covers any kind of gaps missing. And I think in closing, I just want to say that this is a really important moment for arts and culture in Boulder. I think you all know that the blueprint is really going to strengthen our cultural ecosystem in ways that

[20:01] support your city council and planning board priorities and our city's overall goals. Thank you. Good evening all. My name is Vivian Castro Woolridge and I'm leading the engagement strategy and imple implementation for the plan update. It's been really wonderful to work alongside these other teams and projects to continue to build more voices into the comp plan process. And I'm going to share with you in a few slides where we are um currently in the process and discuss how we've been working with the community and what we've learned along the way. The last time we had this group all together was in February as we were wrapping up the existing conditions work in the Boulder today phase and moving into phase two, a Boulder tomorrow. And we're now ready to complete the second phase and dive into policy conversations and work. Engagement has been woven into the process throughout the project to

[21:00] make sure we're hearing diverse perspectives, new ideas, and giving multiple opportunities to be heard. and the community process for the comprehensive plan update launched last October with the community openhouse. Uh many of you attended that and since that openhouse, we've tried a lot of different uh methods for engagement and have had great participation across the community. Here's some uh highlights. We've colle collected over 4,000 comments across 31 different events and opportunities. Over a thousand people have participated so far, which is amazing. And thank you to everyone who has helped us connect with community members over this time. And we've also held 10 events specifically to reach uh groups historically excluded from planning processes and reached over 250 people through these efforts. And all of that engagement has been in informing the vision, values, uh and areas of focus that you'll be reviewing tonight. and we'll explain how

[22:02] the engagement process has supported multiple iteration cycles on these important pieces of the plan to get us to the place uh where we are tonight. And since we're trying new things in the process and stretching our engagement practice, we wanted to share back with you some lessons that we're learning along the way about engagement. First, we found that partnering with local community organizations like Modus Theater and Once in Future Green has been really effective in reaching new people that don't typically participate in such local government processes and helping ensure belonging in this process and hopefully beyond. Second, long range planning is not a particularly well-known topic for a lot of community members. And so, we put a lot of effort into educating people about the process and why participation is important. But we're also working to keep pace um and momentum and deliver the project on schedule. So uh so that's been a challenge for us. And third lesson to share is based on what we're hearing. Um

[23:02] and it's that fear can sometimes hold us back from finding common ground. And at the core from the input we're hearing, we find that people often want the same thing but perhaps coming at an issue from a different angle or passion or knowledge base or even with fear. fear of scarcity of resources or of not being heard or of not belonging or of change or of not enough change. Um and so as we move to the next phase of work um and our engagement, we thought it'd be valuable to share that while the methods of targeted outreach and more traditional exercises have been successful at reaching a wide variety of populations and hearing lots of diverse perspectives. We do want to put our efforts into getting diverse groups together in the same room to tackle the issues of uh the comp plan. and we're very much looking forward to working with Unifi and the community assembly over the summer and the fall to help us achieve this goal of more dialogue and deliberation. Thank you and I'll now

[24:01] turn it over to Tess. Hello everyone. My name is Tess Sha and I'm a city planner on this team working on the major update to this plan. First, I'm going to walk you through the vision, values, and focus areas. So, the vision statement is intended to express what the community aspires to be in the future. While it's challenging to craft a vision that captures all the wonderful input we've heard so far, we've cycled through drafts with the community and internally multiple times. Based on that input, the recommended vision statement is our community is welcoming, diverse, and committed to the Boulder Valley. We balance economic and housing opportunities with respect for nature and open lands. Serve as a model to others as we face a changing climate and leverage our community assets and innovative spirit for the benefit of future generations.

[25:01] Next, we analyzed the previous values described in the 2015 comprehensive plan as well as the city's guiding sustainability, equity, and resiliency framework, the guiding principles of Boulder County, and then most importantly, we've gathered community input on values throughout the process so far, and we found that the sustainability, equity, and resilience framework goals really do represent the values that the community holds for the future. of the Boulder Valley and they also align with and in fact progress the values that were described in the 2015 plan. So we will carry these seven values forward through the comprehensive plan. This will also help to strengthen the relationship between the comprehensive plan and the SER framework. Finally, we are recommending seven areas of focus for this plan update process. And to clear up any confusion, these

[26:00] areas of focus describe the topics that the community most wants the plan process to address. Community members have identified these topics as either areas where we have great challenges or areas of strength that they would like the plan to build upon. They are not meant to indicate that these are the only issues that we are considering in the process. On the left of the screen is the list of key topics that came out of the fee February 5th for body meeting you all attended. Um as the engagement process has gone on since um and we've had the opportunity to hear from new voices um we've identified some new or revised topic areas. This is an example of how the community feedback is helping drive the process and outcomes of the plan. Our team has worked hard to identify policy gaps from the 2015 plan based on these areas of focus um that were identified by the community and we

[27:00] also worked with other city departments on existing and future equity considerations for each of these focus areas of focus. Um and the memo goes into more detail about this analysis for today. However, I will now go through what we've heard from the community about each area of focus in a little more detail. Starting with climate action, we have received many comments from a passionate community who are greatly concerned about the climate. They have a lot of ideas to adapt to climate change in the future. These ideas range from small-scale mitigation tactics to cross- sector solutions. Economic issues did not initially rise to the top of community interests, but as the engagement process has gone on, we've heard about a couple of issues. One such being the support of local businesses at a law at a range of scale from micro businesses to some of our large primary employers. Another thing that's been top of mind for community

[28:01] members is finding ways to build community wealth. Boulder is an expensive place to live and we've heard people say that they want to be able to learn more about economic e opportunities especially around entrepreneurship so they can build their own family finances and afford quality of life here. Similar similarly the concept of food systems is a new focus area because we've received so much interest and feedback through the engagement process on this topic. People are interested in agricultural practices and opportunities as well as increasing communitywide access to local and nutritious food. Probably no surprise to this group, housing issues remain a top interest of the community. In general, most comments around this issue describe a need to find ways to increase the housing supply, but we do get comments in opposition to this idea as well. Another focus area that has risen to the

[29:01] forefront as we've collected more input from the community is the idea that Boulder is and should be a multicultural and multi-generational community. Community members seek to strengthen social connections and foster belonging. The next focus area is safety, which continues to be a priority issue for community members. perception of safety in public spaces and planning for wildfire being at the top of mind in a lot of engagement work we've done. Finally, the community remains passionate about increasing mobility choices into the future and wants to continue to build out the network for pedestrian and cyclists. There is also major focus on addressing performance issues uh related to the public transit service. Oh, all right. That was a lot. Um, that concludes the summary of the vision, values, and the seven focus areas um or areas of focus. These are the two

[30:02] questions that will guide you for this part of the meeting. Um, and here is where we'll open it up for the first discussion. Mayor Brockett. All right. Thanks so much for that excellent presentation from the variety of you. Lots of great information that was very fascinating to hear. So, let's open it up. um to questions. I'll say I'll just open the floor for questions there. We have the vision and the values. We have the areas of focus. And if people have questions about any of that, I would welcome those. Now, uh there's a lot of you. We're all at the same level here. So, hold your uh hold your hand up high if you could when you have a question to ask. And I'll watch for Laura online as well. Who wants to get a start? I've got I can't even see who it is. Claudia. Claudia. and then Tina. Hi, thank you. Let me try to get close enough here. Um, I have a question about areas of focus. And if I understand correctly, we

[31:00] have the community assembly working on the topic of 15minute neighborhoods. Is that right? And I'm just curious how that um work connects to the focus areas. I'd like I could imagine 15inute neighborhoods being a focus area in its own right, but it's not in this listing. So, how does that topic and that work fit in? Great. Thank you for the Thank you for the question, Christopher Johnson, comprehensive planning, senior manager. Uh the uh the 50-minute neighborhoods, you're correct. The community assembly is focused on that particular topic. Part of why we have not identified that as a specific area of focus in the broader uh community conversation is is because we have that group that is specifically uh looking at that. I agree that it it it's has sort of been identified as its own area of focus and potentially has the ability to influence a number of these factors like travel options and our housing choice and opportunity um small local inclusive economy etc. So really the the 50-minute

[32:02] neighborhood will almost serve as a bit of an umbrella to a lot of these factors. Um but that's partly why we didn't call it out as a as a separate topic. I can also just share that in the next u meeting which is on the 31st. The assembly members will be looking at the focus areas and talking about which ones they feel are most closely linked to 15-minute neighborhoods and would like to dive into deeper. And so we're seeing 15minute neighborhoods as more like a like a filter that they can all connect to potentially. Great. Thank you. Yeah, Tina. Yeah. On the uh local um the farming and the food systems when we're talking about land use um is there enough farming land in the city of Boulder or we also really thinking broadly about the county land? Yeah, thank you for the question. Yes, we are absolutely thinking about the county lands as well. And this is a this is a particular um particularly interesting topic where we have a lot of

[33:01] crossover with our county colleagues and the decisions that the planning commission and board of county commissioners will be able to involve themselves in. Um you know, it's interesting because it is a bit of an overlap between city-owned property in many cases of open space lands that's used for agricultural practices. Uh but that does exist out in the county and so there's a crossjurisdictional um collaboration that needs to occur with that. And do we feel that we're moving forward in partnership with the county from the beginning in this conversation or would we I just I want to make sure that we're in alignment with the county because that doesn't always happen organically. Sure. Sure. Well, the good news is is yes, the the county, particularly county staff, has been involved from the very beginning on on the project. Um, and as Sarah mentioned, uh, we had a very similar conversation. It was much shorter. They their agenda was limited, so we only had about an hour, but we had a similar conversation with both planning commission and board

[34:00] of county commissioners um, on these topics and and some of the concepts that we'll be sharing later in the evening. So, I do believe there's alignment and there certainly is a lot of um uh cross discussions between our county staff colleagues and and ourselves. Any other Mark? Okay. Thank you. Somebody needs to know how to do this. Um, if my math is correct, and it unfortunately usually is not, um, it seems that about 2% of our housing stock is um would be classified as appropriate for middle income um tenants and and and purchasers. Are we going to be discussing strategies for increasing um the level of middle inome housing to something a little more robust than 2%. Yeah, that that is certainly a a topic of interest in something that we would

[35:00] continue to explore throughout the summer and the fall um as we have those additional community conversations and then ultimately as we get into conversations around possible land use map changes and those kinds of things. those those will be policies that we'll be um looking at and and weighing trade-offs and understanding what what the community interest is, but then also I think what um what our role or what the opportunities are for us to uh section out or target a particular type of housing and what uh you know what opportunities we can do to to influence that and encourage that type of u development. Kurt and then I have Nicole and then Lauren. I was surprised that in your community conversations it sounded like affordability was not a particularly high area of interest. Um and that just it seems a little odd. And so I saw that you were sort of flowing from the affordability into four different areas. But in terms of the more dis um detailed descriptions of those, I really only saw

[36:01] it coming up in the housing context. And so I guess I'm looking to see some sort of a a verification that it really will be an area of emphasis in those other areas of focus. I can maybe start by saying that the four main um things that we heard about where affordability is really an issue is childare, healthcare, housing and food. Those really rose to the top. Uh what we also heard was that like a desire to actually have more economic opportunity for people to um have more agency and and and um be able to afford living here because it's a high-cost environment. So a realization that that is not going to go away and that um resources you know to subsidize all of these things is very difficult. And so the focus and also we found it confusing in community conversations when we were talking about housing. people often

[37:01] wanted to talk about um affordability issues and so instead of having affordable living as like a separate we now talk about affordability under housing and food systems in particular for our areas of focus. It doesn't mean that there aren't other conversations to be had but for areas of focus it's um food and and housing are the are the important ones. Does that answer your question? Yeah, that's good for now. Thanks. Yeah, Nicole, then Lauren. Um, and Erin, can you just clarify, are we just doing the first question or any question that you have on either of those two? Should I do both now? Yes, please. Okay. Thank you. U, first of all, just thank you. I I really I so appreciate all the um engagement work that you all are doing. Uh, and really appreciate you showing us what's changed in in your thinking as well as this has evolved from um from the engagement. Um, I just actually had some questions, more

[38:00] specific ones about kind of word choices and how things changed um around the vision statement as well as some of the phrasing of the focus areas. Um, with the vision statement when it changed from um the first to the second, I was just curious why um accessible and equitable opportunity came out. You know, I think it was uh it was mostly just a a process of us of taking all of that community input um that we had received and starting to um you know, filter through that and come up with different words. Obviously, it's it's nearly impossible to you know, choose the right word for um for every situation when you're trying to craft a vision statement that is applies citywide or valleywide. Um it's not that those those two things are not uh are not important uh or um we see them as being sort of incorporated through some of the other word choices and the other descriptions that we've included. Um but there was no there was no um you know specific reason why those were were

[39:00] removed or replaced with other words. Okay. Thank you. Um, and then it seemed like the original one was a little bit more active as well, um, and saying our community embraces versus our community is, um, kind of a like a path to how we might get to some of those things. So, I was just curious if there was a reason that that came out as well. Yeah, I think you know similarly um when crafting a vision statement it it's a it's a bit of an art and a science in terms of uh you know trying to strike that right balance between um sort of the actionoriented but also just uh painting this picture of 20 50 100 years from now sort of who we are. Um and so we you know we made the decision to write it um really as a this this is what we are or who we who we are as opposed to um uh you know focusing on the things we need to do to get there um that we feel like will be captured more uh in more detail and more descriptively through the values of the STR framework and then ultimately the policies of the

[40:00] plan itself. Thank you. Um and then I was wondering what does it mean to be committed to the Boulder Valley? That's a great question. What does it mean to you? I really And I have to say while I appreciate the enthusiasm in the audience, if we can have quiet please from the attendees. It was just like I I I didn't know what that meant. And so I was just curious what that was getting to. You know, I I think it I think it draws on um it it from our perspective, it draws on the passion that people have for this place, right? And there are people that have been here for a very long time and that care deeply about the community and and care deeply about um the way things were or have been and maybe the way that they would be in the future. There's also people that are brand new to this community that care about it and see the potential and see the opportunity here. And so, um, you know, commitment is is something that, if anyone's married in the room, you know, commitment is something that is, uh, you know, is work and it and it it takes hard work and it's it's not always perfect. Sometimes it's messy, but, um,

[41:01] but you're committed to it and you're going to do what it takes to to do it right. Yep. Okay. No, thank you for explaining that. That's helpful. Um, and then just around uh, some of the focus area um, wording there, too. One of the things that I got from the um engagement summaries and things is that with food systems in particular um it seems like there was a real desire for equitable food systems and so I was just wondering how you see equity kind of fitting into these focus areas since it's not really named explicitly. Yeah, sure. I mean really the the um you know the fact that that we are using our SER framework and and um carrying those goals down through the comp plan and and describing our our city values of those seven goals and then ultimately that will translate through our citywide strategic plan, our department plans, etc. I mean that that roots equity in everything that we do and the and the conversations we're having. So, um, even though we haven't called that out specifically, it is embedded within each of those focus

[42:00] areas and and will be a focus. Um, we've, uh, we'll get to it a little bit later, uh, in the evening, but talking about as we move into this next phase of work, uh, we will be using the racial equity instrument to evaluate, uh, all of our different policy choices and options so that we understand what some of those potential harms or benefits might be to different members of the community. Cool. Thank you. Um, and then I think I think you you just asked my uh last or answer my last question, but I'm going to ask it anyway just to make sure I'm understanding correctly. Um, so with the the climate action focus area, one of the things we've been talking about so much lately um as a city is the idea of climate uh adaptation, resilience, things like that. And so is it the same thing there that that really that climate action if that's the focus area still has the sustainability, equity, and resilience embedded into it. And so that's where it Yes. where you expect it to come out. Yes. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. Lauren and then Mark.

