October 20, 2025 — University Hill Commercial Area Management Commission Regular Meeting

Transcript

Captions from City of Boulder YouTube recording.

[0:00] I wanted us all to get together and get to know each other and see where we could find synergies and powers to work together, maybe light loads for the staff at times, if possible, but I think getting to know each other will, help us be more efficient. And we are not both islands in the city, we are one city. And so that was kind of my bigger picture idea, was just getting us all to understand how we can connect, like. BMC, the Downtown Management Commission, is always talking about how we connect to the hill more. Anyways, that's just preamble before we got started, but, Ali, do you need to do something for us to get started in recording and et cetera, et cetera? We are recording, and I recorded your intro. And, we can start the meeting, we don't need those forms. We need to take things officially, or, you know, we can, yeah, we can do, the intros, and that will be our roll call. So, since this is our first time getting together as All Commissions in some time, and for many of you it's your first time doing an All Commissions meeting, thought it would be good for us to go around and,

[1:08] Introduce… introduce ourselves, which commission we're on, maybe our specific interests or passion related to that, volunteering. And then, there were some prompts that were written. You might not have noticed. But the first prompt is, what is something as a commissioner that you're proud of from 2025? It doesn't necessarily have to be 2025, but maybe in your, experience with, the district that you represent, something during your tenure that you're proud of. So, does that sound good to you, Mr. Chip? Sure. So I don't wanna… I'll let you volunteer, please. Well, I'll… to finish that, something I'm proud of is, Well, future and the past is the DDA. We did some work, I helped out on the commission that was kind of organizing that, and I'm really excited by what that can bring to all of Boulder. So that is, like, one of our big goals for the future and launching in the future as well, but also

[2:11] It's the 50th anniversary of Pearl's Day. And so, I'm just really excited about, like, the vision plan that got put together a year or two ago, and… while I wasn't incorporated in that, I'm so happy to see everything that's in it. Now we're having economic issues. I'm doing too long, longer than I want you all to do. So I will wrap it up. Let's just go… maybe we'll start with staff here, because you all know them, but some quick intros from staff, and then we'll go down the ticket this way. Sure. Hi everybody, I'm Mark Wolf, Assistance at Advantage. Do you want to share some, you're gonna hear a lot from me in the first part of the meeting. Certainly excited for some of the things I had. A lot of work on our end to support things to support our district, support the business community in general, and so…

[3:04] It's out this weekend, a lot of people around downtown, really exciting to see. looking forward to ways that we exploit those types of methods. All right, you all know me, so I won't talk a lot about who I am and what I do with the city, but I guess, you know, coming up… well, there's a lot that I'm proud of, of, my time and tenure. Coming off this weekend, in the Roots Music Festival, there were many, many, hands that made things happen. I know we've been working with Roots Music Fest for a number of years now. Regan. Pat Shazansky, Justin Greenstein, working to get some more activations in some underutilized spaces, and it was so nice to see all of that hard work, from this team, in collaboration with, others who saw the vision. And help make something really cool happen. Sundance was really involved in it as well. They had a lot of Sundance staff, our local staff.

[4:05] been, kind of looking at The Roots Music as kind of a soft. launch of what, you know, what can be done, and how we can activate spaces and have a multi-venue event, and from what I've been hearing, they were all really, really impressed with the energy and the simplicity of how, it all looked. So really excited about that. A lot of other things to be proud of, but, coming off of a really great weekend, it was… It's my, my current problem of my interior. It's staff first, so I'm not going there. I think I know everyone, but hello, Regan Brown, Senior Project Manager, Community Vitality. I'm biased, but I'm very excited for the DBA work. I think it's just gonna be a really good opportunity, forward-thinking opportunity for Boulder. So, yeah, kind of echoing what Dawn already mentioned, and echoing what Chris mentioned, too, the Rigs Music Fest.

[5:01] Really great to know this evening. Oh, we're gonna go over here. Christine Edwards, really proud of… Construction should be starting at the Spruce Garage, as early as, like, late January, early February, so that will be huge, because I think many people have heard me say. about 20% of all the people who come downtown park in these garages, and there are some areas that need a whole lot of extra support, and making sure that they stay in good condition while some days here is going to be very important. I'm Melissa Mazzani, Operations Associate. I would just say just being a part of a really productive team, and getting to assist in all the different projects we get to do, and kind of being a part of everything a little bit has been really exciting this past year.

[6:02] Elliot, Levantique. And I'm most excited? Let's go for doing? Proud of. Proud of. That I can play musical chairs, because I'm moving… again. Good time's the charm. I would say what we have built in Community Vitality over the past few years, from the birth of CV, I don't know how long ago, to the inheritance of CV under new leadership. And where we are today, and all of the people that made that possible. the impact we're gonna have on the community, with your help. And Ellie's taking notes. We all know Ellie. Hi, Ellie. Thank you, Ellie, for your support. All right, I'm Tib Rockwell, the chair of the University Hill Commercial Area Management Mission. I work at the university, I'm the assistant dean there. Most proud of… well, I mean, I'd hate to echo what Chris just said, but the origins of that, very inkling origins of that, I think, may have been us talking on UCAMPC about activating spaces that normally would have been being used for those kinds of purposes. It didn't happen this hill for this particular event.

[7:17] But then that led to discussions around… and again, I'm not going to take credit for anything like that. The city staff really did such a wonderful job of making sure that There was seed money available to even look into this, and then support it as it was growing as an idea. Anyone who actually attended this thing this weekend had a wonderful time. I mean, to a T, people were absolutely just godsmacked. I mean, it's just such a fun time. And to see that kind of in the shadow of what we know will be coming with Sundance. It's sort of a, a proof of concept that we are up to the challenge and we can do this. I'm very excited for the DVA discussions. Some of you may know I'm also a little skeptical of the voters, and so, I think we've got work to do in order to figure out what does a DBA mean to the average voter, and how do we make this something that will appeal to them so that it does succeed when it does reach the ballot.

[8:18] Trent Bush, UCAMC. I'm really, I guess, interested in the Hill. I have many generations of my family. I've lived there, worked there, kind of gone to school there, started businesses there, so it's near and dear to my heart. I live up on New Mercy Hill, and I think One of the things I'm most proud of right now is being able to watch the transformations happening right now in the hill. not with the… not only with the Moxie and LimeLife, but just with the city's approach towards the hills being, what you said, a real part of the city, instead of it just being kind of the domain of the students, and I really look forward to how we can make that even better, the situation.

[9:05] Dane Anderson with UTMC. I think what I'm most proud of is I'm a… new addition to this commission, A, seeing how my fellow commissioners are passionate about the Hill, such a unique spot in Boulder that needs the attention, but also how community vitality has been such an amazing support for everything that happens on the Hill. I'm really proud about seeing that as a resident of Older, yeah. I'm Tel Jones, UTMC, one of the owners of the sink, so that's kind of one of my interests, being on this commission. Some of the things that I'm proud of, probably didn't have a hand in any of it, though. Obviously the hotels. I feel that the ambassador program in which we inquired is Just took us to another level, as far as cleanliness and safety.

[10:00] At least the feel of that. And then, Really excited to pursue a DBA, and I hope that goes through. Hi everyone, I'm Stephanie Trees, I'm the Vice Chair of the DMC. I've been on the DMC since 2021, I think, so I'm almost at the end of my term, and I think I'm proud of two things. First up, the outdoor dining pilot. This is… This is dating me. Just how this CV responded. during COVID, and taking something unfortunate, and then doing something innovative, like changing the way that we eat outside, in Boulder, and how that looks, and the look and feel of that, I'm really proud of. And finalizing… well, is it still in pilot mode? How many years later? Or are we… Oh, it's very pilot, but it's been a very successful pilot. And the other thing I'm really proud of is the Ambassador Program.

[11:05] Just the ability to continue to fund that, to request more funding for that, to see it expand and grow, and just to be a part of that, and I think it's a really unique way that a city responds to a need, We've kind of increased, you know, the presence of police, but we've also increased the presence of non-police as a way to identify some of the gaps that we have, and it's a really creative way that all cities should adapt to Boulder. I'm… excited about what I'm… as my term ends next year, just seeing how some of the stuff in… in motion plays out, but with Sundance and with the DBA, but… most… most of my term is… has happened, and I'm really proud of what we've accomplished together. My name is Erica Dahl, I'm also on the Downtown Management Commission.

[12:01] I think I'm most proud of all of you guys that don't work for the city, that are willing to kind of work two jobs, and your willingness and my own willingness to grind, and then come and grind some more. I'm most looking forward to… My mom has had a business on the Hill for 53 years. I would… she… she talks about Eugene and Cajun and all this stuff, and I think we are close to actually finally really bridging a connection, instead of just talking about bridging a connection. I don't think other people know that it's not downtown Boulder, and so I think it would be remiss for us not to make sure that they match And so that if people hit the hill first, that their first impression is just as good as if they hit Pearl Street first. So, that's something that I'm really looking forward to. And then, as a Boulder native, you did tear down the hospital I was born in, but it's okay. I just think the Sundance thing is so cool, because when I grew up here, nobody knew really what Boulder was.

[13:12] And now I feel like we're really on the map, so it's exciting to be a part of that. Oh, and I own a business on Pearl Street. That's my date, that's my grind. So, I have a two-part, like, I'm… I want to keep Boulder what it's always been to me, but I also do have a financial vested interest in keeping Boulder. So we've got a couple questions here, but hopefully you've gotten The gist, can you… do you know what the question… well, you get the gist overall bobbin. You've heard it. Yes. Sorry. I'm sorry, it's always a little confusing, and you should know there's 30 college students on the other side of my door right now having a coffee hour, and they're not quiet. So, my name is Robin Adel-Ronen. I am in the BJAD Parking Commission. I worked in the parking department at CU Boulder for 2 years, which is kind of how I got

[14:09] Very interested in the often overlooked importance of how parking affects a city. as a city commissioner in the past few years, I'm most proud at how my fellow commissioners have been able to advocate for the concerns around things like the mill levies that we have in our area, and I'm most ex… and the signage, of course, the beautiful, beautiful signage, we now have a beach ad, as I'm not a… I'm not a Boulder native, but I have been here for 8 years. I love living in the city of Boulder. I take advantage of every part of the Buffalo, pun intended. And I'm really the most excited about seeing the city expand and vitalize and really activate areas like Bijad that maybe haven't been something that you first think of. It's not… Like, you think Boulder, you think Pearl Street, you think of those things, but we're really building out the parts of the city and expanding access, and I'm really excited to see how much more so that might be possible now that we see RTD and those areas going back into effect. So, I'm really looking forward to this meeting.

[15:14] Thanks, everyone. I'm Rebecca DeMachell, I'm on the Boulder Junction Districts, both of them. Let's see… proud of and excited about the fact that we do have a variety of constituents in the district, from mixed-income residences, as well as businesses. And so I am glad that we were able to advocate for differing points of view. I am… excited and grateful that we have bus service back in the district. That is something that I'm glad has already started, and I am looking forward to, and I am looking forward to those millennes dropping a little bit, so…

[16:04] I'm Justin Calvin, I'm on the DMC, and I manage the CD underbelly of Pearl Street. I think what I'm most proud of is, to echo the… sentiments about the Ambassador Program. Just being able to have input on that, and finding an alternative to police intervention and contact being the first thing that some people might have. While we're… we're coming out of the pandemic and, Rating back in the… the Pearl Street vibe. As well as the… being involved with the… Signage outside of the parking garages that are not just boring signs saying park here, but informational, and dated Andy Nathan, I'm a founder and CEO of an ad agency on 15th Street. I'm also part of

[17:07] DMC. I guess what I'm… I'm literally in year one of my tenure, and it's been interesting just trying to soak it all in and figure it all out, but I'm definitely proud of just seeing everyone come together, both those who've volunteered, those who work for the city, and how passionate they are about making Boulder, you know, just as, you know. as magnetic and gaining as much momentum as possible. It's been really interesting to see all the things that are, coming to bear, whether it's, Sundance and the new hotels and Even Coach Prime, all these things that are just creating a lot of energy and excitement around the city. So I'm very excited to see, especially Sundance, the impact that that's going to have on the city moving forward the next few years. I'm Danica Powell. I own a… my own company called Trestle Strategy Group, does a lot of work in Boulder, and I'm on UCAMPC. I am also… I feel like I'm in year one, but I might be in year two. I'm the vice chair, so that, I don't… I don't know yet what I'm proud of, personally. I think…

[18:14] I still feel like I'm learning, but what I'm really excited about is I guess I'm proud of something that's not yet… that brought me to the commission, was… which is the implementation of the two hotels, which was, you know, getting those approved and built. That was a vision of the city for a long time in the university, and it was a big vision, and… it worked, and, like, then I got to be a part of, like, getting them done, and now it… now I… that brought me to UCAMPC, because I told… Moxie, I'm like, can I be your… Can I be your property owner rep? And, like, they're like, sure, I don't even know what that is, but… So if you guys need me to deal with anything with epoxy, I am their property owner rep. But I'm, I'm just really excited about all of it. I think I was on planning board in, like, 2010, and, you know, we never thought of the hill as anything but the hill, and, you know, did things to just kind of prevent things up there for a long time.

[19:07] And it's just really exciting. I'm excited about the DDA and having them linked together, even if it's just mentally. That's huge, and I'm excited about the words economic development, because those were, like, bad, bad, bad words for a very long time. I mean, when I did the Macy's redevelopment, the mayor at the time told my client that his whole purpose was to get rid of high-paying jobs in Boulder, and that's why he put a moratorium in the Opportunity Zone to not allow any development, And we have come a long way since that. That was only a few years ago, so… Good job to… city. Changing that, and our elected officials are changing that. End up. In a pandemic. And now a Macy's building that's sitting empty, which is really, really sad. So pretty. It's so pretty, I know, it's so beautiful. Someone's getting it. Well, you can't do residential there, so it's just… Fantastic.

[20:07] Okay, well, I hope somebody finds a home there that is… and there's 7,500 square feet of affordable commercial space. Anyone knows? They're very beautiful. Yup. a lot of commercial space all throughout town, and I think that's some of the challenges we're all going to be facing, too, because we talked about what we're excited about. There's a lot of challenges we have, too. The change of working from home. Since it's all these other things that we also know, you know, we talk about our positive aspects, We also have… big changes at the city, too. And so I know Mark's here to talk about that, but this is a kind of a unique time that we're all getting to talk to each other and make you guys knew this was, I don't know. It's handy that we're all here to be able to hear as, we're on this new… On ramp. So, Marty. Yeah, happy to jump in, rather than doing intro.

