Board of County Commissioners Regular and Meetings - Special Meeting

Thank you. Hello, everyone. It's May 5th at 11 AM. And this is our regular meeting of the Lake County Board of County Commissioners. This is a reminder to turn off or silence your cell phones. We'd like to start with the Pledge of Allegiance and a moment of silence. Pledge of Allegiance.

To the flag of the United States of America,

let's see can i get a motion to approve the agenda with the exception of item number 10 which is a resolution 2026-16 the resolution designated certain routes and trails in lake county as part of the stage and rail Historic route, and I don't think that resolution is quite ready. Do we need the table agenda item 10?

Is that the language you want to use?

Yeah, I think we just need to postpone it to the next meeting. Hopefully it'll be ready by then. There were some issues. GARNA hasn't got the HRA's approval on part of the Highlands and Trail.

Okay. Well, I will make a motion to approve the agenda with the only change being tabling agenda item number 10.

Second.

To vote?

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Next, we move to community information items. I have none. Commissioner Elsa?

OK, I have a big one. And if everyone who's interested can turn to the whiteboard. Today at noon, there is an emergency steering committee to discuss a potential bill being introduced into the legislature. It is House Bill 26, 1430. It's called the Colorado Budget Protection Act. And it's an answer to the thing on the left, which is a constitutional amendment that is being put on our state ballot in November. It's initiated by Road Contractors Association. It's also called the State Revenue Supporting Road Transportation. And what 175 does is that it takes all sales tax, use tax, excise taxes, and fees from vehicle sales, vehicle parts, the use of vehicles on roads, and gas. which right now, all those things being collected fund lots of different things, including the DMV. And what this amendment does is it takes all of those things that are being collected and says those monies can only go to construction of roads, surface repair of roads, maintenance of roads, vehicle safety on roads, engineering and design of those roads, and the state highway Now, that sounds great, but because we are a Tabor state, that changes our budget. So if you look down on the bottom, there's like a little cylinder, and that's my representation of how Tabor works in our general fund. So first thing that gets calculated is all the fees. Those are on the bottom. So every fee that gets collected that goes into our general fund takes up a certain amount of room in our general fund. Then we also have health care and Medicaid, which we can't change except for our provider fee. And then we have to fund K-12 schools, and then we fund everything else that comes out of the general fund. Now our TABOR cap, that little spigot on the side, That goes up and down depending on how much money the state has collected year over year from all the taxes that go into our general fund. And when we collect too much, too much over the cap, then the TABOR cap gets triggered and we have to refund money to constituents through three different mechanisms. I'm not going to talk about that. But the point is that This ballot initiative, this constitutional amendment, will increase the demand on that cylinder and therefore push more of the things that we're already funding above the TABOR cap, which means that that will have to get refunded. So, and in next year, in fiscal year 2026-27, that starts in July, That amount that would be collected would be $1 billion that would go to Rhodes. The demand on the general fund would be $264 million that would have to be cut from hospitals, schools, public health, et cetera, in order to stay below that TABOR cap. The next year, it would more than double, so it would be $2 billion that would go to roads. And the demand on the general fund would be $539 million, et cetera. It just increases and increases. So our state is already in a fiscal crisis with our general fund. And this would actually increase that crisis. And the things that would suffer would be health care, public health, schools, all the other things that the state funds for us. Okay, so what the state legislature is proposing is, see that big red arrow at the top that says if, then, it's if the ballot initiative 175 passes in November, then House Bill 26-1430 would click on. And that would try to save the general fund in some ways, reduce the stress on the general fund. So gasoline excise tax, fuel excise tax, road usage fees, and then all of these other fees, they would reduce those from next year through halfway through 2030. They would reduce the amount that they're collecting. So we would all be taxed less to try to relieve the TABOR cap. that 175 would stress on the general fund. Once that's been reduced, we cannot raise it again. So we can't get those funds back. So funding all those things have to come from other taxes then. We would have to go back to the voters to raise those taxes again once we've reduced them. Then there's this other fund, I didn't even draw this, but there's this other fund that it creates to try to alleviate the general fund even more so that those taxes can go to this other transportation fund. The point is it's a bunch of complicated, ridiculous math that does a lot of arithmetic to try to put a patch on what is an underfunded system at the core level, which is the taper cap. And the Tabor Cap feels like a good idea in that it can only increase when the state increases revenue times inflation. But inflation is calculated by CPI, which is the Consumer Price Index. It's determined by the federal government. And the Consumer Price Index looks at what individual consumers like us in our daily lives buy, like milk, teddy bears, pencils, vehicles, like the things that we buy for everyday use. The government doesn't buy those things. The government buys roads and pays people. So the consumer price index, which is part of our TABR cap, doesn't float the way that our budget and the things that cost money to us float. So it's a lovely idea, but we pay for completely different things. And the TABOR cap locks us into consumer goods as opposed to government goods. So all that to say, the conversation at noon today is determining what CCI, how CCI wants to take a stand when it comes to this bill. And my I have some inclinations about how I would vote, but I really wanted to make sure that we all could talk about what it is. This is not partisan. This is the actual part of the bill and what the bill is trying to do based on the ballot initiative. And this is real life, what it will do to our general fund without agenda. So I wanted us to be able to talk about it before noon so that I could take a stand that actually represented us.

