April 23, 2026 — City Council Study Session

Transcript

Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.

[4:55] Thank you so much. All right. Well, let's get this show on

[5:00] the road. All right. Good evening and welcome everybody to tonight's study session of the Boulder City Council. I'm Council Member Matt Benjamin and I appreciate you all joining us. We've got a bit of an action-packed evening with two items. Uh first, we'll have a discussion about the airport and then our second item concerns an update on the city's power resiliency and reliability. Um before we get to our work, I'm going to do a little bit outlining of how tonight's going to go. Um I know that first discussion is going to be one we've been debating for a long time. We've got some very specific questions, so I want to talk about that. Um and we'll review bit of staff's presentations. We'll have time for some questions and some comments and then at the very end we'll make sure we get staff what they need in terms of the direction for that particular item. You know, [clears throat] one thing I want to set the stage for because I know it's a big conversation, there's a lot to discuss, we've heard a lot from community is with regards to the airport. We're being asked a fundamental land use question um with regards to

[6:00] airport and whether we operate this indefinitely. And it's really important that we stay focused on not talking about the operational tasks. We're not being asked about grants. We're not being asked about specific funding mechanisms. Um but what's really important is we stay focused on what staff can do to evaluate our direction with regards to a specific land use direction. Um, so I want to ask my colleagues to keep that framing in mind and for your questions and your comments and our legislative authority to speak specifically to the land use and not to the financing or operations of the airport as that is duly in the responsibility of the city manager's office. Um, so I'll be working to keep us on track and to make sure that we're on task for tonight's conversation. I want to make sure we stay focused and questions are actually within the purview and the jurisdiction of city council. Um, I won't hesitate to respectfully um inter interact, intervene, redirect, and get our questions and focus comments back on the tasks at hand um because we've had a lot to converse about and we want to stay on

[7:00] schedule for this evening. So, without any further ado, I will turn things over to the incomparable city manager, Nuria Rivera Vandermine, to introduce our first item and get us started. >> Why, thank you, Council Member Benjamin, and good to see you all. Um, tonight, as you were mentioning, we're back today to get your thoughts on the future of the airport. Last time we talked about the then airport community conversations and um, some initial financial and regulatory constraints. A decision on that continued use of the airport site or not was deferred at that time, but we are back to discuss as our financial circumstances has certainly changed and I am looking for another word than financially constrained because we need something new. and we have now also heard from the courts. I want to acknowledge uh that this discussion has elicited a lot of competing opinions. At the same time, we would be remiss if we did not raise the real concerns we currently face financially. As we

[8:00] prepare for next year's budget, we need better certainty about what resources we have at our disposal. And that is dependent on whether the airport will remain a working airport into the future. And that is the policy question for this body. We understand the implications of this decision. Scenario two would require us to seek alternative forms of funding for the ongoing operations and maintenance of the airport. We believe the sources of funding in this regard are limited and will likely mean that we will have to include subsidy from the city's transportation fund or the general fund through the end of our current grant assurances. We also know that scenario one would open up potential sources of funding, including FAA funds, and allow for more certainty about the future of the airport staff were to choose to go in that direction and accept a grant. Now, we also know that the FAA has currently told us that uh those grant assurances would obligate us into perpetuity. We could always challenge that assertion legally regardless of whether to uh move forward. And uh I know we have had

[9:01] questions and I appreciate your framing, council member Benjamin. Uh I want to say that regardless of whether or not to move forward in new federal grants, the city preserves the right to ask the FAA to decommission the airport at any time, whether now or in the future. And I'd also be remiss again if I didn't say that the FAA currently believes that we are now in perpetuity uh as we stand currently. There's a lot more detail to this, so I'm going to pass it to our director of transportation and mobility, Ble to get us started. Bly Bailey, you're on for you. >> Thank you, Nuria. And I hope everyone can hear me. Um, I'm sure that you'll start saying something if you can't. My my microphone was doing funny things a second ago, but I think I'm good. Um, good evening, Mayor Brockett, and members of the city council. I assume we have a presentation. I can't see. Is it is the council seeing a presentation? Okay, >> they are about to black. There they are. >> There I see it now. Thank you.

[10:02] So again, uh thank you Mayor Brockett. Thank you um Council Member Benjamin for leading the discussion and members of the city council, thank you for taking a few minutes for a discussion about the future of the airport. As you know, as Nuria said, the litigation with the FAA is closed, at least for now. And we think now is the opportunity to take a look at the airport finances and other aspects of our work in light of the long-term policy direction, which has led us to forego federal grants for about the last six years. First, I want to lift up our new airport manager, Eric Vincenses, and his team. I couldn't have asked for a better airport manager to have been hired right before I got here. Eric's leadership has been crucial in understanding the recent past work, where we are today, and how we project the airport to be operated into the future based on either of the pol policy scenarios we're going to present to you today. Eric is available for technical questions as they arise and I believe

[11:01] also Scott Carpenter may be here for financial questions if there are those that we need his assistance for. Eric will also join me on a couple of these slides. Next slide, please. So, what we're talking about today is um we'll take a few minutes refreshing important background, including results of the 2022 to 2324 airport community conversation, the legal status, and the FAA's position, and provide updated financial considerations that highlight aspects of our short and long-term projections, as well as some future options to consider. Next slide. At the conclusion of our presentation, we will share again these questions for you to consider. And thank you again for um some of the hotline requests. We've modified these questions and hope they bring greater clarity. Um so we're basically asking what questions uh regarding the information presented on the current or future state of the airport might you have? as well as does

[12:01] council have feedback to support scenario one which is indefinite operation of Boulder Municipal Airport or scenario two which is maintain closure opportunity. Next slide. And to recap the recent timeline of airport activities, we completed the airport community conversation which we presented to council in 2023 per council's direction. Subsequently, we completed a financial analysis and brought to the council in July 24. Uh two options were presented in that presentation. A scenario one in which we operate the airport uh indefinitely and a scenario two in which we continue forgoing grant funding opportunities at least until 2040. As of summer 24 though, there was a ballot measure which had reached the required number of signatures which would put the decision about the fate of the airport on the voters. So the council took a wait andsee approach at that time. As a reminder and for anyone

[13:00] new to the council, the city filed suit against the FAA soon thereafter contesting the notion that we would be required to operate the airport in perpetuity. And also around the same time the ballot measure was pulled. So, with the legal case coming to resolution late in 2025, we're here to present a current information for reconsideration. Next slide, please. The city's lawsuit against the FAA was dismissed, I assume, as you all know, on procedural grounds due to lack of jurisdiction with the judge indicating the city had not yet been harmed and wouldn't be until years in the future. So, the final decision on whether or not the FAA would concur with our desired consideration to close the airport and reuse the property is pushed to 2040 as long as we continue to forego grants that would extend that time frame. So, the financial trade-offs associated with foregoing federal grants until 2040 do not guarantee autonomy of the decision. They only provide for the option for us

[14:01] to make the case to the FAA again at that time. Next slide. In 2023, as mentioned earlier, the city launched the airport community conversation to understand community aspirations for the airport's future. Through the process, we conducted about a dozen engagement events, including working group sessions, multiple open houses, and four bilingual community meetings. Additionally, two surveys were completed with the first including over 750 responses. Through that effort, we heard a wide range of perspectives with with no clear consensus. Some emphasized the airport's value for economic activity, emergency response, and aviation services, while others advocated for what they believed to be a better future to be a better f future use while raising concerns about noise and leaded fuel. Further emphasizing that this is a uh an interest that continues to be uh widespread throughout

[15:01] the community. I counted earlier today over 300 emails to the contact city of Boulder portal in the last three weeks alone. So clearly this is a subject that is of interest to a lot of Boulderites. Next slide please. During the community conversation, we frequently heard questions about the city's uh regulatory authority uh particularly with regard to leted fuel use and noise. Uh to clarify, aviation regulation is governed at the federal level and is independent of whether or not local municipality takes federal grant monies. Put simply, whether we rely on federal dollars or not does not change how we can or cannot govern aviation policy like the use of fuel types and noise. Um, regarding noise, we can use primary management control documents, commonly known as PMCDs, uh, of which we are in the middle of doing that, to help tracking and, uh, notifying of noise events. But we do not have punitive powers and, uh, even if we

[16:01] did, certainly can't regulate air traffic that originates and lands at an airport other than uh, Boulder Municipal. Similarly, we are obligated to adhere to the federal guidelines around unled and leted fuels. Uh we'll talk about that in a little bit more um in just a second. For now, note that a fleetwide drop-in designation for unled fuel is something that is going through regulatory approvals. Um fleetwide drop-in designation just means that it would be a fuel that is u compatible with all engine types for the piston aircraft. Um at that time we will transition fully away from leted fuel as identified in our uh unled aviation fuel transition plan. Uh but we are restricted from doing so until the FAA approves that designation. >> Hey Eric, I'm sorry. Before you continue, could you just introduce yourself real quick? >> Yeah, I'm Eric at Boulder Airport's new

[17:00] airport manager. Thank you. Uh, next slide, please. Before we turn over to the long-term policy decision uh, question that is presented to you today, I want to briefly update council on work that's already underway uh, that is in response to long-standing community concerns. These efforts are independent of the decision before you tonight and will continue regardless of council's direction, but demonstrate our commitment to work on community priorities regardless of the policy decision. As mentioned in the previous slide, uh noise and unled fuels are areas of interest for the community. Uh noise has been one of the most consistent concerns that we hear about. While the city cannot directly regulate aircraft noise, we have taken a number of steps to reduce impacts and improve responsiveness. I've reinstituted quarterly technical noise committee meetings. I've expanded

[18:01] excuse me, I've expanded communication of our voluntary noise abatement program or VNAP, including to pilots who did not originate from Boulder and begun regularly attending and advocating for Boulders's interests at Rocky Mountain Metro Airport's VNAP meetings. One recent example of that advocacy is when the FAA at BJC or Rocky Mountain Metro uh was adjusting their flight patterns. Um the one of the initial routes was uh sending traffic to the Boulder stacks on Arapjo. Uh that happens to be where our glider training area sits. And so we advocated for uh safety reasons to uh choose a new path. And uh as a result of that advocacy, they they did change it and and no longer send that traffic to the Boulder stacks. Recent staff transitions have led to generic noise events responses, which we recognize can be frustrating to those experiencing the noise events. However, uh through the

[19:00] city's customer experience project, I aim to improve the ways that we receive notifications and to streamline the research process uh by utilizing a CRM um customer resolution management software add-on module that our existing airport operations uh monitoring service has. And we're also developing improved tenant communications through trend reporting so that we can better measure the effectiveness of this work. Um, moving on to the other long-standing uh concern which is around the use of leaded fuels. We recently completed our unled fuel transition plan and that was submitted in December uh which went into effect in January of 2026. And uh as a result of that plan uh we did apply for the division of the Colorado airport board's um unleted fuel incentive and in partnership with our fixed base operator who provides fuel

[20:01] services at the airport. Um they're going to be procuring temporary infrastructure now that the city has signaled support of this initiative through the fuel subsidy. Looking further ahead, our capital improvement plan includes replacement of airport's permanent fuel tank infrastructure, which would allow us to transition fully to unled by the target date of 2030. And this is a critical improvement that we intend to pursue regardless of policy decision. And at the same time, it illustrates the broader financial challenge, this infrastructure upgrade alone, which is expected to cost more than $2 million, which the airport fund cannot absorb on its own. Next slide, please. >> Thank you, Eric. Um, I also want to acknowledge uh Eric's lean but potent team, which includes himself and his colleagues, Jacques and Christian, for their persistent work bringing value with limited resources. shown here. Um, very recently, Eric and his team

[21:01] utilized a borrowed from Cedot crack sealing machine for pavement preservation, showing resourcefulness that helps manage our maintenance needs while limiting our costs. In addition to this work, Eric secured a grant from S DOT that will not extend our grant assurances for a muchneeded runway seal coat project that we plan to complete later this year. That grant saves the city $450,000. and in the nick of time as our runway was resurfaced in 2020 and we generally try to apply seal coats after five years. It's worth noting that CDOT has indicated unwillingness to provide this grant in the future without the city signaling an intention to operate the airport indefinitely. And so to illustrate the short-term impacts of the policy direction, I want to highlight that had we not identified the COT grant, the full cost of the muchneeded seal coding was more than what our airport fund could have been able to afford. This trend continues into next year um because we've planned a seal coating for the rest of the airport's paved surfaces, not just the runway, but

[22:00] the aprons and other paved surfaces in 2027 at an estimated cost of $750,000, the money for which is also not available in the airport fund. So, this short-term need brings into focus the timesensitivity of the fiscal challenge. Um, as mentioned earlier, for scenario one in which the airport is operated indefinitely, we have the ability to use discretionary FAA grants. So, the cost of this planned 2027 project would be about 5% of the total cost or about $37,500. Whereas in scenario two, the local cost equals the full cost of the project or that $750,000 number. The seal coating of the remainder of our paved surfaces planned for next year highlights that time sensitivity of this decision as in one scenario our available funds are adequate to complete the work and in the other we would need funding from another local source. Next slide please. Okay, I want to back out and describe the updates that we've made to the financial outlook for each scenario so

[23:01] that we can put into focus the fiscal tradeoffs of the 14-year timeline as well. Um the previous slide I intended to show uh the urgency of this year and of next year but now we'll talk about the remaining 14 years as a whole. Um so I want to acknowledge some needed corrections also from the information that is included in your memo. Eric has used the scenarios developed for the 2024 presentation as a base and made some current day updates. In in our preparation of the memo, we were more broad in our determination of these projections and since its completion have completed some updates to those numbers. So these numbers might look a little different, but I think they still tell the same story. The slide here represents the updated average difference between airport revenues and expenses over the next 14 years in each of the two scenarios. A negative number equates to the average amount of funding we project to be needed from other local sources on a year-to-year basis to support the airport. And a positive number reflects our estimate of how much we project the airport to be financially

[24:01] self- sustaining during that time. to highlight some of the updates since the last time we presented on this topic in 2024. Firstly, we've operated more frugally the last two years than had been previously predicted. So, when we presented to you in 2024, we of course didn't know what was going to happen uh in in 2024 and 2025 and we've done better than we thought we would do. So, that's made a little bit of a difference. Um this is the case for both scenarios. Secondly, Eric's done great work in refining and updating the assumptions for costs and revenues in both scenarios. He moved some critical capital projects out of the next 14-year timeline that we didn't think were absolutely necessary to do. And we've also assumed a reasonable amount amount of money we can expect from FAA discretionary grants. And this brings into contrast the financial difference between scenario one and scenario two. Put simply, over the next 14 years in scenario one, because we can make use of federal grants that would extend that would extend our asurances, we believe

[25:01] that we can operate the airport without requiring any other trade-offs from other funding sources. In scenario two, however, due to the year-to-year costs associated with critical capital improvements planned over the next 14 years and the inability to utilize federal grants, we expect to require assistance from other local funding sources at an average amount of about a little over $600,000 per year. Next slide, please. So, the previous slide showed a yearly average between the current base and 2040, but the year-to-year budget projection varies depending on the number of years in which we plan capital projects. I do want to remind and emphasize here that these numbers come from projections made by updating our 2024 fiscal analysis with new information based on actual budget from 24 and 25 as well as updates to the assumed discretionary grants and a refreshed look at the next 14 years. there's some fundamental unpredictability in projecting out that long and when assumptions change based

[26:00] on real circumstances we learn something new say next year or the year after. Um so there's real circumstances certainly these numbers can go up or down but our intention here was to make an earnest effort to analyze the objective differences in cost associated with the differences between the two scenarios. With those caveats in mind, I'll point out some things to further illustrate these projections and the differences between these scenarios. You'll notice a small dip in year 2028 in scenario 2. That's when we target uh the critical replacement of our fuel tank infrastructure that Eric mentioned a moment ago and a couple of other capital projects whose total cost is approximately $3 million. In other years, we don't plan major capital projects. The difference between revenue and cost is smaller. One other difference between the scenarios is important to illustrate. In scenario one, because of the practical availability of discretionary grants, we program a full pavement a full pavement reconstruction in 2029. But we don't include this work at all in our CIP for scenario two. Both scenarios include

[27:01] preventative maintenance, seal coating, and crack sealing across the next 14 years, but only one includes the cost of full pavement reconstruction. So the difference in total cost is significant from one to the other. In scenario one, the full cost of all pavement work across the full 14-year timeline is about 20 million $28 million, while in scenario two, it's only $12 million. And likewise on the revenue side, in scenario one, over 90% of that cost is covered by revenue from FE FAA discretionary grants, but in scenario two, it's 100% cost to the city. Additionally, it's worth highlighting that since pavement reconstruction is not accounted for in the scenario 2 capital plan between now and 2040, if we get to that point and the FAA or the C court ruling at that time requires indefinite airport operations thereafter, the city would face a significant additional expense in the deferred maintenance of having not fully reconstructed that pavement at that point, which we feel like would be roughly equal to the difference between

