City Council - workshop

This is the Cortez City Council Work Session Special Meeting, Tuesday, July 14, 2026. I'd like to call this meeting to order. On our agenda, we have A, teen court information presented by Judge Beth Padilla.

Good evening. For those of you that I haven't met yet, my name is Beth Padilla, and I'm the municipal court judge here in Cortez. I've been the judge since 2021, and I'm happy to continue to serve as your judge. You may have seen that I'm also now the municipal court judge in Durango, but I was very clear with city council in Durango when I interviewed that I would maintain my position here in Cortez. And so that has remained unchanged. So it's an honor to work with all of you. I want to talk to you today about a new program that I'm implementing called Teen Court. In the last year to 18 months, we've started accepting more juvenile cases into municipal court. And the rationale for that is that in municipal court, we're addressing very low level offenses. And with many of our teenagers, it's their first contact with the criminal justice system. And so I wanted to involve them in the criminal justice system with the lowest level of intervention possible so that they were not involved in the same court proceedings as maybe teenagers committing more serious offenses, drug offenses or gun offenses. In municipal court, we're seeing kids with shoplifting cases. We're seeing a lot of kids with possession of marijuana or tobacco. We see some young people that have possession of alcohol cases. And occasionally we'll see like a disturbing the peace, basically like a fight. And so that's kind of the type of cases that we're seeing in teen, in our, normal juvenile docket. So teen court is a new program that I am looking forward to implement in the next, hopefully starting in August. So to give you a little bit of background as to what is teen court, teen court is essentially a sentencing court. So juveniles involved in this system are admitting guilt and then they're going to be sentenced in the teen court framework. The teen volunteers serve as the judge, the prosecutor and the defense attorney. I know that sounds scary, but they will be trained and I will be present at all times. I'm not handing over the courtroom to teenagers and walking out. That is not what's happening. And so teen court is a voluntary program where essentially the prosecutor would tell the juvenile offenders, this is an opportunity for you to typically do some community service, maybe some classes, and then this won't end up on your record. and so it's voluntary and the kid has to admit that they've done the thing that the police say they've done right so in teen court we're not talking about guilt or innocence we're talking about sentencing and so these are real cases with real consequences i traveled to los alamos new mexico in early june and observed their teen court i was able to see a training and then a live session so judge allen in los alamos has been incredibly gracious. She shared all of their materials with me. They have a very developed program that's been around since 2012. They actually have a teen court coordinator that's employed by the court. We won't have that. But I've taken a lot of their materials and ideas, incorporated it into what will be our version of teen court. so this is an alternative to traditional court we will still have traditional court for teens if a teen comes in and says i didn't do this i didn't have a vape at school i wasn't there for that fight they can still go through normal court this is a voluntary program they don't have to do this if they don't want to it's essentially a type of diversion and it is different from normal court because a jury of teenagers determine the sentence Within guidelines, again, we're not handing over the court to the teenagers. If a teen defendant does not comply, they just go back to normal court. That's essentially what happens if they don't do what they're supposed to do. As of 2010, there were more than 1,000 teen courts in the United States. So this is not something that I created, nor is it something that Los Alamos created. So these are just some, this chart shows you a comparison between teen court and traditional court. So teen court is youth driven, and that's why studies show that it's successful, right? It's teenagers passing judgment on other teenagers. If we all remember what it was like to be a teenager, a lot of us listened to other teens more than adults. And so in this model, they would be receiving their punishment from a jury of their peers, literally, people the same age as them. And in traditional court, obviously adults are in charge. This is a sentencing hearing and the defendant must attend and they must admit responsibility. Parents also have to attend teen court. So those obligations are the same. In teen court, we focus more on why the offense happened, not whether it happened. So, okay, you were in a fight. Why were you in a fight? What happened? What led to that fight? What can be done differently in the future? What extra skills do you need so when you're presented with that situation, you make a different choice next time? The question isn't, did you punch that other kid? It's why did you punch that other kid? In teen court, the jury's gonna provide the sanctions, so the punishment, the sentence, the consequences, whereas in traditional court, the judge, I do that. The teen court model is more restorative. The youth has to make amends to those affected more often than in a traditional court. The evidence presented, so this is a real hearing, right? And so the defendant, the teen defendant will testify and will be asked, what did you do? Why did you do it? A big question is what punishment have you already received? And when I was able to observe the jury deliberating in Los Alamos, that was an important question for the kids. They were like, oh man, That guy already got grounded for two months. That's a big deal, right? Like whatever punishment we can give him isn't as bad as what his dad already did. And so that's that's really important information for the jury to have when they deliberate. So there's not going to be physical evidence. You know, we're not going to say like, here's the vape that you were smoking, right? That's not the question, right? The question is like, well, why were you doing it? Were you? Were you pressured from other kids, or was it really your vape, or did you take the fall for one of your other friends? What caused this to happen? So the focus of teen court's really different. Teen court does not determine guilt or innocence. It doesn't replace traditional court. We still have traditional court. Kids can still engage in the normal process. As I mentioned, juries don't get to sentence kids to whatever they want, right? They can't say you're going to jail for six months. That's not an option. And I'll show you the guideline in a few moments. This doesn't allow teens to administer justice without training or without supervision. So the teen judge and the teen attorneys are required to do a mandatory training, which I'll talk to you about a little bit more. Any teen that wants to participate can be on the jury. they haven't done a training so we might have a kid come in that says I've heard about this I don't really know what it is I'm not sure how I want to participate okay you can be on the jury with other kids but you don't get to be the judge and you don't get to be the defense attorney or the prosecutor and teen court does not give parents an out right parents still have to be there for the teen court proceeding So why do we want this? The biggest issue is it reduces recidivism. And so there are some studies that I've cited here that show in Alaska, recidivism, meaning how often is a teen coming back into court, for teen court cases was 6%, whereas traditional court, we're looking at 23%. So that's a pretty substantial reduction in recidivism. In Missouri, teen court rate was 9%, 27% in a traditional court process. So again, it's this idea of like, Teen defendants are accepting punishment from their peers better than what they view me as some old lady in a robe, right, sitting up on the bench. They're gonna take it better from kids their age. This also gives some pro-social opportunities for our youth because we're going to have our pro-social kids that are the judges, that are the attorneys. so these are the kids that are maybe in student council national honor society they might need volunteer hours in order to graduate i've already reached out to one of the teachers from the high school to see if there might be a way to offer the kids extra credit maybe in a civics class if if they participate in teen court so we're also giving these young kids that are not in trouble some really pro-social opportunities A really big thing that it also does is it gives us an opportunity for career development. So in our community, we are in what's called a legal desert. It's not a nice name. We don't have enough attorneys by a lot. A lot of people in our community cannot access justice. They cannot hire a local attorney because we don't have enough people. And there's certainly an argument that if we start a program like this and perhaps a young person in high school gets interested in being an attorney, maybe they'll wanna come back to this community and serve their community in that way. So I think it is giving them some exposure and some other options. I was actually talking to the former municipal court judge in Durango about the program and he said that's why he went to law school. In his community in North Carolina, they had teen court, and Judge Margason was like, well, I was kind of good at teen court, so I guess I'll go to law school. And I was like, this is amazing. That's exactly what I want to have happen. So I believe it can happen because he told me it happened to him. I think it also gives young people an opportunity for some critical thinking skills. So