[43:00] Thank you for putting this all together for us. Um I had some questions in a similar vein to Nicole. I noticed some similar things and I think first I just want to start off. Are is the vision and values statements intended to be complete at this point or are we still like workshopping the language? They are intended to essentially be complete at this point. Obviously the draft of the of the plan will not be prepared until early next year. So there is room for you know continued uh word smithing and adjustment. Um, actually we received a what I thought was um potentially a good edit from one of the planning commissioners at Boulder County yesterday um speaking to the the statement in the vision uh vision statement that says that the that Boulder serves as a model to others as we face a changing climate and and his suggestion was to change that that we serve as a model of action as we face a changing climate. And so I think you

[44:00] know there there is room for some um for some strategic changes if we think those are are worthwhile and receive support from from the group. Are we going to go share our thoughts about changes and feedback later? Right now it's just questions. Correct. Well I don't know that this section is coming back to us later on. Correct. We have about 30 minutes total for sort of conversation around these particular items. So, I would I would recommend if you have something, go go go for it. Yeah. I I guess I've had a lot of alignment with the ideas that were presented, but I think similar to kind of what Nicole was getting at, um, often I think the language is a little clunky or might not hit right for different people in different groups. Um, I think that I would recommend workshopping it a little bit more and I would like to see it be more aspirational. I think even you know just starting off with things like our

[45:01] community is welcoming and diverse like if you don't feel like this community is welcoming to you currently then that sort of is then especially this is how this document starts off and it makes it feel like this document is also not for you. And so I think that um just trying to be much more I think it is important for this to be aspirational um and both in the vision statement and in the values. Thanks. That's helpful. Thank you Mark. Um I have a question in a similar vein and that is I I I've been I'm a student of the current 2020 uh BBCP on a weekly basis and um chapter 3 has nine sections actually I'm sorry 10 uh um 10 sections are are seven how do our seven uh focus

[46:04] areas that you've delineate ated. Now, are those superseding uh the 10 sections that are in the current plan or would they be folded into or how would that relate? Yeah. And actually if you if you look at the plan there um uh earlier I think in the chapter right before all of the policies so chapter 2 um there uh there is a description of the focus areas that were of community interest back in 2015 originally when that major update was prepared. So that's essentially the same as what these are. I I can clarify these will not be chapters in the in the future document. Um, you know, we we have only scratched the surface about what that format looks like. And if it follows a similar uh organization like it does today where all the transportation policies are in one section, all the housing policies are in another one or if it um actually might shift slightly

[47:01] and we use the seven SER goals as our organizing framework and then the policies that support those goals whether they be housing, transportation, etc. those fall under those categories then. So, we haven't made any decisions about exactly the the organization of the document, but um but yeah, I can clarify, don't be confused that the areas of focus um are the only things that will be addressed in the comp plan. It will still cover uh all the things that it does today. Great. Thank you for that. I I'll simply say that, you know, we all like what we're used to and I I appreciate the structure and organization of the current plan. So, that's my comment. I just wanted to add like the areas of focus like KJ mentioned. Those are also ways to organize the conversations we're having with the community and they're the things that have been brought up is the things we need to spend more time thinking about for the update. So the focus areas will be part of the plan but they may not necessarily end up as

[48:00] sections like KJ mentioned. Taiisha, thank you very much. Um, so I agree with my colleagues regarding the vision statement, um, and would have some concerns around the proposed process of us not voting or coming to any kind of consensus around some of these core anchoring things until way after a lot of other things are going to come after that are anchored on this thing that we have not all agreed on in any kind of meaningful way. Um, so I just want to express that concern right up at the front and I'm hopeful that this feedback is taken and we can come back to what our process is and just getting some more consensus building opportunities along the way instead of waiting to the very end. So just from a process perspective um as far as the statement itself um right now it's very um human centric and uh have some just general concerns around the wording around nature and open space as

[49:01] if it doesn't include urban. Um so there's just some synergies that would love to be revisited there. Um also again the human- centeredness on the future generations. Um but again we also are responsible of h you know the vibrancy is in um healthy habitat healthy w you know clean air clean water going back to the aspirational in the neighborhoods that we want to live in. I also look at these vision statements as something that is um that our community can hold us accountable to. So, I appreciated your comments around some of the words that we're using because if we're not clear on what those words are, it'll be impossible to hold um for our public to hold us accountable to what we're saying. As far as the air the area uh areas of focus, I just want to thank um our community for lifting up their voice around food systems. Again, I already mentioned um the incredible session on food as a utility and then uh I actually was late because I was at the farm dinner at uh at the Lraange this

[50:00] evening um just to say hello and and extend and continuing to build relationships within the farming community. Um and I was happy to hear that uh the city and county reached out to the farmers um after again I expressed my concern of them not being engaged until that point. Um, and it sounds like those visits were very uh meaningful and that the relationships, you know, they really felt seen, valued in her. So, I'm just really grateful, Vivian, to you and the team for getting out and doing that. Um, and again, I don't have any comments there. Um, but I did just have some general questions around um I wasn't clear on like why some of the things from before didn't make it on and even with the values, it just feels like it's the same. And I I just I know I feel like there's a lot has changed in the la the la since the last time um that we've done this plan and even in the last six months. And so I just feel I'm not suggesting that we have to go back and do all of our deep engagement. But I would argue that the core of our nation and our federal

[51:01] everything has changed significantly. Um and I think this plan needs to be responsive to that. Um I think if we asked about you know people's uh afford the affordability conversation would look very different um now than it even did six months ago. So um I want to honor that there are some significant structural changes in the things that are going to impact our ability to to to meet the focus areas. And so I'm hopeful that that additional layer of engagement is available and how we can engage our many many partners like the social venture partners and others um to continue to help with that engagement. I was curious um I didn't hear much about the climate action plan and so I was just you know although it's wonderful again to hear about the cultural arts plan I was also surprised not to see such an incredible pivotal compon plan not being formally addressed and aligned to this work. Um and then let's see

[52:02] um just equity in general. I heard the use of the racial equity plan uh tool. That's a qualitative tool that's not designed to do what you're suggesting that it could do in this moment. And so I really am hopeful that um we get some more um expertise around the balance of qualitative and quantitative, the iteriveness of it, um how accountability shows up. Um similar to the way that we have finance woven within all of this. We haven't talked about finance, but we know finance is heavily embedded in every single thing that we do. And I would love for equity to be as embedded. But when we don't have clear definitions, clear indicators, measures, and metrics of success, that's impossible. So um that's just in general an area um in the vision and values. If we're taking those words out, then we need to make sure that it is clearly articulated throughout this plan. Um otherwise, it's um we're whistling in the wind. But um those are all the questions that I have uh about it in

[53:02] this moment and I look forward to uh other comments for my colleagues and the planning board. Thank you. Ryan, I think I have a a few questions on on the vision statement. Um building on some of what Nicole, Lauren, and Taiisha have said. Um, and I I really trying to hold back from word smithing because I know this is, you know, this this can be a painstaking exercise, but just to follow the logic of the first statement on on the on the paragraph says, "Our community is welcoming, diverse, and committed to the Boulder Valley." Um, the word community to to me I I think of that is the Boulder Valley because this is the BBCP. Um, and so I'm trying to follow the logic of that we are committed to ourselves and maybe there's more meaning behind that like that the two things connected and I'm just curious if you could talk about that. Yeah. Um, you know, part of that uh word choice was actually to try to draw a bit more of a connection to place. So

[54:00] between, you know, thinking about the community as people, but also the fact that we are committed to this place and the nature and the systems that that are here. Um, that was the intent of that. Obviously, vision statements can get fairly obscure pretty quickly. Um, and you know, we we are challenging ourselves as a team to to write this in as clear of plain language as we can for the majority of the community to be able to understand. That is an extremely difficult thing to do, particularly when you're talking about these very aspirational statements. So we have tried to to um you know keep it as succinct and as clear as we possibly can um knowing that you know people are going to interpret this or um uh infer different things as they read it based on their own experiences. So our intent was that we were trying to share and and create that connection between people in place. Thank you. Okay. And to the extent that you do have more time to take a look at this I would agree with Lauren and Taiisha um their their comments. Um, second question on the 15 minutes neighborhoods idea. I it makes

[55:00] sense to me that that's a that's a a theme that is kind of touches different points of the focus areas. Um, I guess my question is procedurally as we learn more about community interest feedback on that topic. C can you see this I guess where does where would that then fit in? If it doesn't fit in as a focus area, does it is there another place where we could expect it to go or not to go or where's the home for that in the BBCB? Okay. Well, I'm gonna steal your thunder. Um the so the conversation so the the community assembly has met once. They met uh May 3rd. Their second meeting is coming up May 31st and then they will take a break over the summer and then reconvene at the end of August. We will have the opportunity to have a number of different community conversations over the summer and as part of that be able to tease out those ideas that could then relate back to the 15-minute neighborhood concept. So our plan is to um summarize and and capture those community conversations and then feed that into the community assembly process. So we'll be creating that

[56:00] linkage between what we're hearing with the broader broader public and then bring that to that group so that they have that information as well and can uh incorporate that into their deliberations and discussion. Okay. All right. But as far as the BBCP, where it would land in the BBCP as a published document, where the 15-minute neighborhood concept, um, you know, it most likely is going to uh show up in a couple of different locations. Um, my sense is it won't be called out uh necessit, but my sense is it probably won't be called out as a um a specific chapter or section, but it's it is going to relate to all these various topics and um our economy, our transportation, etc. And so my sense is it's going to find its way into policies um specifically around a number of different a number of different topics and and show up really kind of throughout the document again if the community assembly believes that that's a supported idea and carries that forward to all of you and you also support it as well. Got it. Thank you. And then finally um to the extent that we have um comments on within the focus

[57:03] areas so with respect to specifying or or clarifying when is the right place to do that? Is that tonight like in in and in this very moment or later? Yeah. If I mean certainly if you if you have some ideas that are specific details or topics within that larger um you know within that larger focus area now would be a good time to raise those but also know that these will be the subjects of a lot of our community efforts over the next four months or so. So there will be ample opportunity for you to um meet with us or attend those community events um to be able to feed that information into the process as well. Okay. Then I'll just briefly tell you um on on climate sorry um on on climate I I think one thing that would make sense would be to really emphasize the nexus of of climate action with well-being. Um there are a number of types of of of well-being initiatives that support climate action especially around creating more freedom and access

[58:01] to housing, transportation, food and energy which are come up in other parts of the BBCP but which are 40 to 70%. These are the so-called demand solutions. Incredible rich opportunities there. Clean air is another one. The majority of our fossil fuels are, you know, as we clean our air, we will be reducing GHG. And then also inclusive economy, which of course is related to this as well. But I would just encourage a real strong focus on on well-being within the climate um action part. Um, and then in transportation, um, having used the BBCP, the current one, and, um, found finding myself sometimes thinking people could look at things and make different interpretations, I'd propose a few clarifications if we can. Um, so the first one is to spell out that we want to provide access to destinations in ways that work for different needs um, for different members, for the entire community. And as we know there's like you know large percentage of people who that who cars don't always work for very well. So that's one. The second one is

[59:00] that we would strive to understand the disproportionate impacts of the costs of certain types of modes and behaviors um and look to allocate those to users when doing so would be consistent with equity. And conversely that we would provide support and encouragement for transportation modes and behaviors that we think are helpful to stewarding our shared resources. And the final thing is that um I I would like us to try to develop a perspective on potentially having more control over our transit system and specifically to establish goals and standards for transit in in the in the Boulder Valley and then a commitment to achieving those aims. And I don't propose that we know enough to say we need our own transit agency, but I do think this is our chance to make that evaluation and bring some options to the table so that the community can really look at it. Thanks. All right, let's go to Laura online. Thank you, Erin. And um I don't want to

[60:00] be repetitive here. I just want to thank everybody for the really wonderful comments uh so far and staff for all of the great work. I want to bring up uh one thing in the focus areas that was in our previous 10-year BBCP update and um has dropped off for this one and it's not a sexy area that's going to come up organically in community conversation but it is something that we've been grappling with at planning board which is sub communities and area planning and I'm sure that over the next 10 years this is going to be a big topic. are we going to continue to do sub community and area planning and what is that going to look like and how do we use those sub community and area plans in a way that is meaningful and that validates the amount of work it takes to produce them. Um I could say a lot more but I'm sure that staff and city council are familiar with what I'm talking about here. So I don't know how this feeds into the community conversations for example or the analysis that staff needs to do but I do know that um this is something that will be important for the BDCP in the next 10 years. So, I wanted to get that

[61:00] into the conversation. Great. Thanks. And um I'll stop there for now. I do have a couple of specific comments, but I think I can just send those to staff offline. Appreciate that. Um I'm seeing a few hands raised from people who have already asked questions. I will just note we have four minutes left in this section. So, if you can keep any uh follow-up questions uh quite brief. I'd appreciate it, but Matt has not gone yet. So, thank you, Ran. appreciate the opportunity to jump in front from those that had their hands up a little for in front of me. Um, one question is sort of follow up on the 15-minute neighborhoods. Is there, and this might be in the community assembly aspect of things, but I'm wondering if there's opportunity or where it fits in to discuss perhaps the tension that's created with 15-minute neighborhoods from an economic development strategy perspective. Because as we look to put people in their neighborhood cores to get more of what they need, that intrinsically means that they have less necessity to go to our downtown core if

[62:01] it's farther from their neighborhood core to seek those needs. And then what impact that perhaps has on our downtown space. And so I'm curious how that works from a comp planning perspective in terms of how do we future vision our downtown core if the neighborhoods are supporting more of the community need versus downtown and does the downtown core become more tourist focused or still centric. What does that look like? How do we prioritize those things? And then of course how it ties into the work we're doing with the economic development strategy. So I do I think there's a tension there that I think needs some rec discussion or reconciliation on a number of fronts. I'm just wondering if there's opportunity for that to be discussed. Yeah, thanks for that. Thanks for that comment. Um, absolutely. So, uh, later in the, um, when the assembly comes back together again at the end of August and then through really through September, um, as they are, uh, learning more and really refining their ideas about what 15-minute neighborhoods um, are, are they a good idea, what do they look like in in Boulder? um that's where they will

[63:01] intro introduce and have those conversations about the potential trade-offs um that are associated with them. So you you raise a very good one about um just the sort of a the economic viability of of providing uh businesses and services within neighborhoods if you um you need a certain amount of people, a certain amount of density that can support those businesses, but also what are some of the ripple effects to other commercial centers that exist within the city. And so that will absolutely be part of that conversation and their deliberations. Um, and I would expect that as part of the report out to all of you, uh, that will happen in October, December. I'll have to look at the calendar. Um, yeah, December. Um, of their of their work. I I um I feel like that would be an important thing for us to make sure that we are communicating and raising in their final report out is what some of the challenges were that they've that they've um talked about and and how they would address those going forward.

