Historic Preservation Advisory Board - Regular Meeting

Excuse me.

Today is 07/28/2025, and I am calling the Erie Historic Preservation Advisory Board meeting to order. Oh. I've been good. Sorry.

No. Came. The door's open.

Yeah. Okay. They were propped open when I came in.

Oh, they're

not. They're not. I'm just too cold. K. Are

you? Alright. Pledge of allegiance, please. Pledge of allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America to the republic from which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. And we have a full board tonight.

How about that?

Nice to meet. Party time, Mike.

Yeah. The lotto. K. Madam secretary, roll call, please.

Mike Turner. Here. Deandrea Arndt. Here. Melanie Fong. Here. Patricia Menace.

Here. Rachel

Folger. Here. Laura Thomas. Hi. Here.

We also have counselor

O'Connor? Yeah.

And O'Connor and Anil. We have our liaison, Harry, and we have Parson rep, Luke Bollinger, which you probably already got. Yeah. Has everybody had an opportunity to review tonight's agenda?

Yes. Nope.

May I have a motion, please?

I have one one request since Luke and Rachel are here joining us. I was wondering if we can move them up a little sooner on the general business. Maybe the after the budget report.

After oh. Before before the Before

yeah. Yeah. And, Mike, did you also wanna mention that?

Yeah. And then we need since we're gonna modify the the agenda, well, we can put that under new business when we get there. It's like, does anybody have anything else? We're talking about plaques for all the mines so people know where they were. Clayton Mine we know where the Eagle Mine is, Clayton Mine, Washington Mine, all those kind of things. That was Brian's recommendation. And so we can either say, hey. Does anybody have anything else or we can add it to the agenda?

It was clutter.

Pardon?

Well, whatever is clutter. It does this. It's like

But, yeah, it's been

It works under new business.

It's been the agenda has been a a motion has request is set forward to modify the agenda to have the COAs for Schofield moved up under the budget report.

Here's what you have to say.

So I moved to amend as noted. And I second.

Okay.

So is that all of the new business? Is that the COA and the barn or just the barn?

They're one and the same.

Okay. Just wanna make sure I

Mhmm. Yes. There's three documents, but they're all one thing. Got it. It has been moved that we approve the agenda as amended by Andrea Deandrea and seconded by Laura. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Approved unanimously. Has everybody had the opportunity to read the minutes?

Yes. Motion?

Motion to approve the minutes as minutes as ready.

Second.

Second. K.

Laura has moved that we accept the minutes as written, and it says seconded by Rachel Folger. All in favor?

Aye. Aye.

Normally, I just say Rachel, but Yeah. Okay. That gets us through here.

So

we don't we don't check for online. If there's nobody here, then there's no public comment. Okay. We also it's disappointing because we had invited

Check, though, the lobby. Since the door.

I popped the door back open.

Oh, okay.

Okay. Because I I had asked Michelle to invite the three applicants tonight, and I don't see them. So Oh. So okay. Events coming up is September 7 is the airfare, and yet it is a Sunday.

So and then we ask that if you can get your times to Melanie, please, so she can schedule. I have all the materials, so I will bring them. Okay? And I have a a big box of candy now. Okay.

Thanks to Brian.

What do you mean?

I just

Yeah. Put that together. Yeah. And then a couple weeks after that is biscuit day on the twentieth. And as you know, I will not be manning the booth that day.

For me.

Yeah. She's with the history historical society, and I actually work with the biscuits. So I'm not available. So we'll work that out as we get there, but make sure you I'll have it set up because Luke's team always comes and help set up. And then so I'll have it set up, but just you guys have to man it.

What should I can? I know I've I've already sent you.

Yeah. Okay.

Twelve. I'm

I'll be

there with

my Alright. Bonnet. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Can't wait. Okay. Okay. Budget report.

I can pull it up if you want, but no no changes to the budget report. Still the full 4,000.

Okay. So

probably not not much to show.

Have you heard any feedback on our request, our 2026 request?

No. I no. So we submitted that. I'll double check when those conversations actually happen when when they're setting the budget.

Yeah. Because, for the council members, we're anticipating, hopefully getting two grants next year. So they're both gonna be competitive grants. So we're asking for 20,000 this year. So and that's been submitted.

Yep. And next up is Schofield COA. Alright. Let me pop this on the shared screen here if I don't break it. Actually, it broke my computer for the passcode.

Super No. I gotta cut

a little little process intro too. So some of y'all we we don't do a lot of or, I guess, just haven't done a lot of COAs. It doesn't come up super frequently. The last one we did, of course, was for the town hall expansion probably about a year year and a half ago.

Yeah. It was a while.

But we do HPAP reviews and makes recommendations on COAs, and then eventually it'll go to council for final approval.

Anytime there's a anytime some Schofield is a landmark property, anytime there's a modification to a landmark property, a certificate of appropriateness, COA must come past this board. And that's what they're here for tonight.

Ready? Yeah. K. Well, good evening, everybody. I'm Luke Bologer. I'm the director of Parks and Recreation, and I will let Rachel introduce herself.

My name is Rachel Weissip. I'm the recreation division manager.

Rachel is kind of assisting. We're we're we're kinda co managing this project, since, recreation is gonna be largely or not largely, all of responsible for the programming at Schofield, I wanted to make sure that that Rachel had ample opportunity to really get involved in the project management side of things as her team will take over all the programming. So, yeah, we're gonna talk about the Schofield Big Barn re rehabilitation project. I wanna emphasize the word rehabilitation because according to the secretary of state secretary of interior standards for treatment of historic properties, it's a rehabilitation. Right?

So that you know, in in layman's terms, that's we're we're getting the structure back to historical look as much as we can while making modern upgrades. So it's not a restoration, and it's not a reconstruction. So just quick overview of what we're gonna be talking about tonight. We're gonna go over just a just for those of you not familiar with Schofield, hopefully, everybody is. We're just gonna do a quick background. What have we done today? Where are we going? I I think Harry touched on a little bit, but just wanna touch on the the certificate of appropriateness process for treatment of historical properties. I'll go over the a brief project overview. We'll get into the project schedule and then leave ample time for questions and discussion.

So Schofield background. So we purchased the Schofield property in in 2014 with Trails Natural Areas Fund and then quickly got to work on well, I say quickly. Four years later, we completed a master plan for the entire site. We saw lot a of community engagement. What does the site want? What does the community want the site to be? What's our vision for this site? What kind of programs, events do we want out there? So that was that's really our guiding document on on how we're we've been treating this project. I joined the town in June sixth of of two thousand eighteen.