the attorneys are going to walk in the courtroom, be given a police report and a notebook of questions and say, now, if you're the defense attorney, go meet with your client, go meet with the defendant and her mom or his dad or whatever, and figure out what argument you're going to make. Right. You've got 15 minutes to put together an argument that you're going to have to then make an opening statement. You're going to have to ask questions of the defendant and you have to make a closing statement. So a lot of on the feet critical thinking skills are going to be offered to our pro-social kids. I think it also will obviously increase youth confidence, exposure to public speaking. I mean, just all of these things that are incredibly beneficial. I also think that it can make some of our young people more competitive when they're applying to colleges. I'm absolutely gonna make myself available to any participant that I will write letters of support that I'm happy to be a positive person to help them get into college if that's what they want to do. The other thing that's really beneficial is the defendants are always going to be required to do community service. And so what's so valuable about that in the juvenile context is their parents can't do it for them, right? If I issue a fine, mom and dad might pay that, especially if the kid's 12 or 13. But if I say you have to do 15 hours of community service, mom and dad can't do that. The kid has to do that. And so I think it's a really great way to hold our young people accountable that are involved in this system. So the teen volunteer, our pro-social kids, can be involved as a judge or attorney after they complete the mandatory training. And I was able to observe the mandatory training through Judge Allen in Los Alamos, so I have an idea of what it should look like. I have all her training materials and I've been working on that over the summer to put it all together. I should also tell you, I started working on teen court last summer. So Miss Odell and I have been in meetings and talking to other courts and trying to get information. I've been observing different courts, different teen courts, both in Colorado and New Mexico, to see if it might be a good fit for our community. So any teen can volunteer as a juror. This is a really important part. Every defendant gets sentenced to jury duty. So every defendant goes from being the defendant to then passing judgment on their peers. So it really takes the kid from being in trouble to now you're in the pro-social model, right? Now you're the one that has to decide what someone else's punishment should be. And depending on what crime you've committed, you might have to do one jury duty, you might have to do as many as four. And so that's something that the jury would decide what your punishment is. and so the teen jury will determine the defendant's sentence using a guideline here's what the schedule is going to look like so teen attorneys and defendants are going to arrive at 7 30 a.m the attorneys will review the police report and the summons so basically what what do the police say has happened here the teen prosecutor will prepare an opening statement and cross-examination questions and the teen defense attorney is going to meet with their client and then do the same prep Teen court's going to start at 7.45, the third Monday of the month. So our normal teen court is the second Monday. So if a kid picks up a ticket, they're going to come into court. The prosecutor's going to say, hey, we have this thing called teen court. If I think you're a good fit, we'll do a deferred prosecution, a diversion, essentially. You come back next Monday, and you're going to do teen court. and so that's what the framework would look like we're starting early for a couple reasons one school starts around nine o'clock for our high schoolers so we want to get them out the door into school where they need to be as fast as we can and city hall opens at 7 30. so that's why we're getting started so early The teen judge will call the case, the attorneys will question the defendant after they make opening statements, the attorneys will make a very brief closing statement, which will essentially say, I think my client should get the minimum sentence because he works a lot and he's really sorry, or whatever. And then the teen jury will go into the jury room and deliberate and figure out what the punishment is going to be. The jury will come back, they will read their punishment aloud, and then that will become an order of the court. So that's where I come in and say, hey, teen court says this is what you have to do. You have 90 days to do it. And if you don't, you're going back to normal court. That's sort of what the process will look like. So here's a framework of what sentencing looks like. So for level one, these are our lowest level offenses. Speeding, no seatbelt, really traffic violations. Community service is mandatory, so the jury's going to choose between 10 and 15 hours. Jury duty, the defendant has to do between one and two. They mandatory have to do a course called Alive at 25. It's a driving course for young people. And then other possible sanctions could be a letter of apology or an essay on the impact. And so that would be up to the jury to decide whether those additional sanctions were appropriate. The next level is traffic offenses that are more serious, speeding, where we're really going to see these cases are shoplifting, theft, disorderly conduct and trespass, right? Kids going to Walmart and being wild. You know, they might steal something or they might be back in Walmart after they're told they can't be in Walmart. So then they're looking at 15 to 20 hours of community service per offense. And I'll tell you that I did decrease some of these hours from Los Alamos because I felt like their punishment was pretty stiff. It was pretty high. So this is the framework that we're starting with. Two to three jury sentences, jury duties, excuse me. if it's a traffic offense again no matter what you have to do a live at 25. it's also mandatory that if it's theft or shoplifting there are online courses of varying durations so between 4 and 16 hours and be up to the jury to decide how long of a course the defendant has to take Additional penalties, again, are that letter of apology, an essay. Another option is engagement of 10 hours of pro-social activity. And so that could be maybe they're on a sports team and they would get a letter from their coach saying, yes, I'm playing soccer and I've done at least 10 hours. That could be they're in a club. It can also be pro-social activities through Pinion Project. And so Miss Odell and I have met with leadership from Pinion Project. They are willing to partner with us on this and essentially accept kids to be sentenced to do pro-social things at Pinion Project. So whether that's Check and Connect, where they check in with a mentor, whether that's field trips on Fridays, and I know it may sound weird that we're gonna sentence a kid to a field trip, but these kids don't wanna go on that field trip, right? They wanna go do whatever things they're doing in the community that are not pro-social. And so it's possible that they could get some of their hours through some of the programming at the Pinion Project, and they've agreed to help us out with that. So those are our level two offenses. Our level three are more serious. And this is really these are our marijuana cases. And we are seeing a lot of marijuana cases. Kids with vapes at school is typically what we see. So they're looking at 20 to 25 hours of community service for having a vape at school, which is a lot for our kids. It's a lot for a young person. Three to four jury sessions. and then mandatory if it is drug related is to do an online course and that can be there's an MIP course like a minor possession course there's a vaping course there's some different options and again the jury would decide how long of a course they have to take And then those additional possible sanctions are the same as level two. So when we say the jury is going to sentence these kids, these are their options, right? And I will be with them in the jury room saying, no, no, no, you can't do 40 hours of community service, right? That's not one of your options. Like these are the options. And they'll be given the sentencing guideline. We'll have copies of that for our jurors so they can see what kind of pick and choose what they think is appropriate. in the jury setting all the kids have to talk so every person has to say what they think is an appropriate sentence so you can't just sit there quietly and not participate so we need to hear from everyone and and i was really impressed to see the i've seen two juries deliberate one in the front range and one in los alamos and they all took it really really seriously so it was really impressive to to see the deliberation So next steps are that we are going to start our first teen court trainings, probably the end of July, beginning of August. I've been working with one of our court staff, one of our new court staff members, Ms. Herman. She's very connected with the local youth community. She knows when volleyball practices and all that stuff. So we're gonna coordinate around that to make sure we're not conflicting with when sports practices start. And then our first teen court session will be Monday, August 17th at 7.30 a.m. And Ms. O'Dell very graciously reached out to law enforcement today. It sounds like they're on board to provide security during that time during our court session. So... I think we're in pretty good shape to get started. So I know that was a lot of information. I essentially just summarized an entire year of what I've been working on and learning. So happy to hear any questions or comments that you have about the proposed program.

Leave it to me to have some. So it sounds like you already have volunteers. Do you have enough volunteers already signed up or?

