Town Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening. First, I want to thank everybody for being here, whether it's online or in person. We'll open with the invocation. Heavenly Father, we ask for your guidance, wisdom, and support as we begin this meeting. We gather here today and intend on doing good work. We seek to represent fairly and well those who have given us this task. Help us engage in meaningful discussion. Give us clarity and strength to use our best skills and judgment. Bless this community, its residents, its businesses, and its visitors. Help us to continue to do good work in your name. Amen. Roll call, please.

Council Member Hollingshead. Here. Council Member Bracken. Present. Council Member Davis.

Here.

Council Member Brooks.

Present.

Council Member Dietz.

Here.

Mayor Pro Tem Cavey. Yes. Mayor Gray.

Here.

All are present.

Please rise for President Davis.

one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

I'll go ahead and start with council comments. We're heading to the end of the summer here. School's already started, and everyone's getting back into school, so that's always exciting. We had our last first Friday not too long ago. We have one or two more concerts left, so that's fantastic. You know, and rain's in the forecast. So I'm really hoping that we can get some good rain. And it's been a while since we've seen everybody, so welcome back. Council Member Hollingshead.

Yeah, thanks, Mayor. First of all, I just, you know, we're going to have a lot of public comment tonight, which is a good thing to have an engagement. And I just want to recognize that, you know, this council does a lot of good work and is very committed to this community with generally good intentions. So, you know, unfortunately sometimes, you know, we hear some things that may seem, you know, unethical and unprofessional. And unfortunately a lot of us get accused of those kind of things on a regular basis. We don't do any of those things. We're just local people doing, you know, serving our communities and doing our best and doing good work. So unfortunately, we're in the situation we are tonight. But, you know, it is what it is at this point. But I just want you to know that the people that I work with up here generally are trying to do the right things all the time and that they're, you know, doing the best for the town. So that's all I have for this time. Thank you, Council Member Holland.

Council Member Bracken.

Thank you, Mayor. No comments tonight.

Councilmember Davis?

Yeah, I wanted to give some kudos to Dan Saylor and the Public Works Department. There's a lot of work going around this town, a lot of new streets and things like that, and I just want to say that that's probably the smoothest road I've ridden on. A lot better than C-470, that's for sure. I just want to thank all the guys and pretty much the whole town for being really good about going around them. It's a lot of hard work, some of it's nights, but... I think it was Santa Fe, Blackfeather, Crowfoot. I think it's a couple other ones, Fifth Street, all that stuff. Just want to say kudos to you guys. You guys did a phenomenal job. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Brooks.

Mr. Mayor, thank you. A couple of things. I want to thank CRPD for keeping their lights on in my neighborhood. School went back into session Wednesday. And what is that? Today is the fifth day. There has been four of the five days that I have seen CRPD with somebody pulled over for speeding in a school zone. So a little bit of a reminder and just a request. Please slow down. The state, the county, this council has worked very hard to ensure that kids are safe when they're in school. Let's make sure the kids are safe getting to school. See the yellow lights, slow down, school is back in session. Let's give them a break, all right? And good work for enforcing that. I'd like to think that every time somebody sees somebody pulled over, Yeah, some of those folks are probably like, man, it could have been me. And then hopefully maybe they're just a little bit more careful next time. The other thing, Mr. Mayor, that I'd like to do, and I could take care of this, you know, I guess when we go to accept the agenda, but I think I'll go ahead and throw this out here now. I'd like to make a motion to move item number 17. the direction 2026-020 discussion and direction piece for the designer's view board. I'd like to move that off the agenda and move it for a date in the future just to make sure that we're giving staff plenty of time. I'd like to maybe do it after the election so then that way we have plenty of breathing room.

Second.

We have a first from Council Member Brooks, second from Council Member Dietz. Any further discussion? Council Member Hollingshead.

Yeah, I do think that tonight's probably not the best night to have this discussion, but I do think it's important that we have this discussion, not because I think there's anything wrong with Design Review Board, but there's been a consistent attack on the work that's been done in our downtown over time. The DDA, Design Review Board, we continue to bring this up over and over again, and now when there gets to be a little bit of pressure, we don't want to have the discussion. That's a little disappointing, because... You know we have great community partners in our downtown our Chamber of Commerce at downtown business owners We've done some really amazing things that we all take credit for and we all go to all the things downtown We all love the vibrancy But then we want to have this attack on these groups, and we don't want to do it tonight, so that's disappointing But I understand that it tonight is probably not the night for that, but we do need we need to have the conversation Councilman Bracken

I think tonight's just a night for it. And in the spirit of kind of what's happened lately, is this an effort to get rid of the DRB so that council members can now make decisions on behalf of the design of buildings? I think it's the perfect night to have it. I'm opposed to it.

Council Member Davis.

Yeah, I'm the one that brought this up in the very beginning. So the reason why I brought it up was the DRB hasn't had one meeting this year. We had four meetings in two years, and it's not just to get rid of their voice. This is just to get rid of the point of having something that's not being used at the time. I don't hate anybody on the DRB. I'm not trying to get rid of it to be mean. I'm just trying to bring forward efficiency, accountability, that kind of thing. So this is not an attack on anybody specifically. This is just trying to be efficient.

Council Member Brooks, followed by Council Member Bracken.

Mr. Mayor, thank you. Just to kind of dovetail a little bit into Council Member Holland's comments, I think that that helps us kind of clarify a little bit, gives a little bit more time, because indeed we do have great community partners, great folks, downtown business alliance, downtown development authority, the downtown partners that we're very much working with. gives an opportunity to ensure that all voices have an opportunity to be brought to the table and considered before we dive headfirst into the discussion. So then that way, hopefully, there isn't any sort of feeling or narrative about attack. Because I don't... See that I can see perhaps how that narrative has been played out, but let's push it back a little bit to be able to To work around that so then that way when we do come to the table. We know that we're doing so with everybody you know and they're inputting I Would say ma'am air yes, go ahead.

Sorry comes my bracket.

I would say before the election and I And because this has been brought up consistently since my second term. And we've had sub-meetings. We've had breakout meetings. We have meetings subsequent to that. We've had roll call votes. We've been up and down this issue of the DRB. These are volunteers in our community, which are boards and commissions that serve our community. And the election commission didn't even meet this year. Should we eliminate the election commission?

Yeah, we did.

We're going to?

We did.

We met. OK, so the Election Commission is like, what are we going to do with our gerrymandering and our restructuring? Are we just making decisions here because people have special interests so that they can put their information on a flyer to make them sound like they've made an impact? That's where I'm going with all this. And so that's been the playbook for quite some time. And quite frankly, I'm tired of it because it's been It's been three and a half years of the discussion of DRB, who has no budget, who has projects that come to them that are recommended through the town by the staff, and they've never recommended one project to come through the design review board that didn't meet the requirements. So after that, it's all a matter of process and all a matter of consideration in variances. And in the spirit of what's been happening this week in particular, is this an effort to take the power back from the boards and commissions and let council members decide how they want it to look, what they want it to do, and why the attack. I just don't understand it. I think it's an appropriate night. It's on the agenda. We've waited. We've vetted it. We went through it. We've gone over and over again on it. What's wrong with tonight? We've been talking about it for literally three and a half years now. Let's have the discussion tonight. I'm tired of it, frankly, and I'm frustrated with it because it keeps coming up, but I don't hear any substance behind the why. I just don't. I haven't heard a valid excuse behind the why, other than somebody wanting it on their ballot issue, on their flyer, something to talk about. Those are my comments.

I'll go ahead and finish up if you guys don't mind. You know, I think that the frustration for myself on this is that it hasn't been three and a half years, it's been like five and a half years. And we bring it up every year about, or maybe every six months sometimes even. I work and live downtown and so I think that the DRB represents businesses owners and building owners and homeowners in Castle Rock. People who have a vested interest in Castle Rock. People like me who have all my money wrapped up in Castle Rock. And I think that that's what kind of is disappointing is sometimes I think that we as a council don't take seriously the people who are really putting the effort and the money into downtown. But I also think that we probably don't have enough information to do a really good job tonight on that. And so with that, I'm in favor as well. Council Member Dietz.

I just want to thank everybody for their comments. Very powerful. I also, too, think that Castle Rock is going to be even better. I want to have this dialogue in the future. I think it's important and nobody's gonna change a thing, do anything now. We'll have that discussion down the road, but downtown is important, but I think the whole town's important. I think that everybody has to, we'll find a collective here. We'll find a way to make this better for you folks downtown. And I also know the economy is not very conducive right now for a lot of development. some is happening downtown probably has its own other inadequacies because it's tighter parking stuff like that i get that but i look forward to a future discussion and i want to thank you mayor and everybody else's comments thank you councilmember bracken i would like a friendly amendment motion to say that it's before the uh new election my motion stands the motion stands roll call vote please

Councilmember Hollingshead? Yes. Councilmember Bracken? No. Councilmember Davis?

Yes.

Councilmember Brooks?

Yes.

Councilmember Dietz?

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tem Cavey? Yes. Mayor Gray? Yes. Motion passes.

Thank you. Anything further? Councilmember Brooks? Councilmember Dietz?

Just want to kind of Just echo some sentiments that even Council Member Hollinshead makes. We do try hard, and I appreciate that comment tonight. I think that everybody in here has opposing views. We have differences. There's a place to do it. You do it in meetings. Society shouldn't be full of attacks and argument of things. I do want, I would like to see that have a little more peaceability in our society, but I'm just grateful, again, for Castle Rock and the town that we live in, and I look forward to more dialogue in the future. Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you. Mayor Ports, MKV.

No comment tonight, Mayor.

Thank you. Moving on to the executive session report. Executive session 2026-10. Executive session was held in conclusion at the meeting on July 21st, 2026, regular town council meeting. The purpose of the executive session was as follows. The conference is with a town attorney to receive legal advice regarding laws and or policies governing operation of recreation facilities and programs within the town, all pursuant to CRS 24-6-4024B. If anyone believes that a substantial discussion of any matters not included in the motion or going to executive session occurred during the executive session or that any improper action occurred during the executive session in violation of the open meetings law, I would like you to state your concerns for the record. seeing none we now move on to unscheduled public appearances this time is reserved for for members of the public to make a presentation to council on items or issues that are not scheduled on the agenda as a general practice the council will not discuss or debate these items nor will council making decisions on these items presented during this time rather than have them follow up for staff Comments are limited to three minutes per speaker. Time is limited to 30 minutes total. Residents were given priority in an order they signed up to address council, followed by non-residents representing Castle Rock businesses, then non-residents and businesses outside of town of Castle Rock as time permits. Council is also accepting public comments submitted online at crgov.com backslash council comments by 1 p.m. today to be included in the public record. I do have a handful of people signed to speak, and I will call on those, and then we'll see if anybody else would like to speak as well. I'll start with residents, and then business owners, and then non-residents. First one up for a resident is David Miles. And us.

That's the first person. There's two days.

They're all the same. They're all the same. They have two days. Are we already starting the clock? Okay. I'm going to wait until they have their handouts, please. Okay. Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, Members of Council, I'm here tonight because a text message was sent by Councilmember Mark Davis after he learned about the recall effort that we put in place. I'm not going to talk about the recall. What I am going to talk about are the text messages that Mark Davis sent me and the father of a fellow recall participant. Councilmember Davis, first contacted the father of a recall participant. During that conversation, he said, and you have the text in front of you, he would make sure the man's buildings went through and would give him the alleys, the alleys, town property between his properties. Councilman Davis then identified the man's son, Nathan Birkencotter, as someone involved in the recall. He referred to playing hardball and asked the father to speak with Nathan about pulling back the recall. Later, Councilman Davis sent me this text message, I'll drop getting rid of the DRB if you pull the recall. Let me know by Monday at 8 a.m. The DRB is not a political football. To me, this is simple. Public decisions should never be offered in exchange for stopping lawful political activity. Council members should not promise that buildings will be approved or that town property will be given away. I have provided the complete conversations, the text conversations, so that they can be read in context. I'm not here to decide whether a crime has been committed. That is a question for independent investigators. I'm here to say that this conduct is unacceptable from an elected official at any level of our government. Any level of our government. First thing I request is I call upon every member of this council to join me in asking for Councilmember Mark Davis to resign. Second, I ask that the town to preserve every relevant record and refer this matter for a truly independent investigation. Third, I will submit a CORA request, Colorado Open Records Act request covering communications involving multiple town officials town council members that are conducting business. This was done on Mark Davis's private phone. I am going to ask that those records include private communications as well because this cannot happen to our town. The press will include public communications conducted on those personal devices where covered by Colorado law because messages before... I don't even know what I'm thinking right now. I don't want to read this anymore. I don't know what to ask of this town council. This is unacceptable behavior. I am a resident and a business owner. This behavior cannot exist in our town. This town is too special for this to go on. I can't believe it. I can't believe that we're here.

