Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

The community planning and housing committee with Denver City Council. Your community planning and housing committee starts now.

Welcome to the community planning and housing committee of Denver City Council. Today is May 19. I'm Sarah Parity. I'm one of your council members at large and the committee chair, and I will start with introductions to my right, if councilmember Doris I'm

on your right. West Denver District 3. Good afternoon, Diana Romero Campbell, Southeast Denver District 4. Amanda Sawyer, District 5.

Flora Alvidrez, Vaqui District 7. Amanda Samuel North, West Denver, District 4.

And I think we have a colleague online as well, maybe two. You.

Give me

your drinks.

Alright. Councilman Kevin Flynn, Southwest Denver's District 7. Thank you.

I like your card again. I was gonna say you added that to your office this morning.

It's a

good card. Alright. So the first thing we have today, we've got two action items starting with a rezoning that Fran is ready to present. Thank you very much.

Good afternoon, members of committee. My name is Fran Penafiel. I'm a principal city planner with community planning and development. And today, I'm gonna present an overview of the rezoning request for Laredo Heights. Arts and venues is requesting to rezone the current P U D G 24 and P U D G 25 Zone District into a two new PODs.

They're gonna be P U D G 41 and P U D G 42. As you know well in this presentation, we're gonna go over the location and context, then I'm gonna touch into existing and proposed zoning. We're gonna go over the process, and then finally, we're gonna look at the review criteria. This property is located in Council District 2, which is represented by council member Flynn, and it is in the Harvey Park South neighborhood. Here, I'm gonna take a quick minute to go over a little bit of the background so that then we can move faster because you can see that it's actually a pretty simple when it looks complicated, but it's a very simple rezoning.

The sites were originally rezoning 2021. If you recall, a few of you were here after we approved the Lloyd Wright small area plan. This rezoning primarily consists of a targeted adjustment of the PUD boundaries and the reorganization of the existing PUD framework into updated PUD g 41 and PUD g 42. As a reminder, a PUD or a planned unit development is a customized zoning district that establishes site specific land use and development standards tailored for a particular property. Here in this aerial view, you can see that the sign showing to the west is what it's called currently P U D G 25, which is proposed to be resold to P U D G 42.

For the purposes of this presentation and make it easier to follow, I'm gonna refer to the PUD G 25 as the residential PUD and the PUD G 24 as the campus score just to make it easier, less numbers. So all of this rezoning is simply and I'm gonna get into detail, and I'm gonna show you a more detailed image, is to move a small parcel that it's only 14,000 square feet from one beauty to the other. So it's gonna move from the residential beauty into the the campus core. So here you can see this is assuming if you're familiar with Laredo Heights, you can see there the library and the theater. And that little parcel that's there that it's owned by the city, it's this 14,000 square feet property that used to be in the residential PUD, and now the applicant is requesting to move it to the campus core.

Let me see here in my notes. Yeah. And this is gonna create a new sub area that I'm gonna go into the details. As previously mentioned, the current zoning of the site is P U D G 24 and P U D G 25. If you recall from the rezoning from 2021, it was a bigger area.

So we did rezone back then in 2021 that area that you see there that it's U M X 3. So that one went to a standard district and then also, like, the CMP I 2. That one to the south, that's where the DBS school is. So those areas where we're zoning to standard district, and then what you see in yellow is what we're rezoning now, but it's the two PODs. The land use of the site is currently mostly vacant with the exception, of course, of some of the historic buildings, some few public and quasi public buildings, an office building, and there's a few residential buildings that are built to the north.

Here you have a little bit of context. So you have, of course, the iconic Admin Building. This is a theater and library, the buildings that we're kind of referencing here because this parking this site that we're gonna rezone the purpose of it is a parking. I'm gonna go into that in more detail, and it's to serve the theater and the library. And this is just some photos of the context surrounding.

So you have some residential, of course, like to the north and well, you mostly have residential to the North and to the West, and then you have some commercial and federal. K. So let's look at the proposed zoning. These maps highlight where the boundaries are proposed to be changed for each BUD. Here, we list all the proposed changes to the BUD.

There are no changes proposed to the residential BUD other than the boundary change. And on the campus core BUD, there are no changes proposed to sub area a and b. The only proposed changes are in this new area that we've created that it's sub area c, where we're proposing to reduce the allowed heights to allow for a transition to a residential area to the west, west, and we're proposing a new setback, a new side interior bold lane. So if you can see my cursor here, that's the property when you look at the, of course, here at the campus core. And then here, it is this little rectangle here.

So we're just taking it out and giving it to the other BUD, and this BUD is not touched. So the residential BUD won't be touched. Here, a little bit more detail. So this site standards in sub area c ensure that any future structure on the would provide an appropriate transition to a protected district located in the North and West. These standards will continue to guide the design and massing of the proposed structure to maintain compatibility with the neighboring residential areas.

So, again, no changes. And then only in the sub area, we thought it would be important because it is right next to residential to have some to be careful so that we don't create any so we have a good transition to the residential. In case I'm I'm sure that arts and venues can speak if you have any questions, but for now, they're just planning, like, a surface parking. But in the future, they would like to do a two story parking, so we wanna make sure that when they build that two story parking, it doesn't it has transitioned to a residential. And, again, here saying that BUDG 3042, that it's residential, doesn't have any changes.

It stays the same. K. So now looking at the process. Informational notice of this rezoning was sent out in January twenty second of twenty seventh of this year. We presented at planning board on May 6, and the property was noticed for that hearing on April 21. We're here today, and we're hoping to get to city council by June 29. At the planning board hearing on May 6, the board voted unanimously to recommend approval. And so far, we haven't received any comments. I should say, when I did these notes and send this presentation, we had no comments. I did receive one comment that you're gonna get for city council from someone that had some concerns about traffic.

So I'll make sure that you have that in your packet moving forward before the public hearing. So now let's look at the review criteria. For a resounding to be approved by city council, it must be found that the requested map amendment is consistent with three standard review criteria plus our additional five review criteria for a PUD. Our role as staff planners is to evaluate the requested district, in this case, the PUD g 41 and PUD g 42 against these eight criteria. The first criteria is consistency with adopted plans.

