Board of County Commissioners Work Sessions - Regular Meeting

Good morning. It's February 9th at 9:04 a.m. We will start this work session of the Lake County Commissioners. First up is discussion and direction regarding the community builders climax grant request. So, um, Community Builders has been working, um, with our planning department and the city's planning department to do the one community project and get together a comprehensive plan. One of the items in their their contract is that the city will pay a certain amount, we'll pay a certain amount, and that they will contribute a certain amount by fundraising.

Yeah. So, they had reached out to Climax uh to to see about $10,000 worth of funding to put towards wrapping up, you know, this one community project. Um because they've it's what they've said they would do. When they reached out to Climax, Climax said, "Well, that's great. Fine. We don't mind the the inquiry, but we only award to local entities." So, Community Builders has asked that we would be the one submitting for that grant to Climax for $10,000 to go towards their work on this project. And that was Climax's guidance.

I just wanted to check in before we do that. I know it's only $10,000. It's not a huge amount. Um, but because we are going to a community partner who I don't know, this is outside of their normal grant cycle and we might want to ask them again. I just wanted to make sure there wasn't any strong push back. It didn't the information I saw from Climax and I didn't get a hold of Mel directly um didn't seem like they it was any big issue. It's just like we we don't award to people who aren't here and so that's why we were suggested as the applicant. So, I I just need to get a little bit of guidance on on whether that's something we we're interested or feel fine with moving on or if there's a concern. What is the concern? Uh so, I can kind of get that moving forward or not. Um

how difficult would it be to ping off of Nell just to ask, hey, is this like something that's going to piss you guys off or not? I can reach out to her um this week and get that sense. But if she didn't have any like, hey, this would be an issue. Is there any other issue or my thought was should the city be asking but also don't want to punt it to another partner without getting a hunch for how you guys feel? Could we ask jointly? just a dual letter head or whatever. Like, hey, you know, we're getting a really great deal that's going to benefit the community as a whole. We do five and the city does five.

Yeah. Okay. That's what I needed is just like a little more direction about how you feel about the request and and and the approach. I mean, honestly, I don't feel great about it. That's what I was afraid of. Yeah. and let me just like an easy ask and that's I was like feels like there's more to

I didn't I guess that you know this whole thing started before we got here so I never knew that community builders was going to be asking climax for the money. I thought they were coming from outside of this community with their own money to bring to the table. And I feel like asking climax is this thing where we try to be coordinated and intentional as a community, especially for off cycle requests. And we've been doing this for over a year. So why hasn't it happened on cycle is frustrating to me. I don't want to have like a relationship with Climax where we're being squirly buggers. I agree.

I I hate that. And I think that as a community, we've done that a lot where we just toss requests of them off cycle and they're trying to have cycled requests and they're not the parents. They're on our piggy no piggy bank and now they're getting it it seemed like when I read it that they they can't finish the work without some money. So they've been doing this stuff for a year. The money should be in place. And I really feel like it's like going to your dad and ask him for gas money all the time. And then when you need to fix your car, I'm taking Andy's uh

his metaphor. And then when you need new brakes, your dad, it's like took all the money. I guess I don't know. That's a good metaphor, but I feel like they should have come to us and said, "We would like to we need this money to finish." Like first of all, we can't finish. You said we would agree. I I feel like the mind should be for capital improvement project and not for administrative stuff which however you guys feel about I feel like it's a little bit of a jobs program that whole thing. Uh I a little bit of busy work. I mean we have to do it. We have to do it

right. Yeah. That's where I'm at. no matter what if they if they need this to make get across the finish line, you know, go. Yeah. Taking a step back and being like, we knew from the beginning we were getting a pretty we were getting a really good value for the, you know, the city and the county each put in what 40k into this and normally it costs us 150 to get a comp plan. So if they need an extra 10k, I'm okay doing that as a county. and ideally splitting it with the city of like, hey, you know, let's um

I also I know that I have heard of other people talking about asking climax for large capital off cycle grant requests and I don't want us to be this community anymore where we're not communicating and we're all going to climax and and not coordinating because I don't want us to have this $10,000 ask but then like Brightart has a $500,000 ask and we look like the clank bits. You know, I'm just making that up. I'm not saying that's what's going to happen. I'm just saying I know there are big capital requests out there that are critical for the community and I want to be on that team as opposed to this whatever this is. I don't like it.

Yeah. Reach out to the city, see if they'll be willing to do five, we'll do five. Yeah. If the city isn't willing to do anything, we think that we've gotten a good value for the work they provided. It's just a supplemental to pay them the additional 10 and then encourage them to look for grant funding elsewhere. Yeah. Okay. Thank you, Candace. Yeah. Thank you. That is all I have for that one. We do have other people joining us at 9:30. Do you want me to jump to the bottom one that seems like it could go quickly? Yeah,

sure. You want me to call it out? Discussion regarding county classification for Colorado counties incorporated. So, we we know that you guys would like to uh look at um changing classifications. Uh CCI reached out, asked me, gave me a form to fill out that just was yes, no. And then they came back and said, "Well, we have to know about what level they're going to be looking at and then you guys will have to come back with a resolution." Um, so I need a little bit of a hunch about what level are we just stepping up one or more than that. So I'd like to just if we can have a discussion about I put in your packet the levels. Yeah.

And what other counties are at so I can tell her, hey, this is what we discussed in a work session. and we'll we'll move to resolution so it's official. But she said that would be enough today for her to go ahead and start to put us on the list of counties that aren't going to do that. I don't know why they didn't ask for it in their This is about getting the sheriff's pay raised. Mhm. But she can't be broken out separately from ask. It's not just the sheriff. It's all I know. It's all the

But that was the gen that was the that was the seed that got planted was trying to figure out. And um I unless we're able to differentiate between you know it's I guess it's systems just not built that way. There's no way we can um and there's no other options for us to pay the a different payment mechanism outside, you know, I don't know if it's some kind of like bonus or stippen or something like that. Like I I don't even I don't even feel comfortable doing this. I don't I don't it doesn't you know like Matt touched on it before that like how are we even it feels weird to me that we're even allowed to talk about

what essentially boils down to giving ourselves a raise via us trying to do us right the sheriff's department well the raise doesn't happen while you're in in your current term

I I think it's a broader discussion of if you want to have qualified people in elective positions you would have to be able to pay people who could be trained, right? So, think about the treasurer. If you want someone with an accounting degree, it would have to be at least somewhat within the range of like someone with an accounting degree could afford to take that position or the professionalism, the more qualified people are, the more and I get it, people are elected. You get to elect whoever. doesn't necessarily mean they don't work out that way. But having a little bit more professional level of pay does encourage people who are professionals to actually throw the hat in their

table's a little bit confusing. I guess the the categories there one, two, and three. Is that based on population? Yeah, we are 4B. It's population is one of several consider. So the category they look at your tax base like that. So we would still be in the four category and the top of four is 4 A.

Well, I think that's the discussion is where do you want to request to be 4 A moved up from 4 A to 4 B? Do you want to stay the same? Do you want a request to be moved up to three? But we're we're in 4B and so 4 A would for him would be you know about 10,000. Well, I want to not make this about the sheriff because I I don't want people to get confused that we're doing this. We're doing this for all the elected officials. Um so I don't know the I don't want to single out the sheriff. So we can't we can't. Yeah. So you did ask

you asked you asked the sheriff CCI there's any opportunity to break out like bands of of elected elected officials in there. Is there any mechanism that's outside of your salary that could be a bonus? Yeah. I don't think so. I don't I mean I don't think so. I think it's it's you know I think if you start doing that you're going to have you know you're going to be pitting elected officials against each other would be my concern if you well we're going to give the sheriff a little official well you know step by step so

well and it's like how much is enough also is the tricky part of this it's really tricky because It's we want to help the other elected officials and then we're in assuming one of us gets reelected. We're we're inadvertently helping ourselves or it's going to seem like we're doing this for us. Well, I don't really necessarily think that's true. And it would be What would be the timeline on something like this? because there's an election this year in November. Yeah, it has to go.

Well, I would assume for for you, Andy, that probably your your next term if you got reelected. Yeah, I'd have to look into it, but I assume I didn't know if this thing would take like a year to put into effect and then Yeah, bills came into effect in July. Okay. general timeline after passed in the legislative session. So, you could recuse yourself or that's sort of what I'm wondering. I mean, already the sheriff in every county and every level is paid more than everyone else.

So, there's that that consideration is already built into whatever level. I think it would be good to understand like what is the actual like if we're arguing appropriateness of professionalism for pay, what is that level? What all elected officials in this community already paid more than most people make in the county. So what what is the line of how much is enough? Well, I think we asked to get upgraded one category and that would be uh that were a that would be 4 A. Okay. I don't have the like argument to do it, I guess, is what I'm saying. Like what is the argument of like how why 4A? Why more than it is now? Like I don't have the reason yet to to back this. I guess it's a lot of money already. In some cases, the staff make considerably more than the elected official.

Yeah, totally. And so that's a really some of the positions are really important and if we want to have a good successive, you know, as a successor to the current elected officials, we have to make it attractive. I'm not saying that's my argument. That's the argument that I've heard.

No, I've heard that too. But I'm just saying like why why is 4B not enough at $111,000 and why does 121 make it enough? because I think we want especially with certain departments we want to attract really good qualified individuals where traditionally I think Lake County has suffered from getting people who are a little underqualified and maybe didn't do the best job and then from a dollars and cent standpoint costed us more money in the long run through things that have happened, but lack of professionalism, ineptitude, not being the best candidate for the job, you know. So, with the idea that the better quality candidates we can attract, we're going to be running a better operation. We're going to be possibly having less problems. Um, you know, I mean, especi when you look at a department like the sheriff's department, I do not want someone who couldn't make the cut somewhere else being like, "Oh, well, you know what? I I'll uh I'll run for this and, you know, that'll that'll be all right." I don't know. It just it feels like it's going to abstractly save the county money by having better people be attracted to apply. But the part that just really screws this whole thing up for me is that this applies to us too. And I just hate that aspect of it. So if we were to apply this to like a different forget the sheriff, if we were to apply to it to a different department, let's say ours currently our staff are paid about at 145. So, in order to attract more qualified BOCC

commissioners, we would want to try to bump it up above what our staff are paid potentially to try to attract the people who could be supervising.