[28:00] those costs or $16 million. um and likely higher because of a longer period of deferment of the maintenance work. Importantly, regarding assumptions in scenario one, we've heard valid questions about how much we can expect from the federal government as it relates to whether or not they can be a reliable source of revenue for help with our ongoing capital expenses. I want to highlight again that these analyses are both dependent on predictions over a decade into the future. While funding is not guaranteed and certainly less predictable the farther into the future, we have relative confidence in the reliability of future aviation funding for three primary reasons. One, in the immediate term, we do not know of an effort by the executive branch to pull support for aeronautical funding like they have for other initiatives that they have publicly deprioritized. Two, our federal lobbyists in a recent EBT meeting indicated that the administration has been forthcoming with h heavy transportation monies and that we might actually see more funding coming for things like aviation infrastructure. And three, the airport

[29:00] and airways trust program is userfunded and therefore uh more likely to be self- sustaining than tax revenue funded programs. Next slide, please. But this decision is not only about current operational or capital costs for the next 14 years. It's also about the potential of the use of the land that we would realize after 2040 in one of those scenarios. The slide shows Google Earth images of the Stapleton airport in Denver, which closed in 1995 and has been gradually redeveloped over several decades. A complicated redevelopment of a site like an airport, even for ours, which is about 5% the cost of Stapleton clearly is a large endeavor, which very likely comes with a long timeline. So, I thought it helpful to think through some of the reasonable assumptions about the future use of the land. Clearly, the possibility of a redevelopment of the land is far into the future, but also not dissimilar to recent thinking about the area 3 planning reserve. A lot of work would need to be done to put a finer point on potential value or costs

[30:02] for the redevelopment. Such things to consider would be the need for a full-sight redevelopment plan, environmental and engineering studies, potential litigation, environmental remediation, site preparation, and entitlements such as those that incentivize things like affordable housing if that was the city's chosen direction. Next slide, please. And so, while while difficult to predict this far in advance, national comparisons suggest mitigation costs could range widely. Our memo uses a preliminary estimate of 10 to 30 million which uses other comparisons we think are on the low end of complexity. Some examples suggest that if our remediation is moderate or highly complicated, costs could be three to four times that amount. We provided more explanation on these numbers in our re recent hotline response earlier today. We've also obtained a preliminary broker opinion of value for the land based on market assumptions that val that value would vary depending on redevelopment goals. For example, market rate development

[31:00] versus subsidized affordable housing. The BOV that we did lays out several highlevel assumptions. First, it assumes the site represented by scenario 4 in the 2024 report. You may remember that was the only one that aligned with potential future closure of the airport and full redevelopment. And that scenario called for a mix of commercial, residential, park space, and new street infrastructure. We use that plan to provide sort of a proportion of those different uses. Second, the BOV excludes any consideration of entitlements. So for example, subsidies or requirements for the provision of affordable housing are not factored into the into the opinion of value and also non-revenue producing land uses are excluded as is the cost of horizontal infrastructure as well as environmental remediation. So generally the BOV values the airport at market rate. Uh you can see the the numbers based on our acreage above as well as our future predicted numbers in 2040 as it relates

[32:00] to what we think the broker's opinion of value is. And as mentioned a moment ago for a future reuse of the site we should also be thinking about site plan and development administration site infrastructure and entitlements such as for affordable housing or other community needs. And next slide please. Before wrapping up, I want to acknowledge that over the course of conversation, we've heard lots of other related questions that we try we'd like to try to address proactively. As I mentioned, Eric is here and available for more technical questions, but here are some of the popular questions that have arisen. First, we're frequently asked about landing fees. The FAA pre preempts local jurisdictions from enacting landing fees for the purpose of manipulating air traffic. For that reason, we would recommend if we were to enact these fees, following the standard and typical rates that are usually enacted by weight. Using these typical weights, we believe that landing fees would generate revenue that would be roughly equal to the administrative cost of implementing them. Also, we hear concerns frequently about the persistent usage of leaded fuels. We did earlier

[33:01] provide information from the state as well as Boulder County that we had shared with the community during the community conversation that we hope helps explain the risks of exposure due to lead fuel as well as other sources as well as the best ways to reduce exposure. As noted earlier, we don't have authority to ban the use of leadbased fuel for aircraft, but we're committed to achieving goals of our unled transition plan, which commits us, as Eric mentioned earlier, upon federal regulatory approval of a fleetwide drop in, meaning when the federal when the federal when FAA approves the fleetwide dropin. At that point, we could fully transition to unled, and we believe that that's feasible by 2030. Regarding economic impact, we've not engaged any further studies to supplement or refute what's been cited by CDOT, but we have confirmed some major employers of the site earlier today in our hotline response, as well as information in recently completed studies that's Boulder specific. Um, let's see. We also heard a lot in the

[34:00] community conversation about um communityoriented events and we just wanted to note that we our airport day our 1940s ball and young eagles were in the process of working through all these things as well as also communicating them in Spanish. And I want to say that Eric as well comes from an airport where special events drew in much of the community and visitors. and we'll use this experience to prepare the airport um for all kinds of community related activities regardless of the scenario. We'll keep trying to asssure that the airport is a community resource for people and also I want to mention electrification. Um we think that it may be possible for electric charging facilities to be eligible for state funding and we'll be looking for all opportunities to advance this possibility. One place where electric planes are quite useful is in towing gliders, which if if we're able to deploy more of that infrastructure possibly um has a positive impact on our noise situation at the airport. Um and as fully electric airplanes become more prevalent, being an early adopter of

[35:01] electric infrastructure will only aid in the further reduction of low-led fuels. Um and then I'll go to the na last slide please which is the questions that we posed to the council. Again thank you for um giving us the opportunity to give you some updated information and and an opportunity for a discussion for a further discussion on the airport. >> Thank you so much Ble and Eric. Really [clears throat] appreciate you guys um putting that information in front of us and Elicia thanks for putting those questions in the chat. Um so as you can see um council we've got just two questions in front of us um that staff has proposed and so certainly like to open up to anybody who has questions uh based on that presentation. And again just reminding like if we can make sure our questions are in service of answering those two questions um that'll help kind of keep us moving along and get us towards providing the direction that staff is seeking from us. So open

[36:00] for questions. I see Rob. Go ahead. >> Thanks, Matt. Um, has staff taken into consideration uh what moving [clears throat] forward what take not taking funds would do as far as our efforts to keep our scientific research in Boulder and CAR and some of these labs given our current political landscape? Uh, thank you for the question, Council Member Kaplan. Um, I I think the question is if if we what is the impact to research labs as it relates to scenario one versus scenario two? Is that is that the right question? >> It Oh, sorry. it is um but more more in like we're we're trying to maintain these research facilities that we have and I'm just wondering >> if that was taken into consideration if

[37:00] any research has been done into that >> that's that is not I do not know the answer to that question and certainly we'll we'll see if Eric or anyone else does but that's the first we h I have not done research on that in that regard Eric do you know >> yeah I can speak to um at least one tenant that's at the airport um Neon Battel uh who does ecological research um their current lease is up in 2028 and so they recently um asked about the upcoming council meeting and so there is interest um by existing scientific communities at the airport in this topic tonight um but we do not have a detailed analysis about um where everybody is in their um efforts. >> Okay. And my last question, I know that when um you've got a piece of property or an investment property and for example, if you have a 20-year lease, it gives you security that you have an income stream as that lease

[38:01] compresses into two years, then it's just basically the land value. Are you I I think we've briefly touched on this, but are you see seeing or hearing from current tenants that the uncertainty of the airport may be driving away any economic activity? >> Yeah, Eric, would you take that question, please? >> Yeah. Um the answer to the question is yes. Um tenants do have concern about the um uncertainty of the airport's future. Um there have been reports of um some tenants uh losing employees due to not being sure if they have a future career at the airport. Um out of respect of their privacy, I don't want to name the the organization. Um we do have a vacancy of a hanger. um and it's it's difficult to get filled um under the existing conditions of not being able to

[39:00] provide long-term leases and that that one's had a a negative impact on our budget. Um is does is that answer your question? >> Yes, it it does. And then my last question um Ble was saying that the FAA um entitlement grants are pretty secure um as far as we know. Are they operating? I I mean I understand it's independent of the executive branch, but what level of security do we have to keep receiving these grants in the future? I don't know if you can answer that or not, but >> yeah, >> I I don't have an answer for that at this time other than what's been um provided by BL earlier. >> Okay. I know it's a pretty >> It's a hard question if I if I may. It's a hard question to answer because we have seen um a dwindling of applicable federal funds across all um

[40:00] areas of work. We have however seen uh more funds coming in the transportation area uh than in any others. Um, and in speaking to our federal lobbyists, we believe that we will continue seeing more and more in the transportation sphere, but I by no means want to guarantee um that what that could look like uh as we move forward um as cycles change um uh and folks um and um funding opportunities may um may evolve over time. I appreciate that. That's all I have. Thank you. >> Thanks, Rob. Ryan, go for it. >> Thank you. I think I just have one question. Um, and it's it's actually Matt to pick up on um your uh request that we we stay in the the proper lanes for council tonight. And I have a question uh to make sure I I I know the where the lanes are. This probably for Nuria or Teresa. So I I think

[41:02] essentially we are being asked to consider providing direction that would implicitly authorize the use of grants which would have perpetuity covenants those and those would be new as of 2022 as you discussed and they would be new you know post the lawsuit. So this does seem like this is new territory. So my question is like do I have that right that that's sort of you know part of our discussion tonight and if so can you confirm it would be appropriate for council to be considering our tolerance for perpetuity covenants as part of tonight's discussion. >> I'll let Nur and Teresa answer that question. >> Yeah, I'm I'm happy to take a shot at it and see um what Nuria has to add. Uh it is it is accurate that um taking new FAA grants come with grant asurances

[42:00] that that run into perpetuity. Um the reason for that is a little bit technical but but but boiled down that is accurate. Um, is it appropriate for council to consider? I you know, it's it's honestly it's a very difficult question to answer on the fly. Um, typically typically council does not weigh in on what grant conditions are are in a grant and whether we sign off on those or not. That's purely operational. Um, I understand Ryan that what you're talking about though is is the incumbrance of a piece of property in a way that looks different. And my honest answer is I don't I don't know if that's if that is policy or operational. I've not had an opportunity to research into

[43:01] that. >> Okay. Um, thank you Teresa. And sorry, did Nuri already go or did Nuri want to add to that? Well, no. I just I I appreciate that, right? As as we're thinking about it and appreciate um legal advice as we're moving forward, I'll um say we enter into I guess a series of other grants like state historic fund grants and co that have covenants as well. Um and um so it it is it's an interesting question as we um enter into any covenant or agreement in furtherance of existing policy. >> Okay. Thank you. And then um just a thing just to define for the record. Teresa, you're right about it's it the question is about incumb encumbrances of the use of property, but it's also to I think the first hot point in Nicole's

[44:01] hotline today. There's also I believe requirements that we would need to operate and maintain um you know the use in in in a way for the airport. So I guess that's the kind of scope of my question and I think I'm hearing we're not sure. I suppose I'll leave comments on for the comment period. So, okay, thank you for that. Um, and then I think I have one other question that um, Rob's Rob got me thinking about and this is probably for Eric or or transportation folks. Um is there so you talked about the long-term uh you know like uncertainty and long term and um I'm just wondering is there evidence uh just like in the industry if you look around that um there is something that that that is considered a sufficiently long-term commitment to you know to to create certainty that is that is not just forever right that's not eternity right is there some is there

[45:01] some some term in the industry that that you know would would fit that bill that's short of eternity. >> Yeah. Um I'll I'll start with a little bit of historical context. Um the FAA has uh guidance on on lease terms and uh historically speaking there used to be a 99-year cap and at some point during the last 20 or 30 years, I don't know exactly when, um they updated that guidance to 50 years. So, the there is a 50-year cap um based on current rules and regulations. Um the typical uh setup is is about 20 years um for for agreements, but there you can have uh any iteration of grant um excuse me, lease terms that you want. You can do fiveyear with five-year options going all the way up to 25 years or up to the 50 years. It's just all um negotiating points. >> Cool. Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Ryan. Uh Mark, you're up.

[46:01] >> Okay. Um I have a a couple of questions regarding the information we've been given. Um did we do any analysis of the a potential impact of Sundance in terms of our ability to have additional revenues to what we have today? or B um did we project out uh on the possibility that the economy will actually recover providing additional revenues for the operation of the airport? That that's my first question. I'm happy maybe to jump in on the Sundance question um and let others do it. But I will say that um we don't know yet, right, is uh what uh what financial this the extent to which we will benefit um financially. We know that we will see a hopefully a bump in sales tax um as we move forward with the Sundance Film Festival. Um we in

[47:02] speaking to them we do not anticipate um and understanding their current operations and guest we do not anticipate uh immediately that our airport will come into play. >> Okay. Um may I add to that? >> Certainly. Um it's it's generally understood that uh a lot of the traffic that would be flying in are either going to be coming in via airline or or through jets. And um a very very limited number of jets can actually come in to uh Boulder Municipal Airport, but it is entirely possible for folks to taxi from uh any airports that they would fly into, such as Centennial or Rocky Mountain Metro into Boulder. So I I I do think that there is some planning that's needed for that. Okay. Um, you know, we just recently had a um a housing development completed at at the edge of the what had been the

[48:02] airport property. Uh, in terms of raising money for needed maintenance, did we look at the possibility of uh carving out a piece of of property at the edge of the airport and uh selling it for that purpose? >> Yes, I can speak to that. Um there's a a 2.3 acre um piece of property that is um in the master plan that was identified as a potential release and that um property was released and converted to residential. Um today it's known as a bellow um condos and um the existing master plan does not identify any other parcels for potential release such as that one. Um, but I I I do think that um that's something that can be evaluated as a part of the next master plan update. >> If if we're looking between the couch cushions for money, that seems to be an obvious place to look for money. Um

[49:06] um I I want to point out that in every iteration of um expense factors, whether it's uh the the gap in funding or the remediation for um environmental cleanup, uh the numbers seem to get larger. Um, and while that may be in service to a particular argument, I'm just not sure that it's [snorts] fully justified. And I I don't see a lot of background and and supporting evidence for those u representations. Uh, I I you know, I see what you're doing with respect to the the um environmental remediation, but I don't see a lot of support uh for those numbers, and I'd like to see more. Mark, is that is there a question with that or is that >> Yes. Could I see could I see more information?

[50:00] >> Okay. >> Concerning issues of that type? I mean, if you want me to put a question mark on it, I'm happy to do so. Um and um lastly um we've had extensive community conversation uh and otherwise with respect to uh the impact of uh lead in the air. Um and did we look at all at the composition of the population? uh so let's say within a half a mile of the airport in terms of the over representation of Latino population uh in that exposure to lead if I'm thanks for the question council member Wallock I think if I'm understanding the question um correctly um we we did we were we were very intentional and deliberate about how we engaged with the communities that were

[51:01] closest to the airport and cited some of that in our in our in the information that we provided. We've not done any specific testing as it relates to those populations, at least not through our efforts in the city of Boulder. Does that answer your question? >> Uh, yes. Um, all right. I'll save the bulk of my comments for answering the second question. Thank you. >> Thanks, Mark. Uh, Tara, you're up. Hi. I don't know if I'm going to make it much longer than this with this migraine, but I was waiting to ask this one question. So, I don't like the the noise from the airport. I dislike it, especially today with this headache is so bad. No, in all seriousness, my most important thing is that this airport does not get bigger, that more planes don't come, that we don't have more noise, because especially after reading

[52:01] the packet, which by the way, I thought was really great. Thanks for the people who wrote it. There was a fair amount of information on um the Rocky Mountain Metro and how it's gotten a lot larger, not been able to control it. the people are very upset in the neighborhoods there and I do not want that to happen here. So if I was to pick scenario whether scenario A or scenario B can either one of them make sure that this airport doesn't get larger, we don't have more runways, we don't have more traffic, or did neither one of those have to do with this? I I can speak to the land piece. Um as as far as expansion of the airport as it sits today, we've got a lake on one side and a cliff on the other and then we've got uh residence um just to the north and then a a jail complex to the south.