So I have ideas of who my volunteers are, but I don't, we haven't, I wanted to talk to all of you before we did any official announcements, before we did any official recruitment or set any dates. So Ms. Herman says she has maybe five pro-social kids that are interested, but we would certainly welcome many more, anyone that's willing to participate. And my intention is to open this up to any of the schools in our community. I don't think this should be limited to Cortez. If we've got kids that wanna come in and learn about how courts work and they wanna volunteer, bring them in. And in Los Alamos, there were many kids that wanted to be like defense and the prosecutor. So there would maybe be three prosecutors and three defense attorneys, right? and they just take turns asking questions. So we really want to give these kids exposure and the experience. I don't want to limit anyone's ability to participate.

Do you have any options, because I know that this happens occasionally where the kids really want to participate but parents maybe aren't so willing just because of like whatever reason time or they don't want to deal with it necessarily. Do you have other options for those kids or it has to be all parties on board?

you talking about the defendants or the volunteer defendants for going this route for versus court so i mean the reality is that um no we have to have the parents there and but we have to have the parents there for normal court anyway right right and so it's not a big difference to say what i'm envisioning and i could be wrong is that mr buffington the prosecutor is going to say hey if you come back next monday you can do this other type of program and it's going to be better for your kids think most parents are gonna say yeah we'll come back next Monday at 730 but if they don't then unfortunately that kid would not be able to participate the other thing is that teen court is really just that one session right and then it's like now you go forth in the world and do the things you're supposed to do and then we'll dismiss your case so it's not like an ongoing monthly obligation that a parent and a kid would have to come in got just that first hearing what's the difference between the sentencing is going through regular court and going through teen court So typically our sentences in normal court for our teenagers usually is 10 hours of community service. Sometimes they have to write an essay. Sometimes they have to do, if it's any drug or alcohol related, they have to do the minor in possession course. And if it's traffic involved, they have to do a live at 25. So they're similar, and I think that our sentencing might change based upon the framework of teen court. But there is an incentive for the youth to do teen court because they're not even going to have an adjudication on their record It's literally taking the case completely out of court and allowing them to Basically do diversion You had a lot of information in a short time to get there real quickly we are running a little over but

As I say every single time I see you, I think our criminal justice system should be renamed to the victim's justice system, and I didn't see anything on restitution.

Right. Yep, so restitution would absolutely be required, and it's just as if they're in normal court. So restitution would be a requirement.

Thank you.

If there is a restitution request. Yeah, we cannot and we would not waive restitution.

how will you follow cases or enforce the sentences?

Well, probably set it for a review hearing at the 90-day mark and say, if I have proof that you've done all the things you're supposed to do, you don't have to come to court. If I don't have proof, you need to come to court and be prepared to enter a plea because basically you haven't done what you're supposed to do. So we don't track those things because we don't have probation. I don't have staff to do that. It's on the defendant's it's their responsibility to get me proof right so once you've done your 20 hours of community service you need to send it to the court and then obviously we track it internally like yes we have that or we're missing this but we don't go out and find that information

Once you have a defendant that does have a second offense, once he's gone through teen court, will they automatically go back into the regular court system or will they be allowed to come back into teen court again?

Yeah, I think that's a great question. And so I don't know the answer to that yet. I'm not exactly sure how to handle it or I haven't decided how to handle it in Los Alamos. They will allow you to come into teen court again if you have successfully completed already, although the punishments are more drastic on the second round. I think if you pick up a new charge when you are in teen court, you're probably going to get sent back to normal court for both of those cases.

A couple things. First, a comment. I know historically in our community, a community service has been seen as like a real punishment and to be avoided and people don't like to approach that. And also, do you have... Oh, do you also have like partners who have already agreed to allow kids to do community service for them? I think having that set up would be a good move to make so that they have a place to go.

So a lot of our kids are already doing community service and a lot of them are doing an opinion project. So I've definitely had staff from opinion say that it's the building's never been so clean, right? So the kids are mopping, they're wiping down tables. Because of liability concerns, we don't tell them where they can do their community service, but we have seen kids organize clothes at thrift stores. The rule that we have is it has to be a nonprofit, right? You can't do it at your mom's house, your grandma's house. It's gotta be at an organization. We've had some kids that reside on the reservation do it at a chapter house, and the form will basically list what they've done and for how many hours and require someone from the organization to sign it. maybe they've cleaned floors or raked leaves or whatever needs to happen but I have not yet had a young person say that they don't have anywhere to go we've been able to really partner I think pretty well and I think pinion would accept them to do anything so that's always that's always an option just a comment I think this is a wonderful idea what an opportunity for students

I WOULD HOPE THE MESSAGE GETS OUT TO EVERYONE. I THINK THAT'S GOING TO REALLY HELP DEVELOP THIS AND HOPEFULLY MAYBE THE JOURNAL WOULD DO AN ARTICLE. SO PARENTS KNOW ABOUT WHAT'S GOING ON. OFTEN THE STUDENT DOESN'T SHARE THE INFORMATION WITH THEIR PARENTS. SO ANY WAY YOU CAN GET THAT OUT I WOULD ENCOURAGE YOU TO DO THAT.

absolutely and i've already um spoken with the city manager i know that we have some people within the city that they do a lot of the outreach and do the social media outreach and so i think that that will be forthcoming in the next week or two i really wanted to talk to all of you first to make sure that you were um not voicing strong objections to this plan um and so far it sounds like we're okay um before we did any like actual recruitment or announcements but um yes i agree with you i i think that there will probably be a push on facebook and social media and then once schools in session I hope to reach out to all the schools again and just let the government teachers know the civics teachers that that we're doing this and that it's it's an option as well as student government and honor society and those kind of organizations

With all the head shaking, I think we're all on board. OK, good. Good job. I wish we had more time. You presented very well, and I look forward to seeing teen court get some of our kids held accountable and start the right direction.

Very good. Thank you all. I appreciate your time. Thank you.

Okay, we're gonna go on to item number B, which is the airport advisory committee interviews. Prior to that, I think our city manager, Drew Sanders, would like to address the council.

Well, we're bringing in the first candidate for this council There's a lot of moving parts with the Airport Advisory Committee and I just wanted to provide you with some clarification So there's four main parts to this and you'll notice that some of them are overlapping But there's a little bit of method to the madness. So bear with me tonight. We are doing Some of the interviews we had enough that where if we did all of the interviews at one night It would take up the whole the whole workshop So we've got some tonight, and then we're also doing in the main meeting the first reading of the ordinance to update that with changing of the residency requirements. And then in two weeks, we're doing the second round of interviews, and then we'll do the second reading of the ordinance then, and presumably that will get passed, at which time you'll have an opportunity to appoint committee members from there. So it seems confusing, but it does dovetail, and it's working well. So that's all I had. Thank you, Mayor.

OK, thank you very much. You're on the airport advisory would like to be on the Advisory Committee. If you go ahead and state your name and what we're going to do is ask you a series of questions. The real simple and each one of us will give you a question and give you an opportunity to answer it. Keep in mind that 30 minute answer to a question is probably a little long, so if you tell us who you are, we'll begin.

OKAY. MY NAME IS EDDIE LEWIS, AND I DON'T KNOW, WHAT ELSE DID YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT ME?

YOU KNOW, YOUR NAME'S GOOD ENOUGH TO GO, BECAUSE WE'RE GOING TO ASK YOU SOME QUESTIONS.

