November 12, 2025 — Design Advisory Board Regular Meeting
Date: 2025-11-12 Body: Design Advisory Board Type: Regular Meeting Recording: YouTube
View transcript (145 segments)
Transcript
Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.
[0:05] Does that work? Yeah. That's great. So, to start, we, just need to… approve the, meeting minutes from last meeting, which was. Sorry to interrupt, Brendan, but I think before we jump in that, I, do roll call of the board members. Is that correct? Roles of the engagement? And then we're gonna read the rules of decorum, and then we'll jump right in. Okay, great. So, tonight we should have, Brendan Ash. Yes, present. Matthew, Schneider? President. Steven Eckert? Present. And… let's see, who else is here? Rory is absent tonight, our chair, and Harriet Ingham is also absent tonight.
[1:08] Okay. And then let me just share this really quick. Okay, can everyone see this slide on the screen? Yeah. So, the city has engaged with the community members to create… to co-create a vision for productive, meaningful, and inclusive civic conversations. This vision supports physical and emotional safety for community members, staff, and board and commission members, as well as democracy for people of all ages, identities, lived experiences, and political perspectives. For more information about this vision and the community engagement processes, you can visit our website. The following are examples of rules of decorum found in the Boulder Advise Code and other guidelines that support this vision. These will be upheld during this meeting.
[2:09] All remarks and testimony shall be limited to matters related to city business. No participant shall make threats or use other forms of intimidation against any person. Obscenity, racial epithets, and other speech and other behavior. That'. That disrupts or otherwise impedes the ability to conduct the meeting are prohibited. Participants are required to identify themselves using the name they are commonly known by, and individuals must display their whole name before being allowed to speak online. Great. Currently, only audio testimony is permitted online. And if you need me to change your name in the Zoom, just submit your full name in the Q&A, and I can do that for you when it's time for public participation. So this is a Zoom webinar format. If you want to, provide comment during the public comment section, just raise your hand.
[3:07] If you're dialing in on the phone tonight, I think we… I think I saw one person, you can also press star 9, and then when it's your turn, we'll adjust the settings so you can unmute and provide your comment. This is also… you can raise your hand by clicking the reactions button on the bottom. There's also a raise hand in there. And I think that's… That's it. Okay, that's for something else. And we can proceed. Okay. Right. Now, do we, have meeting minutes from… The previous meeting, or their… it was an internal work… workshop, so…
[4:03] I think we can skip that. piece of it So tonight, we were going to be discussing the expansion of the, Treasure Meadows retirement community. And before we jump into that, we… just want to, point out sort of how this meeting is going to be structured tonight. So, the… the… objective of the Design Advisory Board is to give the applicant, sort of, recommendations, and… to assist in the planning board's review process of, architectural and site design-related, matters, and DAB's recommendations are…
[5:05] supposed to encourage… and our discussion tonight is supposed to encourage, thoughtful, well-designed, Development of projects that are sensitive to the existing area that they are being developed in. And are sensitive to the character of that area. And while our recommendations are advisory in nature, they are… they will be incorporated, into the planning review by staff. and, and just future site planning process. So, with that, it would be great if we could get, oh, and… and we will be, reviewing four criteria tonight that are,
[6:00] Partially satisfied in the design review criteria. And they will be reviewed, first in a round-robin fashion, first starting with Steven, and then Matthew, and then Myself. So, Matthew was thrown to the wolves and went first last time, and so this time. That's true. True story. True story. So, if we could have, an introduction to the project by staff, that would be great. Sure, hi. - oh, let me start my video. Hi, this is Chandler Vanscock. I'm a Principal Planner with Planning and Development Services and Case Managing the project. I'm gonna let the applicant give most of the details, but, this is a site review amendment. There are two sites existing currently. One has the main Fraser Meadows campus, and the other…
[7:03] Is the Mountain View United Methodist Church. And so this proposal would combine those two sites into one site. They would leave most of the church building, do a small addition on that. But we're not really talking about that tonight. And then build a new, 4-story, 55-foot-tall, independent living apartment building with 98 units. The proposal includes vacating Ponca Place, which is the street that currently runs between the two properties, and then redesigning that as a private driveway that's much more pedestrian and bicycle-oriented. We went to TAB to talk about that on Monday. That's the Transportation Advisory Board. But like you mentioned, they're in site review, they've been through one round of staff review comments. And they are currently resubmitted with their second round. Kalani and I have gone over those materials and provided the areas where we feel like they're either not meeting or partially meeting the site review criteria. Those were included in your memo, and that's really what we're…
[8:06] Looking for feedback on tonight, as you mentioned. The planning board hearing date is not yet scheduled, but any feedback that we receive from you guys tonight, we will incorporate into our next round of review comments, and Give those to the applicant to hopefully… hopefully address, and, to help guide Planning Board's discussion. I'm happy to answer any other questions if anyone has any. Otherwise, I would just turn it over to the applicant for their detailed presentation. Great, thank you, for that intro. So, if we can go to, mary, I believe you are… Presenting on behalf of, the applicant, or as the applicant? Yes, I am. Right now, I don't know if you want my video turned on or not.
[9:01] Sure. I mean, it's up to you, but it helps in, sort of, the conversation. Okay. I will… Share my screen. Let's fair. And I didn't give you a very, good introduction, so maybe you can tell us, What your role is in this project. Yes, absolutely. My name is Mary Fiore, I'm with Boulder Associates Architects, and I am the lead architect and designer on the project, so I'll be taking you through the design as well as the 3D model, when it's applicable later, so… Thank you for your time today. I focused the presentation around the four criteria that were marked as partially satisfied. However, I do have some placeholder slides in here, in case, throughout our conversation they're… they're needed.
[10:10] I also wanted to mention that this is very much a project that was done in tandem with Mountain View United Methodist Church. This has been a joint site review, and so everything that, you know, we… you've seen through the packet or here today, they're aware of, and we've collaborated with them on that. However, for today's purposes, it's just focusing on, the Fraser edition. The building on the south end. So I do have, as I mentioned, all the floor plans here, and sort of 2D flat elevations, for our reference later. But I kind of want to get to the heart of, you know, sort of why we're here, and the four criteria. that were identified as partially satisfied. So this first one being around, that transition between a lower intensity zone district to a higher one, and making sure that the appropriate transitions are made through the building, siding and design.
[11:14] And so our first step, and I'm sort of, you know, diving right in, sort of assuming that you've all thoroughly looked through the packet and don't need sort of a lay of the land here, but I can sort of provide those references if they're needed later. But, our first step here in this diagram was trying to find the right balance of open space between the Fraser Edition, the neighbors to the south, and then, of course, the church to the north to create, you know, comfortable open spaces that can be used on either side of the building. And then we also tiered and angled portions of the building to open up that view corridor down Sioux and provide some variation to the massing.
[12:03] And then, in addition to this, you know, providing an additional setback, buffer beyond the 25, required there in the light orange. See, the darker orange is… Is the additional setback, that the building is provided by its placement, and angling, and this almost doubles the setback along, sort of, 50% of the building's length. This section cut through Sioux, highlights our additional setback, and again, that distance across the right-of-way, and to the neighbors to the south, with a total of approximately 142 feet. Between the buildings, which is, you know, again, relative to the 41 feet in height of the actual building height there. So again, you can sort of see our additional setback in the darker orange, and the lighter orange being the required setback.
[13:03] And so, in addition to just pushing the entire building back, we're also stepping back the fourth floor. As you can see here, how it, changes from roughly 6 feet to up to 11 feet, along its building length, depending on which neighborhood that you're… you're at. But this setback, step back in the fourth floor doesn't actually just occur at the fourth floor. The diagram on the left shows you kind of the traditional way of doing this, right? Where we're just taking, you know, your four-story building and stepping back the fourth floor. Our approach is the diagram on the right, where we're really sort of taking the fourth floor and portions of the first through third floors and And pushing them back. To break down the overall scale of the building along the facade, not just at the roofline. And here's an aerial view rendering, of how we're also activating that open space, along Sioux with raised, garden beds, seating areas, social spaces, for the Fraser residents, and tiered rain gardens, to really create, a lovely front yard there.
[14:21] And then, of course, here it is coming all together in a perspective rendering, standing at the intersection of Pawnee and Sioux, looking east, showing you the relative scale and detail of the building, and that kind of full width between it and the right-of-way. And then here's another perspective rendering, that starts to show that open space at the pedestrian, experience in that front yard, and the detail that you get from the building facades there. And so, jumping into our next, criteria, which is asking that, larger floor plate buildings, to have a variety of forms and heights. So, Chandler's comment being whether or not the building had enough variation in roof height.
[15:13] Here's a full, elevation of that south facade along Sioux, with the site review submittal 1 above in our current design, on the bottom, and highlighting how we've articulated the east and west neighborhoods with various, parapet conditions and roof projections, as well as changed, the overall massing and sort of roof strategy in the middle neighborhood. But what I really want to focus on is actually the understanding of the roofline at the ground floor level, because that's, you know, truly how you experience it, and how the variations in the roof projections add to the… the dynamic sort of roof condition here. You know, especially here at the image on the right with the… at one of our links.
[16:03] these full glassy moments that separate the three, building neighborhoods. You can see how the depth of that mass and that volume as it pushes back and as it actually steps back itself. Provides that additional, sort of movement along the facade and at the roofline, to create a more, dynamic experience. I also want to mention that we have roughly 3 feet from the top of our primary roof surface to the 55-foot height limit, so not a whole lot to work with, but however, these, you know, again, these massing strategies, like you see here at the other link. between the west, or between the, yeah, the west and the middle neighborhood, there's a lot of depth provided, and again, in tandem with those horizontal roof projections. And the articulation of the three-story masses, there's… there's just a lot of variety that's actually happening, along the roofline. And then you can see here, again, just… just as the… as the roof is… is meeting the sky, there's,
[17:11] Detail, there's articulation, and just a lot more substance there that you can actually experience from those 2D flat elevations. And now our third criteria, so this one's focused around high-quality materials and detailing. As you know, this is an addition to an existing campus, and our goal is to create a cohesive identity and advance the aesthetic of Fraser and the campus, while still giving the feeling that this building has always been a part of the campus. So here are a few images here from their various, buildings on site. All of these, face the public right-of-way. You can see, sort of, the mix of styles and materials. And so we're bringing this all together, in the… with the palette that you see above here, sort of drawing from existing conditions, but trying to expand on that.
[18:06] So again, our southern elevation along Sioux here showing us the primary materials, being red brick and the red stone, with the blonde brick, accenting that middle neighborhood. And so, in sort of our red brick neighborhoods, we have the red brick and the redstone as our foundation, with stucco and metal panel being the accent materials, with the metal panel sort of highlighting the living room conditions from the ground floor up to the roofline, and then the stucco reserved for that fourth floor zone. And then in the middle neighborhood, the primary material being blonde brick. It'll actually be a stacked brick instead of running bond. And then the accent materials here being woodlook panels and metal panels within those recessed areas, and then the stucco on the fourth floor condition.