There are three plans applicable to the three zoning. Have We comprehensive plan 2040. We have blueprint Denver, and we have the Laredo Heights area plan from 2019. Well, the proposal is to rezone all of the area that I showed you, like both BUDs. I'm gonna focus in this presentation in the small site, how the small site complies with the review criteria, but, of course, you know, you have all the detail in the staff report, so you can look at more detail there.

As stated in staff report, the rezoning is consistent with several goals in the comp plan 2040. This map amendment will continue to support the efforts to preserve and reuse existing historical buildings in Laredo Heights area. Now looking at look at Blueprint Denver. The parcel that it's moving from the residential PUD to the campus core PUD falls within the special district context. The same context assigned to most of the campus core PUD.

The proposed rezoning is consistent with the special district context, land direction as it will continue to support the preservation and adaptive reuse of historic buildings and new residential and commercial development in a campus setting. As you can see on this map, the parcel proposed to be moved from residential PUD to campus core PUD is identified as campus in the future place map in Blueprint Denver. The proposed rezoning will continue to address the historic core of the former Laredo Heights campus with the preservation and adaptive reuse of the historic buildings and new residential and commercial development in the campus setting. The proposed district continues to be consistent with the future place guidance mapping this area. Blueprint Denver in the land use and build form section provides some additional strategies on adaptive reuse.

This proposed rezoning is consistent with Blueprint Denver as the BUDs will continue to facilitate and support the adaptive reuse in the existing buildings on the site. The proposed rezoning supports the city's goal to reduce climate impacts by supporting and facilitating the adaptive reuse of the existing buildings and amenities. Blueprint Denver also provides guidance on when we should allow for the use of custom zoning. In this case, due to the many unique attributes of the property, including the challenging topography and the variety of remaining historic resources located in the center of the site, there is no standard zone district that can address the site's unique and extraordinary circumstances. Therefore, the use of a BUD is consistent with the recommendations of Blueprint Denver.

Now looking at the Laredo Heights small area plan, consistent with Blueprint Denver, the neighborhood context and future place type designation remain an unchanged. The subject site is identified within the special district, neighborhood context, and as part of the campus future place type. The residential PUD is characterized by a mix of low, low, medium, and high residential designations with recommended building heights ranging from two and a half to three stories. The campus core PUD is designated as campus future place type with allowable building heights up to five and eight stories. We add with the addition of the subject parcel, the future place type designation remains unchanged.

The campus definition emphasizes the importance of transitions stating that when adjacent to low intensity development, the campus should transition gradually to respect the surrounding neighborhood. Consistent with that guidance, sub area c includes specific development standards intended to ensure that any future structure provided an appropriate transition to a lower residential zoning to the north and the west. So that's what I was saying that here we have those setbacks and the lower height that would allow for that transition. Now looking at the public interest, the proposed rezoning would further the public interest through implementation of city adopted plans, including the Loreto Heights small area plan. The changing boundaries in the BUD will continue to facilitate the preservation and reuse of some of the existing structures on the former campus.

And then for the third criteria of the standard review criteria is consistency with neighborhood context, zone district purpose, and intent statements. And as you know, with a PUD, we actually call on to give more refined reflection on this. So I'm gonna move on to the five additional review criteria for a PUD. The first is criteria a. The PUD district should be consistent with the intent and purpose of such district stated in article nine, division 9.6, which is where we house PODs within the Denver zoning code.

And it lists some specific reasons under which we should utilize a POD. We believe that in this particular case, it is appropriate because this site has a special characteristics related to a scale of development, the topography, as well as a timeline timeline of development that calls for a more customized approach to create successful outcomes. Now criteria b says that the PUD should comply with all applicable standards for PUD. Embedded in the PUD, there's a line that says it shall comply with all the applicable standards in the criteria. Now criteria c says that the development proposed on the subject property is not feasible under any other zone district and would require an unreasonable number of number of variances and waivers and conditions.

As you know, scenarios of this development were resold in 2021 into standard districts, as I mentioned before, the MX and the campus district to SI, to a south. But this PUD required customization of different standards district to meet the overall intent of the development. In this case, we actually needed a PUD to create the most successful outcome through the combination of building forms and uses. Alright. Now criterion d, does the BUD establish permitted uses that are compatible with existing land use adjacent to a subject property?

The uses allowed on this site are consistent with either the SSU, SRH, URX, and the campus zone district. These are not allowed users in the BUD. They are not allowed users in the BUD that are not part of these districts. And given the scale of this site, we believe that some of the campus uses embedded within it are appropriate appropriately applied as well. And finally, the BUD establishes permitted building forms that are compatible with the adjacent existing building forms.

Similar logic. The BUD districts allow building heights and building forms that are compatible with surrounding neighborhoods. The setbacks and building forms restrictions ensure appropriate relationship to adjacent properties and historic character of the campus score and surrounding neighborhood. Okay. Four, we believe that the proposed rezoning meets criteria e as well. So finally, finding that all eight review criteria have been met, CPD recommends that the committee move this to a vote for city council. I'm happy to answer any questions, and we have here Arton Venues for any other questions.

Thank you so much. I will start the queue with council member Flynn, whose district this is in.

Second, madam chair. I didn't really have a question, mostly an observation, and that is just how much effort it takes to make a tiny little adjustment in the boundary of the PUD, but this is something that makes a lot of sense and I'm I would sure I'm not a member of this committee, but I'm certainly in favor sending it to the floor. It certainly makes sense to preserve the views and to provide that buffer. It's all related to the theater development, which is why Arts and Venues is sponsoring it. So I'd be happy to see this on the floor. Thank you.

Thank you. I appreciate that. Councilmember Almeidro is here next.

Thank you. So I didn't follow exactly. So the admin building will be demolished. No. It's here. Okay.

No. We're not touching any buildings. Okay. So this is just a small sliver of land, like 14,000 square feet

Mhmm.

That currently were part of the residential BUD. So they were just kind of the street goes there. Like, it it was just next to the street. And we talked about different ways that we because there's many ways that we could have gone about this. Like, we could have changed the use in the residential BUD. We could have allowed for the parking use in the BUD in the residential BUD, but then that opened a door of having more parking in other areas that we didn't wanna see. So we decided that it was better to just change the boundary to this one be included and have a use that it's already allowed in the court beauty. But no. No buildings being touched. No.

So this existing context with the house and apartment building on Slide 10, that doesn't exist. That's that's let me The existing context is is actually just vacant land.