[21:03] just jump into it. And we've got Matt Chozanski over here, too. Actually, I might hurt. Consumer. Okay. So I'm going to do a couple things today. I'm going to talk about our economic vitality strategy a bit, provide some updates on some of the relevant projects, many of which you should already know about, so I'm not going to go into super great detail on the projects. Related to the strategy, is, how we're going to carry out the work. As some of you, our board chairs, had a chance to go into a little bit more detail, you all saw kind of the general information that the city put out not too long ago on some of our reorganization to support this work, so I'll get into that and just

[22:00] Provide a little bit of background on that change, and then just some of the implications going forward. So that's the general… purpose of the conversation. My presentation's not super long, but happy to answer any questions that you all might have, can I just do a check to make sure that Robin can hear? Yeah, Robin, can you hear okay? Okay. Just checking on you. Thank you. All right, so, just heard the spiel, we'll go through some of the background on economic vitality Strategy, and how that relates to some of the operational, goals here going forward. So, for those not familiar, we have an economic vitality strategy that we produced and had City Council review back in May. Where, it is the first time we updated our economic vitality strategy since 2013, so it's been a long time, a very different economic context from 2013, compared to what we're dealing with right now.

[23:07] I would say, in a lot of ways, we zoomed out with this strategy and looked at all the different aspects of the economy and what the potential role is of the city. We organized this strategy by 4 different focus areas, equity, resilience, vitality, and innovation. They're not mutually exclusive. You can imagine there's a lot of synergy and overlap between the different areas. We're thinking a lot about who is a part of this economy, who's able to participate in this economy as we think about equity. resilience if, let's say, Excel were to say we're shutting off the power for 48 hours, how do we make sure our businesses are prepared for a disruption like that? So some of that resilience planning, sustainability in general, in terms of business practices, again, what is the role of the city and supports that? Vitality really speaks to a lot of the vibrancy of commercial areas.

[24:09] talked a lot at the beginning about, the role in events and activations, but also how do we… how do we leverage our existing tools and create more tools to promote that, vitality, which I'll get into in a little bit more detail. And innovation. We've always been a very innovative economy? How do we continue to support entrepreneurship and innovation coming out of university and our federal labs in a totally different federal funding environment? How do we make sure we're not using that type of talent and investment? Those are some of the key questions that we face moving forward. As you know, this city council, which term is coming to an end here at the end of the year, established economic development, actually said the word economic development as a part of their priorities for 25 and 26.

[25:04] really two key areas, sorry, that's a pretty small on the screen there, that they established, that overlaps with a lot of your work. Updating our economic vitality strategy, or creating an economic development plan. And then enhancing our programs. Really expanding our tools and our tool belt, and looking for ways specifically to address commercial vacancies and help support small businesses. some overlap with how we're thinking about our commercial areas, in both our inclusion of what makes, vibrant commercial areas in our Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan update, which is halfway through, maybe a little over halfway through. Right now, and specifically called out how we think about connections between the Hill and the downtown, referencing all of the great new investment on the Hill.

[26:00] and how we can make sure that the two areas seem as one, and continue to support that, that experience, so that folks that are attending the new hotels, or the new conference center, or whatever, want to come back. So a lot of, A lot of discussion around that as well at the time. So we've provided a couple updates to this Council on activities associated with their two priorities. And apologies, it's just a lot bigger on my screen when I was staring at it myself. So, in April is when we provided, the updated strategy. With those, focus areas and some of our planned activities. We also, at that time, provided an update on the commercial district analysis, which gave the initial, recommendation to explore a downtown development authority. That was well received, and that work has continued, as you know, through, again, having support of the department. We also provided an update of some of the other tools that we were prepared to explore.

[27:07] Some of the feedback that we received at that time was, hey, this is all great, but how can you go even faster? Which is always helpful to hear, but understood on the urgency of the moment, addressing our economic challenges. And how do we continue to work directly with the business community in addressing some of these issues moving forward? Certainly conversation about the moment we're in. The federal resource impact and other federal impacts. How do we continue to model our values, even as we're talking about economic development, but that's done in a way that's inclusive and reflective of what we want to be as a community. And that we're looking for opportunities to maybe get out of the way as a city, while providing, different, economic tools, that makes sense. So that was some of the feedback from Council at that time, and I took that advice and ran with it in a number of different ways over the last

[28:09] 6 to 8 months, were… You'll see some of the current and upcoming work. I'll just briefly describe these. We are, partnering with an organization called Cities Work. They're a part of a larger organization, called the Institute for Justice. They are a non-profit organization that, Provides technical assistance to cities for free, which is great for a city that doesn't have any resources at the moment, to provide us with an analysis of small businesses' experience with city processes. And really looking at ways that we can lower barriers of entry for small businesses, entrepreneurs, and maybe process and as necessary. That work is just kicking off, but we're excited about the possibility of really focusing in on some areas where we can make improvements on our end to make doing business with the city a little bit easier.

[29:08] We have moved forward some communication enhancements. That was one thing that we've consistently heard, is not, knowing what's going on in the city, or not hearing in a timely fashion on things that the city's working on or addressing. We… that is a continuous, thing we are working on, but there was a downtown business newsletter that was established about 6 to 8 weeks ago as well, so that'll, be another tool that we continue to use. And we've continued the work in affordable commercial with some of those major pilot grants going out earlier this year. For districts in particular, again, you all are aware of many of this stuff. The Broadway median improvements are underway, Is around the help. doing the DBA project, obviously. I will mention, and we'll talk more about this throughout the next several months, is that as a part of the exploration process.

[30:08] We need to produce something called a plan of development. That is something that PUMA and consultants will help deliver, but that will be based on input from all of you and the planning group and our business community at large, which will establish some of the priorities for a plan for Adaptive Development Authority. So that will be a really important document to give us an idea of what a DBA might do, especially at first, and help, not only focus, but give, potential voters an idea of what they might get excited about, and what the role of the DBA might ultimately be. We continue to work on communication and maintenance improvements, continuing to look at internal ways to enhance our processes. Christine has been a big player in all of that, navigating Our very complicated internal world to try to address maintenance challenges, again, in a limited funding environment.

[31:06] Then we continue to move other, aspects of the district analysis forward, certainly providing the temporary relief, from a mill levy standpoint of Boulder Junction, but also looking ahead in the future of our general improvement districts in whatever form they might be in the future. And the last piece, we've, moved forward, at least in some of the initiatives, is in economic development. Expanded an economic incentive program, so that was approved by Council a couple of weeks ago, and that gives us a greater ability to, to waive, certain types of fees, based on different criteria. So, other… If you're a business and you're expanding, or you're trying to relocate, we have very limited tools available to us to try to attract that level of investment. This is a huge new tool to be able to do that.

[32:01] We were in the process of kind of creating the formal program to support that work, but the ordinance change was approved by Council, earlier this month. We are moving forward on some activities related to the Boulder Urban Renewal Authority, or BURA. That group has not met frequently in the last 10 years, and so we have some steps to take in order to consider whether or not there are additional areas that we could use. urban renewal as a tool. We are looking at a couple areas in particular Boulder Junction, the East Book and the Civic area here is a couple examples. There could be others. I can get into some of the detail there, but that's a tool that we have not used, as a city in a long time. And then there are other targeted redevelopment opportunities mentioned in Spokane, certainly thinking ahead to the Phase 2 of Boulder Junction and some of the proposed investment there. How can the city play a different role than we have in the past? It's just simply

[33:03] either a planner or a regulator, but how can we be more active in those redevelopment opportunities? It'll be easier once we have some of these formal tools in place, but I think that's what we're being asked to do, is to spur some of this investment, ease some of this investment in ways that we perhaps haven't in the past. And then a couple other, just quickly, a chip zone creation. So we have, approved this is another incentive that is through the state, that allows for, certain types of businesses in that advanced manufacturing realm to access if we establish chip zones. City Council established 3 chip zones across the city. We need to apply to the state, that to be formalized, so we are in the process of the state looking for removal of our CHIP zones in November, and we are also considering possibility of using metro districts in certain targeted cases, subject to unconditional conversation. Question on that. Are we also

[34:06] involved with any of the Elevate Quantum stuff in addition to chips? We, we are. I would say we're, we're a partner, but A lot of that work is kind of… is driven by… by other partners, the university, Boulder Chamber, and others. But the chips down certainly helps, that if we have companies looking to relocate in Boulder or expand in Boulder, we… we have we'll have this incentive availability, combine it with our own local incentive. Those are two tools that we haven't had in the past. Towards that end, are some of these rules helpful in the vacant commercial office spaces, like second floor stuff, or is this unrelated? Yeah, it could very well be. The incentive program in particular, that is one where we propose some criteria to use an incentive to fill a vacant commercial space.

[35:04] So some of that detail needs to be worked out, but the idea and concept is that you're proposing as a business to move in, maybe you want to Maybe there's just some, improvements to the space, maybe you do want to do a full kind of conversion to some other use, that we would be able to waive certain fees in order to help incentivize that. Could I… could you kind of break down… like, the, like, differences between, like, creation, or the utilization of folder and renewals. First creation of metro districts, first… Yeah. Redevelopment? Or is that all kind of interlocking? Yeah, I think all of those tools can be used for redevelopment. What role the city would play would kind of depend on each circumstance. I would say the DDA and Urban Renewal are similar in that, they are, there's a city role in, the management of those.

[36:09] They both use tax or incremental financing, and so that's probably longer than, like, a 30-second conversation, but essentially, investing the potential future revenue within a targeted area. Both of those use those tools. Metro districts use that as well, but the control is fully the developers, the property owners, and so Boulder hasn't used metro districts in the past. They have gotten a bad rap, just been used pretty frequently across the state. The state did pass new legislation not that long ago to put some more parameters around that. We would have to do our own version of that, setting some parameters here, if that's something we've considered. It's a matter of, kind of, control and risk in all these different communities, and how much control does the city want to have versus is comfortable setting parameters and allowing the risk to be taken on by the private sector. Those are… those are some of the policy considerations and when you would use those different times. Yes, okay.

[37:12] And I guess that's maybe speaking to a later conversation as well, but, like, how… How do we safeguard? against… Or how do we safeguard the interests of the people having utilizing those potential districts. From… I don't know. Cash grabs. Yes. Yeah, it's a good question. So I'll specific to, like, the Downtown Development Authority. with the plan of development, and ultimately, the voters have a role in kind of setting some parameters to what that thing would do and what it would invest in. And so, if it was of interest for the DDA to focus more on

[38:01] kind of direct business support, think, like, facade improvements, or tenant finishes, or grants and other assistance, versus direct investment and redevelopment opportunities, right? Like, there's probably a balance there that's appropriate for Boulder. that plan of development will define some of that, and then the board of directors of the Downtown Development Authority, is mostly businesses. And so… you know, there's some accountability there from within. So it's those type of mechanisms that would be put in place to say, we're okay using this tool, but for these reasons. Sorry, what does CHIPS stand for? Creating, creating helpful incentives for producing semiconductors. I haven't looked it up, like, 10 times, I promise. But bottom line, it's a way to incentivize companies to put into making to the states. Okay.

[39:06] Just a return to form for Boulder County, we've got a long history in pioneering chip manufacturing back in the mid-60s, 50s, 60s. The reason I asked about that was like quantum is because that The Front Range is in New Mexico, similarly has gotten, like, federal notice for doing quantum mechanics work, and we have a lot of quantum companies around here, so they kind of do it directly in a big way. Yeah, and to Mark's point, too, it's more broad than producing semiconductor It's… it's about advanced… industry. So, they… the state's in the process of reviewing our application for us putting together a CHIPS zone. And we've put in basically all of the criteria that we would like, so… can be… can incentivize both the actual manufacturing, but also the headquarters, so if someone wanted to locate within downtown, assuming the state approves the downtown as part of the zone, then there could be an incentive for that as well.

[40:13] Maybe one big, quicker question as I'm thinking about the challenge we have with office space, and getting people there. businesses in, you know, Council or staff really talked about Converting office space to residential. And, like, losing office space. To get more… to deal with affordable housing. Yeah, we haven't… we haven't done that contensely. I think that could be something that we're looking at a little bit more, potentially, moving forward, to talk a little bit about what we're focused on ahead. You know, the preliminary discussion, I think it is still very expensive to convert. Some buildings work on use of that. to that than others. We've seen a couple examples in Denver and the broader Denver metro area, not a ton. So, you know, interested to see some incentive program available to… to…

[41:08] for those that are willing to kind of take that on. I don't know the extent of what is possible yet, but that is something we could look at. Aren't the issues with conversion usually related more to skyscrapers, where there's very deep… floor plans that don't have light, whereas all of ours, like, some of them are deep, yes, but you would have a front and back, so maybe there wouldn't be 10 units per building, but there might be. Yep, that's a good point, and that could be that maybe some of our spaces are a bit more conducive to that. That's something that we'd have to do a little bit more analysis on. Alright, I'm gonna jump ahead, but happen to take, questions. So… All this to say that there's a lot to try and drive forward, and ultimately, the city will have a role in managing not all of this, but,

[42:04] But a lot of it, especially at first. what we have talked about… what we haven't talked about, directly, maybe we talked about it at the outset, with the past weekend, is also thinking about activities that really, benefit all districts, and arts and culture being a key economic driver of that as well. So, something that, community vitality has already done really well, and so something we're thinking about is how do we… how do we bolster those types of activities moving forward and prepare, especially for, Sundance, to make sure that that is, very successful. Someone said once I heard That's… right now, just for 10 years, we're… yes, our contract with Sundance will be for 10 years. We're really opening that is a permanent move, and so we want to keep it as successful as possible right away. We are preparing also for the changes in

[43:00] function for the GIDs, right? So, whether or not a DEA is created, I think in any event, we're going to be asked to utilize GIDs in different ways, whether it morphs to a DEA only, or a different type of relationship between a DDA and the GIDs in the downtown. I think also in Boulder Junction. Through some of, your, feedback and letters is… How do we continue… it's great what we have, how do we evolve, and how do we continue to support different things, like events and activities, that continue to drive that type of general economic activity. So we're thinking about that, we need to prepare for that, so that when voters, weigh in on that, when Council weighs in on that, that we're ready to pivot and respond appropriately. And that with the limited tools that we have, to… low economic activity, address commercial vacancies, as we talked about. Not only do we create the tools, which, good news is we're in the process of creating them.

[44:05] Someone needs to manage them, so that they don't just kind of sit on a shelf. People need to know they exist and actively promote, the use of them. And I think this is an important point with some of what we'll talk about here with the reorganization, is we are not in a time of robust sources, as you all know. The city certainly doesn't have a certain source of problems, so we really need to look at how we do the work. And, We are in a moment in time where it is difficult to add resources, but also we want to be active in supporting the direction that we're trying to go as a community in the best way we can. And so that requires some tough choices in how we carry out the work in full. So, really, to that end, we looked at the moment here to make some changes to how we carry out this work. We will create

[45:08] a new Office of Cultural and Economic Development within the City Manager's Office that will support a lot of this work. Not everything, which we'll talk about. But a lot, and we'll include our work in arts and culture, it'll include many of these district-based tools, and how we're really trying to create a much more robust function to support business community directly in a way that we haven't before. I also think, and you've all talked a lot about this at the outset, it's an opportunity to celebrate where we've been and how we got here. And I think we're certainly looking at this as a celebration of what Community Vitality has done really well over time, and how we can build on that work. We carried out in a different way, but I really think it's a credit to what we've both created in this department, and how we can… how we can kind of take that to the next level across the city and throughout our organization.