OKAY, VERY GOOD.

WE'LL GO AHEAD AND START WITH COUNCIL.

ALL RIGHT, HELLO. WHAT MOTIVATES YOU TO SERVE ON THE AIRPORT ADVISORY BOARD AND WHAT SPECIFIC PROFESSIONAL SKILLS OR COMMUNITY PERSPECTIVE DO YOU BRING TO THIS ROLE?

OKAY, I'VE BEEN WORKING WITH A CONTRACT WITH THE CITY OF CORTEZ FOR WEED CONTROL FOR THE AIRPORT SINCE 97. SO I HAVE BEEN WORKING WITH THEM QUITE A WHILE, JUST BEING AROUND THAT. I've owned an airplane since 07, and then I bought a second airplane two years ago. So I have both those airplanes at the airport. I've worked with all the different airport managers, and of course we have a new one now that's doing good. Anyway, that's kind of my background and some of my interests there. So I also am the president of the Young Eagles Association in Cortez. So we fly kids since a youth program, a nationwide one. So I do that and also fly for search and rescue with the sheriff's office out of there. So those are some of my ties to the airport.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Welcome. What do you see as the greatest opportunities and challenges for the Cortez Municipal Airport over the next five to ten years?

Some of the greatest opportunities There's a lot of interest for new hangar space. There's a lot of people that would like to put their plane inside. So that's one area. Another one would be a self-serve fuel farm. A lot of other airports have those, even Animas Air Park, which is way smaller than we are. And it would be good to have a tanker base here. That's one of the things that has been kind of on our, radar for a time, and then my pet project, my wish list was to put a crosswind runway in there, which I was on another committee, and that's what we had planned on, and it's all gone through the okay stage. It just would be acquiring land is all, so that would be one of the upgrades that would be good for the airport. Thanks for being here, Eddie.

Some of this you've described already, but please describe any experience you have with aviation, airport operations, or piloting, et cetera. How will your background help you evaluate and advise on airport policies and projects?

Okay, like I say, I've had my license since 2017, and so, All of my time has been flown out of here after my training in Grand Junction. That's where I got my training, was up there. But just having a long history with this airport, I can see some things that need to be addressed and worked on, some shortfalls in the current system that we need to really address. There's some issues with FBO and stuff like that, so yeah.

You'll hear from about every one of us thank you for applying it's a very important to the city of Cortez to have people come in and volunteer their time to help us out you live in the city or the county.

I live in the county.

I have a little harder question board members help steer long-term goals like the airport master plan can you share an example of a multi-year project or strategic plan you've worked on and how you kept it on track.

It would just be in the past when I was on the other committee, when we were doing the planning for the future, and that was to put in the crosswind runway, but then also they were doing some, exploring some other things on lengthening the runway and trying to bring it up to where we could have jet service in here. and looking at some of those issues like you'd have to have your own fire department there and various other things it's a pretty big ask so i don't know but these are things we were looking at and weighing options on so i'm aware of some of those those things and um It would be good if we could keep pushing forward on those things and eventually get better service here. We live a long ways from anywhere and aircraft service is very important. And another thing that I see as being very important is keeping it looking good there. Because a first impression, when you first come into a place, fly in, it makes a big impression. If it's all Falling down and you've got weeds everywhere. That's not good. So we want to have it a very clean upgraded and That's where we're going where they've gone with a lot of that is a lot of good improvements. So Yeah

Thank you Mr. Lewis for your involvement and coming before us today and being as involved as you are. You've spoken about five or six or seven different projects that you see and this question is a little bit redundant when it comes back to that. But is there a specific project or need at the airport that you're most passionate about?

Well, I did speak of all these other things. One of the other things that we would like to do and this is kind of more of the experimental aircraft association that we're in, is in the past we had a air show kind of airplanes on display and old cars and things like that. We would really like to bring that back and get that going again. That's a good way to get the community tied into the airport, get airport exposure there. One of the things we were talking about in the past was the tailings pile to the south of the last hangar, getting a place where we could actually have a car show and an air show all away from the rest of the building so it wouldn't be so congested. So that would be a fun little project, I think, for our community, just to really get the airport exposure and community tie-in.

We have good news for you. You've answered every one of our questions. Excellent. Thank you very much. We appreciate you coming.

You're welcome. Thank you.

We're not going to be making a decision tonight. We will eventually let you know what decisions we've made.

Very good. Thank you. Thank you.

Yeah, it'll be at the next two weeks, the meeting in two weeks.

Hello there, if you'll walk up to that big mic in front of you, the top one, and see if that green light's on.

The tall one, yeah.

Yeah, is it on? It's on, thank you. There we go. Okay, we're gonna go through a series of questions for you. They're not real hard, but each council person is going to ask you a question. And before we begin, if you would state your name and where you live.

I'm John Hernandez. I live at 28963 County Road W up in Dolores.

All right, and start us off.

Thank you, Mayor. Welcome, John. What motivates you to serve on the Airport Advisory Board, and what specific professional skills or community perspectives do you bring to this role?

As you know, or may not know, I am the chairperson for the Montezuma County Planning and Zoning Commission. So I am part of the community. Like I said, excuse me, I'm normally on that side. Tonight I'm on this side with Jason. I am... I moved here 20 years ago, get away from the population of San Diego, love this area, want to be a part of it. I worked for Corporate America for 20 years in San Diego, so I've seen what we don't need down here. We do need development, we need to see some progress, and hopefully I can be a part of that and help that. That's why I'm on the PNZ.

Thank you for applying. What do you see as the greatest opportunities and challenges for the Cortez Municipal Airport over the next five to 10 years?

I think the community airport is the welcome wagon for this area. It's a primary mode of transportation being we do not have rail. So hopefully I see in the future more commercial with the development of the area, not only the city of Cortez, but the county of Montezuma.

Describe any experiences you have with aviation, airport operations or piloting or otherwise. How will your background help you evaluate and advise the airport policies and projects?

Okay. Back in 1970, I attempted to get a private license. Flew for a number of hours. I left it solo, passed my ground, but because of expenses, new wife, new children, I had to give it up. So that's the experience I have as far as me with aviation other than I have flown out of this airport probably 80 times with my job working for San Diego Gas and Electric in San Diego. When I left them in 2007, I continued to work remotely up until November of 23. So like I said, I've flown out of that airport multiple times. Seen it grow, been through the Great Lakes thing, been through the boutique thing, and now with the Denver Air, you know, I see progress with the airlines that have come. As far as planning goes, again, I'm on the planning and zoning, so being able to see and listen to applicants come before us, make a qualified, if you will, and fair decision to allow certain things to happen within this county.

Thank you. Welcome. Board members help steer long-term goals at the airport master plan. Can you share an example of a multi-year project or strategic plan you've worked on and how you kept it on track?

Involving the airport or just?

Just the long-term goal.

I'm sorry again?

Just a long-term goal in any situation, I think. Of a project that I was- How you helped a project move forward.