[19:01] So our stucco is really limited to, around 10% of the entire, building, facade length, and, confined to the fourth floor area, as you see here, in these diagrams. And how we're detailing the stucco is also important. We've envisioned this building and the fourth floor to have a substantial feel to it, sort of carved and molded, rather than having, like, a skin applied to it. So you'll see here that we're actually using the monolithic nature of the stucco in exactly that way. We're changing planes. To add more depth and shadow lines to the facade at that level, rather than using surface reveals. And so this adds depth and character to the fourth floor that we feel like complements and mimics the masonry detailing that we have below. And here you can see, some more of that detailing at the pedestrian level, and how sort of the understanding of the building is, is, you know, really sort of confined or, focused in that the, you know, the 1 through 3 floors in the fourth floor kind of, disappears.
[20:18] Alright, that, this is very helpful, and we, we have, we've reached our 10 minutes, I don't know if you have, you know, additional… key points. Yeah, there was one more, this is the… and all of this sort of feeds into this last one, which is the character along the length of the building. I can flip through these really quickly, So we have, the links, the glassy floor-to-ceiling links that add permeability and break up the scale of the building, which actually are where the spaces for social connection happen on the interior, and they're the access points.
[21:02] The glazing makes up, around 27% of the facade, so more than the 20% recommended, as far as transparency is concerned. We've also obviously varied the architectural style along the length, with the middle neighborhood having a different character. And then, of course, breaking down the scale with those three-story volumes, and the added detail of, brick molding, recesses, concrete sills and lintels, along the facade, that are really experienced, at that pedestrian scale. And that's it. Thank you for the extra minute. Great, yeah, no, thanks for, running through that. I think that it makes our review a little easier. So now we, need to open it up to public comment. I'm not sure if we have… Anybody… Eater twice.
[22:07] a raised hand from JVD team, and if you wouldn't mind just Opening the Q&A and popping in, your name. So that we can have that for the record. And, Q&A button, here it is. Okay, I see. Give me one moment. Okay. And I'm going to allow you to unmute, and then you're gonna have 3 minutes. I'm just gonna put up a background so that you can see how much time you have. Okay? Can you hear me?
[23:01] We can hear you. Okay, thank you. I know the purpose of DAB is to encourage, you know, well-designed projects that are sensitive to the existing character. I'm not so sure how one makes a building of the proposed size sensitive to the context across Sioux. without removing some program, but it's a worthwhile goal, and one I hope the applicant will continue to work on. The concept review site plan showed the structure clearly broken into three distinct pieces. That's, I think it was on page 46 of your packet, each with a deep return wall, so that each appeared more clearly as an independent structure. In some respects, that was better than the current design that appears as a singular monolithic form with an unbroken street wall that relies on the smaller scale, formal elements, fenestration, and materials to try and modulate the scale of the very big building. I… I don't think the glassy links referenced,
[24:02] sufficiently break up a building of this size. I don't believe they provide real and meaningful transparency or permeability. They're… they're pretty small, and as shown in the renderings from the sidewalk, from the street, what a person looking at the glassy lengths mostly sees is not through the building, but the underside of the ceiling within the space. Perhaps… Those can be recessed even further from the front facade to create even more depth and a stronger perception of three small structures rather than one large one. Perhaps the program can be reduced a bit, in there to make that happen. And… or perhaps, maybe, if you looked at their renderings. The eastern link, where the third and fourth floors were recessed further, looked to me to be much more successful at breaking apart the mass of the buildings than the first two floors. The other thing I would like to note in the little bit of time I have left is, the diagrams show that on the west end, where the building is 4 stories tall, the wall's about… the building wall about 50 feet from the property line. I think the neighborhood would be really supportive of that amount of setback.
[25:11] But the east neighborhood, where the building is 4 stories above an exposed parking garage, it's 54 feet above grade, effectively 5 stories tall. The setback's just barely more than the minimum 25 feet. So the tallest portion of the building is closest to the street. Rather than farther away. That creates a really highly urban relationship to the street that seems totally out of keeping with the suburban character of the… estate residential zoned single-family homes across the street to the south. If anything, maybe they've got the plan reversed. A more sensitive plan would place the lower portion of the building closer to the street, and the taller portion further away. Perhaps that east neighborhood building can push north to create additional setback, leave the central neighborhood mass where it's at, and allow the…
[26:02] east side of the Central. To be revealed, and, be a little more similar to what was shown at concept review. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone else who would like to provide a comment? Please raise your hand. And, if you'd like to speak, go ahead and make sure that we have your name as well. Let's see… Davy asks if, his wife can speak as well. Could I have, your wife's name, please, in the Q&A? Okay? And… Give me one moment, please.
[27:08] Okay, we have Anne here, going to allow you to talk, and I'm going to give you a 3-minute timer. Okay, thank you, can you hear me? Yes. So, we own the house directly across, Sioux Drive on Ponca Place, at 4700 Sioux Drive. And, I just want to speak to the fact that these, the way that the glassy, enclosures, are designed, I have a problem with, because it's going to put so much light If they're the way that they are currently designed, it'll put so much light directly into our bedrooms, in our single-family home, which is just one level. And the massing is greatest right across from us as well. Of the buildings, so I would still like to see that rather than having this one enormous building, that there are three separate buildings with access
[28:08] from our neighborhood, from our street, through into the Ponca place that currently exists, into that street. So perhaps the connections come, between the buildings come higher, like on the third and fourth levels. I can't tell from the diagrams. I'm not an architect like my husband, JV. I can't tell from the diagrams how far the fourth level is stepped back. It looks, from the drawings that we were just shown, and the ones I've looked at online, to be insignificant, so I don't know how many feet it's back, but I would like to see it back, you know, 20 feet or so, from where it currently is to really make it feel more equivalent to the building that exists on the far eastern part of their, their, of the Fraser property that, the already existing one, because this is so much taller than that building.
[29:01] And that's it. Thank you so much for listening. I really appreciate your work on this project. I think it's a valuable project. I'm all for senior housing, but I just think that the neighborhood is still over-affected by the building as it currently stands. It's completely out of character, with the single-family homes that are across the street, which I will say, are all modest homes. They look taller in the diagram than they actually are, that you were shown. And I just, I just want… really would ask that more consideration be given to the neighborhood. Thank you. Thank you. Can we back on. Oops. Okay, is there anyone else who would like to provide comment?
[30:01] Okay, not seeing any other hands at this point. Stuckle chunk. No other comment at this moment. Okay, well, maybe we can jump into our review at this point, then. The, as the applicant mentioned in their presentation, the first Partially met criteria, design criteria, that we… have been tasked with, discussing is the setback along Sioux Drive, which is that, south… the road on the south… the long elevation, that we've been spending quite a bit of time, on. So far in this discussion. And, it looks like some effort has been made
[31:02] To… to, set that back by providing some rain gardens and some additional landscaping and… And we have been tasked First, I have to say that this project was referred to us by City Council. And… So we… we are not only addressing, sort of. the site planning criteria that was given to us by staff, but also just that City Council has asked us pretty broadly to review this project. Otherwise, it wouldn't necessarily come through our board. So the first one is… as it relates to, you know, its current design, and in my mind, it's how it relates to the, the zoning in… for that lot, and for… and then the adjacent.
[32:06] commercial buildings, as it relates to the Fraser Meadows campus as a whole, and also keeping in mind that we have just down Sioux Drive, there's a, a public park as well as a school. So, maybe we could start with Steven, on your thoughts on this… on this setback criteria on Sue. Sorry, can you guys hear me? Yeah, if I could just mention, before you guys get started, that there… across this top of your screen are tabs, and the criteria that you're addressing are in these other tabs if you need to see that visually. Okay, is that the one that's up right now? Yeah, it's key issue number one. Okay. Yep, that's fair. Okay. And so, alright, because I was thinking this was different than the 200-foot that comes later. One question I have for Chandler,
[33:13] this is a… this was a site plan review PUD, or this is in a zone district right now? There's an actual zone that they're… working within. Well, it's, it's kind of both. So there is an existing site review, PUD for Fraser Meadows. They're in the site review process. They're subject to RH-5 zoning, but they're allowed to ask for a lot of different modifications to the zoning through site review. Okay, and that… that would be my other question. Are they going… they're not going for a height… Variance, a higher height variance. They are. Yeah, they're requesting a height modification to go up to 55 feet. Otherwise, citywide, it's 30… 35 feet is the… Right, okay. But the existing PUD also allows that for the rest of Fraser Meadow.
[34:03] The rest of the PUD does have a height modification, but this is a new site review, so they have to ask for a new one, essentially, for this building. Sure. Okay. Okay, that… that helps. So, I mean, my comments about… you know, I appreciate… first of all, I appreciate all the work everyone has done on this project, and working with the church. I know this site really well. My daughters have gone to Suzuki Strings for about 14 years at that church, so I know it very well. I think, you know, I guess my comment would be. Fraser Meadows is there. It was, you know, when they built Fraser Meadows, and they did that site plan review, and that PUD, that's when the height discussion was… was discussed, and, you know, sort of that's what happened, and that's… that's why I sort of feel like they have satisfied this, because they're satisfying
[35:02] Connecting with the existing site of Fraser Meadows. That feels more relevant to me, and that discussion of whether Fraser Meadows itself is… appropriate or not happened many, many, many moons ago, so I feel like that Ships sort of already sailed. Even though they're asking for something new now, it's still in line with what was done. For Fraser Meadows. That being said, you know, what… what are the different ways that you could, minimize that transition, and I think you're doing a good job in terms of setting back that fourth floor. One… one little thing… I would suggest in that middle building, you have that… the light brick, and then you use a light stucco, and I think there's sort of, you know, if you use a darker stucco, or something that would push that… in fact, when you showed the,
[36:08] Amelia, when you show… not Amelia, when you showed the, diagram that had, the massing, you actually had a darker spot above there, and you could see how it actually sets it back. And that would help that a little bit. The other thing I wanted to understand a little bit more was, there's that patio that pops out of one of the glass sections, and then the other one Is that an… is there an entry there, or is it just a glass? There's a couple of walks, and the reason I say that, because I think… Some of the scale could be softened by perhaps having, some roof covering there, like, especially over that patio, you know, you're at south-facing, it's gonna be quite hot, And that would be an amenity for the… Residence, but it would also help to soften the… the height of that…
[37:02] you know, in both those areas. I'm not sure the one to the west. What is happening there, if there's a doorway? or not, I could go back and look. But, that would be… My comments. How much time do we have, by the way, Brendan, each of our… just to… Oh, you're on… you're muted. Yeah, sorry. We… I mean, I think… Some of these com- some of this conversation is gonna be overlapping. Sure, of course. And so we really just gave it a broad, I'm sorry, I think I said… I think we said 30… 45 minutes? Okay. So, a couple minutes in each… each of us each time. Yeah. Okay. Right. This one, we had 10, but it crossed over with the building length one that was also assigned 10 minutes. Okay. And then the, the roof one was another 5, so almost 30 minutes for overall scale, mass, and roof.
