June 29, 2020 — Housing Advisory Board Joint Session

Transcript

[MM:SS] timestamps correspond to the YouTube recording.

[0:00] and then vice versa um housing Advisory Board will mostly be discussing and then we'll prompt HRC for your questions at the end jacqu you're muted there you go I hit it twice if there are no other questions on the agenda review piece then we could move on to open comment for public participation Brenda if we have anyone we do have one person um with a hand raised if others would like to participate in open comment at this time for issues that are not on tonight's agenda um now is the time you would find the participant icon on your menu either by scrolling at the bottom of your screen or the top of your screen click on participants and at the bottom of that box will be a button that says

[1:00] raise hand and that's how you can indicate to us that you would like to participate in open comment tonight thank you all right so we have Jay if you're ready with the timer um Jay will be sharing his screen with a three minute timer and I'm just going to give him a moment for that also Marie if you can send me your last name in the chat box I can put that on your um your full name associated with your participation first we will have Lynn Lynn seagull and next we will have Marie sorry that's my son talking about my puppy all right we'll be coming to Lynn seagull first Lynn I am asking you to unmute I tried to unmute about 10 times and I could have already made my mistake my statement by the time you went through all these procedures and the

[2:00] procedures and don't interest me at all it's not okay about the recording not being applied because of security threats I don't buy that at all let's get over it we've got a community here that we have to join in times of covid when we cannot see or meet each other and we need to meet this way in spite of any security issues I'm sorry this is our life and our community that needs to be integrated and it can't because we can't see each other it's not okay I don't want to hear that spoken each time in front of any public meeting now I want to know what you're going to do about direct dialogue with people because there is not now there is not you do not hear the public you don't listen and you don't care for example the Gallagher Amendment repeal anyone

[3:01] have an opinion upon that I sure do because I had to go to the first three you know the Board of Equalization each one now I have to prepare for the board of assessment appeals unrepresented because I can't afford that to to hold up the value of my property as being falsely elevated which it is and it was this week at the planning board when they approved three stories for 1725 and 1727 Pearl that was a subsidy a direct subsidy to increase housing costs in Boulder and then of course you people at the HRC and the hab are working on how you're going to deal with the homeless you are not working consistently you're you're working inefficiently you're creating expensive housing as fast as you can build it at the ballom at Pearl 21 at the Mark at Bluff Street at the the diagonal Plaza

[4:01] at let's just name them all over town condos that are affordable for the middle how are the middle going to pay for $400,000 condos with HOA fees that's not for the middle this is a bigger bigger playay in What's called the jinny index do all of you know what the jinny index is that's called The Wealth inequity in our culture we need to bring that number down to zero or towards zero at least and all Boulder's doing is kicking it up and then you're going to complain here for three hours and I'm going to listen about affordable housing about homeless people about human relations issues that come from this this is unacceptable and there is no hope in any situation in the city of Boulder the way they've been operating for decades and they're not listening and they're not going to do anything different but I'm sure going to have my say here you need

[5:00] to clean up your act Boulder done okay thank you Lynn um and Brenda anyone next yep next we have Marie Marie I don't have your last name but I am going to unmute you and if you would start by sharing your first and last name we would appreciate that very much you should be able to unmute now Marie um let's see Marie are you able to unmute sorry can you hear me now we can thank you uh and I was trying to respond but just somehow it couldn't figure it out my last name is shaffner s c h a FF like in Frank N R I live in Boulder I have two questions uh one is what if any is the

[6:00] hrc's role in promoting diversity and employment particularly within the city of Boulder it's my one moment Jay if you could start the timer please thank you sorry about that Marie you may Begin Again should I repeat that okay what if any is the human relation Comm human relation commission's role in promoting diversity in employment and in particular within the city of Boulder it's my first question uh my second question is I requested I sent letters uh one to Lindsay uh lerg as well as the city manager and city council uh requesting that Personnel data that shows the number of people of color employed within the city of Boulder in particular people who hold managerial positions positions of influence and then make the information public and my question is will this

[7:01] [Music] happen that's it thank you okay thank you maray appreciate that sorry about the timer mishap my apologies thank you Marie that is all jaac okay thank you um so we'll move on now to agenda item five addressing homelessness uh listening session and um looks like we're doing well on time so we'll start with Vicki Ebner uh giving us an overview uh of the Homeless Solutions for Boulder County thank you Vicki oh there you are sorry I don't mean to I don't mean to interrupt yeah is is there is is this the time to respond to the to the direct questions to us I think if you can make it relatively brief we have time we could do that for

[8:01] sure cool Marie yeah thanks thanks Marie for your questions um I believe that is going to happen I don't know if um the city's City captures all of the data that you've asked for but I think that the the data that the city captures that you've asked for can be made public and um there is also an open data request um on the city's website and I can follow up with you about that um the hrc's role in promoting diversity I mean we act as advisory to city council um and um there are a few opportunities every year um where we um have an opportunity to send feedback to city council um one of these is a annual letter um to city council um however we um can um raise urgent issues to them through the same method of Correspondence um at any

[9:00] time um and if you have more questions we can we can email you have my email thanks for that Lindsay so Vicki go ahead um actually even though it says Vicky's name yes yeah actually most of it's going to be Vicky but I'm just kicking kicking off the presentation and then turning it over to Vicki okay great thanks Wendy and um Jay is helping us out thank you Jay um with the slides uh so I'm just going to adjust my screen here a moment um Wendy while you're doing that I'll just give a little Pro tip that um you'll see that your view of the folks in the meeting has gotten much smaller while we're sharing screens you can move that box around as you need to you can also

[10:00] change the configuration if you Mouse over um the top of where you see people um it has a few different configurations that you can use um in case you need to see different parts of the screen thank you very much Brenda um this thanks for everyone for bearing with me I guess this is the first presentation I've given this way so um good evening board members and Commissioners my name is Wendy Schwarz I am the Human Services policy manager for the city and I'll be presenting to you tonight on homelessness in partnership with Vicky Ebner our homeless initiatives manager so uh next slide please Jay we'll start out with some of the questions that we'll be asking you uh at the end about topics we're going to cover in the presentation and these are also going to be the questions we'll ask city council when we present the

[11:00] material to them on July 14th so we'll be showing this slide again at the end of the presentation when we're starting the discussion so you don't have to write them down but we did want to provide the questions to you in advance so you can have them in your mind as you're watching the presentation so we'll be covering tonight um interventions not currently included in the homelessness strategy including items such as sanctioned encampments um we'll be talking about changes to some homelessness programs such as navigation and diversion uh we'll be talking about the way we use our housing resources among vulnerable po populations and also the connections of programs with national evidence-based and best practices so those are the things We'll be asking for board and commission feedback at the end of the presentation tonight next slide Jay uh this slide is a brief refresher on our homelessness strategy I know many of you attended a briefing on this in March which was a substitute for the bus

[12:01] tour we unfortunately couldn't do because of the pandemic rather than going through every strategy goal listed on this slide I thought it might be useful to give some background on how the strategy came about and the community community conditions at that time so our new strategy was implemented in October 2017 Under the countywide Umbrella of Homeless Solutions for Boulder County Homeless Solutions for bould County or HSBC so you'll hear us for the rest of the presentation talk about HSBC is a collaborative effort and that includes the cities of Boulder and Longmont Boulder County our local housing authorities and Community Partners serving homeless individuals um such as Bridge house Boulder shelter for the homeless as well as our health and mental health providers uh the strategy grew out of a community working group that started in 2016 and included many of the partners I

[13:00] just mentioned as well as two Representatives with lived experience in homelessness that group was facilitated and advised by a consultant Corporation for Supportive Housing or CSH which specializes in advising communities Nationwide on homelessness at that time what we had in the community was several nonprofits working very hard to help people experiencing homelessness but we really didn't have a good handle on who accessing the services or what they needed it was unclear how many people were really being helped out of homelessness since the data was very limited and uncoordinated we really focused on winter Sheltering and had almost no summer Sheltering and during those years the demands for Sheltering went up every year and Boulder Outreach for homeless overflow which was also known as boho in the community uh they provided winter Sheltering at rotating Faith locations they were serving ing more and more people every year and at the same time

[14:01] Boulder shelter for the Homeless was also hitting capacity more often and turning more and more people away what we did know was that most people had lost hope of ever getting out of homelessness into housing many having been homeless in Boulder for years and we received many complaints from both the housed and unhoused Community about how the situation seemed to be getting steadily worse with no apparent efforts with no apparent success from the efforts so many people were making so the working group developed a strategy that focused on the thing that all the evidence says makes the real difference for people experiencing homelessness and that's housing and that's where the heart of HSBC efforts go um and we put our money where our mouth was when we did that strategy so previously prior to 2017 we spent about $230,000 annually on operating expenses for adult homeless services and and then over the years we invested Capital

[15:02] amounts in homeless housing developments and so an example of that is 1175 Lee Hill but since 2017 we've increased our annual funding for adult homeless Services operating by about 77% and in addition to our Capital investments in homeless housing such as for instance the attention attention homes development we've added about $870,000 in annual funding for homeless housing rent subsidies and the Supportive Services that people need to stay in housing excuse me of note many local housing resources for people experiencing homelessness are funded through state and federal resources so our local funds are supplemental and that's a pretty unique situation um most municipalities do not put that kind of local funding into homeless housing accordingly our success successful exits are way up um it's true

[16:00] that prior to 2017 the data was really limited on who was getting housed but the estimates from that time indicate that our providers are now successfully exiting about the same number of people in two to three months that they used to do all year so next slide with that history I'll go on to highlight how we evaluate the kind of system changes that Vicki's going to talk about so starting at the top with the green circle on this slide um I noted before that the core guiding goal of HSBC is housing and that's part of a national strategy known as housing first and housing first means that you focus on getting the person into housing as quickly as possible and you deal with all the other issues later so you're not going to try and solve their drug problem before they get into housing you're not going to wait until they get a job because all of those problems are going to be a lot more manageable if they have stable housing so when we in HS BC look at potential new programs or

[17:02] other changes we're really going to look hard at how that change either furthers or to tracks from getting people into housing as quickly as possible if we go around the circle to the right um the purple circle we also look at alignment with the city's homelessness strategy and HSBC goals which we just talked about we also look at how the change aligns with data and evidence in the community and nationally we really want to invest in things that have evidence supporting that they'll work and that makes sense with the trends we're seeing in our community so our data is definitely far from perfect but it's better than what most communities have and it's certainly light years beyond what we used to have we look at whether the change is cost effective so the blue circle down there um and we think about the results we expect to see in that context in general if we look at spending money

[18:01] on something we're going to ask how the results we would expect from that program compare to results we would expect if we use the resources for housing people experiencing homelessness and finally we've heard pretty strongly from a variety of sources including many people serving adults experiencing homelessness that we're not going to be able to be everything to everyone that might want to come to Boulder and we need to prioritize services and housing for people that call Boulder County home even if they don't have a home so we do prioritize services and housing for people that have been in Boulder County for six months or more so with that background and summary of the homelessness strategy and HSBC I'm going to turn it over to Vicki to go over where we're at now thank you and good evening I thought it would be helpful to kind of go through some of our recent changes and how those are going to impact what we are discussing tonight so um on

[19:02] this slide what we're really looking at is the impact of combining both the housing Pocus shelter and the navigation program both of which were Consolidated on June 1st at Boulder shelter for the homeless or bsh the uh activity was actually done through an RFP for navigation services and it was awarded to bsh who was the only applicant uh to prepare for that consolidation B such has been aggressively housing its long-term residents and has made significant Improvement in reducing its average nightly Sheltering and one caveat that I have to bring up is that Co can kind of skew some of our numbers and so I would point out however that prior to covid bsh was functioning between about 62% of their capacity in the summer months and 81% of their capacity in winter months and those are based on monthly averages uh after or during covid uh

[20:01] they did make some reductions to their number of beds that are available however they have been able to accommodate the navigation program and a little bit later I'll talk about the impact of um eligibility changes on the navigation program that also helped be able to uh facilitate this change Jay um can I go to the next slide please so um in February we implemented or I should say the HSBC implemented a six-month residency requirement for most of our programs the diversion program is established primarily to Aid people who don't meet that six-month residency criteria but is actually open for anybody diversion uh for goodies education is a national B practice it's targeted keeping people from entering shelters in the first place and helping them not become long-term homeless uh the longer person stays in a homelessness situation the more

[21:01] intensive uh the resource to get them housed is um the uh most common Intervention when you're looking at a diversion type program is reunifying people with their support services one important key I would give you on this is that reunification is not merely connecting them where where they may feel more comfortable in their previous location but it's ensuring or to our best abilities that there is something on that other end so if somebody's uh new to the community their uh all of their support is in another state they want to go back to that other state where they believe they can get better services our diversion Services people are working to make sure that there is actually somebody that is willing to help them on the other side so it's not just sending them outside of the community the uh overwhelming number of

[22:02] people that have been going through our coordinated entry system which is our front door for services um they've been in the community for less than a month and that would be the uh white line in the chart on the right and uh they may have better opportunities in their home communities once they start looking at really what is available to them here in Boulder County and this is still a very new program I would like to add as I mentioned it just started in February so we're still monitoring those Trends looking at the challenges and gathering enough data so that we can see if we are providing the correct service and be able to make any changes that need to happen one of the things about HSBC is that it is a learning organization and so our ability to collect data which Wendy mentioned is a Hallmark of this Depart of this uh

[23:00] collaborative allows us to be able to respond to some of those changes Jan next slide please so I mentioned earlier that there were some activities that happened on the navigation program the uh path to home navigation program was run by Bridge house up until May 31st very admirably and has lots of uh really good outcomes for their clients um but did mention that they did not apply for the RFP and so the service is changing over to bsh um who was already scheduled to be actually housing the people who are going through the navigation program one of the benefits of combining these two programs at one location is that we can have a more efficient use of limited resources while maintaining that program of services for lower barrier individuals the big difference between housing Focus shelter which is offered has and was was operate at Boulder shelter for the homeless and

[24:01] navigation Services is the number of barriers that somebody has to getting out of homelessness so uh typically housing Focus shelter clientele or people that have been homeless for longer term and they have a disabling condition I would add that the length of homelessness is not a criteria for homeless Housing poer Shelter but it does tend to be a bigger variable um navigation services these are typically people that are a little bit lower needs for ass assistance and intervention they don't have a diagnosed U disabling condition um typically they tend to be a little bit newer to homelessness um so they need help with more creative Housing Solutions uh looking at uh rapid rehousing type of initiatives any kind of uh roommate situations job job SE Arch help all those kind of things that go into that

[25:01] um so our City's commitment to operating our navigation at 30th Street was quite significant um annually it costs about $950,000 a year from the city um that is for the lease of the building and for the navigation program operations that does not include uh severe weather shelter operations costs so prior to the changes in eligibility criteria the path toome program was averaging a nightly senses of about 38 people per night uh they did have a u a bed capacity of 50 people per night so they were running on average pretty a little bit below that we were paying about the same amount for each navigation sh shelter CAU as we would be for Supportive Housing units for somebody including their Case Management Services um another thing to keep in mind is that the majority of people that are served by the program haven't been in the community for more than six

[26:00] months so the majority of this clientele is now seen through diversion following the eligibility criteria changes and that allows for the physical location to be Consolidated and the funding that can be reallocated toward housing the change in the eligibility criteria is one factor that contributes to the reduction in navigation clients and in addition uh the program staff are reporting that a number of people dropped out of navigation at the implementation of an every night severe weather Sheltering which happened in January late January of 2020 next slide please so excuse me um as noted on the chart of the right the majority of the people using severe weather shelter are newer to the community and with over half of the people that used the shelter during this past season have been through coordinated entry within the last last year in order to use these limited resources more effectively to

[27:01] get people to help them get into housing situations through year round program the HSBC is recommending a return to the weather triggered Sheltering and severe weather shelter be offered at bsh the goal of the HSBC and the homelessness strategy has always been to cons consolidate Boulder Sheltering services at bsh and to focus those resources on housing and make shelter a temporary solution for residents in addition no other costeffective SWS location or staffing has been identified and we have to reduce our 2020 and 2021 budgets as part of Citywide reductions other budget concerns involve fairness for other local community residents and poverty and this is going to be discovered uh discussed a little bit later with Wendy and her community impact piece um one thing I would note is that moving this to bsh uh will lead to a reduced number of available beds for severe weather shelter than we have recently had in

[28:02] Prior years however the consolidation of this process will be a much more effective use of the resources and will have better outcomes next slide uh this chart is reflecting um all of our housing exits that we have reported through the um the boulder system so this is specifically looking at exits as reported by Boulder shelter for the homeless and Bridge house over the past year and so um as you can see um these numbers are are sizeably increasing uh from where they were in 2017 I shouldn't say as you can see because actually you can't see prior to 2017 on this chart but um it just goes to show that exits are a main goal and that um the types of exits differ depending on the person's need so one

[29:00] thing that I always like to clarify is that housing is not limited to permanent Supportive Housing which we spend a lot of time talking about permanent Supportive Housing but there's a great deal of other resources that go into how we're going to get somebody housed and that may be as I mentioned earlier rapid re housing it could be um one-time rental assistance and any number of creative Housing Solutions that can come up reunification is still and will continue to be a key intervention and referment referrals to things like treatment centers and other programs such as ready to work um make up another share of exits from homelessness next slide please so I just mentioned that there are a lot of different housing options but as I said we spend a lot of time talking about permanent Supportive Housing mainly because this is our most intensive um intervention for homelessness and it is also more