And on June 7, I told the then director of community services this you gotta give me this project because it's super awesome, and I love doing the doing historic property rehabilitations. And and I've been working on it ever since. So I've been here for seven years. So this is my this is my labor of love. So in 2019, we were awarded a state historical funding grant for historic structures assessment that basically gave us a consultant to come in and do an assessment on all of the historic structures on the property.

Pretty much all of them are included in that structures in that structures assessment except for the Kwanzaa Hut, which is obviously the big metal building here in the bottom right. That's the only nonhistoric structure on on the property. In 2021, what what what we saw from the HSA and what we saw from the site conditions was there was pretty significant issues with the overall site and how it drained, and we wanna make sure we were preserving the foundations as much as we had. So I worked with, say, historical fund, received another grant for some site grading and and utility work, which is really important. So if if for those of you who've been around, remember, Schofield was not always on town utilities.

It was served by an on-site wastewater treatment, which was never gonna support any sick significant event. We were luckily we were lucky that nine mile came in and did all their sanitary line work along a Hundred And 11th, and we were able to take advantage of that and run a sanitary stub and a waterline potable waterline stub into the property, which will which has now which will now serve events of of of size that we'll we'll have here at Schofield. So that was funded a little bit. The design work was funded by State Historical Fund, and then the work was funded by the town. So we we ran in some some sanitarians and put water.

In 2024, received another State Historical Fund grant for the complete re rehabilitation of the farmhouse, which you'll see there on the top right. Came out really nice. Brought back a lot of historic features, brought back the historic porch, removed the nonconforming sunroom on the south side of the building, ADA access, upgraded all the mechanical, electrical, plumbing, That serves as some staff offices, myself included, and, and Rachel as well. And, it's a pretty amazing office site. So and then, in 2025 here in just a few weeks, we'll begin phase one of site improvements and and start to really, vision what the what the overall, site will look like.

So this is our conceptual plan. You can see, so Highway 280 Seven's off to the left. 111th Street is off to the right, and you'll see Schofield there in the top right. So this is a a a zoomed out version. You have Erie Lake here on the bottom left. And, really, we we took what we saw in the master plan, and then we kind of updated it knowing what we know about the sites. So we're gonna keep the wetlands intact. We're gonna keep the active ag lease intact, and we're gonna create some trail connectivity in some waypoints out here on outside of of the Hay property. Obviously, we launched hot air balloons from the site. So lot of viewing opportunities and and really enhancing the trail system through the Schofield property as that was a a big priority for for the Schofield site.

Oops. There we go. Zooming in a little bit to the what we call the building cluster. The barn there is circled in in yellow. Just wanna touch on a couple things. The office building is is obviously the farmhouse. The we've been working with economic development for the past few years in a nonprofit to develop the Quonset Hunt into a makerspace. So things like woodworking, painting, ceramics, textiles, even some technology based learning opportunities. So that project is scheduled to kick off here in the next month or so. But, obviously, we're focused on the barn.

So the barn's gonna serve as an event space for needed community space. So everything from weddings to graduation parties, retirement, community meetings, anything that we can think of, and it's gonna be all three floors. We're gonna rehabilitate the interior and make it event event ready. So I'm not gonna read through this, but just wanted to pop this in there just so so you all are aware. Harry did a great job covering really what it is, and then I'll go over a little bit the schedule and how this all works.

So that's where we're all presenting to you tonight. So project overview. So, again, we're talking about preservation of rehab for for community use as an event meeting and interpretive space. So we combine all three of those elements into the barn, and it's not just gonna be the barn. It's the entire site.

So consider this just one piece of this awesome puzzle that is Schofield. So the current project scope includes exterior improvements. That's what you all are looking at as exterior improvements, right, according to the secretary of interiors standards. And it includes masonry, so repointing all the original masonry, structural reinforcement, so looking inside, make sure the building can stand up. It's it's it's actually structurally structurally really sound, so we're very fortunate.

So we're rehabilitating the roofing, and I'll get to the couple pictures here in just a second. We're bringing back the original look of the roof, the cupola, wood siding, trim, windows, doors, rehabilitating all of those elements and bringing, you know, those kind of modern modern upgrades. Right? And I'll get into I'll I'll I'll show you what I mean by modern storefront doors here in just a second. But everything that you see on the barn will remain that look.

We're not changing any of the exterior. We're we're just making it look new again. Interior upgrades, which is a which is a separate town funded project, will address ADA accessibility. Right? So we're installing an elevator inside the the building, and then we're also addressing all all of the mechanical, electrical, and plumbing upgrades.

And we're working closely with the State Historical Foundation. I don't know if I mentioned this, but we did receive yet another State Historical Fund grant for $250,000 to fund the the exterior improvements only, but we are working closely with the state historical fund and McCleave and her team to make sure that we are meeting those standards. So we've we've been closely working with her on the on the construction documents. So just a couple of historic photos. Unfortunately, there's just not a whole lot of the barn itself, which is disappointing.

So this is so cool. That picture on the top left, I think the most the thing that bums me out about most about this picture is that big cottonwood that we had to cut down last last year because it was just on its way out. It's so cool. I wish we we would have kept it, but you can kinda see the red tint on the barn on the barn roof. You can't see the cupola on this picture. And then you can also see that the the top of the that's you can't really see that one. The the in in the nineteen sixties, they removed the top of the of the silo. The bottom is so that's that's looking that's the south elevation of the barn here that you're looking at. You're obviously standing just about where right in front of milk house. Mhmm.

The bottom right picture shows the north elevation where you have that that significant green change. So that's how you get access into the basement, and then you have the loafing shed there, and you can kinda see some cattle hanging out there on in the loafing shed. Again, not a lot of detail there, but it is kind of just really cool to see historical photos. This this photo here shows so a really good picture of the of the barn in its in its almost original state. You can see the the top of the silo, which we're gonna bring back, and I'll get to that in just a second where we got a really cool plan for the silo, and then, of course, the cupola back on the top.