Thank you, David. This must stop.

Next, I have Amy Winshew.

Hi, good evening council persons, and thank you for your service. I want to address the discussion regarding DRB, and I'd like to highlight some things for our audience. So they have two things here in the town of Castle Rock. They have the planning commission, which reviews land, zoning, development proposals, and those go through the town council for final assessment. When we're talking the design review board, anything up to 10,000 square feet, the design review board makes the final decision. That does not go through the town council. My question is, where is the elected officials' opinion on this who were elected by the people of Castle Rock? Where is that in the design review board for anything 9,999 square feet or less? There's not a direct connection to an elected official. I'd like to talk about the Design Development Authority. The Castle Rock Downtown Development Authority is a local quasi-governmental group that uses funding like tax increment financing, except the Castle Rock Downtown Development Authority is not elected. One of those members of the Castle Rock Downtown Development Authority sits on the design review board. I find that interesting and possibly a conflict of interest. If you look at other persons sitting on the design review board, every single person deals with downtown. There's not an outside opinion related to the design review board. It's developers and cash people but the town council and the elected people and the residents of the town of Castlebrook do not. Regarding meetings, as pointed out, of the 14 scheduled meetings so far, there's been one meeting June 24th. In 25 of the 24 scheduled meetings, there were just three. Of the ones in 24, there were just five. The most recent minutes, by the way, Article IV of Design Review Board bylaws state that all meetings of the board shall be kept and shall be done in a timely fashion. The most recent minutes of the Design Review Board are from June 24, 2026. And you're thinking, oh, maybe those are like this year's meetings. Nope. those meeting notes are from september 24th 2025 meetings those are the most meeting notes we have of the design review board in reviewing three years of the design review board minutes There's like almost nothing. So that's not to say that the design review board doesn't have a purpose. I'm sure they do. But since they've chosen to come into the limelight, and since they've chosen to speak loudly, you know, let's look under the hood. Let's see what they actually do. So thank you. Thank you.

Pardon me. Thank you, Amy. Next, I have Erin Kaye or Jackie McKenna. Which one do you want to do? Aaron Kane, you don't want to do unscheduled? Okay, Aaron Kane.

Thank you very much and good evening. Thank you for having me today. My name is Erin Kane and I am the very proud superintendent of Douglas County School District. I appreciate the opportunity to address you all this evening. First, welcome back to school. Thank you for your added patience with the additional traffic, your dedication to keeping our children safe, and everyone's grace as we get back into the swing of things. My colleague, Jackie Millay, the District's Chief Operations Officer, will have comments on Ordinance 27, which is set as an agenda item later this evening. I have family obligations tonight preventing me from being able to participate in that discussion. But I wanted to come and speak to the Council more generally about the District and what we hope to accomplish with the Town of Cassarock over the next several years that we work together. First, I want to note a few things about Douglas County School District. We are very, very proud to share that we have the highest graduation rate for our district of all time. We are the top scoring school district in the Denver metro area. And thanks to the support of our community, our academics have continued to increase and our staff turnover rate has dropped from 26% to 13%. Our schools are award-winning, including many of our schools right here in Castle Rock. And that is in large part because of our community's investment and our incredible partnerships, including here in Castle Rock. We have been a very proud partner for Castle Rock throughout the years. Most recently, we partnered with the Brickyard URA. In spite of the loss of revenue to the school district, We share this body's dedication to building a bright and prosperous future for the Castle Rock community and families. For the continued benefit of our families here in Castle Rock and our students and the broader community, I want to promise you that Douglas County School District is committed to continuing to strengthen our collaboration with the town. Whether we are planning for growth, addressing infrastructure needs around our school sites, or ensuring safe routes to schools for our students, we know that our goals are shared by this body. So I want to make sure that all of you as council members know that I and everyone on my staff welcome early and meaningful communication and collaboration on any matter that affects the families that we jointly serve. You will hear later today how we hope to do that specifically with respect to school properties within the city, but not limited to that issue. We want to make sure you know that you can reach out to us with any questions you have related to the school district's operations, its needs, or plans within Castle Rock. And if you hear any issues from your community, even those involving first day of school traffic, please feel free to reach out to any of us in Douglas County School District. Your community is our community too, and we share serving those families together. I look forward to continuing our longstanding partnership with the town of Castle Rock, and please know that my line is always open, and I look forward to hearing from each of you, and thank you for hearing our comments later today. Thank you for having me.

Thank you, Erin. I have no one else to speak. If someone wishes to speak, please approach the podium and speak through the microphone. State your name and whether you are a resident, non-resident, or business owner. You'll have three minutes to speak.

Hello. My name is Harry Young. I am a resident of Castle Rock. Good evening to all of you council members. I'm here tonight to remind this body of a simple truth. You were all elected to represent approximately 88,000 people who live in Castle Rock. It is not, you know, it is not just to represent developers and business investors. Every member of this council took an oath to serve the people who live, work, and raise families here. Your job is to listen to our voices, protect our community, and faithfully execute the will of the voters. Right now, that trust is being tested as Mark has been put up for potentially or recall. And so. you know let's be clear about why mark davis was elected he was chosen by his constituents because he's a builder voters wanted someone with real world expertise to help this council responsibly manage our growth he ran on a transparent promise to represent his constituents desire to keep high-rise buildings out of our historic downtown he's doing exactly what he was hired to do Recalling a representative simply because he's fulfilling his campaign promises and standing up for his voters is a direct attack on our local democratic process. The pressure to build high rises downtown isn't coming from the people who live here. It is being driven by outside investors and builders who may not even call Castle Rock home. They see our town as a profit margin. We see it as our community. Their financial investments must never supersede the collective will of 88,000 residents who actually live with the consequences of your decisions. The hard reality is that our downtown infrastructure is completely unequipped to handle high density over development. Our water supply is precious, finite resources that cannot sustain a massive sudden influx of downtown residents. Our wastewater and sewage systems are already facing significant demands. If we rush into high-rise development, we risk pushing these critical utilities past their breaking points. Beyond what's beneath the pavement, look at what's on top of it. Our downtown streets are already clogged. Forcing massive residential complexes into our historic core will turn daily traffic into an absolute gridlock and completely overwhelm our limited parking. Growth is inevitable, and managing it is indeed the job of this council. But your mandate is to champion moderate, sensible development. Growth should never come at the expense of our infrastructure, our utility systems, or the unique charm that makes Castle Rock so special. I ask this council to remember who put you in these seats.

Thank you, Harry.

Thank you.

I have no one else to speak. If someone wishes to speak, please approach the podium, speak in a microphone, state your name, whether you're a resident, non-resident, or business owner. Seeing none, we'll move on to town manager's report.

Good evening, mayor and council. I'm going to hit just a couple of quick items this evening. Starting the process of our open houses, council member Davis is here on the 25th, and then you see the other ones moving into September. As you know, I've been traveling, and I think I've got a good 10-hour airplane cold that I'm occasionally fighting. So the good news is I won't speak as long as usual. There's a number of other events going on. Be sure and coordinate with Shannon if you want to participate in going to, for example, the Heroes Gala for the Community Foundation, the Library's annual gala as well. I think there's a number of other events events out there, Wellspring and such. We are planning the State of the Town event at the Cantrell School. So in addition to all the council members, the mayor's having an open house as well. And then on the 29th, we're going to have the appreciation event for our boards and commissions. Wanted to provide you with the budget calendar. The budget team met again today. We're in the process of finalizing the recommended town budget. Plan on introducing that on September the 15th. Before that, I'm going to ask for... one hour of your time. I only need 59 minutes for Councilmember Brooks. But I know time is precious. But I would like to have some time. I'd be happy to meet early in the morning, evening, whatever. Walk you through the major policy issues in regards to the budget. As you know, the budget's the most important document, in my opinion, that we've adopt every year, provides the marching orders for town staff on an annual basis as to how we want to implement it. So we introduce it on the 15th, first reading of the budget in the mill levy there on the 27th. On October the 20th, we have a second reading. We also then have the budgets for the General Improvement District, the Downtown Development Authority, the Business Improvement District that we approve for Miller's Landing. And then come that first meeting in December, which is also changing of the guard night where the new council members and mayor are sworn in. we'll have on that consent calendar for the old council to adopt the second and final reading of the mill levy ordinance, because we will have by then the final assessed numbers from the county assessor's office. So that's our budget calendar. Shannon will be asking for some time, probably starting next week, to go through you at your convenience. Again, I'll be happy to come early, stay late, whatever works for you, I'll schedule, but it's going to take probably about an hour to walk you through some of the major policy choices that we have in regards to the budget. A few other highlights going on. We've had a very successful concert season. I think Jeff will probably report that it's probably been our most successful concert season up at the Miller Activity Center. We've had a number of different events in addition to that, and you see that here. A few more items there as well. And then we do have a neighborhood meeting. The election office is going to expand. So they'll be doing a neighborhood meeting that we have under our town laws to let the neighborhood speak if they have any questions about that proposed land use. And I think with that... TAR will provide development updates at our first meeting in September. And I do commend for your reading the mid-year reports from the service contract providers, all the different groups that you provide funding for. They provide a mid-year report, and that's good reading as well. I'd be happy to respond to any questions to the extent I'm able. Any questions for David?

Thank you, David.

Moving on to town attorney's report. Thank you, Mayor. Members of Council, I have no report tonight.

Mayor?

Council Member Hollingshead. I know it's not typical for us to comment on public comment. This is a unique meeting for sure. I'm upset as somebody who's committed six years to the town to be on council to do things ethically, do things the right way, to have people accuse you of things at times, of being corrupt or being bought out by developers, which none of that is true. I wish I would have seen what it's like to even be bribed once. No one's ever approached any of us with that kind of stuff. We don't do that on this town council. We understand there's differing views of growth and development and all those things, and those are fine discussions. Like I said before, I do think there are good people sitting on this board. But the actions of Councilmember Davis, unfortunately, are unethical. They go against our code of conduct. He is not a bad person. He made a mistake, but unfortunately that mistake gives us all a bad look. It causes distrust in the town of Cassarock and elected officials. That's frustrating. That's hard for all of us to deal with now, and it's just not right. We all got to face the music sometimes when we mess up, but this action was not okay. So because of the unethical behavior and violation of our code of conduct, I move to censure Councilmember Davis moving forward.

I'll second and speak to the motion. I agree. I think that I received those text messages to my town phone and read them and obviously there's folks here tonight speaking about the the uh the issue and uh it's a it's a very real conversation uh via text message and it's super concerning and as council member hollingshead has said this is a reflection on on all of council this isn't this isn't just a reflection on on mark davis's actions and um and if we don't take this very seriously and take a corrective action um i feel like we're remiss and and uh we're not doing our responsible um actions that are within our purview um so i support the motion thank you councilmember books mr mayor thank you i um i'm going to disagree um i just saw

text messages I just saw them five minutes ago so if somebody could rationally I don't think they can explain to me what the breakneck deal is here where we haven't even had I have not had a chance to have a discussion about this with the town attorney I'm not an attorney I think that a discussion with the town attorney is appropriate. I think not having a discussion and rushing to judgment is wholly inappropriate and dangerous. We've got something in this country called due process. And I would want that for everybody up here. I would want that for every person. To be able to have a time to be able to have some reflection on the information that has been put forward. Thank you. Not quite done yet, sir. I perused this, but because I also wanted to be respectful and listen to the comments that were being made, didn't really have a chance to read it in depth. which i would like to do i would like to have conversations with town staff and i feel like it's appropriate uh to just wait you know let's say at the end of the day forget who said it corrective action is necessary fine next meeting We can do that. There isn't anything that is pressing to have to do that tonight without some sort of due process and honest consideration of what's in front of us. Councilman Bracken.