[53:00] So with terms to expansion and landwise um it's it's not foreseeable that the airport would be expanding >> nor the runways then >> it would be very expensive to uh extend the runway due to the the nature of uh grading and and filling in um to make that possible. All right, Terra. Was that good for you? >> Awesome. Sweet. Thank you. Tina, you're up. >> Hi. Um, can you hear me? >> Yes, we can. Loud and clear. >> Okay. My video is not working and just thank you to Chris Muzchuk who has tried to troubleshoot uh virtually, but we are not successful today. Um, so thanks. Anyway, um, so just following up with Tara's question, um, I appreciate that

[54:01] the land configuration can't change. Would we anticipate more takeoffs and touchdowns in the coming years that might contribute to noise? >> Yeah, I'll take this one. >> Yeah. Um typically master through the master planning process they do um forecasting and uh due to the age of our master plan I I don't have an accurate picture of what uh the next 15 years will carry. So I I can't speak to that. >> Okay. And I was just basing it off the Daily Camera article I read that they just said that air traffic is generally picking up in the region and I wasn't sure if we'd be part of that as well. So trying to >> um Okay. So then my other question is we do talk about the importance of supporting our science community and emergency services about how much of the airport activity is specifically from science coming from ENCAR as Rob

[55:01] importantly brought up and also for emergency operations. Uh I am not prepared with that information. Um, but we do have an airport uh monitoring system that I can pull the report and get those to you tomorrow. >> Okay. Is it I mean is it like half and half or is it a small portion? Do we know or >> I I do not. >> Okay. Okay. Yeah, no problem. And I should have sent that out in advance. That's on me. Um, so okay. Um so one question is we're looking at the perpetuity piece whether it's true today or not but we would certainly be confirming it if we move forward. um would we be so we have to operate the airport into perpetuity and we may need we may not get grants and if we don't get a grant but the FAA requires us to operate the airport thereby using more of our local taxpayer

[56:01] funds to subsidize the airport. Do we have any ability to sort of to then sue or otherwise go after the FAA for repairs? Because they've they're putting us in a funny position where if they decline the federal grants, the city of Boulder needs to pay for what's more or less a regional utility. So is there anything we have in that scenario? So, I I think what you're asking is would there be a cause of action to recover funds invested into the airport? And I I don't I don't believe that that would be a a fruitful um avenue. Uh because it is it is frankly a choice and council can make the choice

[57:03] and um the FAA has made clear what their position is, which is that airports, all airports including our airport have to continue to operate as airports once they have then um once they've been funded by federal dollars, we can always ask to decommission the airport. Um and you can do that in a variety of circumstances. Um those those are uh not granted lightly and not granted often. >> Okay. And then do we have minimum things that we have to fund for safety? So do you know I mean how low could we go in case we don't win grants yet we

[58:02] still need to operate the airport? And again I mean it's our it's the taxpayer general fund that's going to go here. >> Yeah. So the FAA the FAA has has preemptive authority over airports. So, they get to tell us what we have to do whether we're accepting their money or not. Um, by opening an airport, we um we agreed to abide by federal rules. And so, we do have obligations um certainly for safety, but they go well beyond safety to uh maintenance and operation. And those obligations remain uh whether we're accepting grants or not. Tina, does that end your line of inquiries?

[59:06] Tina, can you hear us? All right. I'm going to assume it does, but if you have one, text me, ping me in the chat or something. Let me know if you got another question, we'll get back to you. But in the meantime, um let's move over to Taiisha and uh and and go for it. >> Thank you. I just have a couple quickies. One on just confirming that um if we decommission the airport, the um airspace then could be sold and the noise and the um lead spray would continue. Correct. I can speak to this, >> but only 20% of the lead because 80% goes on takeoff and >> right >> I'm not familiar with percentages of uh combustion and and lead. Um but I I can speak to the airspace. Um, so the the airspace being federally regulated is is not something that's for sale, but in

[60:00] the instance of um the new flight patterns that the FAA put into place at Rocky Mountain Metro, the reality is um if the airport goes away, that space would be filled up then by Rocky Mountain Metro's um traffic. And and the reality is we were able to use the justification of the airport here in Boulder um to turn that traffic away from the Boulder stacks in East Boulder. >> Okay. And then I saw um the EV stations, but I was curious if there were any um conversations going on right now regarding um energy development. It was something we discussed last time we had this conversation in 2003. as a possible re revenue generator and how much that could bring in. >> I'm sorry, Council Member Adams, would you repeat the question, please? >> Uh, I was asking I noticed the EV and I appreciated the stations and I was

[61:01] curious if there were conversations or um considerations of possible revenue streams for from um potential uh renewable energy generation like solar on site. >> That's that's what I'm sorry. I thought that that's what I thought your question was. We've not done any studies, but I think certainly if there's um if there's a there's a difference between the two scenarios fundamentally as it relates to the the certainty of the future in one versus the other not. So certainly in the in the one where there is more certainty of future, we would we would we would be more >> better positioned to more aggressively develop land and certainly renewable energy would be one use um that we could consider and we're that we haven't done any specific studies on it. And I'm just asking and you weren't not here when we had that conversation the last time. So this isn't it certainly is not to meant to be meant to be an I gotcha. >> Uh but one of the when the um group that

[62:00] was trying to turn the neighborhood turn that into a neighborhood um or spraw into a neighborhood. Um, I asked about whether or not uh renewable energy could potentially be cited regardless of whether it um remained at an airport or not and was told that um there are current cases where airports are citing renewables and generating revenue and income on that. Um and so that is what I'm I'm asking about. I noticed it wasn't included in the thing, but uh so when we're talking about revenue streams, it seems like that would potentially be one. Taisha, I can take that. [snorts] Um, there are cases as close as Erie where they have a solar site um near the airport. Uh, it would have to go through a glare study with the FAA. Um, >> but >> but there is precedence. >> Yes, there is precedence. Um, >> and do we know how much they're generating from that? >> I do not know the specifics of of their deal there. Um, I do also want to call

[63:02] attention to uh Denver International Airport. They have a very massive solar farm there. >> Massive. Um so the the amount of land and and the type of terrain you have are potential limiting factors. >> So the the the cliff on the one side um doesn't really help us in that sense but it it is something that that is an available avenue. Um, and I've uh by happen stance um I had to go through that process in the airport that I was managing in Illinois because the municipality was a um uh the utility provider power, water, electric or power and electric same thing. >> Um and so we we did get a uh from start to finish a solar project approved on city property um adjacent to the airport. >> Thank you very much. That's the end of my questions. >> Thank you so much, Taiisha. I appreciate that. Nicole, you're up.

[64:00] >> Thank you. Um I just have a few questions. Um one was it sounded like um our approach to community concerns about lead pollution um was basically giving the airport neighbors a flyer that says wash your hands, take off your shoes, get a hepailter, and maybe get a blood test. Um, is that because we don't really have any authority to do anything else? >> I certainly welcome Eric to supplement um, Nicole, but I I think that's right. We we can't we can't regulate um certainly can't regulate the fuel use of planes that are already in the airspace. We what we can do is again once once the regulatory approvals from the feds are are complete, we can transition to unled which would not prevent entirely planes in our airspace using leted fuel, but it would at least eliminate the possibility they could buy it from us. Um, but at the time I think that's pretty much what we were limited to do was just provide as much information as we could so that

[65:01] community members would would know as much as they needed to know to try to keep themselves safe. to to build on that um we we wanted to provide objective um information and uh we use that um state resource and county resources to do so because we don't have that expertise in house. >> Yeah. Is there any um financial support available for people living near the airport who have lead concerns like to pay for a blood test that they're not always cheap and if you don't have insurance it's not easy right? Um just wondering even like a hepailter or something like that. I'm just wondering is there any possibility of any support for folks? >> I I believe that uh folks that are on government subsidies um are eligible for free blood uh lead testing and I I I think that is in the lead materials that were passed out as a part of the hotline response. >> Yeah. But not not for like getting a hepailter or anything like that. >> I'm not sure or aware of a program like that.

[66:01] Um, I was also wondering I I didn't quite understand the answer to um Terara's question, but it sounded like there may be a possibility of developing more of the airport's land for operations um in the coming decades if it stays an airport uh like building more larger hangers um or runways. Is that did I understand that right or did I get it wrong? I we do have in our plans again from the 2024 study some additional development of hanger space on the property. >> Okay. And um could the FAA tell us that we have to expand things or make runways larger or anything like that? >> Yeah, I was laying on Eric see him shaking his head now. No, they they uh rely on the airport to lead the master planning process and uh take community input on on that kind of um planning and so they they do not um take authority in in how an airport gets developed. They just participate as as funders and

[67:01] regulators. >> Thank you. And then just one last question. Um this follows up on Ryan's question. Um so probably Nuria Teresa, somebody else may may know this one. Um, what are the approximate sizes of the properties in situations where we've taken funding that has put permanent incumbrances on city- owned land and the buildings and facilities on it? >> Just approximately ballpark, [laughter] >> right? Conservation easements are quite large. Um, and those are permanent encumbrances. Um I again you know I I don't know that we've had the chance to look into it but uh certainly water sources um where there are conservation covenants. Um there are smaller things of course as well. Um you know from from small parcels to to many many acres. Um

[68:04] and you know things come to mind like open space where uh open spaces uh property bought with open space dollars has to remain for open space purposes and those are very specific purposes. >> Yeah. But those are our our encumbrances, right? Not the federal government's or >> um the open spaces, but the like uh conservation ements and things are I believe mostly on the state level. >> Okay, thank you. >> Is that all, Nicole? Awesome. Thank you. Uh Tara, double dip. >> Sorry. >> All good. Um, I two questions following up with Nicole. Um, and I don't know much about airports obviously except that I go to them, but besides that, um,

[69:03] would more hangers necessarily mean more flights then? >> Eric, can you take that? Yeah, the uh the airport has a hanger weight list and that weight list is almost 400 um people long and uh those are individuals that are are seeking space. Um so naturally as you add an an extra plane to be based there, there will be added activity. But I do want to note that um that these are not flight schools that are on the wait list. Um these are individuals that that live in the community um and and in the uh county. >> Okay. And this is the the real question I had this um and that was we had this ballot measure and then we stopped it because we were uh we brought that suit to them, right? Um can we but I feel like the the people still might want to

[70:01] do a ballot measure. So my question is, and forgive me for not knowing the answer to this, but I couldn't read anything today. If it was answered today, I couldn't read it. Um, can you decommission an airport if you take does it matter if you take the funds or not whether or not you can um go ahead and try to decommission your airport? So in other words, does scenario A or B affect whether or not you can decommission an airport? That might be an easy answer. So >> it's uh it's actually a little bit complicated, but um certainly granturances are a are a factor in that will be considered in a request to decommission. Um, I I do want to reiterate that it is the FAA's current position that we are already encumbered into

[71:02] perpetuity. >> And perhaps Teresa adding, I just want to clarify, we we did not um stop a petition as that moved forward. Um, and I think >> I realized that. >> Yeah. >> I'm sorry if it sounded like I said that. >> Oh, good. Um and then the choice or the request to decommission um could happen now or it could happen in the future whether or not we take federal funding. So, that's a request that has to happen no matter what because um because of our current position um with the FAA. >> All right. Is that it, Tara? All right. Being sensitive to time also. We we've been at this for about an hour. Um we've sort of got to give, you know, roughly an hour and a half for this and then about the same for our next next

[72:01] subject. Um although um you know we can kind of do as we please on that front should we need to. Um but with that being said I do have one question then we can get to our next um question which is I think where some of the meat and potatoes really gets with this. But these are some good good questions. Mine just comes down to pavement reconstruction. I know on the slide we talked about that if we do puh pursue scenario one that we would have a pavement reconstruction probably in the 2029 time frame that I saw. But I'm wondering, would we be able to avoid pavement reconstruction and meet our existing grant assurances through 2040? Are we able to sort of just patchwork our way all the way through that or or do we actually or or does that have to actually come into play? I'm just worried that have we gamed it out that we might be perhaps coming close to violating our our obligations if we don't do a pavement um uh reconstruction between now and 2040. >> I I can take that question. So the state

[73:01] does uh pavement condition index reporting every few years and uh our our runway and taxiway rate pretty highly because they were recently done in uh as recently as 2020. Um and and the maintenance that we're doing uh this year with the seed do grant money that we got um is is going to extend uh the life of of those pavements. Uh however um with the reprogrammed money for um ramp reconstruction in uh right around the time of the the community conversation um we we had to take uh maintenance into our own hands and uh we didn't do it to the extent that we could have had we had access to those grant dollars. And so, um, the patches that were performed, um, on the ramp, uh, throughout the entirety, um, are reaching about a year and a half since they've been seal coated or crack sealed. That's why you saw pictures of me and my team out there crack sealing, um, to try and catch up with some of that maintenance. Um, but, uh, the the

[74:02] cracks are now um, where the cracks had previously been filled, the cracks are now appearing on the on the sides of the repairs. And so, uh, reconstruction is is one that, um, is is in the near term, in the next, you know, four, three or four years. Um, and and one that I I anticipate in either scenario. Um, we do have a section of ramp pavement as of the last, uh, pavement condition index that ranked um, 26 out of a a 100 scale. And, uh, when it gets that low, it's it it becomes a lot more expensive to replace. >> Okay. I I hear what you're saying. I was just because I think we you I think what was discussed in the slide was that that large pavement reconstruction cost was not factored in to scenario two. And so what I'm maybe hearing is maybe it will be at some point. >> Yeah. So that's that's a really good point. Thank you for asking that question. So a part of the June 24 um

[75:02] financial analysis, there was also a long-term capital plan report that was produced. And in the report um there was an assumption made that um in scenario two you don't do the full pavement reconstruction you just do the crack seals and seal coats. And uh they they had that every 5 years. Um, but it did note in that long-term capital plan under scenario two that if pavement conditions reach um poor enough condition, uh, there there would need to be a, uh, replacement cost factored into that that was not factored in under scenario 2 per the June 24 analysis. Okay, I appreciate that. So, so it's fair to say that by this, you know, if we're lucky, we can avoid that, but there is a a there is a decent chance that we would have to factor in a significant capital investment where we're covering that cost ourselves to do a significant pavement reconstruction that we didn't plan for, should the

[76:00] pavement conditions go worse than maybe we're crossing our fingers to achieve, >> it is possible. Yes. >> Okay. All right. I appreciate that. Okay. Uh, that was my last one. I was hoping to move to the next question, but I see Tina. And look, she's got her camera working, so she's ready to go. Um, but I know she got cut off, so she may have had an extra question before she lost internet. So, Tina, go for it. >> Yeah, thanks, Matt. Um, I finally figured another option out. Um, so I did have one question. I I realize that um whether how we use and accept federal grants is largely operational, but I'm wondering what the process is to make sure that any assurances related to a grant or conditions are in alignment with our general community values, our you know, our basic mission and beliefs. And if there is a conflict, um, how is there a centralized point in the city that ensures that the conditions that we're accepting do align with our values? And how does council get a heads

[77:00] up if there's a perceived conflict? >> Teresa, do you want me to go or you go? >> I I I don't mind starting. Thanks for the question. Um, the city manager implements the council's policy daily. And one of the ways the city manager does that is by making sure that all of the city's contracts, including grants and grant asurances and grant conditions align with city council policy. So, an excellent example is that this uh that the council adopted a racial equity plan. Um, so we we do not sign grants that that differ from that plan. Um, there has not been a stated policy with respect to incumbrances on property. I was able to get a little more information. Um, there are federal land and water grants like the one we took for Cenus that that has

[78:02] permanent encumbrances. Um, [clears throat] to my knowledge, there is no policy currently about encumbrances on city properties or encumbrances that the city places on other properties. Is that a proper topic for council to um develop a policy on? Uh, perhaps. Perhaps. Um, but I guess how how do you know that the city manager is is acting in compliance with your stated policy and direction? I think that there's a uh some level of um of understanding that the city manager acts at the direction of city council. Uh in addition, all of these documents are public. you're certainly welcome to see them at any time that you'd like to and

[79:01] um and I'm sure that if you had questions, we'd be happy to answer those questions on a case-by case basis as well. >> And the and the grants would go through the city office. They're not done in the individual departments. >> So, I was just a huge process. [laughter] >> There is a process for that. We have uh centralized um have been moving to centralize and and most of our grants now go through our grants manager. Anything that is um anything that uh is impacted by um federal orders, new uh existing or new um go through review with our uh city attorney's office. Um and we have a process and a procedure to make sure that none of what we are signing goes counter to um the city's values uh and council's direct priorities. We have

[80:00] been doing that um for a while now and every grant whether it has been modular homes or DOA grants, housing grants, this would be no different goes through the same process. >> Okay. And so for like so you know the new assurance that you need to provide the 100 leaded octane fuel even though that might be contrary to some of our health goals for the community but is so but is that but we don't really have a policy about um clean air from airports or anything like that. Right. I I think we have an advocacy position to continue to move forward and look for more sustainable ways in which to provide all our services. Um, and I will say that the the FAA and correct me because now I'm speaking over muskies. Um, so Eric and Ble will will correct me if I'm wrong. Um but the FAA as they are