No, that's a problem. Like I I I agree that that doesn't make sense to me because we are primarily hired to be representatives of the community, be voices for the people who can't be in this room, make decisions based on those things, and be the, you know, punching bags for people who don't like what we're doing. that isn't as near nearly as heavy or as intense of a job as say being the sheriff or you know some of the responsibilities that are involved with being a treasurer or you know

so I feel like that's where I have the problem with this is that it has to apply to all of us across the board cuz I don't feel like I don't feel like our pay in these seats is inadequate. I feel like the sheriff's pay is inadequate. You know, someone who's got to take firearms training and go and put themselves in, you know, dangerous situations and drive cars going 90 something miles an hour to whatever, you know, like that seems like a job that should pay more than this. And the way the laws in the state are set up, the only way for us to do that outside of something really wonky that could introduce all kinds of problems, it sounds like is this table right here. And it's I'm frustrated that this is uh how it has to be because I don't it's like all or nothing. I don't I don't think we need the all. I think we just need to fix one or you know, one or two situations.

Yeah. Unfortunately, that's I don't think that's an option at all. It seems self serving. It'll seem self- serving, but I think I think we should if it was up to me for one category. Mhm. Step up.

If we were to forget the table, forget the table, how much do you think our share should be paid? I would probably do I'd need to look at a chart of all their staff, what their staff is paid, what they're getting paid. Uh I'd like to see what other counties share where other I guess I've got that right here in front of me. um almost like it it would be a really complex thing like if we were able to detach ourselves from this table it'd be looking at like scope of duties.

Yeah. you know, how many hours does he spending in the building a week in a patrol car? and you know how much uh CE does he have to deal with you know like um but it it seems like just the hazards of the job itself doesn't that doesn't make sense with what I'm looking at in front of me as far as a pay rate. We do have the smallest, one of the smallest counties in the state, if not the smallest. Population wise, we're at 10,000. If we looked at population wise, we're at seven 72

72 and change. But we're in the we're about in the middle. When you look at some of these counties on the eastern plains that are gigantic compared to us, they are revenue, budget, population, they're way smaller than us. So we're actually kind of in the middle of the pack from what I see on, you know, counties. We might look small, but we are mighty. So we're not counting city. When you say seven and I say 10, the difference is people in the city. It's the whole county. It's only seven. 72 60 or 80. It's inverted. It's 27 in the city. 72

So that should be considered as well. That's unfortunate. Can we ask our I mean some of the counties the sheriff's making two over 200,000 Summit Weld those are big populated counties Boulder Eagle running through and yeah yeah and their commissioners make 160 it's pretty wild you know

I mean they're clerks and coroners or but that's that's a them issue that's I'm just you know what's what's going on with us what can we afford board. What can we do? I'm really banging my head against the wall on this cuz it feels so unethical. And what part feels unethical? The fact that we'd be giving ourselves a raise. What if you get reelected? You know, that feels a little more immediate to me than I guess because Well, you could solve that by recusing yourself from letting any vote. Yeah. Who would settle a tie?

Well, and I'm not asking you to vote. I'm just trying to get a sense of direction, right? Because if it seems like you guys are aren't on board, then I would reach back out to CCI and say, "Hey, we're just not going to do this this year. They just came back and said, "I need to know what direction they're trying to go in because you guys have to come back and do a resolution to make it an official decision." Right. This will change he's pay for next year. Assuming we get Yeah. Is he up for Everybody's up for election except for the two of us. Oh, wow. Okay. From the DA to the sheriff to the assessor and corner. Okay. Um,

so this would change everybody next year. Change our budget next year. So, since we're in a recorded meeting, I would just like to state on the record that I believe the sheriff is underpaid for the job that he does. and I would support figuring out how to raise the sheriff's pay, but since it would also include this seat's pay, this person said to be the chair, and that will, you know, I have the option of being in that this seat again in less than a year, depending on how an election goes, that I would probably recuse myself from that decision officially. Leave it up to you guys. It's just a little too close for comfort for me.

I feel like I'd be more interested in making this having this conversation next year. We're really close to an election. And I think that the point of doing this is that it could bring more competitive people out to run for office. And we are now less than a month away from the Democratic and Republican caucuses. and that's not enough time for this to actually like make the difference for those seats. So, timing wise, it doesn't feel appropriate for us to do it this year if the intention is to try to recruit stronger candidates for elected positions.

That's a good point. If that is the state intention, it might be a little too late. People who are thinking about running probably aren't going to be swayed by this just to be $10,000. They might be, but not within like four weeks to decide if they want to completely change their lives, right? Just to uh add a little caution though is that who are we retaining and who might not want to stay if that's the case, Julie? But I also feel like it's a pretty high salary for this community already. for all the other elected positions. Yeah, I agree.

So 883,000 is a lot to be paid to be uh I don't know. Feels like a lot to be an assessor, a clerk, treasurer, coroner, commissioner. Yeah. And I do want really strong I want really strong competitive elections for all of those seats. And I just don't think that we can get it in 4 weeks. It would be less than that cuz we'd have to do the resolution. We'd have to like this is just the first conversation about it. But I'm a strong proponent of doing this and trying to have really strong candidates. So I'd be happy to do it in a future year.

I think that's a good compromise. I do wish we had done it earlier. It would have been great to see it this year, you know.

Yeah. I didn't know that. Um I wished the initial conversation was or the conversation was initiated a little earlier cuz this came about by department heads of elected people bringing this to our attention and I don't disagree with them. I just moving at blazing speed of local government. Well, it's tough with so much inflation, you know, pressure. There's inflation everywhere. So, pretty tough. I disagree with Elsa and that it's super tough right now. Inflation's just was out of control. It seems like it's a little more tempered now, but you know, four years of incredible inflation,

it's made it tough and and there's no increase. You know, a lot of people get increases. Yeah. So, I don't know. You know, four years ago, it was plenty of money. No, they do. They do increase it. They increase the whole table, though. They don't Isn't the majority of the state of Colorado's population registered independent? 52%. Unaffiliated. under. So, you know, when it comes to like caucuses and stuff like that, I mean, that is a factor, but it's not the defining factor in my opinion. No. Could I ask a favor? Could we circle back to this issue? Yeah. Yeah. Let's get to

our uh other partners on it, but he's I think wanted to join for the discussion. And I'm I'm recognizing when we moved it out of order. Oh, okay. Well, we can we can revisit it. Can I just say one thing, Matt? I totally agree. This is I don't think that like $83,000 for elected officials is amazing. I'm just saying compared to all the other people that we're trying to serve, it is a lot. So, I'm just trying to acknowledge that. Okay.

I don't think that it's easy. I don't think that that salary is easy to live on. I just think comparatively it's important to understand the whole community and what we're paid comparatively. Isn't our average in this community around that around 80? 100% AMI is $83,000 for for for two working people combined. Combined. Wow. A 100% AMI for one working person is 60 something 64 65.

Let's uh those guys are wait online and waiting on us about them too and then we can circle back. I think he he's going to try to join us at 10:30. I apologize. I just don't want to leave someone out that really wanted to be a part of that. Absolutely. All right, Elizabeth and Allan, welcome. Matt, good morning. Yeah, good morning. Um, so we're going to move into item number two, discussion uh regarding legislative legislative updates with political advocacy, excuse me, advocacy incorporated.

Yeah, good morning. Um, I'm going to start us off here. I think it's loud in the capital where Elizabeth is. Um but we are about three three weeks into session. Um it's that typical slower start that we see. Um bills have been a little slow to be introduced. Um departments have been coming in for their hearings. Committees are just meeting for the first time. Um but we expect it to start ramping up here uh pretty soon. Uh the main story continues to be the state budget. Um as a reminder, the state is about uh $850 million in the hole. Um and the joint budget committee will start making some decisions on the budget budget starting this week in their figure setting process. Um a lot of these cuts are going to be really really hard and really painful. And I think the the JBC is just starting to wrap their head around that. Um how difficult this is going to be. Um the best way to frame it is that we're talking about cutting health care for kids with disabilities. Um that that's how that's how what the crisis level is right now. Um we're watching a couple things that the budget um for you all um that'll affect the county. Uh one is there is a proposal to cut funding for LPHAS's for public health. Um also the CCAP program is now insolvent. So they're having to figure that out. Um and then there is the CDHS. They have a proposal to uh start some regionalization um for a lot of the administration of things like SNAP and TANNIF. Um the joint budget committee is not really happy with this proposal. They've asked the department to come back in and actually explain how this is going to work. Um but we've been keeping staff informed on all of that and we'll continue to watch that um as that progresses. Um Elizabeth, what do you want to add there? Um, I would just add that you're also seeing cuts from the federal level at some of these programs targeted

specifically at Colorado, which is really impacting the um, just unease of how the budget's going to balance because um, Colorado is getting singled out as one of the five Democratic states that the federal government seems to try to continue to withhold funding from. And so the attorney general is spending a lot of time in lawsuits um with the Trump administration.

Okay. Well, thank you. Is there anything else you'd like to add or any questions? And when you're ready, we uh do have a list of the bills you asked us to be prepared to kind of go over. Um and so if this is a good time to transition transition into that, we can bring up your bill list. That'd be good. Yeah. Great.