Okay. Again, working with San Diego Gas Electric, I worked in the real estate department as a land manager. I took care of their easements and their properties. One of the properties they have was in Carlsbad, California, where they had a generation plant and the three lagoons to cool the power plant. The city of Carlsbad was going to no longer wanted to be a partner with San Diego Gas and Electric. They used two of those lagoons for a recreation, and they wanted to pull out of that. being the land manager for that area, I had to sit with them and tell them that I'm gonna fence the lagoons to keep the public out then. They thought that was not a good idea, so we, our governmental liaison person for the utility, volunteered me to sit on a on a quasi board to resolve this issue which we did we ended up um making sure that the the public could use that lagoon use that water the city was still on the hook um not so much finance financially, but they had the liability of it. And to this day, they're still using those two lagoons. And it took a lot of sit-down thinking how we're going to let the passive users, the kayakers and the wakeboarders, the paddleboarders, as well as the jet skis that were in the area, ski boats. So we came to a solution where we would allow, for certain hours, the jet skis could utilize the lagoon counterclockwise, and the passive users could use it counterclockwise. So it came to a pretty good fruition, and I've got a little star for it.

John, is there a specific project, issue, or infrastructure need at the airport that you're most passionate about addressing during your term? Thank you.

Yes. I see three things that I think need to happen to the airport. Like I said, I've flown there at least 80 times and heard multiple times when someone comes off that plane, how do I get to town? So COVID's over, we need to have a rental agency back. So that's one thing I could see soliciting the Hertz, the Budget, the Avis, some of the other ones. I don't believe Enterprise wants to be here. They pulled plug out of Cortez anyway, so I would not even waste my time with them. Secondly, the machines that the TSA people use for scanning metal detectors, they are strictly that, metal detectors. And me having a metal knee, every time I go through, I set it off, and I know the TSA agents well. They know me well, but they have a job to do. stay to that job. I would like to see an approach with TSA to buy or use one of those scanners that they have. I'm sure you've all been to the airport where you have to raise your hands and the machine scans. They pick up your knee and they pick up anything else in your pocket. If you don't, you're right through. So I think updating that would help passengers get on board quicker, especially with the people that have metal in their bodies, whether it's a knee or a shoulder, hip, whatever. It takes quite a bit of time to go through a frisking. I don't know if anybody's had that opportunity, but it... It actually takes away a TSA agent also. So by modernizing and getting into the 21st century, maybe we could do that. The last thing I have is the bathrooms, the air dryers in the bathrooms. Those have to be 1980s. I've used them myself and sometimes think I'm going to miss my flight drying my hands. You know, with today's technology, the Dyson's power air and the hemp cleaning, you know, they're about $1,000 a piece. I've checked on them. That would be the way to go, in my opinion. Those are the three things I see that could update and welcome people to the airport.

John, the good news is you're done. Thank you very much. We appreciate it. We will not have an answer today. I hope we will have one in two weeks, and we appreciate you volunteering to do this. It's going to be a tough job, and we thank you for being on Planning and Zoning as well.

Great. Thank you for the opportunity. Thank you.

If you would go right to the big mic on the top, and there should be a green light on. Is there a green light on? There is a green light. And you're good to go. What we're going to do is we'd ask you to state your name. A lot of us already know you since you've lived here about all your life, but state your name and where you live, and we're going to go through the council and ask you a set of questions, and it should be easy peasy. Okay. Go ahead.

David Bostrom. I moved here when I was four years old with my parents and we live down on Coronado just two blocks away from here.

Okay. Well, I'm going to start with the first question. What motivates you to serve on the Airport Advisory Board and what specific professional skills or community perspectives do you bring to this role?

Well, I am a commercial airline pilot. I work for SkyWest Airlines. I've worked there for, it'll be 26 years in September. I've learned to fly at this Cortez Airport and a Cessna, and I would love to see more commercial traffic in here. in the future and I can see helping with that to get more commercial traffic in here, bigger airplanes, better service.

Thank you, David, for participating and putting yourself up here. Can you tell us what you think the greatest opportunities and challenges for the airport is gonna be in the next five to 10 years?

Well, get more air service. I think it's going to require, with a bigger airplane, be a longer runway. I do think they're going to have to expand the runway and expand a new terminal, and that's not going to be cheap. But in order to have the air service, I think we need to do that.

Thank you, David. You've already described a little bit of this, but please further describe any experience you have with aviation, airport operations, piloting, et cetera, and how will your background help you evaluate and advise on airport policies and projects?

Well, I'm a captain for SkyWest Airlines. I fly the E-175. It's a regional airplane that seats 76 people. It looks like a small 737, but it doesn't have the middle seat. That's the nice thing about it. It's an aisle or a window. And my experience with that, just being in aviation for so many years, I feel gives me the opportunity to advise the city council on the best way to expand and improve airport operations.

Thank you. Board members help steer long-term goals like the airport master plan. Can you share an example of a multi-year project or strategic plan that you've worked on and how you kept it on track?

I really haven't had personally a project to do for work or anything, but just myself working, continuing to work and That's about all I've really done. I haven't done any projects that are multi-year projects for anything.

All right. And then I've got your last question. Is there a specific project issue or infrastructure need at the airport that you are most passionate about addressing during your term?

Well, the longer runway for more air service into here. I do know that Russ Meacham, the, I guess, two airport managers from now, we know each other, and he told me that SkyWest called and wanted to bring CRJ200s in here and that they needed 2,000 feet more of runway in order to do that. I do not know what SkyWest's plan is now. We've had a lot of our pilots go to the majors, and I don't know how many extra pilots we have for the small stations and stuff, but I'm sure that is still in SkyWest's sight, and if we could get a bigger runway, we could definitely get, I'm sure somebody would wanna come in here and start doing air service.

Awesome, thank you very much.

Okay. Well, that was harmless. It's all done. Thank you very much. We're not going to have a decision today, but in two weeks we hope to have a decision, and we appreciate you volunteering your time and looking at being on the advisory board.

Okay. Thank you.

Hi there. Like Bob Barker would say, come on down. If you would go to that top speaker there, and I think it's on. So what we're going to do is we're going to go down the council row and ask you a set of questions. They're not hard. They're easy to answer. But before we begin, would you let us know your name and where you live?

Where I live, Robbie Wright. Live 713 Apple Drive here in Cortez. I was brushing my teeth this morning looking out the window at the original Southwest Hospital and realized I hadn't gone far in life.

What motivates you to serve on the Airport Advisory Board and what specific professional skills or community perspectives do you bring to this role?

I've been a pilot for a little over 17 years. Learned to fly here in Cortez. My parents learned to fly here in Cortez. My grandfather helped build the old terminal building. Aviation's been in my blood for a long time. Spent many years self-employed with Four States Tire. handled every headache there was to handle as a self-employed person that grew a business. And there's numerous skills and assets to bring to the table and offer any help that's needed.

Robbie, what do you see as the greatest opportunities and challenges for the Cortez Municipal Airport over the next five to ten years?

Money. Everybody needs money.

Do you want to expand on that?

I'm in the process. A lot of reasons to be involved, so I'm putting a lot of money into building a hangar down there and working with the new airport manager and just budgets extremely tight and we're trying to figure out utilities and with the change of the previous, you know, the change of airport managers during the project, it's just airports in a tough situation needing more funding.

You've already touched on it, but could you describe any experience you have with aviation, airport operations, piloting, and how will your background help you evaluate and advise airport policies and projects?

Dennis, probably just flying. And again, I grew up flying, you know, parents were pilots and flew. So just involvement in aviation community, involvement in a lot of travel, a lot of different airports, seeing how places are run, different airports, different styles, and just a good background with a variety of airports and airspaces and travel that I have. Thank you.