[38:07] Okay. Yeah, and, you know, I do agree with the… The gentleman from the neighborhood, you know, the original plan, actually, the very original concept plan where the It was more of a sawtooth addressing the street, you know, in some ways was a… Was up, a little bit. breaking up the mass more, but… and I don't know how, you know, what the discussion, but I'm sure it came from You know, site plan review and staff and whatnot, so… Anyways, that's my… 2 cents. Matthew, do you have to… Yeah, I think, You know, I'll try and constrain my comments to this particular issue, because I know we'll sort of overlap with other ones as we proceed, but… You know, I concur with a little bit, with what Stephen said, in the sense that
[39:04] You know, this is basically an extension of an existing use on the site, phased over time. And it seems, as far as I can tell, to be within the constraints of the original development's sort of proposed density and scale. I… I… I do, you know, acknowledge that I, like, the 50-foot setback. on the… let's call it the western wing, I think is a really generous gesture. And so I think that goes a long way to… You know, establishing a… Some kind of transition buffer to the lower density housing zone to the south. I think it's, you know. the western side, as it… where it replaces what, I guess Pancha Place used to be.
[40:02] That turns into, it appears like a private drive now. that corner of the building appears in the materials to be about the same setback as the main Fraser Meadows building just to the east. So I think that creates a fairly reasonable datum of where to bring that building. I guess my only question for the applicant Would be… and this isn't a… this is more of a rhetorical question, but, To address some of the scaling issues adjacent to the lower density housing to the south. You know, are there any, strategies or mechanisms to go, maybe instead of exploiting the entire 5 floors on that southeast corner. Maybe there's an additional upper setback? or some accommodation to just sort of reduce the Balkan scale on that corner, where it's closest to the neighborhood.
[41:05] The last piece of this, I'll say, you know, just kind of focusing and dialing in to this particular criteria. Is the, appropriate transitions through design elements, open space, siding, design. I'd say generally, you know. the, the open space along the south, seems to be sort of in excess of what's minimally required, and it's actually… seems to be a very thoughtful, well-designed sort of buffer zone. So I imagine, in all practicality, that's gonna be a nice south-facing space, if it's built and maintained the way it's being presented here. So that seems like, A fairly reasonable kind of accommodation to, you know, creating a buffer zone that isn't a sheer 5-story building.
[42:02] Yeah, I think I'll leave it at that. Okay, great. I would agree with, all the comments that both Steven and Matthew made. We have reviewed, as a board, projects in the… several projects in the past that, have. A real, interface with. a, you know, Commercially zoned property, and how it interfaces with, single-family housing, neighborhood, or, like a hotel, for example, and how that interfaces with adjacent, condominiums. You know, we have had this discussion quite Frequently as to, how these sites kind of, lead or integrate themselves into the… into the existing, residential neighborhoods. And I think that, as a whole, you know, we… Boulder has done a good job of… of…
[43:09] Allocating different parts of our community to be zoned commercial. And like Matthew was saying, I think that this is really just an extension of Fraser… Fraser Meadows, and it's not… we're not creating, like, a whole new, building type or, you know, high-density. residential units that, you know, haven't been seen in this neighborhood before. It's really just an extension. And I would agree that I think that the… the architect has… the, applicant and architect, have done a good job of… of… Giving it some, good detailing that not only integrates it with the property or their existing buildings, which are, you know, phased, and so I think it's difficult to sort of… if you look around the entire
[44:10] But… site of Fraser Meadows, that there's a lot of different architectural languages that have been spoken, and in different phases and different times that they've been built, and I think that this does a good job of of integrating some of the language that's already existing on the campus. In particular, the… the building that is directly adjacent, to the east on Sioux Drive. that doesn't have the, you know, these setbacks, and I… and I agree that… that… Giving that 55-foot setback is generous, with additional, planting and landscaping, and I think that that's… that will be a good buffer. for… You know, for the start of this project, to this… to the property across the street.
[45:08] Hmm… So I think… I think that we're in… we're in agreement that… that this criteria actually appears to have been, appropriately addressed, and… and meets… And meets the criteria. Matthew and Steven, would you agree with that? I think… Yeah, I know. Steven, you had a suggestion of, some change in material, and I think that we can. Yeah, that'll come up, I think. I'll dive in a little bit later. Yeah, when we talk about. And then… And I also thought maybe some roof, extensions over that patio, and then I… and, Trying to understand what's happening in the other…
[46:01] sort of walkways that go into the building, you know, if there was more of kind of a… entry condition, but I'm not sure exactly what's happening there. One additional suggestion that Matthew had was… was studying the portion of the building that does appear to be more of a five-story element. If there's a way that we can… to address the massing, above the parking to… To bring that back down into scale, so it doesn't… it doesn't appear to be more of a 5-story element, but more of a 4-story element. And… Great, okay, and… onto the… Hmm. The next, key issue… For tonight is, the variation in roof height.
[47:00] So I think that that… can maybe blend right… right into, that conversation we were just having about that… the five-story element, So, it appears that, I think that that we have, you know, we've seen that this project has been broken into three different, zones, or neighborhoods, or, parties, or whatever you want to call it, with, you know. basically the same, roof height. I mean, we do have a big variation in parapet, materials and heights and, and some plane changes and setbacks, but overall, it really is a, four-story building, or five, depending on where you're looking at it. So,
[48:01] Steven, if you want to start with your… Insight on that? start talking, sorry. Yeah, I'm assuming, and you can correct me, Apple can correct me if I'm wrong, that you know, all the floor plates are the same. You've got Obviously, ADA issues here, you need to have all the floors be at the same level, so… You know, the opportunity to kind of step the building down that grade a little bit would be… quite difficult, in this… for this program. I don't think… I mean, I feel like that overall, the heights step enough to sort of highlight the three… the three main Partee buildings, if you will, neighborhoods, as they call it. Again, I think when we get into the materials, there could be some ways to sort of
[49:01] make the… the lower three stories that are kind of highlighted in the material facades pop more, so that those upper pieces step back. Some of it also is the way it was rendered, You know, so that you can see it, the shadows and the sun shadows aren't sort of, like, fully turned on, it's a little bit washed. You know, we could probably even pull up, look at the SketchUp model with the sun on, and you could see that those upper floors would be much more in shadow, so they would, I don't think, be, you know, appearing as… Prominently, But I don't think… I don't think that we would be adding to the building if, you know, we started doing, like. Alternating parapet heights or something more than they're showing. You know, I think we would, you know, it's gonna get too fussy, I don't think that…
[50:01] Right now, that it's… I guess I'm… I'm fine with that articulation of the different roof heights that they have right now. That's about all I have on that. Can you tell me what you were saying about the, step backs and the shadowing? Sorry. Yeah, in… in the elevations that they show, that there's shadows on, but it's… it's, you know, the way they did it so that you don't block out, you know. Part of the whole facade isn't totally in shadow, but in reality, it would be. You know, when you have the morning sun and the afternoon sun, much of that fourth floor would be in shadow. There's a bit of a roof overhang, you know, then the up to three floors kind of pops out on each of those buildings, so I think that there's more relief and more, you know… Reveal that would happen
[51:01] You know, with the full shadows. Okay, and Mary, I don't… would you mind… Yeah, you could pull up the… The renderings or… and or building elevations. The renderings are the model. You could pull up the model, maybe, you know, you could turn the… I know it's tricky. It's not gonna crash. Yeah, I know, that's… So that's… that's the only risk, is… Yeah, or even the elevation, that could explain it on the elevation. Yeah. that might be good, just stop. That one south elevation. Yeah, so the way, the way…
[52:02] Mary has, you know, has rendered this. She has a little bit of shadow on, just to give it a little bit of depth, but it's not like the real sun shadow. But, you know, in reality. I don't see I can draw on here. Like, all of this… there's going to be much more shadow line up on these upper… that fourth level. If you will. And perhaps that could also be, you know, enhanced by Depending on how much your roof overhangs are of these little Kind of roof elements that are up on those… those levels, too. But there's gonna be a lot more, pushing and pulling of this facade when the sun Full shadow is actually… Sean. you know, the… the one comment I would say, you know, looking at this,
[53:03] Can you guys see where I'm drawing on here? Does that show up? I'm not sure. you know, those are where those two glass boxes are. You know, perhaps there's a way, you know, those particular moments to bring that roof height down a little bit, you know, that might help… help your cause some. And the other thing I was saying before, if you were doing some kind of Covered element, either here and or, over here… again, I'm not sure there's an entry right there, but that would also help to sort of, give it a little more of a human scale along that. Facade. And I don't know if your SketchUp model would… I know when you turn the sun on, it can wreak havoc on things, but…
[54:04] it could show what I'm trying to say, you know, that there's actually a lot more shadow lines in this. Yeah, let me, let me attempt to do that in the background. And I know, I appreciate… I know how hard it is when you're trying to show the facade, because when you turn it on, it's like, wait, everything's… Then it's hidden, and it's like, well, yeah, that's actually, you know, what the neighbors want to see, but it's not what you want to show when you're trying to show the elevation. At the same time. So, Matthew, I don't know if you want to, jump in and… Yeah, I can… I can, segue… segue here between, I just… I'm recollecting the… the elevation we're just showing. I don't know what, level of… you know, development, the drawings and structurals are in at this point. I'm just speculating by what I'm seeing on the elevations. It… It does appear like there's a very shallow roof deck, section through the building, where on the top floor, it looks to be a very sort of minimal distance to what's showing as the top roofline.