[30:02] expensive that being said I'm sure um people will point out to you that um when you start looking at the community impact that people who experien chronic homelessness um create in a community that cost is somewhere between 30 to $50,000 a year and your typical permanent Supportive Housing Voucher plus case management costs a little bit less than $20,000 a year uh the housing specifically permanent Supportive Housing is accomplished through a variety of different ways um the locally funded vouchers which as Wendy mentioned is is something that is I won't say unique but unusual in most communities um plays a big factor in our flexibility in order to respond to uh particular needs that maybe aren't being met through a more Regional process um it's also the creation of new units

[31:01] and leveraging what we can from other Regional opportunities um for example um one of the things that we that has been quite frankly a game changer is that the local housing authorities agreed to set aside 20% of their affordable housing vacancies to use for people experiencing homelessness we were then able to leverage that against a samsa which is I line wrong actual definition of samsa but it's um a grant that was provided to us for mental health services and we match those Mental Health Service Grant dollars to provide the case management for the people who go into the Housing Authority set ofde vouchers and that's probably one of the greatest strengths of the HSBC is that we can do that so it's not just the city paying for something or the county or lont really use and maximize every do we can Vicky I'm going to interrupt really

[32:01] quickly your sound is getting a little glitchy um may I suggest you turn off your video that can sometimes support the sound being smoother sure in theory yes let me find my video screen now that it's all scrunched you know what I got you okay thank you there we go okay so Jay if we can move uh to the next slide so um I mentioned that we were using the SSA Grant and um that brings to to bear that mental health is a big and strong contributor to lengthy homelessness um this is not just mental health issues but it's also significant substance use issues and so um it creates its own level of challenges as we try to House people and keep them maintained in their

[33:00] housing um the biggest challenge that we face and quite frankly we haven't come up with a a significant or meaningful uh response yet is specific to people who have meth addictions uh they have issues from a placement and engagement side and they also have um problems on the housing side with landlords being willing to take them so is something that we continue to struggle through and we're working on with different partners and I would also point out that HSBC and its Partners work very closely with mental health providers at all levels of this process from initial engagement Outreach all the way through getting people placed in housing and in some cases U Mental Health Partners For example does provide a significant amount of the case management person support of housing clients next slide um I would hate to give the impression

[34:01] that within the city of Boulder that the housing and Human Services Department is the only one that is focused on providing services to the homeless so um the two big players uh besides our department are the municipal court and the homeless Outreach team within the police department the municipal court has a municipal court homeost Navigator and her job is to provide assist to people homelessness who also have Justice involvement um her biggest Focus within that is on housing the high utilizers of the justice system so people who have more than uh 20 cases uh they work really closely with them those would be the green boxes on those charts and um as you can see they've had some pretty good success with housing some of the people that are probably the most difficult to to house these are people who are sex offenders people with significant substance use severe mental

[35:02] illness and people with frequent incarcerations they don't do that in a silo they are very connected with not only the homeless Outreach team but with HSBC and different levels and with our regional partner metro Denver homeless initiative who is our continue of care for the seven County greater Denver area the homeless Outreach team is made up of two non- enforcement officers and so their job is to engage with people who are experiencing unsheltered homelessness connect those people to resources and Aid in the housing process um while they are police officers again their job is not to enforce and they all the feedback that we do get from clients who have interacted with them has been extremely positive and so they really can have the time to build those relationships and really work with people to get them into housing the um one thing I would point out um I

[36:01] mentioned that they were very successful um 52% of the navigation clients uh that have been housed since they started tracking are high utilizers and 12 people have been housed in October 2019 and while that may not sound like a large number when you consider the challenges that this particular subset of people experiencing homelessness has that's really an actually a very exciting number a lot of that can be contributed to the new homelessness na Municipal Court homeless Navigator and her ability to really move the needle on helping get people prioritized and matched and and housed next slide please um while this isn't necessarily A change I thought it would be helpful for everybody to uh know about our covid Recovery Center or the CRC the CRC was open in March 20th and it provides respit care to people experiencing homelessness who are

[37:00] symptomatic of covid or who have tested positive um the very early date that we were able to get this open and staffed and combin it with our very thorough uh response from our partner agencies and shelters has really kept the high-risk population relatively safe uh keep in mind that these are groups of people who do not always have access to uh sufficient sanitation um they live in congregate situations and many of them have uh complicated complications and health issues that make them extremely vulnerable to this disease there're also um very likely because of congregate settings that if there is a contagion it's it would spread very very quickly in the shelter system so we're very proud of the fact that but it has been a very low sensus at the CRC um as a matter of fact the CDC has

[38:03] toured the facility as a bre best practice for covid response next SL please so uh moving on to a couple different topics at the January Retreat city council asked staff to investigate possible additions to the homelessness strategy including specifically sanctioned inment safe parking and timing homes um specific to encampments and I'm not going to read this entire slite to you um we really looked at what other communities were doing and there's a variety of activities of services funding structures and a variance in the connection to resources um that make it hard to say there's one particular program that stands above any others um but this is just a quick outline of some of the different services and funding um that's available by

[39:00] city next slide please so as with encampments we also looked at what other cities were doing in safe parking initiatives so basically these are sanctioned places where people can park either RVs or personal vehicles and that differs by Community as to which is which is allowable and um as with the encampments again what the commitment is and um the connections to resources um truly very quite a bit next slide please interest um the pros and cons for both encampments and parking are essentially the same um so while sanction camping or safe parking can help us protect certain parts of the environment um it it's our opinion that they don't offer an exit strategy to homelessness and in some cases can even

[40:02] discourage people from seeking out long-term Solutions um a lot of communities reported increases in area crime rates trash biohazard collections violence around camps um a local example would be um actually a covid response in Fort Collins um they had a sanction of 100 basically to 100 t0 based on all the reasons I just mentioned they actually shut it down and open something similar to a CRC um a lot of larger encampment Endeavors are also located in more temporate climates um so that can be a concern when you're talking about a Colorado winter um again these are all just pros and cons um it the devil is in the details and it's how you would design it but really we feel very strongly that the two biggest giveaway uh takeaways from this is um C can um these

[41:04] encampments or safe parking things really affect and move people from homelessness to housed and how can they be engaged and be productive pieces of our overall strategy so um you can kind of same thing about tiny homes uh there are multiple ways that tiny home Village could be set up particularly if it's responding to homelessness um tiny homes in some cases are um not what we would consider safe and decent housing and we actually included um in one of the examples on the encampment because it was basically a i a wooden shed type of situation with no running water no Plumbing no um no restroom facilities no

[42:04] cooking spaces um so if you have a tiny home that is constructed as safe and decent housing and and meant for habitation it can help people transition from homelessness to a more long-term solution such as permanent Supportive Housing and or what we would call Bridge housing um however there are quite a few situations where we have to look at the sighting availability land use efficiency you know is it really dense enough to meet the needs for affordable housing um and then of course neighborhood concerns and those all can continue to become barriers and so with that I'm going to turn back over to Wendy thank you Vicky so as oh Jay next slide please as we come to the end here I'll highlight some broader Community context that's relevant to consider when

[43:02] we look at solutions for adults experiencing homelessness we have about 7200 people in the city living below the federal poverty line and um for those of you who aren't familiar with that that's about $225,000 a year for a family of four so it's pretty low and I think we can safely say there are also a lot of people with incomes above that line that still probably need some help to make ends meet and um that estimate uh lots of times if you look at poverty line estimates in Boulder you'll see a higher number but that estimate of 7200 is adjusted to exclude people who are likely to be CU students um who might not have any income that's reported um but also maybe not be the target of poty programs we do a lot of work with Community Partners to make sure how households living in poverty are supported on a regular basis and we've

[44:00] expedited about a half a million dollars to Partners during the covid crisis to help people with basic needs like rent and food so those are Community profit uh Community nonprofits um but as we evaluate some of the other things the city might invest in for adults experiencing homelessness it's important to keep in mind that other people might need help including people on the edge of housing stab that we certainly don't want to fall into homelessness and as the pandemic continues no one knows yet how many people in the community are going to need more help as some of the federal stimulus payments and some of the other assistance uh starts to ratch it down we do have some numbers on this slide demonstrating some trade-offs in potential Investments so for example standing up an additional severe weather shelter would cost about the same as helping more than 330 households with rent for 3 months in some of our

[45:02] programs and these types of trade-offs would be true whether we're considering expanded shelter campgrounds or any other interventions so as we look at where resources are distributed we can't just look at one subpopulation need or one part of the problem in isolation next slide as we go forward with the changes that we talked about today will be monitoring how they work out a core component of the HSBC system is to collect coordinated data and work collaboratively to make adjustments based on the data and evidence we'll continue to focus strongly on creating housing opportunities for people experiencing homelessness as that's the Bedrock of our success and what sets us apart from most other communities in addition on this slide we've highlighted a few of the ongoing challenges we'll be working with Partners on um Vicki highlighted really um a lot of the big

[46:00] challenges for people with meth addiction that's really tough from both a housing and treatment perspective um certainly improving the data sharing across organizations um for our high utilizers a lot of those folks impact a lot of health and mental health providers um Justice systems homeless services and so um the more we can improve that data sharing the more the more quickly those folks can be helped um encampments are a big challenge in Boulder and really in cities across the country and so that increased coordination um for the best outcomes um on encampments is going to be important going forward and certainly building on the successful work we've done so far with our covid rec Recovery Center the CRC and the screening process to keep people safe during the pandemic mic um and so with that I think we're ready to just move on to our final slide

[47:02] which is the questions that we posed early on for our board and commission members thank you thank you okay so um going back um going back to the agenda um How we'll move through the remainder of the listening session um HRC will have its own discussion um while housing advisory well that service as more of a listening session for housing Advisory Board then housing Advisory Board will have its own discussion as that serves for more of a list as more of a listening session for HRC um and um for each of those sessions opposite commission the commission listening um hold your questions to the end um and then we'll move into a cross

[48:00] a cross commission conversation um to wrap things up um and hopefully move into some action items uh points of agreement and ways to move forward before we get into that um I wanted to make space for questions um across the commissions yep hi thank you so I have uh questions for um for the presenters uh Vicki and Wendy thank you and I want to ask a question and then I want to explain the reason why I asked it so I only have one question and it's um the data that you used especially in attachment C that was sent to us and that you put up in part um in the presentation I'm curious about how and when you collected that information so the uh information that was provided

[49:01] under attachment SC in this presentation were gathered um I would say over the last six months uh we actually had assistants from the city of Longmont who was looking at safe parking and they are part of a safe parking task force and one of the options that they looked at was working with um Metro dener homeless initiative and GA and looking at some of the data that they GA gathered so primarily was collected that way on the encampments that was just researching the different cities and looking at uh what was available to us um I I think it's a surprise to no one that um there really hasn't been much research that was done prior to development of these materials for you back in March um because we have been focused on Corona virus um but that that's when and how okay thanks and I have the reason why I

[50:00] ask is I have a very good young friend who used to run a nonprofit at the age of 25 in Boulder and moved to Seattle and she's um extremely involved in this in the homelessness issue and safe parking encampments and all of that and I get her newsletter because she's a friend of mine and and I had read enough about homelessness issues in Seattle that I thought this is curious it doesn't Jive what I see in the newsletters so I sent her um attachment C and she was so alarmed at reading it about how Seattle and King County were characterized that she sent it to several other people who work in the homeless community and um one of them is a PhD who teaches at the University of Washington a course called the anthropology of homelessness and he served on the governing board of the King County commission for Continuum of Care and he served on the advisory panel for coordinated entry and also three people who work for a place called

[51:03] Lisa don't Li Hi and um the gentleman with the PHD was so concerned that he highlighted 40 points in just the comments about just the comments about encampments and safe parking and how it related to Seattle 40 different points where he either feels there's information that was provided to you incorrectly or that he disagrees with the conclusions that were drawn from that and and he believes that um the programs in Seattle are working that there was new legislation passed by the city council in February that the mayor of the city council ran on starting more tiny home Villages and has done that and that the programs show outcomes that definitely agree with the outcome goals you want of that more people are coming out of homeless lessness obviously in tiny homes they're getting out of homelessness but that uh the safe

[52:00] parking has a much higher outcome for people going into home long-term housing than than just going to shelters um and then the people from um The Other Place sent me a letter they said to whom it may concern so I'm free to send it on where she says that um they have served thousands of homeless residents in Seattle for providing shelter accommodations Superior in quality of life for residents and the outcomes far surpass success rates of traditional um traditional shelters and enhanced shelters for residents they also have provided a big uh safety measure in times of covid um I also somebody else are also sent me about 15 or so links to data demonstrating the success of these programs and how much they do fit in with what both Boulders goals are and the um housing first strategy and so

[53:01] this is just one place in all the cities that resided well to Seattle and the county King County and if there's so much discrepancy between the providers of these services and the data and successful outcomes they have that just sort of freaks me out so I just wanted to put that out there well thank you for that and um you know as I mentioned our our research is just benchmarking research uh one other thing I would add is that um we aren't saying that they aren't successful um as I mentioned in earlier in the presentation it's how they are structured and what are the specific Community needs the other thing I would point out too though is that the majority of the large cities have insufficient Sheltering space and a lot of these were put into place in order to combat that issue also a lot of shelters don't have a housing focused Drive um

[54:01] they are typically just shelters with no endgame that's not to say that all of them aren't there are a considerable number of housing Focus shelter but that is something that we have is very dedicated both in short-term navigation and in housing Focus shelter is a dedicated housing path which in a lot of communities these safe parking and encampment type of setups and particularly with tiny homes because that is usually more of a bridge housing option um try to meet that need that way it would be it would be great to it would be great to see that data though Judy I'm really glad that they sent that to you because it'd be it'd be good to take a look at that yeah because it does really it it makes the conclusions that came to in your pros and cons if that's just one city and their conclusions were that it's positive and from the

[55:01] information that you know that you got and sifted through is like maybe that's not the whole picture and maybe those programs um do offer a lot that fit perfectly into um the housing goals here thanks Mason thank you so much thank you Wendy and Vicki for this um presentation um kind of along the same lines with Judy I was and I can't even say slightly stunned I was alarmed reading the data and the presentation um when you go back and part of the hard problem of us waiting until questions at the exam at the end especially within Zoom is that you can't ask questions about each one of the slides like so many of the slides just said 0 to 20 0 to 250 0 to 400 what

[56:00] people numbers it was really vague and very frustrating to have to wait to the the end and in general um I forgot I could unmute myself and interrupt the presentation but there was also a a lot of acronyms that were used and we have for a general public that really isolates and shuts out a majority of individuals from the conversation when we get into using a vacular that is um exclusionary so people can't participate in it um the frustrating part for me every time we get into the unhoused um unhoused population discussion is that I I get as a city we're driving towards coordinated entry but I wish at the same time we could be very honest and authentic about the fact that we have major gaps in what we are doing and in those major gaps there are a significant amount of people that are folling um

[57:00] through these and we're getting ready to face a a an an inordinate amount of individuals that are going to be facing um being homeless due to covid Etc and Wendy I understand when you were saying that we have to prioritize where our funding goes and we can't you know we've got to look at the people that are already housed but this is not an Andor discussion this isn't that we try and keep people in the houses and in their houses and forget that the unhoused population or prioritize them somehow less than the individuals that are still in houses we have to figure out how to do a little bit of everything so when we look at all of these tools when I see those pros and cons lists and you talk about violence in the encampments OR violence over here all those cons I could do the same thing with that slide and put all those cons into the pros category and flip the whole discussion um as to why those are the reasons we would want to set up

[58:02] um those programs when we when you say with the tiny house that they're just walls and they're they're not insulated and they're not good for people you know as somebody who's in the tiny house movement and and know thousands of families that are raising kids in these in tiny homes it's just shocking to me how we're classifying some of this um data data which I'll use really Loosely because it just I I was looking at those numbers and again I was just shocked and alarmed at some of the stuff the other thing that really surprised me about the data is um from February to March or when we know the numbers were um you know you were saying that you make your decisions based on the data for expected outcomes well I'm sorry but how many of us have ever gone through covid before so how are we going to collect data for this and how are are we going to have expected outcomes the there's no expectation here all we can do is all

[59:00] handson deck to try and get as many possibilities as we possibly can forward and help as many individuals as possible so the data argument to me of looking for for um the most successful programs that we can and I would go back with Judy as well on some of the encampments ETC is that um if we're going to exclude individ ual and put up barriers that say they have to be here for six months but then we don't provide faith-based Sheltering or encampments or anywh else and we're emphasizing diversion then what we're ex we're essentially doing is building a wall and saying you're not welcome here we're only going to help those that are already here right now because that's what we're doing is you're dropping the numbers because you're telling everybody to go elsewhere and that's not helpful either that's just putting the pressure on everybody else's community and it's not it's not us addressing the needs that we have here um so again with that data piece

[60:02] with the co portion of it I'm surprised that there's no highlighted area that says covid started here we moved this population because what you're showing by those numbers dropping down is that somehow we were just so successful at housing all these people when all we're doing is diverting them into other people's communities um back over so that was shocking again there was a whole bunch of stuff to go through when we talked about the $950,000 for the building upgrades on the navigation program did that um include our our building upgrades you know the $2 million where did that go into the funding um when we talk about um God there's just so so much I know there's everybody's probably going to hit on the same the same thing but I'm just in general really concerned with how we filter data how we present information who we are excluding and how we're weaponizing some of this stuff it's just it's really harsh to me so I'll just end there but I could