So board members often steer long-term goals like the airport master plan. And can you share an example of a project that you've worked on that went over multiple years or a strategic plan that you've worked on for multiple years and sort of seen through?

Aviation related or just I can pick four states tire I got a summer job there in 1985 and bought the place in 1993 we had my wife and myself and one part-time employee and Over a period of 40 years grew it from 300 and around 375 thousand and in revenue to almost between 20 and 30 million and multiple locations and 100 plus employees and and so it took a lot of ups and downs a bunch of getting knocked to your knees and getting back up again and so I Can stay the course?

Thank you. Is there a specific project, issue, or infrastructure need at the airport that you are most passionate about addressing during your term?

Honestly, no, no real agenda, no issues. I like the direction that it's headed. The new airport manager, somebody just looked up, oh my gosh, I got to say good stuff now. I was going to say, great young man. Didn't know he was here until you gave it away. You looked over. The last airport manager, look at the place, it's cleaned up, it's nice, the new parking lot, the metal fencing, so many improvements. They're not as fast as anybody wants. Again, if the airport had a monster budget, they would be getting everything done that they want to get done. I think the parking, the paid parking was 10 years overdue. I think it's underpriced. I have pilot friends. And I've had to leave, in the world of self-employment, I had to leave vehicles at different airports. When I visit my stores and, you know, the amount of money that you pay other airports, what Pagosa Springs charges to leave a vehicle there per month compared to Cortez, there's, you know, there's a lot of areas need to raise some prices. And parking's one of them.

Robbie, believe it or not, that's all of our questions. We appreciate you. We appreciate you applying, and you know everybody up here probably knows you, and you probably know everybody up here.

Not really. No? Okay. I'm just glad you're not looking in your rearview mirror at me.

Thanks for applying. We appreciate it. We won't have an answer for you this week, but maybe in the next council meeting two weeks from now, we'll have you in answer.

Thank you all.

Thank you.

I don't know if this is an appropriate time to ask or not if those two if it would be a conflict of interest with the weed um contract and the planning and zoning um probably not we we can get more specifics but likely not okay I mean there's not money expended here or anything so I kind of assume not yeah just making sure

All righty. Well, sorry, Mayor, you didn't call me to the floor yet. Never mind, I will.

Well, I'll tell you what I'm doing.

I'm looking for my little work session sheet, and I don't know what I did with it.

It's up here. Are you up?

I'm ready. I just need my presentation to come up on the screen.

The council's all working together. They just helped me out a little bit. We're on item number C, which is our lodgers tax, intended purpose and use, and City Manager Drew Sanders is going to address us.

Yeah, thanks, Mayor and Council. Got a little excited there, so thanks for bearing with me. So, lodgers tax. Now, we've got a lot of irons in the fire right now, particularly with things like lodgers tax, which Council indicated that you are interested in moving forward with. We do have the next step in that process tonight at the State of Meeting, which is requesting Council to authorize the Mayor to sign a letter of intent. Then we have to we are already working on a ballot question where the city attorneys already got a draft ordinance ready and We need to work on an MOU next there. There's several steps down the road that need to take place but When we're looking at this, and I've already presented to you in the past what our ordinance says that we can use it for, but strategically, if we're going to do this and bring it before the community, my recommendation to council is that we be rather specific on what that means. Because otherwise, if it's just nebulous, hey, give us more money, You are not likely to be successful Talking with Montezuma County as we were told previously that they were looking at doing a sales tax Ballot measure that is no longer in play But I am told that it is I'm not got a clear answer yet on whether they're moving forward with the lodgers tax or not if they are I'm hoping to partner with them and to help you know make sure that we don't defeat each other perhaps but um bear with me tonight and i'm hoping to take you through this journey and uh so we can arrive at some council direction on how to proceed with this and what our external messaging can be that we can be very clear with the community so this is a previous slide what the intended purpose was these are the five different areas that it mentions in the city code now which is advertising the community improving services financing new facilities attracting conferences conventions and meetings to the city and beautification of the city So on that, I think I had indicated previously that maybe we would want to change the ordinance for this. After analyzing it further, I am not recommending we do that because those items on there are very sufficient for where I'm suggesting the council go. So just to catch you back up on this, our current lodgers tax, it is two percent. We collect roughly two hundred fifty thousand dollars per year based upon a three year average. And we are way behind the rest of the state. Most places are at least six percent. Some are eight. And the city of Denver is ten plus. So the reality is that lodgers tax is something that it's not a tax that we pay. It's not a tax that our locals pay. And as I've mentioned to council before, the best tax is always one that somebody else pays that comes from out of town, pays that tax and then moves on and doesn't necessarily use that service. so what we've historically done with this up until fiscal year 2026 most of our lodgers tax every year has gone to mesa verde country we won't rehash that this year that's a little bit less we're doing some other uh items with it and i don't want to go into everything we're doing right now with it because it's it is it's very limited but one of those is our business beautification grant But the reality is with $250,000, although it sounds like a lot, when you're trying to move the needle for our community and actually reinvest in it, it's nothing. We're too short and I kind of appreciated the point that Mr. Wright just made was yeah, we're underfunded in a lot of ways. This is one, but this is one where I think we can move the needle on it because When we are recommending future uses of it, we want to get it to a sufficient point where we can actually have meaningful and visible changes in our community. This is a great way to do it with outside money. So before we go there, I want to talk to you about some basic guardrails. Keep in mind that this tax here and what we would propose to use it for is basically icing on the cake. It's putting the finishing touches on our community. in a lot of ways and i'll tell you more in just a minute excuse me because of that strongly suggesting that we steer away from core functions we have other funding mechanisms for that it's never enough but this isn't going to be enough either so i strongly suggest that we move away from core functions and focus more on what our ordinance says we can use that for which is tourism and marketing and Keep in mind again the messaging that I'm suggesting the council authorized us to use is direct investment back into the community with visible Things that are going to help us improve tourism and crew of our marketing attracting facilitating more economic development helping businesses helping things that are going to help spurn that that largest tax and get it self replicating Redevelopment of properties and infrastructure and then you know as we talked about the business beautification grants and so on again Yeah, it's nice. Yeah, it's good what we've done, but it is you know what I maybe I'll just use the term mouse milk It's not really effective. It's not enough to really do anything, but if we triple that we can absolutely start moving the needles and helping with better grants and Actual improvements for the community Also, strongly suggesting that we have directly invested in walkability, especially of our downtown area, landscaping, structures, other improvements, again, that are visible. And one counselor has even used the words a couple of times, perhaps statues or anything, you know, monuments, anything in our community that are going to attract people and get them to stay a little longer. And then also investing the arts and cultural events, programs and facilities. We have some of those here, but if we can somehow help seed some of those. And again, another the same counselor has actually mentioned, you know, things like the mountain rodeo, different things that do bring people in from the outside. They need a shot in the arm and even, you know, Couple of thousand dollars would help a few thousand dollars would be more But if we could even though that's not necessarily held in the city of Cortez It would be nice to bring more of that in here. I know historically that was a big thing for the city of Cortez so those are the strong or suggested uses and And keep in mind again We want to take it from way out here and broad and this is almost too broad But we have to keep it a little bit try to narrow it as best we can but I think the messaging Really is direct investment in these items that I've got in front of you For the future, so it's not the city just keeping this money somehow we want to get it and invest it back into the community and So with that being said, I'm hoping that that generated some curiosity or perhaps some guidance from you all that you can help us move forward. Thank you, Mayor.