[81:00] moving towards um lead free aviation as they call it uh do not prohibit us from pursuing that. What they currently disallow is for the city to restrict leaded fuel until um they have sufficient uh guarantees that there is enough to go around and they have put something in place that we certainly cannot restrict leaded fuels in its current capacity at the earliest before December 31st um 2030. Um but after that we are free to continue to expand whether it's uh unleted or in fact we are continuing to think about um electric aviation as well. So >> and to build on that Nuria um if if council's priority >> I've gotten that wrong don't just build Eric but correct me. >> No you you've got it spot on. Um just to build on that if it is a priority of council um to further incentivize those kinds of measures. There's nothing in the current state legislature that um

[82:01] restricts us from adding to the fuel subsidy to make it even more attractive. >> Okay. And then my last question is just a technical one and I I'm I'm positive I know the answer, but um by accepting grants into perpetuity, we're also obligating city councils into perpetuity for devoting probably some of taxpayer funds to the airport. And this wouldn't qualify. We we try not to um dedicate or restrict future council's budgeting, but in this case that wouldn't be the same. Is that right? I you know, I think that that is right. Um the the the code currently provides for an airport. providing for an airport in this community made us um subject to a variety of conditions through the FAA

[83:01] and and and so I think that that binding happened a long time ago in some ways, right? And so, um, that's that's not to say that this that this wouldn't be additional or different, but, um, but I think it's important that we don't get confused between the fact of having an airport and the FAA's control that they have and what comes of grant asurances because it's not just the grant asurances that bind the Okay. All right. I'm good. Thanks. >> Thanks, Tina. All right. Um, great questions for everybody. Um, really appreciate all that and thank you staff for answering everybody's questions, even some of those that were quite technical and difficult. Um, again, Ble, Eric, thank you so much for answering those. Um, now we're going to get to

[84:00] sort of the meat and potatoes of this qu the second question here. Um, does council have feedback to support scenario one or scenario two? Remembering that scenario one is direction to say, look, we're interested in in maintaining this airport indefinitely. Um, and then option two is sort of maintaining our our window and door foreclosure. Um, for the sake of brevity, let let's hopefully not have long opining statements and really just get to where you're leaning here real quick. And I think the best thing for us to do is to have a straw poll here towards the very end. And that'll give staff very good clarity in terms of who supports scenario one of maintaining the airport indefinitely and who supports scenario two um or I wouldn't say supports expresses interest and preference um towards scenario two. So um let's just quick comments if we can and then we'll get to the straw poll and then hopefully um we can give staff some clear direction here. So, um, with that

[85:00] in mind, um, Ryan, take it away. >> Okay. First, thanks, uh, thanks the staff, especially Eric and Nur and Teresa for spending a lot of time with me the last couple weeks. Um, so summary, I I think we should continue to operate the airport. We should do that with the kind of real long-term planning and commitment that we do with any other large public facility. U, many of which we're working on now. Um, but I think we should for now avoid taking the extraordinary measure of locking out um, you know, essentially the some of these rights we've talked about that a that a perpetuate a per perpetual agreement would would encumber us with. And if we are going to if we're really going to do that, we should make sure there's no other realistic options. So, um, just just a few more things to say on this. So, I think there's really two issues. The first issue is do we continue the airport? And you know, this is explicitly the question in the in the airport community conversation that we've gone through. This is this is the question before us. Um, personally, I would rather us be ending this in a more formal meeting with the hearing. Um, but in any case, in advance of that, I'm

[86:01] ready to say that my direction is we we should continue with the airport. Part of the reasoning is that we have just significant operations costs. they're on the hook for and also there's a possibility of a negative judgment in 2040 or whenever that we go forward that we're just going to have even significantly more money we're going to have to be um responsible for. But there is a second issue which is do we authorize significant perpetual financial and land use um uh covenants that the community is bound to forever and [snorts] and whenever we do I think we need to give clear direction to staff on this. we need to come away from this meeting or come away from in the very near future a sense that we're all clear on what the direction we're giving is. So, I do think it's appropriate for this council to make a a sufficient long-term commitment. Um, and we need to eliminate the uncertainty for investors. There's no question about that. But, we have a process for making long-term plans. Um, the way we do that conventionally is looking in 20-year increments with the BBCP. So, I would

[87:00] suggest that we do that now. There is a big difference between that and forever which is which is a perpetuity agreement. There are small perpetu perpetuity agreements we've heard about. But this is a very big perpetuity agreement that is not only the the rights to use land but but the operating costs. Um there's just a few reasons I I'll say them and then I'll I'll I'll come down. Um that I think need to be clear. One, we don't have a super good policy to govern this kind of a decision. I think it's clear that this this is a little bit of a of a singular issue. If we go forward with this, I think it raises the question, well, if we want to what if somebody says you can have $20 million for a rec center, but you got to make a pickle ball cart in perpetuity, or what if you know, we'll give you 15 million for open space, but I want a private trail. I think this does open a question about how do we deal with significant perpetuity contracts. Another thing is that that if we are going to we're ostensibly making a decision on the community conversation. I don't think the community conversation dealt with this this specific perpetuity issue. I just

[88:01] don't think we we've really taken this on. There are thirdly a number of practical financial considerations that have not I think not been answered. What will this really cost us? We have not done something like a perpetuity issues assessment. I think that's that's called for here. And then and then the final thing is, you know, we have the this these ballot measure organizers who stood down while we went through this legal proceeding in good faith. As far as I know, we have not closed a loop with them. And I my understanding is the first they've heard about our plan to decide this was when they heard about the study session. So in some I think this perpetuity matter is something we should we should we should decide in a in a in a principled way. I think it's a little per it's a little premature. It's not a little it is premature to decide that this moment. But having said all of that, I do think we should support the long-term use of the airport. Um and we should do that with thought to our normal conventions. And I'm open to if it's more than 20 years, let's talk about that. Um but um yeah, so I'll I'll leave it at that for now. Thanks. >> Thanks, Ryan. We'll come back to a straw poll and we'll see where that vote

[89:00] resides or that preference resides, I should say. Um Mark, go for it. >> Thank you. I I do have a few comments. Um the first is for a decision this consequential, I cannot believe we're using a straw poll at a study session for guidance. Um this this really requires community input. It requires a hearing. Uh this is a um a piece of property worth hundreds of millions of dollars and we're doing this in a study session. Um forgive me that that that seems entirely inappropriate. Second, um you know, continued operation of the airport without grants is temporary and can be changed. Um applying for the FAA grants is permanent and forever. And I I think that would be a a huge mistake on the part of this city. Um, [clears throat] I agree with my colleague uh Ryan um

[90:00] that what we are doing with respect to the 3,400 people who signed an initiative uh and now will not only um not have that initiative be judged by the community, but they will never be able to do an initiative of that like again. And I I think that is entirely inappropriate. Um finally in in terms of of uh what we have been presented tonight, I think it has been more of a brief [snorts] for uh taking FAA money than a what I would have regarded as a more even-handed um presentation of the various positions. Um we have highly speculative um environmental remediation figures without much support. We have an estimated statement of value that is barely $1 million per acre of value. Um I invite anyone attending this meeting to go into Boulder and attempt to buy an

[91:01] acre of land uh of the prime quality that this is for a million dollars. That's not going to happen. Um there was very little analysis of alternative funding mechanisms or funding sources. And and so for all of these reasons, um I I encourage us to uh take steps that will not bind us in perpetuity. Uh we can revisit this at any time of our choosing. We can see what the facts are and how it's playing out. Uh and at that time, we can we can come to a different decision, but doing so tonight via a study session um is frankly the height of hubris and and we ought not to do it. Thank you. Thank you, Mark. Rob, you're up. >> Thanks, Matt, and I appreciate both my colleagues comments. Um, I'm a big fan of home rule with uh Senate Bill 101 and the lot splitting. Um, you know, that takes power away from us and I do want

[92:00] to acknowledge the people that signed that petition um and wanting to keep the land with Boulder. I I understand it. On the other side, I also understand the financial responsibility that we have as council members looking to the future. And you know, to Mark's point, there is a lot of ambiguity on these numbers. And there always is. In my experience, when we're talking about cost, the numbers always go up. Um, maybe not in this case, I don't know. But I'm looking at $9 million over 14 years. And some people will say that's not a lot of money, but just last year, the director of parks and wreck had to close Spruce Pool early just to save $20,000. And I don't want to compromise things like the South Boulder Rec Center and our streets and some of the other things. This money is will come out of the general fund and it will will affect our city. Um, based on some of the

[93:01] conversations I had, if we don't take the funds and we went $9 million for 14 years, in today's uh net value, we'd be about 300 um $300,000 in litigation. Santa Monica's litigation to close that airport when they were fighting with the FAA took over a decade. So that 300,000 is probably very low. And from all the research that I've done, there's about a 35 to 45% chance of us even winning that suit. Um, I don't want to put this city into a precarious financial situation. We just had our facilities meeting. We're looking at numbers that are 400,000 $400 million. I don't think that responsibly looking into the future, we can encumber our general fund even more when we're

[94:01] currently looking at ballot measures to try to bring in more money. Um, I think there could be value. I mean, there could be climate research, aviation campus. Uh, to Taiisha's point, it could also incorporate solar farms, clear aviation test beds. I'm sorry, clean aviation test beds. There's a lot of things. We've got research centers here that would use it. Right now, as the time compresses, enterprises, nobody likes the uncertainty. They will leave and we will have basically a brown field. But I think that if we do straw pull and we do decide to keep this, there is a potential for us to put energy and time and attract all the kinds of enterprises that we want in Boulder with specifically with research. Um, that's it. Thank you.

[95:03] >> Thank you, Rob. I appreciate that. Mayor Brockett, go for it. >> Thanks, Matt. And, uh, thanks city staff for all your analysis and the detailed answers to the questions that came out this afternoon. And, um, Eric, it's really glad to really good to have you on board. Uh, you're doing extraordinary work. So, uh, thanks for being on the team and moving things forward. [clears throat] So, my um analysis on this uh comes down pretty similarly to to what Rob just said. You know, I've been really intrigued by the possibility of the airport uh repurposing and I've certainly followed that along with with great interest over the last few years to see what the potential might be. And you know, we had that community conversation and the different scenarios and um and so I supported us um filing the lawsuit uh when we did uh so that we could try to get an answer to the question of whether we might be able to to close the airport. And the the courts um sent us um back and said come back in in 2040. So then I've been thinking

[96:00] about what what might that look like? And so as I understand it, that potential path to closure would involve waiting until 2040, then filing a lawsuit, and then that would take, you know, my guess would be five years to 10 years. Um and then we would find out at that point having already spent um many millions of dollars out of the general transportation fund and many million well some amount of dollars in the legal arena and that it might well come to nothing. In the meantime, the airport will be gradually deteriorating. The deferred maintenance will be piling up. Um and so my my concern is that we're we're putting an an important um city facility at at real risk here to to be kind of essentially gradually degrade over a course of 20 to 25 years for what may well end up being a a decision that we would have to keep operating it in perpetuity and then we'd have to kick in even more funds uh to then take that back up um at that time. So I just see

[97:01] from a fiduciary responsibility to the city perspective that I think it's um the responsible thing uh for us to do at this point is to commit to the indefinite operation of the airport. I wish we had other options that were in between um perhapitly um and waiting for 25 plus years. Um but the choice in front of us is what we have. So, um I do feel like it's time to go ahead and uh say that we're operating the airport indefinitely and then make it the very best possible airport, both in the sense of functionality and catching up on maintenance, um but also in the sense of mitigating any problems to the community like with um moving away from uh leaded fuel as quickly as possible and doing all the other mitigation methods that Eric is now working really hard on. and just all that is in the framework of our decreasing spending power and um increasing backlog of needs that we need to attend to in the meantime. So that's

[98:00] where I land. Appreciate everybody's uh thoughts on this. >> Thank you, Erin. Uh Nicole, you're up. >> Thank you. Um well, thanks first of all staff for the presentation, discussion, all of this tonight. Um I agree with Mark as I often do on financial issues. Um, I'd like us to continue operating the airport and I can't support a decision that adds perpetual federal obligations right now. Um, so if those those two things can't be disconnected and we have to make this decision tonight, I can't support scenario one. Um, which leaves me with no alternative but um, scenario two. Uh, I do have unresolved concerns about the financial commitments we're taking on and handing to every future council. um as well as the flexibility we may lose and the willingness of the federal government to partner with us in perpetuity. Not to mention massively violating the expectations of thousands of community members when they withdrew their petition and the expectations of the community that they'll be included in

[99:00] major land use decisions. If scenario one is framed as a decision to commit future generations to the perpetual use of this land in the same way it's used in 2026, I can't say yes to it tonight. Um, I really don't mind being wrong. I sincerely hope that I am and my lack of faith in the federal government proves unfounded. Um, but I won't be supporting scenario one tonight. >> Thank you, Nicole. Tara, >> I agree with everybody. It's true. Um, we don't have the money. Um, we're still going to have noise even if we have an airport or not. Thank you Taiish for that uh point. Um for the most part our airport can't get larger really and in some ways our airport stops or limits the flight patterns coming in from Iraqi Mountain Metro. Also I agree with everybody that said that we

[100:00] should have a public hearing and a study session poll is not the way to uh go forward. I'm happy with the straw poll, but I don't want it to be the the final decision maker. That's it. >> All right. Thanks, Tara. Well, we'll get to that straw poll in just a minute. Um Taiisha, you're up. >> Yes. Thank you so much again. Thank you to the staff. Um and for all of those who participated in the very extensive 2023 conversations. Um also just wanted to lift up I would you know, I've gotten some feedback from or read some emails and things from community members about, you know, the level of democracy and and you know, we didn't talk about these things. Um, and I just want to reiterate that there was a whole airport forum and what I'm about to say is very similar to what I said then. Uh, and if anything, my position

[101:00] um has deepened because of the poly crisis that we're in right now. So, I'll just start with the perpetuity conversation. And to say that the line of thinking that you're currently using would mean that me and my um [snorts] African-American ancestors would be three-fifths a person still. Um, our government changes, it's it's disingenuous to act like it doesn't. Um and especially with our current administration, there will be several things uh areas that we will have to reconstruct because of the deconstruction that has happened across so many federal agencies including transportation. The second is around the environmental components and um again we didn't we had three drops of snow um this year and I continue um to believe our climate scientists who have been very clear on the escalation and expansion of emergency and disaster response. And so I do believe we're going to continue to need that area and we need it to be functioning. We need the roads to be functional um for emergency uh and

[102:01] disaster response. Um, I am I'm de still devastated about the FAA's uh oversight as it relates to both noise and lead transition. Um, however, it is my understanding based on the staff's response that um these two issues would not be resolved regardless of if we went with area scenario one or scenario two. Regarding SNA um grant status, I would argue that the question that uh my colleague raised um is applicable to every federal grant that we are accepting. Um and so I don't know I mean I don't know what to say that that to me is not in in in sufficient enough to not accept uh the money and if anything uh because we are not getting the grant amounts that we were getting in um some of the other areas particularly around health and human services etc which are now going to lean even more heavily on our general fund. Um that will be absolutely critical which then takes us to our fiduciary responsibility. Um I

[103:02] would agree um that um the numbers that were provided are I actually would say that um considering the status of the straight of Hermouth and the status of the pro dollar and the status of our global um um ecological challenges that we know are going to to are going to exacerbate our finances at every single level that those numbers are too low including that for mitigation. Um, and so it's going to lean more heavily on our general fund. The numbers that we received were about the entire fund, but it's important for us to be reminded that the majority of our um fund, our budget is restricted or dedicated. And so it's actually an even higher percentage that is going to be used um out of our general fund. And those are things that could be used for an elevate bro Boulder program, which we couldn't afford. Um the community connector program currently does not have sustained funding and of course we know

[104:02] um the need for South Boulder Rec Center and other um deferred maintenance um and things that need to happen there. And then lastly, um I just wanted to follow up on the airport effort and remind folks one I appreciate the 3,000 plus people that signed that petition which is only which actually only represents 1% of our registered voters. Uh but it also um it was my understanding in my memory that the reason that that was pulled to was to see how the um legal matter um would would play out and we have the answer to that legal battle. Um and so let's see. I think that's all I have on this. Oh, I did have this last thing around study sessions. And I do agree with my colleagues around um how this particular decision is made. And I would also argue how our study sessions are being used. This is supposed to be a place where we're getting information. I'm noticing we're getting longer and longer hotlines. Um 11page responses