[61:01] probably go on for the rest of the evening okay Mason thanks Lindsay um John hair you're there you go all right good um good evening again everybody so I have a few things that I would like to say first I want to say thank you to Wendy and Vicki but um can you hear me well guys can everybody hear me okay cool so again my problem was um with the data that just presented here and I'm GNA just be short on what I'm gonna say but I'm going to explain it to you so if I'm wrong somebody can feel free to jump in and to help out out to let me know that where I where I was wrong so I look at the boulder colorado.gov um homelesshomeless

[62:03] dashboard so this the dashboard has not been updated for since January 2020 which again that question the data that um in the in that report for me and when you look at it it's uh if you look at the three months like March April and May in May um H with the covid thing I don't think the data should be even be considered there but in fact I don't remember I think Judy asked a question to Vicki Vicki said the data she had was considered for the last six months so like I said half of that half of that data for me is already not should not be there because of the amount of people that been homeless during that time which I I'm speaking with experience and uh I took a few notes and two of the slides I think Vicki started to present it which I which confused me even more

[63:01] she said she said there were no dat data available and there were multiple nonprofit operating back then so if you had no data available and you had nonprofit operating and now you said you had data somewhere for me it's a little even more confusing and um and I don't understand that data part and again I feel like I understand the city needs to make decision about homelessness and uh we're in the middle of a time where everybody's having a hard time now I think it's worse for the homeless than it is for anyone else and the biggest problem I have with it is I understand you guys are doing your work and uh for for some of you who do not know I am I'm from Haiti and I've been leaving in Boulder for almost 12 years now and uh I own my house in Boulder and I do everything I'm not an outsider I have two kids here okay and uh the problem with it is like driving people

[64:01] out like that I don't think it's a good thing the community needs everybody I understand the homeless May some of them are bad and some of them are really good it's like the way I hear that conversation it's like for me it's uh it's either a Catholic priests that explaining marriage to somebody that because they never been married they read it somewhere it's a day yeah it's the same thing for me and the last thing I would like to say is that the city I don't think it's the city's job to drive people outside I think it's a city's job to serve the people that live in it and the problem is I understand like the city has to drive their money somewhere else but in the end the first person I think she she I don't I think her name was lean something she just talk about how her have been you know the value have been decreased but when the city of Boulder Clos

[65:00] like path to home Bridge house there is no service for those people where are they going you're going to have exactly the same problem with lean because homeless will camp on her house and that problem will drive us more to like I'll say to the dump so I don't want to keep talking more but I just would like to share that and like I said I don't think I understand the CD want to do a lot but the thing is and the time we are in now I think this data don't get me wrong I think it's pretty biased to me that's the way I will say it because I speak my heart and the other thing is is like um I don't think it's good to make decision without whe wheel data for the city to move forward thank you hey just I'm going to jump in real quick Lindsay I'm going to let you select I keep seeing hands and I want to do it but I'll leave it to you okay thanks I'm going to try to alternate um

[66:01] commissions Charlotte awesome thanks so much um Vicky Wendy thank you very much for your presentation and um I'm just GNA piggyback a little bit off of what Mason and John Hiller were saying um I noticed um in the um memo and also throughout the presentation there seems to be a focus on um you know our unhoused having some sort of residential connection to Boulder before they are admitted for services before they are granted services and um much like covid is a national worldwide pandemic um homelessness is to a a pandemic um it is not something that is specific to Boulder um it is something that you know we are experiencing more and more and we will experience more and more um as Co continues and um um as things close down again um inevitably and so I'm curious about when that um you know that six

[67:01] Monon requirement was enacted and what the intention was behind that um is is it um intended you know so that we only serve those who will stay eventually stay in Boulder um I know that there are some diversion services and reunification Services intending to help folks you know go back to where you know they originally came from um but as John Herer said you know we should be a welcoming and open Community to all people and I think that Boulder's problem is Denver's problem is Kansas City's problem um so I'm just curious when was that yeah when was that six-month you know screening requirement um enacted yes would the chairs like to would the chairs like me to answer the question now or uh would you prefer that we wait okay okay um so the answer to that question is that the six-month requirement was implemented in February of

[68:00] 2020 um and prior to that time the requirement um there was no requirement um to get no residency requirement to get into navigation services and the requirement was 30 days or more for housing Focus shelter which was the program at wer shelter for the homeless um in addition there were other requirements um for housing Focus shelter that had to do with your level of disability um and length of time homeless and so that really was working with those um those proxy measures for chronic homelessness so people who are more likely to be chronically homeless were referred to that resource um and so the reason that those decisions were being made and and I should add those decisions were not made um solely or specifically by the city of Boulder those were made by the county wide collaborative Homeless Solutions for Boulder County um and that had to do

[69:00] with really an analysis of um the availability of housing um and the ab the ability to House people um and also the significant amount of community feedback um received about the criteria that we had at the time and so I understand there's many people on this call who disagree with having any residency criteria and it certainly is a choice that Homeless Solutions for Boulder County um that the community could make would be to not have that anymore um but there are many people who have a different point of view which has been expressed um very significantly that for instance they think six months is not enough um the I mean I think I think the other issues that we'd have to Grapple with here is what what are the housing opportunities that were leading

[70:02] people to through coordinated entry and um so if we don't have residency criteria for our housing which is a you know a challenging resource right um to to put in place and frankly when you look at the size of Boulder and you look at the level of resource investment that's gone into expanding housing resources for people experiencing homelessness there's really no community in the region that can compete with with that level of investment and so many people in the community are very concerned about having that level of housing investment um you know really really leaning into that housing and having people come from other places to use those expensive resources so again

[71:00] those I mean those are all choices that can be made differently by Homeless Solutions for Boulder County that can be made differently by the community but that's some of the background that might be helpful for board members and Commissioners in understanding some of some of the way those choices were made in addition Homeless Solutions for Boulder County looked at what other communities did and there was a pretty big range it was everything from zero residency requirements which actually don't happen very often when you're talking about housing programs to you have to have you have to prove your residency in the community for two years um so you know so we started at a very low low level with the one month for the more extensive programs and it was recently moved to six months and and just to follow up how are um unhoused folks expected to prove that they've been here for six months is it like heray or yeah I'm just really not

[72:02] familiar with that process self-reported at coordinated entry self-reported okay um okay um thank you so much that was such a detailed and helpful qu answer um uh quickly are are have there have there been any kind of um Explorations into kind of bridge programs between Boulder County and other locations um if Boulder County is you know has this you know has looked to other models but is is kind of seemingly like insular in its solution you know has have we looked to partner with other you know Housing Solutions in Denver you know if Boulder has you know clearly has such a housing crisis you know there's not enough space for for people to live um you know are there kind of if someone wants to find housing you know um you know and they want to go through Boulders Boulders system are

[73:01] they able to go to like Denver or somewhere else you know to find permanent housing yes they are um we are heavily Homeless Solutions for Boulder County is heavily involved with the metro Denver homeless initiative so that's a seven count uh Regional homeless organization and in fact their executive director is on the Homeless Solutions for Boulder County Executive Board um definitely if people and and many of our resources that I mean our local dollars that go into those housing resources are supplemental to a broader array of housing resources that are accessed for people experiencing homelessness that are either state or federal voucher type programs or units and and um certainly people have gone through our system and been housed in a Housing Resource in another place uh it doesn't happen very

[74:02] often and that's because generally people who are accessing those types of services here and have been here for a while this is their home um even if they don't already have a home here and so they want to stay in their Community understandably so that that doesn't happen very often but sometimes there is an opportunity that comes up for someone in Denver or someplace else and the person is interested in that opportunity and so that is that is possible thank you so much Wendy thanks um note on time we're at 7:30 that's about when we indicated we were going to take a break um so um let's I think um good way to move forward finish our Q&A period with um ideally um questions and brief answers and whole

[75:03] discussion until the discussion periods um which is not a comment um but a um a request thank you um and Stan you're muted Stan so I get to go before the break yet I just want to take a little slightly different angle and it be very fairly brief with this you know one of the difficulties in the different angle on this is that so we're eliminating people that haven't been here for six months we're not giving the CP to camp and so forth the courts and in any moral position says you got to give people some option I mean you can't simply be in a place of putting people at risk and not allowing them to camp and not allowing them into shelters uh I mean that's just simply not a tenable position it's I mean I understand priorities I'm very appreciative of the sensitivity you have

[76:01] all the priorities but but that's still a bottom line issue that is different than budgets and so forth that we have to look at the ways of which we are not putting people in that particular position of simultaneously not being able to be sheltered and not being able to shelter themselves uh and that's particularly I think important in this in this case because when you have these the lack of you talk about your Regional involvement but we don't hear I'm sorry to cut you off do you have do you have a question yeah that what is the nature really of this Regional involvement I mean so often we hear about it but what we're doing is just talking mostly about how we turn people away not how the region coordinated their resources to say because if we're turning that many people away we have the possibility that we have tons of people that have no Regional qualifications in any of these communities instead of having a coordinated system which says if you haven't made residency here where have

[77:00] you um and so I really like to know the nature and extent to which you're working regionally to making sure that the individuals that you're not allowing into our system have a real system to go to would would the chairs like me to respond now before okay um so there's there's not a perfect answer to that Stan and I really appreciate your question because this is something very difficult that we you know that all of our partners wrestle with all the time um so there's the regional collaboration there is the one home system which is a shared um housing platform um but to to really get to the heart of your your question when we help people um through diversion with a reunification program for instance which is working with them in

[78:02] diversion to figure out if they have supports someplace that we could help them reconnect to um and go to then you know that is that's something that can occur very locally or you know depending on where their support system is um further away but we we don't necessarily have an answer to everyone who's ever going to come to Boulder and and want to seek homeless Services I mean that's that is the truth um so so we want to really give people the support that we can um but we don't have a perfect answer for everyone thanks both of you um

[79:09] Darren I think Darren is public and we want to stay within hrcn Hab yeah so I think art would be next I wasn't as quick to my mute button as Mason was Daren is a member of the General Public he's um indicating his interest in participating in public comment later so this is this is the thing um before we process question before we move on public comment happens at what point so let me jump in Lindsay so we have open comment which was the first portion that we did and then I think when we're done with this question session regarding the presentation from staff um which hopefully we can wrap up relatively soon

[80:01] then we can get to the public participation specific to homelessness cool thanks for clarifying I misunderstood that earlier cool sure and uh I know we're trying to keep this brief uh so more of a request for staff then a question and um first I want to acknowledge again thank you to to uh Wendy and to Vicky and um I want to acknowledge the skills and the experience and and the caring I think staff has um for for this issue among many others so so know that I'm I'm coming from that space um but I want to agree with a lot of the other uh Commissioners and board members whove commented that um it really feels like there's a bias um to the information that's been presented um that bias I in the pros and cons I was noticing it there were areas where yeah as as others have commented you could flip them or

[81:01] there are areas where maybe a pro for tiny homes doesn't show up in the in another area where I think it clearly could so seeing seeing bias there um data selectivity in the time periods being chosen uh was another area where we saw um some bias and how that data is being brought forward um also felt like there is an opportunity to talk about best practices because I know that's one of the questions in front of us but best practices also in in relationship to to Regions um what's a best practice in one region may not translate so much to another um and the other place where I felt like I noticed some bias was just in the comments about Bridge house and not applying to continue without the context of why they didn't apply what had changed why did they choose to not um put forward a response to the RFP um leaving that out implies one thing

[82:01] putting in that context helps us understand the broader picture so to the degree that that bias may be unconscious or or just folks may not be aware of it I want to ask that you pay attention to that um you will present a much clearer argument to us a much cleaner set of data and we'll be able to come up with better robust um decisions around all of this with a complete set of information thank you for that art we I mean we certainly um we certainly want to pay attention to that so thanks for that comment start scanning the digital room and I oh Dan oh hi Dan sorry I had some uh some Zoom issues there uh I just wanted the one thing I wanted to say I absolutely agree and

[83:00] understand with the uh comments of the concerns about how we um focus on this notion of uh you know something that's more specific to um residential and stuff but uh I I think there's some real challenges here and so this isn't really uh I'm sorry Lindsay this is more a statement than a question but I'll kind of end it with a question so that I still qualify but uh I I I want to commend staff and I want to commend uh the city and I do want to commend Wendy and Vicki uh for doing a great job laying everything out there and I I think the point that I want to make is um I'm very impressed with the effort that the city's made so far we can always do better um nothing's ever perfect but um this is very challenging this is very challenging times we're going to be coming up on some very significant budgetary shortfalls for every municipality throughout the uh entire State throughout the entire country World probably right especially with municipalities and sales taxes Etc and

[84:02] uh we're also going to be like Mason brought up we're also going to be dealing with probably a very significant spike in homelessness you know it's been on the news a lot recently that um we are now just going to start facing um a real slew of evictions Etc because um you know we've had this kind of stop Gap in place that's not necessarily going to be there very much longer and so the reality of uh everything is really coming to the four and so I guess my point and my question would be um what are we doing to try to come up with essentially some sort of covid policy because I think necessarily there's going to be a challenge to um focus on how we deal with our community and the and the increased demands that we're going to have in our community um coupled with uh a lot of budgetary restraint that we maybe haven't had to deal with quite in the same manner in recent years and so um I'll leave that as a question but I do want to make that

[85:01] point that I I do like the efforts that are being made and I know um ideally you wouldn't have any sort of regional thing but I do understand where you're coming from with it because um this is going to be very demanding and there's very limited resources so that's all I got okay so I think I heard you ask about covid policy um and that that was your question and so what we are doing is first of all continuing with the CRC um there's some concern about whether we've had a small population but we really think that helping that small population to be in a safe place where they can safely isolate has really helped keep the cases is down um here in Boulder County um and so continuing with that screening protocol where we offer that

[86:00] respit space at the CRC um to keep the you know the individuals who might be experiencing symptoms as well as the rest of the people using the shelter safe um in addition we are really continuing to be um to push ahead with our housing policy policy of creating more housing opportunities for people because that creates even more safety for people who now might be residing in shelters and also makes room in the shelter for people who might not currently be there um also Boulder shelter for the homeless has had a small number of uh very medically frail individuals in a hotel and so that's something else that we've continued to do um as we look forward and we think about those broader questions with regard to things like evictions um and and how we react to

[87:02] covid in that way um we have had a very strong partnership um with the nonprofits in the community that help people who might be experiencing potential rent shortfalls or other basic needs um that they they need help with in order to to pay for rent um and so we've had a pretty extensive uh collaboration with funders across the county in trying to support those organizations and keep as many people as possible from falling into homelessness so that's kind of the high points and I I hope that answered your question and if I could just add a little bit to that um we are in almost daily conversations with the state and with our regional partn Partners about augmenting our funding for things like rapid rehousing and for other safety nets such as prevention funding in ways

[88:02] that it really becomes the biggest benefit we can provide people um coming out of this covid situation is to keep them from becoming homeless in the first place as Wendy mentioned but then secondarily those who do fall through the net looking at ways that we can rapidly get people back into into a stable housing stable housing situation so it is a little bit of everything um it isn't a one siiz a one solution we are constantly looking at things um over the past three months we've done things like implement the the CRC but we've also when there was a lack of water we provided bottle water U and filling stations we authorized opening of um the nightly shelter every night um beyond what council had authorized uh We've made we actually just had Public Health

[89:00] just tested all of the people at Boulder shelter for the homeless and are now moving to attention homes um to test for asymptomatic positives so that we can help further control it uh we continue to monitor the situation and look for all of those different possibilities and how we can respond to the to the crisis before it becomes a specific crisis to this particular population very quick follow-up question then Jean hillair um uh we so Hud's guidance to not sweep encampments during covid-19 is Boulder following that guidance um there have been uh some encampments cleared since the beginning of the U um the epidemic um and that's consistent with most other cities uh because what we are finding in

[90:01] some cases is that the conditions that exist in encampments that are risks to people there in multiple ways including public health risks um are more dangerous than the potential of people dispersing um at with the the breakup of the encampment um I I will also say that um some of that that Guidance the way that it's set up oftentimes in the National Literature Like That is they're really looking at a scenario you see in a very large city with large areas of um heavily populated densely packed encampments so skidrow in Los Angeles or other types of things and so some of those things look a little bit different when you're in a smaller City where there's already more dispersed smaller

[91:03] encampments thank you John Hiller um thank you um I have two questions um the first question is that um as of May 30th uh Boulder closed after to home and Bridge house and um I have a friend who delivers like how do you call that eviction notice as of now he has 400 in his hand immediately the the the covid um they LIF up the covid uh restriction for R I can tell you Boulder gonna have another thousand people so if thousand homeless are onh housee people my first question on that is is that okay this program Bridge house path to home I don't know what else are closed and we're going to have more people in the street soon does Boulder have an

[92:01] alternative to house those people soon and that's the first question the second question I just want to just give you the question and you can answer and uh the second question is it's based on Vicki was talking about the homeless uh the boulder homeless shelter how do you let me read it again the boulder shelter okay so I would say in Boulder we have probably I think let me look at it again because I just um asked a friend about it so I can have the accurate information before I I say anything so Boulder has probably between 4 to 500 adult homeless and if you count it all together 100 youth which is makes it about like 600 okay and um Vicki said the boulder sh um actually right now with the covid uh decrease the amount of people they can receive and uh pretty much the boulder