[46:08] So this… this office will be specifically tasked with, carrying out our economic vitality strategy, and weaving all the different city plans, especially thinking ahead of the Arts Blueprint, which will be, finalized in Q1 of next year. So, in order to do this, we are restructuring two areas, the Department of Community Vitality and the Office of Economic Vitality, which is correct within the City Manager's Office. A lot of small ones. Sorry, three different areas within this new office. Arts and culture, which will look a lot like it does today, continuing the work to carry out, the arts blueprint, direct grants, our public arts program. Creative Neighborhoods Mural Program, all that good stuff, will continue to live there. Business support, so this will be repurposing much of our economic vitality function.

[47:06] What you'll see here is continued business retention, attraction, expansion efforts. What you're likely to see is an enhanced business navigation and technical assistance directly to the business community. Something we'd like to do that we just haven't been We haven't been in a position to be able to focus in that way, so I think that's exciting. Our small business development center operations will continue to be up to this function. And then economic development's really the area that we haven't had in a specific way. We will repurpose a few positions to fill roles within this division of Economic Development. This will focus on the redevelopment opportunities that I mentioned. Also, carry out the work of managing the different tools. So, you can imagine the right negotiations on incentives, management of renewal, the management of the relationships that need to be able to forward. This is where we see Regan's work continue, in this space.

[48:11] And so, again, an opportunity to really lift this work up, across the whole city. Can I ask a question to that? Since we're refocusing a bit on economic development, what programs, if any, were cut or downsized to repurpose staff time? Yeah, that's a good question. I'll get to some of the reductions in a moment. I will say we are in the process of work planning right now for 2026, and trying to figure out let things, need to just be paused or come off of the workplan altogether. You know, I think the good news is vast majority of functions we're able to find a home for. Whether or not they have the same amount of resources is kind of what we're wrestling with from a work plan standpoint. I will say that one of those things that I know you all have been involved in is the commercial areas blueprint. That is one with the EDA planning.

[49:12] and the, hearing completion of the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan update, that we felt needed to kind of pause for a moment and get our ducks in a row on the other planning processes to figure out what might fit. We're looking at other ways to fill that gap, but that would be one where we need to delay a bit to think about. Okay, and then to follow up on that, like, arts and culture is the amount of money that we're spending on Aren't increasing, decreasing, or staying the same? Good question. It's… it's increasing, technically, in 2026, as proposed, and may be adopted on Thursday, by Council. That is reflective of anticipating having an arts blueprint that guides some of those funding decisions. But yeah, so we'll tap into the resources in the… from… from 2A.

[50:07] REU for the business? encouraging them and all that kind of stuff. Are you looking at things that may not actually cost money, like changing… regulations around where food trucks could be. Right now, I believe they can't be within, like, 150 feet of any restaurant that's brick and mortar, so… That might be a way to… cultivate. And, you know, support the food scene within Boulder. Yeah, absolutely. I think, I mentioned the city's work, consultant. I think that's one area, right? Like, where can we do better on our own, you know, processing scale? Where there are areas where maybe things have been a certain way for a long time, maybe our interest has changed a little bit, so yeah, that's a good point.

[51:00] Maybe tying both these. Points together, but, creation of a new… entity. Paired with the creation of subentities within that. To me, sounds like cost. Cursion. Does… is… do you foresee this, like, adding a good amount of cost to get this up and running? Rather than… attic. I think another arm to something, rather than creation of a bird. Yeah, it's a really good question. I think, for 2026, it's a… it'll be a net reduction year over year, and the reason for that is that, A, we're able to find some efficiencies. in other departments that will be managing some of these functions. I'll show where those are going in a moment. Unfortunately, we're also losing 6 roles from the current department in the shuffle.

[52:02] We are working with those impacted employees to try to find other vacant seats across the city. We're currently under a hiring freeze, and so You know, hoping that we're able to… to make that happen over the end of the year. So just with those kind of efficiencies and reductions, it's a net reduction. You know, I think as we… as we look at the VDA, as we analyze the use of general improvement districts, we'll have to figure out the right amount of resources, to really do all of the work that we'd like to do, but for now, we anticipate we have the resources necessary to do some of the stuff that I'm talking through right now. Right. Won't spend a lot of time, but just to mention that we've… decided to move forward on this and did not do kind of an extensive planning process, which is maybe off Boulder Bramp. We did look at other models that, that, especially for cities that have been in the economic development space.

[53:07] That have, leveraged arts and culture to be an economic driver. Fort Collins, Longmont are a couple of those examples. So, so we looked at, some successful models, and what we might learn from them. We are able to continue the focus on some of these really high-impact initiatives, so just know that that work will continue while we prepare for the future, and positioning our general improvement districts to be in a really good position with the change ahead, knowing that it'll be some change. By the end of 2026. So where are things moving? Special events, as you know by, now, Chris is transitioning to a role at City Manager's Office, certainly will help us, make Sundance successful, but also, in general, how we think about building our strategic partnerships across the city, and with that will be special events. So you'll see, Justin.

[54:08] Chris, and continue to support that work. Our maintenance, our first maintenance operations will move over to the facilities and fleet. Christine will continue to support that, work there. Parking enforcement, which is something previously announced, will be moving over to a unified code compliance division within Planning and Development. I don't… we won't see, kind of, any impact to that change immediately, but I do think it's an exciting opportunity to think about how code compliance can be active, in ways that help support the presence of enforcement, given certain circumstances. Customer service, so our, our parking customer service operations moving over to city manager's office will be supported by, our folks here, our administrative team.

[55:01] And then, parking management, so think about, like, the program piece of parking. We'll move to transportation. And since you've gotten to know all the staff, I just thought it was helpful to name where the new… Same faces, new places are going to be. I mentioned Chris and Justin. Matt will transition to a role at CMO as well. We're working on that title, Matt, but I think helping us with the citywide strategic plan Really, excited for his role in helping us bolster strategy across the organization. Christine's role over in facilities, again, helping us think through, our improvements across the whole organization in that space. And then Sam, moving over, to, transportation building as well.

[56:00] The last two slides, just to give you an idea of orchard, again, that's small, and this is the Office of Cultural and Economic Development. If you caught the original announcement, we are looking at this as a temporary move, that we will incubate this function and really figure out, you know. hopefully it'll grow up someday to be a department, but, kind of remains to be seen how we work through the different tools, the DDA, the nature of the relationship with the city. All those will have influence on what this function ultimately becomes. That is the reason why we're holding a position vacant in the economic development space. But you'll see our three different functions there. Business support, economic development, and arts and culture. And then this is a chart to show you where those functions are going. So I've verbalized this, but just so you can see where folks, that are impacted.

[57:03] Transportation mobility absorbing our parking programs. City Manager's Office, the new function, and then Park and Customer Service and Special Events. FN facilities and planning and development for maintenance and parking placement, respectively. Alright, so where we going? We are working through all of the transition issues. Our goal is to have this new structure in place, which will be the time that we formally dissolve community vitality as a department on January 1st of next year, so we have That's the most time. We have two and a half months, to work through all of our, different, transition, items, finalize rolls, make sure that nothing's slipping through the cracks, all that kind of stuff, so…

[58:01] Many conversations have started. Those will be ongoing over the next several weeks. We will continue to support those key initiatives, in the interim and future. Listed a few of those, talked a lot about those economic development, conversations, certainly the arts blueprint, work forward. We are still finalizing some staff roles, and with that, the work planning that I mentioned previously to figure out what we're able to support. If there is any impact on projects, we will certainly communicate that to you all and the other impacted parties as needed, but hoping we're able to cover most of the planned work for 2026. And then I mentioned, again, that we are working with the colleagues, our colleagues that are impacted, that do not have positions structured, hoping that with our hiring freeze, because there's a number of vacancies across the organization, that we're going to be able to find some efforts.

[59:04] For those folks as well. Just acknowledging that, this is a huge change. You know, I think it's exciting. I think you'll hear a lot of that excitement from us moving forward, but… but it is, departure from what we've done in the past, and you know, I started my career at the city seven years ago, community by talent. It's a great group of people, and everybody's feeling it a little bit right now, and so I just appreciate some grace as we navigate the change, and We'll get through the initial push here into a better place, but, We're dealing with a lot of change management right now, so just recognizing that as well. So that is plenty of talking, for me, but I am happy to answer any questions. Yeah, we used to have Sarah, then we had Jake, who's half-time. On the phone? Who, or where will that next sit?

[60:02] to… I didn't see regular from that February. Outside as well. Yeah, it's a good question. It is one of the, kind of, work plan items that we need to figure out. I think you know, generally how, how districts, how the GIDs get support will be through that new office. It's likely to be multiple people and not one, but, that is something we'll have to sort through and communicate, kind of, who the points of contact are. I will clarify, so Regan was who for that role that Sarah had been in. Jake is an employee of the Hill Boulder. Oh, got it. That is through a contribution that we've traditionally made. I imagine that contribution will continue. Apologies. In the comments. Yeah. Are you going to share this stuff? Yeah, I have to. What, please? This summer, we also… for spring, we also had the

[61:01] mission research that was done, where they kind of interview missions, and I don't know that you guys want more change on top of more change, but, like… Is there a way… you know, one of the things I'm looking for is how we can be more efficient, like, I… I know you're typing away doing stuff, and Matt's got his phone, but, like, all of our meetings take up so much of your guys' time. Under these new setups, Is there a way that you think mission structures can be more efficient? And… you know, less maybe by, you know, do we need to worry about the hill in this area and this area? Is it more by… parts of economic and support that are, you know. Talk about all that. Yeah, that's a really good question. Appreciate you thinking about efficiency. You know, it's a balance between getting you all the information and feedback we need from all also wanting to be thankful that everybody's time, as you all talked about the multiple hats that you all wear as well. I think there is an opportunity to look at that. You know, there's some kind of

[62:11] you know, the legislative piece of this that you all have to need to make certain recommendations, but I think there's ways that we can think about that. I know that the team has thought about that previously, and I think it was a few years ago, you all went from meeting every month, meeting every other month, and then trying to gather, as all commissions, at least once a year, and so… I'm certainly open to that. We might need to have some of that conversation as we think about what board support looks like. to support it. 7 different ports. So, yeah, appreciate the suggestion. I don't know exactly what that looks like, but there might be a way to continue to get feedback from you all, but a way that, you know. Maybe there's a little bit less time to test it, but we'll see. one of the things I talked about with Chris, just to talk to the other commissions, is, like, we had people coming

[63:04] in person to our meetings, and as much as possible, we try to get written reports instead at times, just to free those people, and they can duplicate that and give the report to one of us instead of having them always have to come, but I know you guys gotta get in the packet and timing… doesn't always work. But I always welcome, you know, yes, we are here to help. But I also feel like sometimes they're in the way. So I want this… I've looked for ways to help Government can become more efficient. I think along those lines, and Danica kind of said it during her introduction. It would be really interesting to figure out if there are ways to improve onboarding for new commissioners to new commissions, because it takes a long time for a citizen to just get there in around the process. Let alone the actual governance side of doing the work of, and I think that's something that… I mean, there are several people on the commission currently, of the University of Hill, who all are like, I feel brand new, and they're in 2 years, 3 years, right? I'm set to cycle on in 26, and I think a lot of people are like, you can't leave because you know. That kind of cycle is something that commissions

[64:20] And it would be really interesting to think about how can we improve onboarding so that it's not such a burden for staff, and it's also not such a huge hurdle for a citizen who's just interested in being involved. Yeah. Yeah, towards that end, I mean, I guess the three of us are term in 2026, maybe that's it. And I agree with that, that, like. I was like, whoa, even just the acronyms alone. It's like a full language that you have to learn. Yeah, it's just that we're gonna have vacancies, and we struggle to even fill seats for a long time, so I… I'm curious about

[65:03] also a more collaborative forum across the general improvement districts. I think there's some benefits of meeting separately, but… I don't know if they outweigh the shine… spent from staff, and obviously we do the planning together, but then the meetings itself aren't together, so… Speaking for… for those who go after me. Like, there could be other… Efficiencies to be gained for staff, and also The collaboration might even help people to learn. What is going on at a bigger scale. And I think the context on these, and just one really quick, sorry, is that because of the reorg, it's gonna mean increased communications to the commissions in a way that looks a little bit like onboarding. So it's probably a great opportunity to be thinking about that. Sorry, go back there. You have two items in direct competition here, though. At one point, you're saying fewer meetings, and at the other one, you're… you're probably on an issue with long

[66:03] duration of onboarding time, and the fewer meetings you have, of course, it's going to feel like people who have been here a year or two years have only been 6 months or 9 months, right? So, you have to think about it from that perspective, too, not just do I know the terms, but have I actually interacted with my commission… the fellow commissioners on a regular basis? And then, oops, that one meeting out of 5 or 6 this year happened to fall during a vacation. Wow. That delays your onboarding time as well. Those who are on the University Health Commission know that I did not advocate for less meetings. I've actually advocated for more meetings. We've invited that. So, I agree with you. I think that it does… it does mean more time, but it… if we can make that time more productive. To help people be… feel like they're onboarded within 2 or 3 meetings, rather than 2 years in. I think that that would be welcome. One of the things I did when I was joining my board was I…

[67:09] watched one video of the previous board, and I met with one or two of the people in advance, and so one of the things I would maybe do, advocate for is, like, an exit interview of sorts from a commissioner leaving and just talking to staff, just for, like, here was my experiences, here's what I had. But also, a handover mentorship kind of thing for, like. I'm almost required, before I leave, to talk to the new people. And I tried to talk to everyone on my board one-on-one. At once, at least once, just to kind of… here's So I could understand what everyone was about, what they needed, and offer my two cents to them, too. But I could see formalizing that. Yeah, one last point to that is that I feel like If people read the packet in advance, we shouldn't need presentations in the meetings.

[68:00] like, there should be… but, like, because there are presentations, you sort of don't really need to read it, but you could really, you know, like, I think that's a dynamic where we could improve efficiency. Whereas if you know that the only way you're gonna, like, be, you know, be up to speed and be able to participate when you get there is that you've read it, it will create some… you know. Or, like, would you guys make a, like, a video, and then you just, like, the video goes out? Because I feel like sometimes they're not meetings, they are presentations, so maybe… and I've sat at a couple, like, when I filled in for you, and then I felt like Christine, I was like, oh, I already saw this. she has to still be there in person, like, she could have recorded it, just sent it out to everybody, here's, like, the parking structure updates. Yeah, so I think there are some things where we… we will do homework, but I think that people, if they realize, I'm going to do the homework, and then it's going to be the same thing in the meeting, then I don't really need to do the homework. If I have a lot of other things going on. So just ways to, like, make it… You know, more efficient in terms of

[69:02] Yeah, that's something that I've just thought about coming here. And obviously, if you don't really understand things, you should also do them to get onboarded, but, you know. I appreciate all that. We can take some of that back, brainstorm a bit, but it's good to know where you all are. Are you confident that planning will be done by January 2026? things will all be… you've said we're still kind of planning things out. Yeah, I am. I think we'll be… yes. better place than we are today on January 1st. Are there some, you know, loose ends that we'll still be tying up? Are there things that we're still figuring out? Hey, is this going to be Department A or B? Yeah, I mean, that's going to be natural, with this type of change. But I think as we finalize folks' roles, and really have… I think that's part of the process right now, is that so everybody feels confident on January 1, they know exactly what they'll be working on. Once we're there, I think we'll take a better place, and we'll get there by January.