The good news is we've got a little time. So as a council, I think it's important to our city manager. It's certainly important to me. I think the council needs to talk about it. Anybody want to go first?

City Manager, would you mind putting up that last slide again so we can refer to it?

That one?

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

When you're talking about redevelopment of properties and infrastructure, are you talking about city owned or something similar in the form of grants and applying where businesses can have funds to improve their own properties and infrastructure?

Both. But ideally, mostly trying to, you know, and we've done a really good job with business beautification grants. It's just there's not enough there. But I would like to really up that and improve The appearance of our downtown is improving. It really needs to do better. And if we can give it a shot in the arm, that would be helpful.

Because I know we had discussed a little bit that, you know, obviously tourists do use the rec center as well. And so if that's something that could fall underneath.

beautifying the rec center yeah that that's going to be a little more tricky because it's got a specific revenue stream so that that's going to be crossing over the crossing the streams as it were and that's that's not going to work good yeah the parks though yes and around it okay okay

And I'm on board with you. I think that we need to use this money for tourists. And it's what makes people come to Cortez. I don't see people coming to Cortez from New York because we have a nice rec center. but they will come back if it's beautiful, it's pretty, it's inviting, and it's entertaining, it has art, it has all of those things. When I go to Grand Junction, I don't necessarily see the bad roads, but I certainly see the statues they have on Main Street and the artwork that they have. When I go down Cortez, I see the artwork on the side of the buildings and I'm very impressed with it. So I would like to see some of that money go to attracting people to Cortez. And the rodeo thing, back when I was a kid, the rodeo was big in Cortez, Colorado. They came from all over the Four Corners just to come to our rodeo. Well, it's kind of slowed down. Back then, every business on Main Street had a rodeo theme, every business, not one or two, every business. And we had parades, and it brought money into Cortez. So not only will the lodgers tax bring money, but it'll help support our businesses and help support the city of Cortez. So I would like it to be specific to helping bring tourists in and having them... really talk about Cortez as being the place. You have a place and the place, and I want to be the place. I heard this in a CML conference. Do you want to go to a doctor or do you want to go to the doctor? And I want Cortez to be the place.

Thank you, Mayor.

I was kind of thinking along those same lines to elaborate a little bit on what you said, Mayor. And can we help with advertising? Can we ensure that there's going to be security for the parades that we're going to have staff for that? Is there ways that we can help promote those kind of things and encourage maybe make flyers for the businesses? I know we have the big banners that go across Main Street, but yeah, are there other things that we... to help support that for everybody. That's not outside of our scope of assisting, because I think sometimes we need to be a little careful of what we are getting involved in, but still wanting to support all of these things.

Absolutely. That's advertising our community. And an example of that would be our Parade of Lights. And we do compete with at least Moab, and I think there's maybe one or two others that do that. Price Utah does that, I'm aware. But, you know, again, going back to A or B, I think that's a good way of putting it. And yes, we can. That's all falls within there. And I think our, you know, again, reinvesting directly in investing in all of that, you know, it's just how do we take the money? Because it's going to go quick, you know, but we just need to, you know, laser focus as best we can.

Yeah, I think whenever resources are scarce, like being strategic about them is really great. And these five principles in our existing ordinance, oh my God, I was like, what is that word? Are great, because they touch on attracting people and then also impressing them once they're here. So I think these five principles are excellent to start from. And I love your idea of direct investment for our future WE LIVE IN A BEAUTIFUL PLACE AND AN AMAZING HISTORY AND TO REVAMP THE THINGS THAT ONCE WORKED IS WONDERFUL AND I LOVE THE IDEA OF GETTING THEM HERE AND IMPRESSING THEM ONCE THEY ARE BECAUSE WE HAVE A LOT TO OFFER.

THANK YOU, COUNCILOR. I LIKE HEARING THE DISCUSSION ABOUT REINVESTMENT. beautification of their business, et cetera. An area I think really needs a shot in the arm is South Broadway. That's an area, especially when you come from the airport, and that's your first impression, as one of the applicants mentioned about the airport. That's your first impression. Well, if you're driving in from Arizona or wherever, THAT IS GOING TO BE YOUR FIRST IMPRESSION, AND I WOULD SAY THAT'S NOT AN IMPRESSION WE WANT OUR TOURISTS TO SEE. SO ANY WAY WE CAN BEAUTIFY THAT WOULD BE ADVANTAGEOUS.

Agreed, Bill. Council Member Lewis, I think that's a wonderful thing to draw attention to. And what I always see on that south side is such an opportunity with those retro motels and things to highlight the beautiful history that we have and bring it back in some way. Because I think I love the little retro things throughout downtown and the signs and keep it Cortez. But yeah, reinvigorate it.

Well, I'm going to be the Debbie Downer in the room. I think this is all great ideas. And it's like the wish list of everything. We talk about wish lists and being able to afford it and what's practical. And I'm going to try and be on the little bit more practical side here. The way it's stated right now, as far as I'm interpreting it, says that we can use it to improve services that we have here. And if we attract more tourists, they're gonna use more water and they're gonna require more laundry. And I'm gonna go right back to the bottom line is that if we don't turn on the pipes and have clean, fresh water and abundance coming out of it, we're in trouble. And this is gonna put a strain on that system even if we are lucky enough to increase our tourism that much. So it is a service that has to happen. Along those lines, we have police departments that have to be that, you know, in these sort of events will require more police duty, et cetera, et cetera. So as I look at your list, tourism and marketing is that's great. The number two and three are extremely vague to me. Attracting and facilitating economic development is not an issue for the tax dollars. I can see where we would want it to, and who would say we don't want economic development? Nobody up here would say that. We all want that. but I have a hard time justifying how you're gonna use a lodger's tax to do that, and how would you do it? We've always struggled with this plan, as we have recently. We've dealt with this a lot in the last six months coming up into the election as far as economic development. it's great but i don't know how you're going to put this practically out there number four improving walkability landscaping structures other improvements all that's great if it's city property right but we can't do this for private properties both pardon both yeah i'm sorry i missed that both Yeah, walkability is great. We are what we are as far as our downtown. We've got a major thoroughfare coming in through it. These are all great ideas. And I don't want to say that they're not doable. But I am saying we've made attempts at this in the past. And I am all in favor of investing in cultural events and programs that will bring things in, right? Balloon festivals, our 4th of July sort of thing, the rodeo, all that's good and great. And yes, we should make the best out of our parks just But we have a park system that needs a lot of attention right now. And in order to do that in our park system, we're going to have to put some of this money into the park system. So that's about all I have to say. I just think we have to be practical about this. We're already dealing with a lot of issues that we can't afford. And I just don't want to give ourselves a blank check. I think people don't want us to have a blank check. We've got to be able to sell this specifically.