Um let me pull it up too here. Um, so as we've done in the past, we're kind of focusing a lot of our attention on housing and um, human services, which is kind of the big things. Obviously, obviously, we could give you a bill list that's probably 50 bills long, but we're trying to focus in on kind of the core things that are most important to you all. Uh, the first bill on the list is House Bill uh, 10001. This is from Representative Baseenecker and it is um kind of building upon a bill from last year that they were running. This is something that CCI and others are posing just on a a local government control local control issue for local governments. Honestly, it it doesn't really do a whole lot. It's interesting that so much political capital is being spent on this bill. Um it did pass the House on Friday um on third reading. It was um on partisan um so it passed, you know, with just by the Democratic votes. Um and it allows for school districts um to potentially have a little bit easier route um in order to do affordable housing on their um property. Okay.

They're not sure if this is one that you specifically wanted to weigh in on or not. Um I will I will say that the school districts are supportive, but they don't think it's going to be life-changing. There was a bill last session that allowed for bonding um uh for school districts for affordable housing and for solar. So from their perspective, they kind of think they can already do this and they're surprised that this is becoming such a such a big issue. Thanks, Elizabeth. Is this also uh wasn't this the same bill last year attached to church property or religious and they dropped that aspect of it or

Alan, are you able to jump in? I have people talking around me. Yeah, it's it's kind of that same thing. They've they've dropped that part, but this is the the the giggly bill, but without um sleeping trip. Yeah.

So, this goes along with the density that the state's trying to push and smaller communities are pushing back. Does it have anything to do with density or how does it make it easier? Just permitting or or bypassing local permitting? Yeah, for for this one, if you're on school district property and you want to do some affordable housing, it streamlines and maybe reduces some of the oversight um and paperwork that would have to be done. Um yeah,

well, as a builder, I would like to have that, too. I'd like to have a carve out, but my initial reaction is that no one should have the even the state should not in my opinion be able to dictate to local communities density or they could maybe encourage some things, but and I think that's I think that's exactly CCI and others argument isn't necessarily this bill per se, but the slippery slope argument of okay, once we pass something like this, then what's next, Right.

I put it on the list, not cuz I thought we were going to feel differently about it, but just because everybody's talking about it so much, I was like, we might as well have the conversation in here just so we have it out of the way. Yeah, I think that's right. And I think part of the conversation is because there isn't as many bills out right now. I think if this bill was out later in the session, it probably wouldn't garner as much attention. It's It was surprising to us. This is not coming from the school districts. They didn't bring this forward. This came forward from some foundations that are working on it. Um, and so I I personally was surprised when this took up like seven hours of debate time on the House floor last week. Mhm.

And it p I'm surprised it passed so easily. So many people are against it. Um, the Democrats are really trying to make a state for affordable housing. It has very good bill sponsors. This is the House's the House number one bill. So that means it has leadership and other priority to get it through the chamber. Um so it will it will continue to I think it'll continue to have partisan support.

The only reason I think that it would be okay is because because it looks like it's probably going to pass. The only reason I feel like it's going to be okay is because you have to prove there are a lot of criteria you have to prove to actually get this administrative pass through on projects and one of them is you have to have you have to be a nonprofit that has shown that you're dedicated to affordable housing like only so and you have to have a track record of accomplishing affordable housing. M

so it's not like anybody can just apply to build on school district land that school district wants to work with in order to actually get this concession. You have to they have to find somebody to work with who h meets all of these criteria and I don't think that's easy. So I don't think this is going to be like this huge boom of changing density or pushing through affordable housing or even if the school districts are going to have bandwidth to do any of these projects. So I don't even if it gets through I'm like this is nobody's going to do this.

I Yeah. I think the I think the fight is over the precedent and the topic and not necessarily what is going to happen on boots on the ground. Totally. Yep. That makes sense. Is there uh more specifics on what kind of uh administrative processes it would circumvent? We can get that over to you. We have some information on that so you can read.

Okay. Thank you. Uh the next one on your list is the continuation of a tax the child care contribution tax credit. This is House Bill 1004. Um this is coming from leadership in both chambers on both sides of the aisle. So uh pretty good chance it's going to pass. Um it passed committee um 10 to zero. It will end up um in uh appropriations for quite some time. Um lots of groups are supporting this. Um, I think this makes sense for you all to support. What what is interesting, however, is, you know, anytime we have these tax credits, then that's less money that's coming in to the state um for the uh overall budget in the state. Um but this um is a taxpayer who makes um contributions to promote child care and the state is allowed an income tax credit that is equal to 50% of the total value of the contribution. Um so people are allowed to make contributions on their tax returns and then get that discount from the state.

Okay. This one I brought up only because I thought it was important that we understand like what is available to our community as because we're we have a lot of child care issues in this community and with a lot of funding and mechanisms being taken by the federal government and now potentially by the state. This allows I just think it's important that we know what's being talked about in the legislature that could help our community. It's going to pass. I voted to support it with CCI, but just wanted you all to be really aware of it.

Would you all as Lake County like to take an official position on this? It is kind of We always like to also point out um when you have your legislators running bills, as you do with this one with Speaker McCcluskey, I would support this. So would I. Yeah, we do. Great. We will list that. Thank you.

Um, now the next one, House Bill 1036. Um, this is a this one is all over the map. So, this is dealing with local taxes taxes on vacant residential property. So, this is saying that if a property is vacant, then you as a county could increase taxes. You can do excise. you can do a number of different things when it comes to um the taxing for that property. Um it allows the local government to create a new property tax classification um and allows you to so it's and and the registration is all over the map on this one. CCAT is supporting um Alan did CCI take a position on this at the end of the last week.

Oh yes they did. What did they take? Sorry. Um I'm not sure what the position is that we commission. We voted to amend so we could stay at the table.

Okay. So CC and then you have some cities that are in support, some that are opposing, you have CML supporting, you have Cass supporting, but then you have a lot of counties opposing. Um this one's really all over the map. Um I think an amend position makes a lot of sense. Some of the things that we have heard in the capital or you know what happens if someone is selling their house in an area that can take a long time to sell and then technically their house could be vacant because it's on the market trying to sell for a long time and then it gets levied with higher taxes. Um there's a lot of really interesting conversations and this is this one is definitely garnering a lot of conversation down at the capital. I think CCI went to the conversation at CCI um was very much around local control. So people were on board even if a county had taken a position against or even if a county would never think to put it on their ballot, they voted to amend because it allows a local government to have their own control as opposed to a state dictated tax or tool. So I think that's one of the main reasons why CCI was ultimately supportive of this with obviously a lot of like considerations and technical technical issues. I think we've already taken a position on this.

We have. It's 2 to one. I'm against it and uh Andy and Elsa are for it. I think the administrative costs are going to be greater than the benefits and there's going to be so much technicality and you know somebody's going to have to enforce it. It's just sounds like a nightmare. And also it's going to discourage people from coming and building a second home here because even if it's a nominal fee, it's it's still, you know, an attitude that says we don't want you here. we don't want your money. And then the other thing is too, they they're already paying taxes. Some of them have the the nicer, bigger houses in town. They're already paying taxes and they're not using any services. So that's my public statements. However, I am outnumbered.

Elizabeth, is this still being um are they still receiving comments this afternoon on this? heard less.

Oh, and by the way, the carve out for the uh for the short-term rentals is interesting. Is that from the uh the short-term rental lobby or how did that It seems like it's a you know that those two should be lumped in the same category. So, I think we already have the ability to add fees to short-term rentals and there there's some pretty significant extra costs tacked onto those. What I like about this is that it puts the idea in the hands of the voters and letting the people decide. People in this community, it's their voice that would make the decision ultimately. And that's why I support this cuz it's

pretty pretty easy to target people with, you know, rich people. So, let's just keep targeting them until we drive away.

I I'm not rich. I told you I live with this. It's a reality of my life having an inherited tiny little cabin up north that we pay ridiculous taxes on, but we figure it out because it's a family thing, you know, it's generational. My wife's grandparents built it with their hands and we're not going to get rid of it. And it's really stretches us thin during, you know, the times we got to pay the taxes on that place. But their stools and their roads up there are really nice and you know we pay it because anyway we've already gone through this. We're we're we're digressing into competitiveness. So let's just move on I guess. Well, unless you wanted

I think the point is that the reason why I put this on here is because and I sent that email is because there's this afternoon is testimony. So I know that we all feel differently about it and have different reasons for it. So, I wanted to make sure Matt, you especially knew that just because we as a county have voted in this way doesn't mean you can't testify. Mhm. So, that's also why I put it on there. Okay. Thank you.

Will you be registering an official position for Lake County on this of support? Okay. We will let our legislators know that. Um, House Bill 1037, um, which is, uh, banning government purchase of personal data from a third party. Um, I don't have a ton about this bill in my head yet. Um, I imagine, um, one of you it to the list for discussion. I put it I put it on there um because this this session well I don't know about before but I didn't see anything on the previous sessions about trying to regulate any of this and I feel like as a millennial I've watched lots of different technologies be completely unregulated and flot cameras our personal data and uh how it coincides with the county and fourth amendment. It's just I'm grateful that the legislature is even trying to address this, but this bill in particular would be putting the onus and the like liability on the county

and CCI. I'm seeing I'm seeing a private right of action in here. Yeah. Yeah.

Against Yeah. It's not awesome. Um But I like the intention. The intention of the bill is to try to put some liability on and and guard rails on what personal data you can sell and can't sell and how you keep that safeguarded. And I love that because I think it's important for us to be at the forefront of these technologies. um and CCI moved to amend it while also sending um a letter of like a value statement letter really different for CCI. So instead of like technically the bill is a mess and we definitely don't want it passed as counties as as CCI as anybody. This is not a well-written bill yet,

but the intention to try to put some guard rails about how these private companies are are are using our personal data is valuable. So, I just I wanted to make sure you all knew that that this there are two bills actually that have some attempt to regulate how personal data is shared. and the county nexus right now is like it's putting it all on us. Anyway, so I just wanted you to know that CCI, which I think had a gut reaction to say, "No, this is a bad bill. We're going to oppose it." They found a way to stay at the table because the intention is good. Yeah. Intention's good. It's just if we're going to do it, do it right.