[70:09] So as Chair, I'm keeping an eye on the time to our agenda, and we're actually 9 minutes ahead. I'm happy… so, if anyone else has questions for Mark, now's a good time, because we actually are on schedule. I mean, I'm just curious, I mean, in terms of the reorg and what it means for those who serve on commissions, what… Is there anything coming in the near term that we should be aware of, in terms of change in format, change in staffing support? I'll be honest, my reaction is different than Don's. Mine wasn't, oh, how can we be more efficient to help? It was, what are we going to do without that training? Because we rely on it so heavily, particularly in our commission. I'm sure most commissions are similar. So, can you share just a little bit of what you are seeing, at least in the near term, the next 3 to 6 months?

[71:00] Yeah, so we have a board support function in city manager's office. I… you're still going to receive some of that support. I, you know, we're still working through what exactly that looks like. I… I think… you'll still get the information that… that you need, what format and what updates and what frequency, I don't know yet. And you all will still meet, I think, your regularly scheduled meeting to see. One more this year in January, so those will continue. If we need to make any changes or adjustments, that's something we'd want to talk about, Jerry's talking about. It's a really interesting point, because Steffi and I have been on commissioned for long enough that I know what's going on. I read the pack, and I can ask smart questions. But yeah, we're reinventing everything, and we're probably going to have a lot more questions than we did before, yeah. And I'll point out, right, like, especially for Camp CNDS, with the consideration of the DBA, you all will have to be informed on what's going on there. Your recommendations is something that Council will be listening to as they head into those policy discussions in March and May, and so, yeah, we're not kind of staffing forecast.

[72:15] Okay. All good? So, thank you, Mark. Yeah, thank you. And it is a lot of work. I think you're all digging. So next, we have the Civic Area Project Update. Hi, folks! While I get situated, I'll just start talking. I'm Allie Rhodes, I'm the Director of Parks and Recreation. I've met some of you, but not all of you, and so thank you for having me in your marathon, triumvirate board meeting. I… I don't know if any staff ever tell you this, I will, because I don't work with you. We're a Teams organization, so every time I have to present in Zoom, I feel very inept, and so thanks for your patience with me.

[73:02] We are at a critical milestone with the civic Area Planning Process, and I'm really excited to bring it to you all, and hearing you all talk about your passion for downtown and the Hill, and economic vitality. I've been sitting over there, just hearing your conversation, it… I'm excited to hear, your comments on the plan. There we go. I think I have 30 minutes total with you all, so I'm gonna watch… watch the clock, Don. I'm gonna try and fly through this in less than 15 minutes so that there is ample opportunity for you all to weigh in, but there's… there's time, so if you have a critical comment that we don't get to, you can find myself or the project team. I am here. We're in a window where we're doing the board tours. We are going to Prabh next Monday night, the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board, and we go to City Council on November, 13th. And so, I'm taking my shift here on behalf of the most amazing planning team. So, Shihomi Kuriagawa on our team is a senior landscape architect and the project manager, and we have a whole crew of folks, and

[74:09] Rios, a local landscape architecture firm, their office is right behind La Liga's Grocery, and it's been super cool to have a world-renowned firm who's based locally diving in on this project. So I am going to give you a very brief update on the project. its background, and then talk about what brought us to the concept plan we'll be sharing with you, and talk through the process, and then hopefully have plenty of time for questions and feedback from you all. So, the civic area, if you weren't aware, is right here. We are in the heart of it. It is the largest swath of public land in downtown Boulder. It encompasses everything from 9th to 14th. between Arapahoe and Canyon. We're very aware that it's, especially talking with you all, it sits at the heart of, also, some of our most vibrant economic areas, cultural areas. Obviously, we're right between

[75:05] The Conference Center, the New Hill Hotel, and those exciting amenities, and Pearl Street, and The Hill. And so you can see all the arrows pointing towards, the Civic area has a real exciting opportunity to drive a lot. There's really great research coming out of people's investments in downtown Barks. One of the ones I am drawn to a lot, if you haven't been to Dallas recently, they've been doing some really cool things with their downtown parks. And HR&A Advisors, who's a nationally recognized economics firm, they've done research on those investments and are showing a 7 to 1 return. So we're really grateful for, both City Council and Boulder voters' approval of the Community Culture Resilience and safety tax that is funding this improvement. This is one of our oldest parks. Which makes it one of our most special. And one of our most highest maintenance, and so we're really looking forward to really decreasing the maintenance load, bringing a lot of vibrant activity to the civic area. This is the planning context. We exclude Phase 1, because in 2012-2014, there's a Civic Area Park Plan.

[76:07] And now it's our job to steadily march forward and implement that plan. This is the timeline. When you do a project in a downtown area along a creek. With lots of partners, it takes a really long time to do it thoughtfully and well. So we're two years into this project. We spent 2024 doing a lot of planning analysis that actually was incredibly valuable. I say actually, because a year sounds like a whole lot of time. But the background on what worked in Phase 1, what's going on in our community, the site's constraints, the hydrology of the area, has been incredibly valuable. This year, we've been working on the design and getting to this concept plan, and we'll be moving into design development construction documents next year. Shovels in the ground sometime next year, ribbon cutting sometime It's in there for late 27, but we'll see what happens with winters. I fully expect this timeline to refine over time.

[77:03] So this concept plan, when we do work in the parks and in the city, it's really a balance of three inputs. One is, of course, community engagement. What are we hearing from the folks who are going to be in this area? There's a whole lot of policy guidance, and then there's the site analysis I mentioned. Each of those inputs are considered. No one input lets us make decisions. On the policy piece. These are all of the plans that define, park development and the activity in the downtown area. And so, our team has considered all of them because they're all really guide what happens here in the Civic area, and I'll point out, because I know you all saw the Downtown Vision Plan that Downtown Boulder Partners did just 2 years ago, that's one of the inputs The conversations around a historic district in the civic area provided amazing research on what happened in this area before it was a park. So all of that's getting synthesized. Part of the key policy is the 2015 Park Plan Guiding Principle. Council approved these in their very first touch on this project in winter of 2024. So that meant the plan is intact, we can move forward without redoing a plan. And so you'll see these guiding principles show up in the concept plan.

[78:18] The analysis just shows that we looked at the hydrology, we looked at transportation connections, there's a lot of interest in pulling in the energy and building on that exists across I know Chris Jones is excited to see this idea of just a nature-to-culture connection. We've got all this nature around us at this site, everything to the west. And then, of course, the culture that exists on the bookends, up on the hill, downtown. And then engagement. You won't be surprised, we've been doing a lot of community engagement. Step one was just confirming with the community their values and vision for the park. We used that to show them earlier this year a couple of designs. Feedback from both of those phases had brought us now to Window 3, where we're showing people a concept plan and saying, did we hear you?

[79:12] I don't know if I did the lag. There we go. So this is just some of the engagement by the numbers. We did not send you all a memo for this, so… and I'm flying through this. Ellie and the team has this presentation, we'll make sure you get it, but the numbers on engagement are pretty amazing. Our team has done very specific and targeted engagement with some of our communities that are historically excluded, including families. With children that experience disability, people of color. We've had two paid community connectors on this project, one connecting to our Spanish-speaking community, or actually two represented in our Spanish-speaking community. That most recent round of engagement, these are the favorite features. There's a boardwalk on the west end, the nature area. This area of the Boulder Beach that is highlighted, that's that area just across the creek here, where New Britain and the Park Central buildings are now.

[80:07] So when those buildings go away, we'll be ready with a concept plan that folks were pretty excited about. A beer hall. or a beer garden in Marco Hall was pretty, pretty, appealing to people. I keep trying to figure out how we could just turn the tape building into a beer garden. So, stay tuned. Lots of, lots of constraints. So that brings us to just this concept plan overview. This is it at a very, very I'm gonna zoom in. There's 4 distinct zones in this concept. that I'm going to spend some time walking through. So we're going to start on the west end, and you'll see this spectrum. There's, a more natural to more developed, and that's that nature to culture spectrum. So we're going to start on the west end, and this is the areas Basically west of the library building, so really focusing on nature immersion, nature play, creek access.

[81:06] Have any of you been able to check out our Wildwoods Nature pop-up that is currently in the civic area over here, just by the, By the farmer's market, so that's something I'm really proud of. I saw your kids there, Stephanie. We're really proud of… so our team in Parks and Recreation, I'm proud of it for lots of reasons. Our team built it. They designed it with partners at CU, the students in the Environmental Design Program, and it's been a test of three things. One, what nature amenities are most popular with young people, because we'll be doing more of it. We know how critical it is for kids to get dirty. To play with sticks. To fall? To… DARE, so we wanted to see what's most, most popular with the kids. We're going to be doing more of this. We wanted to build the skill on our team so that we could build it. The cost of that play area was $14,000. The cost of your typical prefab structure for that same age group is about $500,000 right now. So we're pretty excited about the opportunity on this. And then third, it was a positive activation in the civic area all summer long. It brought families out all hours a day. We saw a dramatic change the minute the kids were back in school.

[82:11] We have done targeted engagement with Boulder Day Nursery, that's at 15th and Walnut. Those kids get to go on a playground, a field trip once a week. And every other week, that play area is where they choose to go, whereas before, it was, you know, places all around there. So we're really excited about that, and this… I talk about that here because that's something that might look in this more natural area. So, here's just some renderings for you to drool over of what that might look like. If we were able to develop in the Nature Discovery, Art Tunnel, contemplative areas. So now we'll move a little bit east to the Boulder Beach. This is areas, this would be a nature and recreational hub. It changed on my side! That one's slow. Again, one of the things people really want in the Civic area is they want to access the creek. We've seen that in some of the areas that were addressed with Phase 1, people connecting to, and getting to play with the creek is something they love. This would be a great spot for a cafe, a tubing eddy.

[83:17] Food trucks, a swing forest, that's my favorite thing. If you have seen the adult-sized swings everywhere. I have, and they're a lot of fun. There's another just rendering. We really see this area, when it gets there, being used in this way. If you walk through the civic area on a summer, especially the minute CU is out of school, this area is really popular with young adults, and we're eager to embrace that and facilitate that. So now, if we move further, this is another rendering just of this park patio. You can see that building right there behind, that is the Tate Building, and we would love to explore in future phases how we might activate the Tate Building as one of the drivers of activity in the civic area.

[84:02] Another thing I'll highlight for our team, one of the… one of the things that all of our communities love, including community members with disability, is access to the nature and the creek, and we're not doing that at all right now. So that is something you would see in future phases. So the East End. Folks, we want vibrant park and urban spaces here. We want a festival street that, yes, facilitates our beloved farmer's market, but other activity, perhaps a music festival, perhaps. other things. We're looking at enhancing the bandshell. People love it where it is, and so we want to make it function better as a performance space. A creek viewing deck. You can see that there is a land bridge over the ditch in Central Park. That's just in parts of Central Park. It would still say exposed to the west of this area and to the east at the tea house. This is where we would have the beer garden and the porch. A teahouse garden, and more nature play, and if we can afford it, a splash path.

[85:00] Here's some imagery. One of the items that's coming up next, you'll see on our next steps is a conversation with the community about branding, naming, and colors. That's one of the things great parks are doing well right now. I think 16th Street Mall, if you haven't been down there, is a great example. Each block has an identity, branding, colors, including with the play features that's really fun. And then this is what that might look like when the farmer's market is happening. And then our last area is just the Arboretum path. We have included this in the study because we know how important this connection is for people to move safely, well, and happily from the hill down to the civic area, down onto Pearl Street. And so we've talked about, right… I'll just share with you right now, it's no secret, that's kind of the opposite of great design. It's dark. It's disconnected, it's not facilitating great activity. And so we do want it to feel dynamic, to feel welcoming, that there's lighting.

[86:02] And so I'm just going to show you some of the imagery. There is the idea of a raised bridge to address some of the grading issues in that area. and some climate and education gardens, improving the bike path, and then this viewing tower and outdoor classroom is really popular with young people we're engaging at Boulder High, and even up at the university. Here's what that would look like with some experiential lighting. And that same viewing tower and, outdoor classroom. And a lot of gardens. All right, so next steps, we are getting… we're in this final window of engagement with boards. We've already talked to the community. We'll take all of that and move into schematic design. There's still more work to do on costing, including an overlay of what does it cost to operate. One of the things we've committed with this plan is that the great work doesn't stop at ribbon cutting. What does it take to operate and make sure the civic area is vibrant? That includes working with partners, anchor partners like the festival, or the farmer's market and the library.

[87:07] and others, so that there's really great positive activity happening all the time. This summer was a great experiment and example, where there's more positive activity, we see less negative activity, and that's the goal. There's also, in that first quarter, I mentioned the park naming and branding. We'll have final design third quarter of 2026, and hope to begin construction Q1 of 2027. Throughout those, we're developing that park management plan that focuses on… so park design is where people ought to spend their time and money, but there's three other elements we're looking at. One is the operations and maintenance of this new space, one is the activation, and then the other piece is just the enforcements, and what are the rules and regulations that support everyone feeling welcome in the park space. 15 minutes for questions and feedback, folks.

[88:01] Sir? I'll leave it. Sorry. You mentioned the developer, like, this… how do you tie in what the East Poken development plans are to the Civic Area Plan? Yes, that's a great question, and a big miss on my part. So, part of the East End… I'm gonna go see how quickly the computer will catch up with me. Part of the East End, I just… everything to the east of 13th Street is what we call the East End. It's ripe for redevelopment, so there's a large surface area parking lot, there's several city-owned buildings, and the city is looking for old partners to help us reimagine that space. We're hosting an industry day next Wednesday, October 29th. We've been sharing materials on that with potential developers, the Chamber's been helpful in sharing it out. I've shared it with someone who… Trestle Strategy Group, they do a lot of partner development. Just shared it with, Danica today, but we are trying to get the word out on that. The team just let me know. We've got about 40 folks RSVP'd for that next Wednesday, which is really exciting.

[89:04] Because, magic on that east bookend will not happen with the city alone. It's… it's not within… nor… nor should it, honestly. I have been doing a lot of incredible park touring over the last couple years, and great downtown parks don't happen alone, and they should. Bellevue, Washington is a great example, where they… the city has been working with local landowners and developers to really great… make great public spaces. Like, I know they did this, they did plan… they looked at this area to be redeveloped a while ago. I think there was, like, a hotel and some apartments. Is there expectations for what those uses would be, or are you looking for a developer to come all the ideas, or how… Both and. So, we would share with anyone, we've been doing a lot of market research. with, Rick or Cunningham have been the consultants on this project, working closely with Rios. We have information on what they say the market would support in this area, and certainly we're looking for developer expertise.