[64:00] Appreciate it. My my final one is a sort of a question. It's a comment question is one is I I joined Taiisha in supporting the a focus that is been that that is brand new and and long overdue um given just how much land actually is occupied in a in our city. That's tremendous. Um, so I'm I'm appreciative of those voices speaking out, but also that we're responding to that. Um, and I'm I'm curious if if if we get into that place of talking about beyond just the land designated as agriculture, but thinking of the Perry urban and urban opportunities for uh food production or farming. I think Montreal poses an interesting model where where they have now zoned most of those rooftops viable for food production and have done so in a very interesting way. They have a similar climate to ours. And so I'm just sort of curious if it expands beyond just the the green belt of a land as we designated it or more holistically about where some of that can be. So I'm just curious if it's really broad or or specific to supporting the farmland as it's currently designated. Yeah, I would I would say it's all on the above and that's part of the conversations we will continue to have. So, you know, the the

[65:01] topic of food systems as a broad category is um is a an area of focus, but as we get into the details of the different policy choices, that that's where we'll wrestle with some of those um decisions. I've got Nicole, Mark, uh Claudia, and Tina, but again, encourage brevity. Thank you. I will be uh try to be brief and go fast. Um I just wanted to make a plug for accessibility to think about coming back into the vision um especially given our rapidly aging population. um accessible and equitable opportunity do seem like they're crucial for the top level of our main planning document um because that that's where a lot of accessibility shows up. Um I agree with Lauren about an aspirational statement being um okay and I would love that. Uh it goes along I think with our ask to be bold in all this that I feel like you all are doing so well. Um the idea of balancing the economy and housing with open space and land felt a little bit contrary to what came out of some of the engagement summaries. So some of the discussions seem to note that these concepts are interdependent

[66:01] and that we will achieve our sustainable, equitable, and resilient goals when they're acting in harmony. Um, so just this idea that housing and jobs don't have to compete with land and open space, but that we can reinvision something different that brings it together, a different model of being. That's one of the pieces of wisdom from the frontline communities. Um, that that seemed like it represented a really bold um kind of uh focused um shift in our thinking. Um, and I really like the phrase leveraging community assets and innovation for future generations just because it was really active and um again aspirational. Thank you. Mark. Yeah. I just have one question. Um, and I'm going back to the staff memo on page 18, uh, which suggests that we explore amending the height limitations in Boulder. Um, you in a response to my hotline, uh, it was said that staff are not recommending these policy changes, but rather are requesting confirmation

[67:00] on whether these ideas warrant further study. So, Mark, I apologize. I believe we're talking about this in the next section. Is that right? So we will absolutely have the opportunity in the next section. I will wait for the next section. All right. Thanks. But I will be waiting. Claudia, my question was actually a process question and that was to confirm with staff. I thought according to your outline for the meeting, we would have time for comments on this section after both presentations. Um, so I recognize we're out of time on this, but I did have comments as opposed to questions and I was planning on saving those for the later portion of the meeting. I believe the intention is for these two items to be dealt with at this time and that we will have comments on the uh potential compl concepts to explore in the second half of the meeting. So if you got them, you get now is the time to to lay them out. do it now. Oh lord.

[68:08] I think Tina is waiting, so I will defer to her. I'll go while she's getting hers. Um, mine are pretty simple. I, um, I actually like the vision statement. I um I understood it and read it to be our vision is to be a welcoming belonging uh place in in Boulder. But if uh if that doesn't read that way to other people, I think it's great. I really appreciate the simplification of the language. It's really important to me um that it can be read easily, especially when people like to scan documents or are not settling down for a good six to eight hours with this comp plan while they're watching Netflix or something. Um and I I think it's a hard document to read. So, anything we could do to make it more accessible just in terms of simplifying language is great. Um the other thing is there are a couple terms that I saw that

[69:01] it would be helpful to define maybe in a different way. So under inclusive economy understanding what what do what does inclusive mean you know what what is that idea we use the word inclusive a lot but we we often don't define it um and you know at some point trying to understand what would that look like and and try to get some visuals um another thing would be uh the word um you know supporting community-minded businesses community-minded is is really difficult to understand which community you know who's benefiting fitting who's the what's the target there. So, the extent that we could help communicate that to the people who read this document um would be would be great. And then if I have a comment about whether we're looking at housing in the context of student population, is that now or later? Now would be fine. Okay. And I probably will have a quick answer for you. Okay. So, I looked at the you know, I did a

[70:00] hotline. So, our population's been flat for the last 10 years. We've gained 9,000 students, which means 9,000 other people are gone. And I hope that when we talk about building and creating a more inclusive community, we understand that a lot of that 9,000 is simply households getting smaller as people left and and we know that. But we also know that the housing type people want our incomuters have actually increased with the housing we're developed. So we're definitely missing something. So I'd love to see that reflected somewhere in this conversation. Okay, Claudia. Okay, so I've cut this down to two comments I just want to make about the proposed focus areas. Um, small things. Um, first has to do with inclusive local economy. And I just noted that the um the interest that you describe in that particular focus area seems to focus on local businesses and wealth building opportunities. Um, I'm curious if things

[71:00] like uh workforce issues like wages and housing access should also be part of that conversation as you bring that back to the community. Um, and then uh comment on the multicultural and multigenerational community. I just want to appreciate seeing this focus area and I'm really actually glad to see that age is a part of it. I would expect um multiculturalism and racial diversity to be part of it, but age is important there too. Um because I really as I look at our plans in the city, I think they're often reading as fairly neutral with regards to phases of life, but they often have a hidden bias towards working age adults. Um and then an absence of children, youth, and elders in the plans. And so given our growing aging population, giving our declining youth population, um I think both of those conditions suggest we need to do better planning for the whole life course. So I'm really happy to see that multigenerational aspect. And I'll stop my comments there. Okay, I got a couple more people queued up. Mason Lauren, I'll be super quick. Agree with a lot of

[72:00] what my colleagues have said here. So, the only thing I wanted that was left in my notes to say is that I I see the Boulder Valley comp plan as a it's largely a guiding document, right? It's the it's the top of the pyramid that everything falls out of. So, um, what what I'm not seeing here is more direction about how to, and maybe this isn't the right place for it, but how to actually use, uh, the comp plan, what takes priority when we are balancing these sometimes competing values and policies. Maybe we'll get to that later, but I do want to make sure that that's in there. And I agree with uh Lauren's comment around uh Laura's comment around the neighborhood plans that you know it's I think it's going to be really important to have more guidance on how to use these things in practice uh rather than just be visionary. I do like the idea of having a a more visionary vision statement um as well. But yeah, Lauren, I got Laura too. Thank you. Um, I have a couple of specific things related to the focus

[73:00] sections that I'll follow up um later with staff about, but I think the big one that I wanted to introduce um because it I don't know might not get a lot of support um is that I feel like one aspect that's missing to me especially as sort of we see change these changes happening at the federal level um but that also ties to some of local things has to do with um community feedback um and free speech. I think we've had a lot of whether it's at council meetings and people parti uh wanting to partic um petition their government versus you know feeling safe and kind of discussion around that within our chambers to signature gathering and how the um legal framework of that and where people are able to do that has changed over time. um to kind of what our expectations are

[74:00] for neighborhood plans, for our community feedback, and when outreach and things are expected. I think having a section that maybe speaks to how we go through change in this um process might be beneficial. Okay, got Laura and then I'll wrap us up. Thank you just really quickly a couple of specific things for the different focus areas. Uh one thing that uh is spoken to in the current BBCP and I think also speaks to our focus areas around climate action and housing choice and opportunity is landmarking and historic preservation. We have an awful lot of our housing stock especially that is coming into its uh being 50 years old and would be eligible for landmarking if it's proposed for um redevelopment. And I think we're going to have to grapple with that very seriously in the next 10 years. And I know that our historic preservation staff is thinking hard

[75:01] about an overhaul basically of the um authorizing legislation for the historic preservation um program. It may be helpful to have some guidance in the BBCP about how we see historic preservation for Boulder, right? Like we how much of the city do we want to have preserved? What eras are important to preserve? It's not just every building that's over 50 years old. We already know that. But um this may be an area that is ripe for some more uh high level guidance. Um and I and I do think that speaks to a lot of our goals around um providing more housing and uh compact neighborhoods. And then around the safety goal um of we know that we are going to have a municipal airport for the next 10 20 years. And um so this is not about whether we should keep the airport or redevelop it. That's a separate question. We know we need to address the lead emissions uh from the airport. It's a serious air quality issue. It's a serious human health issue. It also speaks to greenhouse gas emissions. So, having some more guidance in the BBCP that um directly addresses

[76:00] that problem, I think would be helpful. Thank you very much. Okay. Well, thanks everybody for the ideas and the questions and the comments. And so, just uh turning back to city staff. We've had a lot of uh great ideas here tonight. Just frame for all of us, you came to us on the basis of over a thousand community contacts. Um, and like on the vision statement, I think there was 230 specific bits of feedback on that. So, just there have been a lot of great ideas here tonight, but we've also heard a lot from the community. So, it's a it's a challenging balance uh to strike. And of course, vision statements are tough because you only got so many words, so you can't pack everything into the everything you might want to. So, um glad this is your problem and not mine. Um and uh with that, we'll wrap up this section. I did want to make a quick comment to to the audience just for people who may not be familiar that our um rules of procedure um and behavior guidelines call for quiet in the audience. That includes things like snapping or um saying words or things like that. If you did want to express some support, you can always use uh

[77:00] silent jazz hands. Um and with that, I'll uh hand it back to you all for the next phase. Great. Thank you, Mayor Brockett, and thanks for all those comments. Um, we are going to get to the fun stuff of the evening. Hope everyone's ready. Uh, I hope I'm ready. So, um, we we are excited to move into this next part of the meeting. Um, this is where we begin to be bold and I will I will come back to that in a minute. Um we are going to talk through a set of potential concepts that the project team is proposing that we uh potentially study further through through this next phase of work and have additional conversation with the community. Uh just from a quick scheduling note I am going to go through each of the seven concepts to explore first and these are organized

[78:00] in no particular order. Um and then we're going to take a very brief five minute break just so everybody has a chance to take a breath uh collect their thoughts and then we'll return and have a brief 10 to 15 minute conversation on each of them. Uh we are going to be handing out a worksheet during that break. So you will all have this worksheet and then we will ask you to fill that out after the discussion. I'll I'll touch on that in just a few minutes. So before we begin, I did want to provide a little bit of additional background and a few points of clarification. Um first I want to just recognize the the great work that has gone into the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan over the last 50 years. Most of the policies that are within that existing plan are aligned with our city values. They they will be carried forward. They're great. We are certainly going to look for opportunities to consolidate some of those, simplify some of the languages as we spoke about um to some of those existing policies, but we are absolutely not starting from scratch and we're not ignoring the last 50 years of community

[79:00] input that have shaped our community. Um if you remember back in 2024 in October when we kicked off this project, you challenged us staff to be bold. I think be audacious may have been Matt Benjamin's uh quote. So we have identified these several potential concepts to explore that have emerged from that challenge and also through our conversations with community members with all of our department colleagues both on the city and county side. Um many of us had an opportunity to attend the national planning conference a few months ago which was held in Denver and so planning uh experts and practitioners and then all the conversations we've had with you up to this point. um these concepts could ultimately result in a more substantive shift or realignment within the comprehensive plan. So that's why we're putting them forward as do do these have legs? Should they remain on the table? Should we explore them further? Um we are not actually asking for your approval or support of the idea itself tonight. We are just asking is

[80:00] this a topic that is worthy of additional research and community conversation. The goal being that we can come back to you with more information and more details when you actually do have to make a decision about policy choices uh and and options. Next slide. So pending your feedback tonight, if any of these concepts to explore are supported, we will approach these in four different ways through the summer and the fall as we move forward. uh anything that has a land use application uh or um implication will be modeled through what we have what we call the digital twin. We we have a GIS-based um ArcGIS Arc urban uh digital twin of the city where we can model different land use changes and look at what the potential impacts in a quantit quantitative basis would be things like housing opportunities, greenhouse gas emissions, water use, etc. We will also be employing the racial equity instrument to understand how some of these changes um might harm

[81:00] or benefit various members of the community. Some of these ideas are totally new to Boulder and so we will be conducting some case study research and reaching out to other cities where similar policies may have been implemented and to see how they're functioning or maybe not functioning. Uh and then finally, we will incorporate all of this analysis into these upcoming engagement uh windows through the summer and the early fall to understand what the community's appetite for change is. Next slide. You'll also see that each of the concepts and really most of the policies within the comprehensive plan are multi-dimensional. They are interconnected, right? We know that if we pull a string on one end, it may start to unravel uh the other important things on the other end. So to that end, we have highlighted on the side of each of these concepts the different areas of focus that could be influenced by policy changes within that topic. Um it's really just a a a you know a visual way for us to link back the concepts for change back to those areas of focus and

[82:00] see how we're starting to think about those and address those. So if everyone is ready, let's dive in. Um, this first concept is focused on the comprehensive plans future land use map. So, I think you all know that this map depicts a plan of what the desired land use pattern should look like in the Boulder Valley. And it's used in a lot of our decision- making regarding future code amendments, reszoning applications, development decisions, etc. The team is recommending that we explore how the land use map uh is created and and is represented particularly the fine grained approach that is currently in the in the map where it applies a different land use designation almost on a parcel by parcel basis in some locations. The comprehensive plan as you know is supposed to sort of fly at that 30,000 foot level. So is there an opportunity to make this map more generalized and more flexible going forward? Also looking at the number of different designations and the definitions of those different land use categories.