And you can see the original hay doors, maybe windows, and then the entry doors on the for the first level. So a couple little just concepts from the from the construction documents. I'll I'll start here on the on the top left. It kinda hard to see because it's so small, a lot of detail. But what I was talking about is these these storefronts that we're gonna install. So we're gonna be installing some some glass entry doors, what you would see on a modern structure, but we're gonna keep these original sliding doors. So you'll be able to close the sliding doors and make it look like the historic barn. We work closely with the historical fund to meeting that requirement. And then what we're gonna do on the so that this is the up here in the top left left is the is the east elevation, I think. Nope.

That's the west elevation. And then on the bottom left is the east elevation where, again, we're we're we're we're bringing in those modern looking storefront doors, but yet we're gonna keep the the sliding doors to slide back.

Are you putting the sliding doors on the livestock entry? No. Okay. Because that would be the other side.

Yes.

Yeah. There's and there's no actually sliding door. So these are the only two sliding doors is on the west elevation or the east elevation.

Where the concrete is. Right?

Yes. You're yes, sir. You're exactly right. And then you can see what we're kinda gonna do with the silo. You look really closely, actually doesn't show up well on that on that presentation, which really that really that's a bummer. We're we're planning on putting a set of spiral stairs within the silo. We were we were figuring we were trying to figure out how can we use the silo, how can we make this a really cool amenity. And when we put the top back on the silo, we worked with our architect, and we're gonna put a set of spiral stairs within the silo and and make an observation deck to the inside. So you can access you can kinda see it right here, but you'll be the you'll be able to access it through the the 2nd Floor of the barn. So it won't be open access to the public.

It'll be open during certain hours of or for events and things like that. But, again, you know, just general, you know, again, replacing the doors or rebuilding the doors and the siding and the masonry are are really the the the foundational elements. Folding off the entry to the livestock pen from the silo? From the silo? Mhmm. Well, there's no livestock entry from the silo. Oh, there's a Yeah. On the bottom side. Yeah. On the bottom side.

Yeah. We'll we'll close that off, but we are gonna interpret that space to make sure that we we honor that that you know, because, obviously, the silo dropped down, and that's all the yeah. That's all the where the insulates came down to feed the livestock in the basement. So that's that those are those those are those historical interpretation opportunities that we're gonna take advantage of before we start the reconstruction process. So quickly, just a project schedule.

So on the June 13, we were awarded the state historical fund for the for the exterior rehabilitation. On the eighteenth, we reviewed the 90% construction documents. Those are going over to state historical fund for kinda one final review before they go to a permit set. Tonight, we're we're now at the HPAB meeting. Hopefully, on the fifteenth, we'll have a 100 of August rather.

We'll have a 100% construction documents, and then, pending HBAB's decision here tonight on this COA. Hoping to get, in front of council on the twenty sixth to approve that COA. And then shooting for, '3 for scheduled construction start. We'll start in the we'll start with the masonry repointing and a lot of the exterior work, and then we'll move into the interior as as the project progresses. So I don't have a construction schedule overall yet, but it will start in the in the '3 sometimes.

Just gonna happen. Is it going to be any traffic with the Makerspace? Because they're going in there in January. Right? Yes.

I've yes. We we'll have three contractors on the site. And so between Makerspace, the site improvements, and this contractor, yeah, we're working all that in internally with our with our contracting. Yep. Yeah. And we we have a we have a monthly contractor meeting with all of our consultants and all of

our contractors. So Okay. With that, I'll take additional questions and and discussion. I have a yeah. You mentioned that the town is funding the in the interior portion. Mhmm. Does that include environmental?

Yes.

Because it is all the feces. It's you can't go in there. Yep.

We've already done a cleanup, and then we're we're gonna have a sub cons a subcontractor of A and M renovations come in. It's Heron Enterprises. They'll come in and do a

full environmental say again? Heron Enterprises. Yeah. They're coming in and making it all nice.

It's they'll they'll clean it up before.

I mean, it looks nice inside. It just we weren't able to go down.

Yeah. Yeah. We've since cleaned a lot of that that old wood and and trash out of there. Yeah. Yeah.

What will the three levels be used for?

It's a great question. And I didn't have a floor plan here, but the the basement level will will include a suite. So, you know, if somebody would think of it like a bridal suite or something like that, just to kind of a flex room, office space storage, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing room, mechanical mechanical for the elevator, and and then the stairs. That's the basement. In the in the 1st Floor, we'll have kind of a flex space, a warming kitchen.

So if you wanted to bring in a caterer, you have a place. It's not a it's not a fully cooking kitchen. It's more of a, you know, like I said, a warming kitchen, two restrooms, and more storage and mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and elevator and stairs, and then the Top Floor is our big event space. I think it has a capacity of around almost a 100 people Yep. That you can put up there, elevator, the connection out to the bar or the silo. Let's see what else is up there. I'm missing something. I think we have a small storage room up there as well. So we're trying to keep it open as much as possible.

Did I miss anything? The section on the right, yeah, that's an awning. That used to be stock.

Are you talking about the loafing shed?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So that so that will be that's not part of this project. Okay. But we will rehabilitate that as well When the that will we're leaving that towards the second phase of the site improvements. So that building cluster that I that I showed you that kinda zoomed in, when we start I don't wanna go too fast, and that's exactly what I did. Oh, no. I didn't. So, really, what you're kinda seeing right here is that's the with the caveat of the parking lot here down at the bottom, what you're seeing around the building cluster, that's phase two, And that's when we'll start working on some of the other some of the other buildings and some of the side improvements, and that's what we'll do.

I don't know I don't know if this is has the town decided to shave or get rid of the greenery? Right now, we're saving it because it's a historical structure. We're we're not quite we're not quite sure what we're gonna do with it yet.

Yeah. It'll be rehabilitated. We just don't know exactly what the use is.

So It's decided that it that you wanna move it, then you don't wanna keep it or wanna move it, then the wise homestead has said they'll take it.

Oh, okay. Well, that's good to know. Yeah. Actually, that's actually really good information to know because we you know, we're not quite sure. We kinda have it set off here in this in this terraced area. Yeah. We thought maybe it'd be a cool addition to kind of the activities that you're doing on the terrace, but we're kinda throwing around some ideas. We're gonna take the original machine shed here in the middle, and we're gonna turn that into the site restroom building. We've got a really cool concept that that obviously, that will be a separate COA, but we've got a really cool concept to, you know, preserve that that the exterior, and then you'll go in and

Restroom building, the milk shed.

No. That's the machine shed, the original barn.