[55:11] And I'm wondering if maybe there's… We could anticipate a slightly larger parapet, or is that a height-capped element at this point? Because I think one thing that's… For a big building, I think the two brakes are, good gestures. They are a bit narrow by comparison, so they don't quite relieve the overall height. uniformity. A couple of the vertical masonry appearing, like, masonry elements do seem to sort of pierce that Top of roofline, to good effect. But I think the thin sort of lid across, like, a lot of units in the larger sections of the elevation And unfortunately, I don't have that elevation up anymore, but,
[56:02] I think that's an area where I'm just wondering if there might end up being a little more thickness there in reality. I'm talking about on the white middle section, that's that continuous bronze-colored cap. I don't know if that could be broken or interrupted in a logical way that, you know, helps rather than creates just, busy work. But I think that area could be an area where we introduce a slight variation The other area are the four, sort of, like, it looks like. Two-unit bays on the wings where we have the longer stretch of that thin lid. I wonder there, too, if maybe there's some gesture there that we could get… play with the thickness of the lid. I think those might be some areas to address, sort of, the uniform Building height. I will say, though, when I… when I… Just full disclosure, like… This bullet…
[57:07] tends to encourage, like, a variety of forms and heights, like, that's… I personally am not into that, like, I prefer the uniformity, the visual clarity to be maintained. I think in a lot of times, that… Prioritizing the variety of forms and heights creates a lot more visual confusion and emphasizes bulk where there really isn't. So, I guess, you know, just to conclude on this particular key point, I think within reason, some element of maybe introducing one more thickness or height variation in the longest spans could be helpful. But I wouldn't try to go… I wouldn't advocate, you know, doing something really standout or extreme just for the sake of, you know, meeting this particular key issue, because I think it's… it's…
[58:03] Principally already in the design, with some of the elements that are already there. Okay. Yes, I agree. I think sometimes, in an effort to make these really long elevations, appear like smaller buildings, or appear to be broken up, it… it can turn fussy. I think that… that… that this elevation in particular, you've done a good job. I mean, I think we really are focusing… the north elevation really seems to be, fairly private. It also has the element of the entry, which brings down the scale of it. It's inviting, kind of, a drive-up Feel, you know, participation from… I think the way that… that the Ponca place, has been…
[59:04] sort of, intersected and now is… has become more of a private drive is helpful to that particular building. I'd be curious what Transportation said about that, but that's not in our realm. I have to say that the… you know, when you're… when you're looking at this, the diagram below it, the adjacent building to the east is… it really is, like, a relentless, long elevation, of that existing building, and I think that this does a good job of Sort of being the, the… the younger baby sister that has sort of addressed some of the issues that that part of the campus is lacking. But I agree with Matthew that I don't want it to go too far, that it can't make up for all the faults of
[60:01] of the older siblings. In all these diagrams, I think when I first looked at this, I… I was really… drawn to the… the… Opportunity of the breaking elements, and the severing being that glass piece. And when I was looking at it diagrammatically, I got really excited about it, but then when I look at this elevation, I sort of feel like, I get it conceptually, but it's just not… it's just not quite there. I think, Maybe if, you know, for example, on the piece that's to the west, the third building on the uphill side. that glass element becomes kind of a sliver, and it's sitting, and it's tucked into a piece that it's… that is, you know, the tire parapet. And I know without, you know, making you change the program, and I do want the living areas to be celebrated within the units.
[61:08] But it would be nice to see if that was kind of reversed, that if you could get maybe some height, in that atrium, glassy area, maybe it doesn't have to be glass, but if you can make that a little more prominent and, And… I don't know, or maybe not prominent, but I just feel like it's neither here nor there. That it's… that it's sort of a suggestion, but it still is very, broken up and horizontal with the floor plates. articulated in it. I know the neighbors are concerned about the addition of the… of glass, and having maybe too much glass in that. And… that… that maybe it doesn't have to be all glass, but… but… I mean, I…
[62:00] I don't know exactly where I'm trying to go with this. I just think that, I like the idea of the buildings being broken up with this element, whatever that element is. I just think it needs to be taken a step further, and that might require the parapet, jump and parapet on buildings, if we're gonna call them… the east portion and the west portion. If… if the immediately adjacent parapets need to… Come down, and then those glass elements go up, or somehow making it, they're just more… it just needs to be more. It needs to be more distinct, in my opinion. I… Can I say something here, maybe help you out a little bit? Yes, thank you. Yeah, the, because I agree, like, part of me is like, well, I just want to… I wonder if it was, like. black instead of glass, you know, if it was solid. But then I've started to think, well, maybe it's the fenestration, because you've got these big, tall.
[63:05] pieces of glass, and you maybe haven't gotten in there yet, but it's very repetitive from all, you know, what's happening in the three buildings. Maybe that's cow wall, maybe it's not transparent, maybe it's translucent, like cow wall in there. That, you know, is more horizontal, so you're… it's really more like these little neck pieces that's connecting the three buildings. You know, which I think could help… help that, and it might help the, you know, so at night, you know, there isn't as much light shining through. Now, I don't know what's happening there programmatically, if it's, like, a library or something, you know, I don't know. But, Yeah, maybe there's too much glass. Maybe there's a way to, you know… like Brandon was saying, minimize that. But I would say that, you know, the relief and the step back in the balconies, and then the plane changes…
[64:00] really accentuate. enough of a roof change, and then the parapet height change. The roofline doesn't feel too monotonous, even though that central section, is… is a little flatter, like Matthew said, but I wouldn't… I don't know if I would suggest adding making it fussier. I think that there… it's a little bit elegant in its simplicity, that central piece and that central… and it makes it unique. and maybe more prominence on the… those look like trellises above the windows on the balconies, or… or some kind of, maybe it's not a height change, but it is a relief in plain. But, you know, on the ground floor, you really aren't… you really can't see up that high, particularly if those balconies… the… face of that building is stepped back on that balcony, you're really not gonna…
[65:01] you're never gonna see this building from this vantage point. So. Right. Yeah, so I would say… Boy. Yeah, there you go. In conclusion… I would… I would say that… That… home. Let's see… I think that the… the three element… the three building sections have… have done a good job in… in, varying the roof heights, with… with parapet changes and, plane changes, and that further study and investigation Could be had, and those… those breaking apart elements that could make it,
[66:03] You know, more distinct or more special, whether that's a material change, or a change in height, or… but some… somehow highlighting those They seem to be more, like, public… You know, public spaces where people are coming together, and could potentially just be highlighted more. Okay, great. So, the next criteria is the use of, of stucco, in this project. All right, and I guess this is… is this also the material discussion, or is that the fourth one? So this is, the third, and it's the building materials. Okay, so it's all the bill of materials.
[67:01] Yeah. Okay, Actually, go back to that picture you were just on. Yeah. So, because this kind of has all of them in there. Right? So one thing I was saying before was the stucco… Color, you know, up, up in here, right? You know, you might look at that in relation to this lighter color. The other thing… And Mary, is this a client… Desire to have the flagstone. Probably, you know, you don't have to answer. Because here's… I know that there is, like, you know, there is… I call it lick and stick, right, that's on the rest of Fraser Meadow, but there's sort of, like, too many materials going on here. I mean, I would love just to see you eliminate the stone, quite frankly, and just do this as a brick building.
[68:00] Like, that's what it is. It's a brick building, make it a brick building. you know, this is such a, like, a Colorado Boulder thing, like, oh, we gotta have a base that's stone. Like, it's not stone, it's, you know, it's fake stone. And it would just be… it would be so much more elegant and simple if we just didn't have that. I'm like, you can see on the white building on the left, right, you've got the brick going all the way down. How much more elegant that is? You know, there's a little bit at the bottom. And I'm not talking about the… this flat stone that you have off of the patio, but really it's these, you know, this area. Like, I'm not understanding why you need… need that. And then… go to brick, right? And maybe that's a bias, but actually, if you can go to… maybe go to another elevation now, like the whole… Yeah, like, that's a good one, or… Yeah, that's good. Actually, the other one you were just on.
[69:00] This one? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, so again, I, you know, we often get… I mean, you've got a lot of things going on here, because you've got the metal, brake metal around the windows. The stone, the brick, So I'd actually… preferred to go a little simpler. The other thing I would say, if you go to one of the elevations that has all three buildings. Yeah, maybe that… where it doesn't have the materials, like, just where it has that… more, like, the fenestration. This could be okay. One of the things, you're using this… this same set of, These… this window pack here. Right? Throughout, it might be really nice… the other Frasier Meadow has some asymmetrical windows in it, right? They have, like, a fixed, and then a, off to one side, it has…
[70:03] the awning at the bottom, and then a… maybe a casement at the top or something. You know, I'm almost wanting you to, like, change up those windows in the middle here. You know, that really make it a little more distinct, so that it's not… You know, sort of just using that same triple set throughout the whole project. I don't think you need to go so far as to, like, have each building have its own. window, but I think you could… you could mix it up a little bit more, And I think the asymmetry in the old Fraser Meadows give you some clues that could be a nice tie-in. Back to that building as well. But yeah, I think overall, you know, I… Just making a brick building. You know? just lose the stone veneer. You've got the nice stone on the, Planters, keep that, the flat stone, but just lose the… stone veneer.
[71:03] Yeah, I wish CU would do it too, but that's another whole discussion. Alright, I'll be quiet. Well, what's your, just your opinion about the stucco? My opinion about the stucco, I thought this was all materials. I think the stucco's fine. I don't see any reason why you can't use stucco in those elements. I would just try to, you know, look at the colors, So that… The colors of, like, on the… east or the west building isn't necessarily the same stucco color and matching the kind of the middle, you know, because right now, there's sort of two colors, maybe 3 going on. So I would just sort of look at those Try some different color variations, and maybe the middle building, if it was a little darker, actually would push that. Building behind it, back. A little more. But stucco in itself doesn't bother me. I think you've done a good job of detailing the stucco and setting the windows.
[72:01] You know, back in, so they're recessed, so they're not flush with the stucco, and I think it's fine. Matthew. Yeah, I think, there's two parts of the criteria which, I think just we should make note of. One is, you know, stucco is considered not a durable material, I… and the second component, and therefore not recommended, second component seems to be it shouldn't face any public areas, like street, right-of-ways, etc. I do think stucco can be handled well, and I feel like some of the, Some of the prejudice against stucco. It comes from a real place where it was used poorly and installed poorly. So I would say the case at hand now, it appears to me I could be wrong, but two things make me okay with the stucco in the sense that they're all…
[73:09] for the most part, at these upper levels, they're recessed, even a further setback at those levels. The stucco seems to be all in set and not a face condition of the facade. So I think that supports it, because from balconies, it can be maintained and cleaned and… whatever. The second component is it's used as an accent material, and not the primary material on any of the facades. So… because of that, I think this, you know. Although not technically consistent with the guideline, which prohibits, well. Doesn't prohibit it outright, but, you know… discourages it. I think this, if you're gonna use stucco, this is the right places to do it. And then the third thing I'll say is where it's used in the biggest quantity in the middle section of the building.
[74:06] I think the, the level of detailing that you showed, where it's in multiple layers with some depth. is tasteful. And I think that level of detail sort of elevates it from the condition of just being a flat stucco plane, which is, I think, a lot of the intent that this particular, criteria is referencing. So, I… those are all… for all those reasons, I think here it's used in moderation and with some skill, so… Yeah, I don't… I don't see any issues with that. I think the overall palette is fine. I understand that it's sort of being curated from the existing buildings on site. So, yeah, I think the overall palette is durable, and… You know, complementary to the rest of the… Of the, campus.