[83:02] Today there are 26 within the plan. There are um many of them have overlapping goals and descriptions. As a good example, I think there are five or six different flavors of mixed use land use. So it can cause a lot of confusion not only for you but for community members and for staff as well. And so um those are that is a concept that we are very interested in uh exploring if you support it. Next slide. This next concept is about exploring the city's physical and geographic composition both in the horizontal plane and vertical plane. So, if this is supported, we envision testing how area two, which are those areas that are outside the city limits but are eligible for annexation and the planning reserve, the area 3 planning reserve, could potentially support our community needs. Uh, as an example, city and county staff have been looking at, you know, what what would allowing ADUs across area 2 look like and what what would be the infrastructure and services needed to support that? would that uh

[84:02] help to support the community housing needs really across the valley even though they are out in the county technically. Um this would also this section or this concept to explore would also incorporate that second step of the planning reserve process which is to identify community needs and assess whether those are sufficient to warrant moving to the third step of that process which is to create a sub community plan for the planning reserve. I will note that will happen after the comp plan. we will not be able to do that in tandem. Um we we also think it is worthwhile to explore the vertical nature of the city and whether there are strategic adjustments to the height limit perhaps in key locations or only under certain conditions could provide additional benefit. Again, we're not necessarily advocating for this, but we think it's worthy of some additional analysis. We also acknowledge that the height limit is codified within the city charter. So any changes to that would require a public vote to change change the city charter if the policy discussion

[85:01] actually went in that direction at the completion of the update. The comp plan is really only able to set policy but it cannot change the height limit on its own. Next slide. Uh this next concept really is less focused on the policies themselves but how they get implemented into the future. So this term of targeted universalism is what we included in the memo and it's really more of the academic term that is essentially a commitment to using data to evaluate our choices and how they could benefit or impact different communities within the city. We then use that understanding to help us um and help everyone in the community meet a universal goal. So that what that means is that some neighborhoods or community members might receive or would need different approaches or support in order to reach that that universal goal. Um in many ways we're already working in this way. Uh the 2022 comprehensive flood and storm water plan took a similar approach and and analyzed and ranked all of the

[86:00] potential storm water projects to determine which can do the greatest good first. Right? And then also if you think about our six-year capital improvements program process that also each of those projects are evaluated against the SER framework and they are prioritized based on those projects that can meet multiple goals uh in a in a single project. So if if we were to consider this or move forward with something like this, it essentially would just mean that we would be um creating a you know a much more broad sort of application of things that we're already doing across the city. Uh this fourth concept gets to council member Shuhard's idea about transit and re you know is RTD our only transit provider as we move forward. So this is really uh an opportunity for us to collaborate with our regional prog uh partners to make better progress on major projects and investments. We already do this and we're very proactive and do a lot of collaborative work with our partners. Really, this is an idea that's intended to move toward a

[87:00] specific project or a series of projects that is really focused on the health and wellness of the community on a much longer time frame, a generational scale. So, this is about the long game, right? Um, is there something that the comprehensive plan can initiate within the plan's 20 year horizon that would provide benefits over the next 50 or even 100 years? You can think about the preservation of our rural lands and open space that surround the city. That's a perfect example of a big idea that came about 50 years ago that we still enjoy today. Next slide. Uh this concept is about further exploring what it might take to enhance Boulder's night economy and test whether or not that's a path that the community is really interested in. Um as I think we've all seen and experienced and really around the country, the rhythm of daily life is changing and that's partly related to COVID, that's remote work. you know, many other shifts and this concept would allow us and staff in the

[88:00] community to explore a little bit further about how we might actually capitalize on that shift and expand our social and our economic and our cultural opportunities in a new way. Um, this obviously would have some relevance to uh related to the arrival of Sundance uh and also presents an opportunity to more fully engage all of our different age groups in different activities throughout that 24-hour cycle. Uh the next to last concept comes from many community comments about how we think about our natural systems within the city. And this is um you could think of this sort of as the the shift between green environmentalism and gray environmentalism where green environmentalism was kind of the original notion of of protecting nature sort of in its place. Then gray environmentalism starts to speak to how do we infuse nature into our urban systems and actually use those not only as amenities but also as functional elements particularly um within climate change. So, this is really kind of a um

[89:02] a fairly deep and theoretical sort of exploration of um how do the existing natural systems that that are within our city, how do those move beyond just the beautiful amenities and essential components of of the natural ecosystem that they exist today, but how do those begin to play much more of a role in our climate resilience and the overall infrastructure of the city? So this is about reinforcing those those healthy natural systems but also recognizing their value and importance as literally the lungs of the city as the city begin you know continues to urbanize and change over time. A couple of examples that we would uh explore as part of this um this concept includes you know how our greenway system can evolve beyond what it is today which is primarily a transportation and a storm water infrastructure use. um how how could that become more of a formalized park or a community amenity to people that are living nearby? Um looking at

[90:00] strengthening our open space requirements for redevelopment. Um you know again there's a lot of tension and opportunity between providing uh redevelopment and housing opportunities. But those housing opportunities need to be livable. They need to be places where people want to actually be and you need to provide those outdoor spaces for people to um to thrive and also nature-based climate solutions. So thinking about our tree canopy, thinking about pollinator gardens and pollinator highways and all these other kinds of things that can be infused within an urban environment um that help to make the city a much more living and thriving place beyond just the sort of human- centered um functions of the city itself. And then the last one uh is a nod to Boulder's special vibe. Uh it Boulder has a shared history as a place that's a little, you know, a little weird, a little offbeat, a little groovier than your average town. Um but it's really ba building on our community's historic assets, our local oddities. We would examine the ways that

[91:00] Boulder can enhance the physical environment and our social fabric and the economic engines that make this such a unique place both in Colorado and really the nation. Um, we know that bringing back the funky in Boulder is we're not trying to recreate the past. It's is certainly not something that's possible or even desired. What we're talking about and what we're thinking about is how do we create opportunities for innovation, creativity, and ingenuity that reinforces what makes Boulder so special as it continues to evolve and change over time. So, now that we've had a brief sort of summary and overview of each of those concepts, as I mentioned, we're going to take just a brief break, about five minutes. Um, when we come back, we are going to have about an hour and a half, 90 minutes, um, or about 10 to 15 minutes per concept for some clarifying questions and brief discussion. Unfortunately, just given the size of the group, we're not going to have time for everybody to comment on every concept. So, use your time wisely. Um we

[92:00] will keep our responses brief. Uh that's my that's my guarantee to you. Um and at the end of the discussion I mentioned we are going to pass out a worksheet a worksheet for all of you. So for for each concept uh after we have that that discussion you're going to take that worksheet and we're asking you specifically um should that topic or should that concept be taken off the table and not explored? Would it be a nice to have? Would it be nice to explore if we have time to do that or is the topic critical and absolutely needs to be explored further as we move through the process? So, um there's also space for you to add some guard rails around the concept if you feel like that's necessary. Um, we are going to collect those worksheets at the end of the meeting. Uh, and we will include those in the meeting summary that we will circulate um, you know, in a couple of weeks at at your next city council meeting so that they're part of the public record um, as we go forward and we will make sure to get a response from Laura and uh, online as well. So with that, we are going to take a fiveminut break. Short break. Emphasis

[93:01] on the word short.

[103:15] Okay, I hope everyone is feeling tanned, rested, and ready for the second half of our exciting program. So, uh, KJ, I'll hand it back over to you. Yes. Okay. So, um, uh, as I, as I mentioned, thank you. Uh, thank you for that brief little break. Hopefully, you're you're feeling refreshed and recharged. Um, we have these have these two questions for you. Um really I think the goal of of these uh brief 10 to 15 minute discussions around each concept is is

[104:01] let us answer any clarifying questions that you may have. Again I mentioned we'll we'll keep our answers brief. Um and then be thinking in your mind or or even introduce as as part of your discussion. You know is this something that uh we should continue to go down the path and and explore. Um, is it something that, yeah, that's interesting but not critical? Uh, or is it something that we can take off the table and and focus our energy on other other elements? So, um, I'll turn it back over to you, Mayor Brockett. Okay, great. And can I get a request to maybe throw a few pens out on the table for those of us who did not arrive with We're prepared. Look at that. We have a whole bag. Okay. And and if it's We got a bunch coming over this way. If it's helpful for me to bring up the the slide of the concept that we're discussing, I would Yeah. If you can please uh bring those up one at a time. Great. Okay. So,

[105:02] all right. Set settle down everybody. I don't I don't want to have to start assigning demerits to people. The um So, okay. So, we got a few things here. We were looking at 10 to 15 minutes each. that means that we don't all have a chance to speak to everyone. So if somebody's already said your thought, great. Or if there's a thought that maybe isn't critical, you know, maybe we leave that behind. Um so what I'll I'll do is for each of these, um I will open up the floor for clarifying questions and we can rock it through those and then once those are done, I'll ask if people have a a few brief comments to offer about whether we take these up or not. So our fus first one is exploring revisions to the future land use designations and map. Any clarifying questions on this one? And remember raise your hand up high. Tara, what do you mean by that? Exactly KJ. What what do we mean by revisions to the future land use map? So uh through this staff would explore both

[106:00] um the designations themselves and the definitions. So we'd look at those 26 different categories, look at ways to collapse some of those or combine certain ones, redefine them. Uh and then also the land use map. We would also start to explore and investigate um different ways to sort of organize um the the land uses on the map. So primarily, you know, we're going to have a core downtown. There's going to be some commercial nodes or other things, but we would also look at um you know, are there areas that we should perhaps change the land use designation? And that'll be part of our um uh part of our kind of land use alternatives analysis. And then we'll be able to determine what does that look like in terms of the number of housing units or job opportunities or greenhouse gas emissions. Does that reduce traffic or increase traffic? Those kinds of things. So the question was, is that something you think we should do? These are all things you think are worth exploring. Yes. Yes. Okay. Yeah.

[107:02] Nicole. Um I just have one question here. Uh one thing we've heard a lot about over the years is how long some of our planning process takes, especially for um folks who are trying to change something. So say there's a commercial space that's not being used, they would like to to, you know, change it into something else. Is that something that would fall into this bucket? Yes, that I said I'd be brief. No, that would uh that would be uh we would incorporate that as we look at the definitions of the different land use categories to see if we can build in additional flexibility with with still being true to what the designation is itself. Thank you. Um and Erin, would you like me to include my comment here and then I'll be quiet for the rest of this one? I think we're going to do questions first then comments. So Mason, sorry. I have a I have a process question. I came prepared a little differently with ideas under each of these that I would like to be explored and I'm seeing only a place to write guard rails. Should I just go ahead and include those here there anyway? That'd be great. Yes. And then if you have a

[108:00] guardrail that's overarching. Do I just like maybe blank space? That would be great. Okay, that would be fine. Thanks, Tina. Um, quick question. Would some of the would it possible that there would then be impacts sort of following up on what Laura was talking about to the sub community plans in this? No, not necessarily. So sub community and area plans uh look at obviously a smaller geographic area than the city itself. those um those would still be effective tools that take the broad citywide policies of the comprehensive plan and translate those down to more sight specific um or area specific um policies. So that that those are definitely still part of the toolbox of planning. Right. I'm not seeing any other hands raised for questions. So any comments on this one? Nicole then Claudia. Thank you. Um, I really love this idea, uh, because a big question that's on my mind right now is

[109:01] how we maximize adaptability. Um, we saw this with our COVID response that helped us, um, move quickly in that case. We've got climate crisis, economic crisis, federal government, it's kind of in chaos. Um, it really means that flexibility is going to be key. And so, um, I what I really like about this idea is is that it seems to open up a place for for us to be um, more goal oriented rather than fine grained. um and really think flexibly and adaptably and how we can maximize that for um the the next couple decades. Claudia. Okay. So, I'm also really glad that you are going to be re-examining the map, not just updating what's there, but thinking about how it's made and for what purpose. I actually see two problems with the map that we have currently. First of all, as you mentioned, it's very fine grained. that makes it difficult to shape change in the future, particularly when it's coupled with a private land market where we don't have any control over which parcels are coming up for redevelopment

[110:00] at any given time. Um, but second, I think this map that we have is primarily descriptive of our present reality. Um, and it tends to have the impact then of conserving rather than evolving the city. So, following on from what Nicole said, working towards a more flexible adaptive map. Um, that might mean having fewer categories. It might mean having different geometries, like thinking in terms of of nodes rather than polygons like you see on the map, fuzzy boundaries and things like that. So, yeah, I'd be happy to see changes here, Lauren. And then Mark, thank you. I agree with both what Nicole and Claudia have said. Um, and I would just encourage you to go far with this. Like, you know, if there's 26 categories, we should be looking at like 10 or fewer. like really go far. Thank you. Um yes, I agree. So just for everyone's knowledge, we use the current map at every um every decision, every quasi jud

[111:00] quasi judicial decision we make uh use tables, use reviews, site reviews, and it's essential. And so updating it to me seems completely essential and rethinking it is also essential. Also, as ever, as two people have said, simplification is great. The city tends to put far too fine a point on our planning documents in our use tables and and everything. We it it feels sometimes like a Russian central control kind of economic document. So simplification and broadening and creating greater flexibility uh is would be greatly appreciated. All right, Ryan, I agree with everything that colleagues have said so far. And just on the the subject of of polygons and nodes and how to think about mapping, I would just point out that the idea of of of travel time of getting from a place to the things you

[112:00] need, whether it's a grocery store, cafe, or whatever. That is also another framework that could be could be part of this and I' I'd be look very much forward to seeing. Um, and then also I don't know if if um wild wildfire wildlands that is meant to be a part of this, but Nicole's comment that about thinking about our climate future makes me think in fact maybe that does make a lot of sense and and considering that do we have a false sense of precision in some cases when we look at maps as we as we currently understand them with with with wildfires when you think about high winds and so on. So if there's a a chance to look at that here as well, it would make a lot of sense to me. Great. All right. I'm not seeing any more hands. Uh great job everyone in being succinct. So let's move on to item number two. So this is reconsidering the physical composition of the city both in terms of area 2 and the planning reserve and possible adjustments to the height limit. Clarifying questions. Great. Just to verify when you're talking about the height limit, you're talking about the height limit in the charter, not the height limit in the zoning code. Correct. Okay. Yes.