Oh, the original oh, the original barn.

Okay. We call it the original barn. This structure right here. Barn. Yeah. Yeah. Because it's in and, again, it's it's it's it's in pretty bad shape. We'll actually need to raise that structure. We're gonna we're gonna just interpret the Bruder House, which is right behind it. There will be there will we'll have some storage in there. So we've got a plan for just about every building so far, but I'll hopefully, it'll all it'll all work out in the end in terms of our budget. And then yeah. But the greenery and the and the milk house and the root cellar, we haven't quite figured out what we're gonna do pro matic. So those are those are future projects. But

They're just they're part of the site. So Yeah.

Yeah. Ask me, like, field trips or

I have not gotten the courage to go down into the root cellar that.

Yeah. It's actually really cool. I've I've been down there. Yeah. I think I usually catch a spider web or two. Yeah. Yeah. I bet.

Are the is it maintaining kind of the white wood color, or is there a different color composition here? Yep.

We'll maintain that that that white wood siding. And then I think the only change that you'll see that's pretty obvious is that red tint on the roof.

Right. Because you guys are doing cedar, the wood, instead, right, instead of?

Yes. Yes. That's a great question. Yes. We'll be we'll bring back the original cedar shake. And

then I just had a curiosity with the wetlands. Is there any wildlife over there?

Oh, there's tons of wildlife over there.

Yeah.

Are there any beaver?

There are not any beavers over there, but we've been actually visited. There's no nest. There's no active nesting site over there, but we we have a couple of bald eagles that like to hang out in the big cottonwood that's existing on-site.

So Squawking outside my office all day. Yeah. Thanks.

So there's a there's a there's a parent and a juvenile that's been hanging out there.

Like, every time I drive by,

I see him flying. Yeah.

Like, oh. Especially since they drained Prince Reservoir Number 2, I think they've been pretty well fed.

Yeah. Luke, one thing, is the parking good for the 100 people even?

Yes. We have we have adequately sized the parking lot for anticipated event, and we also have some overflow parking. Much like you see at the ECC with the native, we're trying to you know, we're we're we're we can open that up, and we can park people in in in that if we absolutely need to. And

we did also talk about, you know, being really strategic in how we plan events and how many people people can be there and not having more than one event on the space at one time, working closely with the makerspace, cocreate to make sure if they're holding something, we don't have a 100 person wedding that same day. You know? So we had some conversations making sure that we, you know, have adequate parking for the events we offer. Do you have other channels that are helping guide you in this? Like, think about Lafayette has a historic barn, but they haven't done anything with it. Uh-huh. So do you have people that you're leaning on as you go through this?

I'm I'm laughing because we we did several field trips

We did.

For historic barns. Okay. I I will say that that because they don't they don't you just let you allow a tour. We had to we had to pose as a potential

Oh, absolutely. Couple. Yeah. So so I

I think I I think one of our event coordinators and I were were were engaged, and

he was my best man, and Rachel was made of honor.

So we we did what we had to do to get the information to help guide our discussion. So Dedicated. We were we were very dedicated. So, yeah, we've been talking to some of organizations. Windsor has been doing a lot of historic renovations on their facilities.

What what I've what I've seen is none of them are doing it to this scale. But luckily, our our con our consultant Formworks design group has been on the project since I've been on the project. So they're very familiar with site, and they have done these big barn renovations and so has A and M renovations. They're the same contractor that did the farmhouse. So we're working with the quality contractor team, which we felt was really important given the site's historical significance and and and what we want the town to be in. We want it to be something that's really cool for the town, so we wanna make sure that we're hiring the best people to do it.

So Do we have any meeting spaces or, like like, this is something? Can you you even when you

Not the only historical meeting space is over there at town hall. And then if you count the conference room at the chamber, I think those are the only other two historical buildings that the town owns that are considered meeting spaces. But, no, this is gonna be pretty unique to Erie.

It's gonna be pretty costly.

Other than historical, do we have any event spaces?

No.

BCC? Yeah. The the Erie Community Center.

Library. Historic.

Yeah. But not historical. Very small.

Very small. And hard to get. Yes.

Yeah. Mhmm.

Sounds like a lot of the funding is coming from grants. Is that true?

Well, $250,000 is coming for from for the barn rehabilitation project. We have a $1,100,000 grant for the site improvements for phase one of that from the Land and Water Conservation Fund. Those funds come from the National Park Service. And

then

the rest are coming from the Parks Improvement Impact Fund and TNAV.

Do you have hopeful opening?

The site improvements will probably take about a year. So the, you know, the parking lot, the drainage improvements, some of the trail connections. I haven't gotten a construction schedule yet, unfortunately, from a and m renovations, but I assume it'll probably be a year, if not more, between all three floors and the exterior improvements. A fully open date, I think I've been tossing around maybe early twenty twenty eight Mhmm. Or 2028 in general. I I never I never like to put a timeline on construction because you just never know, but we're hoping to have the that first phase completed in at the '26 and then move, hopefully, kinda right into that second phase, which is the building cluster inside those site improvements, and that'll probably be another, I would anticipate another year.

That makes sense. I I can be overly optimistic, and I I don't think I need a new full time person for Schofield. Luke was like, sorry, Rachel. It's not happening.

Like, It won't be ready next year. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. Mhmm.

So I noticed there's an event plaza area. Would that be available for, like, an outdoor setting Mhmm. Event?

Yeah. We're trying to we're trying to make this space we're trying to keep this space open to the public. So you can come here at 05:00 on a Tuesday and come you see we have a a little small playground network. Again, this is second phase, but we're trying to keep the site open so you can come and walk around and read the signs and interpret, or if you wanted to bring your kids. Now if you

In in conjunction with, like, events, like Yeah.

Yes. To answer your question. But, yeah, you you yes. You could use the the the outdoor event on as part of your event. So Mhmm. Yeah, Yeah. We we try to make it as flexible as possible.

Can you show us where the

elevator is gonna be? Sure.

So the elevator is on the Northeast corner of the building. So it'll obviously, this is just exterior. But if you can you can kinda see a little bit what they're in on the inside here. So it'll be in the corner of the building where the existing set of stairs are.

And it won't be visible from the outside?