So these these two images are on the outside. So that's like a very

SPEAKER Nearby, but not out Yeah. On the SPEAKER

This is me trying to I thought that maybe I need to make it more clear, I should say. The red is what's on the development, and what's in blue is outside of there. So it's like the context surrounding. And

how did is there like a TDM plan that determined how much parking was needed, or how was that decided? That's a question maybe that's a question for

Our design team.

You might have to come up to the microphone and then introduce yourself, please.

Arts and venues in coordination with Sorry.

Introduce yourself first. Thank you so much. I apologize.

No worries. Matt Young, Denver Arts and Venues. And we're working with DOTI interagency team who's implementing our contract. Their design team and consultants have performed a transportation mobility study based on the whole campus, including the library and a potential amphitheater. And then as we refine the scope, it got down just to the theater. We refine the scope of the quantity of seats in the theater. And another parking mobility study was done to accompany that and justify the parking garage and quantity of spaces.

Okay. And then in that TDM plan, what other types of plans were there? Is there bike mobility? Like, what is the transportation plan in this area in general to rezone, like, such a large amount of space for parking? So can you speak to what other plans are there for?

So on the north side of the development, we're going work with West Side and the metro district there to get an RTD stop. And then bike, there's 25 bike racks throughout the campus just on our property. And then the adjacent streets to the south of the theater all have public parking.

Okay. That's helpful. And then what about is there a vehicle charging requirements for this parcel that might be

The parking garage will have electric vehicle charging stations quantity based on CASR's ordinance. And then we'll also have EV ready stations to add add EV charging in the future.

And so for this whole new development, there will be one RTD bus stop now?

That's all in progress. We're working with the Metro District on that. So it's not there yet, but but that's in progress.

And so do you know, like, how many seats in the theater versus how many parking spots are

in this?

700 seats in the theater, two fifteen parking spots in the parking garage.

Okay. So everyone else is expected to get there in other ways

Correct.

Or park in on public parking. Okay.

Yes. And the mobility plan had the quantity of space of public parking in the right of way adjacent to the theater. I don't remember that quantity, but it's in the three digits. It's 100 low hundreds, I believe.

And then the housing has a separate Correct. TDM plan. Okay. That's helpful. Thank you. That's all I have for now. Thank you. Thank you, committee chair.

And I'll just quickly follow-up and ask if you could email to the committee members or whomever. I can get it out to everybody the actual study part of the study. We would love to see that.

Yes. I will follow-up with that.

Thank you. I have madam Proton next and next and last in queue.

Thank you, madam chair, and thank you for asking some of those questions. I had a just what is it currently? What is the what is currently in the in this parcel of land? It's vacant. It's just vacant land. I was trying to look and see. I couldn't tell, like, what it is. So Yeah. It'll have just the access. Is it one access point in and one access point out?

Yeah. So you can see oh, it's hard to see in the map, but so the street goes, like, right next to the lot. It it's kind of like the road that divides the BUD, like, residential BUD from the campus score. And what's interesting is, like, that there's a lot of topography in that street. So it's like it's like the the the garage, the parking garage when it's built. It's not gonna be very intrusive because it goes up, and then you can see the library and the theater up there. So it's it's a good spot for it because it's not gonna be super disruptive with the residential that has a golden topography on the to the west. But, yeah, right now, it's vacant.

Okay. Great. Thank you. Thank you, madam chair. Good. Anybody else have any questions before we alright. Great. I will take a motion and a second. Moved by Sawyer, seconded by madam madam president. Anybody here? Thumbs up from all the committee members. All good. Great. Alright. Thank you so much, Fran. I appreciate it. Thank you. The next thing that we have is a presentation by some of our colleagues. We got a little preview of it in budget and policy. This is number o six eight six lobbying reform with councilmembers Torres and Gonzalez Gutierrez and Lewis, although she is out of the conference, and then the clerk's office.

I have to sit in the seat. No. When you guys are settled behind us.

When you

guys are settled,

Thank you, madam chair. And thank you to the community planning and housing committee for accommodating us. We really appreciate This

is not usually the topic that this committee would be great. Anyone is watching popular. Sorry. If anyone is watching and curious, this is coming to this committee just because our our schedules have been so jam packed, and this was kind of where we had some space. So, no, this is not about planning or housing exactly. But it could risk. It

could be.

We get lobbied about it. Alright. Go ahead, guys. Thank you so much.

Well, thank you. Thank you very much. We are here to formally present the changes and updates to lobby ordinance. I want to let and his team introduce themselves, but I just want to thank the committee. We were at budget and policy last week. We had great, I think, dialogue about some decision making points that we want to share with you all as well. Councilwoman, do you wanna say anything as

No. I don't think I have anything else to add. I feel like we'll get the presentation. You all will get updated on some of the those decision points, and I think we're ready to go. Okay.

Let's do introductions, and then I'll do a quick intro.

Sure. I'll start. Andy Sikiris, chief deputy city clerk, clerk and recorder's office.

Paul Lopez, Denver clerk and recorder.

Nick Mann, the campaign finance admin administer for the Denver clerk and recorder's office.

I will say it's been a really good opportunity to work with this team as they've been able to see over several years what does and does not get reported, more likely does not get reported when it comes to lobbying activity, which I think we're all very interested in making sure has greater accountability and transparency. So we started talking last year, and the team has done a really good job. It's just trying to thread a needle on some responsible language. So I'll turn it over to Andy and or the clerk and or Nick and walk through the slides.

Do you want to do a little intro?

Yeah, sure. I mean, I really appreciate the partnership and the willingness to hammer out some of these things, especially creating, like, a foundation and a framework in which to operate. Because when you don't have that, there's no guidance. And when there's no guidance, there's just it's chaos. And I think at the end of the day, you know, my office and our our office is committed to a larger vision of a culture of participation and basically restoring faith in the democratic process.

And that doesn't doesn't include voting. That also includes just faith in representative government. Right? And and, you know, voting in elections, obviously, but also faith in public service, which is has eroded. And if you look at the the the spiritual part of this, that that the the faith in elected leaders and elected office is at an all time low.