[90:04] And who are you looking to come to the industry meeting? Is it only developers, or is it other… like, nonprofits, or, I mean, who's… what's that? Yeah, you know, so the city's interest is to sell some of the property in this area, and so we are looking for folks who would want to buy and partner with the city to develop these areas. I keep looking at Mark, because he's also obviously… You heard a lot about economic vitality earlier, right? And this is where you see us braiding the work together, and we've been working really closely together to say, what does it look like? What is the city's role? here. Now, I'll mention sleep. you know, there's a role, it could be including nonprofit organizations, farmers markets critical to this area. I think one of the things that the city has in the… in the every big document is, like, some of the things we're interested in is having, like, a year-round presence at the farmer's market somewhere there. So we could imagine a partnership to accomplish that. And yeah, I mean, what is,

[91:05] think about the opportunity with the vacant, parking lots on things, looking there, potentially able to purchase some of the young buildings, within that space. And then how might we leverage some of the other opportunities as well? On the west end, The city now owns the parcel adjacent to the Agewell Center on the west side. And so, So it's the properties between the library building there, the main building, and what is the footprint of the AgeWell Center, those two long rectangles there. So our plan is to move the AgeWell Center activities to Parkville Direct Center. Obviously, there's some funding components to that, but that's another potential opportunity, so… I think we see, the city not being the developer, we see the city helping facilitate, make the partner, and really trying to ground truth that with the development committee, and see what possibilities might exist.

[92:00] And the intent, I'll just clear, the real takeaway for us, hopefully, is to inform an RFI that goes out. Is the… Thank you, thank you. I just… I've heard a couple of other questions, so I wonder if we could give other folks… yeah, thanks, Danica, because I know we'll… we'll be sure to follow up. So, one of the other big nonprofits other than the farmers market that's in development is KGMU's building, right there at the East, and it occurs to me that, you know, I don't know if anyone's familiar with KEXP out of Seattle. They specifically work with the City of Seattle to create a park around the building that KDXP developed, so that's just an observation. of an example that maybe we can follow up. What happens to the 13th Street bike corridor? It's still there. Okay, so it's still a bike lane? And it'd be like now, right? So now, if I go running or biking through the farmer's market for a Saturday, I divert a little bit, and I slow a little bit, because there's hundreds of people down. But it's still there. Okay. And we went to TAB last week, and they're supportive of the concept, they heard all of the details around traffic calming and what it'll look like when there are events. It's a both-and, right? It's not a street anymore, though. Oh, yes. It is not a street anymore.

[93:14] But it is a critical bike connection. Got it. And I… That actually really ties into my question, which it looks like that would be really beautiful for 13th Street, but also very expensive, especially when we go back to last for all, which was really supported by a lot of the community and by council, but there were concerns about costs for that, and now we have The entire street? The street? Yeah. I would say they're a little different in that this street already functions as a pedestrian street and a bikeway, almost part of the park, and so it is a little bit of an easier expansion. but we're looking at shortfalls and other parts of the budgets.

[94:08] I know this is a ways out, but how do we reconcile that involved? Can you, maybe I can, help a little. Project budget is about $18 million. It will not do all four of those. Oh, yeah, I should clarify that. I'm sorry, if I think in… I couldn't see names, Rebecca. I want to clarify that one of the final steps with Prab and City Council is to talk about a boundary. So, at this phase, we did want a concept plan for the whole park. So when we finished in 2015, we didn't have a complete concept plan. We had ideas. We had goals. We have a concept plan. It's going to be implemented in phases. It will not be the whole pack. What is looking like the recommendation is going to be parts of, just this east end would be within the boundary. And can I understand your… is your concern that we shouldn't be funding a conversion of the street?

[95:07] If we have short calls in other parts of the city. Is this the priority right now? Knowing that we do need to plan for nice things in the future, right? And then, just how we view the disconnect between taking over 13th Street, which, yes, sometimes mentions as pedestrian on farmer's market days, But… in the very recent past, we weren't able to do that with West Pearl. Got it. Which was supportive widespread in the community, so… Sure. I don't think it's helpful to revisit that decision, only because it's done. What I do know to be true is that this change is widely supported, has gotten a lot of support, and so I… Did I hear a different question down here? No, just a clarifying statement. I don't think the closure of West End was widely supported by the businesses or by Council, for that matter. I think that's… yeah. I said community, I didn't say businesses, I said community. Yeah.

[96:08] Can I… can I take it another direction? The funding… I… I asked you about this before, because I was like, this is amazing, we need more money! So it is part of the… like, the redevelopment and the selling of the city buildings connected to that, that was new. That's a good question, but the selling of the buildings is really connected to funding the western city campus at Balsam. But on the… These buildings, I mean. Correct. Yeah. Oh, okay, so that's funding something else. But as far as ongoing funding for this, we… I keep… has anyone been to downtown Omaha? In the recent past… recent 3 to 4 years. I'd hear you. Yeah. Go to downtown Omaha. They have spent $350 million on their downtown parks. They leveraged 50… they leveraged $50 million in city money and got private development, they got philanthropic development. I keep telling… if we can take… can we… if they can take… turn 50 into 350, can we turn 20 into 100?

[97:06] And that's my challenge to the community, is that we have this amazing vision, and what can we do? Where can we find money in our community to do more? We're trying to be ready for that. That's part of the development of the partnerships. It's part of the conversations with partners. I hear folks say all the time, there's so much money in Boulder! show it to us, we're ready. And so that is part of the work ahead of the next year, is… is does the community want to invest in amazing places? Is there, like, a… not, like, a crowdsourcing idea, but I think of the Chautauqua area where they have the little bricks that, like, people bought them. Is there a way to create, like, a community crowdfunding? I think people will spend $500,000 for the brick, because that's the kind of… you know, that's… I mean, there's probably… there's, like, big donor funding, and… So the typical stack, when someone wants to fund something really big through philanthropy, right, is that, yeah, it's this pyramid where you have a whole bunch of people who do little bits. They sponsor bricks, they sponsor trees.

[98:08] And you have bigger donors as you go who will write the big checks. Our hope and intent is that through the schematic design and as we get costing, yeah, we put out opportunities to fund elements that easily can get added in with this phase. And then, as we talk about future phases, we would want to do the same. I think there's some real elements in here that the fund… so for the Arboretum, for example, it's unlikely that's going to be funded in this… in this round. But can we make available, the wolf Walk? And Mark writes a $2 million check to have this… Walkway, I mean, y'all… They stay safe for 5 years. These cushy government fox, right? Sitting around. Question. Thank you for that. By the way, this is a bold vision. I think it's pared down from what you guys presented in the first round. There's a lot of less bells and whistles, which I really appreciate that.

[99:03] A couple of things. I think the phasing is going to be critical, and rebecca's absolutely right. I mean, we have a budget shortfall. Is the $18 million a portion already? Like, that's something that we can actually spend as a city? It's in the budget. It's in the budget already. I'm so glad to hear you say that. We're gonna do everything we can to make it amazing and fun. So, does $18 million cover everything, or just… It will be a portion. So, what I believe… I mean, we're working with the internal executive city team. Crab and City Council to define a boundary, it will likely be elements of this east… this east area. So if you go to the whole park and the whole concept. It would be elements of Central Park. And perhaps some other things, like we would like to see some continuity within the park and wayfinding. The signs that have been happen, that are down there now, they're great, but they're temporary, and so there… is there a wayfinding and branding effort, lighting efforts, or other things that can carry throughout the park?

[100:08] One of the reasons why, and again, that decision has been made, some of the feedback we get will help determine that, but because of the opportunity with the redevelopment on the use book end… Right. it'd be nice to kind of have that all come together at the same time. Yeah. And the connection piece, that's the part that's the real connection from the hill and downtown, and when we're going to be having a whole lot of people and already have a lot of people, how do we help facilitate that connection? So, along those lines, kudos for tying economic development to a city project, like a park. I would be very careful with the HRNA study. saying that 7 to 1 ratio on our investment. In Dallas, having worked on some of those parks, there is skyscrapers around it. Like, there are 30, 40 stories around. Sure. So you can get a 7 to 1 ratio. I am not so sure that we'll get 7 to 1 over here, but certainly they'll produce something, so…

[101:04] Just, yeah. Other than that, I think, this would be very interesting with the right time and the right… Thank you Frustrated. what… Has the department and city done around improving It's of the rest of the group vass. between here and East Boulder. The width of the creek path. Yeah, right now it's very narrow, right? So there's… there's parts of this concept that are talking about boardwalks, things like that, which may be very useful to help bring people in from other parts of the city. Whereas right now, we've got several, like, flying curves, things like that. Yeah, so a review of the Boulder Creek Pass is not, like, the scope of this plan, but I can pass that feedback along to the transportation team. You might have… touched on this, but is there overlap with the library districts? Like… They're an anchor tenant, and so they've been involved in planning when we have, you know, meetings with key community organizations. They've been at the table. They're part of the work on the park management plan, because again, we see that as an anchor partner that can help with activating the park. So, yeah.

[102:14] Nice thing about having a concept plan for the whole area is that if they wanted to do some additional investment to spur along somewhere around that area, it's great. Okay. Sorry, like, my question is quick. You said that, so the East… the RFI is going out for the East weekend, but you also mentioned the Senior Center, or AgeWell. buildings next to it. I've also heard the Canyon Center and the library, I don't know if that's… is that… are those buildings being put into the milieu, or… Yeah, so we will talk as a part of the opportunity, but city-owned, age well, and now the parcel just adjacent to it. Can you point that out? Those two vertical builds, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Or Affordably affordable senior housing, owned by Boulder Housing Partner. Because of the floodplain, they're not available for improvement, and so the city

[103:07] It's a great opportunity to assemble a nice piece of really developable property. What about the canyons? I'm aware of the rumors on occasion. Okay, thank you for clearing up that rumor. Yes. He said a splash pad in the flood zone. A little stupid. Doesn't flood every day. I'm sorry, go ahead. What happens at the Age Well Center today? Is that used for? Older adult services, so it's where Meals on Wheels does meal service, and then there's adult programming. They're open, like, 9 to 4ish, Monday through 5, doing a lot of the more social activities for seniors, so some of those services are also available at the East Age Well Center, but, that's operated by the Housing and Human Services Department. The service is really focused on our frail rentals. Okay, but if we look at… be more affordable retirement homes in Boulder, which is Golden West, and…

[104:05] Presbyterian Maynard, they're closer to here than they are to North Boulder, so what… else that has gone into that, as far as, yeah, continuing to be accessible? Sure. So, the great thing about the North Boulder Recreation Center is it's still on the skip line, and so a mile from here, when we look at service areas, anytime you locate services, you're going to have folks who are closer and further. There are also, affordable senior units that are closer to the North Boulder Recreation Center, and so it's… one of those trade-offs. Additional space for older adult services for the downtown area was just seen as not viable. That building, FYI, fun fact, was built to be temporary. Years ago. I think, a nice thing about… we're years away, but I think having, those services located within the rec center, yeah, opportunity for that.

[105:00] Including, kind of, the aging in place, the activities, the center, the wellness component that we don't have access to at the current… The closed location and the benefits we see at East, we would love to duplicate those at North, because there are many. It's an efficient use of space from a taxpayer's perspective, and the intermingling of generations has all kinds of benefits, rather than having an age-specific facility. Did I hear another question somewhere? Oh, going back to cost, Did you guys price the whole thing? We know what general cost per acre for downtown parks are. And I think the total cost is, if you did every single element. At a really high quality of every single thing in here, it is around $100 million. Have you… I… I'm… I… have you put this on social media, like, to kind of stir up some excitement? The syrup excitement. Tell me more, like…

[106:03] trying to write checks? Yeah. Yeah. They're really exciting. Awesome. That would be a next phase. So the engagement to now has been really intentionally focused on, did we get it right? Did we hear you? We've been listening hard. We've been trying hard to balance all these different inputs and, you know, customers that we have in this area. That's been the focus of the engagement today. That would be a next step, and we want lots of excitement, so I appreciate your mention. Are you outsourcing the fundraising, or… We have a thriving nonprofit, the Play Foundation Boulder, and so, really, we would work closely on them, on any fundraising. hustled those tulip bowl donations. Well, just keep us on time. We've had a lot of discussion around this. Daniel, you joined us late. You got to hear… you missed all of us introducing ourselves, and we had a couple questions, but just so we all know who you are, can you just give us, like, a 30-second. I am in the Boulder Junction Access District Parking, and TDM as well, so on two boards.

[107:07] And I'm a local developer, architect, and designer as well. Great. Well, we are… down to the minute, on schedule. So, I've seen Elliot playing with all of your food over there. I washed my hands, I promise everything was good. But what I hear next is, according to our agenda, we have dinner and connections exercise, so apparently we're doing jumping jacks while we're eating. That's why I'm here. So, good luck doing yoga while eating stars. Is… What's the connection, Zachary? So, There's a… there's a multiple entendre on connection. You've been hearing the word connection a lot, throughout our time together so far today. I have some worksheets you all are going to be working on. They're placemats, really, for your dinner.

[108:06] Get some instructions. So… We're going to be doing, eating, connecting with each other, also connecting with community there. So, there. Once you get back to your… your seats, I will request that we actually kind of mix things up a little bit with Half commissioners over here, half commissioners over here. I'm not going to tell you which side you're going to be on, but you can't have more than two other commissioners, from your state commission in your group. Does that make sense? And so you'll have a placemat? And… Task number one will be write your name at the top, and then I'll talk more about instructions after you guys have taken a break and gotten your food, and split it up into two groups, no more than three members permission. Can you tell us, just so everybody knows, how we're going to get your food sort of organized? There is a fest… there is a single… Oh, yeah.

[109:08] You talk about generating economic as a driver. We want three young children, and so… Are you at the same? No, I don't… But they're gonna be… I like to hear it.

[110:06] Yeah. Football games always. Yeah, right? Well, maybe. Same thing with that one's okay. I've heard your same people's gonna change anything, but… We are! So…

[111:00] You can hold on with us for the rest of the meeting, if you don't feel like you've recorded everything you want to record. We're transitioning now into the Boulder Valley Comp Plan. workshop, but Matt Shazzance is going to be leading a presentation. He's got a script provided from our friends in Playing and Development Services. We do have some specific questions, they were in your packet related to the work happening with the comp plan, but This work that you did just now is kind of, you know, there's the wide grain, the comprehensive thinking, and then we also want your input on your ideas, and we'll be collecting these at the end of the Session today, but… be thinking about what you've been, writing based on your persona, and how we want to be thinking about, then, what are the big, citywide policy initiatives, where we're headed with the Boulder Valley Comp Plan in, decision-making moving forward. So, thanks for

[112:01] Your participation in that exercise, but we will continue to use your input from this in this next conversation, and then we'll collect at the end of the day. Over to you, Matt. Thank you very much. So, thanks for this opportunity, The comprehensive planning team, sends their regrets they weren't able to have anyone join us today, but, both myself and Regan Brown are on the subject matter expert team and have been following the comprehensive plan and through its development, and so what we're going to do today is, to give you a quick overview about the comprehensive plan, to start out with, and this is going to be quick. I'm going to rock these slides. So if you see something that you have questions about, or that you want to get more detail on in this first section of overview, just Weigh me down, and we'll slow down and make sure that we get all of your questions answered about that. It's going to include some of the high-level perspective on the policies and the land use updates that are going to be part of the plan, but the key to this is to get your feedback.