[75:04] Yeah, I think that's it for that one. Okay, let's see… I would, again, agree with Betsy and Steven. This has been such an agreeable conversation this evening. We don't have, any one of our members sort of on polar opposite ends of this. I, you know, grew up in Colorado and, you know, frequently went to New Mexico, you know, as a kid, and continued to go as an adult, and, I… I… really like stucco, and sort of the nod to the Adobe, material, and… and I do think it's, you know, very native to our, region of the country, and, and I… I…
[76:10] I've come up against, you know, in some of my own projects with the city's, desire to not to highly discourage stucco, and I'm always a little bit surprised by that, because I do think it can be tastefully done, and I think that, again, like Matthew said, the way that it's detailed in this project. And… and, Steven was saying, sort of the limited use of it is… I think it's appropriate, especially for those upper floors. you know, if Rory was on this call, he would applaud, you know, there's a tremendous amount of brick being used on this project, and I think that that's fantastic. I mean, you know, we could just have sort of a base plinth of brick, and then the rest of it could be stucco, but that's not the case here. I think, there's…
[77:04] The use of brick, you know, and the different colors of brick. And… and the integration of natural stone in that mix, I think is… is really nice, and it is a more expensive product. I think, stucco can be less expensive, but, but can also be appropriate, I think. when it is mixed with… with these other materials that you have in this project. You know, especially on that, like, the third floor of that… that middle building that has the stucco, when you are introducing the… the wood ele… I think that that's… really nice. I think that that's a nice detail and a nice touch. I would agree that… that there could be some… some conversation about the… the… how… what color that stucco is, that… but I…
[78:05] But the way that it is now, it doesn't bother me. It kind of… it blends in with the materials, rather than being highlighted or standing out. So, I would say that, in conclusion, I think that we agree that the stucco is appropriate, and has been appropriately used in this building and in this application. I'm… Then there have… there are additional suggestions on, studying the materiality and maybe simplifying some of the material… additional materials that are being used in conjunction with the brick, I'd be… careful in integrating, I think, too much metal when it comes, for example, when it comes to
[79:03] the material transitions, that it needs to be done, I think, more selectively, And, just to keep… just to keep the material changes simplified, But overall, I think we all agree that the palette is appropriate and, and good, and the detailing and the plane changes and the material transitions are, I think appropriate. Would you guys add something else to that? Conclusion. I think that sounds good, and you know, just thinking, you know, I don't wanna… Not trying to be a jerk about the stone, but maybe… maybe it's oversized brick? You know, if you want to have a little bit of… Transition, just do the same brick, but a different… Scale, you know, you could have that little bit of the… the, you know, that feel of…
[80:02] A base or something. But yeah, I agree, I think… Brent did a good job of… Summing it up. Yeah, just, just, You know, the concern is that the… that the stone can look… lick and stick, or it can look fake, so, Just keeping that in mind, and we encourage the use of the stone in the landscape and site walls and landscape elements. Yeah, because a lot of that has gone to panels, and it doesn't have mortar. You know, so the stone is, like. It, you know, it looks really fake, because there's no mortar. Right? And… So, that's why I say keep it simple, just go with the brick. And then you had suggested in the… in the first point about adding maybe some more, roof elements, and kind of… if we're talking masting and,
[81:06] And… Yeah, thinking about… Was over here, you know, something… some kind of… a cover for that. Maybe it's a trellis or something, because that, you know, it will be a… warm, you know, hot porch down there. You know, it's a great spot. There's probably beautiful views, and… It might also kind of give it a little bit more human scale. And… and then if you went to… one of… you had, like, a… you had a page, Mary, that had, like, the pictures from the previous… Frazier Meadows? Somewhere in there. You want this one? That one. And what I was talking about with the windows, was, like. some of these conditions, right, where it's sort of doing some… You know, kind of asymmetry and stuff, that could be a nice little tie-in.
[82:04] And kind of break up the monotony of that triple, you know. Just being repeated over and over again. For what it's worth. Okay, if we're… I think we can kind of quickly go through this Fourth criteria, which is the… just the the… General length and massing of the building. I feel like we've… we have been touching on this… for the last three criteria. But Steven, if you have just a… Yeah, I don't think I have… remark on that. I don't think I have anything more to add, you know, I mean, it could… You guys have done a really good job, like, in the landscape plan, there's sort of, like, 3 areas, you know, those kind of… you know, so I think that's all gonna break up That length,
[83:01] Yeah, so I don't… I don't think I really have anything… I would say with the… one thing with the landscape, I'm assuming with Fraser Meadows, they have They will program the… Garden, raised garden beds. You know, because we've seen a lot of those, and then they don't get used, but… These will actually get used, which is good. very passionate, sort of resident-driven, like, there's a waiting list, actually, for garden beds, so… Right. They will be well-loved. Yeah, we've done a couple projects where, you know, we'll plant… have them plant, like, sunflowers in the fall, so that over the fall, you have the, you know, the sunflowers look really cool, and they, you know, they sort of die, and they're, like, there. But anyways, I'm glad… I like how you broke that up, and I think That, you know, we're just looking at this elevation, but there's a lot of other things going on that you guys are working with that break up the massing of the building, And,
[84:01] And like I said before, you know, I'm not sure… and Mary, maybe can I answer this, is… Can you enter in these spots? In, like, in those spots, or not? I mean, here, I know you've come out, so you can… That's… those are, the one on the left is a resident entry point, and then the one on the right, obviously, is an occupiable exterior, patio. Yeah, it might be nice to somehow make that… this one a little more… Obvious as, like, an entry. You know, of some sort. And maybe that's with landscaping, or signage, or whatever. So one thing that we do have to balance is security, because it is a secured entry point, so we don't want to encourage, sort of, the public to interface, necessarily. Right. With the building at that point. Yeah, but I think we've sort of talked about most of this already.
[85:00] Matthew, do you have a… Yep. Yeah, I guess, I mean… Just… just to be… the most informed. Is the building… greater than 200 feet along Sioux. Yes. Yeah, I could probably answer that just by looking at it, but… Does… do the breaks, the two segmented breaks, maybe this is a question for staff or Kalani, Have those been deemed, as… you know… compliant, like, breaks in the 200? Do they meet the form and… Dimension to break up the overall greater than 200 foot facade. I'll let Chandler speak more to this.
[86:00] Yeah. Yeah, that criteria is something that we're supposed to consider for buildings that are… Requesting a height modification, so it's not a hard rule that it can't be over 200 feet, but, Yeah, we worked with them. We had a comment in the first round of review comments, asking them to Make some moves to make the buildings appear more distinctly as separate buildings. And… I think we feel like… they're definitely moving in the right direction, if not already there, in that regard. But we're open to more feedback if you guys have some. Yeah, I don't… I just… I think… I think adequate steps are being taken, like… like the sort of angled building setback, the… the fact that part of the building is greater, you know, almost 50 feet setback. And then there are segments that change in the setback. The two, sort of, breaks, I feel like serve as, you know, massing breaks.
[87:05] That would, adequately satisfy this… you know, guideline of 200 feet, so I think that's all good. I don't… I don't know that the, the two glass connecting elements really satisfy, like, real visual permeability. I feel like that's usually only satisfied by an actual break in the building, and maybe there's a… two-story connector or a one-story connector. But I do think, I think… thinking completely about the use of this building, I can only assume there's a very functional need to keep the entire floor connected, because of the particular program. So I just, I just want to, you know, for the record, I, I think if this were a different type of building that didn't require the 4-story glass connection.
[88:01] It feels like we might be able to ask for or encourage some More significant break in the massing. But I do want to be realistic about what this building is, and the people it serves, and the program. Where I… I… I… I can understand why you need a continuous floor connection through there. So, other than that, that's not really, like, a, you know, feedback or a comment. I'm just sort of saying this for our review and for the public record that, You know, it's my opinion that, like, a lot of steps have been taken to break down the overall, Mass of the building and large floor plate, with keeping in mind that, you know, a lot of these little… gestures have been done because there is going to be a height exemption employed. I don't know if there's a floor area ratio increase here, necessarily, but…
[89:02] Yeah, so I feel like the proposal's… Consistent with the spirit of what's being asked for here, these… for these additional exemptions. Okay, great. And I… I… agree, I think it… I think… you know. Considering the overall campus of all the buildings as a whole, this has done a very good job of, with the additional step-backs and It has done a very good job of I think minimizing the appearance of this very long elevation. I also would like to reiterate what Stephen was saying about, the programming on the south side. That, I think is really key and very successful, and I think a great way to integrate this
[90:04] building and the residents into this residential neighborhood, and I really like the idea of that… the gardening area being active and used by the residents, and that they, you know, it's that sort of front porch mentality of… Of being a part of a… being a part of a neighborhood, and being a part of a community, and having that programming, you know, not be tucked away on the… on the north side of the building, where gardening is not as successful. But, having it being on the south side, that it does feel, special and a good integration of you know, this building into the… with the community, and I think it helps bring, you know, with this long facade and… and big massing, I think it helps bring down, you know, the… the overall scale of this project into a,
[91:04] street-level experience, and so I think that that, is successful. And so I would say, that that is sort of a concluding remark, I think, to this particular topic, but I think as this… to this building as a whole, and the, first note about the stepbacks on Sioux, and the materiality, and, I… I… I think… that… That they have met, you know, the requirements of breaking up the over 200 foot Elevation with, appropriate massing and step backs. so… I think, you know, we're right at… we're just past 5.30, and we were hoping to be, sort of concluded with this,
[92:04] at… At 5.30, so I just wanted to know, maybe we could just have, Stephen and Matthew give Your overall thoughts on the project quickly, and then, we can let the applicant Go. Yeah, I think… You know, I agree, I think overall, you've done an excellent job, I think, you know, I really appreciate… I know we're not… looking at… I guess it was Scott Rodwin did that connector piece, and, you know, how you guys have worked with the church and the whole neighborhood. I think this is going to be a really great project, and… You know, like a desperately needed housing in our community. you know, I think you've satisfied these four criteria. I hope you can look at, you know, as you get further into it, like I said, look at some of the fenestration, some of the colors, and see if you can't simplify some of the materials.
[93:09] And, you know, I think in general. as I said before, when you really look at the shadows, it will… the building will feel a lot more… Relief than, you know, than we're kind of seeing in this elevation, let's say. Yeah, that's kinda it. Matthew. Yeah, I think I'd just reiterate, I think a couple of strong points, from my point of view is, like, the… the, the thought into the setbacks along the South. I think, all things considered, given the, nature of this campus, the size and scale of the buildings, with relation to the lower zone area to the south, I feel like those setbacks could be a really nice community benefit.