The cons the conspiracy theories, the misinformation, things like that, you know, false narratives, examples of, like, rare stories that are applied to the whole, you know, it it's it's an honorable thing to to be elected by the people and to represent and work on behalf of the people. It absolutely is. And I think it's, you know, the restoration of that faith in government, that faith in in in in what we do on behalf of the people requires transparency. Right? I think restoring that trust requires transparency and also making it easier for folks who have any question or any doubt about the intent of government or representatives of government to be able to easily access that information without having to take a research methods class to be able to do it.

We did this with campaign finance with MapLite. We simplified it. We increased the tools and the capability for folks to be able to access things like campaign finance. The larger vision of that was and still is things like lobbying, things like contracts, and everything behind that. So, you know, this is something that's that's that's always been, you know, important for us in terms of creating that trust, that transparency with the public, but, you know, making sure there's a framework on which to operate if there isn't, then so these are good these are great push for steps. This is at a one size fits all. It's the end all, be all. No. And I think there's a lot of learning that we have to have. So so with that I did

also wanna point out Laurie from the board of ethics is also here.

Oh, thank you, Laurie.

Graciously given us some time just because I know it blends sort of near, and there were some questions around that. So I appreciate you joining us as well. I'll go sort of quick quick through this, because I know you've all sort of received this, but, really why is the reform needed as the clerk touched on. The law is pretty dated and confusing. It provides fails to provide meaningful transparency.

We noticed some opportunity gaps over some of the bigger, more spicy fights that have come in front of you with some outside spending to identify that. Really, the goal is to increase transparency in local decision making, provide clear and relevant information to the public and lobbying community, aligns with best practices, and then establishes really a fair and consistent enforcement model based on campaign finance. Some new disclosure requirements, compensation will be reported by client per period so we can roll up and see how much is being spent in in sort of those those big ramp up cases or generally across categories. Disclosure activity to identify which covered officials were lobbying, lobbied, client they were lobbied on behalf, and then if available, council bills, ordinances, different different pieces. But really, who is lobbied, in what period, and by whom is really the goal.

And so you can sort of see on a report. Additionally, lobbyists will have to identify themselves and a client when they're contacting you for meetings or public testimony, things like that. So you're aware ahead of time, so it's not a surprise. Grassroots lobbying, so the spending on public campaigns to urge your officials and contacts to them. I think we've seen it on TV ads, billboards, radio ads, etcetera to sort of sway your vote.

This also would extend to the mayor's prerogatives of veto or or signing legislation. Creating clear and consistent who can be lobbied. So this is covering elected and appointed officials. It does not include career service employees. Again, all obligations will fall on the lobbyist.

That is what they're being paid for to do. Also, on top of lobbies, file the correct paperwork. And really, there's no additional obligation on you all on this other than maybe if you feel like you've been lobbied, sending them our way to make sure they're doing it correctly and or if you feel like they've really gone astray filing a complaint against the lobbyist that will be adjudicated by a hearing officer. Clarify who a lobbyist is. So it really is a person who receives compensation for lobbying.

If it's part of their salary, that would be included starting at a thousand dollars. And then really current exemptions, volunteer lobbyists would not be included if you're lobbying as a public official. That would not be covered and then representing themselves even if they are lobbyists if they're coming to you for a rezoning question or historic designation or lobbying on behalf of themselves that wouldn't be covered under this. This is an old deck, so I know that there is a discussion on sort of timeline, and I'll let you sort of figure out their discuss where everyone landed, but the creation of a cooling off period. I think we've landed sort of close to the ethics code and sort of timing and the really preventing the revolving door of influence.

You can't roll off counsel and immediately go be a lobbyist right away and or, you know, an agency head or or someone in that sort of vein. Be very clear that aids are not included in this language. And then just an improved enforcement protocol and language for us, really sort of taking the the enforcement directly out of mine or Nick's hands unless it's reeducation or a small fine, things like that. We don't wanna get too heavy. But if it really is an egregious case, referring it to a hearing officer that can make

It's Councilman Flynn, can you mute? Councilman? I didn't

know what's happening. Glad you guys did.

Coming from above.

I was like, what's going on?

We're all descending. People are sitting there.

At this point, you never know it.

That's unfair.

So and and I I do believe I heard the question. It is written in the bill. It is 18 here. This was decided after this was submitted in what is in Legislature. So and then just the model of the language really is if there is an egregious case, it can refer to a hearing officer which can levy substantially larger fines or actually pull an ability to lobby for a certain period of time, but that would be adjudicated by a hearing officer, not by Nick or I to sort of really make sure the enforcement and the regulator have have some some space. And then I'll sort of pause there. I know that there's been some bill updates since this piece on it and sort of turn it over.

Thank you so much.

I think what we were debating, there were two different lines of inquiry. The first is about a cooling off period, and the second is about who falls under reporting requirements. Where I connected with council members asking where they wanted to be on the cooling off period. Six months was the overwhelming space, largely because it already aligned with an established, excuse me, almost probationary period for ethics code. There were a few others who were fine with either, with either six months or a year.

I didn't really hear too many folks asking for more than a year. So we'd like to move forward with six months. And I will say I think there is movement here in the not too distant future, because my understanding is that the ethics code language itself might need some updates, we would like to make sure that we're not different even at that time. So while our language doesn't hinge on the six months of the Ethics Board, it should not be dissimilar if and when the Ethics Board updates their language and potentially extends that time period. So we'd just like to be consistent along the path in future iterations.

So that's kind of where we've landed now. I'm interested in any feedback and questions. On the other track of who gets who does reporting take place with, I believe we landed with aids being included in that. Correct me if I'm wrong.

So what we are forecasting and sort of looking at is not individual aids but as the office as a So it would be if it was a direct communication with you, it would be listed as with you. But if it was with an aid, it would be with the office because we did feel it would be slightly unfair to lobbyists and other folks to know sort of an active running list all the time of who's in what office. And so it would be still a communication to your office in a lobbying capacity, but to your office, not to and additionally to some of the boards and commissions that would be sort of under this as well. So it would be just a lobbying activity if you sent an a to a meeting or they bumped into them at a public, you know, things like so really, still the communication on behalf of what what client would be captured, but down to the aid as an individual, we thought it may be kind of hard to manage with sort of just generally knowing who's an aide versus an intern versus, you know, what role. And I know you all also had some discussions of, like, actually creating different ranks in your office in terms of staffing.