So to be clear, you haven't had communication with the source at all concerning these communications?

I'm not having an open discussion about that. What I told you, Councilman, is I told you that I just saw this for the first time. I'm not having a discussion with you where you're obviously trying to get at something, and you've been trying to get at something all night, okay? So, okay, so you ask me a question, you ask me a question, you ask me a question, I will answer the question, and then it can be your time. I'm not going to answer any of your questions about whether or not. I told you that I just saw this, okay? If that's not good enough for you, I don't know what to do for you.

Okay, that's enough. Okay, so... In light of Councilmember Brooks' comments, I still stand by the second for the motion. And I move for the censoring.

Councilmember Dietz.

I welcome Councilmember Bracken's sentiments. Due process, I'd like to see a little more discussion and look into this deeper and talk to the town attorney. So I thank you, Councilmember Brooks. Thank you.

I'll just speak in motion.

I feel like Councilmember Davis has owned his actions already and apologized for it in some circles. And I think it's clear that this is what happened and we're going to move forward after this. But I do think there needs to be some action taken. Any further discussion?

Councilmember Brooks.

The no vote that I am about to cast is not to say

that a further discussion is not needed the no vote that i'm about to cast is that i don't believe that it's appropriate to do this right now just to be clear councilmember deets you know councilmember bracken we have a wonderful past and president and everything and i can appreciate you but you're an old peach either when it comes to texting and accusing people of things do you want me to let the public know

Oh, do you want to? Guys, guys, guys, absolutely stop.

Absolutely stop.

Okay. I'll go ahead and finish this up. I think two more weeks is too long for a censure. I think that this is going to be tried in the public, it's going to be tried in social media, and eventually maybe even tried in a court of law. And I just think that the censure is something we should do now. With that, roll call vote, please.

Council Member Hollingshead?

Yes.

Council Member Bracken?

Yes.

Council Member Davis?

No.

Council Member Brooks? No. Council Member Dietz?

No.

Mayor Potemkovi? No. And Mayor Gray?

Aye.

Motion fails, four to three.

Thank you. Moving on to the acceptance of the agenda. If there are no other changes other than agenda number 17, any additions or deletions to the agenda, a motion to accept the agenda will be presented as accepted.

So moved.

Second. I have a first by Councilmember Bracken, second by Councilmember Hollinshead. Moving on to the consent calendar. Sorry, roll call vote.

Councilmember Hollingshead? Yes. Councilmember Bracken? Yes. Councilmember Davis?

Yes.

Councilmember Brooks? Yes. Councilmember Dietz? Yes. Mayor Patemkevi? Yes. Mayor Gray?

Aye.

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. Moving on to the Consent Calendar. These items are general routine in nature and have been previously reviewed by Town Council. And we voted on a single motion without discussion. Any member of the Town Council may remove an item from the Consent Calendar. Number 7, Resolution 2026-89. Resolution approving the First Amendment for the Services Agreement between the Town of Castle Rock and Barker Rinker Seacat Architecture PC for Construction Administration for the Castle Rock Sports Development Center. 8. Resolution 2026-90, Resolution approving the Third Amendment to the amended and reinstated Intergovernmental Agreement between the Town of Castle Rock and Douglas County for Highway 85 Wastewater Collection and Treatment System. 9. Resolution 2026-91, Resolution approving the Third Amendment to the Services Agreement between the Town of Castle Rock and W. W. Wheeler and Associates for the Castle Rock Reservoir No. 1 and 2 Construction Project. Number 10, Resolution 2026-92, Resolution approving the purchase and sale of agreement between the Town of Cass Rock and Findlay Family Properties Limited Partnership for the Plum Creek to Ruder Hess Pipeline Infrastructure Project. Number 11, Minutes 2026-20, Minutes July 21, 2026, Council Meeting. I'll accept the motion.

So moved. Second.

I have a first by Council Member Bracken, second by Council Member Hollingshead. Any further discussion? Roll call vote, please.

Council Member Hollingshead. Yes. Council Member Bracken. Yes. Council Member Davis.

Yes.

Council Member Brooks.

Yes.

Council Member Deeds. Yes. Mayor Pro Tem K.V. Yes. Mayor Gray. Yes. Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. Moving on to advertised public hearing and discussion action items in quasi-judicial hearings. The following items, 13 and 14, are due process hearings as required under Colorado law. In order to afford all parties due process under law, town council must be fair and impartial in deciding whether the application should be approved, approved with conditions, or denied. In making that determination, Each council must consider for the record, which includes the planning commission recommendation, staff recommendation, applicant presentation, public comment presented during the hearing, and other written public comments offered before or during the hearing. Under the law, town council must evaluate the proposal based solely on the record and the criteria established under the municipal code, which is highlighted in the staff report. It is important that each council member remain objective and capable of considering information offered into the record during this hearing. If any council member believes that he or she is incapable of evaluating and voting on the application consistent with the due process requirements, please describe the situation and recuse yourself from further participation. Does any council member have a conflict of interest that he or she would like to discuss prior to proceeding? Seeing none, Madam Clerk, has the public been properly noticed under applicable regulations for this type of land use hearings?

Yes, it has been.

The council will now hear from the applicant staff and public comments will be taken in a limited four minutes per speaker. I will read the following two items together, but we'll build it on separately. Number 12, Ordinance 2026-25, ordinance annexing the town of Castle Rock, Colorado, multiple parcels and land totaling of 16.12 acres of size owned by the town. Number 13, ordinance 2026-26, ordinance approving the initial zoning for multiple parcels of land totaling 16.12 acres in size owned by the town of Castle Rock, Colorado. All right.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. So before you tonight are two items that are related, the annexation and zoning of some town-owned property. So in this situation, we are both the applicant and the staff presenting it. So I want to just quickly remind folks on the annexation process. It generally follows a three-step process. with substantial compliance, eligibility, and then the annexation and zoning hearing. There are exceptions when the property is town-owned and does not solely incorporate public right-of-way. So in that case, the first two eligibility and substantial compliance hearings are not required under the state statute. Council acts directly on the annexation, which is the first item tonight. And then the Planning Commission doesn't act on the annexation, but in this case they make a recommendation on the zoning, which they have. So the item before you tonight for annexation and zoning, just a little heads up, as you know, we've been doing a variety of cleanup of town on parcels. Sometimes they're solely right-of-way, sometimes they're not. So there's a little difference on this one. There are multiple parcels involved in these items tonight. They're generally grouped in four areas. The vicinity map really in the center of the screen is showing the Home Street parcel. It's a collection of parcels that is just east of I-25. You can see it touches the town's boundary on the north side and it does get contiguity across CDOT's right of way. The Maher Water Tank parcel, aptly named, does have a water tank on it on town-owned property, and it is adjacent and meets the contiguity requirements to town jurisdiction. Over on Founders Parkway, this is a combination of a couple parcels of land that are now all owned by the town. They are just south of the Canyon's far south property, and as you can see, to the west of some property in unincorporated Douglas County. And then the vicinity map in the bottom right is a very small sliver. This very small portion of town on property is just to the east of Sage Canyon Elementary School. So why do we go to the effort to bring in these parcels into town's jurisdiction? It does clean up our jurisdictional boundary. As you're aware in our town map, there's... various pockets of unincorporated Douglas County and town land. So it cleans up our jurisdictional boundary, it makes sure our town zoning ordinances apply to those areas, and it also cleans up the law enforcement response and puts it all under Castle Rock PD. So these are the latest of the recent parcels of cleanup. The proposed zoning is public land one district. This includes permitted uses for municipal facilities, utilities, parks and recreation, public improvements, and public right-of-way. I'm going to go back just one slide just for a quick moment to say the town's use of these properties are generally what they are for. Obviously, Maher Water Tank is going to continue to have a water tank on it. The Home Street parcel does have, I believe, some Cass Rock Water utility lines and well facilities that might get constructed in the future. So just wanted to make sure you guys were aware of all these permitted uses. There's no development besides these public uses that are planned for these parcels. So the annexation, we look at both state statutes as well as the town's municipal code. We do review it related to our comprehensive master plan. Staff does find that it meets those requirements, and we recommend that council consider approving the annexation for these four general areas. Separately, the zoning is looked at against some different sections in our municipal code in 17, Title 17, and Planning Commission reviewed this and recommends approval to the PL1 district. When the mayor opened this case, he read in both the agenda items. So there are two separate motions for your consideration. If the annexation ordinance is approved, we are under our own town requirements and states required to also zone it. So we have two motions for your consideration. I do have alternative motions if you need them. But both of these motions are requested tonight. Happy to answer any questions.

Good point. Any questions for staff? No questions. Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Cavey, sorry.

Could you go back to the slide that shows the... One more. That one. The one over here where we annexed in Canyons Far South. That's that corner, right? Yes. And is that part of what they... We're giving us for? No, it's not. OK. So what is that?

There's, I think, four different parcels up here. A triangular piece was dedicated to the town and has a well site on it today. So if you drive on that curve and hopefully are there. and able to look to the side.

Oh, yeah, the one where the stone?

Yeah, it's a really nice looking well facility. Good job, Castle Rock Water. There's also a strip of land that was really rectangular in shape going straight up through the middle of it. It was previously owned by Douglas County government. It was an old piece of platted, what would have been Ridge Road if it had extended that way. And then the other bulk of the corner, really the triangular, that was owned by a metro district that had actually uh the terrain metro district and founders metro district villages the castrock metro district four they didn't have a need for that property so as we were doing our research into cleaning up parcels we wanted to consolidate that so it took us a little bit of time to get ownership on all those pieces but they deeded that to us so there was no um I THINK THAT'S A CHALLENGE TO THAT. CHALLENGE TO THAT. CHALLENGE TO THAT. BUT YEAH, THESE ARE ALL BUT YEAH, THESE ARE ALL BUT YEAH, THESE ARE ALL OUTSIDE OF EVERYTHING THAT OUTSIDE OF EVERYTHING THAT OUTSIDE OF EVERYTHING THAT CANYONS FAR SOUTH GAVE US IS CANYONS FAR SOUTH GAVE US IS CANYONS FAR SOUTH GAVE US IS NEXT TO IT. NEXT TO IT. NEXT TO IT. OKAY. OKAY. OKAY. SO THAT'LL JUST KIND OF STAY SO THAT'LL JUST KIND OF STAY SO THAT'LL JUST KIND OF STAY THE WAY IT IS WITH THE LITTLE THE WAY IT IS WITH THE LITTLE THE WAY IT IS WITH THE LITTLE WATERSHED ON IT AND THAT SORT WATERSHED ON IT AND THAT SORT WATERSHED ON IT AND THAT SORT OF TH

Any further questions from council? No further questions. I don't have anybody to speak. Signed to speak. If someone wishes to speak, please approach the podium and speak in a microphone. Please state your name and whether you are a resident. Non-resident or business owner, you'll have four minutes to speak. Seeing none, we'll bring it back to town council for a possible motion and discussion.

Move to approve the annexation ordinance as introduced by title.

Second. I have a first by Mayor Pro Tem Cavey, a second from Council Member Davis. Any further discussion? Roll call vote, please.

Council Member Hollingshead. Yes. Council Member Bracken. Yes. Council Member Davis.

Yes.

Council Member Brooks. Yes. Council Member Dietz.

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tem Cavey. Yes. Mayor Gray.

Aye.

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. I move to approve the zoning ordinance as introduced by title.

Second.