[113:09] On some general ideas about, where these policies should go and, important information that we should know about from your perspectives as representatives of the community and advisors to staff and to City Council on some of the concepts that are important for the districts. So, like I said, your role is advisory, to inform this. There's gonna be a bunch of boards and commissions that weigh in on this and have already given their feedback that's going to be incorporated in, how the plan plays out for adoption in 2026. It's also important to note that, staff, subject matter experts from our own department and other departments have been working hard on this update for a while. And,

[114:02] with your expertise and our expertise and a lot of engagement in the community, that's how this is going to come together. And, a note that there are four adopting bodies for the Comprehensive plan. Ultimately, City Council, the Planning Board, the Boulder County Planning Commission, and the Board of County Commissioners are going to adopt the plan. So, just to get you set up on the questions we're going to ask you at the end of this, there's 3 things that we'd like your input on. First, what considerations should we be thinking about to maintain district vibrancy? And economic resilience in the light of changing retail and office dynamics. Number two, the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan team is considering input from the community and city council for policy that enhances nightlife economy. 15-minute neighborhoods, local businesses, and commercial area vibrancy. What are the most important needs, thinking about infrastructure, land use policy, or regulatory changes, that would improve these categories for your districts?

[115:03] And then three, what challenges and opportunities should the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan consider for access to commercial areas to further reduce single occupancy vehicle trips and improve connection between the districts across the city? So, let me tell you about the comprehensive plan. The comp plan is Boulder Valley's long-range vision. It's an aspirational guide for how our community will evolve over the next 20 years. It includes policies and a future land use map to help staff, boards, policymakers, and the community change towards, towards a vision. The comp plan is updated every 10 years. This update is especially meaningful. It marks the 50 years of the comprehensive planning in the city, giving us the chance to step back and reimagine Boulder's future, and partner with the county to guide growth in the Boulder Valley. It's also a state requirement. Every city over 2,000 people must have one, so it's both an opportunity and an obligation. And you can visualize it as the comprehensive plan is a 30,000-foot level document. Like, the cruising altitude of a plane represents the big picture that shaped all of the city's work.

[116:13] Then, when we talk about sub-community and area planning, that's more of that 10,000-foot level. There's various plans. Right now, we have a North Boulder subcommun, an East Boulder sub-community plan, area plans for different smaller sections of town. They have more focus and more detail about how the city can be built. And at the ground level, we use zoning and municipal code, as for the detail about how these division comes into reality. So, to talk about the planning areas, this is the entire Boulder Valley, everything inside the city limits, which is that, pale yellow on the map, plus unincorporated Boulder County land that surrounds the city, shown in green.

[117:01] Planning areas are divided into areas 1, 2, and 3, which relate to how and where urban services are provided. And, you can dig in the city's websites and the GIS map, you can dig deeper, into, how these things interact and how that it's affected by the plant itself. But, there's also a structure to how the Comprehensive plan fits in. So, you are familiar with the top level of sustainable… sustainability and equity and Resilience Framework. These are the city's generational goals. These are the things that the entire community is pulling together to accomplish over the longest term. Moving down from that, the comprehensive plan is the 20-year vision, and like I said, it takes a big picture and works it into policy and land use from those 7 objectives in the SARE framework. that shapes things in this, this 10,000-foot level that is like the area plans I'm talking about, but on an operational level, that's where the citywide strategic plan fits in. That lays out midterm priorities, and,

[118:09] With below that are department plans, budgets, area planning, and sub-community plans that, are sort of incorporated into the priorities that you see in the CityWatch Strategic Plan. And then finally, every year we go through an annual budget process, a capital projects, planning, zoning standards, work planning, so there's, things that flow into every, step, that staff takes every year. So, the comprehensive plan, kicked off last year, started with what they call a Boulder Today, and that was the focus on current conditions. Then, moving into Phase 2 early this year, that was a Boulder Tomorrow, talking about community mem- talking with community members about their vision priorities for the future. Currently, this is Phase 3 of Boulder Direction. Is it yellow on the screen? It says it's yellow on the screen. Okay, that's the, the major work part of the phase, which is, translating, the policy advantage from all of that engagement.

[119:11] And then, coming up is Phase 4, Boulder Future, which is the actual drafting and adoption, which will happen through the summer of next year. The community engagement's been pretty, profound. You can see the numbers there, I won't read through that, but there's been community events, open houses, workshops, community-led conversations and pop-ups, virtual and digital engagement, including online questionnaires and a statistically valid survey, which just closed, like, a couple days ago. And then partner agency conversations, including with the Chamber of Commerce and the Downtown Boulder and other folks. I wanted to point out this community assembly thing, which is pretty exciting. It's a new model that hasn't been used a lot in the United States, but it's bringing together community members who have been chosen To be representative and, actually paid through a course of, I think, 6 weekends they come in and dig deep, especially on the 15-minute neighborhood question. It's been a really interesting part of the process, and, one that

[120:12] I can't talk about too intelligently, but I think, Mark, you were at a community assembly meeting. Seems to be going pretty well, right? Yeah. Wheels. probably the most diverse group of Boulderites that I've ever seen in one room. It was a very intentional way to, gather a representative sample, across the community, and specifically try and over-index in some of our, different groups that are a little bit tough for the reach and engagement, opportunities, traditionally. So that involved that. specific kind of demographic breakdown, and then a lottery system, and then, finding folks to join. And so those 48 individuals have gathered over

[121:00] 7 or 8, Saturdays? I spoke the same day you did on housing, and we did a very deep dive into housing. They were very informed and asking really good questions. They also get paid a stipend for participation, and I do a lot of community engagement, and I'm very impressed by the community, and I've actually made some connections that I've followed up and been… people are challenging me on, like, the housing policy, and not that I set policy, but… I think it's great. Yeah, yeah, it's a good experiment, so hopefully we'll do it again. And I, and I told the mayor that… I asked the mayor. I said, please, please listen, take their feedback seriously, they're working really hard. And he said, we will. Because I think they're working really hard. And it's… I go to a lot of community meetings, and none of the people that you normally see at PT meetings were here, which is… Which may probably helps. What? Payment probably helps. Yeah, because they're taking a whole Saturday off from their… from their jobs. Let's get to the next slide. The last thing on community engagement, the Community Vitality Department, the folks over in public art have deployed experiments in public art to embed, artists in residence with different aspects of the comp plan, so that's been a way that we've been participating directly. But…

[122:15] I'm sure you want to see the draft vision. This is, where the direction's headed. Through all the engagement efforts, staff's drafted this vision, and it's, meant to tie in issues of belonging, creating opportunities, and sustaining the health of the Boulder Valley for future generations. So, this will still be iterated on, but it's a direction that it's heading in to sort of capture the meaning of the plan and have everything tie back in. Are you gonna share this with the group, or… Certainly, yeah, I'll just… So I wanted to, linger on these areas of focus just for a second. These are not every area of focus that was brought up by the community, but it's sort of where the engagement has led us to in what to, spend extra focus on, and if the writing's a little small, it's inclusive local economy, safety.

[123:13] Housing choice and opportunity, travel options, climate action, food systems, and multi-generational, multicultural community. So there's gonna be all topics covered in the comp plan that's comprehensive by its nature, but these are the top of mind for people right now, and might help you galvanize your thoughts about answering some of those questions. So, policy goals, we're gonna share some policy updates, in a second. But some key themes that have emerged that are related to economic and businesses and districts, that I'll mention a couple times, some things that, within those categories, sort of popped up as specific policy directions.

[124:07] Fostering a resilient and diverse economy. Expanding opportunities for experiential night and visitor economies, especially with Sundance in our future. Strengthening support for local businesses and affordable spaces, and prioritizing, transportation options and multimodal connections. So we'll come back to that soon. But, did I advance that slide? Yes. Speaking about the policy updates, right now, the plan is… has over 200 policies. Beauty members, policymakers, and staff, they shared that they're… some are repetitive, some are captured in other guiding documents, or even conflicting with each other. So, in this update, they're adding to… trying to aim to have these policies made more clear, simple, flexible. And resilient, so they can guide us without locking us into conditions of change. We're also focusing on what… the what and the why of letting departments… while letting departments figure out how.

[125:06] So, there will be, both Less prescription on very specifics and less detail, but more direction in how these, policies play out. So, just a quick list of land use goals that… those land use definitions are an important part of the comprehensive plan, and so the, the intent is to reset expectations of the map. That describes the future of the community. Building resiliency to deliver desired outcomes in changing conditions, deliver equitable opportunities and outcomes, integrate climate strategies into the land use plan, and strengthen relationship between land use and mobility planning. So to do that, they're going to be simplifying and reorganizing how land use is represented in the plan. So, just like all of the policies that they're trying to make more legible and efficient, they're reexamining and rethinking how to map land use. Instead of parcel-by-parcel micromanaging, they're moving towards designating neighborhood scales.

[126:10] So the goal is going to be to plan for places that reflect community identity. Not so much uses, but the places. Allow for more mixed uses, so not so much prescripting exactly what use is in a specific parcel in this plan, but taking a look at how housing, work, and culture can coexist with each other. And then providing more choices so the community can adapt over time within individual land uses. All right, so where they're headed with this is… I'm not going to read this full list, there's, going to be an important, Joint Planning Board City Council meeting on December 11th, which will address some of the recommended, policy and land use. And then, moving into next year, they're going to be working on revisions and feedback over the winter, looking at having a draft in March that will,

[127:04] the community would be able to respond to, and then in the summer of 2026, hopefully adopt it, and then I guess start working on the next one, because it takes forever. So, a website for you to visit about abolderFuture.org, there it is. Like I said, we'll send this out so you can click the link. The survey isn't live anymore, that wrapped up, but there'll be a lot of FAQs and other ways to get involved in the future, and so not only something for you to dig in with. But also to spread to your networks. We want to make sure that everyone gets represented and their voice gets heard. Sorry. The results of the survey, are they public? Not yet, but they will be. So, we have, these three questions that I mentioned. I'm going to repeat the policy areas that I said before, so you can kind of have those in your brain, and then, Don, I'll hand it over to you to have the group answer the questions. But the policy areas, again, are, one, fostering a resilient and diverse economy.

[128:07] Two, expanding opportunities for experiential night and visitor economies. Three, strengthening support for local businesses and affordable spaces. And four, prioritizing innovative transportation options and multimodal connections. So what we're going to do is, we're going to record your conversation. Get some notes going from that, share it with the comprehensive planning team, they'll pull that in with all the other boards and commissions that they've heard from, and that will become a part of the next revolution plan. Matt, the survey's open until the 24th. Oh, really? I had the 17th on my little piece of paper. Nope, it's still open, everyone should take it. I'm sorry that I like you. It's very well written. Four days, take that thing. I seem to remember it ending Friday as well. Yeah, something happened. Vote early and vote often. So we have these three questions, and I've moved here so you can look at me and this, and I'll try to keep the discussion moving because we have

[129:00] About 25 minutes, 30 minutes to get through all of this, and so, let's go one by one. We'll start with kind of just doing one, then two, then three, then after the discussion, we might have some ideas to recap and go back over some of the other details. But so, for item number one, what considerations should we be thinking about to maintain district vibrancy and economic resilience in light of changing retail and office dynamics? So I'd like for people to just raise their hands, just so we can kind of keep, at least to start, and have an organized conversation. We can play off each other and so on. But, does anyone have anything to say about item 1 ideas? I knew Stephanie. I've been thinking a lot about this, and if anyone's interested in reading this book with me, small is beautiful. Economics as if people mattered. It's like The Economist Schumacher talks about local… the focus on local business and smaller communities, so I think two things. We have a lot of people who work in Boulder, like myself, now for companies not based in Boulder, work remotely. They're… people are working from home, but could we create more of an intentional working downtown culture for remote workers?

[130:11] That's an aside. The second thing is, as we've sold our first company, I want to think about, like, what's the future for the next companies, like, can we have Boulder be more of a hub for entrepreneur, entrepreneur activity across different industries? How do we build a future for entrepreneurs to want to come build a business here and fill that space? So I think those two threads I think something to think about for the longer-term future. And then real quickly, Stephanie, could you repeat the name of that book? Oh, small is beautiful. For the record. Small is beautiful. Thank you. Go ahead. In order for people to be working more remotely, they need to have actual, like, food options, grocery stores, and speaking on behalf of the chair of the University Hill commercial area, there are no grocery stores anywhere nearby, and that's a significant issue, not just for the Hill. There are other areas in

[131:11] Boulder that are in a similar plate. And so, making sure that we're balancing what commercial interests we're, trying to attract, and maybe incentivizing those that really support the people who are living in those neighborhoods. I'm gonna call on myself for one. When I think of maintaining vibrancy, we are in a perfect storm, I think, because one of the things Sundance has found is that, like, people would rent their facilities only during Sundance, and then keep it vacant the rest of the year. And since we have so many vacant spaces, we're kind of in a perfect storm of badness for having The ability that… Places won't rent, and it's kind of a ghost town rush to the year. Are you talking about commercial space, or working space? Commercial. Okay. Holding events and stuff, and then they… they make all their money in two weeks, and then they don't run it the rest of the year, because they don't need to, because they made a bajillion dollars during Sundance.

[132:04] And by they, you mean one person, right? Landworks. A landmarks. Maybe two. I think it should be a concerted approach for our downtown vacancy and office on second floors. Rather than to look at each property independently. Rather… by knowing that each one of these properties has a separate order, perhaps, but… They should be treated as a campus, as a collective, and we should be reaching out to the world, to everywhere in the United States, to attract a campus-like environment to all these offices. A user that perhaps can take over thousands and thousands of square feet all at once, such as a university. a company that maybe is not looking to have a centralized office, but rather a campus-like environment. I 100% agree with that. So that we can actually take care of the problem all at once, because the problem is gigantic. I don't think we're gonna solve it one by one. I think we need a much larger approach for our downtown, so…

[133:04] Other cities that we believe, and correct me, Mark, if I'm wrong here, but I see other cities and conferences doing tenant attraction. They're out there offering, assets, to places like this, and I don't think I've ever seen the Boulder staff participate in any of these conferences, where they're actually looking for tenants, for these environments, so… Yeah, just, up further on changing office dynamics. I mean, definitely trying to find more incentives to get employees to want to come into downtown Boulder to work in the office. I also wonder, you know, should there be some recommendations in terms of, like, certain days a week, or, you know, like, like, for instance. you know, I know Patina had a… I think it's, like, the first Monday you have, you know, you encourage your employees to go out for lunch. Well, I think a lot of the offices in Boulder probably don't come into the office on Mondays for Fridays. So just thinking through different strategies that kind of incentivize employees to want to come to the office.