So we figured this would be the best way to cover it and see what the data looks like, and and then we can really sort of come back if we think it does need to be individual aids or, you know, so we could come back with some data on that.

Yeah. We figured nobody really, you know, is in our ops conversations or our HR working group and knows that we're actually thinking about the classifications and titles that we've got for our aids. And not everyone is an aid, and not everyone may be an aid in the future, so we don't want to write something into the ordinance that prescribes something that may change in the future. So this felt like the cleanest way just to cover that somebody's been talked to in councilwoman Torres' office. Office. So I think that's it. Happy to take your questions. Great.

I have councilwoman Sloyer first in the queue.

Awesome. Thank you. I was trying to look up the language, which

is why I was not ready. I did not know

I was going first. Sorry. In terms of the aligning with the ethics code, is there a way to write the language so that we don't have to go back and change the ordinance when the ethics code gets updated? Like, this might be a John question.

Phone in a friend.

Right? Like, it just and I don't it might already be like that.

I just didn't look it up in time to you. Probably isn't yet.

And and John can I spoke with Ben about this, and John can jump in as well? Okay. Is it's a on it's page 15, and and right now, it does not have a direct tie in. And Ben's strong legal opinion that John can can jump in here as well is that citing a different section of code in the statute is would not be good drafting. What he'd rather do is and what our office is more than happy to do is if you folks change this, either do a companion bill updating this or if the scope of the bill is appropriate for a single subject, include a change in this at the same time. So we Okay. Are in agreement with it conceptually. We did not think it should be in this. That was his opinion coming out of that. But right now, that language does mirror the six months.

There's just not a direct reference to the point of ethics in that in that phrase.

Okay. I John, do you have an opinion about this? I kinda disagree with Ben's read. That's why I'm

I'll just just throw him in. Yeah. I think everything that was said is accurate. The only thing I would add is usually when we're conforming other things to a further bill, it usually falls within single subject. So I would hope we don't have an issue moving forward. But, yeah, that it should be able to update along with any update. Yeah. Thanks, Doug.

And that was John Griffin, deputy legislative council. Council member Alvi oh, or

I'm not done.

I have one more. Okay. And then second question is around the lobbying of the aides. Like, what is the trigger for that? And the reason I'm asking is because I will tell you, like, my aids in their, like, annual goals in Workday, it is annual goals for them to actually, like, work to make active connections both internal to the city and external to the city as part of their professional development.

So, like, that's what Workday says about my aids, and I feel like then there gets into this weird spot where, like, I have told them that this is what they should be doing because it's part of their job, and then now the lobbyist is Sure.

Having to report that

or, like, what is the threshold or whatever? Like, I just I think we all just need a little clarity.

And we've sort of wrestled with this too. Right? Like, what is sort of the trigger because the aides don't take an official sort of action.

Right.

Right? It would sort of fall under the same as we sort of see it, hi. I need your boss to vote for this. Right? Is that sort of trigger or or, hey. Can you get involved and help move this project for me with a board or commission? Right? Like, in in your capacity. That is how we're sort of envisioning the same trigger. Right? We don't wanna stop them from attending community meetings and having that be reported or walks site tour, you know, like, the things that that that falls under that. But really, it's the high, hey. Do you know where so and so is gonna vote on this? I you know, can you find out for me? Okay.

You know, are are you guys gonna be a yes or no? It's sort of the triggers of of those similar to you all if we don't wanna hinder the sort of stakeholder process and the the briefings you all get in those type of things.

Okay. Did you have something you wanna

Well, I mean, I I think the intent so so when you look at this, the the aides are a function of you and your office, right, in their official capacity. And, you know, they should not have report every conversation they have in passing by, but when you are officially being lobbied when you're officially being lobbied on anything that's that's in front of you, you may not have the time to do it yourself and your aides are just as good as doing it. And I think part of that is is mirroring what exists on the federal level as well too. If you've ever lobbied on the hill, you're meeting with the staffer mostly. Right. Most likely. It is just as important. And I think part of that is is the intent is is to to recognize the actual function of the office and the function of those aides and their official capacity as opposed to the passing by.

Okay. Really appreciate that clarity. I think that Yeah.

Makes a

lot of sense. Yeah. Okay.

Thanks. That's it. Yeah. Thank you. Before we go to councilmember Vedras, I just wanted to mention that this was an item that had public comment, but no one signed up. So I skipped right over that in the councilmember questions. Yeah. Anyway, council member Alvedrez.

Thank you. Just to clarify, so lobbyists need to report meeting with an aide, but aides are not required to have a cooling off period or they

are Correct. They are? They are not required. Required to have

a cooling off period. Okay. And so the ultimate decision around appointees for the mayor as well are, like, their appointees do have to have a cooling off period, but not the legislative liaison. Yes. Just wanted to get started.

We actually narrowed it to just the mayor's cabinet. So not every appointee in his office, just the cabinet and elected officials are covered by the cooling off period.

Okay. Okay.

Thank you. That's all I had.

Can I actually hold on? Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. I just wanna make sure everyone else got in queue. No. You're good. At the moment, that's what I just was last council president, did you wanna next it then?

Does the cabinet equal the 14 positions under charter?

Yes. Okay. The 14 positions under charter Oh, not safety. Are not there's the there's the three safety positions in there, chief of police chief, fire chief.

Include them here? Referred to what's in charter.

I think we've actually added in a definition of the mayor's cabinet that references charter section 2.21 a. So But

it's not the three safety

It's not the three safety And after the most recent vote, it includes the executive director of RCP. Excise and license in HRCP, but not or whatever we call excise and license now, d for protection. C p. LLC. Licensing and consumer protection. Right. So it's actually it was 10 positions. Now it is 12 positions, but it does not include, for example,

the executive director of host.

It does not include, for example, the executive director of DITO. Correct. It does not include right? None of those positions, none of those agencies were created in charter. It does not include the executive director of CASR. None of those agencies were created in charter. So those agencies heads cannot qualify to be deputy mayor. Those agency heads also are then external to this. So just so you guys like, that's what I wanted to jump in and say. It's it's a little more complicated than that because it is it's 12 positions, but it is not all the positions in the city and county of of all of the executive directors.

It is manager of safety, parks and rec, DOTI, HRCP, DCLP, DLCP DLCP. DLCP, you know, and then, like, kind of the big ones Yeah. But not it is not some of those other ones that were created either in ordinance or by executive order and not in the charter.