No. No. Yeah. There'll be no that's something that we really worked really hard on, and I think we went through about three different versions of an elevator before we found the one that would fit. So we're we're installing a pitless elevator so it minimizes the the footprint and the footprint that it takes up within the interior of the building. But something that we really wanted to stay true or is making sure this space was inclusive for people. So, you know, if if I have a mobility issue, why shouldn't I be able to get up to the to the 2nd Floor? So that's why we really pushed the elevator. We worked hard with FormWorks and AM and renovations to make sure that was possible.

Is there a view of the mountains from

Yeah. So oh, great question. Well yeah. So so right here yep. So this is the west elevation here in the top left, and what we're gonna do is we're gonna open that up. And the first thing, say, historical fund said was, well, that does that doesn't remain true to what the historical Yeah. But we said, well, what if we opened it up and created, again, the doors that came down to maintain that historic appearance? Because what when you open up those doors, if you look at that little tiny hay door Mhmm. On the West side, you can just see the mountains. So we worked with State Historical Fund to make sure that we could take advantage of those mountain views while maintaining the historic character of the building.

Event space is definitely indeed.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. We're probably about

on that. I'm excited.

Yeah. We're yeah. Rachel and her team have done a fantastic job and just, you know, hey. Where do we need outlets and lights, and what are we gonna do for programming? So I think we got a couple staff members that are just chomping at the bid. If I let them have a wedding there tomorrow, I think they'd probably be able to

do it. I've had a

couple staff members that are like, that's what? Better engaged.

What would I'll I'll plan the party for the twenty twenty eight two thousand parking gate.

Yeah. There you go. Yeah.

Yeah. Luke and I were asked by the council at one point after they finished the farmhouse. This is what do you think we should be the next building? And we both said the same thing, the bar.

Yeah.

Because if you're gonna have a wedding, you need a place for a reception.

Mhmm. Yep.

Anything else? K.

Thanks guys.

If you guys are ready, you can make a motion on a recommendation for the COA.

A motion to approve the

COA is presented to me.

We'll recommend

approved. Melanie

has a motion that we has a recommendation that we approve the COA for Schofield. Is there a second?

Second.

Deandrea has seconded. All in favor? Aye. And I have to drop a I have to draft a formal letter to to the town clerk, so to give so Sure.

Fantastic. Well, we'll make sure we'll keep you all posted on the groundbreaking.

You answered my you answered my questions because for the silo came down in the granary entrance, you know, you can see it still. Yeah. Yeah. And so that's why I wanna know. Can are we still gonna be able to see it?

So We won't be able to see it, but we'll make sure we'll we interpret that space Mhmm. Because they have to do some structural work

on the silo. Oh, yeah. Because I'm surprised they're still standing.

I mean, they don't make them like they

used to. Well, if they if it wasn't for the cage around it, I don't think it'd be up. Yeah. I think that cage is what saved it. Yep. The the bar's on it. Yeah.

So, yeah, we'll we'll keep the the groups posted on groundbreakings, and we're gonna be doing project tours and things like that. So I wanna really bring back what I did for, you know, Erie Community Park and Erie's old house and make sure that the community has the opportunity to come out and visit and and see the work that we're doing because I think it's really cool. As I've stated several times. Thank

you all very much. Thank you.

You posted. Thank you

very much for your presentation. Absolutely. My pleasure. Very well done. Thank you all for all the

work that you're doing. And thanks, Harry, for getting us on the schedule.

Yeah. Thanks.

Have a

good night, everybody. So, Luke, are you gonna need me at the 08:26 meeting? Just

leave and let it close.

Yes. Okay.

Yeah. Thank

Yeah. Alright.

Yep. We'll be

there. Alright. Thank you, everybody.

Bye. Good night. I

think next on the agenda

Is history research or Yeah. Laura is up. You do you

want me

to screen share anything?

Yeah. Okay.

Do you want me to send you a I can send you a link. Or I have can I do it from my computer or no?

You can. You have to join the Zoom meeting.

It was in our packet.

It's yeah. Actually, if it was just what was in the packet, I can pull that up.

That's totally fine.

Okay. Alright.

But I I don't know if my if it'll present the same. I don't know. It might

I don't

know if, like, it's gonna be weird the way it scrolls, whereas I can do, like, his and, like, actually present through it.

Okay.

I think that would be Are you obviously you've spent a lot of time on this.

So just wanna say thank you

on No problem.

So much work.

No problem.

If it

looks off, we can I can turn it over to you maybe? But

Yeah. Because if it's gonna be like, yep, that's not gonna

Okay.

That's gonna be sad.

Okay. Let's see.

So if if you go to I

don't know that it actually has the website on there.

But if you go to zoom.com/share,

I found about my computer is that my slash button

Oh, really?

I don't know.

Could probably Yeah.

I just

Oh, gotcha. Copy and paste it from somewhere else. Okay. So then hey. That's how big

this is.

I have a couple buttons on my server that don't computer for my zero doesn't Yeah.

That in

the budget.

My slash key doesn't work. Those are the main ones that are of consequence. Okay. So I'm doing this hPav meeting ID or pav email?

The ID first, and then I

can go prompt you for the it's good.

2483.

I can read it off too. It's this way, it gets into the recording. Awesome.

Perfect.

Just gotta call it right. Okay.

Yeah.

So I, you know, I know last week when or last week, last month when we were talking about all this, just a desire to found a bit more information and planning and and this way we could execute this. I will put this disclaimer up, so just read that real quick. I won't play teacher and read you everything. But, yeah, I don't know what's within our scope. I don't I don't under I don't know the bylaws of this entire town.

So I'm not gonna pretend that there's things in this that we can't do or we can do. So if it's deemed not okay, it didn't exist in this town. So this is a very aggressive timeline. I figured might as well go that route then let this drag on forever and ever. But there's kinda two phases to this. There's phase one that I'm considering, like, info campaign, which is just getting information out to the public. And then there's phase two, quote, unquote, collecting signatures. We do not formally have to collect signatures. This has been something that's been very confusing in my communication with mystery Colorado. They're like, as long as there's not an overwhelming disagreement with this.

And I'm like, what does that mean? Check with every they're like, we will check with everyone, but it doesn't I they're very wishy washy on the exact parameters of this, and I'm happy to send along their exact language of this. But it is not like you have to hand over a document that says, here is, you know, 51% of of all homeowners and business owners, and now we can do it. So I think that's just worth noting is that we don't have to formally collect signatures in this, like, very specific boat way. But I do think from our perspective, it might be better to think of it that way to feel solid that we're not gonna have the pushback.