[93:02] shelter is the only program that that exists in Boulder right now so my question is I understand the data that you have are not really which I I I have to say I'm not trying to be offended to anybody understand that and that's the way I speak and I think you are great people you did a good job I want you to know that make criticism always help us well that's it and what I want to say is what is Boulder plan with those dat what was the plan with those data what why do we pull those out and why would we use them thank you so I can I can start a little bit on this one um so one thing I would make sure everybody understands is that while Bridge house is not providing navigation Services navigation Services have not gone away which is provided by a different agency in a different location um the 600 person number that you quoted that is the annual uh point

[94:01] and time count that is inclusive of all of Boulder County um and also as you mentioned is split between individuals and families which have different responses that need to go with each of those um the other thing about the limited capacity we are working with bsh to increase their capacity um we also um have a situation where as hendy mentioned there are hotels there's the CRC that do help um create a situation where we are housing more than a 100 people in that shelter it just may not be at that physical location um the plan again is more Upstream to try to keep people from those infections and from ending up in homelessness um but we are looking at using what resources we we have again that's where if we can augment with rapid rehousing then or um other in interventions one-time assistance those kind of things then

[95:01] hopefully we can keep people from having to enter the shelter system in the first place sorry may I may I say something else I feel like you are not clear with your alternatives if that makes sense because this is this is this is where I want to get with that question again it's like okay the whole state of Colorado asking people to stay inside you know safe at home order and right now Boulder is closing shelter for people who could have be somewhere for some reason so what I'm trying to say to you is like it's like okay do we have alternative for those people to stay somewhere instead of having encampment and spre spread the disease even to more or why you know okay I understand like you said you know we're under pressure to for budget and stuff like that but these are human

[96:00] beings to me I human beings too and it it's it's it's more important to save people to keep people safe than keep going after the money because if money was an issue in this country and I'm I'm not pointing that at you is that look at it boom a pandemic happened everybody got 1,200 bucks but they couldn't even support people for healthcare so what I'm trying to say is it's like what is the Alternatives like right here where I'm at right now close to me next to this golf course there's an encampment right there I um Let me let me try again um so thanks Vicki for um for providing that information and I'll just add to it by saying that um first in encampment are not necessarily something that goes away when you when you have shelter and and that's what we've found out historically um throughout Boulders so I

[97:01] think if we provided shelter for every person who's homeless in the city we would we would still have encampments um second uh when you're referring specifically to the closure of the path to Home Center at the 2691 30th Street location so that is that's a closure that's been planned for years since the beginning that was always planned as a temporary site and consolidation into our existing fixed asset a boulder shelter for the Homeless was always planned most nights including after the consolidation Boulder shelter for the homeless does not hit capacity so um they've been they've been getting close to their new capacity but there they have not hit capacity most nights there have been some nights when they have so when people try to figure

[98:01] out sometimes why we think there's there's more people who are experiencing homeless in Boulder than there are shelter beds um then what we know is that on most nights historically they haven't all been been filled is that is that helpful in answering part of your question uh that does but that again go goes like you said it goes how would I say that I've exper I've I've been having experience with the boulder shelter as well and I think like you say I have a different answer than yours most night they have Rich capacity so thank you we don't we

[99:03] Charlotte um really quickly um has City staff have you you know um Wendy Vicki have you ever considered moving forward with the assumption that Boulder actually can house all the unhoused people who want to live here has that ever been kind of explored um you know how can we make that possible that's kind of a far-fetched idea but I love I love that idea um and and so I mean trying to like really really put the push on housing for everyone I I mean we're in housing in human services you we love that idea um I think that that looks daunting certainly because we've had challenges even when we

[100:02] prioritize a group of long-term residents we have challenges um we've had a lot more successes in the most recent year um but but do we love that idea yes um we would just have to really um change the way we're allocating resources have a pretty dramatic increase in resources especially since we we continue to have a lot of people coming through the front door right and what we've noticed even since word has gotten around that more people are getting housed some of the you know the long-term people who have been waiting for housing for years who had given up are being housed word has gotten around the region and people will show up saying I want to be here because I hear you can get housing in Boulder so I think we would expect to see more of that and I I think one thing to you know to be really clear about is that when when we look at the criteria or the

[101:03] resources that Homeless Solutions for Boulder County has set up there's there's certainly different choices that could be made right and so if what the community wants to do is find a put the resources into more shelter or put the resources into safe lots or encampments or tiny houses all of those things can be done it that just has to be a choice about Community Resources right that we're going to put far more resources into homelessness and that we're going to probably have to create a capital plan for shelters for expanding and building more shelters every couple of years years for more safe lots for more encampments and so that is a resource plan and a capital plan and a land use

[102:00] plan that can be put together if that's what if that's what the community chooses um historically that has not been what the community has expressed to us that that they want to choose unlimited resources and use of land and other things for that purpose and so that's why the focus has been on really trying to maximize housing for people who have been waiting here for a long time thank you Mason so Wendy or Vicky um do you think the general public is educated and knowledgeable on our unhoused population and all of the tools that are available to um successfully

[103:00] uh Implement programs no okay so when we talk about um housing and um policies or um the will of the people would it be safe to say that a lot of that has to do with educating and communicating um comprehensive plans as well as potentially the leadership um uh having the political will and um desire to implement particular ethos or or programs one of our greatest struggles absolutely for a long time has been really having the public understand the facts about homelessness and having them

[104:01] understand what works and having them understand really what doesn't work so you have I mean there's a large amount of emails for instance that the staff and the council get all the time that's about you know why aren't we you know making sure these people are from Boulder like I said with much stricter residency requirements than the system actually has um why aren't we making them work why are why are we allowing things such as needle exchange programs to occur in the community um so education is very important um and we have really tried to make an effort at that um I think and and that's and that goes beyond Us in the city that's the Homeless Solutions for Boulder County cooperative um but it's you know that's really tough so in answer to your question about you know could we change the dynamic and could we

[105:01] change the resources and and and what people want to do with the city's resources in this area I think that I think the answer is maybe um but I do think I will say it's been challenging there's time when I have um sat with groups and presented them with very specific data for instance about the percentage reduction for instance that someone chronically homeless can have in justice system interaction and ambulance rides and all those other things if we give them permanent Supportive Housing and they will pretty much say well yeah but why aren't we going to make sure they're clean and sober and that they have a job and that they're from Boulder um so so you know I um I want to say that yeah with some enhanced effort on multiple fronts that um that that can change the choices um but I will also

[106:00] say that realistically the amount of resources required to provide everyone who might want to come to Boulder with what they need and want um is very very large right very I I'm going to Echo what art head said is that it makes it harder and larger and bigger to scale when the data and the bias isn't recognized when reporting on information so when our pros and cons list first of all nobody expects you to house every last individual that comes to Boulder um would I love to see every last individual house that comes to Boulder yes but do I expect that I think it's a process I think we have um a lot of debunk myths that are still being used even in this presentation tonight on um certain again biases and way that ways

[107:02] that we use the information and it's frustrating when the screen rotates and I was looking at you here um now I don't even know where you went there you go um it's frustrating when the the the people staff when you're working with the data and everything says we can't we can't we can't we can't we can't and we have a Title Wave coming towards us at the same time and knowing we have the resources maybe changing the lens over to um how can we and what's the best that we can do and presenting this in just a slightly different way that's where my frustration comes into with with all of this is just saying that there's no way we can't we can't and we're only going to do this over over here and there are possibilities I mean I guess I just want to hear that glimmer that there are possibilities we have opportunities it's not that everybody needs to be in a brick and mortar there are alternatives

[108:02] we can do things everybody everybody matters their bodies matter should be protected should be safe have the right to some form of Housing and a place to sleep at the end of the night and that's where I'm challenged is what we're saying right now what I'm hearing is that there's only two populations that we can really help and that's because of money and that's a challenge for me when anybody stops and says it's just money when there are always ways to figure out more so that's all I have to say and I want to I want to thank you for that um it was certainly not my intention to say that um everything is negative um I I think it's a frustrating thing on the part of staff to to to be honest that we feel like sometimes we're in the position of having to say no a lot um one of the things I would mention is during the presentation one of the things we talked about is it's all about

[109:01] design um so again this goes back to what Wendy was saying about what is the will what is the outcome and what is the efficiency and Effectiveness and if there is a program that can be designed then great um I I don't think that there is necessarily a staff bi to any particular thing I would also say that one of the big tenants of the 8,000 meetings I attend today is about how do we do more with less how do we help people who are currently falling through the cracks what are those different things that are working for example um you know in partnership with like built for zero type of uh um organizations and our continu of care and National literature are there things that are a good fit for Boulder and so it I I I hope and it sounds like that I was somewhat unsuccessful in this but I I hope that we can convey that we are not

[110:02] entrenched in these particular resources and path this is what we are currently implementing there are some changes that have been made recently there's certainly the will to help people in their homelessness and whatever mean we can do it in in a smart and wellth thought out manner that's where we want to be uh the tiny homes I think one thing I know that someone mentioned earlier um about tiny homes that I did want to clarify is um tiny homes um if it's safe decent housing can be a perfectly good solution a perfectly good permanent housing solution to end someone's homelessness um so that's not Something That We're opposed to I one of the challenges with that solution can be just given the scarcity of land in Boulder um for housing people

[111:01] experiencing homelessness or housing anyone then that's not a very dense solution right and so you've you know you when we've worked before on sighting homelessness housing you know you think about that you know that rare precious piece of land and getting homelessness housing on it then you know one of the questions that is asked really you know even if it's very good housing is is about the density and making the most of that space um but again that's something that the community could choose right but there's I mean all tiny I'm gonna pause you right there for a second this is what I mean by about um this is a great example yes that is a challenge however what how we frame that by saying that there I wonder though if we can save the discussion just because we haven't really gotten to our break yet even are Wendy are you going to be here for the discussion yep usually uh staff that present leave

[112:01] at that point for our discussion group so this is the time where we talk with staff um before they leave but if you're going to be here for our discussion that'd be great absolutely thank you thank you duck yeah um I wanted to jump in both kind of in chair position and I'm gonna actually hold other thoughts that I have until the discussion piece um I know or I believe we have some people waiting to speak in public participation so I I'm just thinking maybe it's time to wrap this up and and get get some input from the public into this and then we'll come back to the discussion um so Brena there you are hi

[113:02] Brenda turn off so I'm not distracting can we move into that that phase and see who we have there sure um at before we began you had discussed taking a break just to give everyone five or 10 minutes um at some point during the meeting um that now perhaps and I just also wanted to share that Jean hair is still with us he had to log out of his computer and log back in with his phone um so he is still attending the meeting and I'm sure we'll chime in as he can with his phone later during the discussion okay then I'd suggest since we have people stacked up and waiting that we just do a five minute will that suffice for everyone okay all right so we'll do do a five minute break we'll be back here at 812 great and I'll just share really quickly if I may if you would like to participate in the public comment portion um you can raise your hand at

[114:02] any time um from now going forward um by using the raise hand button that will be found in your participant box um by clicking on the participant icon and then clicking on the raised hand so you can use the break time to find that if you wish thanks for

[118:57] Randa yeah while we're still on break real quick I just want to check in with

[119:01] Jean hair to make sure that you have the functionality that you need on your phone yes I do have the functional can you hear me we can I can hear you okay yes okay thank you uh I'm just trying to put my kids to bed while we guys are still talking the camera yeah okay thank you I put you on mute so you can unmute yourself as you need to how do our hands look Brenda uh so far we still just have one um but we do have some other members of the general public so I want to do one more call um just to let people know where to raise your hand should you wish to speak um if you find your options menu by scrolling either at the bottom or the top of your screen you'll see the participants icon click on that icon and you will find a raise hand button by

[120:01] raising your hand you can indicate to us that you would like to participate in public comment and you can do that until jacqu or Lindsay says you can't um so so far we just have Darren and Brenda folks have three minutes again that's up to you all but I believe that's what the agenda States would you like to stick to the three minutes my impulse says yes because we're behind we're behind schedule um all right jack what do you think yeah I think we need to stick to the three minutes um and uh depending what if more hands come up M great see what happens there um and do we want to make sure we see all the faces of the members before we begin I would like to um how about we

[121:03] give another minute and a half or so two minutes see if we you're ready question can I ask a question yep thanks um so usually at our Hab meetings as you know we sometimes ask questions of the people speaking the listening session and I think that's one of our best things we do really well can we do that at this one if we want yeah I think and Lindsay you know with you on this one I think if you raise a hand while someone's speaking to indicate that you have a followup that you'd like to do with them definitely we could can do that cool so folks we'll have three minutes and then we as Commissioners might have follow-up questions and then people can respond

[122:00] outside of those three minutes yeah if we have a follow-up question for them we can extend that three minutes thank you thanks Judy technical reminder to board and commission members because of your um co-host status of the meeting you do not have a raise hand button so as you have been doing you need to raise a physical hand to indicate that you would like to speak as we're still missing quite a few Lindsay maybe we give it another couple minutes there I hate to it back but well I wonder you know I feel kind of I feel kind of funny like like limiting the time that people can speak and then like waiting for much longer for people I wonder no I agree

[123:01] with you can begin and and I'm only seeing um I think we're just missing who may not be coming back on video right now and Sarah who is your ex officio everyone else back Terry I'm missing Terry but yeah let's go ahead I mean it's age6 now so let's go ahead yeah I agree and and begin and I'm muted all right so we have two now um so we have Darren OK Conor first and followed by Lyn seagull um and as a reminder unfortunately community members we will not be able to turn on your video for your comments you will be um Audio Only so Darren I am unmuting you now hi everyone Darren o Conor here I'm uh criminal justice chair of the nwacp Boulder County and an advocate with

[124:00] long-term interest in homelessness in Boulder and now an attorney after going to law school because of this issue being so important to me um and I'm I'm really grateful that you're all here tonight I really appreciate the questions that have been asked and one of the things I think you as a group have hit on is that there is this prevalent attitude at HSBC and among City staff that if if we build it that is provide service beds they will come we'll be overwhelmed with people coming to Boulder and and there's a Corel to that the that that message that goes out which is if if we reduce the beds they will leave and I think if you look at the point in time count over the years um and you see that even in the last year year when we've been hearing that that we've been doing a great job of getting people housed and I commend us for doing that as a city and county but even as we have supposedly removed so

[125:00] many people from homelessness the numbers barely changed this year it it went up from last year even as we're hearing how great the system is I was part of the point in time count this year and I can tell you that um you know half the people we talked to on the streets didn't want to be counted and we barely touch the people who were on the streets I know uh from uh Mr Bill Sweeny from the year 2016 when when boho was working with the city to proide provide day Services we had 4,884 Unique Individuals have contact with the different areas of our service agencies 4,884 we've seen since 2017 something like 4,700 listed on the single adult bu homelessness dashboard we know all of these numbers are an undercount so HSBC data with my last minute I want to say is completely non-transparent the the data that we're getting from the city

[126:01] completely non-transparent I've done qu requests requesting you know Colorado open records act requests anonymized data that could help us fill in the gaps of some of our information I've been refused at the county level and at the city level HS B BC has one exactly one I believe person with lived experience on it that happened only after being in existence for a year and we the community complaining about it and the last thing I want to share is that uh in March um our severe weather shelter and and all our shelters were full um I I called City staff I'm not GNA out them but but they're on this this um Zoom meeting and said check the numbers I no people are being turned away it turned out 19 people were turned away on one night when it snowed in Boulder and that is cruel and unusual punishment that we give people camping tickets that is

[127:00] still happening it's got to change we need a board I'm gonna end we need a board with Independence and made up of at least half or more people with lived experience to get the truth about what people are experiencing on our streets because it's it's horrible that we don't have that information and we don't have any one homeless on this this meeting speaking to you tonight thank you okay thanks Darren I think we have some questions for you I see that Judy has a hand up so Judy why don't you go ahead you're muted Judy sorry you miss hearing the howl outside my window too a little earlier um thank you Darren and could you just give us a little summary of actual changes you would like to see yeah so so first of all we've seen our bed count go from a capacity of

[128:00] about 350 when Boulder Outreach for homeless overflow was operating to now today 110 and one of the things I I think many of you have touched on this but um you know we're never going to house everyone we're we're housing something like 7 to 10% by the city's own numbers and what I want to see um Judy is that people suffering is reduced that we we respect their dignity provide them day shelter things like um day shelters where people don't have to just go to the library and find out that it's closed and right now that's every day and uh while it's it's horrible in the winter when that happens and that has been addressed after Community outcry um the lack of any day shelter now um when it's you know I think it was 95 today here in in Boulder being outside all day is terrible the other thing I would like to see is a stop relying on the police and and

[129:02] criminalization through camping tickets which has been found to be cruel and unusual in the ninth circuit our neighbor um I met a night I mistakenly went to the municipal building tonight thinking this meeting was there I I'll avoid sharing why but met I saw a woman right outside there um with a tent that I talked to in March who has had a camping tiet to me it's not you know services and they will maybe it's just me um can you repeat just sort of the last minute of what you said yeah I was saying that tonight I ended up at the municipal building as through a mistake of my own at about six o' met woman there with a tent i' had seen in March and in March she had one camping ticket she now as byy camping tickets it it is not solving