Yeah. Council president, does that answer? Do you have more questions? No. Thanks. And then did you have other questions, or you just wanted to get back in to say that?

No. I just wanted to say that because I'm actually not convinced that that's the right way to go. Yeah. I am I am actually a little bit concerned about that because I do think even though Host was created in ordinance, the executive director of Host should be a part of this, even though Dido was created, I think, by executive order.

It's a

clear Dido should be included in here. Kasr was created by executive order. Kasr should be included in here. And, like, I just it's

We don't disagree with you, so let us figure out a way

to add that. And I understand the mechanism is difficult to explain why those ones should be included. And very easy to just say the charter agencies Correct. Is why we went with that for our council approval of mayoral appointees. Correct. But when we're talking about something like noncompete Yeah. Especially where we're struggling to recruit leadership for these physicians because they don't get paid very much, it pits agency heads against agency heads when they should all be on the same team. Because it would be better to take the executive director of DDo job We need

to figure out what the right language is to pick those. Because it's not like your average policy analyst appointee. It is a head of a department, an agency. So let us work on that because I don't think we're in disagreement with you. Yeah.

It's just a tough mechanism unless you want to say charter agencies and then specifically list out head of AVD, head of host.

Which we know changes. So

don't don't know exactly how you do it. Yeah. And if you can't do it, I understand why, but I'm very uncomfortable with the idea of Yeah. Including some and not I could see that.

Yeah. And and I think at your core, what you're concerned about is the is the intrinsic conflict of interest that could arise because of the position approving contracts being the signature, being everything on that. So I think part of that is just looking at it. I think there's a way to do that really easily.

Think it's fair.

It's beyond charter.

Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate that. Thank you.

Okay. Great.

Does anyone else want to get in queue? Because I have questions. No one else is in yet, but I'm gonna check for Flynn too. I

have just a real quick question. Go for it. So that also means the airport and the airport is not included.

The airport is a charter agency Charter agency. Part of

this already. Okay. Having a moment. Good. No. Okay.

Thank you.

That was it. So a couple of things. I think I just wanna be super clear that I that I heard this correctly versus seeing the slide. Can you guys tell me again where the cooling off period is at now? Six months. Okay. And the slide still says eighteen, just from the old record. Correct. Really still think it should be longer. I know you guys kind of talk to members of the body, but six months is so short that the same policies are still gonna be, like, moving through in that time, especially, like, we take a while on things. The state is two years. Federal is a year, as you know. The federal cooling off period is widely viewed as way too short. Six months to me feels like it will just be very ineffective. So I know you asked that question before.

I don't think that I had answered it personally. So I don't know. Yeah. If you wanna talk a little more about why but understanding the tracking with Board of Ethics, I still don't know that that's to me, I don't know that that tail should wag this dog, I guess.

Well, you're in the minority, I would love to say That's fine. In my conversations with counsel, though I do understand where you're coming from on it, especially because we're looking at, I think, even two years at the state level. But I do want to make sure that we get a package passed and that I'm hearing where most folks are comfortable, and they're most comfortable being in line with where the ethics line is also at. And I guess my assumption is that we're going to be looking at that language pretty promptly as well. I think this has definitely urged us to make sure that all of our language is up to date, especially that one.

And so I don't anticipate it'll stay at six months terribly long, but we did want to make sure that we were hearing the body and most folks were at six. Okay.

Me then ask Laurie to come up to Mike and introduce herself, and I have a quick question about that. Thank you. Thank And I just am curious if you could say a little bit more about whatever update you're undergoing, and if you have a sense of where that will land. If it's premature, it's Okay.

So with respect to this bill, one of the things Councilman Flynn had asked me a question about this as to where perhaps the cooling off period might reside. My thought was for subsequent employment in February of the Code of Ethics, it's not really applicable very often for employees leaving the city. I think for the average employee, six months might be right. My suggestion was that employees need to have notice in the code of ethics if they're going to be held to an eighteen or longer month period in the code of ethics while they're employees as to what happens when they leave. So there should be some consistency.

And my suggestion was I always look at the purpose of this. So we don't want people using their relationships and their knowledge of matters they just worked on while they were in the city. When we're talking about the higher level officials and electeds, that should be maybe a longer period of time. So my suggestion was 2.64 has a couple. It has an A and a B, adding like a C that kind of speaks to lobbying and the need to have a longer period for some certain individuals.

But again, I think it's important that the ethics code give notice if the if the term is gonna be longer so that people don't say, well, here I was told when I joined the city I'd have a six month clean up period. But now I'm reading this, I have eighteen months.

Okay. So the provision that we're talking about that we've been referring to throughout is the provision that applies to all city employees in the ethics code or or most. And and I guess then my question back to the and I think, Laurie, that I don't have any other other people may have questions for you,

but I'm good. So you

can sit down if you're Oh, thank you so much. I don't wanna make you keep standing there. Question for the sponsors of the clerk's office then is if the if the current ethics provision is sort of it's much broader. Right? And and the concerns about changing that would be notice to employees and also maybe that we don't wanna change that. I I'm still a little bit it leaves me with a little of question mark about why we would pass an ordinance that is specific to those of us that are higher level, but then turn to the board of ethics to carve out a new provision for those of us that are higher level when we just pass an ordinance about it. It just I'm just not understanding that. I

don't know that I have an around that. I think we are doing one step at a time, particularly because there's so much more that's being added in authority and responsibility on this team to get in place. We just want to make our first entry into real reporting and real accountability when it comes to, frankly, the reporting side of this, not even so much the cooling off side. I think we all saw several electeds leave office in 2023. I didn't get lobbied by them, so they didn't come to counsel necessarily to lobby, even though they had registered as lobbyists for something else in Denver.

So I do want to make sure we're solving a problem, and I'm not yet seeing that as a problem that needs that much of a step. I think we can get there, and I don't have a

problem getting there at some point. Okay. And does the existing cooling off period that's in the ethics code already apply to all appointees? It would because they're state employees.

It does.

Yes. Okay. So the so what's new here is applying it to electeds? Yes. Okay. Alright. And having it in

this section of the code. Sure. Yeah. Mhmm.