I want to be careful saying that the blank check is not just like our beautification grant. I mean there are Milestones they have to meet there are certain things they have to I may have to prove up and show Progress with that and that's what we would want to do. It's just it's it's less than meaningful now just because it's so minimal and

I AGREE COMPLETELY WITH COUNCILMEMBER RANDALL IN THAT WE NEED TO IMPROVE OUR INFRASTRUCTURE. I THINK THAT'S TOTALLY NEEDED. IT'S WELL BEYOND TIME. ALTHOUGH, I DON'T THINK USING THE LODGER'S TAX TO DO THAT IS THE APPROPRIATE WAY TO SPEND SPEND THAT MONEY FIRST OF ALL IT'S IT'S ALMOST OUT OF SIGHT OUT OF MIND FOR MOST PEOPLE WE WE CHANGE THAT INFRASTRUCTURE ARE THEY GOING TO SEE THAT NO THE WATER IS STILL GOING TO FLOW THE SAME WAY WAY IT HAS I I THINK IF WE'RE ASKING VOTERS TO APPROVE THIS INCREASE IN LODGERS TAX THERE HAS TO BE SOMETHING THAT THEY GET SATISFACTION FROM See seeing improvements that that's that's my take on on that But councilmember Randall I agree we need it and we need to find sources, but I don't think this is

Just have a question is infrastructure kind of the same as the rec center when it comes to there's already a revenue stream to it That that wouldn't be If I understand you're right no infrastructure is different than the rec center rec center has its own sales tax earmark and An amount that goes to that infrastructure your you were we would more consider like roads sewer Well, we don't do sewer but water the two main ones. Okay

The one issue I would point out is that this tax we're pursuing on a lodger's tax is one that we're perceiving that is not going to affect the people who are paying it, right? They're paying it, it's going into our system. So I don't think we have to, I don't mean to be harsh or callous Silly about this, but I don't think we have to make this case to them. They're gonna come here or they're not, right? But I do believe that the city in itself, the water system of our city, needs attention. And those people will be using that water system just like they'll use the roads and just like they'll use the police. And this is an opportunity. I'm not saying use it all entirely. I'm all for the ones I shared with you that I was all for. But I think a portion of this has to go to our infrastructure. We just can't keep building and building and asking more people to come without building something for them to come to and making sure that the water comes out of the tap.

So within that then, is it something we can set percentages that go towards certain things? Is that something we would get to do ahead of time so that we can be a little bit more transparent and know things are going to certain things?

I mean, we're looking at the same bullets, right? I see on the third bullet, redevelopment of properties and infrastructure. I'm looking at the same list. We all see infrastructure is on there. Are we in agreement?

Yeah, it can be. I just think we need to be clear with the voters on what we're planning to do. I mean, if there is some, you know, minor infrastructure things, but I would be looking at that as just like replacing the barrier we lost in the park, you know, and bathrooms and different things like that that I think are visible and usable, especially under what the spirit of the code is here. you know I mean what when it comes down to it we're gonna collect an amount and you know and then the next year when that when we have a fund balance in there then we'll be dividing that up using the budget and that will be also a council discussion of what that is but I think whatever we arrive at and whatever that ballot question is I think we are morally and perhaps legally obligated to adhere to that closely. But yes, infrastructure is on there, and yes, it's broad, but I think we need to be specific about what we're trying to do. Voters, if it starts turning nebulous, they're gonna turn off, which means a no.

And I think to elaborate a little bit off of what Councilmember Wolf was saying, can we, and maybe this wouldn't be a good thing, but can we put percentages, maybe include that, be like 40% is going to go to water pipe infrastructure, 20% is going to go to business, beautification grant or whatever or does that and hinder us because if we put all that money into it so 40% of the 200,000 that comes in we put it into that well that's not enough to actually do anything so it just sits in that account because it's not enough to do anything and then we get that backlash of why didn't you guys use that money does that put us in that kind of predicament

and other problems yeah it's sooner rather than later that will will turn on us however that doesn't mean that we can't you know the council can't suggest during budget discussions on hey we'd like to see a little more go towards this this fits within the code we'd like to see this and we would probably be identifying that as well but putting hard and fast percentages on it although it seems like a good idea right now it will turn on us quickly You know, there's a lot of pitfalls. It's a good idea. It's just history plays out. It just won't work good. But there is a place for that. Just don't codify it. Just don't put it as part of the ballot question. Put it as part of the expenditure process.

I'm afraid if we start Spending our money on infrastructure and things like this, if I'm saving my money at my home and I want to save it until I have enough money to buy a sprinkler system for my house, that's what I've saved that money for. But all of a sudden my water heater goes out, I'm gonna take that money that I saved for my sprinkler system and put it to my water heater. That's exactly what's going to happen if we take these lodger's tax and we carte blanche and say we'll use it for whatever we need. We're gonna use it for the things that are emergencies and never get Cortez beautified because emergencies will have the priority if we do not say it's to be used for tourism.

that's my point of view and i think that goes back to what city manager was saying as far for it to get passed the voters are going to know a specific what is this going and i think we have to we have to define that to next it's real important that we don't tell the voters hey you're going to be paying for an orange and then show them an apple right that's yeah yeah do that

Yeah, and we would be making some promises with this, and I will tell you that I think we're going to have to come up with a very specific plan budget-wise after we start collecting. It's going to take a year to collect it, but then we start expending that. I think we've made promises to voters. We need to do something visible. We need to perhaps put out a dashboard and everything else of what are you getting for your tax dollars here, folks. and that direct investment in the community, that's one piece that is missing still here. And although I agree 100%, infrastructure, super important, but voters practically are not going to vote for something that they're not gonna see, not for this, in my opinion. And I think we've seen that play out in other local governments.

Public transportation on the table.

Okay, anybody else have any comments? All right, let's move along. And I know we're gonna hear more about this. Did you get any direction at all from us

I did I think I have a pretty good idea where to go and it's not too radically different than where we're at I will work with our Tabor attorney to adjust the ballot question appropriately and you all will see that in fact I'll probably push that out to you sooner rather than later. before we bring it to a meeting so we can you know try to try to arrive at the right place but we need to be in lockstep and we need to do that fairly quickly and and i think we've we've made some ground here this evening and i think we're we're on the right track but once we start moving into public Um, uh outreach which is going to be soon. We're meeting on it as staff very soon And I just need to be clear on what we're talking about and if we make promises we have to deliver on that and you all are the advocates of that so Um, yeah, we we certainly don't want another south park debacle So we'll leave it at that, uh, let's move on to item number d, uh Council general discussion.

Does anybody on council have some? Something they'd like to bring up

Would just like to get an update on the Empire Building and what what's going on right now?

Well that that projects idling because I'm dealing with things like lodgers tax and many other items that are much more pressing right now, so we've got the report done on that by the architects and I just need some time to put into it and And there's only 16 hours a day in the I've got so. Yeah, we're working on it.

I city manager, but did we get that report back from them that what what the possible recommendations we have? Yeah, we have that and yeah, we do.

Yeah, we just need to analyze it and find the realities in there.

Thank you.

I guess I will throw a little tidbit in. When we get recommendations from these outfits that we pay an abundance amount of money for, of course, they don't know Cortez the way we knew Cortez, but we certainly need to look at what they're presenting and make sure that it fits within our theme, our city. But I don't want to be paying these people a whole lot of money and they're not taking their advice. I think it's a waste of taxpayers' money.

Agree, we just have to like I said they get to it.

There's other more timely things right now to to deal with so Okay, nobody has anything else we'll go ahead and Let's see for your information Let's see the meeting minutes from the Montezuma County Board of Commissioners on May 26 June 4th June 9th June 16 June 23rd and June 30 26 Nobody has anything about that. So let's go ahead and adjourn this work session and meet back at 7.30.