[130:00] anything to issue tickets and make people march up to the court um and go through the as a form of Social Services I appreciate that we have homeless Navigators I appreciate the kindness of the people who work at the court and even the city prosecutor Chris Reynolds and the efforts he's put in but folks should never have to end up in the criminal system because gonna reer 350 2016 so my my first and foremost call is that we recognize the Dignity of all those who cannot get housing whether they're from here Texas Florida wherever they're from thank you thank you okay thanks Darren so Brenda who do we have next next up we have Lynn seagull Lynn I'm going to unmute

[131:00] you you should be able to unmute now I can't unmute me there you are um well it's just the discussion that I expected and I want to see a more nuanced discussion than this and I want to see some more back and forth and I want to see some more casual opinions and everything everyone's so freaking formal can you hear me properly because Darren was really coming in poorly Lindsay I can see you that's kind of a yes yeah cool okay I hate when that happens um the tiny home situation stop bothering with it when you're giving a million doll subsidy to a guy at 1725 and 1727 Pearl just this last

[132:01] Thursday what are you talking about tiny Helms for the property value is going up so much you know Jean speak truth to power thank you so much right on you know you want to Stack 50 tiny homes on top of one another then you can afford it in Boulder right we all know that snap out of it people Alpine Balsam city owns that put a bunch of homeless housing there H that's going to be tough isn't it if you all want to keep your jobs you staffers Wendy and and uh Lisa whatever you know we've already got furlows you know the city can't do it no one can do it B Boulder housing Partners funded by the Community Foundation it's called philanthropy is the barometer of social injustice that's your Mantra SP say that

[133:00] over and over again the opportunity Zone that's helping property values in Boulder I don't think so none of you think so where did this thinking come from you know I grew up on Mercer Island which is a real Island like Boulder except that surrounded by water you know Paul Allen from Microsoft has you know Eight houses at the South End for 32 million bucks housing's cheaper in Seattle what can you say I lived with a black family there actually he was a gastroenterologist and his my mom died of leukemia probably what she got from uh when we lived here in Boulder when the fire happened at Rocky Flats so she died so I moved in with this black family and

[134:01] um you know Mercer Island is really you know enclosed in terms of the property value there Boulder doesn't have to be quite so much but it is it really is and the only thing that's going to stop this is stop the subsidies the guys at 1725 Pearl did not need three stories they did not ly 38 feet but they didn't can you give us a quick wrap up here stories I had you know you said you spent a million bucks um it was I forget which one Wendy or Lisa said you spent a million bucks well I spent on on you know the I think I think that you've gone over your three I think that we probably got your points and I want to see if anybody has any questions for

[135:00] you from either of the boards I just wanted to say one more thing I had 17 people in my house one summer and I made 75 $79,000 that year on Airbnb illegally okay and I had no complaints in my neighborhood of Mapleton Hill have ask Hill and I did it a lot cheaper than a million bucks Lynn please you could thank you um sorry Lynn sorry Lynn I'll talk to you personally about that but I do think we got your point and um I actually will speak to that a little bit during the discussion portion of this um Brenda do we have anybody else who was waiting we do have one more Sweeny so um Mr Sweeney I am going to ask you to unmute now you should be able to

[136:02] unmute am I on I'm getting a sign that says I'm not you are on yeah oh good thank you um so I wanted to uh thank you all for uh having this opportunity tonight um I'm Bill Sweeny and among other things I work with the bridge house I uh wanted to take off a little bit from where uh Darren spoke and speak to the fact that what we are hearing tonight is a position from City staff that in essence defends the St City status quo there is no other voice here that speaks as the homeless or speaks from a stud position of the homeless problem there's no one here that speaks as the extremely poor or speaks from the point of view of poverty rather than hassling about one or another of this or that detail in the city's plans I think we ought to be looking at creating a

[137:02] voice a fixed voice and informed voice for the homeless and the very poor whether that's a new committee or whether that's a specific Charter enforce enhancement uh for the cab or the HRC or some other group group it still should be there I think that the general strategic question that we're all wrestling with and that every so often staff seems to come back to is in some senses this is not a Boulder City issue staff seems to at times say this has been imposed by the count by the Commissioners by Boulder County perhaps it has if that's the case then why is that not how the dialogue is being condu conducted if Boulder does have the choice to make its own decisions as a home rulle City then why do we have that sort of backup that we have to do what the county has to do don't really get

[138:02] that part and unless someone's studying the issue I don't think there's going to be a good answer those are my thoughts for tonight thank you for your time thank you jacqu yeah sorry Bill um I was slow getting to my mute button there I think we may have some questions um Lindsay did you have a hand up for Bill did go ahead thank you um Bill thanks um I'm wondering um if you this um a thing that's come up in both of uh like in two of the public comments um you know people who dedicate a lot of their work um into working with the homeless Community what do you think uh I I wonder if you can talk more about what you imagine um for some kind of uh

[139:01] board representative voice Charter enhancement Darren mentioned um half of the people on the board with lived experience I wonder if you can like give us more um specific suggestions like that I sure would um yes I think one important thing is to hear from people with lived experience I think another important thing is to hear directly from providers not filtered through um the city that pays for them I think another important um area is to hear directly from the the people of the city whether they are on one side or the other there should be a very broad representation of points of view and that group whatever that group is should be chartered to spend their time looking into this so that they aren't in the position of being told by staff well here are the answers to the questions city council wants answered and we think those are the answers you ought to give that's not really what I think of as um a good

[140:02] Democratic use of the skills of the citizens who participate thanks Bill thank you Bill anybody else with questions for bill um bill and I believe I know I received your letter that you sent thank you for that I believe everybody else here should have also received it and uh Mason's shaking her head I'll make sure it gets sent out again to everybody else I thought it went to both board and the commission but I sent a note to uh the city manager and the city council the hab email is broken okay yeah Mason's nodding that she hasn't seen it either so we will uh we'll look into that um but thank you I just want to thank you for um your very thoughtful input in that in that letter that we saw okay Brenda how are we looking is that the end of the hands

[141:01] that's the end of the hands we have no other participants okay um so Lindsay I suppose we shall then move on to our board discussion and um I wanted to make a comment and just kind of pass it by you Lindsay it seems to me like the focus from both the commission and the board members is fairly well aligned from the comments that I've been listening to and hearing um and so in some ways I think that our initial thought to kind of separate into two pieces may be Moot and we should go ahead and open it to to the Joint meeting what's your thought I agree and I want uh caveat are there just any clarifying questions that one commission feels like it could benefit from from hearing from the other

[142:01] commission before we get into discussion seeing thoughtful looks pensive looks okay I suppose also also what we can do is just say during the discussion if something does pop up and you specifically wish to direct it to either staff who thank you is still with us um you or the other you know a member of the of the opposite board or commission then we can do that also so we can get it in there okay um so with that as far as managing the discussion um I think we'll just take hands and again I think you know Lindsay what you did last time was great where we kind of tried to shift between commission board commission board uh so we'll look to do that so be patient and

[143:00] we'll we'll get to you okay Lindsay should I call hands this time or does it matter to you it doesn't it doesn't really matter to me no I'll go ahead then and call hands this time around and uh we can get going Judy um so um I think this has been really helpful and um I would hope that we come up with actual recommendations it does seem like we're in a lot of alignment I hope we do come up with specific recommendations um to pass on to staff I I realized that um this is just going to be sent as recording for feedback but we're still able is my understanding to make recommendations to council and I really hope we do that and so I wanted to just go through the questions and then I'll probably be just

[144:02] listening for most of the time um as far as question one um do we have input on interventions and yes I do um and I think that the options um that we're looking at really do meet all the criteria of the evaluation changes in the housing strategy um that were mentioned in the beginning I think that um I'm an advocate of housing first actually and I think it's a really good strategy and I think that staff um has done a great job in many many areas and certainly I've never questioned their caring and passion for um the people they work with and work for I guess um but to me housing first doesn't mean housing only it means housing first and so I think that many other programs are needed and I'm going to focus on those aspects as far as encampments um sorry I'm gonna interrupt you really

[145:01] quickly Jay um we're only seeing your desktop not the presentation with the questions sorry Judy I just wanted to make sure that we were seeing what Jay wanted us to be seeing oh okay you mean we were seeing a person skiing or something okay he was intending to show the questions you're responding to that's probably where he'd really rather be right now okay Le Zoom so as far as encampments actually um I was going to suggest that this one was complicated and maybe we table it but actually Mason convinced me that this was really something to look at and I'll leave that discussion for others except to say a couple things and one is that an interesting FYI is in Boulder's history historic Boulder had a camper renting almost every single backyard in Boulder because Boulder was considered

[146:00] such a wonderful healthy place to live and even in the winter and so the argument that this isn't a good climate for that um has B been disproven by Boulder's own history um let see what I else I have under that um I also think that the the data um if we look at other data than what the city was able to present to us tonight we'll see that um it is viable and does have uh good outcomes in many places it is perhaps the most problematic of all of the suggestions I realize but there are places where it's been successful as far as safe parking there's just tons of information um that validates that uh there better outcomes for safe parking than for shelters as far as getting people uh transitioned into housing and of course um day

[147:00] shelter you know I remember Carriage House very well which then became Bridge house and they just provided so many services for so many people um oh the one thing I left out of encampments was we have to remember that there are some people and I've met some of them who can't live in a house they can't whatever's going on with them they can't do it and so I think it's pretty important that we have a place where they can live safely if they can't live indoors so day shelter on for the tiny homes um HRC may or may not know that that that Hab had a whole session on tiny homes and it seems that the biggest issue with tiny homes right now for the city is that the land is so unaffordable and I think there's two different ways of paying for that and one is a portion of city-owned property and the other is like the project being done for veterans

[148:00] in Longmont it's a win-win-win situation for everything a developer who has a piece of land that they're going to use for residential development or maybe mix use development donates a portion of that land to a nonprofit donates paying for setting up the utilities and all that gets a fabulous ride off gets it through this they got it through the city of Longmont in one year instead of four years so it's a win for them and it makes it um a financially viable proposition um as far as people who've written into us um somebody did suggest the idea of um using empty office space and converting it to mixed use I want to lay that out somebody else also suggested I don't know if I just got it or if other people got it but that there are hotels in Boulder that are struggling and that the city could negotiate with them to lease the whole hotel for the duration of um

[149:03] certainly the covid pandemic um for a portion you know for a reasonable rate and for me a key thing is to have a have an orientation where staff would really uh do Outreach to find to go after developers and nonprofits and other entities to partner with them and a group effort to raise money I know that um that Kristen talked about um fundraising before um I also think that um there's a big issue with homeless Advocates and people who have lived experience aren't feeling heard in the city and so I suggest something and and Mason and I have talked about that as well I suggest something to address that um I also suggest I want to suggest

[150:00] two pieces of material that might be of interest to staff there's a publication called hidden in plain sight finding safe parking for vehicle residents it's 42 pages and it's from Seattle King County and then also there's a book that's for sale for $149 but it's a whole manual from Santa Barbara a nonprofit called New Beginning the new beginnings Counseling Center and it's a whole manual on the safe parking uh safe parking programs and it it um would save you a lot of time if that's a direction the city goes in um for the other questions to three and four um let's see so I Rec I I do recommend some sort of oversight um as I'm guessing Mason will discuss so that um people who have not been heard from can participate

[151:01] in the conversation and as far as the question about the current balancing of resources among vulnerable populations um I didn't get enough information on that to have an I don't right now have any idea of any specific specific U populations that I feel are being ignored and maybe there are I just don't have enough information U but do board members number four have input on alignment of the homeless strategy programs with national evidence-based programs and best practices so my background is nonprofits and I deal in issues like best practices and um evidence-based programs a lot and I feel that um the city might want to revisit the data collection they did and actually talk to the providers in even just the cities where they've already gather data uh because I think these extra programs definitely align with

[152:01] evidence uh based practices so that's it for me thank you shuck you're muted sorry I having problems with my button Mason go ahead you're muted I know we're switching off and on but it was there's some I can't see everybody else I didn't see anybody else whoops sorry my screen just shifted on me yeah me too sh screens it becomes limited how many folks you can see at a time but there is an arrow so that you can scroll through and find everyone right okay and I think I think I have everybody up who's here and I didn't notice any hands from HRC yet so I was gonna say go ahead Mason okay I'm gonna

[153:01] uh just kind of be relatively succinct because Judy hit on a lot of what um I was thinking as well I sent out to everybody the 2020 Vision plan um that we had been working on on I don't know my years are blurring right now but back in January and February right before uh we got tabled and our next meeting was going to be on the unhoused so several of us had kind of worked on the 2020 Vision plan and what it seemed like we kept coming up against which I wrote in the opening statements on that is that if we peac meal out all of these different elements to a comprehensive plan and put it through a public process um what it does is kind of what I was getting back to with Wendy is it hinders our ability to educate the community that we have a full comprehensive plan

[154:01] and that these are the details to it and this is how we capture or create a net for all of the individuals that are different that need different services so we know that just a housing first program which is awesome it's not an Andor it's awesome and we need more tools to catch the rest of the individuals that are falling through the cracks um so in the 2020 Vision plan we listed out the the coordinated entry which isn't going anywhere and then all of the other elements that um so the camping band the overnight shelter the safe parking and the miscellaneous services that need to support all of those elements in the tiny houses and going back to kind of what Darren had said too is human dignity is really key so knowing that we have all these individuals and yes some

[155:01] of them are going to get housing but the rest of them still need a safe place to put their head every night and they need to be treated with dignity so when we talk about encampment we know that there's a percentage of population that are kind of resistant to getting into um uh shelters or other locations um for anybody who doesn't know I was homeless for about three and a half years and um I wouldn't go into any of those facilities because I didn't feel safe so there is and some people just feel safer being in tents being in in um smaller encampments so those to me are important and being able to have a sanction encampment that has a structure to it safe parking we're getting ready I mean we're watching what's happening on the coast we're getting ready to get hit with all of that that's happening on the coast and people the first thing they think about when they're losing their house if they don't don't want to live on the streets which you know a majority

[156:00] of individuals don't want to they think about can I live in my car can I convert a van I mean we're seeing we already have a little over three and a half million people that were already living mobile I think that number is is low just because it is difficult to count people so I think we're going to see huge numbers of this so providing safe parking places for it tiny homes Judy hit on that about the cost it's not about buying land and putting houses permanently on it the beauty of the tiny house movement um that we're seeing in Denver and other areas is that we have a three to four year process like let's look at at um dagal Plaza I mean look at all of that parking that's there but my the original plan that we had had um with the tiny houses is that you would move them just like what beloved does down in Denver is that you move it to a different spot so it's not about buying the land underneath it and that's how you keep the prices lower skipping back a little bit to safe parking the other

[157:01] thing that's unique to Boulder with safe parking is that we have a lot of Trail heads and dog parks growing gardens that are empty From Dusk until dawn and almost all of those locations have bathroom and services provided to them if we marked off like take North Boulder Park for instance or I should say it's flat irons Park the one one way up North you know there's probably 60 parking spots up there you tape off six spots and when people come for safe parking spots what they do is just like a dog T you go watch a five minute video you still pay fees for your parking permit you put them in your car on the back of the window and it pulls people out in neighborhoods it safely Parks them into one of these parking spots that they go to they have trash they have all their services provided for them they've contributed to the community because that parking ticket I mean that uh permit pass might be $300 for a quarter

[158:00] or something like that and they prove that they're working in the community or something like that so it's safe parking for a reason there's ways to implement that and utilize the services we already have as a city um day shelters and Judy brought up something that I'm I'm glad you reminded me of is the office space so a couple of my clients are like from Google and some of these places that just built these monstrosities of um Office Buildings and the joke is when is everybody going to take them when when's all your employees coming back well we know that model shifted we know that that's changed and likelihood now that all of those employees are going to come back to that building is pretty slim so we have an opportunity here to look at our office space in a different way and consider efficiencies consider converting them into affordable housing so it's another opportunity for less money all of these options are a lot less money than us trying to have to

[159:00] figure out putting everybody into a brick and mortar so that's my thoughts on doing an un you know a filler the gaps that we're missing on this great program which is housing first we need to fill in those gaps okay any other hands yeah jeann left uh thanks Jo you say my name really well do you speak French hope [Laughter] so um I want to say thank you no say it again sorry I couldn't hear can you hear me yes okay I would like to say thank you to uh to the city you know City staff that did that work and uh and to you know for my first meeting I think I start to understand what it is about um I would like to say a few things about

[160:02] that situation but I will use an example to to at least um make you guys understand better 10 years ago I moved to Boulder and in the corner of uh Baseline and how do you say Baseline and the little F there used to be a huge amount of little oels there and now they're all gone so when you guys talk about hotels and Boulder I would like you to know that Bing get less and less hotels every day we need a real sorry give me oh go sorry I can't can you hear me we can hear you so we need we need a really real solution because today theels who have been Boulder they are not like these little cheap hotels that we used to have in that corner and reason I'm saying that it's

[161:00] because I heard uh a few of you keep referring to hotels and I do understand and that's a again that's a bandaid over the problem so we know and it's we need to have a real solution about that the second thing I would like to say is is that as a black man that moved to Boulder one of the thing that I encounter a lot in Boulder is like uh some of my friend who are I will say 98% white they would always tell me oh yeah I read that book about racism why don't you read it that will give you a better understanding the reason I refer to that is because I live racism every day and I see that report that CD CD workers do um as something like that it's like they're trying to take I say false data like I said I'm not trying to be disrespectful to tell these homeless how to change you know the situation for the