Okay. My other question goes back to the topic of who's covered. So first talking about, as council member Slayer recognized, the fact that there's lots of who we think of as agency heads that aren't charter level. I very strongly agree with that if we can figure out how to define And then why not include folks in the mayor's office? Because they seem very likely to potentially go out and lobby.

Are you talking about, like

say that again. So people who are not charter level, like, agency heads but are, like, the mayor's chief of staff, the mayor's legislative director, the I mean, those seem like positions we would really care about because those are quite powerful and close to the nerve center of the city. Yeah.

But still be applied to that rule.

Oh, I know. I'm talking about the lobbying, though. Oh.

Those are all appointed positions.

Sure. Yeah. I think we we we're we're I think we're sort of open to that. We were trying to figure out what the sort of bright lines to sort of figure that out is. I think we could look at expanding that. The the biggest problem we've sort of run into is is not every administration sort of looks the same and has the same title and and sort of roles and responsibilities. So we'd love sort of input on if we want to expand it into those roles. I do hear you that I think they're involved in a lot of different things. I'm just not exactly sure how we capture it in the ordinance. Because we're talking about, like, Adam Paul, Jeff Dolan, or

Melville Moshe. I mean yeah.

I think I mean,

I think and councilman Swaye, we're getting at this is we're looking at those that are appointed by the mayor. Right. So they're that you're you're talking about are appointed to the mayor. Like, our appointed by the mayor.

Sorry. Council aides are appointees. Right? The mayors those those positions within the mayor staff, those are appointees. They're not career service. So maybe that's the

That's the connection.

Distinction. I'm sorry. I'm trying to ask, am I correct that in the current bill, they aren't covered? Okay. Why not?

Because as we said earlier, that was a that was something we didn't maybe think about at the until councilwoman Swire maybe brought

And the distinction. I mean, they're appointed by the mayor. I think there's a difference between, in this particular city government, people that are appointed by the mayor as opposed to appointed by the other 12 electeds. I mean I don't think we disagree. Oversees all the agencies. Right?

Right. I think disagree with with the desire to look at that and how we can incorporate it, I think, what we've said.

And what I will say, where we were leaning was directors of divisions. They're making moment final decisions when it comes to contracts or hiring or whatever it might be. I think we get into overly broad territory in saying all all appointees that the mayor appoints what is that, 52, 54, or something like that? And it's everyone from the policy analyst to the boards and commissions director to an outreach person that we're saying, Okay, everyone now has a bright line around rolling into lobbying. People lobby for really great things, too.

We're not just, I think, policing lobbying. I think we're policing who has influence that they're gathering in their job? And it's harder, I think, to distinguish who has Johnston appointed to key roles. We didn't have a COO under the prior mayor, so we would have had to have named that or included all appointees if we're going to name a particular position. Just as a kind of thought, though,

and I see, Mr. Cook, that you also want to ask the question. But given that we define lobbying itself fairly narrowly, where it's asking for a specific policy action, typically, are not gonna ask the outreach person to tell the mayor to take a certain policy action. Or maybe they are. But, I mean, I think that problem maybe is sort of solved by the narrowness of the definition of what is lobbying. Right? Because most of the there are absolute people that take those meetings on behalf of the mayor. I would venture to guess that most meetings in which the mayor is being asked to do something, the mayor is not taking. So I think this is like and maybe the concept is similar to us in our offices where it's like if you're lobbying the mayor through someone that he's appointed, then it's reportable. You know?

Like, if what you're asking for is an action by the mayor because agency heads have their own discretion, so they're kind of being lobbied, like, in their

own

capacity, whereas the mayor, I would imagine, is usually lobbied through others. And I just think if we miss that, then essentially we're never going to capture lobbying of the mayor.

I hear that, and I also want the language to be as clear as possible for those who have to report, that they're not asking themselves, is this the right person or is that the right person, or what am I reporting in this particular two month period of time. Otherwise, end up with no activity because they can't decipher, am I reporting on that person or not? I don't know. Right, but even if the mayor has

say we say people that don't work with an agency, and we've had issues with we've had to fix this in the budget process, and we did fix that. Like, they now delineate if someone does a majority of their work for an agency. They're under an agency. Otherwise, they're within the mayor's office for budget purposes. So if we define the mayor's office the same way as we do for the budget, and lobbying itself is also narrowly defined, that is not that that many people, and anybody out there in the world knows when they're contacting the mayor's office to lobby. I mean, then it's, what, 30 people or something like that that actually work outside agencies in the

mayor's office. As somebody who's worked in an agency, an agency of the mayor's office, I would have interpreted that differently. I worked for the agency for human rights, not for the mayor's office. So if you're in children's affairs, not in the mayor's office, We're

talking about two different things, though, Jamie. I understand. So we also have this issue that the mayor creates, like, these sub agencies that we also have been trying to define, like, who are the heads of those. I'm just talking about the people that directly report up to him that are under no that are not given any kind of title of an office, nothing like that, that are just the people directly around the mayor. Almost all the lobbying that he gets comes through those people. And, again, we all know who they are. If if they're not covered by this ordinance, it's

Do you want want to

It's a huge problem, I think.

Councilmember, the, sorry, your original question about are they covered by the cooling off period? No. They are covered by covered officials for the purpose of disclosing meetings. We tried to split the meeting on that.

I think we have been quite confused. I have been trying to talk about the lobbying provision Okay. Not the cooling off period. Okay. About who can lobby the mayor. Who has to report lobbying?

Am I I'm picking up the program again. Yeah. I wasn't. Sorry.

I don't Can I ask the sponsors again then in the clerk's office for purposes of lobbying reporting if someone lobbies someone with a title in the mayor's office, again, you know Direct? That's as

diff counsel.

But Does that have to be reported

on As defined as in the current draft, that's before folks. Covered official includes any members of the mayor cab mayor's cabinet, comma, and any individual I'm sorry. Excuse me. Individual appointed by an elected official to serve in a policy making or advisory position, which we would define to include the mayor's Okay. Higher level staff.

Okay. And then second question, back to the cooling off period. Couldn't we use that same definition then?

We could. Okay.