[105:00] from staff. Um and my question to my count my fellow council members because we are a self-governing body, but also um from our team, you know, oftentimes we have to use a kn of three or not of five um if our questions are going to take it sufficient staff time to research. And you know if Ryan you have nine, M Mark Mark you have six, Rob you have three. Um Matt you have five, Tara, you know exactly Tara you have three. No I don't see you don't use like that but it was funny. Anyway, my larger point is is if we calculated all that time together would that be similar to the kinds of asks that we would have for um you know um a research question? Um, you know, I'm fine with having uh my fellow council members ask um uh staff for additional questions they have after receiving the packet, but I do have concerns around an expectation that staff is going to send these detailed responses when honestly it could be a

[106:00] fivem minute conversation during a study session. So, thank you. Uh oh, sorry. And for all of those reasons, I will be supporting option one. >> Great. Thanks, Taiisha. I appreciate that. Uh Tina, let's go for it. Hi um all right yeah thank you for all the discussion and I appreciate all the perspectives of um my colleagues today and um and first of all I'll just join the course and um saying that I don't think a study session is appropriate for making what I think is a decision not a direction and just a reminder that in this format we've established that this can't be relitigated and so it is a big deal and it did not allow for community voice. That being said, we have heard from the community through the community forum and through emails. Um, and I do think we have a good sense of the different uh considerations that the community is is thinking about. Um, and I am, you know, I'm still at a little bit of a crossroads. This has been a

[107:00] really difficult um conversation about what to do. I fully support the airport, uh, but I don't like the way the federal grants are structured. So I think for me um I would have liked an option to have had a real discussion about what we might want to see alongside a commitment to keeping the airport open. So some things I would like to see would be a clear policy on how we understand when federal grants might be coming in conflict with our community's values. As Teresa said, that could be a policy and I think we should pursue that um conversation so that we understand what's going on with all of our federal grants. It doesn't mean we have to monitor it and it doesn't mean we don't have trust in our city manager. It just makes sure that we're aware of the different types of conditions and insuranceances that are being requested of our city and how they might be in conflict with our community. I also would like us to see a much more aggressive legislative platform on the congressional and senatorial levels to advocate for changes in some of these rulings that have been made in

[108:00] particular around fuel around pollution and possibly as Nicole was mentioning are there ways that the federal government can subsidize impacted communities by aviation especially when cities have little control to Taiisha's point we don't have any tools for the next you know 14 years to help with noise are led. So I think the best we can do is really strongly strengthen our advocacy and hope for a climate where people will listen so that the communities can be protected. Um the other piece is I would have liked to have said let's think about this in terms of having a more transparent dashboard around the impacts of the community by noise and by the schedules that pilots might be using. The one of the things that's been the most troubling about this conversation is the incredible tension between the aviation community and the community surrounding them. And I would have liked to have seen us go through a process where we can find some mutual respect and understanding so it's not just this

[109:01] constant um just this this constant friction. All that being said, I do agree that I don't I think conditions will change and I am going to end up going with scenario one if I vote at all. Um, and I think this is a vote. I don't think this is a straw poll. So, I I think I'm just struggling on that piece so deeply. Um, but that's all I've got to say. Thanks. >> Thank you. Um, I'd like to weigh in, but I see two more hands up. It's It's got to be lightning quick because we're already a bit behind. So, uh, super super quick. Uh, Tara, it's got to be lightning quick. >> Lightning quick. I just want to uh agree that I council council colleagues, I'm asking us to read the uh the little booklet we have, the council handbook, and reconsider how long our hotlines are. I'm just asking for everybody. It's just taking too much time. >> That could be a separate conversation and a separate phase. not doesn't need

[110:01] to be here on this issue, but I appreciate the thought. Erin, go for it. >> So, Matt, I just wanted to ask a process question of Teresa and Nura um which is I know we we've heard uh several people having concerns about talking about this only or um having a a type of direction only um at a study session. And what I'm wondering is, you know, could we um whatever direction that we get, would it be possible to formalize that direction with a resolution of some kind? You know, perhaps that we could vote on, you know, that maybe it's a on a consent agenda like just so that we whatever direction that we're giving, you know, could we um formalize that with something that's more on the record? >> Thanks for that question, Aaron. Um, indeed, part of council's charge during a study session is to identify action items that they would like staff to bring back. So, this is your opportunity to identify

[111:00] action items that you would like staff to bring back. Just because staff didn't prompt you to do so doesn't mean that that's not the case. >> Okay. Thanks. >> Um, so I I would note that currently there is an ordinance that provides for an airport And so that direction has already been given. Should you all decide a different direction, formal action would need to be taken for that. >> Can we clarify that, Teresa? So you're saying that if scenario one is pursued, no formal action is needed as if it is because it's already baked into an existing ordinance. But if scenario two were to be given guidance tonight, then yes, formal direction would need to be uh given in order to make that change at a local level via ordinance. >> That's correct. >> Council could direct staff to bring an action item to affirm their decision tonight. That's certainly a possibility.

[112:00] It's not necessary, but it's a possibility. >> Okay, I appreciate that. Well, let's take these things sort of in order. Um, but Erin, I I appreciate you bringing that up. Um, and but let's start with we have a threshold question to get to to some extent before we get to that next procedural question. Um, but first, uh, barring anyone else wanting to weigh in, I I'll sort of save myself for last if you don't mind. Um, candidly, I think, you know, I'm just going to just come out and say it. I I think supporting scenario one is the only fiduciary thing we can responsibly do here. And I think it would be fiduciarially negligent to roll the dice, spend $9 million till 2040. And as Aaron pointed out, wait another 10 years and spend perhaps another increasing amount. As I think Taiisha point out, it's only going to get more expensive compoundingly so. And so we're just spending the money on a hope, an unlikely hope that the federal government is going to somehow side with us when they've swatted so many others

[113:01] down. Um, I I just think that's the MUN 2.0 and we didn't learn our lesson the first time. So, I think it's important for us to maybe learn it again here and not go down that path of futility. Um, this wait and see that I'm hearing is not a policy choice. It's really just kicking the can down the road. And we've already effectively kicked the can for three years. So, this is a choice point and it's an important one that we take it to give certainty not only to those that want to see an airport become viable in our community, but even to those that don't like the airport. We need to give some certainty and we need to make sure that we can do so and move on. But moving on doesn't mean that there's anybody who loses in this community because we get to define an airport for the future. Part of why we've have an airport we do now is because we have not taken the opportunity to create that certainty from which to define an airport for the future. This can be the most sustainable and environmentally focused airport in the region. It can be an envy around the state, but we have to choose to want to do that. And these things are important for us to consider and there's grants

[114:00] and opportunities to bring new business to our community to bring those jobs and to catalyze a strong economy around an airport of the future. Um, and I just have to say, you know, if scenario two is where we go, there's real harm in that and those trade-offs are going to hurt the very core services that we've been struggling to protect. Um, and so I think that that works against the values. It certainly works against what I heard in the last election cycle that people want our core services to be addressed. And if we say sorry, we're going to have to harvest another 500,000 a year from those core services goes against the promises we've made to community in these hard financial times. So, um I think with all of that, I think it's a pretty obvious decision for us to to go with scenario one and let staff do what they do best, which is take that direction and execute the best possible policy going forward um with their um mandate to follow that direction. So, in any event, um let's move on. Let's talk about a straw poll in terms of do we want to pick? I saw Ryan. Do you have a question or or is that or is Aaron's uh

[115:01] process sort of aligned with what you were angling for? >> No, I have a process question, but if I do or I don't want to interrupt you. Should I do it now? >> If you got if you got a question, let's do it. But I'd like to get to these straw polls because we are now running way behind. >> Yeah. Thanks. So, I I'm actually um I I know my view, but I'm actually not sure which scenario it is. Um, so I'm I I think maybe this is a question for Theresa Nura about this word indefinite. So whether or not to operate the airport indefinitely. I think of when we offer something indefinitely, that's what we're doing with the Alpine Boston facility. That's what we're doing with with the new fire department. Indefinite means we are planning to move it forward. We have no plans to change it, but it's a long-term commitment. So I would support that for the airport, but I I don't support a perpetuity commitment. So, I'm not sure if I'm scenario one or scenario two or if or if there is there something else we should be defining in that. So, that's a question for Teresa. Nuria, >> go ahead, Nuria. [laughter] >> Sure. I was going to say that's a for me

[116:01] that's a it's a hard distinction to make. Um, and I understand the question, right? like the choices we make to um acquire land or um to consolidate into alpine balsom, we're not thinking of those as anything but perpetual if you will, right? Those are long term. We're not thinking about that's only a 10 years and then we're bringing it down. Um it's just an unusual situation where we have the word perpetual uh attached to what we do. Um, and I would say it's not something new that it is currently attached to what we're doing. Um and so um decisions decisions to to open an airport and to have that as a city amenity have led us whether we knew that 30 years ago or however many years ago before have

[117:00] now led us to perpetual at the moment. Um the question I think is um will it remain in that use moving forward? And I I don't have a good definition of what's indefinite and what's perpetual in this scenario. I I don't know if I have mucked it up for you, Teresa. >> No, I I'm just trying to get us to a straw poll. I don't know if there's any more that can be sused out because I think the question is very clear and and I think we just have to we just have to get to our straw poll and then there is a process question that that Aaron posed. Scenario one is do we wish to operate do we wish to give direction to operate the airport indefinitely? I I think we all know what that means. We know what that entails. We know what that triggers and we can vote that. Scenario two is do we wish to uh have an airport which keeps the closure opportunity available to us and and not uh pursue uh those things that that would lock uh the airport in

[118:02] perpetuity. So So we need to get to this straw poll. I think we're we're circling it. We're we're trying to get to something that may isn't really there. So So I'd like us to get to the straw poll. Um and so I think that's what we're going to start with right now. So um let's see if we can get folks to raise their hand. Who supports scenario one? >> I did have a mini point of clarification, but I'm going to let it go. >> It was m Okay. So, I see five people in support of scenario one. Please raise your hand if you support scenario two. Okay, I see four hands for supporting scenario two. So, it looks like the preference to staff has been given to support the direction of scenario one to operate the airport um for the foreseeable future, which likes is likely an indefinite time frame. So what

[119:02] uh okay I just want to quickly ask for staff do does is that enough to answer that first foundational question >> for staff do they have what they need? I see a nod of ahead from Nuria. >> Well I was going to allow Ble and Eric. Do you have what you need? >> I Yes. I think this gives us the direction we were looking for. I'm I'm pausing because I I'm not sure I understand the process here either. But >> yes, you've given us direction. So >> staff posed staff posed the question of scenario one versus two uh through a straw poll. Five council members gave preference to scenario one and four council members gave preference to scenario four. So in terms of the questions, the comments in the straw poll and sort of just asking was there anything else that you feel you need in order to move forward with the direction um that you were looking for? >> No. Thank you. >> Awesome. Great. So, I see Taiisha with a question. We do have this process

[120:01] question that Aaron brought up. We're trying to move through it because we are we are behind and we just want to button this up so we don't keep Jonathan um here longer than he needs to be with our next subject. So, Taiisha, what you got? >> I just had a point of clarification that decommission uh option is always on the table. It's whether or not the feds will respond. In the when you gave scenario two, it sound as if it wasn't on the table or scenario one. is always on the table was my understanding. Thank you. >> That is a great point of a clarification. You are absolutely right. You could ask to decommission at any time. Um and I think uh our city attorney and and city manager have clarified that, but thank you for reminding us here at the very end as well. Thanks, TA. All right. So, Aaron brought up a process question about whether or not we wanted to affirm this this direction at a point in the future. Um but to clarify since we did did give preference to scenario one and in our current ordinances we have an ordinance that already explicitly uh states that

[121:00] we will be operating an airport. It are we good with just giving direction and it kind of just validates the ordinance that's already on the books or is there a preference to um give some sort of resolution or revalidate that commitment um to to that ordinance? And so that is I guess Aaron, was that really kind of what you were looking for in terms of your your process and your procedure question. And then if if that's something what you're looking for, if I'm rephrasing that correctly, then I would perhaps ask council if there is a preference to either go as is with the ordinance that's already on the books or look to reaffirm the commitment to that ordinance. So I just want to check in with Aaron since he brought that up. And theres at any point if I'm misstating how that process would play out, please interject um accordingly. Aaron. >> Yeah. Well, I just um I heard some uh folks being not fully comfortable with this only being a discussion at a study session and I shared some of that

[122:00] discomfort. So yeah, I would suggest um the idea of bringing back a resolution that we could um have a recorded vote on on okay some future meeting on consent. >> Thanks for clarifying. So let me reach out. Let me ask Teresa since we already have an ordinance on the books that clearly dictates the operation of an airport and we just gave preference towards continuing the pursuit of that policy. How would you suggest process-wise at a future date of more or less reaffirming that commitment to um address this concern about doing so in a different form other than a study session? >> Um according to the charter council acts by resolution, motion or ordinance. Here there's already an ordinance. So you could have a motion um or a resolution >> in from your is there a substantive difference between the two? Motion or

[123:01] resolution? Without having contemplated which would be better, um I I wonder if if council would like to consider the question of whether to take formal action at an upcoming meeting to document this and then if council supports that idea, um let us come back to CAC with a recommendation. >> I think that sounds very reasonable. We'll let you figure out what the best path for us to do that is. So what we'll do right now Taiisha I see your hand up. >> Uh this is a a next steps question related to now that this decision has been or or whatever we're calling it >> direction has been provided. Um I'm curious the possible impacts to the Boulder Valley comp plan update and if there will be opportunities and this I don't have to have the answer for this but I am curious. um you know there is a

[124:01] whole future of section of that of that plan and you know a lot of the things that we had talked about today are there some really big picture things that I don't think that the um community has had a a broader conversation around as it relates to the Boulder Valley comp plan. I'm also curious about you know it is a community asset that I do think similar to our agricultural portfolio should be considered for special designation. So again, not necessarily for this time to have the response, but I am curious um how the airport uh plays in the Boulder Valley comp plan update. Thank you. >> I will say that we have there I know uh Brad, I'm going to take you up on a private offer, but um I know that we have uh the airport is mentioned as part of the current plan, as part of the draft plan. Um so that conversation continues. Brad, maybe you have some additional information to share. >> Uh, so good evening. Brad Mueller, director of planning and development

[125:00] services. So, I appreciate the the question um, Council Member Adams, and also the uh, recognition that the comprehensive plan does cover uh, things such as that. We would anticipate a policy similar to the one that was in the draft plan. Um but we also know that that would lead to other planning processes in the future as part of implementation. Uh but you all will get the recommendation draft as we talked about um in the next few weeks and that can be a point of additional discussion either individually with us as staff or in uh the collective. >> Okay. I just want to know when I can when we can revisit that conversation around the energy generation because that is urgent and important. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Thanks TA. Thanks Brad. All right. Getting back to um our preference in terms of next steps. So, let me ask for a straw poll. Does c um would council have a would council pref would council like to give direction to staff

[126:00] [clears throat] to um at a future date at a future regular meeting. create some sort of formal mechanism from which to enshrine the direction we gave tonight to staff in more formal action and leaving the city attorney's office and staff to work out what that best formal action is um at a later date, but would we like to give staff direction to curate that and then of course CAC to schedule it? So, if I have that sort of stated correctly um I'd like to see a straw poll. Would council like to see us do that? That looks nearly unanimous. Okay. So, Teresa, is that clear? And and Nuria, is that clear for you guys with regards to coming back with some formal action? Whether it's a motion or resolution, we'll leave you guys to decide that and work with CAC to get that scheduled.