[162:02] city and I don't think that's fair Boulder has spent a lot of money to be attractive and I understand homelessness is not is not a thing that attract people to Boulder but it deserve a real solution it's Solution that's not that's not treating them they already homeless at the first place they have been mistreated anyway but they need a solution that will last it's not like we talk today you go out you find a data that doesn't even work and you put it out there and these people what you do is that create more vulnerability vulnerability in the town so in the end I think the only place we have now it's the boulder shelter and the boulder shelter is the only reason I think it's not closed it's because of the building they own the building that's the only thing and that's the only difference the bowler U

[163:00] bowler shelter has with all of the other programs they have closed if we could build a boulder shelter we can close it we could we can build other shelters like that to keep the city you know still attractive even though somebody's homeless and make sure we take care of them and um and in the end I think to like Bill Sweeny said earlier the homeless needs a voice and it's not like city workers that just go out hire agencies and do who knows where they found where they found those datas and give it to them and bring them they need a voice they need real people that can go out work with them talk to them and EXP explain to the city what it is or to the city workers how it works spending money on other agencies to to to help it's a good thing to do the studies I believe it's a good thing and um but I don't think it works until you talk to the people real it's

[164:02] like to give you an example about that is that as a black man that livion Boulder I have a job okay I'm a manager where I work but I'm telling you if I don't tell somebody the kind of treatment that I receive if I don't stand up for myself they will treat me less than home done the CD is treating homeless today and I don't think that's fair so if you don't talk to the homeless to know how they leave I think this data that we get I don't think we should be using it and in the end I think I'm not saying this report should be turning to trash but I don't think anybody should end that report we should come out with it you know they can do more come out with better solution or still since we are in the pandemic time come out with something that can help for the time being and do something real and um I think these people the city of Boulder should should

[165:02] treat them like they treat everyone else they are human like we are they have the same right that we have as people who owns houses here and as people who who who do not because not every one of us have the same opport uh lean said something that I really appreciate she said you know we give Millions to somebody in town we could have used that Millions to to build to build something different to help the hom us to keep the city attractive and I think for me it's really about it's it's a moral issue that these people they need help and I understand if the city can give a million dollars to these people but we are complaining about5 $1,000 to pay for a shelter to to housing people that could die all the city is using law enforcement to to put them in jail all the time that still cost us money and um and I think that's all I want to say thank

[166:01] you okay thank you Jo Lindsay thanks Sean Hiller um yeah the thing that really Rises to the top for me there are two things um as far as urgency goes um kind of like umbrella things one is this idea of like a like um a board or um some kind of oversight body that is made up of people who have the lived experience of homelessness um connected to that you know that connects to a few things that we've we've heard tonight you know we've heard that um part of the conundrum here is that we have um right like the the very immediate life immediate needs of the homeless community and then we also have

[167:03] concerns from the public which it seems like we're all on the same page about like not really based in data or like like real threats to their safety their safety concerns aren't based in um and at the same time these are some of the the voices pulling what we're actually doing um as um as a city right like that this input has an impact on what we do um there has to be a way to elevate the voices of people who are most impacted by this issue to balance that out because the people who are most impacted by this issue can't come to this meeting um can't come to city council um for all intents and purposes right like can't um we'll we'll find a lot of difficulty to even be out that late um

[168:03] because of the restrictions of the shelter um it itself um maybe um or for other um or for other reasons with life being um chaotic and unpredictable and not having a lot of control um so that feels very urgent for me and then the other um the other thing is something that we haven't talked so much about um but has come up before I think at least in the hrc's conversations and that is redirecting the energy and and the resource of the police away from the homeless community and um having other professionals interact with them um and having more resources to meet their needs and not having people ending up ticketed or jailed

[169:03] constantly okay um Charlotte actually I saw Arts hand up first so I'm happy to let art I guess we're going back and forth so or whatever you want I just don't want to okay let let's go ahead and we'll jump back and forth Charlotte then art and then Danny okay great um yeah uh Lindsay thanks for your comments um you know one of the uh the last question that I asked during the Q&A was about kind of um the assumptions that staff makes when tackling these issues um you know it's an observation of mine that the we're moving for you know much of the the city staff and um many individuals are moving forward with the assumption that we can't house everyone um and I I'm I'm going to challenge us to

[170:02] think that we actually can um and I would like to revisit the um the camping ban um specifically with relation to the enforcement and policing and violence that is inflicted on these communities when they have nowhere else to go um I was reading the language of the camping van earlier and just felt um it just like pretty disgusted um by the ways that this community is targeted and um it's you know we if the community has the will as um I believe Wendy mentioned if the funding was there then um we actually could house everyone um and um if we have the funding then perhaps it's social workers that are actually dealing with these communities de-escalating instead of armed cops so that's something that I think we can discuss down the road that's kind of a

[171:01] broader um ask but um just to touch on something that Judy and also Mason mentioned um I think we should uh look at how hotels can be a part of a solution the immediate solution I know Denver has um leveraged a number of its hotels um or at least one I believe um to house um the homeless Community this time during covid so right in our backyard our neighbors are doing it there's no reason why Boulder cannot um and um I think that we should explore um more resources for day shelter um with hygiene stations more handwashing something that mason or and or Judy mentioned in an email to everyone um especially during covid there's there barely any places to hand wash during this time no public restrooms it's contaminating not only our media open space but um you know other environments as well and it's just a huge Hazard to the community um and

[172:00] you know especially when these when when when officers are sweeping encampments it really puts you know these individuals in danger Mobility um the movement of these communities increases transmission rate and and without handwashing stations without resources to keep these communities safe um little on beds you know I think that this is something that we should explore as an immediate solution um you know I've been to a number of parks in Lions where they have like handwashing stations it's like a pumping water station like I don't know what you call those but um that seems like something that could be implemented relatively quickly um so that's all I have to say at this point I'm I'm glad Charlotte went first because I wasn't thinking about the um as much about that that question which I think is a great way to phrase it and and I I think it's not even so much maybe what if we housed everyone because as as others have made the point it's not always about providing housing but

[173:01] what if we served everyone who's unhoused what if we provided the valuable kind of services they need and and some of that's housing some of that's temporary shelter some of that's a just a safe place for them to to park themselves um so I appreciate that that that you you brought that up again and and put that forward because I think that's a great way to to think about how we have that broader broader View and that Vision um for for a better better way of approaching all this I wanted to reiterate basically three three points uh largely what Lindsay said um which is we've had it coming in front of the HRC um a number of folks Darren and others uh talk about issues um with the current services and uh that's been a question we've we've had come up does there need to be some sort of ombuds person is there some way to build more

[174:00] accountability into the system so I fully agree with this idea of an oversight committee um made up at least you know whether it's 50% in a proposal or something like that of people with lived experience think that's necessary um a second point which is also in that 2020 unhoused Vision plan that I really like um but it's that grouping of services that Mason keeps talking about um so that so that we do a better job with the addressing the public perception and the need to communicate well um with residents across the city of Boulder and to provide some education that that if we only do at peace meal um each one of those things gets kind of picked apart um so I do agree with addressing it um more comprehensively and as Lindsay pointed out the one of the more recent

[175:00] things we've been discussing is um shifting Services away from the police the hom homeless Outreach team should not necessarily be um under the guise of the police it should to be um through a different kind of agency uh with a different set of skills and also to help with that public perception if if you have an issue and you're calling the homeless Outreach team and it's the police you're calling it's helping you put that in this idea of it's a criminal Behavior Uh versus it's some other Behavior where where folks have other needs so um I like the 2020 unhoused Vision plan I think it covers a lot of that um so let's let's come up with some good recommendations okay thanks art Danny you're up um so I I guess uh am I on I can't hear I don't know if I'm all right

[176:00] so I think um the first thing I want to point out I think Mr Sweeney brought this up I think Mr or Conor brought this up too and um a lot of us have had this conversation uh regarding the fact that it's really tough to be having this Zoom conference and the people who are looking to serve um can't participate in it and uh I just want to underscore for everybody that we started talking about this I think it was um December or November and um our original plan was to go to a place and provide a setting where we can really focus on getting the input from the people who we need to get the input from and I think that the fact that we're dealing with this is one of the unfortunate reality of you know the way the the world is right now but it really underscores the fact of um the things that are lacking for community that you know needs and deserves a voice and so this is a really good example of that fact because obviously I don't think there's a lot of laptops um um

[177:02] that everybody has access to and Wi-Fi right now to participate and so that you know we really wanted to be um in a different setting in a different form right now and so I just wanted to underscore that for everybody um just kind of going back a few months before covid um the other point that I was um addressing before is also the unfortunate reality that I think um we're going to be dealing with the Confluence of two um very significant um trends that are inevitably going to happen which is a um a real shortfall in budgets and we have to take that reality into consideration here because it's absolutely going to happen the second thing is that um there's going to be a much higher demand for services because you know everybody likes to pretend that you know we we're through this or whatever but you know the economic realities of everything that's gone on and continues to go on um will come to the four more and more and from that perspective I just want to tie it to a

[178:01] lot of the things that I know uh Mason brought up and that everybody's brought up here which is um and something that that for the past year I know with the housing Advisory Board one of the things that we've really kind of been pushing exploring which is the notion that given the finite resources that we had even before covid Innovation flexibility and creativity are absolutely Paramount to try to tackle problems that are you know beyond the easy grasp or easy scope of resolution and so from that perspective um given everybody props here things that I heard that I absolutely agree with is a Innovation and and policy enforcement and you know um you don't don't need to um be policing the homeless as much as reaching out to them reaching out to that Community from a community perspective and I think that's an absolutely important thing I think it's imperative and I think it will really help because especially if we can figure out some other means of um providing

[179:02] assistance so in other words um we're much more likely if we have people Social Work background or whatever it is um communicate to people where they can go for safe parking which is to me absolutely imperative and and and such a uh um such a such a pressing need because again that's that's you know you see even with the graduations now you know people have been doing the graduation parades you know people when when when you don't have a home to rely on your car becomes your next form of shelter in a lot of ways and so um I think you know focusing on being able to orient people to where they can be safe where they can park where they Camp uh what resources are available to them because I think that's one of the biggest issues here too is communicating what might be available um to a community that um doesn't have the same means of getting that information um readily available to them so that's

[180:00] where the emphasis really should go I think and so I just really think this whole concept of um Innovation is imperative and I do support you know and staff and we were talking about the notion of you know we're talking about housing first and the um the the you know local aspect or the local priority for housing first and I do support that because I think it's pragmatic it's very real but um you know uh all right you brought up that issue of resources and and and solutions and that's a different thing and for that I think you know that should be Global and our our focus should be on how do we provide those in the most effective way so that um we're not disseminating those between where somebody came from or whatever it is but we're really trying to tackle the problem um because reaching out to the community on something where people have a lot of uh guttural reactions to it without any basis of knowledge or fact or anything one of the biggest things

[181:00] you can say is if this is a community problem we're solving it as a community and the benefit is for everybody in a lot of pragmatic ways as well so that's that's my thought on this I just think Innovation is going to be something that really has to come to the for um in the next few months I think it's going to become a very very challenging issue I feel personally this is a good first step we're all stuck by the you know um what we're dealing with right now um in terms of the pragmatism but I think um if this could be continued if this could be to be continued to uh another Forum where we uh uh sorry I got a bunch of 13y olds in my house uh another Forum where we have um uh an opportunity to reach out to the community that we're trying to uh address and serve here I think it's still um is something that would be uh very visable and would would be really effective and so I I'm way open to continuing this conversation in that Forum as well that's all I have

[182:02] sorry okay thanks Danny um Stan I think you may be the only one who hasn't made comment art has his hand up again for some more so I'll go to you art yeah just a quick comment which for you know several people have brought up it's only going to get worse and I'm not sure in the 2020 on house Vision plan um whether it addresses that like on on a large scale like if we had to respond in the way that we've been planning to respond to covid-19 and you know triage centers and stuff like that how would we do it um around this issue so um maybe Mason or whoever else worked on that Vision plan could talk about about ideas on that yeah Mason I'm gonna call on you in a minute I just want to see hands for who has seen the 2020 Vision plan from

[183:02] the boards and commissions has everybody had that in their inbox okay all right so Mason would you follow up on Arts yeah so so are you right that um this was written preco um [Music] and to me if I if I'm if I'm trying to put myself in the shoes of somebody who's unhoused which um part of what I wrote in the mo motions that I sent out later was um an oversight committee because I think reviewing all the policies and everything that comes through one of the things that I did with the unvision when we had it was I drifted it in front of quite a few key players that are providing services to kind of get their input to see where it was at but it is only a shell of where we're going and um

[184:01] yes CO's going to require a lot more of everything and to me what I what I liked about what we were putting together was that we were touching on each one of the stones in the areas that we need is it going to scale up to everything um that we may need no or I don't know because I don't think we know the full impact of what's going to come our way but at least this way the hope is is that we're getting in front of the ball um right now it's coming our Direction and we're not doing anything I mean no offense Wendy or or Vicky it's not like we're not doing anything but we've already already had these major gaps for a while and um we need to get on the ball and get in front of them as much as possible and so I think we can simultaneously do all of these things for very little amounts of money um as

[185:02] compared to trying to force everybody into a house so does that answer your question art okay Judy so this has been great to listen to and I just want to comment on a few things the first is that I hope that staff that's listening doesn't think we're extremely naive and oh let's have encampments and let's have safe parking and let's put on a play you know I we're only talking in the broad picture right now but this we recognize there's a specificity that's needed for example in the safe parking um Mason alluded to one approach of people buying tickets there's many other approaches where people could enter in order to stay in safe parking there're thereby entering the coordinated entry system and can get services and are required to maybe at least talk to people about it or something I mean there's things that can

[186:01] be done so it does so it's not so nebulous oh great and I think that our two boards can help with that because we can without having to have a public meeting up to two people from each board and commission could meet with staff to help them get into the specifics of some of that um also the concern about shortfall of budget is very real and I honor it I do think that those people who are in charge of adjusting the budget will hear will recognize that number one human survival is probably the highest um one of all the city budget um needs but also um places like the Community Foundation raised tons of money really fast to address covid and I think that Boulder is such a wealthy place I think there's opportunities when Danny was talking about creativity to

[187:01] raise money um I also think that tonight is our only chance to reach Council right now when they're making some broad decisions and I agree with Dany that we can go on and talk about these things with more specificity at another time but I really hope tonight that we come up with some recommendations and as a framework I'm especially interested in um using Mason's idea as uh as her idea as broad we recommend it we know that it's Broad and can be filled in but then go through some of the um specific ific recommendations that she mentioned and adding in a couple that have come in tonight like about the one about Co and I think another one or two came up I'm done thank you yeah if I I'll just tag on it is a broad framework and the cool thing is between our boards is that we

[188:01] could look at the if if it's something that we wanted to move forward on we could immediately start looking at or recommending to city council the oversight committee and while the oversight committee is being addressed we can div divide up into little tiny committees that address okay how do we want to approach camping um encampments how do we want to approach safe parking so everybody take a little piece and work on it and then come back again with more firmer recommendations as we and it can go to the oversight Committee of like what do you what do you think of this are we in the right direction what do we need to adjust but it's steps okay um I'm not seeing any hands up I guess I'm G to put in my two cents worth now uh and a couple of things one is I do want to check in and say I only saw Mason's latest email because I was in

[189:02] transit on my way here now as I opened up that email um with your suggestive motions and the like there so uh two things from chair position we are already well over time and I just want to kind of get a thumbs up from everybody out there that we're good to continue um or if we need to somebody thinks we need to wrap it up so Danny's like aren't aren't the kids asleep yet Danny come on um so shall we continue is that kind of what I'm getting okay um so that's the first piece um I will probably come back to you Mason at some point with you giving these motions that you presented here um and the one thing we were talking about with this meeting and and Mason was getting to and a few

[190:01] others have commented on is we were just gonna because of the time frame we were thinking we're just going to end up with Council listening to these kind of individual perspectives and we wouldn't have time to Cobble something together um I'm hopeful that we actually can Cobble something together and give a message to council because what I'm hearing from all the board and commission members here uh there's a lot of of balance I think a lot of the agreement is encompassed with within what Mason has put forth here already so I don't know that we have that far to travel um so that's kind of the direction I want to take um and Lindsay if you think that's a good way to go we can do that yes so you mean moving so getting agreement around the Motions correct yes correct and and using the the 2020 Vision plan as a

[191:02] framework basically as Mason has presented it um Mason can I ask you quickly uh and I could probably find that out but you'll be able to answer quicker did this go out to everybody on HRC and have okay so everyone should have that in your inbox it was 420 um it went out to have and hrc's general email so if somebody's not on that then that might be an issue but I it went out to both General emails okay all right great thanks um I'm gonna just put in my like I said my two cents now and then we'll move forward um unless there's any F further discussion uh I think one of the things that strikes me the most and a little shout out to Lynn here even though I cut you off um is that Lynn's point is I feel very accurate and this doesn't have to do