[134:05] And I think the other thing is, more efficient solutions for people outside of Boulder County. I think my employees, certainly from Denver, like, they just do not want to come here at any point, certainly during, you know, peak time when there's a lot of traffic and stuff. So just, are there any other sort of efficient solutions that we could create on their behalf? That light rail we were supposed to talk about. Part of me is, like, should we even be focusing as much on, like. I don't know if the office model supporting businesses downtown seems to be kind of defunct, and like, should we be trying to… even cater to people that are probably not coming back in the first place, you know? Should less of our effort be on that, and maybe towards something different that we…

[135:01] that can support, like, a day-to-day usage of shopping, restaurants, things like that. Because if people are not coming back to the office, then they're probably not coming back to the office. Even if people have an office, they might not be coming down to it, or want to, or any of that. So, I feel like there's… But if you had more business with less residents or people working in the city, it just dilutes all the money, right? Say that again? That dilutes all the money for each business, if you just add more businesses. And no residents, or… Right, that's kind of what I mean, like, I feel like we should be focusing on people that actually, like. out of here, or attracting people to live here, or… Right. It's a numbers game at that point, you know, just getting more volume. into these places will solve a lot of these economic problems, I think, rather than focusing on the small sect that could, like that… that white whale, you know, that can solve all of our problems in one fell swoop. I don't know if that's feasible.

[136:04] Rebecca? I agree that we probably shouldn't be trying to get people to come back to their employer's office, but to your point, right, when I first moved to Boulder, I actually set up virtual meetups. Sorry, it was a meetup for virtual co-working. So, I would go meet other people who co-worked, not for my company, but at other companies, at different coffee shops and things like that. a few, you know, once a week or a few times a month, right? And so that was a way to… kind of, you know, get some of that community going, meet new people, and support small businesses, but it wasn't a co-working space where, you know, a lot of people cannot afford $150 a month, right? So, when you look at… yeah, that's on the low end, right? And also, you know, the WeWorks and things like that aren't political businesses anyway, right? So… How do you make… Some of those things, if you… if you want more of the… the orange crowd, how do you make some of those things more…

[137:05] Affordable for people who do live here, so that they can't… Create those community ties, and they also still have money, actually, left to buy lunch. So… Jenica? Three things. I think, first, I agree, I think the housing… or the idea of getting… I work from home, and I'm not gonna rent a co-working space, I'm not gonna pay money to… can't afford it, but if there's empty offices, why wouldn't they want me to come down and pay my overhead? the internet, or whatever, and then I'm a body that's in their office filling up space, buying food downtown. So maybe back to that marketing idea, can we market space to people like me who just… get me… get me out of my house, you know? I'm not… but I'm not gonna spend $2,500 a month for an office. I used to do that. And then, I think this just came to me, but… landmarking, and our historic designation process is going to put more and more buildings out of commission, because anything over 50 years old can be landmarked, and I think

[138:07] we have wildly inappropriate, like, historic designation, like, there's so much power in what can be done with historic designation, and those buildings then can never be turned into residential. And I think we should really check that system and say, Boulder was built 50 years ago, when we set our landmarking policy in, like, maybe the 60s or 70s. we were talking about the turn of the century, there weren't as many buildings. We… everything was built here 50 years ago, and we should not be… they could literally landmark every single house that was built in… In the 70s, and And I think we need different housing options. We talked about that. We… boarding houses are allowed in our zoning code. We should really explore different types of housing. That is a different way for people to live in a different economic format. We'll move on to the next question. One of the last point on number one for me is the tax relief, because I can't rent my building, because half of my rent is taxes. And so…

[139:07] just doesn't work for rent. We just need tax relief more. Number two, you can read it, 15-minute neighborhoods, local businesses, commercial area vibrancy. One of the most important needs for structural land use policy regulatory changes that have improved these categories for your district? So now you can think about your area of expertise for the commission you're on. Rebecca? I think something that came up from just our discussions on this, right, is that when we think about nightlife economy, you've got to be able to get home. And the buses turn off too early, right? So whether you're a worker, or you're a visitor, or you're, a patron, then, you know, actually being able to get to and from, when… when things are happening, so even in the middle of the day, right, from Boulder Junction, we don't have bus service, really, in the middle of the day to a lot of places, and we don't have it going home after about

[140:05] 10, it may even be earlier than that. Now, voter tension's not that far from downtown, so could walk home, could bike home, but it would be a lot easier for a lot of people if we had more bus service. Cal. You know, speaking to that point as well, Sorry, I lost my train of thought. Boulder wants to be a green city, and it wants to have a bunch of options where people don't have to drive in and things like that. tube… Two arms of that would be affordability… affordability, so people don't have to commute from… you know, 30, 40 minutes away to work in Boulder, and have to drive, and have to use, parking garages and things like that. limited resources to get to and from those parking garages to other parts of town.

[141:05] But yeah, expansion on… on those… Non-driving options, to be able to service more people so that more people can Utilize those services that actually need it. I'll go for where I live in my neighborhood in South Boulder. Half of that mall down in South Boulder is taken over by the cooking school, and… half of my options for, like, things I can do in a 15-minute neighborhood are taken over by the school, and so… There's… You should go downtown. It's a… it's… well, from a 15-minute neighborhood, it… it unbalances my 15-minute neighborhood. Robin's got her hand up, by the way. Oh, Robin, sorry, I can't… That's okay, I'm apparently the only one who remoted in. So, I would echo the bus service. For about a decade, I didn't have a car.

[142:02] And, like, that time, the fact that buses end so early is really extremely limiting. I was living closer, in the BJ, like. by BeachAd, but I will say, I have the same experience in South Boulder. I feel like there's a lot of strip malls that don't have a lot of things that are going on. This is kind of related to the first question, but also related to this, in my opinion. I actually… I live in Boulder, but I go to campus every single day, in part because I can get lunch for $8.50. it's, like, basically subsidized. There's, like, a staff price, and I think that one of the big challenges, aside from every other completely valid 40-minute ride, the expenses and all those things points, is there's just no, like. affordable, whether it's pop-up, whether it's, like, food trucks or anything like that, there's nothing, like, affordable under 20 bucks once you add everything into it for people to be coming into the city on a regular basis, and that might not be a big issue for some people, but it really limits our socioeconomic diversity of people that come in, especially people that are working in those areas.

[143:14] So, buses, affordable food options, those kinds of things, and I don't know necessarily how you would incentivize some of those things, but I think getting rid of at least part of the regulations and restrictions we've had on those businesses would be helpful. Hang on, Dominic, I just want to add… there's a few people down here who haven't had a chance to speak yet. I'm gonna make sure you're heard. Do you have anything to say? Yeah, I think we need to get very serious about autonomous vehicles and invite them, rather than resist them. A lot of cities around the country already are embracing them, Denver, for example, and I'm not sure if they're considering Boulder, but we should invite them here. I think that solves a lot of the last-minute mile, situation, and… all the parking. Another point is, we eliminated parking minimums, but there's not enough transit.

[144:07] So, I don't think it's realistic that developers will not put parking, because there's not enough transit. So, it's sort of a chicken and egg, and we need to double down on public transit. And maybe to the degree that, we should consider not paying to our TD, but rather taking that money and using it locally for our own system. I don't know if that's even a possibility, but… We pay taxes and mill levies to our TD, and they're not providing the service that we need. We need to take it in-house, if we can. He has doing an outstanding job with what the city hires them. I think they should expand in the city. Danica. I think… I mean, this is, like, I… my podium… I think our… our land use process and permitting process is so risky, so expensive, and so lengthy, that we're losing a lot… I mean, a lot of people just don't do it. They don't… either they don't get permits, or they just don't move their business here. If we say these are priorities.

[145:01] then those… there should be an Office of… was it Regan that talked about the Office of Yes, or… Yes. There should be somewhere where you can go and say, I'm bringing this to the community, and I… there should be somebody, I think, at the city assigned to that case, and make it happen. The City of Denver does this with affordable housing, they run their own tracks. We should do it for… and you… we should just say, you're bringing a 15-minute neighborhood, you're bringing your local business, you're bringing vibrancy to the hill, we're gonna get you a permit in less than 90 days, or whatever. Because a lot of times, it's like a vet moving into a martial arts clinic, and they have to go through use reviews, or whatever it is. Like, let's… let's get rid of those barriers. Just one more note. I mean, I… I mentioned this in my my persona. I think Boulder's invested so much in protected bike lanes and being and by fast and being that destination, but then, like, we could go farther. We're still not, like, European cities, and…

[146:01] I'm… I'm opposed to a technology driven life in a beautiful nature place. I feel like we could go the wrong direction, where we incorporate technology, and then we get disconnected from why everyone wants to live in Boulder, which is connected to nature. So how do we make biking like, also accessible for other people. How do we make it a bigger part of Boulder's culture? I think we haven't reached that yet, where some people do it, but it's not convenient for everyone, it's not available for people who are disabled. Like, I think we could innovate there more than we have. Because we are already a destination. The challenge I see around… well, I shouldn't say this… Winter, I know. Winter is a challenge. Yeah. If we're talking Nightlife Academy, which is the first part of this, we have a choice as a community to either import that talent, or give them spaces they can afford to live here. So, one way or another, we're bringing people in from out… out of the county.

[147:03] Be it public transportation or otherwise, or autonomous cars, or we're giving them spaces here to live. I would say that we have a lot of commercial space in this town. We need to figure out how to turn that into co-op space, boarding house space, or something along those lines. Those people then become a member of our community, are part of the tax-bearing interests of the city. Otherwise, we're just importing them from somewhere else. I'm gonna do Erica. Okay, I just feel like we talk so much about small business, and I don't think any… I don't know if city people understand really how small, small business is. I'm talking handwritten, signed small business. I'm talking, I park in the neighborhood over there because I don't want to pay $250 quarterly for parking. Because it's money I'd rather have in my pocket, and I think… I just hear all this talk about, like, supporting small business, but I really… I can't recall a time in 18 years that I've had my store that anybody has ever actually asked me anything about my small business.

[148:04] So, I think it's like a… I mean, I have a 2,200 square foot space right on Pearl Street, across from the bookstore, and it would be such an eyesore for me to not be there, but I don't think you really understand what a grind it is for me to be there every day with the lights on. I'm working it, like, mostly myself. And then I live in Broomfield, and when I put in how I get from Broomfield from my house to here, it literally says, no options. That is, the option is zero options. So, I am jumping ahead to question three. I'm that single car driver that's, like, I would love to take the bus when I lived in North Boulder. I was, like, a regular skip rider. I can tell you that, like, it was pretty much me and the homeless people. So I think I hear a lot of people saying, we'd love to see bus ridership, but, like, would you really take the bus? Because, like, I really would take the bus. So yeah, that's just my thing, is I think people really underestimate, like, just how small a small business is.

[149:03] So let's move on to number 3. Rebecca, feel free to chime in, too, because I skipped your… But what challenges and opportunities should they consider for access to commercial areas to reduce single occupancy vehicle trips, and connection between districts? Well, I'll jump in, just because it will go back to it, right, is… if you have complete neighborhoods, you can reduce some of those single occupancy vehicle trips, right? So, not just the food options, although things like food trucks and stuff like that will help, and the grocery stores that you mentioned earlier, and more parts of town people can get to. the things that don't pop up top of mind right away, like daycare, right? Is there a daycare? within reasonable distance from the neighborhoods that need it. Is there a dentist? Is there, you know, your family practitioner? Those kinds of things that are businesses, but they're services that people may not think of because they don't use them every day.

[150:05] I think, the city should consider subsidizing, the skid, for example, at peak hours. We're not… it's completely free, say, from 7 to 9 a.m, where people and kids are going to school. It's free again at 5 p.m, where people are going shopping, whenever the times are, and then on the weekends through a certain period. I think people actually start riding a bus if they knew it was free, and then Eric is right, kids are not riding a bus because of the homeless population. Let's give us… truly, taken over by the homeless folks. So I think that's a… that's a… That's an issue. Yeah, I think the bus… the buses should be improved. They should operate longer hours during peak seasons, especially if we have Sundance coming. People are going to be out for a long time. They should be cleaned up, I think, about, like, buses up in the mountains. They're beautiful, they're electric, and they're clean. That should be bolder, too.

[151:03] Yeah. to cheat, I'll play devil's advocate here, just food for thought. What about Lyme, and… scooters, Personally. this is not this, but, like, the electric bikes are driving me nuts. And, definitely need some extra regulation around that, because, it's out of hand. I would push back… I mean, there probably does need to be some regulation, but I think a lot of times it's lack of education, right? So I've heard parents don't necessarily know what the different classes of e-bikes are, and what they should or should not look for when purchasing an e-bike for their child. Right? So a lot of that is education about what is reasonable. Are you a bike? Are you a car? Are you just… I think flying? Yeah, and I think… I think they should have a program, get a license to ride an e-bike. I've talked to the… my kids when they were in middle school, I tried to talk to the principal. My kids are now 15 or 17, they ride e-bikes.

[152:06] I can't tell you how many miles I didn't drive because they had e-bikes, so it is a game changer for a parent to be able… for them to have them. I agree, there's 3 of them on one with zero helmets, and, like, that's not… Okay, but that can be fixed, right? If you had a program that says you have to take this driver training and go, like, a motorcycle training, and… And what about tech? Well, I was gonna slightly go in a different route. So… I came from Chicago before I moved to Boulder, and it was remarkable to me how young this city is. Yeah, we've been around a long time, but we still have room for infrastructure. And so, we're talking about bus lines. Why are we not talking about potentially light rail, particularly going due east? We do have infrastructure potentially coming from Denver up to Boulder. The governor signed some sort of

[153:00] Gonna get funded or whatever. Believe it when I see it, but, how about East? Because most of the people that work for me at the university are actually from Erie, they're coming from almost due east. We still have an opportunity, and it will close in the next 20 years. That's what this comprehensive plan is about. Let's build some light rail going east to where all of that housing is being built. Thanks, Robin. Robin. Hi! So, I completely agree with everything that was just said about the licensing on the e-bikes. I'm a big e-bike rider myself, and I'm constantly horrified at some of the speeds of what's going on in some of the pedestrian lanes. The question specifically came about with the Lime scooters. I kind of feel like the same issue is going on with the Lime scooters that are going on with the e-bikes, which is… It's a fixable problem, but I think it's an enforcement problem at this point. They've been a really good tool, especially in the student areas where we can eliminate some of that final mile issue.

[154:09] But they're being, you know, ridden against traffic, in the street, on the sidewalk, a bunch of places that get abandoned in different locations. And yes, there's a lot of movement to pick them up, but… Yeah, once again, I feel like that's a fixable problem, but it's… I don't… I don't really know how enforcement works on this, because whenever I see, like, the two kids with no helmets on a bike going 25 or however many miles an hour. like, with pedestrians, I do wonder sometimes, like, how are we ticketing this, and how are we doing enforcement? I don't have an answer for that, but I think the Lime Scooters, I would say, is my same issue with it. to keep us on time and schedule, I'm going to go to the second part of item number 3 here. Improve connection between districts across the city. You know, we've already talked about the Arboretum, but is there anything about Boulder Junction? Well, you know, I'll put my two cents on Boulder Junction. If the rail train comes into Boulder Junction, we need to get the people from Boulder Junction down to Pearl Street.