Yeah. So, I I think that we've had conversations in this room about personal data, about flot cameras, etc. And I think it's going to be complicated and I'd just like us to keep talking about it in this room so that we can be at the table. Yeah. So I would be uh I'd be for amend on this. Awesome. Yeah. In alignment with CCI. Yeah.

Okay. Um we will dig in on this um per your direction then and um get more information on where this is headed. And yeah, it's it's interesting um when I see Representative Bacon and Representative Degraph on the same bill. Um they're kind of two ends of the political spectrum. Um it always creates for interesting legislation. I I would personally say like Elizabeth, I wouldn't want you to spend a lot of time at on this because technically the bill is really messy. Okay, great. But just but just have some touch points so we can keep in touch with staff on what's going on with it. Yeah. Thank you. Yes. Thank you.

All right. Senate Bill 30. This is coming from uh your Senator uh Mark Basley. Um and this is regarding the state grant program um for keep Colorado wild pass act that happens and it's um reallocating how the funds um are put out um pretty much everyone seems to be a lot of people are opposing this bill from from the conservation um and uh uh environment communities. I put this one on here because isn't the point of it to potentially take some of that some of that money and put it towards infrastructure for state parks like leading to state parks

the roads going in. Yeah. Yep. It's so that you as local governments can access some of the money instead of all of it going to the state parks. Yep. Yeah. So, um I know that roads are really important to both of you and I wanted you all to know what this was trying to target to get more money towards. We don't have any state parks, so it wouldn't necessarily be able to go to us, but it would help other counties support their own infrastructure where they don't actually have a tax base to pull from for that infrastructure.

Yeah. Um, so I just thought it'd be empathetic to support those counties, but at the same time, we don't know where the money, like what initiatives the money would be taken from. And that's what I was hoping we could get our lobbyists to be at the table to pay attention to so that we know what the trade-off would be, what would be going to this infrastructure versus what programs or other infrastructure wouldn't be funded. What are some of the unintended repercussions of moving forward with this? Because I mean, I was sat in that CCI meeting with where these other counties were talking about how, you know, the the the boundary line of the state park,

the roads leading up to it are getting all the same traffic. And it's like their roads are nice cuz they've got the funding, but the county can't keep up with the traffic heading in and out of these parks and their roads are getting all beat to heck. Yeah. And Yeah. It was like, hey, like help us out. you know, this we only have this road of tax as your park and we can't keep up on it. You know, it's so I it sounded like a really good idea, but I'm curious why like conservation Well, I guess that makes sense cuz it's not expanding the pool of money. Mhm. No, the pie is still the same size. It's taking a slice of it out for the county to maintain the road, which means the park ultimately ends up with less money.

Well, something ends up with less money, not necessarily the park. and they don't know what's going to end up with less money and conservation is assuming that it's going to be them. Yeah. So that's why I mean Elizabeth, correct me if I'm wrong, but there's no fiscal note on where this money would be taken from, right? Even though it's the it is in the hearing tomorrow. The fiscal note should be up before the hearing happens tomorrow afternoon. It is in state affairs and uh we anticipated we'll be killed tomorrow afternoon in state affairs. Okay. Sorry. Okay. Well, okay. Never mind. Good point. I guess

and if it doesn't we will dig in and give you more information. Um but um reading the tea leaves that is what we are anticipating. Yeah, those are powerful groups opposed to it. It seems like Well, we don't know what that we take. Yeah. Weird. Okay. Yeah. And it's Senate Republican on a bill without a Democrat being sent to state affairs is a pretty clear signal that it's going to die. Yeah. Just bluntly. Thank you. With us on time. Yeah.

Yeah. always always happy to to share good news with you all.

Um uh this next bill is Senate Bill 40. It's affordable home ownership program. Um this is another local housing one um with the Department of Local Affairs. Um, and it is, um, allowing for households with certain income levels, um, to be able to, this is kind of gets into the AMI conversation we were having earlier when we first jumped on about um, being able to access uh, through different means, affordable housing. Um, there isn't a fiscal note yet, so it's unclear exactly to me initially. Oh, wait, there is. They just put it up. Here it is.

It allows the division to offer below market rate loans to groups um with households equal to 120% of the statewide area median income of the AMI. I think it'd be great if we could take a position to support this because this is what this is what Jack was. I tried to get it into the Prop 123 legislation, but they only wanted to talk about a very specific scope in the Prop 123, but this is the needle thread of that would pretty much save 10 two, the issue that we have with 10. Yeah. That the unicorn issue. Yep. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I think we all support it. Yeah.

And Senate Bill 61. This is another kind of one of those reoccurring issues in which you all are required to put notice into local papers, but not everyone has local papers anymore to put notices into. Um, do you all fall into that category? We have a local paper, but I sympathize with those who don't. Yeah. Well, the Eagle has drafted this bill or Yeah. Eagle is the has been working on this bill for a really long time. Eagle County or town? Eagle County. Okay. And um they've gotten the press association on board with um the print they've got the print media on board with this idea.

Oh, that's huge. That's why it usually fails. Yeah. So that's why I just thought it'd be valuable for us to support a neighbor. Yeah. And um also it opens up the door for us as things get more complicated with print media. Yeah. We don't have to use it, but um just helps people. Yeah. And I think it'd be just valuable for us to help other people even if it doesn't matter to us.

It just makes sense keeping up with the times. We don't know that our local paper will always be here, you know. And I think CCI I'm I'm pretty sure CCI moved to amend that could potentially put this on to um the digital platforms for newspapers who had print but they could potentially put it on their print on their digital platform as well as on the website. I support this. Cool. I do too. Perfect.

All right. And then the last bill you all wanted us to flag for you is Senate Bill 70. So this is that the flock camera situation that we were talking about earlier where it's prohibiting a local government um from uh accessing a database that reveals an individual or vehicle's location information. Um I basically every local government that we've talked to is opposed to this bill. Um I actually saw Senator Amab on her way into the building this morning and she said everyone hates this bill and I said I think they do. Yeah, they all hate it.

Yeah. I just wanted there were I just wanted you guys to hear from our lobbyists that there were those two digital privacy bills that came up and CCI voted to oppose this because it was just it wasn't even close to being able to be on the table of discussion, but there were two attempts. Yeah. What can you just explain again what the bill is? What's the intention of the bill?

Um, so I think the intention of the bill is to limit big brother a little bit, right? and to have, you know, if you are within the range of cameras of a local government, um, not having your information saved and stored and and recorded about you. Um, I will say from a school district perspective, when we talk to them, they're concerned because if there are vehicles that are pacing or flag or looking at the school, they want to be able to keep information on that vehicle because if it becomes a reoccurring thing, this could be somebody that is looking to potentially be a shooter. Um, and so it's just, um, to the commissioner's point, I think it's, you know, we're having this balance, um, in a number of bills, and we'll see them with a bunch of artificial intelligence bills this session, too, between where's the the person um, protections of um, their anonymity and where is the public? Um, and being able to because we just have so much access to information on on people now that where's that balance of the public good versus a person's privacy and again it's not regulating the industry, it is regulating the government.

And that's where I think the failure is with both of these. It's like the moment that you sign a contract with Flock, they are selling they are selling all the information that they're collecting. So banning the government from keeping that that um that information does nothing to actually regulate the big brother corporation from or stop it from getting collected. Yeah. And sold at a later date. Yeah. Do you have information on this one car and they could come back and say, "Oh yeah, we got that." Even down to like what's their favorite fast food restaurant they're stopping by?

That's the information they're selling. Can we mark can we start targeting them with ads for good times burgers or whatever, you know, like where does this car like to go? Yeah. Like that's that's that's the part where it's like, yeah, that whole industry should be regulated and it's running a muck and we have to do something now, but both of these bills are looking at regulating the government as though we as though a local government has any power over the people that they're contracting with. Yeah. So, yeah, I think they're both they're they're both missing the mark by a long shot. Yeah. How did CCI address this? They're going to oppose. They're going to oppose. Okay.

Cuz it was just too messy and I think they were all tired, frankly. I would I would go with CCI on this one. I would oppose and encourage a bill that address you know corporation the part that is running a muck and it's like a what would we say Andy like a lo unstoppable locomotive yeah it's no breaks no breaks we need help with those well that's why I really liked that CCI took the decided to write a letter of like a value statement Right.

Because I do think that like we should be I want to be at the table trying to get our legislators to actually do something about this but not in this direction. So I loved that as opposed to just being like yes, no, amend, yes, no, yes, no. I liked that they were like, okay, this is the one where we're going to actually try to take a stand as a group that doesn't always agree, but often doesn't agree. Well, it's great when you're trying to find bad guys, but uh when the rest of us are caught up in advertisement schemes and big business.

So, it's it's going to be tough. It's a big issue going forward. I would also encourage CCI as you're working on that to um submit that to your federal delegation because honestly so much of this has to be addressed at the federal level and you know creating this patchwork of what does and does not happen within states is just not going to be sustainable. Totally. So that's really cool. They're working on it and you know hopefully they send it up to the federal level as well as to the delegation here. Yeah, I'll bring that up. is Elizabeth. We can trust those guys at the federal level. Do the right thing. No comment.

Screaming into the wind. We'll do the right thing. Oh man. Um that brings us through the list of bills that you all asked us to um take a look at. We will be meeting with your team on Wednesday to kind of go through additional bills that we might want to bring forward for you for next time. But definitely keep us posted on those that you want to specifically call out on your list. Um, did we want to monitor the enhanced red flag bill? Oh, Senate Bill 4. Is that Senate 4?

Yeah, that's Senate Bill 4. Yeah. So, that's allowing entities to be a petitioner and not just the individual. Um, that's cool. Do you mean can I just ask an an example like could we as a government petition for a red flag?