[192:00] just with uh have and affordable housing and our discussions and how those discussions move forward but it really comes down to what will this community and what will we as board and commission members commit ourselves to and at this point in time I think we're seeing from so many angles that deflecting our eyes and our gaze from what's going on doesn't work and it's not acceptable and so these questions that are in front of us now and this joint meeting even though I was uncertain about how it would roll I think is critical and it's what we really need to do and if we have to take it upon ourselves to give a strong message to council then we have to take it on ourselves to give a strong message to council and I do think that we live in a town that is pushed by those voices that are easily heard

[193:02] and so I want to step behind and I've been kind of keeping a a a rolling list here um I want to step behind the concept of this oversight and getting voices heard that need to be heard um I think that's really important and and critical uh I have my own personal small experiences both with camping and with parking um years ago and I have some sense of what that is and it was always just a search for safety um I happened to be in the hills of Malibu when Charles Manson was running around trying to park my car so it was a sense of safety um but that is critical and I think it's critical that we get those voices heard um and not just represented by us so that's one piece that I'm really strongly looking at um I'm going to just

[194:00] put a quick thumbs up on parking in encampments and Mason's motions here to say let's get some pilot project in place as soon as possible um again I know money is an issue those specifics and details are going to be questionable but again there's a lot of money in this town and I think although it's not the right way to be funding these things through philanthropy in my mind it is a way and with the time frame that we have and with Co um and budget crisis that we're going to end up in here I think it's something we should pursue uh time homes parking encampments um very important the service component to be aligned with these things also simultaneously um and address that and I think more detailed bits here that I saw

[195:01] were um office space or where we do this and how we do it and I'm just going to say that I think we need to put a message out here that says we are going to look into these things we're going to take this 2020 Vision plan we're going to put these motions in play as we see fit and recommend that Council says okay Hab HRC let's get it done you guys put these things on our plate and you tell us what to do that's always been my vision of our board is that we're g to actually be as Jean said we are going to be creative and forward looking and innovated and Danny I think you were on that one too so um my final piece really strongly is the policing component and when we had that meeting back in March where we went to the courthouse I was shocked and dism made that we had I believe it was one FTE

[196:02] from the police department one full-time equivalent that was tasked to engage with the homeless in another part-time and that both were from the police department I think we're seeing it across the country now obviously um but we can do better here um Boulder can do better so that's the end of mine two cents worth uh so Mason um and unless Stan I haven't heard from you yet do you have anything you want to put in or can we go to looking at this 2020 Vision plan and motions yeah yeah let me just confirm that what I'm hearing I'm liking a lot I'm not adding a lot because you're saying at all when I read the 2020 Vision that was the first time I started feeling like we're in touch with the problem um and that's take nothing away from my total agreement with housing first and everything else uh but this

[197:02] was the first time that I actually saw some steps said let be realistic about who the people are what the needs are and so forth you know I've argued for oversight from a whole bunch of reasons due process as well as others for for ever since I've been on the on the commission uh and so I'm fully supportive of it whether tonight we can work out the details I don't know I mean I would prefer to pass it and pass it Forward is a set of principles uh knowing that there are details that to be worked out but I'm very much in favor of taking some stand and and these are very very nice uh this is the kind I mean my complaint of all along has been that there's so much ether or thinking so much kind of massaging data to support standpoints that we haven't really gotten into the creative Innovation part of it you know does it have to cost that much are we looking at alternative models of funding are we looking at alternative models of providing services

[198:01] are we are we going through looking at this thing not accepting the standard assumptions but knowing that we're in a special time that requires actually investigating every one of those assumptions and and I really believe the 2020 vision is a really positive step in that direction thank you thanks okay thanks Dan um Jay and other staff who may have input on this but I'll direct it to you Jay and maybe clay time frame I just want us to wrap our heads around it to see if there are any alternatives to how we might get this in front of council um so can you just refresh us all on that time frame I know council's coming up like tomorrow so the uh the memo to council is due tomorrow morning because of the holiday the deadline was pushed up we basically have a link in the memo that will link to this meeting once it's um

[199:01] it's going to take a few days for it to get posted to the website but it will be available um as we talked about in the chairs meeting I mean this is the any sort of recommendation really has to come from the larger group and it sounds like you guys are are getting close so I would encourage you just to keep going and see how you know how far you can get um and then if you feel like you're you're not getting there then I think you're just GNA have to rely on the recording and then you you also have the option individually of um you know contacting Council on your own you just can't represent the the full board or commission that's all is that helpful Jay when is there meeting meeting July 14th 14th okay okay and it's a study session just to be clear about that so there's no public testimony um it's you know basically a sta presentation and then Council discussion and they're not making any decisions so Council doesn't make decisions at study sessions they

[200:00] can provide direction to staff on additional analysis though so I'm gonna TCH on right there that if this is something we're considering and since it is 33 this evening what I'm Rec recommending um is that we review the 2020 just kind of running it down quick and the Motions that I had and then yes you're providing the link but what we can do is if we agree on the general framework we're not talking about sussing down or drilling down into anything if we agree then what we do is move to make the recommendation of the this listed out and I can just read them down and if in general majority of us agree that recommendation is moving is asking city council to to direct staff to take the next steps so what we would be asking for in the recommendation is for them to take the ne direct staff to

[201:00] take the next steps and again if we look at the motion I can detail that out if that makes sense okay um Danny you had your hand up a moment ago yeah and I just uh basically um paring off what Mason just said I think the notion of having this and and Ja you brought this up too the notion of having this broad framework right now without getting uh delving into the details so we make sure that we have something in front of them uh to to prod this thing forward and saying we need to start working on those details with staff with our respective boards um is absolutely the best way to go about it and the other point that I that I think that you know um Mason made before that I really think we need to to push forward on now too is the fact that a lot of these solutions that we're talking about a lot of things that are in that master plan what I love about it Mason said this is stuff that's not the same type of uh expense and something that can be done in relatively quick fashion if there's good policy rather

[202:01] than trying to come up with the funding etc etc you know safe parking is a lot more uh immediate and effective and expensive than a lot of these other things so that's the only thing I'd say is I think we're all the right page I want to really try to have a uh you know the the macro Vision today so that we can really prod them to give us the opportuni to pair it down to the microvision later on okay art and then I'm gonna come to you Judy do we group the oversight committee kind of equally with all those recommendations or do we lift it out a little bit or at least order it such because I really liked what you said before Mason about having that oversight Committee in place for first and and then having all these other things uh go through that committee so what I would suggest here art is that we make the recommendation along with all of these motions so that they get that and start seating and putting the framework in for the oversight while they also give staff

[203:00] directions so it all goes in the one package all together at the same time and they can make the staff in the oversight does that make sense okay Judy so um I'm very happy with how this is going and and I do agree that we should provide just the broad Strokes right now but I think we should say in the recommendations that go to council here that we realize that these are just the broad strokes and each of our boards are committed to working out more details to each board separately to provide um to Cil on how we feel about this but I do think what you said art about bringing the oversight board up first perhaps um and maybe even finding a way of saying this is of the most importance um is valid and I also think we need to talk about the other 50% because the devil is in the details

[204:02] and if the board is 50% people who either um are our homeless Advocates or have had the lived exp or 50% have had the lived experience in one way or another if you have the other 50% be people who are uh City providers who have contracts with the city they're going to have a certain amount of pressure to want to direct it a different way and I think maybe we can't decide that right now but I think we should that should be one of the things we drill down on okay so clarifying question Judy are you saying then um wait on all the other motions and put forth the recommendation for the oversight first and then wait to the next city council meeting I just mean top of the list with a note that this is the one we think needs to be addressed first okay Lindsay you had something you wanted to add earlier yeah thanks Jack um yeah and I

[205:00] agree with that putting that um at the top of the list um but deliver it at the same time and then the um it process question I guess is this is this like a good time to suggest things that feel very important and aren't in this plan yeah yeah I would think so as we go down um I think maybe make some notes here at the top so if anybody has anything that they see should be added to this let's jop some notes down right now maybe Jay you could help us with that and track it a bit um I'll try to do the same here and uh and then we'll get into it it my suggestion I mean I have a I think one really like it seems simple to me is to do the thing that I first heard art suggest which is move the the homelessness Outreach team from the police department to some other

[206:04] department and the resources that go along with that okay anyone else okay uh so I'm gonna I'm gonna a link out um to I don't know if you copied where is uh Jay did Jay did you just copy and paste that over and you're muted can't hear you hold on let me see if I can help him oh no sorry about that so um I'm working on a a Word document that I can share and then you can guys can Wordsmith so I added to move the hot team out of the police department into a different department out of the police department I think is what I'm hearing clarifying question does that um

[207:02] is that related to funding as well or what what that encompassed in what you're saying okay good clarify I think that's what we were talking about y any other additions um so am I hearing this correct like if we recommend the 2020 Vision plan oversight committee is an element within that because it's all one big plan does that make sense so we're titling it 2020 Vision plan um and the oversight is another bubble within that um that would go between coordinated entry and all the other on the visual did you see the visual um I don't have that yeah we're coordinated entry is over and it says all referrals and then it drops down a portion to the coordinated entry screening and to me it seems like all referrals and then um the oversight

[208:01] would sit to the bottom right of the referrals and um hit both crosses it would oversight the all programs I have a question do you think Mason that that's something that in other words when we present this do we present it with that structure that we need to have that in there at this point or is that something we verbally put into right I hear you um you know again painting with a broad brush stroke let's just leave the recommendation being moving to adopt the plan we drag oversight committee up to letter A so that it's first first yep and then we do path to home focus on miscellaneous services that include more bathrooms and food services staff commitment reopening of faith-based community shelters to serve that six-month Gap where people are dropping out again broad broad stroke increase the number of beds to shelter accommodate need base and then um the

[209:02] next one can be remove criminalization of camps I lost my own screen yeah that's thanks for putting that up Jay and let's make sure we yep so the next one under F would be to um decriminalize so after F would be decriminalize and pull out somebody helped me with words but we're pulling out the the two police officers that do you talked about moving Outreach from the police department h team over to team yeah yeah and the resources that a company the resources and resources does somebody from HRC or anywhere else have a immediate thought

[210:02] or suggestion about where that would go or staff just if anybody I don't know the structures that are there in place already that where that might translate to and not that we have to answer it now it was just a a question Judy I I felt like it was sort of the sentiment of the group that besides having oversight committee ba have an additional sentence attached to it that said something like we consider this the first priority um so that they know it's not just a one of the list but that is the one we think attention the most because that'll feed into all the others um and then also I would like a sentence at the top that says while we plan uh while each board and commission or while Hab and HRC plans to um slush out these ideas these are the broad Strokes of our recommendations something

[211:01] like that whatever anybody wants to put Danny you're always good at coming up with the words yes Dan what if we just said move to adopt a draft 2020 how about we move to recommend the recommend exactly we move to recommend the 2020 unhoused Vision plan with the following inclusions as a broad stroke or starting spot move to recommended as a working document and maybe and uh and that brought me to the next pie piece also do great sorry back so broad outline or do you what so what if we said was the following broad-based policies comma to be um to be more closely uh to be more um to be developed in in more

[212:02] detail uh on an ongoing basis by the respective boards yes Danny leave it to Danny I don't remember what I said now so hopefully somebody else does I capture it I can't read it um okay good yeah's that yes I like it here's out Danny okay how is uh HRC feeling you guys are quiet over there we do we do have as a broad-based policies it needs cleaning up either as broad-based policies as as a broad-based policy or yeah yeah okay so HRC anyone we I'm gonna go back to

[213:04] G okay I feel like this would be like a more appropriate allocation of resources but it doesn't achieve the decriminalization of homelessness I I think that's a really good point Lindsay I was just looking at that too what if we said decriminalize homelessness and move the hot and Associated resources because I think those are you know two different sides of the same coin and we can say specifically what that looks like later in the fine detail planning exactly okay does everyone but me know what hot means the homelessness Outreach team okay thanks [Laughter]

[214:04] wri so in support of that with the general onh house plan we moved down and look at what um we're recommending to staff so we're saying we're recommending that they pilot two to four sanctioned encampments optional sorry my big screen optional within the year and again something we talked about in Hab early on is our job is to go big in Broad strokes and let them kind of sus down to where they want to go if our recommendation is bigger um and these I think would be where they would say to us um where we could start to divide up and kind of drill down um we can look at mother house we can look at all the regional plans we could look at other programs involved does that make sense yeah yes and one thought that I

[215:01] have maybe in this section here also when we are can you scroll up just a little bit thanks that's good um so we move to recommend staff um I'm just being sensitive to the current furlows etc etc etc that are going on for staff right now and so uh in talking to the commission members who are here and the board members who are here a suggestion to place in here a very specific wording that our two bodies are going to do some LIF engage with this and we're looking for support from staff in that effort within their capability at this time Judy I want to um ask Jay about this

[216:02] it's my understanding that our bylaws make it very clear that we don't get to recommend anything to staff maybe I'm wrong but isn't this something we actually want to recommend to council as a recommendation and they then figure it out with staff I I just Jay what is how does that go just to clarify you can't direct City staff as as a board of but you can recommend to council that they direct staff right right majority of council agrees right yep that's what we have to get the wording to yeah what if what if we said here move uh to recommend that the council direct the H the HR uh hrb to work closely with staff to to implement the following implement the following yeah

[217:05] great you how about removing Implement say study or um so that it yeah explore good point yeah I'm sorry I missed that um change Implement to study I actually object to that that's the only thing I've objected to so far I think I think that's part of it is studying the best way to do it but we're not a we're not asking it to be studied and then come back like oh maybe it'll work maybe it won't we want to find out the best way of doing it and do it I think this is um timely and urgent I agree with you Judy um on that uh to work with staff to propose and implement or work with staff

[218:00] to to study and Implement to get both those pieces how about promote or Elevate catalyze I just think we're being Namby pambi here this is something we're all pretty passionate about and um if there's not a way to do it if if the city that's up to city council they can go no there's no more money but we're saying this is something we feel very passionately about I actually support Judy yeah I I think that language is very active and um it doesn't leave a lot of WI a lot of wiggle room for hi you won me over Judy okay and I just think real quick once in a meeting you win really quickly straw pole thumbs up on this one we leave it as Implement if you're for leaving it as Implement give me a thumbs up I got one two three four five six seven

[219:03] eight Johnny I don't see a thumb up is that a thumb down or okay there you go I see your hand now got it okay so we have a straw poll that says we can leave this as Implement so we'll go with that and leave it there thank you Judy for keeping our backbones where they belong just a just a picky thing to implement the following we've got to yeah yeah we do need the no the no two no two oh thank you Mason will you run us down through those real quick yes so Pilots two to four sanctioned encampments operational within the year um I know last year I believe it was Jay maybe you know as well that this was uh a little bit of work has been done around identifying a couple of areas where encampments could go so that's why looking at two to four

[220:01] different locations um piloting two to four safe parking lots with the goal of them in full operation within one year and the appropriate reservations for space bases Data Tracking and on-site access to basic hygiene Services um well I mean everybody can read the these pilot project for three um tiny home villages with case management with the goal being operational within a year investigate leasing entire hotels um and converting unused office space immediately find a way to restore path to home with uh Bridge house creates um an unhoused oversight committee to include at least 50% lived experience folks to review housing policy and procedures going forward and Jay can you scroll updates the single adult house homelessness data dashboard every 30 days to include more data points for the oversight committee deemed necessary I think we've um agreed that the dashb needs to be updated on a

[221:01] regular basis and I think there's some data point areas that are um missing in that um we can move up the oversight Community if we want to really make sure that that's stress and in alignment with the ones that are above it um but again this is Broad strokes and that we would divide them up between our two boards and start digging in Judy oh I was saying do we do we need to put six down there since it's already number one that was one thing I want to say up above I'm not sure we need it I don't want to sound redundant to console the other thing is I I just want to say Mason and I talked about these specifics a lot and I did did a fair amount of research to show that there are places where these things have been done in one year from concept to people actually um living there having the encampments or whatever so it's it's a doable goal Y and you all have to decide if you want that um erased because it's redundant or

[222:01] want to leave it so a thumbs up should we remove six here since we have it initially above um so here's my thoughts about it is like these are the um Jay can you scroll up just a little bit so we can see the top portion of it so um we're saying this is the 2020 plan and this is what we're recommending for adoption but we're uh the we're moving to rec recommend specifics below so to me we're just drilling down a little bit more specifically on that oversight Community being 50% I'm not attached either way if we feel like we want to delete it I think that's good how about if we leave it but add as stated above we blah blah blah you know yeah okay all right so unless anybody has objections to that one um I think we'll just we'll leave it there I have one other thought for this

[223:01] list um I'm loathed to make it longer but I want to just address the funding piece and put out a suggestion that we add a line item that addresses looking into funding sources outside of or in addition to existing city funding and maybe that's something that some staff could speak to for us and how that might work so what I hear you saying is um well for each one of these projects it would have a the opportunity for different funding things so like if we did a tiny house project and it was going to house our vets the access to funding around that is going to be very different than access to funding around an encampment it seems to me that the funding elements because we're painting

[224:00] in Broad Strokes again would be up to whatever committee took on the sanctioned encampments took on the safe parking took on this piece of it part of that would be looking at what would we need to do to make that a viable option and I that still doesn't negate that still doesn't negate putting it in there as um exploring um EXT out uh means of fundraising out outside the city resources my thought on it is that it's just a nod to counsil that we recognize the constraints that are both current and coming our way and we know that in in order to do these things that we are going to have to get creative not only in the concepts that we're trying to push forward but also and how we're GNA make them happen Danny I I agree Jack I think it doesn't hurt to just say uh you know seek all alternative funding mechanisms outside of uh um City uh in addition to