First from Councilmember Hollingshead. Second from Mayor Pro Tem Cavey. Any further discussion? Roll call vote, please.

Councilmember Hollingshead.

Yes.

Councilmember Bracken. Yes. Councilmember Davis.

Yes.

Councilmember Brooks.

Yes.

Councilmember Dietz.

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tem Cavey. Yes. Mayor Gray.

Aye.

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. David or Michael?

I'll start and then Mike can amplify it. Councilmember Brooks pointed out that Councilmember Davis may have wished to recuse himself from the vote that was conducted previously. If he does desire to do that, then we would then revote and he would consider recusing himself if that's what he would like to do. So Councilmember Davis, if you would like to recuse yourself from voting on that censure vote, you could. The result looks to me like it's going to be a 3-3, so the motion still dies. But if you would desire not to be on the record of voting on that, we could then have a revote. I just want to be transparent. That was the communication that came from Councilmember Brooks. No, yes, I should. Yeah, yes. Yeah, I will. All right, so Mike, you want to go ahead and handle the parliamentary procedure you said?

Yes, and I think one of the things that we need to point out that Robert's Rules of Orders provides is that on a tie vote, a motion that requires a majority vote as the one that was made by Councilmember Hoyne said, If it's a majority vote that's required for adoption on a tie vote, that is lost, since a tie is not a majority. So that's fairly simple and straightforward for Roberts.

So do we go ahead and re-vote?

Yeah. And I think we would go ahead and just have Lisa do another roll call.

And then Council Member Davis would be in charge.

Okay, so we're going to keep moved by Hollingshead, seconded by Bracken. All righty. Okay, Councilmember Hollingshead.

Yes.

Councilmember Bracken. Yes. Councilmember Davis. Oh, sorry. Councilmember Brooks. No. Councilmember Dietz.

I'm sorry.

We're voting, we're voting on that. Okay, thank you. Mayor Pro Tem Cavey. No. Mayor Gray.

Aye. Thank you.

Motion fails.

Moving on to number 14 on the agenda. Resolution 2026-93. Resolution approving the site development plan for King Soopers grocery store and fueling station within Dawson Shales planned development. Tara.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. As a part of some of these land use presentations, we modified our format a little bit, so I'm going to introduce it, then I'll bring the applicant up to do their presentation. I'll do the conclusion, and then we'll both be available to answer any questions. So, yes, this is King Super Site Development Plan. I'll just give a quick overview of where it's located. It's a 12-acre lot. It is just west of I-25 in the New Crystal Valley Interchange. It's in the Dawson Trails Planning Area E2. And again, the applicant will go through in more detail for that. For a site development plan, I want to highlight that this property has already been annexed. The zoning approval for the use has been put in place. So tonight's public hearing on the site development plan is focused on the layout of the site improvements and does it comply with all of the overriding zoning regulations and town requirements. Those site development plan review and approval criteria are in Municipal Code Section 1738. So these are the five main elements. They are also detailed in your staff report with the staff analysis on each one. So with that, I'm going to go ahead and turn it over to Aaron McLean with Galloway. He'll be presenting on behalf of King Super. When he is done speaking, I'll come give the final staff analysis and motions for consideration, and then we're both available for any questions. Thank you.

OK, this is on. Hey, good evening, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, members of council. Thank you for your time this evening. We're excited to bring this project forward. It's been about two years, as you'll see through the staff report and some of this presentation, of getting to this point. So it's great to be here this evening. Just a quick overview of our team structure here tonight. With us is Jose Cervantes and Miles Pearson. They're with Kroger Real Estate. They're happy to answer any questions you have specific to maybe site selection or operations, for that matter. With me here with Galloway & Company is Jenny Romano. She's our lead civil project manager. She was part of the overall site design and working with staff and our team to bring the project forward. And also with us tonight is Mark Breese with Nails Architecture. He's the architect of record. Not to rehash everything that's in the staff report, which is well-written and very thorough on staff to bring that packet forward to you. I just want to touch on some of the highlights and key points of this project. As noted, it is part of an overall development, a larger site of tract aid in Dawson Trail Smiling 2, which was completed earlier this year, as far as being recorded. It is a 22-acre piece. We're one of 10 lots. The King Soopers and Fuel are on a singular lot, which is about 12 acres. Again, here, this is where the site is located in the overall Dawson Trails Master Development Plan. It's in planning area E2, which has a variety of mixed uses allowed. King Soopers is one of those permitted uses. And here is a landscape rendering of what it would look like at full build out when the landscape plantings are mature. We'll get into it a little bit later on the enhanced landscaping to the west, which was where the residential properties are located. But as you can see, there's ample landscaping. And as noted in the staff report too, there's landscaping and shrubs that exceed town code. Here we just want to briefly touch on some of the additional public outreach process we had. We had three meetings. As you can see, the first one was back in June of 25. A few people attended in person, and there are several that joined virtually at that time. There are a lot of general questions on the overall development, certainly what size store is this going to be, if the other stores are going to be closing, the site lighting, landscaping design, and store operations. From that meeting on to the next one, after that meeting, we made our first middle. And then we got the town commons back and then had another meeting to address how we kind of worked with staff as well as address the concerns that came out of those neighborhood meetings. There was a lot of architectural elevations were enhanced. The access was adjusted. And just some more additional questions on general operations and site lighting and really when the store is going to open and that was kind of carried forward to our next and last meeting which was held last week one person attended who was not at the previous two meetings so it was nice to see a new interest in the project and be able to bring her up to speed on the similar questions that were brought up again just kind of fuel offerings positioning how many fuel positions would be construction schedule you know store size operations etc Regarding some of the code requirements and compliances that we had to meet, one that highlighted here is a residential, non-residential interface. And that is due to the fact that this project is just non-residential. To the west is Twin Oaks, which is residential. part of that enhancements that we talked about earlier really providing higher grade materials and aesthetic pleasing design which here is the west side of the building it does sit lower than gamble ridge so a lot of those architectural treatments were carried around to the back of the building since you'd be looking down on top for instance the high roof gable the extended visibility a lot of those elements were only on the front at that one time and then we brought those around to the rear Lastly, I just want to talk briefly on a couple of technical criteria variances that were also brought up in the staff report, one being the landscape islands in front of the store. That's really provide a safe zone for the ADA and pedestrian access and connectivity we have to the site. There's a similar design and element at the store at the promenade that has this feature as well. And then the parking reduction, where we're requesting 19 and 1 reduction percentage, where 25% is the maximum allowed. This aligns with the IT standards and the Kroger historical operations to be right around that four spaces per 1,000, whereas code requires five spaces per 1,000. Lastly, just to probably repeat a little bit what Tara may get to in the project compliance, but just want to touch on how we also believe we comply with the review and approval criteria for section 17.38.40. The community vision of land use entitlements, we are full compliance with the Dawson Trails PUD design guidelines and town's architectural goals. The site layout complies with the residential, non-residential interfaces, providing screening and adequate parking, on-site circulation, and screening of loading standards. The circulation and connectivity is in full compliance with town code and the CRMC and technical criteria. which provides the pedestrian and vehicular connectivity networks. The services and phasing and off-site impacts, as mentioned before, this is part of a single-phase development with the overall infrastructure CDs part of a larger PLAT project. That will all be conducted in a single phase and provide that connectivity for future development. And regarding open space, public lands, and recreational amenities, as pointed out too, that all the dedicated open space and public lands previously accomplished with the Dawson Trails PD.

That concludes our presentation. We're happy to answer any questions you may have.

Can I wrap up, Mayor?

Yes, ma'am. Go ahead and wrap up, and then we'll have follow-up questions.

Thank you. All right. Thank you for that. And then Aaron, the applicant, did a great job touching on the other parts of the SDP that aren't in our typical criteria for SDPs. But yes, as he mentioned, Twin Oaks is a residential neighborhood to the west. He highlighted the elements that they added to the design for that, including the increased landscaping. For the parking criteria, Town Code does allow up to a 25% reduction for non-residential parking. So in a commercial parking plaza, they did submit their parking study and rationale behind it. They're looking for a 19.5% reduction, as you can see on the screen. So just around four spaces per thousand. And their staff can answer more questions as needed, but they did provide all of their national statistics for their stores and the increase in the pickup and delivery options also. already touched on the three neighborhood meetings. I want to make sure we always have this slide in here so you all have it, as each applicant might be a little bit different in how they address it. Regarding the review and approval criteria, again, these are the five that we look at. Staff did review this in depth and worked with the applicant and found that it does meet those requirements. It also meets the requirements of the Dawson Trails PD zoning, as well as the other areas of the technical criteria that are required, except the few that were mentioned tonight. Planning Commission reviewed this and recommends approval to town council. We've got a motion for your consideration to approve the site development plan as introduced tonight, and then alternatives, and we're both happy, as well as their whole team, to answer any questions you may have.

Mayor Portem, Katie.

There was a slide on parking. Could you go to that slide?

Yes. On my slides or? I don't know. It was on. That one has the numbers and his has a little more visual layout of where the parking spaces are located.

So we're providing a variance for 100 less parking spaces?

That is their request, yes. So the code allows up to a 25% reduction from their 509 that are required. And they're requesting 410 plus the grocery pickup, or that includes plus the grocery pickup. So they've got the grocery pickup spaces separate from the 410.

OK, and we think this is adequate.

We do, based on the information they provided on stores, as well as seeing how the stores function. The peak day demands in all shopping centers occur generally around the holidays. As you saw in their overall layout, this store and fuel station is also surrounded by other stores, right? So what kind of functions they all have. tend to balance each other out, but obviously the grocery store use on the weekends is generally the heavy user. Is there anything else you all would like to add to that? No? Okay. Okay, thank you.

I have a follow-up question on that. How does that compare to the parking of the other two King Soopers?

I'll let you guys speak to that. Do you know anything?

Yes, so the Promenade store I can speak to is at $4,100 as well. That was part of the analysis too, just understanding operations, how that store works.

Okay, thank you. Council Member Dietz.

And just for the record, if it hasn't already been asked, I can't remember, of course people want to know what you're doing with the other King Soopers on Ridge Road. There's been speculation, are you getting rid of it? What's the deal? So people are watching.

Great question. I'm happy to bring up a member from Kroger Team Operations that could speak more definitively to that. Thank you.

We anticipate the third store will kind of alleviate pressure from the Ridge store and then also from the Promenade. So no signs of closure anytime soon.

And that store up there, I know we're getting off the one over here in Dawson Trails, but that store up there is obviously not the mega stores that you're building.

Yeah, so that store is 60,000 square feet. And how much are these new ones? The Promenade store is around 120. And then this new one is our new format, which is a 99,000. So it should feel very similar to the Promenade store.

Excellent. Thank you.

Mark Davis. Can you go back to elevations real quick? There was a side window on there. I didn't know if that was for a bank or for drive-up pharmacy.

I believe it's pharmacy.

You have to answer your question, though. It's for a drive-up pharmacy down the south side. There'd be no bank internal to the site. Right, perfect. The store, rather.

Any further questions? Any further explanations? Tara, are you good? I'm good. Great. No one's time to speak. If someone wishes to speak, please approach the podium and speak at a microphone. State your name, whether you're a resident, non-resident, or business owner. You have four minutes to speak. Seeing none, we now bring it back to town council for a possible motion and discussion.

I move to recommend approval of the site development plan to Town Council as proposed. Second.

I have a first by Mayor Pro Tem Cavey, a second by Council Member Dietz. Any further discussion? Roll call vote, please.

Council Member Hollingshead?

Yes.

Council Member Bracken? Yes. Council Member Davis?

Yes.

Council Member Brooks?

Aye.

Council Member Dietz?

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tem Cavey? Yes. Mayor Gray?

Aye.

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. Moving on to additional privatized public hearing and discussion action items. Number 15, resolution 2026, test 94, resolution approving the First Amendment and service plan for Castle Meadows Metropolitan District 1 through 3, authorizing the execution of First Amendment of an intergovernmental agreement by the Town of Castle Rock and the districts. Michael Hyman.