So, a couple years ago, a number of entities, a number of individuals were added as petitioners that could petition for a red for a ano order. um therapists, teachers, principles, um and and mandatory reporters within local governments um could all petition. Um honestly, what we told them at the time is that you're probably not going to have a lot of individuals coming forward because therapists, for example, don't want to break that patient client privilege. um you know, teachers and principles and other mandatory reporters don't need one more reason for someone to be upset with them and to show up have time to show up in court and and do all the things that are are are um needed to follow this through. And um a number of um entities said, you know, we'll take that on if we have someone that is employed by us that feels strongly enough about this and you know, we could take that on. And at the time, the attorney general's office said that you couldn't do that. they've since changed their mind and said yes um the mental health center that employs the therapist could be the one to take on the petition. Um same with you all as local governments. We've actually seen some case law where this has happened. Um, so it's extending up for those petitioners so that if you had an employee that was worried about retaliation or didn't have time to go to court, then you all would be able to do that. But you'd have to um identify someone, you know, your county attorney or someone that would represent you you all as that entity within the court process.

Okay. Okay.

Do I want to take a position on that? How did CCI CCI voted to amend or did CCI propose? We didn't look at it. Okay. Can we do a There's nothing. Yeah, I don't think I have enough information like a monitor or something. I don't think a lot of local governments have taken positions on this yet. Um, I think a lot of people thought maybe this would be end up being a a big gunfight and that really hasn't materialized.

So, you don't think it's going to your gut feeling the tea leaves you say it probably won't move forward or

it'll move forward. It's already passed the Senate and it's going to be up in the House. So, it's moving forward pretty quickly. What's been surprising to us is typically anything that anything that touches on gun rights um usually draws a 10-hour committee hearing and this was maybe three. It's just been interesting that this especially since there isn't as much going on early in the session. It's been interesting to us that it has been kind of under the radar so far. Um so the main the main groups opposing this are are the um uh Rocky Mountain Gunners Association Mhm.

So in essence, if you worked for the school system, you wouldn't have to put your name on this red flag complaint. The school or the government would do that for you. They could. Yes.

Yep. And there were amendments um to make sure that there was liability um protections for those entities um either for choosing or not choosing. um either way that you would be protected liability wise. Um uh school districts are required to have a reasonable amount of care. They have a a higher um standard when it comes to reasonable care for litigation claims. Um and so there are amendments to make sure that local governments are protected um for choosing to participate or choosing not to participate. You can't be sued because you chose not to participate and file a petition and something happened. The the one thing that I'm unclear on is that how often when like an institution or as it is it has to be an individual, but say you're allowed to put an institution on the petition. just submitting a petition to um uh revoke or or put someone in an extreme risk protection order, does that mean a judge is automatically going to approve it or is it pretty sure or is there ever a situation where the judge is like, you know, can can hear back from the targeted person and be like, "Okay, like this sounds like you guys have a personal thing against them. This, you know, I don't know. like a petition isn't an automatic,

you know, revocation. Yeah.

Yeah. There's still a there's still a court hearing and a and a process that moves forward. I I believe you're getting probably beyond my knowledge, but my understanding is it moves pretty quickly because of the urgency. Um typically what they have seen is the majority of these petitions have been um regarding self harm and not harm to others um of people coming in and wanting to rem remove guns because they're worried about self harm. That's why um minors have been included in this now um because the vast the majority of the cases that they have seen have been against harm to oneself and not to others. um they're increasing the different petitioners because over the years um it is pretty rare. There's not very many of these cases that are filed. Um so that's why they kind of keep adding to the petitioners to see if that increases the amount of petitions that come to the courts.

So it sounds like there's guard rails against abuse and if there is one abuse case for 900, you know,

real cases, then I would I would say I'd personally support it. Yeah, if it saves one or two kids lives, it's worth some people being inconvenienced, you know, as much as Yeah. And people that are falsely accused have avenues in the court system to fight this or, you know, so I don't know. It seems like that would definitely be the fear of some of the gun rights groups is that it would be abused and uh it's a valid concern, but probably pretty rare, you know. believe the first year that this was put into place um there was only three petitions filed in the state.

Yeah, I'm I'm a fan of this. Do you want to take a position? Sure. I support. Yeah, me too. Were there any others you guys wanted? That was just one of the big ones that jumped out of out of me.

Yeah. All right, Candace. We We probably went beyond our time, so let us know if we need to be quiet. You're perfect. We moved through a couple of the items before you a little more quickly than we had planned, so you guys are fine. We're good. Um, we don't need them for anything else. It's up to you guys. No, just this presentation. All set. Thanks for coming, you guys. Good luck down there. Thank you. We'll be in touch. Bye. Thanks, Alan. Thank you. Okay.

All right. Where are we at now? We're going to jump around back to uh number three, discussion regarding monuments and events on the courthouse lawn. Where's our burrow friends? Well, we're not talking about that, right? Are we talking about that? We are going to talk about it mainly because they've emailed a few times after she's spoken with you and am I allowed to say they wore me down? Let them have it. Yeah, I want all of them.

I my my concerns and and we talked about this with Chris. I haven't really got a chance to talk about it with Matt is that in the in like the the reason I did not want an additional monument for anything on the courthouse lawn is that what happens when every group is like well we're important we want a monument too and we have to do this down the line and my idea that I proposed was that we have a monument space that allows different things to be inserted into it. Um, and that way we can say, "Hey, so you want to schedule some time for your monument? Here's the dimensions. You got to, you know, basically have one monument that could be like a rotating billboard honoring different things like we could have, it could be a, you know, burrow race monument during boom days and the burough races. It could be a 100 series monument during the races. It could be a ski jouring monument during skis jouring. you know, if they wanted to make the plaque that fits inside the thing. The Burough Race folks had already had a monument constructed. Um, they had put a lot of work into it, a lot of effort into it. I would love to accommodate them because of the work they'd already done and because we before we'd actually had the chance to really thoroughly think it out, we're like, "Yeah, go ahead." Yeah.

And then we kind of came back and we're like, well, on second thought, this could open the door up for, you know, Fred the plumber who thinks, you know, his plumbing company has provided such an amazing service to this community that he needs a monument and everybody gets a rock, you know, basically is the the problem. Or or the joy or the joy. It could get messy.

I love a good sculpture garden. I'm going to stick with it. Um, but a sculpture garden is a little bit different than what could evolve out of this. So, I would love to accommodate the burrow folks because of our initial comments. We didn't make an official decision. We just probably are on record somewhere saying, "Yeah, go ahead." So, is there a way to let them run with theirs and then put something in place that puts guard rails up? I mean, I I'll want to look at it a little closer, obviously, and I know we talked about this briefly when I first started.

Um, but, you know, you you're when you open something up like that, it's really hard for you to pick and choose what kind of speech you're going to say is, "Oh, this is good. This is bad." And invariably, you're going to get something you disagree with, and it's going to inflame the community. So, I think that's why most people have just shut the door entirely and said, "No, we're not going to allow this because it's it's the door you're opening is is massive and it's very hard to put guard rails on it." Is there a way we could open up a space and say, "Okay, this is limited to Well, then you're picking and choosing speech. That's what you can't do."

Yeah. Especially if someone says, "I want July." And somebody else says, "I want I already called July." What do you think, Elsa? It seemed to be administratively very challenging to take a lot of time.

Well, that was where we evolved, you know, after it was initially the problem is that initially we were on board with this. I'm still in spirit and in my heart on board with this. I want to help these folks out. But we got to thinking and mulling this over and we're like, well, wait, what happens? What's the unintended consequences of this? And that was the biggest concern that we identified is that you know I mean I even like Elsa's enthusiasm for having all the things cuz it could be really interesting but it could become really problematic from groundskeeping from aesthetics from you know blocking people's views now we have to have come up with all these rules or whose signs are what size and is you know I can't see Mount Massive because of what?

Well, it's going to invariably put you in a position of judging speech, which is incredibly difficult to do without violating the first amendment. You're going to invariably be put in the position of saying yes to those out of this. How you do that from an administrative perspective, I don't know. I think it's there's a reason it doesn't get done very often. I think a lot of people have sort of rotating art spaces in the communities. Um, you know, I know that gets done. Uh, but when you're having a monument to one group or another to elevate somebody's, you know, importance to the community, there there may be a way to do that, but I think it really needs to be thoughtful. And if it's something you guys want to consider, I think that's what we're looking for direction is like, okay, I need to really dig into this from a legal perspective to see if this is something we could do or if it's something that you can do, but here's the potential can of worms. And then, yeah, I think from the administrative perspective, it's it's certainly going to be some some work on staff that's direction. Well, it seems like a lot of extra work and the signs, no offense against the burough folks, but the sign wasn't meant to last 100 years. There was some pine boards. So, I I agree with Matt. I think I think we were surprised by the rock. The rock never came to us.

Freaking rock. All the rock. So, just for public record, when we were talking about letting the burough folks do their thing, then we got surprised by the rock and then we were like, "Oh, we don't know what else has been promised plaquewise." What's the rock? You haven't seen it. The rock up front. Yeah. You walk past it every day. It's that rock. And that was agreed to by Tim by the previous by the previous administration administration without any kind of We don't know. We were just surprised by it. And so we had to, you know, we let that go through. And I think after that we were like, "Wait a second.

It was 3 weeks before this like huge unveiling ceremony where family members from all over the country were flying here for this dedication rock. They had already purchased the rocks and the plaque and it was like I would before a a band except for a one-day permit during the burrow race. Bring your sign out and you have your sign temporary sign.