Yeah. I wouldn't want to do do something that's gonna make us look bad to the community. Oh, 100%.

Yeah. But I'm just saying from History Colorado's point of view, we do not have to hand over a document. They do their own, like, component of of connecting with the homeowners to make sure that this is accepted.

Can I suggest something here where when we are doing the info campaign, we will see how much response it is? Like, we if we start seeing negative, then probably we can choose the route of collecting signatures. Right. But if there is no negativity at all or maybe one or two voices, we can even skip the signature spot and say most of them Exactly.

All of this is very flexible in terms of what we're getting back.

What would you think about because the church would be available, would allow us to do it if we invited to have a community meeting and explain what we're doing.

That is definitely one of the suggestions within here.

That Yeah.

To utilize churches, community center, etcetera Yeah. Places of

Give the give the residents the opportunity for feedback.

Totally. Well, we

will get Okay.

So then if approved and, you know, or accepted or or or desired, the next section would be to, to fill out the official national, nomination form and and submit that. I just got back from Damian today who has been my kind of guy I've been talking to at History Colorado, a successful form. I asked him, I was like, can you give me some sense of, like, what that even looks like? Because the form's a little open ended, to say the least. And, I mean, it's substantial.

I again, I got that back today. I didn't wanna attach that, you know, to the meeting, but I I will happily forward that to everyone for review. It was a I haven't had an opportunity to read all of it. I think it was a Thornton neighborhood. And then January, May, through then, this is also the component.

Would people be interested in a national nomination, a local district? And that is where we would wanna get the community involved again is because we would want them to be a part of determining what those design review components are. What what are they okay with? Do they want you know, are we deciding what the height is of a building that can be? Or how how extreme are we getting?

Can you only have these colors for any new buildings? There's all sorts of ways that you can determine what that design review would be. And then you have to go through the whole survey of every single property that's included and all that that entails in history Colorado has to do their full review. And so that is the the lengthiest part of this project. And I guess that's why in some ways, the local route, historic district is easier for us because we decide what the parameters are.

We decide we don't have to do that review, so to say. We just decide, hey. You live in this square foot by square foot, you know, between these streets. And so that gives us a lot of control, but a lot of people like they need to be on the national registry because that has more of the prestige. That's kind of the brief timeline.

So in phase one, we would engage with Old Town, New York community, get a sense of what they want, share some info about the different historic options like I was just saying, circulate the survey, which we can look at here shortly, provide ways of communicating and engaging further with HPAV in this initiative, and share results of the survey with the community. I think that's a huge part of this is just to remain as open and transparent and trustworthy with the Old Town area community and make sure that they feel like they're being heard all along the way and that we're not trying to just do something. And then phase two, based upon what we learned, create an official form for voting for what folks are interested in, again, national versus local, determine what appropriate strategies we'd like to implement to communicate that. So yeah, what I just said. Something that I think, you know, I know we're gonna vote on adding some additional members, which I think will be helpful, but this is not something I think HPAB can do alone.

I think so we're gonna need to recruit volunteers and folks that can hopefully help with this. So if there are any community members that you know or neighbors, etcetera, that would be willing to, you know, provide a little bit of time to speak to their neighbors, I think that's gonna be another large component of this. Some things to consider, you know, what what communication networks do we have available? We obviously all just saw how much we were communicated with with a recent Erie Town survey. I don't know that we have those kind of resources at our disposal, but they exist.

So what kind of communication will be effective with Old Town Erie residents and business owners? Again, when we go through this next section, we can decide what we think would actually be effective. But languages, are there any additional languages we need to be mindful of? I have documentation from history, Colorado, and Spanish, but is there any other language we need to know about? And what communication vehicles or media outlets are considered trustworthy?

And I would like to think that we are in a higher trust situation as a board, but I don't know. And maybe there's third parties that can help us a little bit more. Again, having Old Town residents speak on our behalf. I think the Erie Historical Society has clout. Is there anything else that comes to England's mind? I don't know. But sometimes having someone distribute information on our behalf is more effective in certain places.

Maybe the economic development. Oh.

Yeah.

Used to be old town eerie, and then they

come to

the economic. The town eerie doesn't exist anymore. Well, they merged. Well, merged. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, yeah, I'd say chamber since they're in Old Town, and they would be in the

They're the historic buildings. So,

yeah, anything that comes to anyone's mind like that, that would be a third party that can speak on behalf of this or is engaged in this, I think, only helps the the ripple. Right. So here are just some online options. Of course, social media through Town of Erie. The website, I think we would wanna update with access to things.

The Old Town Of Erie newsletter, we would wanna put this. And what I'm saying first is for this first phase of things, the survey, to get it to Old Town Of Erie residents. I guess we can look at that survey here shortly. Print and online options, there's publications like YellowSeam. Other businesses, if they can share it on their social media, trying to coordinate that.

Yeah. We all receive text messages. I don't know how that works. You know, if we can get folks to make their own or if we wanted to create something, yard signs down here. If there were enough that you started to see, like, there was support that might mean something. I know we have stickers at our table if we wanna do something that kind of that's my little idea, but keep Old Town home.

That's very cute. Yeah. That you can

we could start to hand something like that and you start to see them places. Again, it's just kind of that that more organic.

Keep Old Town Eerie old. Mhmm.

I think we would need all of this kind of stuff, these flyers printed out at any sort of tabling event. But flyers can go on bulletins. We can do letter drops or or send them. My my old political days, the amount of phone banking I've done,

it's

not fun, but you can do it. It exists. But the bulletin flyers, I think, again, an area of businesses down here. We know there's places. The library has a bulletin. Post office. Post office. Right.

They don't

have a bulletin anymore. They don't? They don't?

No. They haven't had it for years. See?

You

know? And then a car drove through it.

That's That did help. Maybe that's wrong. There's a bunch of places. I know there's the one down by Prinpy downstairs. Anyways, so, yeah, just to put a little flyer there. Public meeting. I think that would be very important to have, you know, whether it's at a church, I think some people might not feel as comfortable going to a church. So having somewhere a little bit less, you know, non denominational. If you could get it like an old mine in that bigger room in the back. History of Colorado has offered to come out and speak to people as well, which I think is really helpful to just kinda legitimize what that conversation is.