Great, thank you very much. What I wanted to do here was essentially present to you an application that's been filed by one of our more recently formed districts, Castle Meadows Metropolitan District Numbers 1 through 3. They're seeking the First Amendment to their service plan as well as to their IGA, I believe We have representatives of the district in the audience just in case we have questions that I can't answer. So back me up. Thank you. So here we go, without further ado. This is Castle Meadows. Castle Meadows has been annexed to the town for over 50 years and has not been developed. You can see it sits on the south side of Plum Creek Parkway, just west of I-25 and adjacent to the Miller Activity Center property. So it's about 136 acres worth of land. It's wholly within town boundaries. And the process that we're going to follow tonight is called out in the Special District Control Act, as well as Chapter 11.02 of our code. Background. As I said, in 1973 the property was annexed to the town. In 2016 there was a zoning change. They approved, the town council approved an interchange overlay plan development plan. and associated zoning regulations for the development of this property. And then more recently, in 2024, the proponents of the district came before you to seek approval for a service plan and an IGA. Now, I wanted to remind you, this was all done following our adoption of the town's model service plan. One of the most important features that we have in here is part and parcel of Castle Meadows service plan, and that is the imposition of a regional mill levy of five mills on the property. And those revenues are remitted to the town to help defray costs of town services. So here are the proposed modifications. And largely I think they come about simply to essentially keep up with what has been approved in other districts as well as keeping up with the construction market, which as we well know from our own projects, inflation has hit us hard. So, you'll see that they've increased the public improvement costs to a little under $74 million. The total debt issuance limitation is now at $86 million and change. The modification to the plan updates both their five-year capital plan as well as their financial plan. And then they are seeking an increase in the maximum debt service mill levy from 50 mills to 64.044 mills. And the maximum aggregate mill levy, which includes operations from 60 to 74.044. It's pretty comparable to what we have proved with other plans. So, just a little bit about material modifications. We do believe these are material. They may be made only by petition to and approval by the governing body of the municipality that approved the original service plan. So that's why we're here tonight. The process is largely the same, public hearing process, same standards apply. And I'm going to, as I warned her earlier today. I'm going to turn to Trish Muller and find out if she is fine with the proposal. And I am seeing a head nod, so the staff has reviewed it. We support the modifications that they've proposed. And now we're here to propose motions. I will invite any questions, and let's see if we can answer them for you tonight. Mayor Pro Tem, Katie.

So almost 75 mills is pretty significant. The whole reason why we entered into what we've done is to keep from having what happened in the Meadows, where Mr. Corliss knows, the mess over there with mill levies. So we capped them at 60 mils. This is a significant increase. Is this due to just market conditions and cost of doing business? What is the driving force behind the increase?

As I understand, that's the case, but I do think, Dave, did you want to speak to it, or do we want to have our representatives speak to it? Because I think they can speak to it a lot better than I can. They're the ones living with the costs of doing public improvements.

Thank you, Mike. Larry Jacobson. I'm the president of Castle Meadows Metro District.

Good evening. I'm Kristen Bowers, attorney for the Metro District with WBA.

So Mayor Pro Tem Cavey, the reason we're seeking this is, in terms of the increase in the mill levies, is to make it the same as Dawson Trails. No more, no less. So there would be in essence. Both districts still have a discharge limitation 40 years. So it couldn't turn into the meadows where it's sort of perpetual. After 40 years, if the debt isn't paid off, it's discharged. The other reason, the other issue with the increase costs is that, number one, the costs have gone up organically, you know, because of the construction world that we live in. And two is, the more we dove into this site, the construction costs, development costs for public improvements have Increased dramatically the retaining walls and roadway improvements. Plum Creek Parkway gets an improvement from Castle Meadows. So when we looked at it more closely, the costs went up dramatically. So that's why we're requesting the increase in costs and the increase in the mill levy.

I appreciate that because I know this community, there was a lot of press, and there still is a lot of chatter and press around the Meadows, right? So I just want to make sure in no way, shape, or form do we ever replicate that again, right? And it's good when you come up and you can explain it because these meetings are recorded, right? And so people can come back and watch the meeting and understand why we're voting the way we're voting when you give the explanation. So I appreciate it.

Thank you, Mayor. Councilmember Davis? You mentioned road improvements on Plum Creek. What did you mean by that?

When it hits a certain traffic level, Plum Creek Parkway will be widened in that location to the full four-lane section. And that's an obligation of the Castle Meadows Metro District.

Okay. And that's already four lanes up to a certain point. So you're saying up to the next stoplight? Is that what you're saying? Okay. Perfect. Thank you.

Thank you both. Any further questions? Thank you. I have no time to speak. If someone wishes to speak, please approach the podium and speak into the microphone. Please state your name and whether you are a resident, non-resident, or business owner. You'll have four minutes to speak. Seeing none, we'll bring back to town council for a possible motion and discussion.

I move to approve the resolution number 2026-093 as introduced by title. Second. Okay. 9-4. Thank you.

Thank you. Second. Yeah, I got first from Deets, second from Davis. Any further discussion? Roll call vote, please.

Councilmember Hollingshead?

Yes.

Councilmember Bracken? Yes. Councilmember Davis?

Yes.

Councilmember Brooks?

Aye.

Councilmember Deets? Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Cavey? Yes. Mayor Gray?

Yes.

Motion passed unanimously.

Thank you. Thank you all very much. Number 16, Ordinance 2026-27, Ordinance Amending Section 16.08.120, the Cash Recommissible Code, regarding use of land and cash fees dedicated for school purposes. First reading. David.

Mayor and Council, you have before you an ordinance that would amend part of your land use code regarding the use of land for school purposes. This has been something that has been under discussion for a couple of years. The purpose behind the ordinance... is to provide clear authority and more importantly a process to remove potential school designation on public land when the town has had ownership for the land for at least 10 years and the school district has not moved forward on the land at that time. Significantly, the ordinance provides a process. This ordinance doesn't change the designation. This ordinance... sets up a process by which we would notify the school district that we're considering about removing the designation. Significantly, we would notify the adjacent property owners about the change in the designation. You'll recall that when the school designation went away from the school district at Rhyolite Park, there was no public process. We're going to have a public process where we would notify the adjacent property owners that there's a consideration that it be moved. And then we would have a public hearing to determine if the land would then be designated solely for town parks and open space purposes. I think one of the things that we learned about the Rhyolite Park episode was that property owners want certainty as to what they are adjacent to. And we're trying to get at that issue. There are a number of parcels that we have identified, and we have provided this information to the school district. where we have a number of parcels around town that have a school designation. It is important to note that at no time has the school district had an ownership interest, a property interest, in that property. That's different than how the unincorporated Douglas County handles the issue, somewhat similar to how the town of Parker does it. The town of Parker went through a very similar process as we have done. as well. In this case, what we would do is we would, if the ordinance proceeds, we would look at this list and then have a discussion with the school district and then present to you the opportunity to remove the school designation and then just continue to maintain it for parks and open space. A good example of that is actually the first one there, the Castlewood Ranch property. It's been owned by the town by over a quarter of a century. It's 62 acres. It's not going to be a high school. And it's appropriate that those adjacent property owners know what's going to happen to it. So that's what we would do is go through that process and let them know what is going to be used. Currently, the town maintains the properties. And when we say maintain, it mows them, not at a park standard, but kind of an open space standard. Some of them are used, for example, I mentioned the Castlewood Ranch site. I think there's a disc golf course there as well. Some of them, the adjacent property owners know about what's going on. Some of them don't. Some of the properties that are obviously in new development areas, it doesn't make sense to proceed in regards to those, but in many cases, we've got established neighborhoods. We've got schools that are adjacent. Red Hawk, there's a charter school um probably within uh i think the comment was a a good a good uh three wood shot away from uh from from that property we don't uh see a school district uh facility use it at that site so what the ordinance does is it establishes that process And then we would then engage not only the school district, but just as importantly the neighbors, so that they would know what is going on in regards to that property. Again, to provide some level of certainty to them. in regards to what that is. We've provided the school district in March of last year this information, and they've provided a letter to us with concerns about the ordinance. We can respond to it. We have a disagreement. REGARDS TO THAT, DON'T NECESSARILY NEED TO AIR ALL OF THOSE ITEMS THERE TODAY, BUT WE STAND BY THE ORDINANCE AS IT'S BEEN DRAFTED, AND WE'LL BE HAPPY TO RESPOND TO ANY QUESTIONS THAT YOU MAY HAVE.

MAYOR PORTIMKAVY?

I WANT TO BE REALLY CLEAR ABOUT THIS QUESTION, DAVE. This is property that never, ever has been owned or maintained by the school district. It has always been owned and maintained by the town. Correct?

That is correct. Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you. Any further questions for Dave or staff? Councilmember Hollingshead.

You know, and I understand the thinking, and I just worry that some of this may be a little short-sighted. If we ever change the designation to open space or park, and 50 years from now, there's a baby boom in Castle Rock when we're all gone, People don't want to turn open space into a school. Once it's declared that, are we considering open space and or still future school usage when we redesignate these?

That's a very good question, Councilmember. The answer is no. When it would be parked in open space, the plan would be to provide that certainty to the neighborhood that it would always be that. If a property owner thinks that it's, when they look on the title records, they see town of Castle Rock for all of these parcels that you see here in blue on this map. The map represents the same thing as the chart. If it stays as vacant open space for 50 years, I think the council would want to see any type of dense use on that school or otherwise would have a significant challenge because it's been viewed as that vacant open space property for half a century. So I understand the spirit of the question. That's why when we go to the list, We're not saying, staff's not saying, council will ultimately decide, but we're not saying that all of these are worthy of removing the designation. But we also know that the school district's not going to build 13 schools on all those different parcels. So at some point, we need to remove the designation and provide clarity and certainty to the neighboring properties. That's the spirit of this proposal. I think there's certainly a counter argument that school district needs assets, needs property to be able to build schools. I think one of the key observations, and I'm certainly not an expert on schools and school siting, is that a lot of the impetus for this was prepared at a time when charter schools were not as prevalent. That's changed in recent years, is my understanding. And charter schools can go in any number of different locations. I don't want to speak a whole lot beyond my knowledge, which is pretty much tapped in regards to that right now. But that's the spirit in which this is, is that we want to provide a process. We want the neighbors to know about it. And we want certainty for the parcels that are selected.

Councilmember Brooks followed by Councilmember Bracken.

Mr. Mayor, thank you. I'm just going to ask some questions specific to this first piece, Castlewood Ranch, because I'm a little bit more in tune with the status of that property, kind of what it looks like, because it's right in my neighborhood. But I think this will probably apply to any of these. Can you kind of talk through what, if this were to move forward, What a piece like the Castlewood Ranch would then look like in terms of what would the neighbors expect? Is there any change with how once the town is designating this as open space, if this were to happen, that disc golf course you mentioned, Is that a little bit more cleaned up? Is there any sort of plan to do anything with it? Or does it just kind of carry the open space designation with not necessarily any change that the neighbors would be able to detect?

It's going to be, in my mind, Councilmember, more of the latter. And if there are resources, and if there is community interest, and most importantly, council decision, it could be perhaps a more developed park. But it would be open space and park purposes into perpetuity. And the neighbors would then have that level of certainty. That's one of the guiding values, at least as we've tried to prepare this, is can we have certainty to the adjacent neighborhood as to what's going to happen on that property? Because that's what we've heard from community members is that they want to know what's going to happen there. And what we're trying to do is more specifically solidify that.

Council Member Bracken.

I have two questions. One, the bottom three, are there any similar contracts to the one in Dawson that we had kind of the mix up with the confusion on ownership and reverting back to the developer once they kind of release it and all of that? Because this is kind of where this started, right? Is that a concern still?