[94:00] I know the… taken on as just building height alone. This proposal creates some community issues. None of us want to necessarily live, you know, right with 5 stories, 4 or 5 stories facing us. But I do think, it'd be nice, you know, for the applicant, for the… for the Fraser Meadows community to treat that garden area, as an asset, I think it'll have some community benefit, like I said, by being well-maintained and well-designed. And so I hope that benefit will outweigh some of the basic massing of the building. And then the last thing I'll say is, just when it does come to the materials and the stucco, you know, some of the proposed detailing looks very nice, and as long as that stays in the project throughout, I think the building will you'll be pretty handsome and certainly, fit within the context of the Fraser Meadows, campus as it is.
[95:07] And that is a big community, and I think it's important to give it a sense of place and connection, and I feel like the project's doing that, so… Right? That's it. Yeah. Great, I think… That is, concludes our… a review of this project. Thank you so much for presenting, Mary, and And Chandler for the… the good run-through on the project, and, preparing the, the materials in the packet. It was helpful, and… I think this was a very simple, nice, mild review, so… Yeah. Thank you so much for your time and for the comments.
[96:00] Yeah. Took a lot of notes. Great. Thank you very much. We're going to be discussing a, a letter to City Council, and you're welcome to stay on and listen to that if you want, but, otherwise you're free to… Jump off. Alright. Thank you so much, everyone. Thank you, Mary. Brendan, can I add one more closing comment? Sorry. Oh. I just think it's important, I wanna… I don't know if any of the, Did you say it's okay to do that? Okay, I didn't know if I'd missed the buzzer. I think it's important for us to acknowledge and thank the members of the community that spoke up. In the community public comment portion. I think it's really important that people are coming to our online meetings and speaking up. This has been several meetings in a row. And so,
[97:00] I think it's always prudent to just thank those people, that we do consider their comments, it's important, and just for the record, we hope the public will continue to… Participate in these meetings. Agreed. Okay, great. But yeah… So, moving into the second part of this meeting, which is, every year we have been tasked with writing a letter, to City Council. It is the… it is different this year, And so I think that we just need to… to highlight… let me get to that. Before we get started, we would… because we ran over a little bit on the last one, and we have a hard stop at 6.30. We'd like to put up the hour timer.
[98:02] Alright. Just to have that, and we'll start using this on… on the, design reviews, too, just to have that in the background, so we're, we can see that. portion. Okay. Yeah, and I, I think… first off, I need to preface this by, even though we don't have our whole board here, but We can vote as a board whether or not we even want to do this letter. Yeah. So, if… a show of hands for, do we want to go through this process at all, as a board? Keeping in mind that this letter is in the past, I don't think this letter necessarily was given enough attention. I think this year that it will be discussed in the City Council Retreat, so I think that this year, it hopefully will actually be,
[99:00] Given some time or review. But, a show of… of… Support or non-support for writing the letter. Show of hands for support. I think we should do it. Yeah, I think we should do it, especially reading the historic letters. That was… Interesting. I don't know if you guys had a chance to read all of those, but that was great. Yep. Yeah, and I think, we will have an opportunity in December to have more of a working session. Kalani, we did not get any applications correct for December meeting? Breeze the date, I think. Today was the due date, and I don't see anything so far, but I'll need to check. Okay. Due aid for the letter, is it… next month, because it's due in January before your next meeting. We need to…
[100:06] Cool, so we do have the next meeting where we could… Right. Yeah, definitely. Okay, good, that's good. I might have to share that time, I don't… You know, I'm not quite sure if anything came in. Yeah, so the… it says the deadline is December 19th, and if we meet, you know, a week before or whatever, I was hoping that we could sort of talk a higher level on this. One, we need to come up with a, scribe, if there… if… someone is, either of you are interested in, scribing this letter, or, assigning it to one of the, members that… what we do is, like. tonight. We're trying to hear. Okay, Claude. Harriet… always Jameson from years past, right? I was like, dude, Jameson, what are you writing?
[101:03] I mean, I was looking at the letters of the years past, and they were all signed by the chair. There, yeah. necessarily mean that I need to be the scribe, or is that… can I… No, you… it can be anybody on the board. It's usually the person putting together the rough draft. It's just that the chair always signs the letter for that year, so… And I don't know if you guys were able to look into, the city-wide strategic plan and the city council priorities, so we need to come up with some, suggestions and… it sounds like sort of specific projects that can be implemented, that align with the citywide strategic plan and the city council priorities, and also that can be, sort of, addressed and completed in a calendar year.
[102:02] So, you know, when you look at… when you look at some of their strategic plans and their priorities, A lot of them are not… not necessarily… relevant, I think, to the Design Review Board. I, in the years past, I think the letters have been Have been kind of geared more towards the design review board, in our profession, and our, sort of… that lane. Like, I don't necessarily think our… our… letter should be about fiscal responsibility or, financial planning, but, you know, there are some topics under that… under that strategic planning, I think, that we could insert ourselves,
[103:00] Sure. Into. I mean… I mean, I think we, you know, reading the other… the past letters, there was a… You know, there was definitely some repetition, and kind of… No. You know, there was some passion, and then there was some… But what I… what my sense is, is that… There were also some pet issues, Steve. There were some pet issues, but it seems like there wasn't a lot of, like, why don't we do X? You know, it was like, you figure out how to… Like, here we are, we want to do Morris, Deb, you figure it out. and tell us, right? Where I think… We should come up with, like, what if we do… X, Y, and Z, you know, here's a, like, a proposal for things You know, that we want to do, or we could suggest. you know. the board get involved in, or whatever, and I think maybe that might have more traction, you know, if it's like, oh, we could implement this, you know? You know, maybe brainstorming some of those things.
[104:02] I mean, you guys all know, as architects, right, like, how frustrating it is if Boulder doesn't… like, the building department doesn't really have, like, a… A legitimate, like, pre-app process, where you can sort of, like, sit down, brainstorm with the With everybody, come up with solutions, you know, it's very much like, these are the rules, you know, and a lot of cities do do that. And you can save a bunch of time down the road, and I would love to have us be… Like, part of that kind of thing, where people could be like, hey. let's, you know, voluntarily come to DAB to get some ideas before, you know, much… a lot of that is, like. A lot of the letters were like, we need to see this stuff earlier, we need to see it earlier, but nobody said, like, how we see it earlier. And that's sort of what I'm suggesting, like, how would we actually see stuff earlier? If that's something we want. to do. I mean, I feel like…
[105:00] it is, right? Even the project tonight. Like, it's always hard, because you feel like, geez, you know, what are we… It's designed, right? And… You know, we can make some suggestions, but… You know, we really should be there in the conceptual design phase when they're moving the blocks around on the table. Because that's when it can have a much greater impact You know, then, like… When it's already done. Right. Like, where we can make suggestions of flipping units and, like, relaying out floor plans, I mean, it's harder, yeah. And it doesn't have to necessarily be based on some, like, criteria. It's really just… you know, we as professionals have an interest in, you know, Boulder being nicer, and… You know, we're all open to that as other professionals, you know, it's a very collaborative profession we're in, and it's like… Sometimes an outside view of these… you get so…
[106:03] You know, in your tunnel, that you don't see, you know, some obvious solutions. So, but I think we have to suggest how that, like, what would that look like? I think. Another… if we're brainstorming, too, I don't think this is something we've really hammered through in previous… Letters or anything, but… And maybe there's something prohibitive about it But the other thing is, in the way that we have a planning board liaison come to our meetings. Could we… Could we, could we do something where one of us rotates each month? like, maybe once a month. Not every planning meet… board meeting, but… maybe… You know, we have a rotation where we're just sitting in. Sure. other board meetings.
[107:00] as a… in the same way that planning sits with us, you can talk, nothing you say has any real bearing, but you're there. You're there as a way of opening a channel of communication. between the different boards at different stages of the projects, being read into common issues that come up. Maybe not always project-specific issues. That would be… if we're looking for ways… we've always been looking for ways to be more participatory. And broaden our… not necessarily our footprint for the sake of it, but sharing… building a connection to other processes in the city where we can bring some value. So maybe there's a little menu that we could propose of ways of slightly broadening the footprint Of what we… what we offer to potential applicants. Yeah, I think that. Funny eyes. And even just on, like, a basic level, we could go as a public. To the planning board meeting, you know, we could do that, and we could suggest that, hey.
[108:03] We'd love to have this formal, but here's what we're gonna do. regardless, we're gonna go to the planning board, you know, and speak as a public member, and we can state, you know, I'm Steven Ecker, I'm a member of DAB, and I'm here, and I'm interested in this project. But, you know, it wouldn't be official, but we can state our title, but maybe if we can make it some kind of more official thing, that would be great. So I think, if we just back up for a second, Kalani, I was looking at. Strategy 15. I think that that might be a good place for us to… like, insert some of these suggestions, and a lot of it is talking about streamlining the process. I think sort of the… You know, overarching… goal of… of DAB is to… to be able to… To aid in the process and,
[109:00] And not make it, like, another step, or a hindrance, or whatever, but just to make it… to be a helpful part of the process, and maybe… here again. helpful part of more projects. But I, you know, I… my soapbox, ever since I've been on the DAB, board has been that I feel like development in Boulder is just an absolute, like, 1% elitist game. And part of the reason why that's happening, that, you know, it takes a tremendous amount of money to do any kind of development in Boulder, and part of that is the review time for the building review time in the city of Boulder is so long that you end up paying, you know, if you buy a piece of property, that you're hoping to be able to, you know.
[110:02] have revenue on, or whatever, you know, if it's condominiums, or retail, or whatever it is, and you're sitting on this property for 2 years as it's going through entitlements and the review process. That's a tremendous amount of money that you're paying on, taxes and, and, you know, design and consultants, and to get… just to get through the process. That takes so long, and then there seems to be sort of a, these roadblocks once you get into the review, where there's, you know… whether it's a lack of staff or whatever it is, I just think… Our projects are taking too long. To go through review, and it's… and it… that process absolutely needs to be streamlined, and it needs to be, like, significantly reduced in time. If we don't want this to be, you know, that 1% are the only people that can.
[111:03] Right. develop in the City of Boulder. Well, Brandon, I mean, maybe what you're suggesting is we could come up with Before we write, you know, before we figure out what we're gonna put in the letter, but come up with, like, sort of a list of, like. issues we see. I mean, to tack on to what you're saying, like. I mean, the fact that we have so much commercial real estate. Commercial, you know, unfinished tenant finish projects around town. There's a lot of… ideas of why that's happening from, like, there's 3 developers, and they're just writing off, they're not lowering their rents, we don't need to go there. But it's also, quite frankly, again, it's the time frame. I mean, if you're like, oh, cool, I could open, like, a boutique. You know, in one of those. 300 available commercial spots around town. and it's gonna take you a year… 9 months to a year to get through the TI process, and you're expected to be paying rent most of that time? Like, you can't do it.