If there's a protest, you can come bring your sign. Maybe it should be treated like a sign for protest. You get your the grass I think is used a lot in the summer. People spread out. There's a tent out there. people eat out there. I really think it's a slippery slope and if we allow them, we're going to make them really mad and I'm sorry. It's a slippery slope. I mean, and then I noticed I remember one time last fall you had all the the flags for all the domestic violence, you know, folks. So, I don't know how that was allowed or what the policy was there. I mean, something we've always done. Literally decades we've done that

for DV specifically. I had an additional item floated by me. It ended up that it never came to you guys, but I do want to mention it because feel like it could come up again. And it kind of is in the same vein of, you know, like what memorials are we going to allow on the lawn. We had a request a while back to have an Alice Pretty memorial. It never got into a formalized request. And also, I think that's where it gets to be like, well, you know, does that would doing something like that end up with us on the news and does it bring more attention here? And if you said no to that, well, could you say no to other things in that vein? Or if you said yes to it, what does that mean if someone else wants to do something that is in a different vein that maybe we're all disagreed on? And I think it just gets to that question of what is the criteria for a yes or a no? And that's where I worry that we're going to get to the point that we're going to let someone do one thing because we don't have any aversion to it.

Yeah. In this room and then all of a sudden we're going to have something that we really have an aversion to. We're going to have that. I think it's okay for people to feel strongly about certain things. I think as a county we need to take a very neutral stance on everything and unfortunately I think that just means a lot of no saying no to our space being used as a platform for people to this is also going to have implications for any kind of Christmas Christmas decorations. Is that right? Or is would that be excluded if we have a I mean I it's my understanding it's the county that puts up the Christmas decorations, right?

Mhm. What if someone says this we would have to write an ordinance that carbs that if the county does it? Jesus. What if we have some kind of other religious symbols or holiday or something? I'm just curious. Yeah. Someone who comes at us and you know this is such a giant can of worms. Man, the advocates thing and the Christmas thing seem like I I don't know that too many communities that don't put up some form of Christmas. Like I don't want to see us get so scared that we can't

celebrate, you know, like but what does this is it this end up being a complaintbased type of thing and that's when we maybe need to initiate further discussion or you know we're just doing what we can in this moment now to avoid what would draw potential complaints. Well, I I think I think we staff need some direction of what you all want to do. I mean, if you want me to dig in, hey, can we do this? I can certainly dig in and figure out some But yeah, they're just getting these random requests and they're like, I have no idea what to do with this. You know, I Yeah.

You know, I don't want to be, you know, as the county manager just defend, yeah, come in. And then you guys walk in like, hey, what's this on our lawn? which is what has happened. And there's there's the rock. I mean, apparently the dude was awesome, but we don't know. You know, like he also brought up a really good point of like what if there's something really shady in that guy's past and we've already he also has three other plaques around the county. You know, I'm not saying he wasn't a good guy, but like and it was just I guess it was only previous county manager was like, "Yeah, go ahead." So, you know, at this point, I don't want Candace to have to deal with all the defends on the line.

Yeah. Like, you know, make an obstacle course out there of monuments. But it feels like when we don't have a policy that's like here's what we would allow, when we would allow it, when it fits. And so maybe that's the discussion is do we have a we need to develop items on the policy or whatever it needs to be. All all county property this would apply to, right? Like don't we need to take a stance as a county what is our policy around monuments, memorials and installations? Yeah. And if somebody wants to have a protest, you know, what's like where where is that allowed or not allowed? I mean I

you get into issues of where it's been traditionally held and you know I haven't been here that long but it seems like traditionally a lot of that happens up front. Yeah. That's a sidewalk. That's a free speech kind of thing, right? Like all this is free speech though. I think two different issues though. I mean I I would say unfortunately no more monuments because we don't know what the future holds. The political divisiveness in the country generally is whoever's sitting here is going to skew that political speech one way or the other. So I I think unfortunately it's time to

so you can you know there there's places you can act time and place and man restrictions on speech. They the issue is they have to be content neutral which is really difficult but saying no to everything that's that's content neutral. Um, and then you have some areas where they're traditional public forums like the sidewalk and it's really hard to a lot harder to put those sort of place. But but it's all free speech. Sure. There's no delineation between a permanent monument and someone protesting. Okay. Okay. That's kind of where I feel like we should just stay focused on the monument subject. And

um with that I I would love to be able to accommodate the burrow folks with their sign and then those doors because they it had already the ball was already rolling you know they had already well and that might be a reasonable line to draw. It's like hey if there's a community event going on you know whether it's the burrow or you know one of the Leville race series we have like this space available for for this event. Okay. So, what are our next action items on how to develop a policy that kind of fits maybe?

Well, if I if I got a sense from the board that's what you all want to do is some sort of policy, then I would probably bring it, you know, develop a policy and bring it back for for another work session. Okay.

But you're still going back to the speech. I mean, what if we have a temporary garden for a sign and and it's not a commemorative sign for a race, but a political speech or an anti- speech to for one side or the other? So, is the policy that it can only commemorate a race or a person or cuz if we're commemorating a pres an unpopular president or somebody like that. So, it seems to me that we just ban it entirely. And if you want to ask for a one-day permit, what if what if people want to protest on the grass and part of their protest is pitching tents and staying for 30 days on our on our on public property, you know, whereas a blanket ban would say we just don't allow that. That the grass is for people to come and go and sit and have lunch. It's not for you to camp on. Well, I think part of the policy would be that it can't inhibit county operations. It can't be burdensome on county staff. You know, I don't know if you can add politically neutral language, you know, can't be um supporting him. I don't know.

What if the race series wants to put up a monument and we have people in the community that hate the race series? You know, it's all political. Everything is political. Some people may hate that there's that this town's known for the race series. Some people love it. Some people think racing. I don't know. I think that's part of the conversation we need to have when we we're having it right now. Trying to give them some direction. So my my personal direction would be it's just a blanket ban except for that's a very easy policy, right? That's much easier than the alternative.

We're really sorry, but we can't go and then the next administration may change their mind and change the policy, but we can't pick and choose who gets to put a permanent monument on our property on county property.

Takes 30 tango. What? What does everybody else feel here? My personal aesthetic My personal aesthetic is collage. Okay. I Hey, I'm going to be honest about this. My personal aesthetic is being able to see somebody's bumper stickers that they've been putting on for decades on their car. And you get to see how they've changed as a person. And I and I'm I'm not going to like die on this hill, but I'm just going to be honest. I would rather say yes to everything with the guardrails if it doesn't impinge on county blah blah blah operations. And I would rather see like everything happen and then see nothing happen because I think doing nothing is also an action to take. But I I don't care enough to like fight this. So, I understand that the conservative way to go would be let's just say no to everything then we won't get in trouble. And I would rather see like all of our messiness and see how we've changed as a community over time and be covered in all of the things that we've been as opposed to just being like this clean ancient brick building. That's where I'm at. Also, we have a lot aesthetically clean. Also, we have a lot of property. So, it's not like this is the only place where we have room for stuff. We got a lot of property to move monuments around and move rocks around and and put, you know, I I think that's cool. Like Sandra was telling us about going to uh Las Vegas and the sign museum of all the different signs of old hotels and motel and casinos. and you got to walk through that and you're kind of like walking through history. I love that. And

I don't I don't think it's bad to like make statements even if they are disagreeable to something. That's how I feel. So, I'd rather see a policy that says yes to everything. It's up to you, buddy. I don't want a middle thing. Just to be clear, I see how complicated this is. In my mind, it has to be either all yes or all no. And I'm not interested in like navigating some maybe path. We have a more tour. Two year tour. Oh yes. Four years. Three years. Matt, that'll get us off till your till our word done. Till your watch is ended. Um

this is just it's we don't have the bandwidth for this right now. I'm going to air on the side of caution and just agree with I agree with Elsa. So, I think it would be awesome to have be able to honor everyone. I don't think anyone's even going to come at us like, "Hey, I want my sign there." Like, it's going to be there's so few people we're even going to want that said, the potentiality for complications and issues and headaches for staff that we just like we don't have enough on our plate right now. And um I am I've been down there on the curling ice with those folks and I've been talking to them and I'm like, man, I really want to figure out how to make this happen. But the logic part of my brain is telling me this is a can of worms. We don't have the the capacity for right now. So, so that brings us to the advocates, the victims of domestic violence, the Christmas display. Are we going to make a card out for things that traditionally happened and or we mean,

but those are not permanent. Yeah. Temporary. I'm not I'm not weighing in on temporary. I'm weighing in on people who want permanent monuments on our front yard. three different policies. I mean, there's there's Yeah, there's I think they're all kind of part of one policy. You know, I think probably the temporary speaks to Elsa's point of just having people have sort of their their speech zone. And, you know, obviously maybe don't allow hate speech and things that are obvious, but even that requires some some level of human judgment, right? What what hate speech is,

but maybe with a time limit The signs need to just some signs need to be up there all summer. Is there should be a timeline? Is there a way to like put this in the hands of like the community? If some group of people find something distasteful, they can set up a petition that gets it removed or like just trying to That sounds like a It's a girl. I'm just brains, you know, throwing stuff at the wall, see if something sticks, you know. Sorry. No bad thing. No bad comments.

I Yeah, I know. I'm always keen on the idea of letting the community decide things. That was just a thought. Well, it's an unfortunate situation, but unforeseeable consequences. So, moratorium on permanent monuments would be the Yeah, I think a pol a policy and and Maybe a a lean towards temporary monuments for a certain period of time. One of the planter boxes or an area where you could put a monument as long as it's not hate speech. political speech. I guess we can't political.

And what if someone puts up a sign that says recall all the county commissioners and you say they don't like that? Just don't put it in the way between me and my office. I don't care if somebody says that. They say it all the time. Well, there's there's political speech and then there's, you know, speech that's geared towards people that are running for election or, you know.