It is not a concern, but it is a legitimate issue that has risen where we have gone through and looked at the originating documents to see whether or not there was any reversionary type provisions if there was not going to be a continued school designation, because that's... That's important because if there was any other property interest out there, it wouldn't ever lie with the school district. It might lie with the developer or their successors in title. And that's not the case on any of the properties up to number 10. 11 and 12 and 13, that property is still owned by the developer. There's not actually in some cases even a meets and bounds description of the property that would have a school designation. But we're not changing the fact that we would still in future development seek to see whether or not additional school sites are needed. But you're very familiar with the town and its growth, and we're kind of filling in most of those pockets, so we don't really have that as a concern. But we have evaluated all of the other properties, and the property next to Rhyolite Park was unique in that it had a reversion clause that if the school district indicated they weren't going to build a school, then it reverted to the developer. That's not the case to our analysis in 1 through 10.

So my second question is, so of the 1 through 10 list, we obviously haven't done anything with this because we're not the school district and we're not the ones deciding whether a school should go there or shouldn't go there. We don't have the authority. But when I look at this list, are there several on here that that, you know, look at Sapphire, Castle Oak should look at, the Red Hawk, that's just down of the first hole off of Red Hawk Ridge Golf Course. I mean, that's just a tiny little parcel right in the middle of a neighborhood, right? Like, is there any kind of process to assess this? Have we gotten feedback from the school district? Like, some of the no-brainers, can we shorten this list? very quickly, and is that part of the process, or is this just kind of step one?

Council Member, excuse me. Council Member, yes, that would be part of the process going forward, is to notify the school district that, let's just take an example. Number three, the Sapphire Point Gemstone Park parcel. It's less than four acres. Too small for any school site. Okay. There's school sites that have been dedicated to the school district in the Montaigne development, which is across Crowfoot Valley Road. So that one seems to be one. And it's like, well, that probably should just be an enlargement of Gemstone Park. and call it a day in regards to that. There's no financial, no legal interest that the school district has in that property. And so we need to clean that up so that the neighbors know what it would be. And we'd have that discussion with the school district, with the ordinance authority, and then bring it back, notify the neighbors, have a public process so that they would know about it, and then you all would make that designation change. Is that responsive to your question?

Thank you. Let's just kind of get that.

Council Member Hollingshead. So one thing we haven't really talked about is money. So schools are funded in very unique ways. When new developments go in, they pay system development fees to the town. We receive money for all the things they impact. New developments impact the school district. And one of the ways that the school gets funding is through the land or cash in lieu, right? So do we anticipate or what has been the discussion? Do you feel like the impact is on the school district by changing the ownership or the future process with this? Do you believe there'll be a financial impact to the school district?

The school district will speak to that. I don't know that, I mean, we have the cash in lieu that goes for our public land dedication, but that money then stays with the town. It doesn't transfer to the school district. It hasn't transferred to the school district. For reasons that I don't understand, the school districts in Colorado have never sought to get impact fee authority. So they don't have that revenue source in regards to that. They rely on other means. And they'll probably speak to that as well. But The concern that I think neighbors would have is that if the school district obtained the property and they didn't want to put a school on it, they would sell it for development that the neighbors might think is damaging to the neighborhood. And that is what we're hearing on some projects. And I think we want to try and avoid that. So that's the rationale behind this process that we have here is that we would provide the level of certainty that the neighbors know that it's parks and open space forever.

I just want to tag on to that back to my original question. This has never been property that's been owned by Douglas County School District, correct?

That is correct.

Secondarily, we, as in the town, have never, ever paid a single dime to the Douglas County School District for property.

Not to our knowledge. I checked with Jeff Brower that's familiar with the public land dedication. I don't recall where the town has provided any funding to the school district, the cash in lieu.

Thank you.

So in the title, why does it say land use and cash fee dedicated for school purposes? Why does it read that? I was expecting to talk more about You know, cash in lieu or cash fees.

That's the title of that section where we do receive cash in lieu for properties, but that then stays with the town and is used for town purposes. It's not necessarily related to... It's all aggregated into all of the different uses that you see in that ordinance language. where it says land for school, water, fire, police, parks, recreation, open space, and administrative facilities. The parks, recreation, and open space is new language. But the other use is how we have used those cash and move funds in the past.

Any further questions for Dave or staff? Seeing none, I have two people standing to speak. First up is Jackie Millay.

JACKIE MILLAY- Good evening, Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem and council members. Thank you for the opportunity to come and speak before you this evening. And also, thank you for the work that you Oh, sorry, it was red, so I thought red mean not speak. So anyway, thank you. I'm sorry. Thank you again for the opportunity to come before you and speak, and thank you for your service to your community. It is greatly appreciated. I am Jackie Millay. I am here on behalf of the Douglas County School District and the 12,000 kiddos that we serve in the Castle Rock community. I'd like to begin by clarifying that I think we have like minds and to harken back to the mayor's invocation at the beginning of this meeting this evening about how we can talk together in collaboration and solve some problems. I think the intentions that were identified with this ordinance make good sense. I think there's an opportunity for us to work together and frankly I don't think we need an ordinance to be able to have those conversations and have that dialogue. I'd like to clarify the conversation surrounding what happened in 2005 with the school site. And that was really a development agreement between a developer and a prior town council. The school district was not a party to that at all. And as a former local elected official, I completely appreciate the position that this council was put in regarding that. Those rules were made by somebody else, and then you had to live with those rules. The school district, again, was not a party to that. And as the town manager indicated, the 13 parcels that are under consideration and were documented as part of this in a prior discussion, none of those types of agreement, including those three that still sit with the developer, nothing in that says that that land would come to the school district That land still is owned by the development, but there was not an agreement with this council or any prior council to have that revert back. So I think that's important to recognize that the situation that was so concerning does not exist anymore. I'm asking the council to delay action on this item to allow for for that thoughtful conversation and dialogue with the school district. When I started in the role that I'm in just one year ago, it was with the understanding that I would be taking a look at the land inventory for the school district and having the very thoughtful discussions that your town manager eloquently described to you. The idea is for us to sit in collaboration with each other. These are conversations that have begun with the City of Lone Tree that have also begun with our Board of County Commissioners to look at parcels and really put them to the best use for the people because that's what they're there for. But part of what this land dedication is also doing is serving the citizens and students in Castle Rock. So, let me speak to what our concerns are. Under the current municipal code, when developers build in Castle Rock, they dedicate land or pay fees for schools. These resources are held in trust by the town and they must be used for the intended public purpose. Current code protects our children by ensuring the district has access to resources critically important to our students. We are concerned that the ordinance before you dismantles those protections in six ways. First, it allows the town to divert land previously deeded to entrust for schools for an entirely different use. Second, it forces impossible procedural hoops for the district to acquire property it needs to build the schools necessary to serve our students. That Red Hawk site was actually listed as a school site. It was on a bond initiative that failed. It was our intention to build the school. Crystal Valley was also on one of our bond initiatives that failed. It was our intention to build that school. We do not have other resources. It cost $70 million to build an elementary school on donated land. Third, it... Oh, Mother Mary. Well, my humble request is please allow us to have a conversation. Please delay action on this and allow us to be the thoughtful partners that we want to be with you to serve families and students. And I think we can get there without an ordinance.

Thank you, Jackie. Sorry, I went long. You're good. Next, I have Sarah Kellner.

Good evening council members and thank you for listening to us on this issue. I am Sarah Kellner and I am council for the district and I thought it would make sense for me to provide a little bit of clarity because as I look at this ordinance as it's drafted, I think it is something that is clearly well-intentioned, but it has serious unintended consequences the way that it is drafted right now. One of the things that was not discussed during the earlier presentation is the fact that under the current ordinance that exists, if the town wants to repurpose land that has been dedicated for school sites, It can already do that. But when it decides to do that, it's supposed to use those funds to pay for the market value of that property so that the school district gets value and money in exchange for giving up that land. Because in most circumstances, when these developments are approved, I'm sure you've done a lot of these, There are a ton of impact fees that are imposed when you have residential properties coming to your town. You have impact fees for sewer, for maintenance, for fire, for district. As you heard earlier, the school districts do not get to impose those impact fees under the town's code. What the town code allows for is dedication of land. And so that is what has been given to the district to accommodate the growth that has been happening in this community. And so when the land gets taken away, that means that it is being taken away from the whole district and all of the existing students involved. that are there that need that additional funding to help with expanding additional schools if they don't need a particular site. The funds in exchange for these sites that the town can then use would help expand existing schools, could build schools at different, more appropriate locations if the town thinks that that makes sense. But one of the critical and core changes in this ordinance relates to that funding mechanism that fundamentally takes that away and provides an avenue for these sites to be taken away from the school district without any funding. And that is probably the biggest concern and something that I don't think was intended based on what the actual intent of the ordinance is, which is to give people clarity. I think there are ways to do that. to provide a more robust process to decide when the school district needs the land and how to organize that. There are comments in the letter about the order of how to do those things because some of certain orders make building schools impossible because of the way school districts have to fund these types of schools. But there are processes that can go in place and exist in a lot of communities across the state that are feasible and viable to add that additional process, to add that clarity that I think the town is looking for without threatening the viability and threatening, frankly, the existing students within the community who need those funds to continue having the schools that they need for all of the growth that you guys are experiencing. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. I have no one else on to speak. If you wish to speak, please approach the podium, speak to the microphone, state your name, whether you're a resident, non-resident, or business owner. Seeing none, we'll bring it back to town council.

I move to approve the ordinance as introduced by title.

Second.

We have a first from Council Member Brooks, a second by Council Member Dietz, and Mayor Pro Tem Cavey would like to speak up on it.

Mike, I have a question for you based on that. Is there anywhere in our town ordinances that state that in some way we owe money to the Douglas County School Districts for these properties?

No mention of that whatsoever, Mayor Pro Tem Cavey.

Thank you.

Council Member Dietz?

Yeah, I just think it's wise to have this back with Castle Rock, councils, everything, the shenanigans that went on in my own backyard of District 6 of Crystal Valley. The school district and the developer didn't have to deal with all those people. I had to go work with them. Other residents worked with them. It is what it is. But I think town staff, council, we all tried to work out something for those residents back there. So I think that this comes back to town council and Castle Rock to decide these things is a good thing. Thank you.

Council Member Brooks. Mr. Mayor, thank you. My comments in support of the motion, irrespective of anything in Crystal Valley, I see that as a separate conversation from what this is, understands that it all kind of gets tied together. But I'm in support of this motion because it You know, I hear it from my own community. I hear it from the folks in Castlewood Ranch. They're unsure of what's happening with that piece of land. I mean, let's be honest. As the annexations are starting to dwindle and as infill is really the only thing that we have left, I understand that folks are going to have concerns about what's happening with every single little piece of open land. I am not... uh unconcerned with the plight of the school district and understands that you know that they're facing some financial uh decisions but you know that to me it doesn't come um you know at any consideration what we do here uh with castle rock you know that was not there's not a dollar figure attached that land that was just set aside um kind of in a good-natured agreement to say, hey, at some point if a school needs to be built there, then that will be there. It's been 26 years or whatever it has been in Castlewood Ranch, just for one example, and I think it's time that we provide some certainty and some clarity and some comfort to those folks that are living around those areas that are looking around wondering, hey, is this going to be open space or what's going to happen here? So I believe that this is the right thing to do. Councilman Bracken?

Yeah, the part that I haven't

really dove in since we started this whole discussion was hearing what the plan is from the school district. I mean, just looking at the date of acquisition or designation, I should say, from the town of Castle Rock to the school district, what's their plan? And I haven't heard that piece of it. I think that's a piece we need to consider. So I don't know, Dave, in your presentation and proposal, was there... a move forward plan with the school district to help work with them to not, again, as I spoke on the opening, making decisions for the school district which could have negative intentions is kind of where I'm going. What's that process? If you can make me feel comfortable with the process, I feel like I can support it, but I don't feel like I can support it right now based on what I've heard.