[112:04] So, who gets in here? Patagonia… I mean, the reason that Pearl Street is all national chain web… basically, they're like web stores, for lack of a better term now. is because you… you can't go through that process. You'll… Kill yourself. you know, now, what could Dab do about that? I don't know, but, you know, maybe we could think of, you know, ways that we could help, whether it's, like. You know, maybe we're suggesting, like. Facilitating, like, a discussion amongst, like, design professionals around town of, like. You know, what's really the barrier to You know, affordable housing, development, commercial properties, you know, like, We need that discussion. You know, and I could see Dab playing that kind of role, you know. I don't know necessarily if… these aren't necessarily, issues that DAB needs to solve, in my mind.
[113:02] No. something that we need to give to City Council and say, like, this is a big problem, and… and, you know, here we have some, we have some suggestions on maybe, what needs… maybe what needs to be changed, and then it's kind of up to City Council to… to figure out, like, kind of how it's changed. Sure, yeah, I mean… So maybe if we can just sort of give some suggestions of, like. This is… this is a problem. We have too much vacant retail. And we don't, you know, necessarily know all the reasons why, but, you know, the retail requirements, and… you know, the developers themselves, or the high rents, or, you know, we have a client right now that just moved into a space, and she took advantage of a program, that's sort of like, affordable housing, but it's affordable retail.
[114:05] Like, a minority female business owner, and she got a great deal on… rent in leasing this restaurant space, and that's rad. Like, I would love to see a ton of that happening, in Boulder, you know, just to get… Just to get people that wouldn't otherwise be able to afford retail rent, and just mom and pop, or one-off. No, it's like an… pop in. embarrassing. Like, my daughter goes to Colorado College in Colorado Springs, and… you know, it's funny, because Boulderites are like, oh my god, Colorado Springs, you know, I'm like, when's the last time you've been down there recently? Like… don't judge until… you know, have you been to the Olympic Museum? Can you imagine the Olympic Museum being built in Boulder? Yeah, right. And, you know, like, their whole down… the old part of downtown where CC is.
[115:01] There's all these boutiques, there's restaurants… there is not a single chain, well, I can't say that, but hardly any, like, chain stores down there, and it's, like, fun to go shopping there, like… you know, it's, like, great, you know, and you… and actually, I talked to one of the store owners, they're like, yeah, we have a whole thing that, like. Basically, encourages local participation and quickly getting into vacant spots. You know, and it's like, we could be doing that. There are plenty… there's plenty of people with money in this town that would love to, you know, try their hand at, like, a… you know, boutique. store in Boulder, and they're just gone. So, you know, they have a few in Louisville and Lafayette, like, what's our problem? Like, I just don't get it. Right. And it's really a problem, it really is. It's starting to be, like… it's gonna be embarrassing when You know, when we have, Sundance in town, and everyone's like, oh, this is like the…
[116:03] you know, outdoor… I always joke, like, how many pairs of yoga pants can… women in Boulder really buy, you know? A lot. You know, a lot! There, there is no top end, Steven. There is no topic. I'm, I'm wearing yoga pants right now. You are, cool! We could write… we could write that in the letter, we're… we're in the… many pairs of the uniform. A limit to the number of yoga pants you're allowed to own in the city. But I don't know, I mean, it sounds like… I'm just kind of thinking out loud, like, what if we kind of identify these larger, you know, development, design. things… You know, and just throw out some… solutions… So that's… complaining, and then we have some that's very specific, dab, like, I love the idea of somehow interfacing with planning board, whether it's, you know, we ad hoc, we just do it as a
[117:00] community member, or something formal, but I think… I think they're in that mood to, like, have Like, solutions, not just, like, whoa is us, you guys figure it out, you know? So I don't know, I mean, I think, You know, if we look at the economically vital portion of the strategic plan, strategy 14 and 15 really seem to be… We can… fit, I think, what we're talking about into either one of those, and that's… and it, you know, it talks about the, the retail strategy and vitality of businesses, and… Excuse me. I think that, unifort… I'm trying to fit. Our letter within their plan. That might be good. Yeah, I mean, and it could be radical, like, have you guys ever been to Savannah, Georgia?
[118:02] Where SCAD is. So, about 25 years ago, Savannah was in pretty rough shape, and SCAD started buying up lots of property, but at one point, throughout Savannah, they had all this empty retail space, and they literally put student artwork throughout Savannah. We're talking 50 or 60 Retail spaces that were vacant. They just put in student artwork. And now it's become this mecca to come and buy art, you know, in Savannah, and it's amazing, you know, and then eventually, SCAD itself started buying up these buildings, and You know, and just doing that. But… it's like… it feels like we're kind of at that point, where, you know, I mean, it's like that building on Canyon and… What is it, 15th? you know, every time I try buying that all the time, like, oh my god, like… How could there be not one single of one of those spaces being rented after, what, we're going on 2 years now?
[119:07] at least change the damn posters on the windows, so they're all the same, you know? Like, do something funny on there, do something, you know? Like… Right, like, it's comical at this point, we're just… I mean, like, did you guys do, Roots Festival at all? The music festival is downtown. That was great! It was the first year they did it. so cool. They had all these venues, they just became music venues. It was awesome, and it's like… We gotta just do more of that kind of thing, you know, with these… and just… whatever, just pressure Tebow and the rest of them to, like, you know. do a… do a one-month rental, and let something… let people try it out, you know, and let… and get the city on board, somehow, like… Whatever it is, it's like, it's getting bad.
[120:03] Yeah, so I don't know… You know how specific we have to tailor the letter to? These strategies, but… I think it, you know, helps… it helps put… You know, our language… Yeah. It integrates it into their language a little bit better. So if we… if we take, like. there was one… there are some letters in the past that have been longer than others. Right. And, that first one, I think it was kind of… it was almost bulleted, and You know, there were a couple of… a bunch of different suggestions that the… board made, and I think that we could, you know, do something similar with this that, has to do with, you know, suggestions of economic vitality in Boulder through good, appropriate design, whether that's, you know, having
[121:11] DAB involved more, or, with the planning, whether it's streamlining this process. I mean, they talk a lot about streamlining government in general. And I think that… that the building department Needs to be a part of that streamlining, And then maybe the, you know, making some suggestions on paring back the retail requirements. Well, and also trying, you know, maybe setting up some way of, like. experimenting, like, you know, during COVID, when they had all the restaurants out in the street on Pearl Street, and everybody loved it, and then they took it away. you know. Which was a big bummer. It was in, Matt, somewhere in Louisiana, I can't remember which… it's not in Baton Rouge.
[122:06] there's a city down there, and they had this, like, dead downtown, and during COVID, they did that, and… then, like, their zoning didn't allow it, and they all said, well, we all love it, let's just make it keep going, and now this town is totally revitalized. Like, people go downtown to eat and drink, and they have, like, you know, basically, it's like a street party every Friday night, where before no one even went downtown in this… I forget what town. Yeah. It is. But I mean, I don't know, it seems like we can get more… Like, try stuff, rather than… You know, para… analysis paralysis, like, that… I don't think Boulder's like the… bubble, it's like, Boulder's the analysis paralysis capital. like… We gotta try stuff. Well, I mean, it doesn't sound like everybody will be able to make the December meeting Either, but,
[123:06] I think that we… you know. Can… can take some of these suggestions from tonight and really… workshop them, I think, With some other board members, and really come up with some specific… Yeah, I mean… Kalani and Amelia, like, maybe we can send out to, like, the… everybody, like, hey, we want to… you know, kind of ideas that we can brainstorm. You know, because we wait till next time, they're not there. You know, it'd be nice for people to… chime in, and they could send it to you. You know, we can't send it to each other, but we could kind of compile it, and then you could give it. You can have. fact. The most you can work on something like that is two people, and then it's a meeting. So. But if we all… the way that it would have to go to meet the open meetings is, you could discuss, kind of, frame out tonight what's going to go on the draft. Whoever is the scribe.
[124:08] is gonna… Rough out that rough draft. Give it to us, and we can resend it to the group. And then, the full board, and then it'll be on the December agenda. And for the folks that are not going to be at the December meeting, what they can do is, they could just submit a letter for the December meeting of their input. And it can be discussed at the December meeting on what you're gonna pull in, what you're not gonna pull in. But it needs to be finalized in December, so there won't be… we can't, run some, back and forth between the two. Sure, right. Yeah, we're gonna have to book that meeting. I mean, I think… Right? Okay, go ahead. answering. I was just saying that, if that's the case, I don't think we even need to, like, bullet anything out tonight, because this could be…
[125:00] Probably… I would like to just maybe make a record… that we focus the group on strategy 14 and 15, like Brendan is saying. Yeah. And give some direction to the rest of the board for the next meeting, come prepared with you know, some priorities that fit within these two strategies. I agree, like, as we're scrolling through all of these, this is, like, really where we make our money, you know, and there's no need to get any broader than two. Sure. To, sort of, these two strategies, but… But is there a way to sort of… We can notify the rest of the board that this is where we're gonna be focusing our efforts next meeting, and that they should… Familiar with this, and prepared to… What we talked with Brendan about was to do, we could do an early packet, Matthew, where… take the direction from your meeting tonight, compile it, you could, you can put together, like, this screenshot of this.
[126:14] And maybe a brief summary of what you guys talked about tonight on what you're focusing on. We could package that up as the packet. Yeah. And we could get it out, you know, really early, so they have, you know, the whole group has a long time to look at it. We could do it like that. And then, for the folks that won't be there for December. They can send a letter directly to staff, and then we can also, you know, then we can repost that to the whole board. I think, I mean, I would like to say that we, tell the rest of the board members to come prepared, to talk about, you know, some specific additions or suggestions for Strategies 14 and 15, but additionally, the, City Council… on the City Council priorities page, they… they're… one of their big… and it's broken, it only has, like.
[127:13] Not 10 priorities or something, but it says one of their top priorities is family-friendly, vibrant neighborhoods, and it's, Talking about the zoning and use code updates. And I… feel like it might be a missed opportunity if we don't say something specific about that, because I think we… you know, we have a lot of, parking lot issues, as Steven is spearheading for us. No, I don't have any from tonight, though. I don't know what we're gonna park. No. that we're gonna ban Lickin' stick throughout Boulder. Or this, I mean, the stucco, the. Okay, yeah, that's a good one. Parking lot issue. Okay. And also, we talked about that tab, the, you know, redesigning a road. That's, like, out of our purview, but, I mean…
[128:04] Parking lot, that. But I just think, you know, that there's… I wish that they would look to us more. When they're having these conversations about, Design and use codes and… Right. Well, one thing that's coming up, and Clanie, I don't know… I'm curious what's happening along… around Prop 123. I mean, I went to the Housing Colorado conference. Like, a few weeks ago? ago. the state bill, and so you have to, from submittal to building permits, do it in 90 days. And how the F is Boulder gonna pull that off? The rural people are all set up to do it, and it's a lot of money. We're… you know, hundreds of millions of dollars. And I'm like, wow, is Bowler really gonna just leave that money on the table?