[127:00] >> It is. Thanks. >> Okay. Wonderful. All right. Well, um, without further ado, uh, any, uh, staff, you good? Feeling good? We got what we need. Last check-in before we move on to the next thing. >> Thank you, Councilman Benjamin, and everyone. >> Awesome. Ble, Eric, everybody. Thank you, Teresa, and Nura, thank you for um, uh, all the great work on this, the memo, answering these tough questions, and being a part of a really tough community conversation. So, thank you guys so much for that. and Brad, thanks for the quick pinch hit on a subject matter that's slightly outside your purview, but thanks for being ready to answer Taiisha's question on that. Um, so thank you. So without further ado, we're going to transition to our next subject and I'm going to turn it back to our city manager, Nuria Rivera Vandermide, to introduce the next subject. >> Thanks so much, council member. Uh, I'm not quite sure the next topic is any lighter. Uh we have this responds to a council priority that truly is in response to um some concerning trends that we have been seeing um with

[128:00] increased power uh public safety or shut offs um or public shut offs. Um we know that we are um facing more and more uh high fire high wind dangers. Um and in response, we have and certainly appreciate Excel has been proactive in trying to ensure the safety of our community. But in so doing, however, that has led to other consequences as we think about resilience and readiness and who that uh how our community is impacted by those shut offs. So you have um put forward a council priority for us to really evaluate and think about as we move forward. So just appreciate that. Um, I will hand it over to our director of climate initiatives to get our conversation started, but just appreciate um the great interest in this conversation um that you have brought forward, Jonathan. >> Yeah, cool. Thanks, Nuria. I think you just said all of my introductory

[129:01] remarks, so I could maybe just uh make this a whole lot quicker. Good evening. >> [laughter] >> Good evening, mayor, members of council, and I want to say thanks to you, uh, Council Member Benjamin, for facilitating tonight. I'm Jonathan Cohen. I serve as the director of the climate initiatives department. Um, I'm mostly here in support, uh, of our energy manager, Carolyn Elam, and an engagement manager, Darren Wagner, who are going to be giving tonight's presentation. I also want to say that our senior electrical engineer, Lex Telles, I think he's hanging around in case you have some super technical questions tonight. So, just a couple of things from me. Um, just reiterating a little bit of what Nura just said, but I think our discussion tonight on power resilience is one of those issues that I like to say until recently, most of us didn't spend a lot of time thinking about, but uh, over the past few years, uh, as we all know, we've experienced a huge shift in both the frequency and impact of power outages. And I think most of our community are feeling it pretty directly. And that's what led to

[130:01] council making this topic one of your 2026 priorities. So, not only are we seeing more outages, they're lasting longer. They're affecting larger parts of our community. And it's not random, it reflects a pretty fundamental shift in the system itself. And that's because the sorts of outages we're experiencing are tied to how utilities are managing wildfire risk. And they're becoming more frequent, longer, and frankly more consequential. meaning they aren't just occasional disruptions anymore. So, I just wanted to talk about a couple of things that are driving this. Uh, we all know that because the grid itself can be an ignition risk, Excel Energy is proactively shutting off power during high-risisk conditions. So, as a result, we've all added a new acronym to our vocabularies, PSPS, or public safety power shut offs, which are those planned outages during elevated wildfire risk. Excel is also using more sensitive system settings that can trip lines more easily and these are becoming I think

[131:01] standard wildfire mitigation tools for a lot of utilities. I want to stress one point and that is while they clearly have real impacts for our community, the strategies play a really critical role in reducing wildfire risk and protecting public safety and at the same time uh we have an aging grid and more extreme weather. So I think taken together this is really a structural change in how the grid behaves and what we can expect more of going forward. I I want to speak directly to community members who are watching tonight. Um and I want to say that we know these experiences go beyond inconvenience. These outages affect people uh with medical needs, uh businesses trying to stay open, people working from home when the internet goes down, and critical facilities and services that the city provides. So, we have this moment where risk is increasing, expectations are increasing, and the system is under more pressure. So, that's what really sits behind the

[132:00] work in front of you tonight. uh our staff team has worked really hard to develop a structured way to get our arms around this. So what's outlined in your materials uh for tonight is an approach to better understand what investments are being made, where the real risks are both now and over time and what the city actually has the ability to make a difference in. So when it comes to the infrastructure, we know we don't own and operate our energy system. We do have influence through our partnership with Excel, through our regulatory engagement, through our own investments, and especially how we support the community in preparing for responding to future outages. So, just to wrap up, um I want to say that council made this a priority for 2026, but clearly this is a much longer effort, which is why we've designed this work in phases leading to a policy roadmap around a set of practical options for council to consider. Um, tonight's really about making sure we're pointed in the right direction before we get too far down that path. Carolyn is going to cover a lot of detail, but what

[133:01] we're looking for tonight is council's feedback on the approach, whether there are additional strategies you think we should be exploring, and whether the engagement plan reflects the kind of community conversation you'd like to see. So, I'm excited to hand this over to Carolyn who is going to walk through the details. >> Great. Thank you and good evening, council. I'm Carolyn Elim. I'm a senior manager in your climate initiatives department. I'm also the partnership manager for our partnership with Excel Energy. Um just briefly, um as Jonathan mentioned, our goal tonight is just to kind of ground us, um and the impetus for this project, review what we have planned, um through the rest of the year, um really dive into our community engagement approach, and we have Darren Wagner, our engagement manager, here to discuss that with you. um we've made progress so far. So, we definitely want to share that with you and then have a discussion to make sure we're headed in the right trajectory to align with your council priority. And I just want to say how much we appreciate that you have

[134:00] elevated this to be a council priority. Um we know it's really critically important to the community. Um and and you know, it's an opportunity to really share the realities of where we're at and where we're going. And I think this is just really important for all of us. Again, we have three questions for you tonight. I won't read these. We'll come back to these. Um it's helpful to start um in understanding um and kind of grounding this for the benefit make sure we're all starting from the same place and also for the benefit of those watching us this evening to understand the complexities of the electric system that serves us because it's really underpinning um the experiences our community is having right now. Um our system is served from the east and west from transmission lines that serve six different substations and then over 30 individual power lines from our community. The graphic on the right um shows you um by color um how those different power lines lay out throughout our community. You can see it's a massive spiderweb that overlaps. And because of this, you can have two homes

[135:02] sitting right next to each other that have a very different reliability experience. And this is because they happen to be served from different power lines with different realities in terms of where they stand in terms of reliability. The other thing I would point to is that um we have power lines that are exclusively serving inside the urban center of the city of Boulder, but we also have a number of power lines that serve out either come into the city from um unincorporated areas or extend out into those unincorporated areas. And it's these particular lines that are the topic of our wildfire concern. And I'll talk about this more um in a minute. As Jonathan noted over the last two years, um you know, while um reliability has always been a concern within our community, our community has experienced a dramatic decline in reliability. This is in terms of outage frequency, outage duration, and how much of our community is simultaneously impacted by outage. Um

[136:02] this definitely changes the context of what we're um experiencing. Um and there's no silver bullet. While Jonathan talked a lot about wildfire mitigation, we're seeing other forms of outage um with growing concern that I'll talk about as well. And you know, just for example, I've highlighted um a a section of our community over here on the right, and the map here is showing you it's one of the data sources we have, frequency of outage. Um this is an area of our community that's been particularly hit by multiple outages. I believe they've had more than a dozen over the last year. Um, and it's because they've experienced every one of the the bullets I have highlighted. They've been included in wildfire safety. Um, they've had weather related damage, equipment's failed, there's been car crashes into equipment. Um, and also construction related outages, right? So, there's no single experience um that's contributing to this, but we have to understand all of them to know how to improve the experience of our community. Um, we hear a lot from the community about Excel's use of of power safety

[137:00] shut offs. Why now? What's changed? It's always been windy in Boulder. Um power lines have always been vulnerable to to winds, but the reality is our winters are are warmer um and drier. The conditions have really changed. The windiest months are historically in the winter months. Um on the left, you know, we typically had snow um and precipitation. Um as I heard earlier, you we've had like three drops of snow this winter. Like the risk is much higher. Um and our current reality is that the strongest winds are coming in our highest wildfire risk now. And we've learned what can happen when power lines come down in these conditions. Um over the last decade, our nationally our some of our most devastating wildfires have been related to power lines coming down in wind storms and drought conditions. Um taking lives, dam destroying thousands and thousands of buildings and causing billions of dollars in damage. Um you know, we we have to learn from this. It's the reality of the risks that have increased with climate change. with our

[138:01] growth into these higher risk areas. So expansion into wildland areas and the aging of our our utility infrastructure. So we do again appreciate that Excel is taking steps to protect our community, but we also understand that they have to um also improve the system. So Excel's approach to wildfire mitigation is really two-pronged. There's the immediate role of deenergizing lines so they cannot spark a fire if they fail under the highest risk conditions. Um, so public safety power shut offs are in the most extreme risk events. So the top 1% of wind speeds and low humidity. Um, but enhanced power safety settings are used more often and we certainly see outages related to this on red flag warning days. In parallel though, they're working to harden the system so these tools become increasingly less necessary and so also so that fewer customers are impacted and they can restore power more quickly after the events. So hardening means under targeted undergrounding. Um designing [clears throat] to new wildfire standards that didn't exist

[139:00] back in the day when much of our infrastructure was constructed. That's covered wire, non-arching sparking equipment. Um improve situational awareness. Um so using weather stations so that they don't necessarily and controllable devices so they don't have to initiate the events until the winds actually materialize. Um so we're not seeing outages when the winds actually don't occur. and then sectionalizing which is breaking the grid up so that they can really target where the outage is occurring. I thought it'd be helpful to illustrate kind of how this concern um promuggates in our community and what Excel is doing. So I'm highlighting an area of Boulder. This is North Boulder. Um the map on the right is showing you the wildfire risk map. This is the state map um where the increasing red is a measure of of wildfire risk. Um this area here is one that has been included in each of the four public safety power shop events that Excel has conducted um in the city. Um so each this area has been impacted. It's

[140:00] largely um within the Boulder city limits relatively north of Violet. Um there's a little bit of dispersity in that but you get the general sense from the map. And really this al um is because of the power line that serves this area but also the mountain areas. Um, so you may recognize this photo. It's Highway 36 and you'll recognize the power line that runs along there. This line actually um runs up Highway 36 towards Lions. It it turns off at Never Road. Um, it also serves up into the foothills along Lee Hill Drive. Um, it serves areas north of J Road, which we could all agree are kind of, you know, large grassy lands and then North Boulder, which is the urban environment. So, it is nothing to do with the area inside the city limits in terms of wildfire risk, but rather how this line um spreads off into the foothills and some of the grassland areas to our north. The plan to mitigate this is to underground roughly 5 and a half miles of this line. So where it runs along

[141:01] Highway 36 um to sectionalize the foothills areas so that near-term north Boulder can be stay on during high wind events and then to rebuild the foothill sections to new wildfire um standards so that again all of these areas that have been impacted recently over the long term in the coming years will gradually be reduced from these types of events. So that's that's how the wildfire mitigation work is intended to work. But wildfire safety operations is not the only outage we're seeing. As I mentioned, we're also seeing increased damage um due to weather. And this is not because winds are getting faster or or necessarily stronger in the regard of speed, but we're seeing um events that have a lot of sheer force to them. So they're behaving like tornadoes um which are extremely damaging um to these poles and more importantly to the vegetation. We have a lot of drought and disease stressed vegetation in our area due to the effects of climate change. Um we also have a lot of mature vegetation

[142:01] that's aging out and these are causing greater damage when they do come down on power lines. The plan is to start to increase some of the vegetation management to reduce the exposure to this. Again, this will take some time, but this is leading to some of our longer outages. Many of the lines that were proactively shut off also were damaged during these windstorms. Many in our community are confused because we're also seeing outages on blue sky days. Um days when it's not windy, days when we've had snow on the ground. And the reality is that we have an old system that was put in place when Boulder expanded particularly in the 50s and 60s as well as again in the 70s um and 80s time frames that's now reaching end of life of useful life. Um there's a large amount of infrastructure um that's kind of in that age bracket and we're starting to see it fail. Some of our most impactful outages outside of the the wildfire safety operations have actually been associated with the underground equipment serving Boulder. So these are lines put in in kind of the 70s and 80s time frame that

[143:01] are reaching end of life. Um they they're stressed by some of our water plane and soils. Um so they're starting to fail. We've had two major failures in emergency replacement by Excel. Um and we also think that the inclusion of some of these in some of these wildfire safety events is accelerating some of this decline. So we're seeing an increase in these types of outages immediately after wildfire safety outages. So this is really the impetus for the council project this year is to understand this to understand with Excel how they plan to fix this problem. And I just want to be clear is our expectation um that they make improvements to the system. I believe it's their expectction expectation that they make improvements to the system to at least restore us to um more historical trends in terms of reliability. Um and we would like to see that go even farther and be more consistent with some of our peer communities. Um so the goal is to really understand from them the whole scope of investments. We have a good understanding of wildfire investments,

[144:00] but there's more that needs to happen. Um so this is kind of the the first phase after we have this check-in with you is doing this analysis data gathering. Um Darren will talk about our community engagement plan. Um this is really to understand from our community um how people are being more successful in these events versus more challenged in these events to learn best practices, understand how we can better support them um and then gather all this on um input on the different strategies we can pursue. We're doing this project in close coordination with one of council's other priority projects which is around enhancing Boulder's wildfire resilience. um and then come back to council to with kind of this roadmap of what can take place in the 2027 and beyond time frame um to continue to push towards improved reliability and resilience. Um council member Shushard had asked a question around um how we're going to measure success. Um we do have a number of means to to measure progress. Um I'm

[145:00] showing here I'm not asking everybody to understand this. Um but this is just showing that there are standards for how utilities report reliability. Um so we are capturing that data. We're trending that data um and benchmarking that against um other utilities within our state as well as Excel's peers nationally um to make sure we're trending in the correct direction. Um we also plan to measure the investments that are being made. Continue to track how much line is moved from overhead to underground. um how much area of our community has been caught up in terms of vegetation management. Um so these are some of the metrics we're we're looking to capture. So with that, I am going to um pass this over to Darren um for a minute to talk to you about our um proposed approach to community engagement. I think Darren. Okay, how about now? >> Yes, we can hear you now. Thank you.

[146:00] >> Apologies. Thank you. Um, thank you, Carolyn. Good evening, council members. My name is Darren Wagner. She her. I am the climate engagement strategist uh for the department and I am happy to be here tonight to talk about how we are proposing to go through this conversation with the community. knowing that it's both a continuation of conversations we've been having as well as a prelude to others that we want to keep having with our community members. And the purpose of this phase is to uh is sort of four-fold. We want to continue, as Caroline was doing just a moment ago, to build understanding of these complex systems. It's a lot of information, very technical, and we want to make sure that we're all working from a level playing field uh in terms of what those um base conditions are. And as Caroline mentioned, we also want to use this as an opportunity to understand different communities and how they are navigating these power outages, how some are more successful than others and why, what needs are remaining um among some of our community members. Um and and

[147:02] really as we're going through this process rather than it just being extractive in terms of what we're looking for, we also want to offer value for the community as we go and look for ways to improve preparedness for these power outages. And so we'll be partnering with the office of disaster management, for example, as well as others. And really the heart of the the set of questions that we have for community during this process is for help evaluating and refining policy options that we'll come back to you and present on by by the end of the year. So we have certain segments of the community that we want to make sure that we reach out to and engage with. We know that our frontline communities are not only at the greatest risk of some of these same uh conditions that Caroline was just describing. We also know that there is a lot of wisdom and resilience inherent in the experiences of these communities and we want to elevate the the lessons and the knowledge from within them uh to really understand how

[148:02] how we can learn from them more broadly. We want to also recognize the importance of connecting with those that are experiencing these more frequent or extended outages like Carolyn was pointing out as well as community members who are experiencing medical and mobility needs uh seniors as well as our business communities. Uh so we'll be uh using different strategies to reach these different segments. I want to say that part of our established citywide decision-making process as as many of you know is to really start from that foundation of information and inquiry. And like I said, because this is such a set of complex uh conditions and questions. We've been doing some work already in terms of putting information out there to help translate that material into understandable resources. So, we do have a website available for community members that are listening tonight and as well as a number of uh subsidiary pages like FAQs in relation to power

[149:02] outages as well as uh information on undergrounding. And really, this is all related to a town hall that we held in late January following on the uh December PSPS events as well. And building off of that foundation, we are looking at a phased approach to engagement this year. The first of which would happen over this summer where we do strategic engagement to those neighborhoods uh with direct impacts and frontline communities. We would have online engagement opportunities that really would seek to engage the broader public as well as our business community to get a poll on and a sense of how they're experiencing power outages and and resilience. And then the centerpiece of this uh engagement window is also a workshop that we'd like to set up with partners from our chambers of commerce from um Boulder County partners within frontline communities leaders some of whom have received funding through the

[150:01] climate um climate equity fund through Boulder County and who are leading a lot of this great work around this idea of resilience hubs. We want to learn what is active in this space, what efforts and needs are being addressed and which needs are still remaining so that we can come out of that workshop with a stronger map of what are the remaining needs and opportunities to pursue. And as Caroline will remind you at the end, we also have an opportunity for Excel to come to city council later this summer um so that you can hear directly from them. What that would do by giving us sort of a broad set of information and input from our community is would as we sort of narrow the funnel and work towards consensus around a set of policy options to move forward with. The second engagement window this fall would really center around uh what's called a community and council forum. And for anyone not familiar with that uh format, it's an opportunity for community members to really engage directly with

[151:00] council and vice versa in a two-way dialogue, very different from a public hearing or open public comment. Um, and it's an opportunity to really explore uh more deeply how these priorities are emerging, what are the experiences that our community members are going through, and for council to hear from members of the community that uh you might not tend to get an opportunity to engage with. And we're hoping that that council forum would be an opportunity to really focus in on those priority uh efforts so that when we come back to you with a set of policy uh options, it's a reflection of consensus that we've built with the community to date. Um, as with any uh roadmap of sorts, there is additional engagement that we know we want to continue or build on as we look towards implementing in implementing a number of aspects of the road map that we prioritize for next year. So, with that, I will turn that back to Carolyn.