Councilmember Bracken, I think the best way for me to answer that is that this sets out a process where we're going to notify the school district about these specific parcels and provide all of the background as to how the town acquired it, how it was designated. Never dedicated. I want to be very careful because there is a difference in the legal consequence of a dedication versus a designation. Property was never dedicated to the school district. The school district never had a legal interest in the property. But before we would remove that designation, yes, we will have that conversation with the school district pointing out all of this background information again to them. But in my opinion, there needs to be some level of a shot clock as to how long they're going to then have the ability to then respond back, whether or not they can show any type of viable use in regards to that. And then we would then present that all to you, present that all to the neighbors in a public hearing. not on a consent calendar item, at a public hearing where you all would decide whether or not to remove the designation and basically keep it the way it is, vacant open space, until the day shines when we actually have a little bit more parks money and maybe we want to do something more on it. So we will be notifying the school district about a particular parcel. you'll get an opportunity to hear what their plans are for the property. We'll have obviously had those discussions with them ahead of time.

So all 13 will be individually reviewed and not collectively, so it's not going to be a...

Absolutely. There are some parcels which I fully expect... The school district can say, well, we don't know what we're going to do in regards to the parcel, like the one out of Cobblestone Ranch. There's not, to my knowledge, a school nearby that area. There is some housing going on. That may be one where we say, well, it's too early to... We don't know, but it might be something. Clearly, there at the end of Crystal Valley South, the schools under construction, the developers that provided funding to the school district. That's where they're building schools elsewhere in Douglas County. Didn't happen in Crystal Valley South. That might be a location there at the bottom of Loop Road for an elementary school. The school district has to decide that. We're not going to build it for it. But even though it might eventually qualify, it's not at 10 years yet. So some of those are not at 10 years yet, so we wouldn't be even talking to them about that. It would have to qualify to be 10 years. We'd have a discussion with them, ask them what the plans are, how much time do they need to determine those plans, but then let's have a public hearing and decide about the designation. That's the process to involve them. And we do need an ordinance for that because we want to be on that level of certainty as to what the public knows the process is.

Well, I mean, just, you know, the dedication, I mean, we were legally... Designated. Don't designate, excuse me. Designation, not dedication. Excuse me, okay. Designated, we were legally bound to do so, you know, per the statute, right?

So we were required to designate that to... We have an ordinance that provides for our ability...

at the council discretion at the time of the development plan approval to designate the property and you can remove that designation okay councilmember davis is there something for some of these smaller ones like castle oaks is that next to a school that maybe later on they can say hey we'd like another soccer field or something you can

That one is actually near some apartments across the street, kind of by the Ray Waterman site. It's not really near the Wrangler Park in the school that's there. And Castle Oaks is the previous name for terrain. So there's not really anything there. But it's vacant. There may be somebody that wants to know what's going to happen to that property. And I would like to clarify what's going to happen to the property. Sarah, no.

May I make a clarification for the record, please? No. I'd like you to look at the first page.

Sorry, Sarah.

No. Okay. Please look at the code language on the first page of that. Thank you.

One thing we don't want to do is take actual school sites that they're going to use. I don't think anybody wants to do that. But I do think that we have mentioned over and over again, we need to give our residents clarity of what might be and what might not be there. I think that's important.

I'm going to be a no until I'd like to see a report back from the school district on these 13 sites and if there's something more that we should be considering. And then I think we can weigh in on that.

Understood. We have a first and a second. Roll call vote, please.

Council Member Hollingshead?

No.

Council Member Bracken? No. Council Member Davis?

Yes.

Council Member Brooks?

Aye.

Council Member Dietz? Yes. Mayor Pro Tem Cavey. Yes. Mayor Gray.

Aye.

Motion passes 5-2.

Thank you. Moving on, skipping number 17, number 18, Orders 2026-28, Orders Adopting the New Chapter 8.01, Amending Various Sections of the Castle Rock Municipal Code to Address Public Nuisances in the Town of Castle Rock. First reading, Michael Hyman.

Thank you, Mayor Town Council. We're going to take a look now at something we discussed at our last council meeting. And it's an ordinance that adopts a new chapter 8.01. And that chapter addresses public nuisances. Without further ado... Just kind of a background, as neighborhoods mature, our staff increasingly faces a lot of issues with regard to established communities, particularly those communities that don't have the benefit of property covenants. So you look at deferred property maintenance, deteriorating landscaping, abandoned vehicles, outdoor storage, and accumulation of trash, rubbish, or weeds that often are seen in places such as that. I want to go ahead and kind of lay the background foundation for the nuisance code. These really have been around quite a long time. The seminal decision in the United States Supreme Court took place in 1915. And nuisance codes have been found constitutional throughout the nation and here in Colorado. In fact, the municipal code statutes recognize this in Colorado. Municipalities have the power to declare what is a nuisance and have the power to abate those nuisances and impose fines upon parties who create nuisances. or continue nuisances or cause these things to suffer on their neighbors. So our proposed nuisance code really is a well-tested, constitutionally defensible process. It's been tried and true in a number of jurisdictions, and that's what you're going to see tonight in our code. 8.01. Some of the really critical features here are we are establishing a step-by-step process for our staff to identify nuisances, for our staff to go out and inspect those properties. We also are providing clear notice to property owners and an opportunity to appeal or challenge staff findings. We're also giving the property owner a reasonable time to come into compliance on their own and only, and I repeat, only as a last resort. We have the authority to cite offenders and abate the nuisance using the Castle Rock Municipal Court and seeking a court order. So, some of the things we address in this code. Accumulation, whether it's damaged merchandise at a business or litter or trash, rubbish that we see in a yard or in a right-of-way. Garbage, junk, places that aren't zoned for having a tow yard or a junk yard.

Five slides, you will see that. So let me jump into these. In Title 16, that's our subdivision code. There's two clarifications we want to provide that really are related to when you plat a lot, it has to have access. And so we wanted to get some clarity on access, easements, or public right away in there. And on the rare occasion a plat ever needs to be vacated, we wanted to make sure that that process was very clear. Typically, a right-of-way vacation is done not with a plat, so that is already addressed even in Title 14 of the code, so this is just providing some clear language when a plat needs to be vacated. Title 17 is actually our zoning code. We've always referred to it as the zoning code, so we're establishing that short title in 1701. So there's a couple of various cleanup items in that first 1701 section. If a property has a building or zoning violation, currently in place, they are not allowed to move forward with a new land use application. So you can't really expand your use or add to a use if you've got a building or zoning violation that's unresolved. So that's an issue where we have some language in here to work to get that cleaned up. And then we also are clarifying language between PD zoning and town ordinances. As you're aware, PD zoning is a contract set of zoning regulations that apply to a certain subdivision. And we had it in our code mentioned a couple different ways in different places. So we're cleaning up. Sometimes contract zoning very specifically is different than some of our town ordinances are. And then sometimes we make changes to town ordinances. And the language you approve very expressly states this applies to all PDs. So we just wanted to make sure that that was clear. In chapter 1704, we are adding a clarification on the administrative process for a building envelope adjustment. That doesn't happen very often on a lot. There are some platted subdivisions where a building envelope was established initially to protect certain vegetation. By the time that lot is is ready to develop years after the building envelope was created. It actually will disturb more vegetation to build in some of those building envelopes. So we're looking to add some administrative ability to shift that envelope over if it provides the same intent as it was originally plotted. We did add, oh, we removed some conflicting statement on utility placement. Our dry utility providers do determine if they go in front yards or rear yards really based on how they're serving the entire subdivision. We had it in our code two different ways in that one section, so I wanted to remove that. And then in 1714, 1714 is our general definition section where we try to have all of the definitions that are used in the zoning code. So we are adding definitions for crematorium and event center. Those are ones we've gotten some pre-applications on in the past but didn't have a defined use in our code. And then we are moving gross leasable floor area and large family child care home definitions from other sections the same 17 into 14 again as we find these stray little orphan definitions probably really since 2019 we have tried to consolidate all of our definitions in this section but we still come across those that are moved out there So getting some clarity on that and modernizing some other definitions. In 17-18, cleaning up some of the wording for large family child care homes related to the state and when group homes are subject to use by special review that has to do with the spacing distance that's required. 17.18, 17.22, and 17.24, giving some clarifying language. When you've got an attached garage on a house that's alley-loaded, it does have to follow the rear setback and height requirements for the accessory structures. So again, we don't run into that very often, but there are moments where we wish our code was more clear.

So that's our proposal.

In 1724, clarifying, R1 is single-family home zoning and R2 is duplex home zoning. Those are both uses currently allowed in R3, which is our multifamily zone. However, we needed to clarify that the development standards, if you're in the R3 zone, follow those standards, even though you're using these other uses that are less intense. In 1728, we have a table that provides a variety of uses and where they're permitted and where they're used by special review. We're updating the place of worship to being permitted instead of the discretionary use by special review category for both industrial and some of our overlay zones. So just putting that in line to match up with the business zone. Again, that 1734, that clarification between the custom PD zoning and Title 17 in generalness, making sure those are all cleaned up to match. 1739, making it clear that a use by special review approval runs with the land. So when you approve a use by special review site development plan if the business occupant changes or sells that business to the next user, if they're still using it in the same way that runs with the land. It's commonly been accepted that that's the case, but it hasn't been clarified in our code. 1742 is a cleanup in our downtown.

Can you go back to the 1739-10? Yes. I actually had a question from somebody kind of around this. It's a friend of mine that lives over in District 1 and they own property and do real estate here within Castle Rock. I think it was somewhere... somewhere downtown, maybe, where they had a nail salon. And they had bought the nail salon, but were going to keep it as a nail salon. And they had to go through a whole big process, he said, with you guys that cost him a ton of money.

Is that something that all building departments face, especially when you have older buildings or a tenant mix that changes out?

I don't want to belabor this tonight because it's already been a long meeting, but I do want to talk to you about this because I want to understand it better. This person was fairly upset over the amount of money that it cost him and how long it took and et cetera, et cetera. I think maybe there's some ways we could streamline this a little bit better. And so I just, we can talk about it.

Love to talk offline, get the specifics and we can meet with our bill. Awesome. Thank you. Great. No, no problem. It's good. There's a lot to what we do every day here. And then I think this is the last page of changes to go through. In 1742, this is in the downtown overlay district, cleaning up some language about when you've got a parking lot downtown that's more than 10 spaces, that it does have to follow our standard parking lot landscaping regulations. We have requirements where you can't just have a A field of just parking, it does have to have trees and landscaping to soften it up. 1742, this is a cleanup language. As you're aware, in the last several months, you all changed town code sections for all boards and commissions to have three-year terms. There was a little statement in 1742 that conflicted with the cleanup to the three-year terms up in Chapter 2. So clarifying that the downtown property owners serve for three years as stated in other places in the code. 1752 is a recommendation to require fences, walls, hedges, that those all have to be maintained in a structurally and safe, sound condition. And if they are not being maintained in that way, the property owner is required to fix or correct it. And then if not, and it presents a danger to public health and safety, it then helps fall under that nuisance code. And then 1752.200, there was some clarification in that section on noise. It talked about both noise limits for business and commercial and industrial, but it didn't use all three of those words in all of the places. So just getting that clarified. So that's the, oh, I did have a few more pages. I'm sorry. I did use smaller font earlier. I was hopeful. But the home occupation, so I wanted to touch on this one. I know it's a topic that's come up a couple times with past councils. Our home occupation regulations were only slightly newer than the $1 fee to go to the municipal dumps. So we still reference in our current code the allowance for Tupperware parties. So shout out to all the great Tupperware that I ate out of in the 70s and 80s and still is around today. So there's a lot of just modernization language, but the actual intent and purpose And how a home occupation is run has not been changed, but all of that language has been cleaned up. I do want to spell out that these uses are still retained as being prohibited. So again, a home occupation is when you live in a house and you're doing kind of a smaller side work that's adjacent to what you do. What's not in here is still in the code, but you can't bring in a lot of traffic. You can't have a disturbance to the neighborhood. You can't have outdoor signage. You can't have displays outside of what you're doing. You could teach music lessons, but not to a level that you would have 20 cars outside, right? So all of that. So these elements are still in the code that we're retaining and making it very clear are prohibited. So no motor vehicle repair or body shop work, no medical or dental clinic or hospitals, no bed and breakfast establishments, no animal clinics or hospitals, and then no retail businesses are similar that generate more than the occasional or minimal vehicular traffic. So those are all still in the code in this proposal. We did remove the prohibition for personal services. So whether it's a hair salon or a massage therapist, those are similar to a music lesson or retail business where one client typically is there getting their service. And again, as long as they're not bringing in more vehicles than is already addressed in other sections of the code here, then it should be able to operate as a home occupation. these prohibited uses do put us in line with our surrounding jurisdictions so parker and lone tree and some of our surrounding areas so that would be the biggest update to our code but again we don't view that as a policy change to what we're doing in 1754 we again cleaned up some definitions because we moved those up into earlier parts and then the parking table was not organized alphabetically. It had some uses and subcategories and then some alphabeticalness, so we are re-issuing the whole parking table, organized alphabetically, where we've added the two new uses of crematorium and an event center, and otherwise made no other changes to parking standards in that. But because we reordered it alphabetically, we had to repeal and replace the whole table. to make it look appropriately so that is now okay that was the last slide staff recommends your consideration for these amendments we really do feel that they will help both our staff utilize the code as well as our applicants to be able to understand the various sections so we request your approval of the ordinances introduced and i'm happy to answer any other questions

Any more questions? Yes, .