Oh, sure. Yeah. Does doesn't Yeah. There's certain boundaries set up by certain acts that keep us from promoting or disparaging certain candidates and you know we can't really talk about presidents or you know we can't put signs on our door that are hey vote for this person or not that person or you know so I think that would apply to the front lawn as well. Maybe we have a certain area carved out. It's like, hey, this is the zone where we allow temporary installations. Installations. Yeah. It can't be up for more than 30 days. Can't affect can't till the grass, can't have be too heavy or, you know,

follow the rules of Yeah. I don't want to set. Yeah. Yeah. The hatch. We have to check in usually with the city to make sure they're not violating any like city sign codes requirement, you know, even for temporary stuff. We usually have to check in. Well, it's 2 weeks. So, if we just said 2 weeks, then we don't have to Yeah, we'll worry about that. Also, they don't enforce any of that. I've been in so many meetings about the temporary signs. The code is a um an appropriate way to say the mess that it is whatever give you guys enough direction clear as mud is it right

I think going down the rabbit hole of it sounds like we want some sort of policy and I I can certainly bring back a policy that you know that's can go any number of directions based upon further conversation. Can we check in and see what Sorry, go ahead. Can we check in and see what other counties do? Sure. Yeah.

What about um when it comes to events we um like are there any events that don't get permitted that use the lawn? because I'm assume because I know that we've done temporary permits for like the race series and I don't know if we've done a permit with boom days but like other than that since you've got monuments events and memorials should we have anything outside of what we already have as a policy for temporary event permits would anything need to be built in or do we need to talk about that

I don't I don't think so when I said events. I meant more like the the many requests for memorials we get. It may just be good to delineate like if it's our staff member, maybe we're fine to have a memorial. And I hate to use that example, but it's happened several times. And like maybe that is like an approved memorial when it has to do with our staff directly, but maybe memorials for other things that aren't. I I don't know. It seems like there has to be some delineation because I am getting more and more requests and I think I'm going to get more and I don't want to consistently I don't know and then by the time I can check in it's beyond that point and then people have just been emailing with no real answer about what they can and can't do. Okay.

How's that handled like with the rearies? Do they pull a permit? permits which is like temporary

specials per vision race series burrow racing but it's going to it's going to devolve into political prisoners countries it's just I can see it devolving where someone says okay you you put up a picture of this guy we want to put up a picture of this guy and I just think of blanket ban is where I'm going with it. So, I've said that three times. My wife says I repeat myself all the time. So, I'm going to stop. She's not here. I'll speak for her.

Do you see what I'm saying? The road that it's going to go down as the country gets more and more divided. I think that's why we need to have a policy in place that sets the guards.

I personally like that road. I like I like the road of of of actually talk I mean people being public about things is way better than than them keeping it to themselves and and not even engaging or talking about it. So I don't know. I don't I don't think that like what is the what is the consequence that you're most nervous about that? I would say if if somebody came to town and saw a sign that was political speech on our front lawn, they would say, "Oh, this town believes this thing or this town is in favor of this president and this town is in favor of this party." And I just that's what I'm afraid of. I don't think it's appropriate for our our community property to take a side in political arguments. I think it should be neutral. I guess like let me give an example of a concern I would have. What if someone wants to have Charlie Kirk memorial on our lawn and then now someone has wants to have an Alex Freddy memorial, right? We we as a county don't really pick

whatever thing you know it's not us but it's on our line. So then it becomes like exactly us. Thank you. And that's where and that was just like a more recent but I could see other things coming up because people are just incredibly divisive right now. Yeah. And that's where I'm a little unsure of where that line is. So that you know something that we would all find offensive like screwed people probably don't find something offensive and we would have something offensive that's not technically hate speech on our lawn. Yes. It's going to offend people. Read the vandalism.

Yes. the sheriff's going to have to get involved. Okay, we have a camera on it because somebody spray painted a mustache on Charlie Kirk or something. So, I just think it's I think it's too messy. I don't think we should be spending time on that. I think it's a responsibility of us to stay neutral on things here in this front yard with respect to all the so many different opposing views within the community. Yeah, we're just business business owner.

Okay. But what about what about not not a not a monument but a memorial? Like where is the room for us to have a memorial for a staff member? Do we go somewhere else to gather as memorial for a staff member? That's a I think that could cannot be written in the policy that if it's about a staff member, it could a staff member's family, you know, like I think that I do think that that's really reasonable and this is a

this is a place where the community is represented. So, so, so to have a space where we can convene and have memorials for our community. This seems like a natural place where people want to gather. It's very um public. It's it just seems like an people are naturally inclined to come here and I and I want to make sure that we know that when we're saying no to everything, we are also saying no to that.

No, I think that's two different initiatives. We're looking at events versus signage displays, you know, like I even see a difference between decorations that don't, you know, don't include any words or anything versus placards and things that are advocating for or against something. Well, a memorial could also be like candles and teddy bears and a cross, you know? Sure. Which we've had on this long for staff members. Yeah. So, I'm I'm just saying saying saying no to some things, but making space for this feels really complicated. It does. And we might need a bigger

I want us to know what we're saying when we say no. We're saying no to these things.

Okay. I'll amend my no say that there should be a card out for temporary tragedy type events, candle vigils, and you know, the advocates should probably have a carve out. I think when I saying no, I'm saying no to signs that are up for more than a few hours or have a place for signs that we have no control over that reflects on our community that what some people are going to find offensive. That's all. No one's going to find a memorial with some teddy bears offensive, I don't think, or a candle. and who decides and that that's where we get down that slippery slope again of what's offensive and what's not.

You can even you can hold your nose for 24 hours, 48 hours. Something's up there for a month that says we hate this person. I wish it were that easy. I I just think it's two different issues. That's all. To be fair, when there's been vigils and memorials of that that nature that are related to staff, I also reach out to to Heath and make sure someone could be available. Can you know it it depends also like can someone be available in case something comes up or we've got lots of people or there's traffic issues.

So, I will say that when we had those come up, we've definitely had to really check in with multiple people before allowing them. So it does seem like some sort of policy is needed and maybe there are bounds in the policy. I don't know. Yeah. I mean this thing it raises so many different issues that I really need to dig into some more. I mean you have issues around election laws and what can be posted during election season. I mean it's you know I'm not sure what the courts are going to think since they're using it too.

Should we circle back on this after doing a little more digging? See what other counties are doing. see if there's, you know, maybe we could pick the best and ideal things from a few different sources and come up with something that makes sense for us as a community. I think the impetus for this conversation is the the burough sign. I think we owe them a decision or a decision to not decide or something. So, I think uh we should at least address that part real quick right now. So for staff they can just tell anyone requesting we have a moratorum on anything happening until we've developed a concrete policy.

Is that the right word? Yeah, I wouldn't frame it in your terms of you taking action other than you're directing staff to look at it, which means we can't help you right now enough enough to say we're we're looking at this we can't say yes or no. Okay, something develops. Great. And that's what we can say and say. Yeah. Y we're uh we're undecided. We have some We're not a unanimous decision and uh we're considering a 4-year moratorum. Please speak up. Oh, I'm sorry.

Please. I mean, your conversation just between those five people here. I'd like to hear what you're saying, too. You want to come close? Come be up here with us. And who's this memorial for? We're talking about the Burough Race Memorial Monument. Yeah. Is the Pack Bar Race Hall of Fame uh foundation still in in being? I don't know. Did you know that there was a Pack Bar Race Hall of Fame Foundation? Yep. Okay. There was and my husband created the trophy for that foundation. Cool. That they gave out to the various people that had been involved with the Paper Res. And what's your name?

My name is Ruth Perkett. Ruth, welcome. I just paid my taxes and I wanted to come and see the people that were going to be spending it and I was just curious as to what this was all about and who heads up this pack race who's coming in asking for this. The request has come from a group. Yeah, it's a group that's interested in putting a monument out front that celebrates the burough races and their history and legacy in Lake County. And I I love that idea. The problem is you got skirt people that are going to come right in on top of that.

That's in the name of equality. And you know, then all of a sudden we've got 10 different groups that want a monument as well. So because all of it was established back in the ' 40s. Yeah. Yeah, that's the whole conversation we're having is who do we say yes to? Who do we say no to? What policy do we have so that people agree with the gentleman in the middle? It's a cut down. Good. Good to know. Thank you. Because you know you I even kind of object to the placards that you put out here during the uh domestic violence thing.

Yes. If I were coming into this town and looking at that, I think, boy, I don't know if this is some place I'd want to raise my children. If there's this is each one of those, see, it's not explained. Is each one of those uh mark a domestic violence case? Each one is Yes. Worth. Sometimes it changes. Sometimes they're worth over what period of time? One year. So, they do it annually. Lord, would you want to raise your family in a town that had that display? Well, we are raising our families in this town. Well, I understand that and I I've been a victim of domestic violence. I understand all of that. Yeah.

But you're anytime you put anything out in front here, it's on display for the whole world to see. And I think that I mean the support for the advocates and and for the American domestic v violence awareness I totally agree with that but you you have to start thinking of how it's perceived by people that just come into town because that's part of your economic base now is bringing the the tourists in. And uh I I I think I think real real long and hard. I think there's a place maybe up on the road to Mosquito Pass could be your monument to your Packro Race Hall of Fame. Uh they used to have ski juring out on the north end of Harrison. It wasn't downtown. That is one thing I I wanted to bring up again. Thank you, Ruth. is that um maybe there's some work we could do to help the bury like if we're going to say no, is there work we can do to help find another spot for their monument? Because

it'd be nice to say no and yes in another offered a few alternative locations. Um they didn't want but I think you know there's uh they felt that there was no location that was as appropriate as the lawn starting other options were offered. Got it. I think if you look at most courthouse lawns they're pretty neutral for reason because you're implicitly endorsing whatever is there. Yeah. Um, you know, whether it's burrows, whether it's domestic violence. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I'll dig into it some more, but I suspect most most counties are going to say we just don't allow anything. Yeah, that makes sense.