[152:01] Thanks so much, Darren. So with that, um, we'll just give you a quick snapshot of some of the progress, um, to date and how we're tackling this because I mean, we've been at this for a while and addressing um, these concerns. Um, so while the the priority is focused on this year and developing the road map, um, there were a lot of things in flight and things still in flight that I just want to highlight. Again, we were very successful um in our advocacy at the public utilities commission and supporting Excel um in advancing their wildfire mitigation plan and and really securing the investments that are necessary to reduce the risk to our community. Um similarly, we supported them in their um distribution system plan which will bring some of the investments that rebuild some of the aged infrastructure within our community. um we're intervening in their electric rate case and next week we'll be filing comments into the public utilities commission around emphasizing the importance of improving reliability and trying to create um more incentive um to ensure that they're successfully delivering on on the commitments to our

[153:01] community to improve reliability. Um we're also engaged with the legislature in the reauthorization of the public utilities commission referred to as the sunset bill. Um this includes um making u quality of service programs u mandatory and we've got some amendments proposed there um and improving penalties and and other ways to support us as we seek to improve reliability. Um in your memo we also highlighted um you know some of the data we've been gathering in terms of reliability and metrics. Um, we've also begun to develop what we're calling risk zones, um, which are tied to exactly, you know, instead of census blocks as typically reported, tied to who is served from different power lines within the community consistent with the map I showed you earlier. um because these would be the areas of the community with common um experience in terms of reliability so that we could better understand um the demographics within those risk zones and where's and who was being more disproportionately impacted and where supports might be more necessary. We've

[154:01] been working with Excel, met with their engineers, walked through town, proposed mitigations to reduce outage impacts and and keep power up for the more of the community. And I just want to say thank you to council um for supporting our ordinance change um uh last month which will allow us to create a fund to reinvest in the community to support some resiliency. Um more to come on that in the future. Um Excel is making progress. I won't read through all this. Um there's a lot of things in flight um in final permitting, final design that begins to harden our system. They've hired an added um personnel to support our partnership. So lots of progress there. And soon we'll be announcing um work to um on the vegetation management that's going to be coming. Uh just want to highlight this. This is in your memo again. These are some of our um initial policy options that we've identified um that we would be doing some of the engagement around um this summer. Uh you know, so continuing to push Excel on grid hardening and infrastructure investment, supporting

[155:01] more um local resources to build in resilience um more broadly. Uh, as Darren mentioned, a lot of this is really integrated in helping the community be more prepared because we cannot get to a future where there's no risk of outage. Um, so really that capacity building is very critical. Again, our advocacy um in regulation and legislative pathways. There's opportunity um to think about city-led investment um where we need to shore up our critical infrastructure and of course all of this should be grounded in some equity centered resilient strategies. So these would be the policy where we would continue to refine this through the engagement and conversation with Excel. Next steps um we will do plan to provide you an update um early this summer on progress on the project. Um Darren mentioned we'll kick off the engagement window um in that early summer time frame. We've scheduled um Excel um for a study session August 27th and then the um community council forum which we're tenatively looking at October 8th for

[156:01] that date. So, with that, I will return to our count questions for council. Um, and look forward to our conversation. >> Thank you, Carolyn, for that. Um, thanks staff for putting together the memo and that presentation. That was that was great. It was a good update. I know we've got a lot of questions. Um, and so, oh, Elicia, thanks for putting those in the chat as well for the questions for us to refer to. Um, so starting with number one here. Does council have any questions regarding information presented on the current or future state of the Oh, sorry, that's the airport one. Sorry. Does council have approach including the proposed analysis and development of a power resilience roadmap align with city council's expectations for this priority? So, let's start with question one and see if um council has um any thoughts on that. >> Rob, go for it. >> Thanks, Matt. Um, thank you Jonathan, Carolyn, and Darren for all that work and the presentation. Um, just around the community engagement piece, for

[157:01] example, the power lines are being buried on 36 towards Lions. At some point, they're going to surface. Um, is that engage and and the wind may be further north. So, am I right in saying those lines are still susceptible to a PSPS for Boulder if it's shut off in Lions? >> Um, no. So, Excel's service doesn't extend all the way to to Lions. It it basically stops up around Never Road um and then heads um east. It's that's actually um I believe Pudra Valley that takes service um along the 36 corridor north. So Excel's plans are to underground all of their lines in that high-risk area um just north of town. Um so that would remove that area and then with the sectionalization um of the foothills area, they can shut the foothills off until they complete rebuilding that and keep North Boulder

[158:00] on. >> Okay. So those undergrounded lines would go to the um substation and then come out. >> It'll be it may still be overhead in town just for clarity. um they're not going to underground like right along 28th Street because there's some conflict in the rightway, but those are not the wildfire risk areas that they're concerned about. The the concern is on the north side of town. >> Okay. And then my other question just when they are undergrounded, what does maintenance look like that for the for those lines? Because I have heard, you know, there there are certain things that can happen underground like animals and things like that and shifting soils. Are those as easy to maintain as a fiber optic line or is that a full digup? >> Yeah, and thank you for raising that um Council Member Kaplan. That is one of the trade-offs and one of the reasons um I think you know our utilities have tended to prefer overhead lines because they're easier to maintain and quicker to repair. Um we see better reliability

[159:02] overall and underground lines, but if there is an issue, they are harder to repair. Um, and we certainly, you know, have seen some improvement in how new infrastructure is put in. You're correct. We we have had issues with wildlife getting into underground gear. Um, so it is a risk. I mean, we certainly it's not immune from um outage. They tend to have a 50-year lifetime and be overall very reliable. Um, it certainly removes the wildfire risk though, which is the the principal concern in that area. >> Okay. Thank you. I was going to raise my own hand. Um, anybody else got a clarifying question for staff before we sort of look at answering that question? I I have a quick couple. One is in the memo, and I've heard these numbers thrown around, is that, you know, 71% of the 165 miles of um, uh, infrastructure

[160:00] are undergrounded. I I find that number extraordinarily misleading because when you look at where the actual critical wildfire risk is, most of that is not undergrounded and that's the west side of town. And so I kind of want I'm sort of curious of like how do we normalize that number to be more accurate more or less to the harm and the risk that we are defining and that residents see every day because people hear that and they go, "Oh, Excel is doing great." Then they go outside and look in the neighborhood and they go, "Oh, not so much." So, h how do we how do we balance that? >> Yeah. No, you uh thank you um Council Member Benjamin. You've certainly named one of the the challenges. You know, our our west side of town was was one of the first developed and so that's where a lot of our overhead infrastructure is and um it's also where a lot of that infrastructure is is back of lot. So, more challenging to maintain. So, we tend to have a lot more um vegetation. Um also, our biggest wildfire risk is not in the city limits. Um, so that number is far different when we start to

[161:01] talk about lines in the county um versus lines within the the city. We've been proactive in driving lines underground in the city. Um, so I think this is again why we're we're looking at these um reli uh reliability risk zones um because we do have the analysis. We we have to be a little cautious about what we share publicly because some of that is sensitive. Um, but certainly we're analyzing each of those zones based on on what is overhead and where that overhead sits in terms of risk. Um, so that's kind of the goal of trying to quantify each zone by its outage propensity or or or start to characterize that. So that's part of the analysis effort we're doing this year. >> Okay, last question. I see Nicole and uh Ryan there is this maybe sort of a silly question but why are we doing this and why isn't Excel making the this investment in time and money to actually understand what's going on in the communities it's harmed by shall I say it the BSBS um that they have here sorry to be

[162:01] cheeky about it but this is it's just not sort of acceptable that we're taking the time and money to understand the risk and the harm that their actions are imparting on our community. So, I'm trying to wonder like how do we reconcile that? >> Yeah. And I I think I would, you know, object to kind of the characterization that they aren't doing this as well. I think we're in a unique position to learn together um because of our work in municipalization, right? We have a deeper understanding than any other community about the infrastructure that serves us and what's connected to that. That's really a, you know, unique to community, right? it's not Excel is not going to know um all the details about how our infrastructure is served, how our infrastructure is critical um in the function of city services, right? So, it's that partnership together that's really valuable and in our conversations with Excel like what they're learning from this experience they're trying to extend to other communities. So, I I I want to be respectful. They they care about this issue too. They've got an

[163:00] amazing team of engineers trying to solve for this, but they're dealing with a very large problem and it's a new journey for them as well. You know, public safety power shops while have been in use for a while have unique characteristics in every community that they impact. Um because nothing's served exactly the same. The impacts are not exactly the same. Um but I do think we we really benefit from the fact that we have this expertise locally. I mean there is no other community in in in this region that has Alex Talishek. Um I just want to say that right he um we get appreciation from their engineers of what they've learned the creativity how we problem solve and it's because we've been intimately looking at our system. Um we looked at it intimately for a decade under municipalization. Um, so we do know the characteristics of it in ways that, you know, you can't unless you're deeply involved in it. Um, so that I think that's really what where

[164:00] we're at. >> All right. I appreciate that response. All right, Nicole, you're up. >> Thanks. Um, I guess I'm I'm wondering where accountability is in here. Um, I mean it seems like it's um it's more agreements and saying people will, you know, they'll they'll they'll do specific things um versus having, you know, metrics um uh binding outcomes, consequences, things like that. And I guess I'm just like what's the why why would they need to follow through on the things that are in here, I guess, is is my question. Yeah, I appreciate that. It's um it's a important tension to name because again we don't regulate Excel directly. Um we that's I think one of the reasons we we spend a lot of um effort intervening at the public utilities commission to gain a little bit more um backbone um to our agreements. So, for example, the wildfire mitigation work, some of the

[165:00] projects we've discussed are part of an actual settlement agreement, which is a a binding agreement um within the um utility commission record um around some of those projects. So, there is some accountability um built into that and we're going to continue to advocate for more, but it is a challenge. I mean, I just want to be transparent that addressing all of these there's not great mechanisms in place today to hold um them accountable to correct everything. Um, so all we can do is kind of lean into our advocacy um and think about some of those solutions. Jonathan, anything you want to add on that one? >> No, I I think that that's right. And I it it makes me think about the work that this council did and signaling to Excel the importance of this work and the letter that you uh transmitted to Excel. And obviously there's not penalty that was included there, but I think I think as Carolyn pointed out, we're using the avenues and the opportunities that we

[166:01] have to build that accountability that you're talking about, council member Spear, and I think it's a really important one. Um, I don't think it was explicitly noted in the road map, but it is something that the staff team has talked about, which is so what if they don't do the things that they say they're going to do? Uh, what is that recourse? Does that mean the staff just does more? that the city does more that we try to find the funding to do the things. No, that's not the answer. So, right now we have because it's a system that we don't operate our own or regulate the the appropriate pathway is to work as hard as we can in partnership with Excel to get the outcome that we want while simultaneously thinking about what if they don't. So, I don't know that that's a great answer for your question, but it's one that we're also thinking about. >> All right, Nicole, you done? Okay, awesome. Thank you. Uh Ryan, go for it. >> Thank you, Jonathan, Caroline, and team. Um and thank you for um responding to my uh whole conference agenda worth of a of

[167:01] a hotline. I uh really appreciate you going through all that and being so diligent. Um so I I I just I want to ask you two questions. Um just kind of building on that and something Nicole said. So, one is um just like your vision for for when when this work is done or at least like um you know most of the the problems we're talking about are solved as far as we like generally have reliability back and or you know resilience to you know sort of make it work. Can can you offer any kind of a vision on like how how long is this going to take and um you know what will it feel like when we get there? Yeah, I mean I think our our grounding goal is what I said earlier, which is our community should exper we're an urban community that should experience good reliability. Most people should not experience outages if ever certainly not

[168:01] of a long duration under normal environmental conditions like that. You know, it obviously excludes disaster. um we benchmark against communities like so that's the end goal. We're certainly far from that as you saw from the the data we showed. Um I I expect that the public safety power shut off impacts on the community are going to be significantly less if not more or less eliminated by the by 2028. So within the next two years most of the projects we've identified will take some time. There's some pockets um that are are longer duration, but the bulk of some of what has to happen in our community, rebuilding some of our substations, is is a 10-year plan. Um so, just for transparency there. Now, that doesn't mean we won't see material improvements fairly quickly in the coming years. Um but I think the full rebuild and investment that needs to happen is is more like a decade long

[169:00] plan. Um so, that's that's what we're expecting. you know, that's going to include again, there's need to to rebuild like the downtown substation. Um prepare for, you know, development um and redevelopment on the in some of our target areas that don't currently have substation capacity. So, there's a lot of work to be done. >> Great. And just to make sure I got it right, I I thought I heard you say you're imagining PSPS's could wind down to zero by like a couple years from now. >> Yeah, within within the city center. um you know understanding the foothill areas are a little bit u more challenging um there's a lot more you know fingers that go off in those areas in high- risk um but within the city boundary um what we see from Excel is is solutions that address most everything that's of concern right now. >> Okay. And do they need anything from us to implement that or are you just kind of looking into observing what they're doing and just it's like it seems like that's what they're on track for. Yeah,

[170:00] I mean we're partnering with them to um you know get access to rideaways, access to open space that they need. Um so there's a lot of collaboration in that regard. You know, one of the big projects that's a little bit longer timeline there is the reconstruction of the transmission line that comes into town. Um you know, we'll we'll have to have a conversation with council about that and and the implications of the community of that project. Um but and then I and some of the projects may require additional support in their next wildfire mitigation plan which would cover 28 and beyond. So we would support them there. But I think in terms of wildfire mitigation, I I feel like they're very solidly um looking at that plan. I think there's a lot more uncertainty around some of the other reliability issues we're experiencing. >> Great. Okay. And then my other question is um >> kind of building on what Nicole was saying. Um, so you in your reply to my uh question about focusing on on

[171:00] outcomes and being really really grounded in in what we're trying to achieve and and having measurement for that. Um, I think I you know heard some agreement that yeah that's that's that's a priority. Um, so if that's correct, can you just walk through a little bit more about like the sort of guess like the the plan and the timeline to build you know build I guess build our system of outcomes and measurement of them and and like with Excel and is that you know is that a a few months process is that a couple years and are there points in in it which council is you know you'd want to involve us with any of it or just like how do how and presumably you know there'll be some push and pull with like what's easier, what's harder. Um like just how do you kind of see that all susing out? >> Yeah. So I mean most of what we've presented to you I think we have a path forward to collect you know so the the performance metrics but just understanding they're they're updated once annually. So it's going to take some trending um to really see if we're

[172:01] we're achieving um improvement. Um, you know, I I I think I think I don't know that we need intervention on that per se um for the plan that we have. I want to give Jonathan a moment. I felt like he had something to add um to the earlier topic as well. Jonathan, >> I I did, but for the sake of time, I I'm going to use my comment time to answer this question because I think it's really important to say to you, Council Member Shard, that we strongly agree that this idea of establishing clear, measurable outcomes and the infrastructure to track and report them is foundational. It is not secondary to to the plan. At a high level, uh we see or at least I see three categories of data. One is data that we have relatively strong access to today. And so you saw some of that represented in the response the hotline response to you in terms of the thing that we can collect. We have facility level information for city- owned assets. We have demographic indicators. Then the second category is data we can access

[173:00] with partnership and we have to refine. So that's trying to get more granular Boulder specific outage data. Circuit level information utility investment plans fall into that category. And then the third I would say we don't yet have a real good sense of the timing on this one is data that we have to build. And so that's the experience-based metrics. What residents actually experience during outages uh critical facility inventories across public and private sectors more integrated data sets related to vulnerable populations. So that's less about raw data availability and more about building the systems, building the partnerships and the governance to bring it together in a usable way. And so I just want to point out that I don't know that we yet have a good sense to answer your question of how long that all is going to take. That is the purpose of the roadmap. That is how we're trying to pull all this together. And I think as we come back to council over the next couple of months, we're going to be able to give you a a snapshot of how we are building that. Where are the pain points? What's working? What's not working? So

[174:00] hopefully that helps answer the question, but I think it's a very important one. >> Thank you. Thank you, Ryan. All right. Uh, Taisha. Oh, I think Tisha, you're muted. >> I just had a couple questions. The first is um just on the reporting requirements and you know, what is the city's authority as it relates to having you know articulating rep reporting requirements? kind of to the question that was asked before is like, you know, for research and evaluation, who holds on to what? Are we being duplicative? Are there ways that we can um align and synergize um not only the reporting but reporting frequency and and grain size? >> Yeah, thank you um for that question, Council Member Adams. Um so, built into our partnership agreement with Excel, we already have a a pretty good foundation um for some of the reporting that we

[175:01] need. So in our partnership agreement, we've outlined things like um we get an annual outage report that breaks down outages by each power line. So a lot of the data we need, we get reports on um how there the vegetation management and investment. So I think we have a solid foundation um from the agreement. Um so that's embedded into our our franchise. Um so we we have a level of of accountability around that. >> And similar for evaluation. So for example, surveys and focus groups and those kinds of things so that we're not duplicating efforts and you know particularly for our frontline communities. I have concerns around uh what I call um you know stakeholder fatigue and so just kind of curious how um and this also kind of dovtales on the community engagement question as well. >> Darren, you want to take that? >> Yeah, thank you so much for the question. Council member Adams. I think that one of the things we recognize and want to build on is that a number of our

[176:01] partners have relationships with aspects of our community where they have been able to understand impacts of the PSPS events for example. And so we would work before asking any additional questions of our frontline communities or our business communities for example, we would first reach out to CU, to the chambers, to Boulder County, to others that might already have asked these questions um to try and reduce that engagement fatigue. >> Okay. And then are there efforts around I see a lot on rebuild and expansion capacity um and even investments but has there been any kind of strategic thinking around trying to own more aspects of our grid and just from an ownership perspective in general. I mean I know again I know where we landed. just I'm constantly curious about who owns what and I just

[177:01] have some real concerns around who owns what. >> Yeah. I mean on on the the polls and wires portion um the No, I mean I I think the community, you know, wanted to go back under franchise and and Excel's responsible for those. Um, we're certainly exploring opportunities, different program models to, you know, help support building local resilience. I think I mentioned, you know, distributed um resources. Um, I mean, I still think there's opportunities of exploring micro griding in certain areas. Um, so th those are things that I think are are still that they're longer game um things that we need to look at, but you know, I think they're of interest to us and we certainly are having conversations in the community about different models um where the city could support development of that. >> Okay. Thank you. That's all at this time.