Thank you. Just, I'm trying to see it, but what is the current home occupancy as far as, you know, you have a single family home. Can you have 30 people live in it?

That's a great question, Councilmember Dietz. I believe the state of Colorado does not currently allow us to define how many people are in your family. And we don't have a limit, obviously, on how many people you can have to your graduation party, your birthday party, and things like that. But that generally has not been an issue that we've faced directly.

If that comes up. Thank you.

Any further questions for staff? Seeing none, I have no one to speak. If someone wishes to speak, please push the podium and speak in a microphone. Say your name and whether you're a resident, non-resident, or business owner, you'll have four minutes to speak. Seeing none, we'll now run back to town council for a possible motion and discussion.

I move to approve the ordinances introduced by title on first reading. Second.

First by Councilmember Davis, second by Councilmember Holliman said. Any further discussion? Roll call vote, please.

Yes. Councilmember Bracken. Yes. Councilmember Davis. Yes. Councilmember Brooks.

Aye.

Councilmember Dietz. Yes. Mayor Patem-Cabey. Yes. Mayor Gray.

Aye.

Motion passes unanimously.

Thank you. The next one is number 20. It's ID 2026-92, comprehensive plan and 2040 update introduction. We will not be voting on this, but we will be taking a comment from the public if needed and comment from us. Tara.

All right, thank you. So it is time for us to consider updating our comprehensive master plan. So I wanted to touch first on what is a comprehensive master plan for community. We have a lot of master plans for our town. You're probably familiar with the transportation master plan. Parks and Recreation have a master plan. The comprehensive master plan we're talking about tonight is really our guiding principles and vision for growth and development. Every municipality is required to have one with various sections in it. from the state. We utilize this as our long-range vision document for the community. It is the foundation that is behind our code. It itself is not code. But often after we do updates, there is sometimes cleanups or overlays or districts that get put in place because of it. We do reference a comprehensive master plan in our code, as you've seen in all of our land use review and approval criteria. and really the findings of fact in our staff reports. It also helps provide consistency and defensibility in all of our land use cases. So what's our current plan look like? This is a little snapshot of our 2030 plan. So yes, I know the year is 2026, but we always have a plan that's talking about the future. So the current plan was adopted in 2017, and it's called the 2030 Comprehensive Master Plan. The vision statement that you can see On this slide, I won't read the whole thing, but it really is one that the town has had for some time, although it has changed a little bit with each of our comprehensive plan updates. But we as a town want to be a world class community that embraces its history and its heritage and that small town character. And then there's a list of bullets of items that are in there. Additionally, in both this 2030 Comprehensive Master Plan and the one before it, the 2020, both the vision statement and the four cornerstones were in there previously, but they were modified a little bit in 2017. So the four cornerstones, really the building blocks of our vision, which is also what we look at in a lot of the things we do for the town, are to have a distinct town identity. to have responsible growth, community services, and a thriving economy. So within each of those cornerstones, a current master plan is broken up into various principles and actions and steps and really the basis of the whole plan is organized around kind of these four chapters. So why would we want to update it now? These plans are living documents. They are typically updated on a 10-ish year cycle. So this plan is about 10 years old, so it was adopted nine years ago. I think in 1991 we adopted the 2010 Comprehensive Master Plan, and in 1999 we adopted the 2020 plan. municipalities. Douglas County recently did a comprehensive master plan update, so all jurisdictions routinely go through that process. We do recognize that growth has changed, infrastructure has changed, market conditions have changed. I do want to make sure it's clear that this is not a taking or giving of property rights. It is a guiding document that we can utilize moving forward, but it does not, only the code indicates itself is what changes how we put these things into action, if that makes sense. So where are we at today? So we have budgeted for this year the ability to hire a consultant to go through the work. So our first step after talking with you all this evening and receiving any feedback you might have is to put our request for proposal out. Brad has worked to get that pulled together. We are looking and hoping to have that RFP released in the next week or two. And then that gives us the next month or so to go through that process, consultant interviews, onboarding, and selecting one to move forward with. These typically are 12- to 15-month processes. So wanted to make sure the expectation is that it's something we're starting now, but we haven't done the work yet, so we're not ready to adopt it just yet. The RFP does have, and our expectations for the consultant is to have a broad community engagement. We have in the past done that each time with various stakeholder groups and really looking to... get feedback from you all this evening. I did have a motion if you wanted to direct us to proceed as discussed tonight, and then we would work to kick off the RFP, and then we would obviously bring that draft plan back through Planning Commission and you all, as well as provide updates throughout the process too. So that's my motion, but I'm happy to answer any questions, and Brad is here to help answer any questions also.

So under the comprehensive master plan, does this include like the transportation master plan, the water master plan? Does it all come under all of this? Or is this only around development?

It's only around development. They all reference each other. So our comprehensive master plan does reference that we have a transportation master plan, that we have a parks and recreation and open space master plan, that we have a water plan, some of the recent changes at the state level do require this level of comprehensive master planning to speak more to water. There are some jurisdictions that aren't as fortunate as us to have an amazing Castle Rock Water Department that has really great planning and has a plan. So there's basic elements that we will just refer to as we have in the past to these other plans. This plan itself does not change or influence those. You all do that as you go through that and vote to update those plans.

I would personally like to see more of that, because development affects all of those things, right? Development affects transportation. It affects water. It affects police and fire.

This plan talks about transportation networks, the need for connectivity. It talks about community services, fire, police department. Our current plan talks in depth about all of that. However, each area still has their own plan that it grows on or connects with.

David and Council Member Dietz.

I just wanted to respond to Mayor Pro Tem's comment, and I want to make it very clear, Mayor Pro Tem. You all decide what's in the comp plan. That's right. I mean, it goes through a process. We hire a consultant. We have a lot of stakeholder groups. We greatly involve the community in these kind of processes. But at the end of the day, if you want to have an emphasis on maintaining certain quality level of services going forward, then the comprehensive plan can emphasize that, try and come up with strategies, and then also tactics as far as changing town code to be able to get at all of those issues. We've had a lot of discussions about that over the years and how we can try and calibrate that. A consultant may be able to help us find a best practice that helps get at that. But I just want to make it clear, and I think Tara does a good job, and Brad, will be key and instrumental in helping us move forward but at the end of the day town council adopts the document so it needs to reflect what you all think is in the best interests of the community and it can have any number of those different ties into that. We try and cast as broad a net as possible in these kind of processes to include as much input and discussion and look at any number of different things But it's all kind of funneling back to, is this what council wants as a long-term comprehensive plan to guide us in the built environment? But as you point out, and TAR recognizes that as well, that's essentially what we do every day is try and coordinate all those different interests in trying to make a good recommendation on what can happen in the built environment.

I think what I've been hearing in the community the most, and you all, I mean, I'm sure everybody else up here has too, and Dave, you and I have talked about this at length, but the traffic issues that we've had when I-25 gets shut down, right? And three of the main arteries in and out of here are owned by CDOT, right? What are we going to do about that? And that has to be taken into account. in this comprehensive master plan. The other thing that I've been hearing a ton about is the community is up, I would say they're pretty up in arms over these stage two drought restrictions when on one hand we're saying, hey, don't use so much water. And then on the other hand, like I was at a neighborhood meeting last night for the new STP for the Walker property, and they're like, how are you building all these homes when we're on water restrictions? So... There needs to be, we need to bring some of this stuff together and have a good answer for our community. And I think this is, I mean, those are the two big things I'm hearing. Maybe you guys are hearing something else beyond that. But I mean, the traffic stuff has not painted us in a good light. And I totally understand why we're doing the stage two drought restrictions, but I can't answer the question of, well, if we can't water our yard, why are you guys building 800 brand new homes, right? So I think somehow we need to weave that into what we're looking at here. That's just Laura's feedback. So thank you.

Any further questions? Council Member Dietz?

Please, and I was looking in the, it's right here, it's for the budget for the, about a quarter million dollars for consultant services. Do we have somebody dedicated that we use? Does it cost a quarter million every year to do that?

It does because of the level of analysis, the level of public engagement that they do, the different aspects of that. What we do in these type of situations is that we send out a request for proposals. Because of Castle Rock's prominence, at least in my opinion, we're going to get a lot of interest from firms that do this at a national level, that are familiar with best practices from any number of communities that have kind of ex-serve growth challenges similar to what we have. And they usually have very talented staff. They have then sub-consultants that will get into a number of the different practice areas, whether it's transportation or quality of life issues, sometimes downtown issues, sometimes environmental-type concerns, all of those types of things. and that's of great value to us to see what are some of those best practices. Because at the end of the day, you use a master plan for two purposes, at least in my mind. You may want to change your code to reflect that, but then you will then get requests for either new property coming into the community or rezonings. And as we move toward being a built community and we have more infill issues or redevelopment, we need some specialties in regards to that. So cost is a consideration. We look at cost. And if we can get something that is below budget, I mean, you know me, I'd rather save a nickel than spend five cents. So that's what we'll do. But we wanted to give you an idea of the scope of this type of a project as well.

And considering we're planning for the future, it sounds like it's money well spent.

Oh, I think spending that level of money to say how we want to grow for the next dozen years or how we want to have the built environment changed over the next dozen years can reap great dividends if we plan it the right way. Absolutely. Thank you.

Any further questions for staff? Seeing none, I don't want someone to speak. If someone wants to speak, please approach the podium and tell us if you're a resident, business owner. Yeah, good enough. Bring it back to town council for a proposed motion.

I'd just like to comment, too, that I think that you bring up a great point, that we do need to address these things, but this should be a huge opportunity for community engagement. So if we can front load it with the things we do already have a plan for, like water, get that out of the way, and then build excitement, this should be a really unifying thing for our community. Most people are really proud to live here. So to engage people and give them a voice in this, that may benefit us all in the long run. So this should be a really exciting thing for all of us to look forward to. So I move to direct staff to proceed as outlined in the 2040 Comprehensive Master Plan update as presented.

Second.

First by Councilmember Hollingshead, and second by Mayor Portemcady. Any further discussion? Roll call vote, please.

Councilmember Hollingshead?

Yes.

Councilmember Bracken? Yes. Councilmember Davis?

Yes.

Councilmember Brooks?

Aye.

Councilmember Dietz? Yes. Mayor Portemcady? Yes. Mayor Gray?

Aye.

Motion passed unanimously.

Time is now 8.45. I will take a motion for a dismissal. Adjourned.

Second.

I have first from Council Member Bracken, second from Mayor Pro Tem Cady. Roll call vote.

Council Member Hollingshead? Yes. Council Member Bracken? Yes. Council Member Davis? Yes. Council Member Brooks?

Aye.

Council Member Dietz?

Yes.

Mayor Pro Tem Cady? Yes. Mayor Gray?

Aye.

Motion passed unanimously.

Thank you. We are adjourned. Thank you, everybody.