[225:03] City budget to help promote uh programs state or something like that I think is it's it's it's a good it's a good nod to the fact that we're we're we're taking a pragmatic approach to this and we realize the challenges that are ahead um to me it seems to work okay can I add then something it got me thinking is if we add this broad stroke on financing we should maybe add one more broad stroke for education for our community so that this plan like any other plan that the city's had has to come with an education element to our general public so that it doesn't get peacee down or land blasted before it has a chance to grow some legs and educate our community does that make sense yes absolutely so maybe those are separate Community committees on how do we educate our public on the homeless and the action that we're taking and then we

[226:02] also have this Finance piece good issues related to the unhoused end the 2020 Vision so it's Gotta we don't want to just right and and this also could be something you know that the um oversight committee is really involved in because it would be speaking their truths we are at 10 o'clock I'd like to try to see us push through this I think we're 15 20 minutes and have her done wrap her up so I'm sorry for one thing this is like I really want this to look good when we go to console and can we just go

[227:01] over a couple can can you scroll back down wait on is this kind of General um edits Judy it's not editing the it's like punctuation and stuff like that right yeah so that's what I mean by edits um can we hold off on that for a second and just make sure we get through the concept piece first and then we'll roll through it okay thanks art um regarding the um the hot team and stuff like that I think it's more than that but I don't know what the other examples will be so I was trying to work on some other wording I don't know if this is close um but the thing I drafted up was something like this and then maybe Danny can come up with a better version um take steps to decriminalize homelessness and affect the perception of homelessness as a criminal issue by preferring by preferring Services over penalties and Social Services over police enforcement that's what I'm trying to

[228:00] get at but I could use some word smithing there and you spoke way too fast for me I said okay uh take steps to decriminalize homelessness and affect and affect the perception of homelessness as a criminal issue by preferring Services over penalties and Social Services over police enforcement it's not great but but I was just trying to get the concept down how about if we said um so before you type Jay let me just throw dispel the perception of homelessness as a criminal issue um by preferring Services over penalties um and and policing right

[229:03] yeah I like to spell and change preferring to resourcing wait wait sorry sorry at the very beginning take steps to decriminalize we're going to dispel dispel right just say dispel so it should just say dispel the perceptions make it a lot less wordy so dispel will be the first word in the sentence dispel the perception of homelessness as a criminal issue by instead of uh preferring resourcing right is that you said yep thank you okay resourcing Services over penalties and Social Services over police action so take up preferring and make that resourcing and I'd say so just put a

[230:00] period after department and then just a capital D this could just be a two sentence bullet point and it ties in the whole concept um and all right I do I do like that way because it is more than just moving that over it ties in the whole concept of what we're trying to say there it's good yeah nice okay and let's remove new from between seven and eight okay do we need language for 10 you mean Finance wasn't enough yeah I'll get it complete sentence day man

[231:02] um explore what do I have in complete sentence where Finance 10 I was just making a joke didn't quite C catch what jacqu was trying to say about Finance I just wanted to make sure we came back to it so what I'm trying just to to put in here as a nod to our current situation is that we will explore um alternative and creative alternative finance options outside of the existing or in addition to the existing City in addition to yeah in addition to instead of outside and uh someone who's more familiar with the budgeting aspects of how the city is working um in addition

[232:01] to what current funding sources there you go that's good we could just leave that for us yeah I think that's fine from my perspective to be broad okay last shot before we lose anybody else from the screen here um for any other content shifts and then we'll move back to Judy's and my concerns and others concerns with punctuation and edits grammatic and punctuation edits create y thank you yeah capitals for all of them um I I do think we had talked about there seem to be agreement that things we say down at the bottom that's up on top even though we're keeping it we should say at the end as above or more

[233:01] specifically from above or something like that so that they don't think God those people were so un together they put the same thing twice tell me which ones you want to do that with Judy um I'd probably just put it right in the beginning a move what if we said as broadly discussed above comma move to recommend then we don't have to worry about great thank you God I love you Danny okay and then updates should be update on number seven yep I keep trying to scroll up the I know me too go back up you want to start at the top yeah okay capitalize draft or

[234:01] no who better than I am at this uh above first line where we have draft 2020 yeah that should be just capitalized draft yeah um at the end when it's of that first sentence when it says inclusions do we want a colon instead of the three dots yes yep I would suggest that we change policies in line one to as broad-based policy as Vision plan would be the policy as of broad based policy yeah yeah sorry say that again where are you should be Vision planned as a broad-based [Music] policy nope

[235:07] nope should B be like restore path toing okay and then lose the two continue at the end of B rid of reopening reopen yeah shelters and services just plural for shelter after Community face Bas Community shelters and services yeah uh do you want to start um D with a verb

[236:00] yeah I would just commit to current data and maybe something like that yes yep commit staff to I don't think you have to specify staff okay point is we just we want to have current additional yeah good um it where on E where it says shelters and services for first six months I'm just looking for understanding of the first what from what point or yeah so where that came from was we're requiring we we've created a barrier to coordinated entry um saying that they have to live

[237:01] here for the first six months so what we're suggesting is that Gap that's been created for people to have shelter would be available through faith-based Community shelter service opportunities to explore that piece again so just the first six months of in support of coordinated entry right so that's it's all there just spell it out so the for the first six months and then yeah okay great thanks for C is do we have better wording than miscellaneous lacking service essal essential Services essential additional Y which would you like essential goodal okay I like

[238:00] that I think the second part's in good shape I can't scroll down are you uh f um just a simplification increase the number of beds at the shelter to accommodate need or the need [Music] okay we can put a period after single every single one because they're a complete [Music] sentence your wish is my command Judy thank you when we're talking about the need do we want to include the discussion on the cold weather shelters severe weather of keeping them open

[239:04] Ah that's a good one yeah do we incorporate that with f or totally on its own I think with f right because isn't that part of including does that capture it yeah I mean it's it's really the rules around the opening of the shelers is the issue right yes and so it shouldn't be begging to have the shelter open during a uh what was it a a a something bomb what was yeah continuing the opening of severe weather shelters without

[240:01] condition um about this adding availability does does that work for people just keep it simple as possible yeah I just want to get rid of the 32 degrees right and then is it the case then that all of the beds are going to be like in this better scenario we're building all the beds are going to be at the shelter the shelter or are there going to be some at the faith based yeah that's good to eliminate at the shelter yep and also maybe at the end to say including including um something about um in increasing the days for severe weather Sheltering or something like that maybe expanding the about increase the number and availability of beds throughout the city to accommodate the need

[241:02] including Zer zero barrier to severe weather Sheltering including of eligibility for severe weather Sheltering how's that say it again including expansion of eligibility for severe weather Sheltering uh eligibility or availability to yeah availability for severe weather Sheltering does that make it clear enough that we want the days expanded or not to matter I mean if I were saying it would say October to April is severe weather period Well questions do you want to get into that level of detail with this document right right yeah I I don't need it I mean I think the we need to get the discussion going and they'll know what that's about yeah yeah we can add that detail as we as we move forward with it

[242:03] maybe is it focusing on essential services or providing should we say provide essential Services yes that's good and rather than to include I'd follow the format we just did on the last bullet and say including yeah Proverbs golly we're gonna win a Pitzer prize for our verbs active writing that has to be a comma after Services sorry provide essential Services comma including combined we are the grammar advis board I know there's some very dedicated members of the public hanging with us while we edit this document still there wow they're they're our own oversight committee our grammar oversight we might be just about there

[243:02] can we see down below again yeah sorry looks good yeah is sanctioned should that be capitalized is that like are we treating that as a proper noun or which one number one sanctioned pilot 2 to four sanctioned encampments ah yes not yeah safe parking is the name it should stay capital okay yeah safe and parking can stay Capital so I have one thing to add in here too um it was just pointed out um by somebody on the county side of it

[244:01] I know that we're kind of thinking a little bit here on the boulder but this is also part of um potentially countywide initiatives as well so we've got mother mother's house um who's also doing funding and I think we need to talk about some family um initiatives so I don't know how we would build that in on this but I think maybe an additional number that says something to the effect of um promoting sustaining supporting the countywide initiatives along with this or integrating County does anybody see where I'm going with that and see how we could you could just say integrate policies with County initiatives if we want because I know that um like we're saying mother house just got their funding but you know in one year that's

[245:00] going to be in question as well so considering these as we move forward because again those are all Gap measures that help this program this vision and this would be number 11 here is the suggestion yeah how I integrate 20120 Vision with County oriented initiatives yes yeah okay I capture that yeah yeah that's f little n little nitpicking is uh I think above 2020 Vision it has the slash in between and here it doesn't so yes it's 2020 I know Mason has that trademarked right no it's 20-20 or 2020 unhoused Vision right there's that

[246:02] too unhoused sorry it's a house Vision Vision plan got it awesome that way we're keeping also one eye on the bigger picture as well so moved yeah that feels awesome you guys yeah thanks for doing all the hard work before the meeting yeah seriously amazing for reading it last minute I was like wow I really suck sending this out last minute a question for you Jay as soon as you're done with that I'll give you a moment that's fine I'm done okay so we have a joint meeting here we are trying to put out a joint recommendation yeah um how do we handle

[247:03] that technically I think that we have a quorum from h still on the screen it looks like does each board committee approve it individually then no I would say it sounds like there is full agreement that um basically you just have a straw poll or take a vote um and then I would recommend that the two chairs transmit it directly to council um you could write a cover letter um I would keep it very brief yep um I would not recommend word smithing the or writing it as a group but delegating that to the two chairs to to communicate that just to avoid all the sunshine issues so does that sound we could get a if we could present this as a unanimously approved and adopted um resolution from both boards at the Joint meeting and and articulate

[248:01] it that way I think it carries the most weight definitely I would second having both chairs say the exact same thing my yeah I I I'm thinking Jay was suggesting a joint letter and was one so um between two members uh the Lindsay and myself will craft a cover letter and we'll both sign it as acting or interim chairs or whatever the heck we are in the time of Co um Co chair Co chair and then we'll we'll send it on did you say we could do one motion one second as an entire group or we had to do that separately no one group I think one um could I ask if the newest members want to do the first and second on it yeah yeah that's

[249:00] awesome Charlotte that's you and Jean is Jean hir still with us yeah yeah hello I'm so sorry I could not find my button that's if you guys agree and if if you're gonna descend from it then obviously that's you know no I totally agree this is fantastic so Charlotte do you know how to make a motion no I do not know how to do that go ahead Mason yeah well Charlotte what you would say is um and correct me you guys if I've got this wrong but I moved to um adopt the recommendation by HRC and Hab to move this to city council do I need to make that motion it's yours yeah we're offering to have the the new people make Motion in the

[250:01] second right um well absolutely I moved to that Hab and HRC adopt this um resolution and that the chairs forward it to um Council for review Johan hair if you would like to Second it that's basically all you have to say if you're still there you're muted though I've asked him to unmute we'll see if it works maybe a young children going going to bed kind of thing could be I think they went to sleep two hours ago I think I can let me he's un sorry I'm not I was in the room I had to work out so you just have to say I second

[251:01] that motion I second that motion okay all right then um I guess you and I will do this in conert all in favor all in favor all in favor of this thumbs up for a visual okay the motion passes unanimously was Clay I didn't see your thumb clay were you up can't hear you okay great so that motion passes unanimous ly to pass this recommendation from Hab and HRC to council good work everybody excellent work and then what is our timeline shuck uh so I think we should get this Jay correct me if I'm wrong but we should get this to council before the 14th right ideally as soon as

[252:01] possible by the 10th I wouldn't do it too soon in advance okay by the 10th for the 10th aim for the 10th then so we'll aim for the 10th on that okay great and then I have one one thing to interject before we all sign off some uh someone messaged me I broke the rule um about chatting they um they said that they were um um have been experien or have experienced chronic homelessness before missed the public comment and wonder if we can um get grant them three minutes before we sign off I think I just look for a quick straw pole sure I can take three more minutes okay Jennifer you're still there uh let me unmute ask Jennifer to unmute thanks you all Jennifer you should be there you go hi um thank you for letting me speak

[253:03] and my apologies for being late uh I don't really have any anything rehearsed and I did miss a big portion of this meeting um my name is Jennifer livvic and I was previously chronically homeless in Boulder for roughly four years I'm a very non-traditional student at CSU and much of my focus and studies is driven by my time spent homelessness um I'm not going to write a resume about myself but some of the things that you have um talked talked about here that I've been able to catch things such as the hot team um I have earn my peer mentor training which is the Samson core core based curriculum um and though I haven't been offered a job necessarily to work with the hot team I have had some officers um

[254:01] say it sounds like you should be working with Paddock and my answer is always that I would absolutely never do that it's not that um I am not a fan of Officer Paddock or of police necessarily but my established Community Trust is an asset and for me to be walking and working alongside a police force that has notoriously criminalized um the homeless population um which is a population I'm still very connected to um would have a negative impact on my my Community Trust uh so I'm all for outreach um being done by another provider I also would like to take the time to plug peer mentoring um positions which is an umbrella term uh for peer Specialists pure Navigators uh there there is a uh curriculum uh training

[255:02] involved um but they're very cost effective and uh they've been proven very effective in areas of mental health um and they're expanding within areas within homelessness the criminal justice system uh as well as uh housing uh one of the other things I wanted to touch base on quickly is is um I have been doing my own Outreach in the community for the past two years with the donation initiative I refer to as save a toe and I had frostbite when I was in homelessness uh and socks are one of the least donated items and so I found um creating this donation initiative and focusing on WEA appropriate socks was a way of giving back to my community in a healthy way it also allowed me to

[256:00] establish um reestablish my uh myself within this community I was very much part of am I out of time chairs pardon me that was that was three minutes but can you can saying really real quickly yeah since I'm out in the community I I have the privilege of walking into encampments and um and to other areas Social Service roles may not feel comfortable or certainly would not be welcome M and I can tell you that um the latest point in time count for unsheltered uh population here within the county is largely Mis under represented um I can think of 50 people off the top of my head as I sit here who are off the grid um so that's another thing I wanted to throw in and then lastly um I am available and

[257:02] um and eager to be a part of discussions um and be part of a better solutions to um more effective services for the homeless that's all I wanted to say thank you thank you Jennifer thank you welcome thanks Jennifer um I know I said we were going to be done 10 minutes ago um however to wrap up um and a quick debrief but one thing before the debrief uh just for HRC and I don't know J if we would need to do this now during the meeting and for Hab should we put together two people from each board who will coordinate together to help move this forward so that we have something in place to actually get this rolling and keep some Focus going thoughts on that

[258:03] Lindsay Jay's reduced to just a black board um I don't know it's up to you I mean basically you have to wait for council's reaction but you could be proactive and assign people yeah I mean that'd be fine I think we would just take uh maybe my suggestion would be volunteers for a effectively what would be a subcommittee on Hab side and uh that way we are ready to go we can start things moving so I see Mason on half abside um Judy on abside are you guys good to work together on this one we worked really well these past couple days what do you think all right let's keep that rolling Chang in 2020 okay so somebody else wants to that's that's fine too but also um Jac and lindsy can you send out to all of us

[259:00] what we agreed on today too Jay's already sent that to me and I will send that out to everybody on Hab Lindsay you can do it to everybody on HRC I assume I already I copied everybody on Hab and HRC so you should all have it in your inboxes thank you Jay thank you Jay wow Lindsay do you want to do something similar on your side and then we join those two groups volunteers I'll volunteer Jean hillair yes a volunteer Stan Dan do you accept oh oh we can't hear you he said yes if you're not able to unmute yourself you can't do it right on this day and age effec yes um I'm gonna make the assumption that

[260:01] everybody can get together between those volunteers yes Mason I was just waiting for you to say debrief so I could say something I was just about to say after that then we can debrief so if anybody has anything that they'd like to just put on the table for how things went tonight and and perceptions Mason I just have to say personally that hands down this was one of the most productive and heartfelt meetings that I think I've been a part of since being in Hab we've done some really great stuff with listening sessions and ex you know other other things but to have us all be on the same page and be bold was pretty powerful and it's nice to have a win in that that category that that feeling of everybody being together and moving in that direction so I appreciate all of you and thank you for working through this process and sticking in so late

[261:02] agree Judy I also just want to say um I couldn't agree more I was shocked that this was so good and I also want to say it's nice to meet the new people from HR I mean the people from HRC that I hadn't met before and it's really fun to see everyone on our habbard again Danny or that's just a okay anybody else um my little piece I am gonna mirror what I just heard from Mason and I do think that I'm I'm really hoping that this is a model for us going forward to start actually taking action on this board and get some things done be Innovative and stop waiting for suggestion but rather put suggestions out there that can then be looked at considered and and moved forward so thank you guys all Lindsay thanks for co-hosting

[262:01] on this um and yeah I move to a Jour I am I wanna uh thank uh everybody from staff for sticking around yes abolutely thank you and and I wanted to thank Sarah two hours prior to us I know she was already on and uh withh planning board stuff I believe and you stuck it out with us thank you Sarah nice you and okay with that said Lindsay if you approve we shall adjourn I approve the July 26th HR c b joint meeting thank you everyone sleep well thank you Brenda thank you thank you everyone have a good night by bye good night