[129:01] I mean… You know, and what… how are we all gonna pull together to, like, be able to do that? You know, because you… I'm not familiar enough for what's happening at the city level to facilitate that, but, right. I can put you in touch with someone, I can look into. Yeah, that would be good, because they, you know, because they have to figure it out, they have a year to figure it out, otherwise… I mean, it'll be like you won't get the… you won't get any money, you know, it's a lot of money. You know, and then we're gonna shoot ourselves in the foot by… not finger… I mean, that's probably part of embedded in this, but it's pretty… it was… I mean, even Denver's doing it. Denver has… Denver's already spearheading AI doing planning reviews, and they've had some success, which is pretty interesting. They were talking about it as a conference, you know, because it's… You know, basically, if-then statements, you know, running through the code, and it was… Pretty interesting, and they were able to chop 2 months off of some of these projects by running the planning process through AI.
[130:02] I'm not sure, but what I would say is, like the… like Council asked, is something that can be completed in a year. So, if, if you can really direct… I think that that… seeing the board write the letters that they've written over the last 10 years. The ones that seem to get, traction are the ones that answer the question that they're asking. Right. And that… so if it… and have a tangible… association with it that's, you know, completable kinds of, you know, that. Fuck. And so, I would keep that in mind as you're working through some of these things here, is because you'll get another chance to do another letter next year. Sure. So if you can keep it to something that they've asked for, aligning with their strategic plan and what is on their work plan now.
[131:00] within that year. And if you can tie them together, that's also really helpful. Like, if you can draw the line between those those topics. Right, I mean, Strategy 15 is… is that. I mean, it… I mean, the state law on Prop 123 is… you have, like. you know, till… till the end of next year, I think it is. To figure it out, like, you have to have a 90-day process in place, fully… vetted? You know, or you just… you wait another year, you don't get the money. Like, it's… and it's millions of… I mean, we're talking millions and millions of dollars, like… you know, Ponderosa, fully funded, you know, Stuff like that, and it's… it'll be interesting. I mean, it was interesting at the… housing conference, because people were like… the rural places were like, yup, we got this, we can do it, because we can just make it happen, but… It's like, I'm curious.
[132:01] Anyways, yeah, I mean, like, yeah, Strategy 15, there's a lot of meat in there that we could help with. You know, like, what would it be? You know, and just a quick one would be, like, tonight's meeting. If we were way at the beginning, that would streamline the process for them. Like, they wouldn't even have to have this meeting tonight with us, because we would have already vetted this stuff. You know, a year ago, whenever they submitted first. And I… and I think, like, Strategy 15, Priority Action C, I mean, it just, like… The process happened. 15, the last one, develop ways to make it easier for individuals and businesses to understand and navigate city processes. Especially the building department, like, especially. Right. development. I just think that has to be a… like, it's so important to… Us, as professionals, and to our clients, and to the community at large, of… of making,
[133:07] You know, making good transitions in the community, which is one of their priorities, and… . That one's funny, because if you fed that through ChatGPT, it would flip it around, it would be… it would say, develop processes… develop city processes that are easier to understand and navigate. Right. Right. It wouldn't say it the other way around. Right. Which is funny. So I think that that could be really helpful. I was, laughing, because I think it was maybe my first year on the board when it was… we were tasked with, every year we've been tasked with something different for the prompt of this letter, but that one year we were like, what… what makes you happy on this board, and what. It's bad. Oh, I saw your… The way that was worded was so weird, I think we were like, I don't know. One of the all-time great.
[134:00] bad. Yeah, and then Jameson's letter was hilarious. I was like, what? What happened that year? Yeah. That was a rant. I don't… Right, yeah. It's funny to see who's been on DAB, too, all those years, too, which is kind of funny. Alright, well, if, if we can, figure out a way to encourage the other members, and I think even if you're not able to attend the meeting. He has some ideas. email suggestions to Amelia and Kalani that can be shared with the rest of. So, I would… what I could ask is, whoever's a scribe that's going to do this, give… that could send… what you could do is… Have a quick little summary page, one pager. That you can give to Amelia and myself, you know, kind of explaining where you're targeting.
[135:05] This Economically Vital section. And a little bit of the discussion, and then the expectations for the next meeting. And, just let folks know, you know, That you're gonna be, If they can't be there, they can provide Information back for us. back to the staff, and we can forward it on to the board for the discussion in September. So basically, write the… you'll put together just a little brief on what we're doing. what you guys are doing. And then, So, probably good to find out who wants to do that portion tonight. You're gonna draw straws, then. And then also, you know, because it'll be writing on the fly when you get to… When you get to December, so… The board's done it one of two ways. They've done it where they didn't write anything early.
[136:04] And then we're struggling the night of. Right. To complete and draft, you know, writing by committee can be difficult sometimes. Because of the wordsmithing and trying to get through that. So, it's helpful to have some draft, so if we… whoever the scribe is can have some kind of draft to… respond to for the group, based on some of the direction. That's helpful, it's just an outline. Brother. It doesn't have to be fully fleshed out, but maybe an outline for your letter. Alright, I'll volunteer, if you guys don't… unless somebody else wants to do it. I've done it before, Steven, so I will… I'll gladly let you do that. Oh, great. Alright, I'll do it. And Brandon, maybe before… I'll try to do it the next, like, this week, and maybe… we could meet at Spruce or something and just go over it before I send, you know, we send it out. Does that sound good? Because we can meet, but just the.
[137:04] Yeah, two of you can meet, so you and Brandon could meet. But I won't. say. Okay. You know, this… we… our… so the packet… Just so you know, the official due date for the packet, for us to post it. is I would need it by, the 28th of… November. Oh, okay, so we got more time. But if you… so it gives you a couple weeks, but if you give it to me earlier. I can post it earlier. Okay. The 28th is, you know, we post it the next Monday, because it takes some time to get everything together for the rest of the packet. Sure. But if you… if you get it to me earlier that week, I can get it out… we can try to get it out earlier for you, because that'll give you, you know. more time as a group and the folks that were not here. Is that… when's Thanks… Thanksgiving's, like, the 20…
[138:02] Yes, so that's the other thing is, it's the 27th, I think? 27th, okay. But, sorry, so it's due the November 28th, but we can't talk about it until December… Whatever. 10th is the meeting day. Yeah. So… Talk in pairs. Yeah, so what you're… what you're putting together, this, like, letter and this… The instructions for the other folks that if you want… you know how you get a packet? for the projects. Like, if you want a packet to go out about this to the rest of the board members, a little letter, an email, whatever, we can… We can, put that together for you if you feel like that's gonna help, you know, drive the conversation and really complete the letter. That sounds good. So, Brandon, I think I can… how about… Get me through the weekend. And then, like, early next week, we could… Get some coffee.
[139:03] And I can tweak it, and then I'll send it. Middle. Perfect. …the end of next week. We can post it for. And then it could be, like, you know, Thanksgiving reading. And homework. Yeah, there you go. If you get it to us early enough, we could get it out the week before to the rest of the board, before Thanksgiving, so they get extra time with the holiday. You all will have extra time to look at it. Yeah. And I mean, really, the… the… two links that Amelia put in that, email that brought this email to the top of our emails, with the citywide strategic plan, that link, and then the link to the city council priorities. Yeah. I think those are the most helpful. Great. In terms of, like. I mean, and you may want to drill down a little bit and let them know you're focusing on the economically vital one here. Right. And if there was… I can't remember if it was Strategy 15 and a particular… Whatever.
[140:04] 14 and 15, I think, I mean, we could get more specific if we wanted to, but. And then I was looking at that. if, you know, if we need to focus more on the priorities, it seems like those are the priorities this year. Although, when I look through that, it looks like they have 100% solved homelessness. Oh. Right? Awesome. That's… Rad. But, so I… I don't… I don't exactly understand how the prior… Which works, but… their work plan, and how they progress on the work plan, and where they're at. They have some itemized things. Yeah, yeah. Usually there's a list of tasks for each topic, and as they check off each task, Right. They have an agenda of… I've heard it. They want to accomplish for that.
[141:01] But the home of this program, yes. But, I mean, I think if there's things in there that… Tie back to what you've been talking about, or you want to tie those together with some of the strategic plan, you should definitely grab that, too. Okay. Tie them together. The more, like, I think the systems types of thinking on how these things kind of work together will be helpful in your letter. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, let's just keep it simple then, and… and… 14 and 15, and come up with some… Yeah, like, like… Anyways. Shovel-ready things that they could do to… Right. do some of these things. I think that's… Gonna be key, because these are so general. Right? That they start to, you know, be typical, like. Political stuff that doesn't go anywhere, because it's, like, Alright? So what's… What's the specific… You know, way to attack this, not just like, oh, we're gonna attack this.
[142:04] Or we… or we as a board think that City Council should make this a priority, and we don't have the answers necessarily, but we have, some things that need to be streamlined, or some… Right. Yeah, or even examples, right, exam… yeah. Yeah. No, we don't necessarily have the answers, but we can… Brainstorm suggestions. Right. Yeah. All right, well, we have, 6 minutes. I know everybody has a hard stop at 6.30, so… Steven, reach out. you know. Yeah. And we'll, we'll try and, come up with… a plan for the December meeting. Okay. Amelia has her hand raised. Yeah, I just… I don't want to throw a little bureaucratic wrench in right at the end, but
[143:01] We… I know we kind of skipped over the minutes, the approval of the minutes earlier in the meeting. Even though there were no, there was no project to discuss at that meeting, I think we should still just do an official approval, just so I can get it signed and filed with Central Records. Oh, sorry. It's okay. And I have it here if you want me to pull it up, but, it was in the packet, and . Yeah. If we could just kind of do that just for… just for the record. I move that we approve the minutes from our… October meeting, is that right? Yes. A second. Awesome. Thank you. Yeah, sorry about that. There was a couple things where I was like, oh, I… Did it wrong again, I skipped work. Okay, but it's kind of funny when you don't… it's not, like, a normal process, right? And it was… there was not a lot of items in there, so…
[144:00] And we were trying to do things, like, a little. We've had a lot of that tonight, where we're like, oh, we forgot to put the timer up, oh, we did. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I didn't get this. Well, at least we got to practice with the applicant to get there. Yeah. Okay. listed right, so… Yeah. Yeah, we did… we did pretty good. I feel like I'm still not nailing it either, but we're getting there. Just practice. So we'll look forward to hearing from you in the next week or… week and a half or so, as you guys are working on that, and I will let you know if we have, anything was submitted as far as a DAB project for December, but I don't believe we have anything. So far, but, yeah, application closed tonight, so I'll know tomorrow morning. Okay. Anything came through. And appreciate your time. Yeah. Great, thank you. Good review. Thank you. Awesome. Alright, Karen. Bye. Bye. Bye.