Can I just jump in and add one thing? I will say there is a difference in, like, job classifications in HR between our staff members and mayoral staff members and a city staff member. Right? So, like, council member Torres worked for HRCP. She was career service. Okay. That is very different and has different rules than our aides Okay. And the people who work in the mayor's office who

are at will

employees and appointees. 100%. That's what our staff members are. This is an eight these are HR actual HR classification. So I think that it's possible to define like, to get to because I agree with council member Parity a 100%. And so I think it's possible to get to where she's trying to go in a reasonable way, thinking about it in terms of, like, the actual job classifications because there aren't very many at will employees in city and county of Denver. And the ones that that there are are appointees of elected officials. So I think, like, maybe that's the difference. If you are that would be a very

clear Still talking about cooling off period.

I think we're talking about both.

I'm talking about

both. Okay. Because

I think that that's a clear definition. If you're career service, that's a different space than if you are

an appointee if you are at will. Well, and our

aides are not technically appointees.

But they are at will. Yes. And so I think that's the classification piece, Right? Okay.

I I think it's we have to ask John. I'm gonna inform him. But I think it's defined in the so our in charter, our appoint our appointees are called appointees. Then in the code, we assign them part of the career service rules and part not. Right? And I think that was, like, to create parity amongst all

of us. All of us are

paying one council aide, like, a $150,000. Right? So that we could create that classification. I just don't know on the back end how that works with HR. So but I understand what everyone's saying, and I do understand that, like, thinking about Tim Hoffman and for not naming names, like, that's

Well, I

just saw a press release about this. He's the new director of legislation legislative affairs. So we're calling Tim. Tim, I'm calling you out. Formerly Angela, formerly Sky. How do you do that? They all had different titles. Sky didn't have that title. Yeah. Sky did not ever have that title. Sky had a different title, and then her title changed depending on what happened. So since I've been here for fourteen years, I've seen different titles in the mayor's office. And it's because they're appointees, they can create those titles.

Mhmm. Yeah. I think But I get what

you're saying.

Hard for me to believe that this is, an unsolvable

drafting problem.

I think I think

I think we can yeah. I think we're open to figuring out how to noodle this. We just need to go back and get that figured out.

I'll take on talking to HR on that. I do wanna sort of just make sure I'm do like, the press secretary is appointed. Are you wanting that person to be included, or is it just the high level sort of folks? Right? Just so I can as I'm having sort of that conversation with HR,

is it The press secretary is the mayor of Denver. It's like the secretary secretary for the mayor of Denver.

Like

Right. I just I just wanna

make sure it's lobbying?

I'm asking the right the right question.

Yeah. I mean, to like, I I don't know why. My particular opinion is that anyone who is doing what is defined as lobbying, if they're talking to anybody that was appointed by the mayor out outside an agency or an office, it should be reportable even if it is, you know, the person sitting at the front desk. Right now.

I feel like the language says that it is. I think the piece that we're debating is is the cooling off period. Right.

And and for then for I mean, it's it also seems like a cooling off period could fairly easily flow from, like, having had a substantial amount of lobbying reports made about them. We're basically just looking back to if we were in fact lobbied to a substantial degree or something like that. Then we have to have a cooling off period.

That's a little more

I think that feels challenging. Yeah.

Clerk?

If I might add, you know, I you know, these are one of those things that, especially with the absence of you don't you don't wanna allow perfection to be the enemy of progress. Right? This is a very first step. It's a very basic framework, a very important one. And I think part of it is just getting to the the the notion of conflict of interest and making sure there's transparency amongst obvious conflict of interest and what could be a conflict of interest or disproportionate treatment from, you know, if a director is in charge of asphalt, right, and then goes and, you know, within a few months resigns and say, you know, I can make more money in the asphalt business, and then starts lobbying and gets the contract, that's that that is an obvious conflict of interest in terms of the process.

Right? If I were to say, hey, you know what? I'm gonna go work for Dominion. Oh, no. It's not Dominion anymore. It's Liberty. I'm I'm done. I'm gonna go make some money. They want they're just want a huge settlement if you haven't read the news. Conflict of interest. I think part of it is just making sure that there are guardrails that are basic in place that people can understand without getting too technical in the terms. I agree with your spirit, councilwoman. I think, you know, really really doing a deep dive into this. I think the sponsors are are there as well too. I don't see any difference in opinion around the table of, you know, what can be, what should be transparent, and what should not be.

Or the question of who can get a contract and when they get a contract and the timeline in which they were serving the public and then after. Two separate things. The other thing I have to say is that I relied heavily on my aides. I relied heavily on lobbyists because one of the things is that we don't have I didn't have the bandwidth to be able to understand how, you know, jets are fueled and what kind of fuel they take. I was too busy. I mean, there was so many different things. So you don't wanna throw the baby out with the bathwater in terms of who's at the table and who can come to come to speak to their council person, right, whether they are living in their district or not.

So here's what I propose, because I think the only thing that we're hearing just a difference of opinion around is just the cooling off period, who it applies to. So you follow-up with HR. I'm happy to circle back around with folks, especially those of you who have been listening to this conversation. Follow-up But I'll just reiterate. I think I had hang on a sec.

I had six council members off for six months, three okay with either six or 12. So that leaves another four that had not gotten back to me with an opinion about cooling off. So I just want to make sure folks know where our body sits because I'll need seven votes to get this across the line, particularly if we know we can take other stabs at this if we feel like it's not working right, or it's not being applied correctly. So I'll circle back around.

Yeah. I

think the other the other issue on the cooling off is also around those that are appointed by the mayor. Right? So that's the piece that we just need to be able to get some more information and details around if how if and how that can be incorporated. I don't think we're in disagreement that that shouldn't that that that is necessary or I mean, I'm gonna use two negatives here. But you know what I'm saying? Like, we're not in disagreement with you with councilwoman Sawyer, councilwoman Parity that we should figure out how to capture some of those folks. We just need to see if that's possible and what that looks like. Mhmm. So I don't I just don't have the language right now because I get what

we're Well, and one more thing to be clear about is just circling back. Like, right now, you're adding this in ordinance for those employees, but they're already subject

to it under city ethics rules. So Different definition.

It's a different definition. Okay. That's really good to know. That's helpful, because I was going to say it's kind of somewhat academic, but maybe it's not if

the definition is. We're saying you can't register as a lobbyist in Denver, point blank. Ethics is saying you cannot lobby on something you were working on when you were a city employee for six months. Okay. Gotcha.

All right. Does anyone else have questions before we do a motion and a second? No. Great. Moved by council president, seconded by councilmember Rommel