[178:02] >> Thank you, Taiisha. All right. Um well, with that out of the way, let's just uh just to give staff some some clarity here, let's uh before we move on to the next piece, um just double check, does the proposed approach, including the pro uh proposed analysis and development of a power resilience roadmap align with city's council's expectations for this priority. Um if that's if that's the case, can I just get everyone to give a thumbs up if they are feeling that that stuff is aligned and that way staff can feel validated there. Okay, good. So, I see pretty much everybody with their thumbs up, so that'll help with that one. Moving on to the next one. Are there additional policy actions or strategies council would like staff to evaluate as part of the power resilience roadmap? Um, so uh if anybody's got some uh additional policy actions, see some hands. All right, Ryan, first up, go for it. >> Thank you. So, actually, I I um I think the balance of what you've got going is great. And I just want to call out two

[179:01] things. So thing one is um this outcomes issue of making sure that we're clear about outcomes from a communitywide perspective while also looking at critical facilities and vulnerable populations. There's a ton of richness and diversity and all that. And I think as you um Caroline had kind of like got to for us to do this well it's going to require a really close partnership and trust and a lot of working as a team um with with Excel. By us, I really mean you, the staff with Excel in in large part. And so, um, one thing I I just worry about a little bit is the dynamic of that we're we're very eager to do this. um excel from their p perspective. Boulder is one of 120 communities and and so um just you know I guess wanting to I have high expectations and hopes for what we can accomplish but I'm also you know just wanting to make sure we're we're learning council's learning if I

[180:00] don't know I guess I would that we're setting our expectations appropriately and you know if things are go slower than we expect we I'd love to for us to know about it or just just to have some kind of a check or accountability in there to make sure um we understand how that's going because I'm just I'm sort of trepidacious that it's going to work. It's so important but just that you know the power dynamics and the different interests it's it's not like a foregone conclusion that that it's all going to work swimmingly. So anyway that's a sort of a partly form thought. Um and the second one is on um you know just on our work to that that we can do policy advocacy legislative regulatory and other I I think that the the the market incentives that that you know that create what they're sorry the economics based on policy that creates the incentives for their business model is just foundational to what they do. And I think one of our highest ROI areas of all of this is to make sure we're being really strategic with our state policy advocacy. Um, so and I know the IGA team

[181:01] with you and all working on that and I just, you know, I look forward to an even more heightened focus on that in our IG work as we go forward that we're just being really smart about creating business models and incentives that that create fixes for these problems without raising rate payer rates at least more than we have to. So otherwise, great. Thank you. >> Yeah. No, I I appreciate that and that offer to be our phone a friend. Um [laughter] and and rest assured, I mean, I just want to be transparent. Um we're coalition building like we do not expect to do this all our own as as a city organization. We're in in conversation with the chamber with regional partners. Um and I think that we'll want to continue to keep the pressure. So I appreciate you you kind of naming that. Um Council Member Shushard. I and we'll certainly keep you apprised of of when we're running into speed bumps. Um because certainly there'll be some along the way. Jonathan, anything you want to add to that? You went off mute.

[182:01] >> No, that's fine. Yeah, we'll keep rolling. I have a comment and then I'll just hold it. >> Um Tisha, go for it. >> Um just two quick things. The first um just curious if relocation was considered and where if not here that is that would be considered and and specifically if the within the city of Boulder limits um god forbid in Chila that we have something like the Marshall fire um you know again when I think of area 3 the only thing I would really consider is for opening that would be for temporary relocation. So just you know again as we think about um the power of resilience recognizing um that there might be need to um include um considerations of relocations whether temporary or um or more. You know it's kind of like that next step after community resilience hubs. Um if if folks need to to be there for a couple

[183:01] of weeks, a couple of months, a couple of years. Um, yeah, just curious for that's my first of of two questions. >> Yeah. No, I I appreciate that. I think within the scope of this current project, we're um really kind of focused on the non-disaster um component at this point, but certainly um you know, I think we'd have to I think the learnings from this would certainly inform some of that. I'd have to look, you know, to some of my partners in in other departments to really, you know, talk about the disaster preparedness um and and like really what happens if there is um a dis for displacement. >> I'm talking about relocation. So, I'm talking about recovery and response more so. >> And we did have that um um lunch and learn around that which I asked for which was very helpful. However, um in my time on council, I have not had any conversation or heard about any conversation as it relates to relocation. And again, given what we've

[184:00] seen in the response at Marshall and who has been able to return and who has not um even from an equity and affordability perspective, I'm just curious if this isn't the space, where is that space? Um, and again, not necessarily for us to uh answer right now, but I would hopeful I'm hopeful that it's it's happening somewhere. Um, in that >> Let me jump on take a swing at this one. Um, Council Member Adams, I'm really I'm happy you brought this up because I think it speaks to the necessity of really connecting dots to other key priorities, particularly our emergency response and some of the other departments that are are centered in this work. uh for tonight, you know, our goal is bringing this forward um as a work plan that is really intended to be responsive to the council's priority and grounded in what we believe we can be that we can accomplish well this year. And I think what we've outlined is what we believe we can commit to in 2026. But that said, I think u what you're bringing up is an opportunity to note

[185:00] and evaluate when things emerge. How do we bring those and kind of fold those into other work streams so we don't lose them? I would not see what you're describing as a central piece of how we set out the roadmap in terms of the rei reliability and resilience of our infrastructure yet. It connects to some of the other key priorities of our community. So, I'm not saying it's not part of this, but I don't think that it's central to what we can accomplish in 2026. >> Yes, I I agree in the one-year time frame. However, again, our artificial time frames are not meeting the moment. And so if this happens quickly there's not you know we have not had any meaningful rigorous conversation around what that means also for a power resilience roadmap you know I would think that the relocation component again I don't think it needs to be an extensive po component but um you know if we're moving people then that where we move them to would need to have energy so um just thinking from that perspective as well but I hear you on

[186:01] the one-year limitation due to things that are outside uh of our decision-making power and I honor that. Um I will now go to my last question which is around the airport um and considerations for solar generation there. >> Yeah, thank you. I was on for um your question around that. We did look at the airport as a potential site for solar development. I I think as Eric mentioned um when you consider development on airport sites, there's there's glare consideration. So that eliminated some areas. We looked at using the structures out there and and they aren't sound >> um for for holding solar. So it turned out to not be a great opportunity for solar. We're continuing to explore that site though for >> well not an opportunity for those two pathways. But if you were to actually construct a shortterm then that was that >> I mean yeah I think that there's there's some other pathways. So that was it's a great location to think about

[187:00] opportunities. I I mean I think we're continuing to look at what um great capacity is available to take that. Um so it is a site on our on our short list of city facilities that we want to continue to look at renewable opportunities at. >> Thank you Carolyn. I appreciate that. Um just kidding. There's a third one and that's just in general. One of the things I'm having challenges around about around about related as rel related to giving priorities or expectations around things is not having the costs of these and I know that in the plan it talks about the costs are coming but I've noticed a pattern in our in how our city makes decisions around this where we come up with a plan there's no money attached or no ex no you know very limited uh projections um and then you know uh the arts blueprint I've seen it I mean I can give a variety different examples and um again we know that we are in whatever financially restraint 3.0 0 is and so I'm just you know when we talk about the prioritizing

[188:01] um I'm assuming that the that you know the team is is thinking about it from that financial perspective but as I said having this conversation without having those numbers and then being in a position where we have a very short turnaround on the budget budget approval process it just it feels difficult to I'm just hopeful that we can get um per you know um some more financial information or options before we go into the budget cycle. >> Yeah, I think from a timing perspective, so it's certainly our our intention by the time we get to the road map to um provide some information on the you know, the financial implications and opportunities around different strategies. um you know that will include um you know examples like one of them would just be bidding into Excel's um resilience hubs RFP which would be a lower cost no cost. The other is the other extreme is if council wanted to underground the other 29% of power lines

[189:03] that's a you know a several hundred million undertaking. Um so we would try and bound it in that way. um from a timing perspective, you know, this would come in the fall, so it would be more towards a 2020 um 8 budget conversation. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Thanks, Tisha. Uh Tina, you're up. >> Yeah, thank you. Um just a lot of gratitude for all the work that's been done in this. when we discuss the priority, this is exactly what I was hoping for and it gives me a lot of understanding about what work is being done. And as on council, especially in this role where I have no technical expertise, but I'm just someone who experiences outages, it's really helpful for me to be able to tell the story of what the city is doing to the rest of the community, and this presentation does it well. So, just um sort of my feedback on what happens moving forward. Um along with the community engagement,

[190:02] I would I would love to think about whether community would like to hear the same thing that I'm hearing tonight in a maybe a more accessible way so that they can understand all the work that's happening and that the timelines are not um you know centuries out but actually within years and that we'll have some idea. When we communicate that to community, that's often really what they're looking for after they complain that power shut offs are terrible. And you know, whether you have a medical device or whether you have a refrigerator loss of food or whether you can't charge your car or you don't have internet, the stories um in terms of that kind of engagement of the experience. Um that's one thing, but making sure people understand that we're working on the solutions quickly I think is important. Um, the other piece is getting during the community engagement piece, just getting specific on how much information people need to know. So, for instance, if they're saying, "I need a solar charge battery." It's kind of like

[191:00] when we were talking about what kind of fencing you get in the new wildfire world, specifics might help because there's so much out there. Any way to give people specific information on what they can access might be helpful as well. Um and then the last thing is is just understanding just like we did that water analysis with area 3, understanding um what is our capacity for new significant energy users in the community and are we working ahead to meet those future needs? Are we still kind of playing catchup in terms of power shut offs? So those are the kind of the things I'm thinking about. But otherwise, this was really great. Thank you. >> Yeah, thank you very much for that feedback and couldn't agree more. Fantastic. Thanks, Tina. Uh well, it looks like um number of folks provided some additional uh policy actions and comments u regarding the road map. Now, moving on to question three, which is does council support the engagement approach as presented. I think Tina kind of front ran that

[192:00] question a little bit, but she could have another bite of the apple if she wanted to. Any thoughts? All looks good. I see thumbs up. I see people looking at gravity. Thumbs up. Thumbs up. Nice. Um, I'll just say I love that we're going to do another community assembly because the first one was a smashing success. Community loved it. I remember staff loved it. Council loved it. I know it's a lot of work. So, picking the right topic to do that at these intervals, I think, is perfect. So, I just commend staff for not forcing community assembly on an issue that maybe wasn't broad enough and of deep community concern. not that other issues aren't but ha but had that depth to it that a community assembly justifies and so just appreciate you guys using um this topic in this instance for that tool um for how we expand our engagement. So I just wanted to say a big shout out to the team for for looking at that and building that expertise in house so that we can do that. So that was awesome. >> And if I might just excuse me council

[193:03] Benjamin if I might just add a clarification. So through the Boulder Valley comprehensive plan, we did go through this extensive process that we called the community assembly where it was a many month process. Um this will be a slightly different method. So this is the community council forum which >> forum. That's right. Which we did. Yes. Right. So we done economic vitality. Yeah, that's right. You're right. Sorry I misused those terms. Thank you for catching me on that clarification. >> Yeah, you bet. Of course. >> Yeah. People are getting random note cards in the mail that you've been selected. So we don't want to get people looking out. It's like the golden ticket and Charlie in the Chocolate Factory. Um, all right. So, thank you for that clarification. Uh, Taiisha, what you got? >> Um, I'm just going back to the community engagement. You know, we talk a lot about tradeoffs and I just would love to see more scenarios where we're giving community more realistic trade-off, you know, decisions that need to be made and specifically from a fiscal perspective. um and not just looking within this one

[194:01] topic uh but to say that if we pay for this that means we will not be able to pay for that. You know what I mean? I just need more cross departmental um analysis and scenario planning because that's our real life and I and when we only have them focus on one area um that's just not realistic to the trade-offs that we're going to have to make. That's all. Uh and then just the differentiation. So you mentioned you know many of us work from home myself included that has one implication. We have our science and tech communities. That's another. So I appreciate the front line but even front line is not the same thing. So just really trying to unpack the differentiation within each of those levels and what to to to Tina's earlier comment not only um meeting community where they are but recognizing the differentiation and grain sizes of information that is necessary related to their industry um or you know again to

[195:01] even the type of resident that they have right a big condo development is very different than single family homes. So just again I think that differentiation is something that I would like to see a little bit more um in the engagement approach. >> I appreciate that. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Great. >> Thanks Tisha. Um all right. So I saw a bunch of sort of front runners throwing a thumbs up on the engagement. So it looks like that um had some some good feedback at least on the thumbs up of where staff's already looking to go on that. Um, I'll turn to Jonathan, Carolyn, um, Darren, is this, you got enough feedback from us, um, with regards to things. And I know I think Jonathan had this, uh, comment that he was holding on to, um, and I think he's saving it for last to give a nice closing statement. So, Jonathan, what you got? >> Go for it, Jonathan. I feel like he lost the internet services. It is on his phone again. >> No, I'm actually at my computer. I would love to say, council members, that the power went out here in my office, but

[196:01] alas, it's just my computer. Um, so it just my yeah, my camera just stopped working, but I am here. Um, thanks for the opportunity, uh, Council Member Benjamin. Yeah, I I there was a thing that was nagging at me a little bit, and it actually was related to your earlier question, and I don't feel like I sufficiently answered it, and it had to do with why are we doing this rather than the utility. And one of the things that I I wanted to say very clearly is um you know our intention is to not substitute for utility responsibility but I do think we have an opportunity and a responsibility to leverage our role to accelerate and shape utilities action and not replace it. And that means that we can actually step into a place of really increasing transparency and accountability around Excel's performance and their investments. And what we do well is we can target our investments and interventions where there are gaps. And I think that's a really important role that the city has continued to play. And that is something

[197:01] that the utility structure won't do. So how do we really target our vulnerable populations? How do we think about community scale resilience and really investing in ways that make sense for the city to really participate in? And so I I just wanted to appreciate the the question that you raised because it is foundational to our team and thinking about what is our role, what is our responsibility, where do we push, where does where does it end and Excel pick up. So again, I just wanted an opportunity to clarify some of my comments. Thanks so much. >> Thank you, Jonathan. Well, it looks like you you guys got what you needed from us on this really important issue, not just to council, but certainly to community. And so I appreciate how quickly we turned this around as a council priority. Um, and I think all of us are appreciative how quickly you guys got this assessment and evaluation to us and got the ball rolling. So looking forward to that road map and future check-ins, certainly talking to our partners at Excel, um, and that, uh, council community forum. I want to make sure I state that correctly. Um, so uh, without any further comments or or things to,

[198:01] um, to mention tonight, uh, going once, 13 p.m. Oh, I see Jonathan's hand up again. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Ghost hand ghost. He just he just doesn't want to not continue to talk about this a awesome subject. So, I get it. He loves this stuff. Um, so without further ado, at 9:13, we're go ahead and close out this study session. Thank you all for a great night. Um, thanks for great work on staff and appreciate the thoughtful comments and questions from all of our council colleagues. Appreciate it. We'll see you again soon. Have a wonderful night. >> Thanks everybody. Really?