[113:05] Uh, I see another clarifying question, Claudia. Yeah. So, again, in regards to the height limit, you call that out as one particular form of physical composition. I think that's triggering to a lot of people in the community. Um, it's also only one of the many dimensions of development intensity. Is there a reason that things like um floor area ratio, lot size, and setbacks are not included in this topic? uh partly only because that gets into a level of detail that we typically don't touch on within the comprehensive plan. But um but certainly I think the sort of broad conversations around the level of intensity within different areas and that would also relate back to that um the land use map changes that would absolutely be um included in in these analyses. That's right. Okay. Can I make my comment at this point Eric and then I'm doing questions first if you don't mind Matt. Uh my question senator rounds if

[114:01] if we were to say hold off on testing how area three and area or area 2 and area three playing reserve could support communities would that effectively halt our pursuit of annexing and that process of area 3 because I just want to know like is this sort of extra or is this actually a functional necessary step in the other side of talking about area 3. We we have already committed to doing that community needs analysis the step two of the planning reserve proc um process as part of the comp plan. So that will carry forward regardless um of any further sort of study and expansion on this. So this is just added on top of or right? Well, the the basically the the study of the planning reserve and the and the community needs that will happen regardless of of this of you know if if everybody doesn't support this then we will still have to go forward with that because we have committed to that. Okay. Thank you. Oh Nicole question. Yep. Quick question.

[115:02] Can you just explain a little bit more about what what if anything is within the scope of this um height limit thinking right now? I mean, are we talking about like just adjustments like we sometimes make where you get an extra floor for um something or are we talking about like building sta staff have not made any presumptions around that. Um and that that that would be helpful that from the guard rail perspective. I think that's um where you know we would be interested in knowing are you talking like all bets are off um or are you know is this um you know your guidance would help us focus our efforts on might that be appropriate in only specific locations or only under certain conditions only up to you know five extra feet 10 extra feet you know those kinds of things we we have not made any assumptions around you know what that looks like yet um but as part of the process if you all support us moving forward we would sort of create a range of of um analyses. You know, we would

[116:01] not just create one option. We would we would look at a whole range of different things. Um as part of that discussion, Tina, I have a naive question. Um when CU buys land in the city, does it automatically get exempt from the height limit as the new owner? I don't know if I know the answer of that off the top of my head. I would assume the answer is yes. I could. I mean it it's they they are as a state entity exempted from all of our land use regulations including the height limit. So when CU owns a property they are exempt from all of those regulations. Right. So and that includes new purchases that they do. They Yeah. Whenever any parcel they own whether they've owned it for a long time or a short time. Okay. Oh and can we just clarify this part about the area two and area three? what would be different that we would do in the first one that isn't being done by the separate parallel area three analysis. Yeah. So um that actually the the what's what's referenced here in

[117:00] terms of the area 3 planning reserve um that would essentially look exactly the same. um what we're what we're referencing here in terms of looking at area two, that's a that's a newer idea where that would require collaboration with the county um because those those lands are out in the county to you know they're thinking about are there ways that those county areas that are so closely associated with the city even though they're not part of the city technically. Um are there ways that those those areas can help contribute to meet some of our community needs? So that's something we haven't explored and and maybe wouldn't uh necessarily go down that road unless there's um you know consistent support from all of you to carry that forward. But the the planning reserve work that we'll be doing that would be part of this would look the same regardless of whether all those other elements carry forward or not. Hopefully that makes sense. Okay. Eml and then Taiisha. Thank you. Um, so Christopher, my question is in this reconsidering the

[118:03] physical composition, would this be a place where it would be appropriate to start um articulating 15-minute neighborhoods? Uh, you know, to some degree, but I think that would actually probably be more relevant in the first one related to some of the land use composition. Um, and again, you know, there's going to be a bit of a back and forth and an iterative process with what we're learning from the assembly and their level of support for that, but but certainly 15-minute neighborhoods and sort of the proximity of goods and services to where people live and and also amenities, things like parks and um transportation uh opportunities, things like that. So, all that's going to be sort of embedded within a lot of these um within a lot of these these concepts. So looking for the opportunities for for defining 15minute neighborhoods will be in the process of looking at the land use map to yeah to to a degree. I mean we're obviously we don't we don't want to get too far ahead of the assembly in

[119:00] terms of what their recommendations are going to be but certainly that'll be in the back of our mind and that'll be something you know we're always considering because it is actually current policy that we that we look at those opportunities. So we we will be um you know embedding that through the analysis. Thank you Taisha and Lauren. So when excuse me so when we were planning uh conver when we were having conversations about area 3 and the first step was very human- centered which was to determine the percentage of commercial residential open space and parks and I asked about habitat and when if a new habitat analysis had been conducted to inform those and at that time I was informed that although existing extent information that was available was used to inform there had been no new analysis uh since 1990 since the 1990s when it was originally purchased. Mh. And so and so when I asked well

[120:00] um that h how do we change that? I was informed that this is the place where um that it's the Boulder Valley Comp plan that drives that and some of our other plans. And so I'm just trying to figure out if it's here that we talk about um you know reimagining and redesigning um urban planning so that it is inclusive so that habitat habitat is as important as humans in our design which currently that is not how it is. Um so if it if it so my question is is is this the place that it happens or was it the previous one similar to the question that I had around you know that first planning process talks about grocery stores but it doesn't talk about food systems in any other meaningful way and so again when do we talk about you know the the the core anchors the guiding you know macro level of planning and the order. Sure. So for the planning reserve um

[121:00] proper that 500 acres that's on the north side of the city that that first step was around you know the um the level of service and infrastructure that would be required right the second step is to assess community need and the that is the process that'll be or that is incorporated here into the comp plan update where there are three criteria to determine whether or not the community need is sufficient to warrant moving forward with the third step. And the third step is um called a service area expansion plan, which maybe we can change the name of that so it's a little easier to to say, but essentially that's a sub community plan for the planning reserve itself. And that's where you get into the real details about what is the vision for this place where we're still sort of at that moment of is it even uh feasible or is it even desired by the community to move into that space? Um, and then and then when we get into that third step of the sub the sub community plan, that's where we would have those

[122:00] conversations around vision to I don't I'm not asking you what the process is. I'm asking where do we decide where do we revisit that process and if that's the process that we want to use because my concern is is you don't wait until step three being a former commissioner for Colorado Parks and Wildlife to determine the you know the things that we would determine at that step. that would normally be something you would assess in step one to even determine the level and percentages. So my question is at what stage of this process would that type of conversation occur? Because when I asked about it then it was this plan that was the gatekeeper for us to be able to make those changes. So I'm fine with the process as is. My question is if the city had decided to get additional land, let's just say, right? we would be beholden to the current process if there's not a place where we revisit that process. And so I'm just asking at what point? If not now, that's fine. I just need to know and I again

[123:01] make the point that there are some structural changes that I would love for us to explore and address related to urban planning and climate and um you know uh environmental sustainability. And so that's really where I'm trying to get clarity on when are we going to be able to have those types of process conversations. Yeah. And I I misunderstood your question. So yes, the the the procedures for the planning reserve um those are those are codified or those are included in the comprehensive plan. So if those procedures are to change, now is the time. That's right. as part of this update um as part of this process that's when we can entertain changes to the procedures um appendix or section of the document to change and would it be in these types of concepts that this or is there another place within the plan that this will come to the floor? probably a little bit later in the process, I would imagine, because we're yeah, we'll be focused over the over the summer and

[124:01] fall sort of on the larger policy and and really um trying to reach some some preferred options and consensus within the community about policy, but then the procedures to implement those things. That'll probably come a little bit later um maybe by the end of the year, but certainly early next year before we draft the the plan itself. Okay. And then for the definitions question, there was a double entandra around like open space. So open space means X during when we're talking about open space and planning, but it means something different in the built environment. So is that something that would be addressed when you were talking about definitions before? Uh don't know if I fully understand, but the um you know certainly so capital O open space. Yeah, that's the one. Yeah. So capital O open space owned by the city exists mostly out in the county. um that would be conversation more around that the food systems and and how agriculture is. It was more so just clarifying the term so we're not using big O and little

[125:01] O for something that's totally different. So I'm just again my question is where that part's going to happen and just making sure I didn't I don't want to miss a step. Sure. Sure. I can just envision months from now somebody being like well we talked about this three months ago and I can just see this happening. So that's why I'm asking very specific questions right now. Yeah. And I think we'll we'll get to that in in um a couple more of these down where we're talking about the the sort of natural systems in the city. But you're right, I use the term open space when related to redevelopment. That was little O open space. I should call that green space or just outdoor areas. Yeah, it's great. It's a good point. Yeah, that's a good point. That's right. Okay, I got Lauren and then we can move to comments. Is this the section where we might also that might include something like um strengthen or reducing barriers to annexation if

[126:01] there's a strong equity component? For instance, I think about our mosque that doesn't have access to uh water tap. Um and is this an area where we might be able to address? Yeah, I do think that we, you know, through this process, we could look more closely at areas that are designated as area 2 currently that are directly adjacent to the city and have those conversations with our county colleagues as well about um about there are there are a number of annexation policies in the comp plan as you as you well know um and also other procedures in in the back of the document. So those those conversations could be part of this discussion around um you know there's a lot of area 2 properties out there that have been area 2 for 20 30 40 years. Will they ever annex in? Should they still remain area 2? You know I think there are some kind of fundamental questions around um around that as well that we could look into. Thank you. Okay. So I'll move to uh comments. I will note I imagine we all have opinions

[127:00] on the height limit. Um, but I would I would invite let's say maybe a a small handful of comments and then the record will be writing down what you think on the sheet. So, we do not need to get all of our opinions out into the ether tonight, but I know Mark will say a few words. It's finally my turn. You know, I I wish you had been a little less bold with respect to your height limitation suggestion. The height limits in Boulder are a a a fundamental and core value. Um this is tantamount to suggesting that we sell open space in order to build 15minute walkable neighborhoods. It's a suggestion, but it's not a very good one. Um, I question whether uh you would get support for this notion from council, but even if you did, I know that you would get a very dim reception in the community for this.

[128:01] Um, if you really want to go that route and put this up for a charter vote, be my guest. Um, it will be a very instructive lesson. Um, and if you've in terms of the impact of doing this, if you've lived in a true urban environment, you know that higher floors are uh more expensive, they either rent higher or they sell higher. We would not be building housing in Boulder that's contributing to the uh to the community in terms of affordability. we would simply be building the most expensive housing there is in Boulder. And so I think this is a let me be kind and say a a an idea that we should not pursue. Uh that's not what I wanted to say but um I I think it is illfounded. Uh it will be very very

[129:02] uh poorly received by this community and I urge you not to go there. Couple other thoughts on this matter. I got Mark. I'm gonna Yeah. Oh, am I cutting? Okay. All right. I'm going to limit my comments just to the um the height limit and say that yes, I concur that going for a vote regarding height limits uh might be perilous. However, changing our height limits to allow different roof forms that are treated with the same um uh respect variability as mechanical screening. Right now, you can build if you get a if you get an exemption and you go to 55 ft, you can go much higher than that with ugly mechanical screening. um if you want to build a building that has a roof form that hides

[130:02] those mechanical screens, then you're subject to the to the height limit. So, if this is an opportunity to create um a better built environment that's more visually pleasing that supports the community's goals of of our built environment, architectural design, if this is the place to do it, then I'm all for it. I got Claudia and Tina and Ryan. Sorry, I tried to jump the gun with my comment earlier. It's also about height. Um, I definitely would like you to study physical composition and what goes forward, but I do think you should be very careful with one-dimensional discussions of development intensity and height is that one dimension. Um, I think height is not the only tool that we use to make and experience places in the real world. And I think if you do want to explore this with physical composition, we will get much better outcomes with a conversation that includes other levers such as floor area ratio, lot sizes, and setbacks, not just

[131:03] height, regardless of its merits. Tina, then Ryan, then Matt. Yeah, I just had a quick process questions. You just referred to our worksheet as a record. Are they is it a record or is this just a worksheet? So these Yes. Yes. We'll we'll collect those at the end of the meeting and then uh include them in the public record in our meeting in our meeting summary that will come to you in a couple of weeks. I just wanted to make sure people knew that that would be available for the community. Yes, absolutely. Terrific. Thank you. Um yes, I I I don't think discussing the height limit would be productive. Um, but if if it's the will of the rest of the group, of course, that's fine. Uh, and I'm good with the looking at the area two and area three. Um, and also look forward to the separate area three. Uh, one of my key questions is how changing the youth on area two and three.

[132:02] Um, how how close it gets to our service levels, meeting our water service levels and and how would it impact infill development if we took water for here? Would it impact our ability to fully do the infill piece and understanding that balance? Ryan and then Matt. I'm thinking about the the go the the goals that would organize this and um I think it would be helped to make sense of why why would we be talking about the height limit if if we were maybe talking about what goals we're trying to achieve in order to to accomplish that. So, one of the obvious goals to me would be to develop more um attainable and affordable diverse forms of infillmental housing and that ideally would lead the the assessment of well what what are options for doing that and there's probably other goals that should be a part of this but I think it's a little the the 55 foot height limit is a

[133:00] lightning rod without us saying why are we talking about this to begin with so I propose that that it would benefit from some goals and I would offer the one that I just said um and then when I think about area three Um I've been um I've had an impression that we're it's a little bit hard to put area three into a wider context of what we're trying to achieve at least with where we've been so far. And I think this might be a nice way to say at least to the extent that area 3 might be something that could provide diverse inflemental housing and it might provide some certain number of those units. Maybe it's 4,000 or 5,000 or whatever. than to ask the question, what is the the most cost-effective and otherwise beneficial way to put that housing into the city of Boulder? And if it turns out that adjusting the height limit by, you know, 3 feet and and then we don't need to develop a green field out in, you know, area 3, that would be a consideration we might want to make. Of course, that's just a crude example, but um it does make sense to me that we would be we would be open-minded if we have goals in mind that we're trying to

[134:00] achieve and then bringing about options for those those outcomes. Matt, then Laura, and then I'll call on myself. I appreciate it. I'll just touch on the height limit stuff. I I I think to the lightning rod issue. I think we should just be clear in our comms that maybe perhaps we're not making a a decision on a wholesale removal of the height limit just to lower the temperature and maybe reduce the emails coming in to council and perhaps planning board which would be quite beneficial. I I will say that I agree with where you know Mark McIntyre was going with this which is the the thought about targeted and not just the roof and and sort of thinking about the screening but also in terms of different uses on the roof as I mentioned earlier you know thinking about Perry urban or urban agriculture I mean maybe those are new things and we think about community benefit in which we give those exemptions or right you could even put a rail for a rooftop at 55 ft for a restaurant like or so so there's these sort of silly things that get in our own way and I could see us getting more creative about how we create those allowances again for the community benefit for rewarding height uh for folks. So I think there's some are places to be more targeted. Laura,