Canvas, again, walking around is not fun, but it works. And then, of course, community events, whether that's I know right now, the town is going to already has a booth set up, I think, in almost all the farmers markets. And, you know, we've got Biscuit Day, Erie, Airfare, all you know, whatever's happening. We want breads.

That is Eirifest also happening.

Right on the second, this weekend. I don't know that we're gonna get No. There. But, yeah, anything like that. Right? But I do think I have them as one of the the organizations listed here at being better neighbors. Got the chamber of commerce here. So, you know, all of the different businesses down here in organizations, I think, you know, seeing how we could engage with them, whether I know, like, Lottie Lanes doesn't exist anymore as a storefront, but she's got a lot of followers. So if she was to post something on her Instagram, that might be helpful. But seeing who we could get to do anything if they're interest you know, just where they're at.

So that's just kind of a list. And at the bottom, you can't quite see it because of the thing. But if any partners will donate items for a wrap I don't know what the right word is when we decided if it was a wrap or if it was a Giveaway. Giveaway, whatever it was. But for residents who fill out the survey, just an incentive to to do it if we're able to get any sort of gift cards, items, etcetera.

Call it a drawing for a giveaway. You said you can't call it a raffle.

I think that. Yeah.

Strike that from me.

You the

drawing for a giveaway.

Yes. A drawing.

Indicates you have to pay money for it.

You're not doing no one's paying money. Yeah. Gets them a permit for a rental. Microphone in the sky. Okay. Yeah. So that's you know, and if there's I know there's other businesses that are not on Briggs. There's some home businesses here too, so engaging with them maybe as well. I think there's, a dermatology center and whatnot. So, anyways

They are, like, realtors.

Right. Realtors between

Oh. We're like those people. There's a lot of realtors in there. Yeah.

The gold and silver place. That's what?

The gold and silver place?

Right. I didn't put the the businesses that were in the

But right.

But yes. Of course. Anyway, I don't think we'll say no to anyone saying do this, would be my general thought.

So I have a question. Are you saying or is it time for questions? I'll wait.

Let me see. I don't remember what I have left. I think I have maybe two or three more slides here before the the taking a look at the what you call it? Sorry.

According to the counter, you have three more.

Right. Oh, yeah. You're right. These were just two different little ideas.

And then

oh, yeah. Last thoughts. If we wanted to create a survey for non Old Town residents just to show their support, that's an option. You know, I could see how if we were at tabling at an event that they would wanna feel like they could do something or that they're interested or they like that about the city, and maybe that would help encourage residents to participate if they saw just how much the community care was into it. I don't know. Maybe not. They're trying to, like, get out of my backyard. I don't care what you think.

Can I have

council members, if we used a sticker Top? Or that said keep old town eerie old, Right? Would we get any blowback from the council?

Think so. I don't think so.

Old Town old? Yeah.

I I know what you're saying by keep old town very old, but, also, I don't know, it kinda seems like a negative connotation. Like, I don't want

it to be old, like,

as in rundown and decrepit and

you know? I don't know. Yeah.

I don't think I would like to think people don't think anyone wants that.

Right. Right.

I think it's more a play on us being the historic society of the town eerie.

Historic district. Yeah. But I like the old keep here he keep Old Towne area old. I like it that way. I don't want I don't like these three story buildings. You know?

Keep Old Towne area vintage.

Correct. Better half of them sit empty. Yeah. But that's Well, basically empty. Yep. I mean Yeah.

I think that's the all the idea behind it is, like, how do we say that without all the all the words? Right. But I'm open to any any other slogan.

The channel marketing people could help us come up

with Yeah.

That's good.

They Yeah. Utilize the staff that

Yeah. I was gonna say all in. Yeah. I know we I know we've talked with Josh and my department about, like, sort of combining efforts. And I I think his his work has taken on a little bit different direction. So, like, I feel like that's part of the reason that none of nothing really came of that. But we do have Gab I know you've probably interacted with Gabby before. And then, Maggie Murray is a new employee who actually works with my department, where she's a communication person that just works with my department. So she's indicated she would have some time to, like, help her review some of this material and, like

You work

whatever whatever you need. So I'll I'll, yeah, I'll follow-up with their contact info. I guess you have Gabby's, so I'll send you Gabby's too.

Yeah. That'd great. Good.

Number two, we will need to allocate funding to printing materials. And I don't know if we will prefer a print vendor or just how that works on anything that we're printing. Like, does that have to get approved at a meeting, or is that a you know, like Yeah.

Any spend has to be approved. Any expenditure of funds has to be approved.

Totally. I'm saying I don't know if, like, printing if, like how much we can send a town of earrings and get away with before it

I would I would send it to staff. We just let staff do it because they have to make repurpose anyway.

Yeah. And I'm sure communications has a that's some kind of vendor that they use more regularly. You bet. You know, we have capacity to print some smaller quantities here, but I'm sure yeah.

Doesn't Gabby print our because the town all already prints our our flyers, already prints our walking tour.

Yeah. Okay. It's the stickers that aren't printed in house, those final stickers, but I'm sure.

And we only have a million of them.

I would I would I wouldn't worry about that. I worry more about, you know, making sure that your idea has if if they convey. Like, the sticker idea to say, here's some ideas we have. Right. Yeah. What are some other ideas, or what are your thoughts? And Mhmm. Because it has the town logo on it too. So

Right. Actually, that's not the town logo.

It looks like I know it's not, but it's supposed to know it.

Use the tree that makes stone.

But it but it's not the untrained.

It's not it's

It's a.

It's impossible.

It try doesn't have the if you look at the logo real, real slow

It's a point zero.

Yeah. It has a little edge pointing, and that points to Erie. That's what

it does.

But yeah. Most definitely. I wanna make sure everything's cool. And then like I said at the beginning, it's gonna take a lot more resources than we have capacity for, funding time, potential volunteers. So just if they wanted to send any thoughts there.

Currently, we have $4,000 and and our and our projections is even if we send we're gonna send out the grant in October, even if the decisions aren't meant to December 15. So even after that, we wouldn't have to pay anything till 2026. Okay. That's why we asked for 20,000. So by the way things work, we don't have to pay for money till next year anyway.

Yeah. Well, if you could if you could purchase

the some of the marketing material this year Yeah. Make it out of '25 budget.

Right. Almost definitely. That

would Yeah. Yeah.