Yeah. Well, Ruth, we really appreciate your input. Sorry you couldn't hear the whole discussion, but we kind of went through all this and now we made this big store. I've met her husband. Okay. I'm Matt Bulock. Matt Bulock. Okay. That name's familiar. And you, sir? My name's Andrew Lee. Andrew Lee. Okay. Well, at least now I know who's going to be spending my money. Yeah. Nice. Doing the best we can. Okay, great. I've advocated for the senior center and thank you for the work that you've done up there. Yeah. When we finally got a line item in your budget and you hired a coordinator. Yeah. You you you did a 100% job for helping us at the senior center. Thank you.

Thank you. Hey Ruth, if you keep an eye on our calendar, uh you can come to any public meeting and there public comment. I know. I know. I used to be very active in that. Okay. I was president of the chamber. I was with the economic development people. I was a affordable housing. I spent 35 years in real estate in this town. Oh, okay. There isn't too much I don't know about Leadville. Plus, I'm 81 years old and I was born here. Okay. So, if you need any history, give me a whistle. We will. Thanks. Thank you. Thank you, R. I have I got to leave. I've got a health emergency with a family member. Okay. All right. Good luck, Andy. Yeah, I'll have my phone on me. Do you want me to take Hazel?

No, he's good. Yeah. Okay. Now, um shall we move on to uh Heath, unless you wanted to weigh in on anything in from a law enforcement perspective on on the the courthouse grounds. I don't know if I'd add much value other than yeah, there's some extra peacekeeping efforts that come about when we have to do these events and memorials and as Candace said u but we also want to you know allow people to exercise their constitutional rights and so it's a it is a very challenging one. Yeah.

Um when it comes to you know permanent memorials and statues it's uh that's just a personal opinion on what to do there. But from a law enforcement standpoint yeah a little extra work. Mhm. Okay, thank you. I guess we'll move on to item number four, uh, discussion regarding county classification for Colorado counties incorporated. And we've already kind of discussed this a bit and I think we can uh we can share Andy's perspective. I think uh we know it well enough. So Mhm.

I think where we landed was, you know, I was in favor of trying to move move us up a classification. Andy was neutral and would probably recuse himself from anything. And also if you wanted to

I suggest we do it in a year because the intention is to try to uh attract more competitive elections with people with more professional abilities. And I said that since we wouldn't actually take this step until the major party caucuses that it wouldn't have the effect that we intend at least within anybody who has a letter next to their name. So I suggested that we do it next year even though that would miss all of the people who would everybody except me and Matt. Um that was just my my thought on it. So I guess I'm a little confused on affecting the majority when the majority would be this cycle.

No, the point is that we the people who are considering running are considering running now and that we're not going to like entice a whole lot of people in a short amount of time by increasing their pay to run for these elected offices. And too late for this cycle essentially. I feel I feel like last year would have been a time Yeah. to address it because I think that if people know what their salary is, it takes them more than 3 weeks to consider whether they're going to completely change their lives. Yeah. To run for office.

But I do but I know that it would, you know, it would and Andy and Matt brought up that it would be plenty of time to impact or encourage people who are unaffiliated to run. Mhm. I was just thinking about the caucuses to come up within 3 weeks, right? Yeah, it's very short notice. It's really short notice. I think um you know, it' be interesting to see what what's happened. My personal experience was I didn't make that decision until March. Same. Totally. Same. Because nobody else was running, right? And it's so I think it's not uncommon in this community to to maybe expose this as a potential. Yeah.

And think, okay, I've been thinking about this for a while now. this is financially a possibility for me to make this move instead of just completely jumping off the edge like I did. Yeah, totally. To have a little more comfort that that is, you know, I can I can continue to support my family if this is something. So, I think I think it's a a good angle to look at and I think it's uh you're probably correct except for Lake County. I think there's a lot of exceptions that will will not equal that uh potential results. Yeah, you can see things a little differently. So, yeah. Yeah. But no, that's a good thought that I didn't think about either.

But but to your point, like some people might not even make those decisions until they're in those caucus rooms. And if we make the decision now and then get it out there, it could actually have an impact on this election cycle, right? Yeah. I do I think that it's the the two parts of it are making the decision but then also making the decision really public would have to happen in order for the decision to make a difference.

So if we were going to move on this I would want us to make I would want us to commit to actually publicizing it. Well, we have to do a resolution pretty like immediately and then we could work on getting that information out there. Making a notice public statement. Yeah. No. No. It's like a press release. A press release. Other types. Other types of things. Yes.

Yeah. Yeah, it's the it's the making sure that it's public knowledge that I think has to happen if we're going to do it now. And if we're not going to do that, then I would wait till next year because I want it to have an impact. It's like options are full gas now or steady

steady make sure people know so they can be ready to run. Yeah. And just so you're aware, CCI reached back out after we said, "Yeah, we're going to do this." And they were like, "Well, then you have to tell us what level." and they're waiting to hear back from me today about which direction we're going to go because they expect that our next move is a resolution and yeah getting it out there. Is there any need for people to vote on that? CCI didn't explain that to me when they asked about this, but I just wondered like we to vote on it. Do people have to vote on changes in salaries or is it just a resolution? No, it's a it's it's a statute. And so what they're looking for is do we need to run a bill? Yes.

Through the general assembly to change Lake County's specifications cuz it gets done every year. Counties go up and down. Yeah. Well, we could write the I mean, we could bring it to a public meeting and have the discussion there and vote on it instead of deciding here that we're forward or against it. with that. I have to let them know the direction we're trying to move in like now, okay, for them to be able to bring it up in time to make the change you hope to see. Wouldn't that be making a decision before our next regular meeting, which is not until next Tuesday?

Well, we're directing staff to give to be in contact with CCI about our general temperature and then we would actually be voting on the resolution. Yeah, I think it's okay to give staff some guidance in a work session, right? Yeah. Unfortunately, there is no guidance. You have three different opinions. So, there's no I'm changing my mind. I'm totally fine going for but only Matt if you're willing to make sure that we're directing staff to make sure that this is very public once we do the resolution. Oh, I think it'll be public. I want us to actually have an active role in making sure that it's public. when you're talking about the the press release

press release any media content okay

some work that I've done just on a small level that I think is helpful for direction um instead of just making the sole purpose of of recruitment essentially u there's a lot of other reasons to look into when it comes to just a comparison of where the other Colorado counties are the current classification of where we're at compared to those uh counties and then why are we going to a 4A or we're doing that proper comparison and our due diligence studying what those numbers are precisely to me that's the public information that I would like display why why are we doing this well it's not just for pay it's for elected officials it's it's also it's more appropriate for a county to be in this category and that we're not overreaching uh but like where we're at now this is the reason why this came up was we're way like

way above when it comes to um the different markers that are used to determine is where the compared to the counties that are in before meeting currently. So it's just really no comparison. So it doesn't make sense that we bucketed there. So that's uh so that would be to be some of the work that would be necessary. It's just that comparison and those numbers are out there easy to find. Mhm. In our in our press release. Correct. It may sway some people. Some people will not be swayed and they're going to be angry and that is just the way it is. Yeah. And by the way, there's no guarantee that this gets on the bill, right? Or that it gets passed

or that it gets passed and approved. So, so the direction I need is what level if we're Yeah. Go ahead and tell them. Mhm. I think these are pretty uncontroversial bills when the counties are making requests. Yeah. I don't think you run into the political battles that you typically see here at the general assembly. Based on the metrics and the numbers that you're speaking of, do you have a preference on what level we would Yeah, I think I think the four 4A is a very safe upgrade. Yeah.

Uh 3B is a little overreaching when you compare our numbers to the counties in 4B. They're they're making a little more money than us on all the different aspects of our revenue sources. The populations are a little bigger. So 4 A makes the most sense. It's still fairly conservative. Also 3A is they've got crazy 3A is a hodgepodge of counties. 3B would be the the next step up from a 4A. I know. I'm just saying if you look even one higher than that 3A has some wild counties in there. Yeah. But it's clear that we have markers that are higher than that.

Right. So it is Yeah, it is. It seems to be a uh what what are we comfortable with? Yeah. You know, what is the county comfortable with? And I like to look at it from a number standpoint um and not overreaching. I mean there's there's counties you just look at population size like uh Summit County and Eagle County, Route County, they all went up to 1A and so it is they felt comfortable that they can do that. So they did it.

It does seem like these are bundled together in a bill multiple counties making all their movements and it does seem like it's a consent agenda type of situation. So, um, not that it's guaranteed, but it's on a on the side of your property will get approved. That would be my initial suggestion. Again, I'm not bringing a ton of numbers for full proper presentation on all this. I think the 4A is appropriate, but just the initial uh look into the different numbers. That's what I feel is most appropriate. Thank you, D. It's all I needed.

Does it change the the coroner? Even the coroner is in kind of a different table. He's full time. Is that correct? Our corner. Yeah. Yes, he's full time. They're all full time. Yeah. Okay. So, are we going to have we had a conversation about that? Am I remembering? We've had a little bit of a conversation about that. But the coroner. Yeah. Um so the coroner by statute you have the ability to determine whether they're partful or part-time. And is that in the same It's totally piece of legislation. Yeah. It's in the statute currently.

So this is this is just changing the classification. Yeah. So yeah, the coroners would go up as well as every other elected official, but you know, if you wanted to circle back and say, "Hey, do we really have a full-time coroner here in Lake County?" I think that's a different conversation. But and that's a that's a county statute that determines whether they're that's a state statute that the counties can use to adjust corner seller. So then would we also go through CCI to potentially change them from part-time to fulltime to get a totally within the county to do that? What? I thought you just said it was a state statute. It is a state statute in the county.

Got it. Thank you. Sorry. Got it. It is listed part time or fulltime. So when you make that decision, you can look at those numbers and say, "Oh, he's parttime. He makes that much fulltime makes that much." And that's what statute. Thank you. We're going to start working. Okay. Well, we have three minutes. We're three minutes ahead of schedule. That's it. Well, thanks for coming, Heath, and thank you all for being here. It is uh 11:11 and we'll wrap up this work session of the Lake County Commissioners. Thank you, Chair. I see.