[135:05] thank you. So I'll just say about area two, in my opinion, I don't think this is a really fruitful area for us to spend time on given all the other things we want to do in this particular update. Area 2 is already area that is able to annex if the property owner wants to. And so I would be very cautious about for example allowing ADUs wholesale in area 2 because that might affect a property owner's desire to annex into the city. They currently usually people annex into the city because they want to get on city water uh city services and when they do that we are able to create negotiate to get an additional housing benefit. We usually insist upon that. So, for example, we just had an annexation where somebody kept their single family home, but then devoted half of their land to multifamily, middle-income housing. I would not like to see our leverage for doing that go away because we're allowing more um more housing into area 2 without the annexation. So, I would just be really

[136:00] cautious about what that what that might look like. I'm not saying I'm totally against it, but for me, this is not the one I'm most interested in exploring. With regard to the height limit, I just want to add an exclamation point to what Mark McIntyre and Matt Benjamin just said. I don't think a lot of people understand that our current height limit is 55 ft, but you can put rooftop appertinances like for for building um air filtration and air air conditioners and stuff on the roof and then shield them. And I think that goes up to what like 12 ft or 15 ft above that 55 ft. But you cannot put an elevator or a staircase um a stairwell on the roof even though you already have these rooftop impertinances up there. So people have a hard time accessing the roof when you can't use it for things like uh green roofs, community gardens, pools, have shade structures, use it for recreation and other amenities even though we already have stuff up on that roof. So I think that that is one small tweak that I think the community might find interesting. Um I definitely find it interesting and I think this is a great topic for that statistically valid survey. Okay, let's let's get a wide

[137:00] range of options out there ranging from the very small tweaks to maybe something a little bit bigger and get a real sense of community feedback because we know um we're going to get strong opinions on both sides, but we don't have a sense of what percentage of the community is in each of those buckets. And a statistically valid survey, which we're going to do for this plan, would be an excellent opportunity to test some of that out. So, I'm very supportive of making this an item that we go to the community and say, "Hey, what do you think?" Thanks, Laura. I'll call in myself. And I was going to address area two uh as well. Um and you had an excellent comment in there. I was going to say I did find it as an intriguing possibility for the area 2 neighborhoods that are fully developed. So where there um you think about Gun Barrel or just north of Northfield Commons um where there is an additional development potential, maybe less incentive um like for some of the things that Laura was talking about. And if the county were interested in allowing ADUs, which if they annexed, they'd be able to have them too. I don't know. So that seemed like a potentially intriguing option. All right, that was my bit. I'm going to ask us to move on.

[138:01] We were definitely a little slower there, guys, uh, pals, but um, it did have the word height limit in it in the discussion. So, uh, that that phrase doesn't occur in the other items, so we'll see. All right. So, next we have the uh, consider a needs-based approach to policy implementation, also known as targeted universalism. Questions on this topic? And yeah, Kirk, I it seems like this is a different term for just databased equity or something like that. I'm trying to understand why we're using this new terminology that nobody or I shouldn't say nobody. I have never heard of and uh it seems like it might be fairly confusing. Yeah, I think I mean if if we do move forward with this, we will uh certainly look at the language we're using when we

[139:00] communicate this out to the out to the community. I think uh partly we use that that uh language in the memo um just because it it it is a sort of academic concept and and we wanted to make sure that we were referencing that um specifically. But but you're right. I mean from a fundamentally what we're talking about here is this needsbased approach and and using data to do that analysis and incorporate that into our decision-m um so that we are you know tailoring the implementation of our policies to different groups so that everybody has a chance to um you know to meet that universal goal. Mason Nicole, this is a uh it might just be being dense question, but I I'm I'm confused as to why this is a a topic for additional I I thought this was just part of our what we do. Yeah, that's yeah, that's great. That's great feedback. And if it you know, if

[140:00] it falls off the list, that potentially opens up flexibility for other items as well, Nicole. and then Laura and then Taiisha. Yeah, I had sort of a similar question um to Mason's which is just how does this um how does this play out? Like how does this policy concept what does it what does it sort of look like? What are the kinds of things that you might explore? And then I've got one more question. Yeah, I mean I think the the difference here is that we we have um you know embedded this this culture of equity in a lot of our decision- making. Um and we've done that through the SER framework. We've done that in a number of our kind of individual plans or opportunities. I think what this is envisioning is is that this becomes a core essentially a core policy and a core value that that begins to apply completely citywide and it it helps to sort of um uh you know sort of fundamentally I think um formalize this as as a policy within the comprehensive plan where today it doesn't really exist. Thank you. That's really helpful. Um and

[141:00] so targeted universalism was a new term for me. um for this concept and I love this concept. I think we've talked about it a lot in council. I'm sure planning board has too. I just wanted to throw out some examples and see if this is the kind of just to make sure that I'm understanding this correctly. Um so, you know, one of the things I think about is uh the earpieces that we have on the dis um and how that helps, right? It was specifically for for folks who have a harder time hearing, but I use those too. They're actually useful for everybody if there's little noise or a quieter speaker. Um, so that one I mean the other thing that I was thinking about is how some of our um presentations and council meetings are starting to um shift. So having fewer words on slides, having shorter memos, um having more structured questions, those are things that help folks who have ADHD or dyslexia or things like that, they actually seem like they're good for everybody. Are those kind of in that camp? Yeah, I would I would include those. And then you know in terms of some of the more um you know physical

[142:01] implementation of uh our CIP projects and and where those are located where our major investments are located within the city, how those get applied. Um, you know, another example I believe that um we read in the literature was, you know, originally the the notion of accessibility and um uh wheelchair access ramps on on sidewalks, right? And eventually people realize that that's actually great for children and people that are temporarily, you know, disabled from an injury or something like that. And so, you know, thinking about those ways that we can um improve the city and and improve the way we implement projects so that they um they disproportionately help those people that need it most, but also it's good for everybody. Okay, thank you. Um and so just another um kind of example and but I can actually save this for a comment, Erin, if that's more helpful. Okay, Laura has got her question answered. to

[143:00] thank you very much. Um I echo my uh colleagues um questions about the term and again as somebody who's been working in equity since the '9s. This term is not actually new. It's just a remix of terms that we've used many times in the past. Um and I'll save my rest of comments for later on that. I do have questions around I noticed the identifying most and least served which is great. Um but I was also curious if this would be inclusive of the actual policy responses and resource allocation and assessing the quality of the work we do um based on you know it's great to know what the outcomes are and we we know what they are. That's water is wet research. Um, but I'm just curious if there was also qu uh conversations around studying the actual policies that were implemented and the effects of the policies that the city is administering

[144:00] as well as um the amount of resources that are being used. So indicators like workforce composition, pay equity, promotion rates, recruitment rates, retention rates, um those kinds of components. Uh I saw other tools used but just in general just trying to get a hand around the governance and accountability components. Yeah. I mean I what I would say is responsibly governed is one of our core goals of the SER framework and and you know this at least the way we've been envisioning this would be um focused more on sort of citywide policy that applies to the community and maybe less so internally to our city operations. it. Um but certainly there are other tools and other things that you know if this becomes a core policy of of the city and of the comprehensive plan. Our internal operating documents also are consistent with the comprehensive plan. So that would be something that would get incorporated as well. Okay. And then does this uh is this the area that would include issues like repair, reparations,

[145:02] and reconciliation from the Colorado racial equity study that's happening for black Colorado. there's specific information around Boulder and Boulder, the city of Boulder specifically. Um, I'm also thinking about the track the tri uh the tribal uh reconciliation education commission's report on the historic land loss and the what 300 million um that would just be the city of Boulderland. That doesn't include water or agriculture. So, just curious where would that fall in our being a welcoming and inclusive and vibrant community? Uh, I don't know if we would get into that level of detail in terms of this particular policy, but it's something, you know, um, it's something we could we could do some additional research on and and try to incorporate. Great. All right, let's move to comments. If we have a few comments on this one, I think we got Laura and then Nicole and Tina.

[146:00] Thank you. So, I I also had the question of why this would need to be a comp plan item. I mean, I I don't know what kind of research or community engagement you would need to do on this. I think it's very broadly supported and so maybe this is just one of those other items that isn't like a focus area or a big concept to explore, but it's just kind of something that we we do because we all support it. Um, but I do want to say that calling it targeted universalism to me feels like it could have the perverse impact of uh redirecting resources towards um parts of our community that are not underserved. So, for example, there's less transit in some of the single family neighborhoods, but there's also less demand for transit way out on the on the fringes of the city where folks usually have cars. Um, I don't know that those are the neighborhoods that need the most access to transit right now, but that could be driven by something that looks like a everybody should have equal access to everything kind of policy. The memo also talked about how our um communities that that score highest on the racial equity index in terms of needing services already

[147:01] tend to be located closest to things like public libraries and recreation centers. I would not want to see something like targeted universalism drive resources away from those those community members. So just I would just be cautious if do we need to call it that because I feel like it could be misinterpreted and misused. Nicole and Tina. Um yeah, thank you. And I'm actually really excited about thinking how we can expand this idea a little bit more um across the city and and I I I fully support moving forward with this as a policy concept to explore. The fact that the frontline communities were specifically asking for this to be a policy change makes me think that it's something that they are still feeling we could move farther on um in a way that would make a difference. Um, one of the things that came to mind as I was just, um, reading through this part of the memo, um, was the degree to which this concept would be so helpful for our city in in the ways we're trying to, um, get

[148:00] the county to help us a little bit more with unsheltered homelessness specifically. This is a place where we are the frontline community in the county. Um, and you know, we are we are experiencing the biggest impacts of this issue right now in the city. we're really struggling with it and um helping us is actually going to help everybody. If we could kind of as a region invest in strategies that are going to help here, it will help everyone. And so I just I think about this approach as being such a crucial one and that's that specific issue is one where we are noticing the lack of it in in our regional approach to to a really challenging problem. So, um I do think that this would be a a a transformational move for the city and would love to see how some of the groups engaged um see this as expanding. Tina and then Tara. Yeah. Um, I appreciate both Laura and Nicole's comments and um, the one

[149:02] caution I have is we've invested a lot talking about the SER framework and the equity instrument and I I don't want us to have ideally too many overlapping definitions and frameworks because it could get confusing pretty quickly. Um so to if we do go down this route to try and clarify what we're doing when and um so I understand that sometimes yes a layered approach is good but I feel like this is getting very wordy for doing some similar activities Tara after googling and studying targeted universalism today and yesterday um I really do like this idea and I'm segueing or colloqueen being off of I don't know if you guys use that word planning uh what Nicole said um if you would say to the county for instance well we should uh we Boulder should get

[150:02] more help with uh those experiencing homelessness they would say well that's not fair we have all these other counties but in reality we're one of the counties uh that are the most affected so by t to me targeting means that whoever is the most affected they get the resources And so it it there's a little bit of nuance there that I appreciate and I think could be good for the city and I also agree that it will be good for everybody. All right, we got Mark and then we'll wrap up. Tish is also I did the questions on the first one. Thank you. I didn't see your hand. Yeah, just very quickly I I want to support those who have a little problem with the terminology. Um, I interpret this as simply equitable distribution of services. People, I think, would understand that this is a specified term and people are going to need to know it. I I I think we're over

[151:00] complicating things. We want equity in how we perform and how we give develop deliver services to our population. I I don't know that the special term of targeted universalism is going to um resonate with large portions of the community. Um and an even larger portion is probably likely to say what is that and I I I think it's it's just a little bit too far for me. Thanks Taisha and then we'll move on. Yes, just very briefly, this is my colleagues and have pretty much said similar things. Um, I just we've worked so hard to get people to understand what equity is and we still don't even have a strong definition for that. I have significant concerns around adding additional language that would then require more accountability and we haven't even been able to identify and and do the work around equity. So, I just, you know, it

[152:00] just feels very confusing and I I'm hopeful that we can um lean into the words that we've invested in. I understand obviously there's federal funding implications to the words that we use. That's real and I can honor that. Um but I also don't want to pull back on all the work that and investments that we've made to get here. Thank you. All right. Thanks. We'll move on to the next one. And I will note that we continue to fall behind. So, let's try to exercise our succinctness muscles here. Um, and our next one is collaborate with regional partners to make community investments. Questions, Mark? How are we not doing this right now? Yeah, I we are doing this right now, but I do think that this was um this was really intended to kind of um think big and and broadly and try to identify a big bold idea that we can

[153:00] that we can have that collaborative um discussion around, you know, thinking about alternative energy systems or regional transit systems, things like that. I mean, I think this is really um this is an idea that we're already pursuing. It's something that we already do, but this is uh leaning into it a little bit further of like what are those big things that maybe we could do at a regional scale that um that we should continue to to move towards and actually to document within the comprehensive plan? Other Mark. Okay. Uh will you be considering transformative health care projects such as uh um mental illness treatment, drug addiction treatment, you know, we need a facility badly somewhere in the county. Um that would seem to me to be something you might want to take a look at. Yeah, I think that could absolutely be added to the topics of to be explored. Yeah. Thank you, Mason. Similar to first

[154:00] Mark's question, how does how does focusing on this help you all get to those bigger because you're already working on this, so I'm trying to understand like how does focusing on this help you all get to that those big ideas. Well, I mean, part of it is um you know, there's policies in the comp plan today that speak to the the fact that we're going to collaborate with Boulder County and our regional partners on a number of different things, but there's there's nothing specific to say we are going to collaborate on, you know, X project, right? And so this would really be I think a an effort to um uh conceptualize what that project is but then also have conversations with our county colleagues and see if there is support from their side as well that yeah that's something we should you know we should focus on over the next 20 years and and really work towards uh implementing that. I guess I'm still struggling with how this is different than what's happening like what like what I'm hearing is and let me know if I'm I'm incorrect is complaint before

[155:00] was vague. we didn't quite have the direction we need. This will allow us to have more direction and maybe better focus what we're doing. Is that the right interpretation? I'd say overall, but also just trying to put a finer point on, you know, is there a major significant investment that both ourselves and our regional partners can all agree that we're going to focus on and actually implement over the next 20 years. That help Lauren and then Nicole and then Matt. Um, it seems like similar to having overlapping plans. I have a little bit of concern with this one around, you know, we already have our inter intergovernmental affairs committee and our packet of information that talks about, you know, we recently chose to include um some strategizing with the county. And in that I Why is the comp plan the right place for having another version of that? and