And, I mean, I would even say now, like, you know, if we're just for printing we'll look at the survey here, but if we're just for printing some, like, basic things and say, yeah. We're willing to put 100 to $200, set that aside. Hopefully, it doesn't cost that much type thing just to know. It's it's been approved, and we don't have to wait another month or two to get something done. I think that might be worth giving at this meeting. What

are you thinking? What brochures, stickers, posters?

And insurance. Sure. Sure. People like shirts. Cars.

Cards. Clubs. No.

But I think if you bought if

you say, plunge it up to 500

Right.

I then you guys

We

more than enough.

Mara? Yeah. I really I think we all thank you for the all the work that you have done. This is just tremendous.

Thank you. I appreciate it.

You have gone well over and beyond.

I I really it's I'm I'm happy to do it. I know it's the thing that that this I I think it'll be the legacy of this board if we can get it done, you know. And and it's it's important because we don't have any history to preserve at a certain point if we don't do it soon.

That's the whole idea for the district before we lose everything.

Yeah. If if you wanna conduct a basic survey, you could do it. You could just print out a two by three foot poster and make a dot hole and just you know, are you an Erie are you an Old Town resident?

Right. Where where's Do you support a

Yeah.

Do you support a You

can do it on can do it at Biscuitar.

Yeah. You do something like that. Yeah. And you can have columns for old town residents, not old town residents.

Yeah.

So that way you can separate separate out. I So just get a basic support.

I mean, I think that's where I and we can look at at this this survey component. I think that's where I'm a little lost, I suppose, is with the I know some of this started as that the the board needed some some evidence of that the town even want the the residents want this. And I I totally understand why. But I guess, like, what that looks like and what that means, you know, or you or are we gonna have enough people at Biscuit Day that are from Old Town that give us the I don't know.

You may or may not. But it doesn't take that. It's not a ton of work to to do something like that. The

I agree.

You probably need us at least a second poster bullet pointing what the basics, like Right. Preserving the look of the whole town.

Right. Well and

that would be with the exterior of the house. Only just basic bullet points about it.

Well and that's this

Only old town residents can vote on this. Something just just to answer those basic questions.

Well, so here here was the survey that I generally came up with in relation to that if we wanted to do, like, a more Involved. Involved survey. So gave kind of an outline of what the area is. For now, I'm just including Cattell Street just in case because there is like, I know the property down

Yeah. There there is one.

Yeah. One that would be

worth putting in. What?

I just would rather like One. Everyone who feels an Old Town included, whether they get whether they wind up working as a part of the district is another question, but I don't wanna have to go back and ask them as well.

Sure.

So that's kind of the the parameters, and it's it's listed there as well. You know, we need to know, do you rent or own your property? Because it really is only if you own the best of any consequence. Just out of curiosity, how long folks have lived there? Are you concerned about new residential development, business development? Do you feel like your current concerns or questions are being heard and addressed? And are you interested in Old Towne area becoming a historic district? So please note this isn't an official book. This is just trying to get purely information. And then please let the board know if there's any additional thoughts you have in relation to that.

If folks say yes, they'll get sent to this next section. If they say no, we're not gonna bug them with a whole bunch of questions about a historical district.

Yeah. Because

I don't wanna waste their time. But this is the document that, and I'll just open it up real quick. Yeah. Thank you. I don't know why it's doing that. I think I might have shown this last time.

Yeah. You did.

But this outlines this is what I would wanna print to have available to folks to know what a national district is, a local district, what the benefits are. Sorry. It's not letting me make it big.

The bottom, the 30%? Is that

I can do it with this. This is probably still a little hard to read, but explains what what the different districts are and that we can be none, we can be one or the other, we can be both. I think that's the biggest confusing thing that we have to communicate.

If you're gonna print that, you may want an email address on there or something.

Thing to contact.

To contact or I think that's a good comments, seen as it

So I have

a couple questions. Yeah. I I missed the last meeting, so maybe that was answered in the last meeting. But you you mentioned that you they don't we don't have to have a vote by by the residents?

Not a formal like, not

as formal as because that's what we previously thought.

Right. And when Damian clarified, I I can like I said, I

can read exactly what So who who approves this? The board the board of trustees on the local level? And then

I see what you're saying. From a national level, we don't need to vote. From a local level, we determine what that means. Typically, we would say 50 per 51. So

51% of what? The people that answer our random survey?

Or No. Of of property owners.

So they would have a vote?

For the local district. Okay. I know. That's why it gets complicated. It's feeling like there's there's two very different things.

So the local would give a vote. The national would just be kind of

Well, the national

there's no parameters that there's no really

We don't have to teeth,

for lack of a better word, on the national. Right. Okay.

They they property owners can let their house fall apart. There's no limits on development at the national level. It does make available federal and state grants, which is nice to property owners themselves if they wanna do any rehabilitation to their homes.

So grants are available on the national level, but not the local level unless we find We

found some magic money that we're going to add to it for that.

And is there an option to have both, or do we have to do one or the other?

We we can do both. The local is we basically create from whole cloth what the local is.

It would've

gone the ballot November, say, '26?

If that's how we chose to do. Or but the thing is you could only That's for notes. It's this

I know. Yeah.

Yeah. Can They can sparse it out.

It's it's probably the same thing, but doing the whole Just like

Boulder, Erie. Yeah. Just different districts for the councilman. Yeah.

If we wanna do it that way, if we want to do it a more, for lack of a better word, like grassroots way, that's you know, we can't.

Because it doesn't have to be

on the ballot. Right, Laura?

No. Yeah. We can just it can be like, it does have to be on the ballot.

Mhmm. No. It doesn't have to be on the ballot. It just Yes. It's So it doesn't have

to be a vote.

Because you said it had to be a vote. Well It's not an official vote.

Otherwise, it's it is we determine the rules.

Okay.

Alright. What what is not the election commission doing the votes? It's probably you send a survey or something.

So it's not official?

It's not.

It was it'd be an unofficial vote. Right. So there's absolutely no official vote for Historic District. Is Is that what you're saying?

Can we call it an opt in instead of vote? Like, I opt in. Alright.

Yeah. That is that is the way to do it as well. I think it's it's it's more that the local district, we decide how we wanna do it. So if we wanna do an official vote Okay. Through the parameters of Okay.

Of an alternate election Mhmm.

Board and all that. Yes. If we feel like there is a route for us to trustfully do that

and get Transferred.

Don't tell me.

Right. That is available to us