[155:10] and be able to kind of take people from Boulder Junction and spawn them to the rest of the city. Right now, we have the hop and the skip, and blah blah blah. So, that's one of my things. So, let's concentrate on the second part of number 3. Are there special district considerations that any of you have? I would… I actually put it on my map, and it doesn't have to be a gondola, but I'm going to say the word gondola. From downtown to the hill… is a real issue, particularly in the winter, even if you ride a bike. And so finding some… something that is something that connects downtown with the hill, ideally Chautauqua as well, would be fantastic. And having that be something that can happen 365, no matter what the weather is, so that old people, tourists, people coming here from Dallas.

[156:04] Can end up… sorry. I'm giving you a hard time. People who don't necessarily want to walk to the destination, particularly when it's cold. So you're saying put the fun back in vernuncular. Yes. Why aren't you suggesting just, like, a, like, covered wagon, like, magic carpet? Well, it could be something like that. It could be a funicular. It could be… So, the idea of the gondola that I heard back in the day, I don't know if we can do it because of the hotels now, but you could have the gondola going up through the arboretum. And you could also have a bike lane that's right below it, that actually is, like, one of those bridges that they've already employed at CU. There's two of them running up to the campus, bike bridges, and that would end up solving this problem. And it's not… you're using it for two different things, not just one thing. Have it have multiple stops. The university's actually explored in the past having gondola run from the campus to East Campus.

[157:04] as a way of making sure that that corridor on Colorado… So again, don't necessarily think gondola, think whatever the thing would be that is weatherproof. Probably… There you go. Electric trolley that goes up and down 13 times. People do, like, San Francisco trolley. Yeah. We'll just put it, they'll pull their electric car out. It's just a circle, just goes downtown, yeah. Something outdoor company, or, like, pay for… pay to play, advertise it. They did it in Blackfield, in Escobar, it's, like, awesome. Like, they turned into a pretty great dress area, and then they have this, like, funicular, and now it's It's like this vibrant area, and it's like… Well, to go to the bigger picture, we're talking about actual solutions here. What I'm hearing, kind of really, though, is, like, we need easier ways to move and different types of weather for people who maybe are from playlands or other… Predictable and safe. Yeah, that are not in the car, necessarily. It's taking them off the street. That's the… that's the other part of this that's a really great idea, is it's not fogging the streets. It's actually using other space in a different way. With the conference center being there, we're going to see huge… and with Sundance, it is… the traffic's gonna be insane in this town.

[158:15] If we had another way of moving people around in the winter, in January. it will be a welcome relief on the streets of Old. And I haven't really been part of the privy to the 55th and East Boulder kind of developments have been going on, but, like, making sure that's well transported to the deck. I think the hop is doing too much. I think there should be two separate routes running along Pearl, hitting Polar Junction, back and forth, back and forth. And then another route going to the university, because it's too long to get the Boulder Junction from downtown, like, have to go all around town. No, no, no, you have to pick which direction. What's that? Contact clockwise or clockwise? Yeah. If you think clockwise, you don't have to go all the way down. It's also not easy for visitors to get online. They have to… make a commitment to take the bus and get the app. It's like, it should just be… Just jump on. Just jump on, jump off. Just jump on.

[159:06] And if you put it in… if you didn't go up and down the highway, you're not gonna have… So, stay on time. We have one minute left. Is there any one last minute comment that people… just has to say? Seeing none… Let's move on. Thank you, everyone. We have 15 minutes. It's all the advertising opportunities for the next section. Okay, so now we're going to move on to the Commission's letters to the City Council from Chris. Hi, everybody. So, hopefully you had a time to review in your packets the letters that pertain… the draft letters that, pertain to your commission. So, we took in all of the input that we received from commissioners, the individual input, and synthesized it into draft letters.

[160:03] Just wanted to make sure that we had time on the agenda today to make sure, you know, first, if there's nobody, if there's somebody that we did not hear from. If you would need more time to provide your input, if you're feeling like the draft letter does not… is not representative of, your feedback that you would have provided, we would like to understand that now. The intention will be that, barring any major significant shifts, based on discussion. tonight, drought to your formal meetings for November for final approval, with maybe some tweaking, at that meeting. I don't want to do a ton of wordsmithing today, since we have all the different commissions represented. Well, do you suggest we just break out into our three groups in different parts of the room? That sounds like a great idea, Mr. Chair. So let's do that and keep things moving. Let's see, there's a lot of UCAMPC people down here,

[161:04] DMC over on the couch, and whatever the last one now I forgot. Head over there. We're going. Yeah, Sylvia, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, you can't… Well, yeah, wholesome, so I was riding my bike, like, 9 months pregnant. I would never… But I would, you know… If it's an awkward case where you kind of go through… I'm gonna cross this at 5th, so they don't be down here now? You can absolutely. That was, you could just try… yeah, it's, it's really… Have you guys seen Robin? I'm moving, thinking of moving out these two guys. Second, Robin.

[162:14] Hmm. I also found out a whole panel for this, but, like… We get a problem. Also… I didn't press anything, I didn't mean that. Stephanie, Alvin. All right. Are you comfortable? Is it weird? I can use mine. FYI. Is it hard to hear people because everyone's talking? Yeah. The microphone would have been, so…

[163:11] like our letter, I think we should put the GDA up. Okay, sure. I did not. Clearly, you did not. I think you guys did a great conversation. I had no idea. Well, we all know. I just… So, here's the thing I would say, is that the PDA part of it is… It smells like a feminine, right? Yeah. Well, they could take it out of the… We don't think we have the votes to do with the Hill, let's just focus on downtown, and we can be removed from the boundary. Yeah. They haven't put the ballot…

[164:08] Which accounts for boundaries and importance. So I don't know, it feels like it should just be, like. keep the hill in the PBA, because then everything else, like, we will have money to… it's not gonna have a lot of money, but we might… This is one warm thing. It's down under placemaking. It is under placemaking? You're right, it is. First thing is financial support. Because I'm fucking pissed off. Yeah, yeah. I'm not saying necessarily call another aggregation, but I don't know

[165:12] That's what Cheryl said today, too, I can watch with her. It's my body. It will be almost gone. I think we'll have one more year worth of reserve left in terms of the general function. So it will spend down millions of dollars for the Hiccups space. So I think… The rule is what you're saying, just move the placemaking up to two.

[166:03] But I agree with you that I feel like, let's focus on real work, because that's the near term. We still have a year and a half before sun ends. I'm not gonna fall off the water, but is there… could we move DBA into stewardship of fugit funding?

[167:11] Robin.

[169:02] Is that okay? Yeah. You have editables… And it's a waste of money. As long as you guys collaborate. Financial support, stewardship, and liabilities. One of my campaigns is a story in which… So, in every one of these policy decisions needs to be vetted as a very positive in that section, because it was… So, for example, another one is the City Council adopts or resolution guidelines…

[170:01] invites and parking spaces. And they have to be on the east dimension. All of a sudden, 24 square feet. Which, by the way, is in a building that does not have a protected bike parking, that would have been incredibly wealthy. It would have been incredibly welcome. On the other hand, for example, we own a number of multifamily buildings that we've got People bring their bikes there, and people sign up to put their bikes in there? They bring them up with their units, and… 24 square feet times, $600 to make it to fill this bike. It's a lot of money in the U.S. So, that was a lot of ramifications. It's okay to just say hello.

[171:13] She's not mentioning the university at all, and I think, I'm wondering, Paula's gonna ask, she's like, when all these events, the Swampett Center, are they… I mean, we need a really good point of it. You need to know when they're creating events, what's happening, and… Oh, that could be in your… okay, there you are. Yep. Cool. Yeah, I just think with the new asset up there, that there's a huge opportunity for…

[172:04] them to be sending businesses, other people to your businesses, and we, as a commissioner, should speak. Yeah, it is the Hill Boulder, but… It is the two. You asked me that. Yeah. Yeah, that's who I am. She's… So you're doing that work, and, like, you need… Better or worse? Not so many full-time. I'm alone. You'll be honest. then, Ellie, is that you… Fantastic. If you just need… I don't know what that…

[173:01] Okay, alright. Better? Probably better. Awesome, okay. Oh, there we go. I put my notes in the chat to you. This is that. Sorry, I don't know what is, like, to change the…

[174:16] All right, we fixed the room out for a second. Okay, But we are still being recorded as part of the overall… all-commissions meeting. I would absolutely expect… Absolutely expect. Okay, all right, so, what we're obviously resetting again, we're looking at the… the points that were sent in, as well as the draft letter. Robin, you have added some of your points, to chat to me, which is that you would, on mill levies, you… agree with what I had sent in on mill levies. I would like to see a continued focus on that. This is one of the most taxed neighborhoods in the city.

[175:05] I would like to… I would like them to examine if we can go further down with the mill levies, basically. Same. Absolutely, I agree. Business owners also agree? Cool. And then on Priority 4, what was Priority 4? Priority 4 is about getting… activating some of those storefronts. Yep. And I'd like to… I'd like to ask the city if there's tax incentives or other incentives that we could be giving, whether it's… Reduced parking for employees, whether it's… whether it's just, like. some kind of credit for their rent to get more people in there and to get a diversity of businesses in there. What I said earlier in the meeting is something I feel very strongly about, which is, if we don't have some of the more… neighborhood-y things there, it's gonna continue just not being… it's not gonna be utilized, and we're not gonna have the employees staying behind and those kinds of things, so I think we should consider giving incentives to small businesses that come in. And I don't know if we need to put in the approval or not for the park.

[176:11] Yes, yeah. Approval for the park? Yeah, like the pocket park. about… I thought that was already underway, no? It's already, like, but do we need to put anything in here for that? I don't think there's anything that, City Council needs to do on that. What I would say is, and maybe I sent it in, right, is how we… how we think about TVAP, too. Yeah. how that interacts with the overall district, right? So, that pocket park is not enough for the density of the neighborhood. It is not really enough even for, like, two of the purposes of what Parks and Rec presented to us. Yeah. So there does need to be additional space that is set aside, and that goes back into, you know… I put it under community resiliency, right? Because of how people

[177:04] form relationships and peer-to-peer support networks and stuff like that from having those, ad hoc interactions on the street and in parks and in your neighborhood pub and things like that. That's totally in line with, Daniel's .52. 49 for this? You know, the one place where you could put something in for the City Council is not necessarily park approval, but, you know, could be park budgeting, where some of the things where it was, I think in that discussion with Parks and Rec, it was there should be. Thank you. You know, water fountains, or, you know, bathrooms probably don't fit there, but if there needs to be an increased budget, saying that this is probably an underfunded parts of. You know. Parks and Rec within town. That's correct. Probably an appropriate part for them. On TVAP2, the approval of the land use and all those maps actually include new parks.

[178:07] So they've already thought about increasing parks on TVL2. Okay. But I think our biggest barrier with TBAP2 is the rail itself. And that connection is very, from a pedestrian standpoint, it's sort of… you're on the wrong side of the tracks, and then on the right side of the tracks. It's not a very good connection, right at the rail. But, I mean, so, I mean, right now, obviously, there's two actual connections, right? At Belmont and on Goose Creek Path? And Pearl Parkway. And Pearl Park, right? So, I mean, I can… I can tell you from living on one side of the tracks that I used to cross over all the time to go to Shemaine's Bakery, right? Like, that is, like, better than going to Starbucks or whatever, right? So, going to Shemaine's Bakery and… and businesses over there, when Community Cycles was on that side, too, you know, that… it wasn't a big barrier to…

[179:04] to go across the tracks? No, it's not a big barrier, but it should be less of a barrier. You should be encouraged, to cross the tracks, so the pro park where it becomes us. sort of a no-man's land to the east. One other area that they could improve connectivity there is from the north side of the creek to the south side, so Boulder Soccer and, Camp Bow Wow and, Junkyard Social, whatever it's called there. Like, that part of it could have more connection to the actual Bike path, so you're not necessarily crossing… That grade. Remember? Kevin, did you have other priorities that you wanted to add? I didn't see an email from you either on the packet. Watch the video. Yeah, I didn't send any points. I think, you know, you hit the big ones. I mean, mine…

[180:01] I'm sorry. You always can be the… I did it 4 years ago. the mill levy with BJAD parking, I don't feel like we really… Oh, that is tough. Had a chance to discuss that at all? Like, we've been asking to for about 2-3 years now. Yeah. Debt got put in front of us without any discussion, and I still think, you know, without any debt on the parking now, we basically have a $650,000 budget just to maintain 150 parking spaces. Yeah, I think it should be reduced even further, but… Yeah, I'd say that that's probably number one. Two. The box, yeah, I think the economic fatality. Basically, the, the boxes that were mentioned, you know, what can we do to get Get, some leases into the area. Which you guys already hit on, and… Other than that, you know, I think… That's fair. I don't have anything additional to add. Why did I write that? Okay. I wrote it because I felt like…

[181:03] I thought they were good. I mean, I thought the family one was good, you know, especially the Boulder Junction-specific ones. I think those were… those were great. I missed the first part of the meeting, But in the last budget meeting. A lot of the budget from BJAD is paying city employees now, move to that… their column. So, in other words, I think we used to pay, like, $60,000 to the city for their services relationship to BJAD. That went to $160,000 or $140,000, I can't remember. And when I asked that, it was just so that they can pay the city employees and… I asked, what do we get in return? Just better service. I mean, this was a way of taking money away from the district so that we could pay a budget shortfall for the city, right? Right. That's essentially what happened. So… I don't know if anybody… any… Comments on that one? Any feelings? I thought that was a little weird. It's been weird for a long time.

[182:02] I guess my follow-up to that would be, right, is that if I look at feedback from other districts, are other districts being treated differently if they don't have the same reserves? But I would say that it is different, as opposed to downtown or Uni Hill that have, like, a wide, you know, much wider net in their services, where, really, you look at the parking district. And the only real role of that district is to own 100 parking spaces. Great. That's, like, the only thing it's supposed to do. And it's got this huge budget where it says, oh, you know, we can take a little bit of money out for this, and we can take a little bit of money out for this, and we can take, you know, pull some out for the playground, and pull some out for the employees, you know, it's… I mean, yeah, perfect. Sure. Okay, I think people are coming back together. So, Robin, I am… I am so sorry, either one of you, did you actually take notes from the conversation we just had? I know we want… we want to go deeper on reducing the mill levies.

[183:08] We do want to encourage connectivity. As well as Parks and TBAP, too. And overall, kind of, incentives, for businesses and vacancies within the district. I did not take notes. I'm sorry, I didn't know. No, no, no, and I didn't actually mean to pit on you, other than you were also a chair. Oh yeah, no, for sure. I'm sorry, I did not know I was supposed to be taking notes, I apologize. No, no, that's why… and that's why I'm just repeating, like, trying to make sure that I've captured what we talked about, so that if we get. That's my understanding as well. Okay, alright. Okay, I am going to drop in here and have Ellie add back the room. Thank you. It's universal.