[156:03] how do we deal with I mean it feels like those conversations shift quickly more quickly than a 20-year time frame. Um so what was the thinking there with well I mean I think I think partly partly the thinking is that the comprehensive plan is a jointly adopted plan between city and county. So this this is the opportunity or a opportunity for us to um to really draw the line in the sand and and fully commit on both sides, city and county to move towards something whatever that whatever that would be. Um again we we have policies about collaborating and I know there's other mechanisms and other ways that we do that. This was just an idea that is there something that could be formalized through the comp plan. Um we would take that opportunity. Nicole, then Matt, then Kurt, then Tina. Um, so this is kind of a similar question to Council Member Wallik. Um, and just saying that because there's two marks in the room right now. Um, I I I

[157:00] would also love to consider a regional collaboration on issues like homelessness and behavioral health. And if things like that are on the table, um, thinking back to our presentation from youth and the youth action plan, could this be a place to engage youth and elevate some of the more regional issues they described around bullying and school climate? Is that the kind of thing that could be in play here? Certainly could be. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I get this is really just kind of permission to think big and by us giving permission to think big if you go off and find some really cool thing that we don't kneecap you and we don't like it because we gave you permission to go big. I mean, I think in many ways this is an allowance and I would maybe argue a little hangover from previous comp plans and previous councils who were not so happy with thinking big. So I I I think this is a much simpler thing than we're maybe alluding to in terms of permission. Think big and you have permission and if it doesn't work great. We thought big and if it works then we win for it. Um so so I think we should

[158:01] just unleash that potential and find those opportunities as they see fit um as they fit into the comp plan going forward. I think we're still in question phase but we'll note that for the comment section. Kurt and Tina. That's good. So, I'm still a little unclear based uh on your responses to Mason. Are you imagining that this would in the process of developing the comp plan, it would identify one or two of these particular things that could be worked on together or would it just say we should work on something with people regionally and we'll figure that out? I'm trying to figure out how specific the concept is. It's it's your first comment that you know really the the extra effort that we would put towards this concept would be to do that research and have those and and do that exploring as to to be able to identify something that you know everybody agrees that that's what we're going to move forward on. um we're obviously not going to achieve that within the short time frame that we have, but if there's the ability to identify the topic or the

[159:00] item or the project or the investment, that's something we would want to formalize within the comp plan. Um but as far as just ex existing policy that you know we will continue to collaborate that will carry forward undoubtedly. Okay, thank you Tina. Okay, let's shift to comments. Um I've got one on Colent Tina and then myself and then Ryan. Yeah, I think this this one is a little tricky because it feels sort of like a council priority that we would then invite to work with the county but not necessarily the other municipalities which is where some of this gets tricky. Um I am interested in thinking about doing something like this but making sure that the guard rails are clear that it's something that really the city and the county can do. So I would have some concern about doing something with the school district which has a separate governmental body unless we collaborate with them and well but as well but they're not part of this process. And then I would be interested in um we

[160:01] haven't talked as much about energy but an energy independent strategy I think would be of of big interest to me and would make sense at a more regional level than just the city of Boulder. Um, and then I would also add into this conversation the possibility of a food goal because the f the some of the food conversation might dovetail into a large project that needs support and that definitely needs a regional view not just a city view. So my my comment would be I'm just I'm hearing from the questions people kind of struggling with this because I think my my understanding is on the one hand of course right like we do this already but please keep at it except you're talking about maybe some big move which sounds exciting and really interesting and so my personal comment might be to say like I really am interested in that idea but I don't think we should create a big collaboration goal just for the sake of doing so. If you hit on one that you're like, "No, this is it. Like, we could really do this." Fantastic. But if

[161:00] you kind of cast around and there's like three like maybe ideas, then maybe it's not worth spending time on. Brian, I said the the bit on transit earlier, so please insert my comments on this. But maybe to also draw out this question of like is is staff already doing this or not. I think it's clear that there's a county transit plan update happening um that's about to to begin, but it's not the case that we should expect staff on their own to say, "Hey, we're going to start a new transit agency." This is this is something that I think we should provide direction for. And um I can't remember exactly what I said before, but I'm not fixed to the idea of it being an agency or a transit district as we currently think of it, but just that we would consider um establishing goals and performance standards and a commitment to making those things happen and that would be the idea. Um and I'm also fine if we end up saying we've looked at this and we're not going to do it, but just that this is the time when we should be making that evaluation as a community. And so I'd love to see that that evaluation be a commitment here.

[162:01] All right, not seeing any other hands raised. Uh, we can go on to the next one. Consider options for enhancing Boulders's night economy. Questions? Yes, Mason. Uh, another question that makes me feel a little ignorant. What What does What does this really look like from a city perspective? Because when I think about this, I think of like market response to demand for nightife in certain areas of town, etc. I'm I'm just curious just because again, I'm ignorant like what does this look like from a city's investment? Yeah, I mean certainly this would this would have to manifest itself initially through policies, right? That that would guide the um uh future changes as one example, future changes to our um zoning code or things like that to allow certain types of uses in different parts of the city. Um but really, you know, this is at its most fundamental level of is this

[163:00] something that we're interested in? is it's something that we want to pursue as a community that we see as a as an opportunity to help support our social connection, our economy over time, etc. Establish those policies, but then that trickles down through a number of different implementation strategies. And they could, you know, range from small things like allowing uh, you know, local cinema in a neighborhood or something like that to something larger of, you know, really getting behind um, uh, larger performing arts centers or other kinds of things that are going to support a, you know, more of a 24-hour lifestyle within the city. I'd just like to add to, it might include things like daycarees open late at night for workers who work late shifts, those kinds of things as well. So not just entertainment and arts which are very important but also other things. Thanks Sarah Matt. Yeah. Thanks for this. My question is this seems pretty narrow in which it seems like it might be I'm just wondering why this maybe isn't core to our economic development strategy and

[164:01] andor letting that strategy feed a more demandbased understanding which then could allow us to send say oh hey maybe we need zoning changes or oh my gosh there's maybe some land use incompatibilities that then would come later. So I it just seems this is the first time hearing this and we didn't talk about it in our economic development strategy. So I think maybe we kind of maybe have the order reversed a little bit. So I'm just sort of wondering why where those pieces are are at a nexus or not. Yeah, it's a good question. We we certainly are in collaboration with um with uh folks working on the economic vitality strategy as well. So this this would become sort of part and parcel of that. Um and their you know their work is informing this, our work is going to inform um their work as well. So, um it's an iterative process. It's not intended to necessarily be, you know, cart before the horse or anything, but um you know, really again the the idea here is like is this a concept that you all feel like is worth exploring further with the community and is it something that you know potentially we need to

[165:01] establish some new or revised policies around? Taishan and Lauren. Um this is just a universal question that hopefully will be addressed in the next iteration of this but I noticed that the the focus for each of the focus areas there was information provided about how that focus area was identified. So there was community input. There was the summary summary of current policy. But for these concepts, it mentions that community members preliminary research and consultation by subject area matters. But then there's not anything specific to each subject to each component. And so although I appreciate all of this, um my question is it would be helpful as we continue on these concepts to have the specific qualitative and quantitative data that was used to identify these as

[166:01] we think about also prioritization. So for this one in particular like it would be helpful to know like what data was used to even identify night economy. Was there geographic reference? Was there age reference? Was there I mean I just I my question is is can we get more qualitative and quantitative data for each of these concepts as we continue these conversations moving forward. Thank you. Lauren and then Mark W. Um I also have a more universal question about this. So, are there areas in the comp plan that prohibit us from doing this that stand in the way of us looking at these things that we need to change particularly related to this topic but also related to the the other topics that we're looking at like I would say clearly the land use map um the physical

[167:01] composition those I understand as having restrictions within the comprehensive plan, but it feels like a number of these other ones we can do at any point regardless of an update to the comprehensive plan. Yeah. And I think that would that would be one of the initial steps as you know again if these are deemed worthy of of going forward for further research that would be the initial thing that we would be looking at more closely of um you know how many of these things are either restricted by the comp plan or there's just not any information in the comp plan at all to guide it. So I think some of these ideas are new, some of them are, you know, emerging out of challenges we have with our current plan, that kind of thing. So it it's probably more likely for some of these um that there just isn't direction or isn't uh policy within the plan that would that would direct us in this way. I know that we do have regulations around hours of operation and things like that. Does any portion of that sit

[168:01] currently in the comprehensive plan? Uh my sense is most of that lives within the zoning code and in landers code, not within the comp plan. Thank you, Mark with a W. Yeah. Um I I kind I agree with Lauren's comments and Matt's comments. This seems a little small for the comp plan. It seems like something that could be produced by economic vitality um or our vibrant arts and culture community which uh is never shy about communicating with us. I I I I just don't know that this is of the consequence um that ought to be in in the comp plan. Um so my view okay file under comments we got one more question. Ryan, question. Um, when I looked at this, before I read the detail, I was thinking about climate change and the the case for creating um more spaces for people in in um and activities in times

[169:02] that are not hot and also about demand management and use utilizing the systems we have that are dormant when people are sleeping. And um I'm just wondering if that was that part of the thinking here or was this really meant to be more rec like kind of recreational? Yeah. Yeah. No, I think you raised a great point. I mean, it kind of dubtales on Sarah's comment about, you know, daycare and other services um and amenities for people that may be working hours that are different, but I think you rais a great point about um our energy use and other things like that and how some of the again the sort of shifts of of the daily rhythm are are starting to change and so um are there opportunities for us to to capitalize on that? Comments on this topic? Yep. Terra T terara says she likes it. I got Emil and also Claudia. Um yeah, so it seems like this would be a vital um a vital consideration for the

[170:03] 15minute neighborhood where you begin to think about considerate consider it in a 24-hour uh component is like what happens what opportunities are there? uh but in a context that they're trying to create livability for a particular area. So I think there's a place and it isn't just about you know going to the disco or you know what we normally think of as what goes on at night um and some of those other comments that have been made about it. I think so in integrating it into how we develop the 50minute neighborhood um parameters. Claudia So, I anticipated that this one would generate some skepticism amongst my colleagues. I did want to say a few words in its defense. I think that um life after dark is a pretty big slice of community life that we do often overlook. Um it's not just part of an

[171:01] economic vitality strategy. There's this idea that some areas of the city, some populations, some functions might be active at different hours. Um and those activities are really essential to the functioning of a whole community. And I think that should be part of our planning. And I'm really glad that Ryan mentioned it as well. Night activity is um also a climate adaptation and I think that's another way it's likely to become more important in the future. I don't know what this would look like in the comp plan. Maybe it looks like adding activity hours to our land use map descriptions. Maybe it looks like mapping night activity centers and connections. You may have other ideas, but I think this is a really useful lens to incorporate in some way. Um, and this is a good opportunity to think about how we can have that reflected in our planning Nicole. Um, yeah, I actually have changed my mind in the course of listening to our conversation here. Um, and I'm really glad that that that you brought it forward. I do like it. Yeah. No, this is

[172:01] this is great. Um, you know, some of the things that I am thinking about that would be really curious to hear more about um is kind of what Ryan was getting at with the climate impacts, like the public health impacts as we do get a hotter, drier climate, um, that's going to make it harder for some people to be outside during the day. And so, as we think about equity and sustainability and resilience, how does this fit into it? Right? Is it is it a piece of that? I think that's a really fascinating question um for us to think about. Um, and then I also just think about how how um how we could create a night economy um as being an interesting one for thinking about equity as well. Uh especially for folks with disabilities and other people um who sometimes uh or you know women often we hear about those too. Uh they're not really feeling comfortable going around um in some areas at night. Uh but some people can't see what's in front of them. if you're in a wheelchair, it's really hard to be out at night um unless you've got some well-lit spaces. So, I think this really

[173:00] just opens up a lot of really rich conversation for us to have as a community and thinking about how we're adapting to a warmer um climate, but also um how we're just creating a more equitable city. So, I think it's very cool and um I'm actually going to change my uh rating here. Ryan, just to speak, yeah, to the the importance of this, I mean, if you think about many of our systems are sized, the reasons we have the size of systems like our energy grid and our and our roads and our parking, they're sized for peak demand. They're sized for the few points at which we have the peakiest demand and then we're we're stuck with all that for the rest of the time. And it's very expensive for for all of us when when the system is oversized. So, I think with um with you know, hotter days, the system is going to get peakier. that is a cost on all of us. Um so I think in general this is uh this has a lot of economic relevance. Um air pollution is another one if you know from moving vehicles around if you can if you can you know shave shave the peak. So yeah this has a big impact. I don't know what

[174:00] the potential is to actually move these these activities to the to the night and can we move used cargo vehicles at night? Obviously that would create other considerations but it does seem like something that would be worth looking at and um especially as we think about you know the 10 plus years ahead that we're aiming for. Okay, great. And just imagine if there were a taco truck open until 10 o'clock and you could get hot fresh tacos on your way home after the meeting. Wouldn't that be amazing? Next one. Okay. Rethink Boulder Valley's natural infrastructure systems questions. Chair Tina. Well, I noticed that I talked to KJ about this already that we are void of any discussion on our parks and I'm wondering if this fits into that disc is does parks fit here or do we not need to talk about it? I mean, I I I think that this is particularly focused on some of the more natural infrastructure systems that we have. Um

[175:01] however in my if you were to ask me personally I think parks and those two things actually integrate very well and and um parks are are obviously a much more formalized sort of human- centered um you know recreationbased in in many cases not all the time but many cases. Um but they still provide a breathing room within the city right and as an urbanized area. So parks are critical. This this is a bit more focused on the natural systems, but I see those two things happening together. Tina, um could this include uh possibly exposing our irrigation ditches to go into the more urban area of Boulder as a cooling and walking space? Uh con conceivably. Um, you know, certainly that's um ultimately the decision I think many times of the ditch company themselves, but um, you know, but those are certainly strategies we could look at. Okay. Thank you. I I feel like that's something that's so um

[176:02] enjoyed sort of west of Broadway and to think that then they're covered as you go east where we already have so many heat islands has always felt like a possible um, opportunity to create this kind of pedestrian and comfort area. Ta. Thank you. Um, is this a place that um, like a local green amendment was would be considered um, which basically guarantees citizens and residents the right to a healthy environment including clean air and clean water. I also am curious if there were conversations around environmental and climate justice response. So although I appreciate the focus on natural areas, there's also the debt that we owe for poison allowing, you know, pollution in the water and the air and those kinds of things. So I just kind of curious the scope of this conver of this particular dimension. Well, I mean, yeah, I think it it's really we would part of the research

[177:02] would be to look at again our existing systems that are out there today and see and and look more closely at their geographic locations and and look at the communities that are that are nearby um and understand, you know, are there ways that these systems can provide more uses and more amenities than maybe they do today? you know, they might serve a primarily storm water function, but are there ways that they can actually serve as spaces when it's not serving that storm water function? So, thinking about it more broadly in terms of um uh in rather than just sort of the narrow focus on, you know, the the creek is going to carry water or the creek, you know, has great riparian habitat. looking at ways that those can be broadened and and um you know serve all the community members that are particular that particularly that are nearby and may not have access or as good of access to all the other um parks or open space or other systems. Okay, thank you. Those are my questions. Nicole, yeah, just um just another question

[178:01] about the kinds of things that might fit in here. Um in some of the engagement, the idea of food as a utility came up. Is that something that would fit into this category or is that something different? I think that that actually could be part of this conversation because again, if we think about kind of our our natural infrastructure or natural systems that undoubtedly includes a lot of the um city-owned open space and other um those other systems that are incorporated with that and we, you know, allow agricultural uses on those areas. So, I I think that could very well be part of this conversation and and perhaps there's even um you know, opportunities for some of our existing open areas within the city to provide some of that space for those kinds of activities as well. Cool. Thank you, Laura. Hi, and just two quick comments on this one. One, I think that this idea of um having more community use of our existing waterways, for example, is a really wonderful one. And I see people doing that informally now, like when you ride along the bike paths, sometimes you

[179:00] see, you know, teenagers sunbathing on the sides of the creek sort of squeezed in next to the bike path or something. So I think this is a great area for more community outreach and understanding how are people doing this now and how would they like to see it expanded. That's one. And then around the idea of food systems, um you know, one thing that I think was really cool in Denver is that they had a model where a private homeowner could basically provide use of their land and pay the water bill for um a nonprofit group to come in and do gardening on their in their yard or on their lawn. Um and that would replace some of our um shall we say non-productive uh private open space with uh with food production um if the homeowner consents to that. So I think looking into that kind of model and that kind of program could be really interesting in terms of how we expand our green space um and our food production and do sort of private public partnerships. Thanks. All right. Well, let's take that as a segue into comments. No, Lauren, you have a follow-up question. Okay. One

[180:01] quick question then more then we'll go to comments. Could this um in looking at storm water management in new ways? Could this include um storm water detention in ride ofways or um below grade? Maybe. No, I think again you know the the value of the comprehensive plan process is that all options are on the table for discussion. So absolutely. Why do we get the sense you've thought of this before, Lauren? All right. Uh, comments on this topic. We got Kurt, Mark, Tyson. Yeah. A couple of the things that you mentioned here, managing storm water and open space requirement. I I think are opportunities for um some really great changes. I've always thought that we should be able to uh provide bio swales in our at our cur curb space um that can um buffer some storm water and add a little micro park little green space to um reduce the heat

[181:01] island effect and also calm traffic. And in terms of the open space requirements, you know, we require 60 feet of private open space for every unit in a lot of places, but it ends up getting all chopped up and it's not very used very efficiently. If we could combine those and make it public open space, then all of a sudden it becomes a really productive, you know, micro park or something like that. So replacing some of the the private open space requirements with a public basically a a payment into a public open space fund I think could be really beneficial. Mark with an M. Um I support this in a very specific way. This I think this is my fourth year as the representative to the greenways advisory committee which has met twice in four years. our greenways which is our creek paths, goose creek path, boulder creek path. These are

[182:02] uh critical pieces of what identifies boulder and they are everyone's responsibility and no one's responsibility. If you can tell me which departments are responsible for the greenway, well is it is open space, it is parks, it is transportation, but I'm I'm amazed that they're in the good condition that they are without any direct oversight. So I think this is an opportunity to take this asset, bring it into the BBCP, create policies around it, and I would hope actually give this to someone to for oversight because our greenways are so important and yet, you know, no one no one really manages them completely. Tesa, thank you. I'm a huge component of of

[183:00] this um particular topic and um again just really push us to think boldly. Um there is no city that has adopted a green a local green amendment um that would would you know prioritize environment in our decision-m and so again I think one of the things I'm noticing is it's feeling like nature is open space as opposed to nature is everywhere. Um, and so that's kind of just making sure that when we're we're using um, you know, this language that it's it's it's in in in our most urban environments as and I love uh, Laura's um, example of turn changing those um, unproductive lawns um, that actually hurt our biodiversity goals into something that is both good for habitat, good for humans and our non-human kins. So those are the kinds of things I would push us on. And then I'm still wondering where our waste and materials management is. It was great to see the um storm

[184:01] water component here, but I do think that there needs to be some significant advancements in that area. And then just in general around water, um I just started the water fluency course with water education Colorado. Again, national experts and local experts reminding us that we are in a mega drought. And so, you know, I'm still seeing all of what what has been presented as um not necessarily responsive to the critical, urgent, and important demands that our climate is asking of us. Um, and I I'm I'm just seeing a lot of nice to haves versus what is urgent and important to ensure that people have access to clean air, clean water, and as somebody who has water utility and real authority around energy. Um, I'm just hoping that this is is a little bit more robust than uh but I'm very excited and appreciative of this. And then lastly, of course, the environmental justice components recognizing that we have community members, right, who have less access to

[185:01] clean air, clean water. Um, and as a city, we have a debt and responsibility to address those issues. Thank you, Tina and Ryan. Yeah, I um I think this is a great focus area and my only thought would be to um pay extra attention or spend extra time getting youth voice in particular people who are further away from Greenways um or or or close to Greenways. I guess the opposite. Uh I think that would be particularly valuable for this Brian. So I really I really like this and I like the the the the use of native uh natural systems to provide infrastructure such as around transportation bios like Kurt mentioned and and using the B the BBCP as a way to provide direction to that would that would that would um require departments to work together on that sort of thing that otherwise might not happen. But secondly, I want to maybe just remind folks that last week when we were here, we had a we had a discussion about fire.

[186:02] And um you know, I think if we if we wanted to make there's just going to be a lot of hard trade-offs in this world that we are trying to build in which we want both be safe and also have a a a community that we want to live in. And you know when we are having a discussion focused on fire you know you can you can really batten down the hatches and say just make everything concrete and inorganic and that solves that problem but um that that's we need more than that and I think we're going to have to as a community have more and more of these kind of difficult try to have discussions and to the extent we can provide guidance through this space of how to think about those trade-offs I think it would be very helpful um uh to do it in an integrated way. All right. Well, that brings us to our last one. We're in the home stretch. It is after nine o'clock. So, let's see if we can do this one relatively quickly. We are ourselves the night economy. There should be more tacos. Um,

[187:00] consider options to reawaken Boulders's funkiness. Questions on this topic? Okay, I'm not seeing any questions. Any comments on this topic, Nicole? Yeah, this one to me feels like um the outcome of what we will get by focusing on some of these other things. Um so I don't know that I see this one as sort of especially outside of the arts blueprint and some of the other things we're looking at as a specific thing to focus on. I really think if we're doing these other things, we're going to get there. Laura, I want to say I like this one a lot. This comes up a lot in conversations that we have with the community and at planning board that people feel like Boulder has lost some of its uniqueness, that they don't like the kind of architecture they're getting. They don't like the kind of public spaces that we're building. Um, they don't like the

[188:01] fact that it's hard for artists to live here. So, I agree it crosses a lot of the other work that we're already doing, but I think it does it does bear thinking about how are the the policies that we're encouraging helping to either maintain or working against um a sense of uniqueness and a sense of funkiness and artisticness in in Boulder. This came up a lot in the East Bowler community plan process and it it's really hard to figure out how this this works into policy. So, I think using this as a focus for engagement and trying to get people really thinking about this. I know that in the um Bloomberg housing um u focus groups that they did, there were a lot of really creative ideas that were generated around this topic. And so even though um it may be hard to visualize why this is different, I think it is useful to to use this as a a prompt for input and engagement. Lauren, thank you. I agree. I find this one really interesting. I don't know exactly what the outcome of it is like many of these but um I think especially as we

[189:04] have Sundance um in our future and I think a lot of part of the interest in Boulder has to do with kind of our local feel. But I also think that um you know that's likely to bring kinds of investment that could gentrify and might it might be harder to hold on to that field that we still have. And so I think that it is a good time to look at how we help um protect and support um new kinds of funkiness in Boulder. Tina and then Tara. Yeah. I I really like this one. Um, and I'm not sure how it fits. For me, it would be almost like a lens for other areas when we think about the local economy and how much we love the sink and we're not sure we want a lot of, you know, fast food chains in downtown Boulder or, you know, or we

[190:01] want local business owners if possible. Um, just the and the arts, we have a the arts plan, I think, would also reflect this and housing type. And I think even Lauren, you've mentioned that some of our our requirements actually lead to architecture that might be less interesting just because of certain policies. And so looking at some of those policies with that lens, I don't know if it's a standalone item or uh sort of like a different scale or something. Tara, I feel like if we had this on our comp plan that we'd be able to have the uh Voodoo Donuts building be pink. which is what a lot of us did want. So, I'm went from nice to explore to need to explore for this. You just got Lauren's vote. Mark, I'm going contrarian here. I think this is u not not the role of government. Uh funkiness is created by

[191:03] people, by creativity, by opportunity um by opportunity uh to be funky. And I think if we want to explore changing our use tables, changing our zoning and stuff to allow things that are funky, but you're not going to get funkiness by by the government interjecting themselves into experiences. I mean, I like funkiness. I like funky experiences, but uh the BBCP as a guiding document is not the place for this. Now, the Department of Community Vitality, change it to the Department of Party Planning and let him go. Mark with a W. I'm going to agree with Mark with an M. Um I I you know, cities do change over time.

[192:00] I I first started coming here in 1980 and it was a pretty funky town. um uh it's a lot less funky today. I just don't know that it should be a government objective to restore us to the conditions of 1980. Um you know and and and try to artificially create funkiness. Um I have sad news to report but Woodstock is done. I mean, and I I I you know, trying to go back in history and be something that we were but are not now. To me, look, I think it's a feudal uh task. And um and I agree with Mark, if if somebody wants to do something a little unusual, they will do something a little unusual. But as a as a government policy, as a uh as provisions, what what are those provisions going to look like

[193:00] in the comp plan? The funkiness section. Um I I you know, it's a little odd to me. So, thank you, Taisha. Then let's see if we can wrap up. Okay. Um, I'm I'm I'm struggling with the word choice of funkiness, but I do see and agree with my colleagues around the overarching purpose, which to me it translates more appropriately as uniqueness. And I think it's ironic that one of my colleagues talked about the funkiness in in that one context but then spoke so adequate so articulately about our height limitations as something that makes our boulder uh you know is a major characteristic right and so um you know I agree that our current policies limit innovation limit creativity and limit in in ingenuity um and so I don't know if funkiness or you know this word choice or approach um is is will will stick. I

[194:01] am um interested in the addressing issues or barriers to innovation, creativity and ingenuity in our comprehensive plan. And so if it needs to be a setside in order to do that, I'm fine with that. But the overarching things I am 100% in agreement of. And I also just want to circle back to what Laura said around the historic assets as well and just getting real clear on what we think an asset is now because 50 years is not an asset make anymore. And so I don't know if if if that can cap if this can if this bucket can capture that as well. I'm even more of a proponent for it. So thank you very much. And with that I'll turn back to you all. any uh final thoughts that you'd like to offer up? Uh the only thing before Sarah's Sarah's struggling with the PowerPoint over there, but we'll get there. Um I just want to say thank you. Um that

[195:02] was a a ton of information. You did a really really good job at staying on on task and on time. We're only 10 minutes over, so thank you. That was great. That's exactly the kind of input that we are looking for. Please make sure and don't forget to fill out your worksheet. We will collect those at the end of the meeting. We do have one last slide uh just on Oh, it's not the next steps. The very last slide. I'm tired, so I'm technologically challenged right now. Sorry everybody. Slide 40. I just push the button. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. We're almost there. It's It's not that long. I promise. a matter of minutes. See? And keep going. There it is. Okay, there we go. Sarah, take it away. You already You already said everything I was gonna say, but thank you guys for sticking with us. It was a long night, but we got a lot of great feedback. We really appreciate it. Um, and it will really help us with our next

[196:01] phase of work over the summer. We got a tight timeline. We're going to start research on some of these ideas and gather that data and information that I think council member Adams, you were requesting for some of these concepts. That's part of what we're working on over the summer. Um, and then this June, we're going to start talking to partner agencies. Um, we'll be checking in with groups like RTD, BVSD, CU, other partner organizations just to share what we're doing, hear what they're doing, what they're planning. um so we can make sure that our comp plans and their plans are in in alignment or at least have conversations about that. Um and then in mid July we'll have community conversations about preliminary policy options based on the analysis we do um and land use strategies and balancing various community needs. So that's the next big um focus for community engagement July July. So there'll be some times where you guys can join some of those conversations. So please keep your eye out for information about that. And then from early August to September, the community change request application window opens and that will give

[197:01] community members the opportunity to request land use changes andor plan changes. They can request any change. So that will happen and then um also starting in August we start um the statistic we'll open the statistically valid survey in an online companion um question form to get additional feedback related to um our options that we're thinking of. And I think um planning me um board member um Kaplan mentioned that that there was some things that would be good for that survey. So we'll take a look at that and think about including some of those questions. Um and then in late August, we're coming back to you. So we'll be providing a summary of what we do over the summer and some of our analysis of alternatives um and get your direction to guide future study of preferred options. That's when we'll come to you with some conversations about that. We'll meet with planning board on August 26th and council on August 28th. And we also will be speaking with advisory boards in September. So, we got a busy few months. Um, but we thank you for sticking with us and doing the work with us. And with

[198:01] that, I will hand it over to you, mayor, to close out the meeting. Very good. Kurt, you have a quick question? Yeah, just a quick question about the public change request applications. That's for the land use map, right? But we're also thinking about potentially completely rethinking what the land use map looks like. And so how did those go together? Yeah, great question. So right now um because we don't know if the land use map will fully change, that land use application process will um will basically include all of the existing designations as as they are today. As we move forward through the process, um there is a requirement we will come to both of you in January with the list of all the applications that we receive and then we go through a public hearing to identify those that would actually carry forward. As part of that process, we will um actually identify if any of those designations are shifting or if staff is going to recommend changes to the map that would incorporate a number

[199:00] of those different applications. So it's a it's a little bit challenging. We you know we don't have a perfect sequence for where we could adjust the map and then ask for you know public u changes and things like that. So the public change request will occur first and we will capture all that information and then roll that into any possible sort of um you know substantive changes to the land use map that we may propose at some point in the future. But again we don't know if that's actually going to happen or not. Okay. Does that make sense? Yes. Complicated, but it did. Okay. Well, everybody, thanks so much for an efficient and productive meeting. Before we close, I just wanted to offer one little bit of news. Miss Alicia did just email us that the out of Excel ballot measure has been withdrawn. So, there will be no um no resident initiated petitions on the ballot this fall. Just thought it'd be interesting to know. And with that, good night everybody and good luck finding some tacos. We're done.