And myself and he wants to go to I was in a meeting yesterday with representatives from the government governor's office. And they were not nearly as close to as concise and clear as Commissioner also was describing this so strong work, the bottom line that if I had to sum this up in a easily digestible. summary it would be that it's it's my belief and many other commissioners across the state that this is not good for colorado's already troubled roads and the money we need to repair those and that it's it's pretty unpopular amongst constituents and counties

Can you be specific, Andy, about which one is unpopular? Because it's two different things.

They are two different things, but 175 is intrinsically tied to 1430. And they want to pass them both together. They don't.

They don't want to pass them both together. This is the, sorry, I don't mean to interrupt you, but it's not true. The governor's office, none of the commissioners want 175 to pass.

Right.

Okay. This is the answer to, hey, if that passes, we're effed. So this is the only way we can see we can save ourselves.

Yeah, they're tied together, right? So essentially, The meeting we sat in yesterday was the governor's office trying to explain how 1430 remedies, the problems that have been brought up about 175. And it's still not very clear how this helps our roads, which is sort of what it's being packaged and sold as an end of the temperature in the room is that we need more money to fix our roads, not less and this we're being told it's going to pass anyway. So we really need to voice our opposition to something that we feel like is going to negatively impact our ability to take care of our already troubled roads is my take on this. And I would like to be in the room for that emergency session of CCI from 12 to one today so that we can voice, I can voice my opposition to what the governor's office wants to do with this.

So just to be clear, 1430, the part that I didn't draw because it's so complicated, is that it creates this special transportation fund. The idea is that, as we know in county government, different funds can be spent on different things, right? So the general fund is the thing that I drew over there. This special transportation fund would, in the big blank spot, would um be where the money would come from to answer 175's uh things the construction service repairs maintenance engineering etc 23 of that fund after it has allocated its other obligations would go to counties so counties would see more money from 1430 if 175 passes 17% would go to municipalities the rest would go to State Highway the other two excise funds they have then this is gonna be another reason that's important for us to be in the room for this meeting this emergency meeting this from 12 to 1 because if there's different takes like if you're able to

to explain this in a better way than the governor's office explained it to us yesterday, then that could be valuable.

I just got all of this from the CCI email that we all got yesterday. I just took their email and I turned it into pictures.

But they didn't have call infographics.

I know, exactly. I think this is how we understand things, right, is through pictures.

I'm also curious why the general consensus is really against this.

Because of the general fund. Because a constitutional amendment, 175, will stress the general fund. And we can only spend a certain amount in the general fund. That is the TABOR cap. So if you say, hey, we want $700 million to come from the general fund, that has to come from other things. Because this constitutional amendment is not an extra tax that would potentially increase the general fund. It is saying, hey, that pie that you have, We don't want the pie to get bigger, but we want you to take $700 million from the general fund and put it only into these things. We don't care what other things you're spending it on. We want you to change how you're spending the pie. And that is where people who understand how the general fund works are very against it. That's why you see a lot of the conversation yesterday was commissioners from the full political spectrum are against 175 because of how it affects the general fund. And that's why they were like, hey, politically, it would be way better. Nobody wants to solve a voter, like if 175 passes, that's the voters saying, yeah, do it. And a lot of what the pushback was, was like, we should not be trying to mitigate voters' desires through complicated math. We should just let the voters have what they want, but what we want the governor's office to do is to use their political capital to try to keep that off of the ballot without this.

Okay, then the unsaid thing is that according to Commissioner Scott Weaver, this was not in favor by voters and constituents. and this is not in favor by the counties and the state wants to run through with it anyway. And what was more alarming to me...

This one, this one would not be in favor by counties and voters. That one...

They weren't talking about this like one connected package.

Because this one only clicks on if that passes in November. This doesn't even, this has nothing to do with anything. It becomes this fun little thing we did in the spring if that doesn't pass.

If 175 gets pushed through and it's against the will of the voters and the counties themselves. Then that raises serious concerns as far as is the state working for the people or.

175 will come to us will come to you and you and you and you and you everybody who votes in Colorado, you will see 175 on the ballot in November. Okay, we need to this is the state saying hey that will fuck us. royally when it comes to school. i'm serious like this is real and that's why everybody at CCI commissioners across the spectrum we're like. Do not let 175 pass, how do we keep it off the ballot and and the governor's answer is this is how we scare them and get them to take it off of the ballot. that was another pushback where it was like this doesn't scare them this won't keep it off the ballot this just this just allows them to put out it does yeah so no matter what we will have to cut things even more if 75 passes even if 1430 passes more will have to be cut our fiscal crisis that is over a billion dollars every year will just increase year over year

My concern is 1430 gets pitched as if we're going to reduce gas prices for the people.

And instead, people are still going to be paying out of their pocket with alignments, ball joints, tires, as our roads just get worse and worse. And that's something I'm not in favor of at all.

And I want to be present in that meeting to be able to learn more and voice my concerns.

Well, let's see. If you're going to voice your concerns over a ballot initiative, I would think that that would be something that you would have to do personally. I don't feel comfortable taking a position on a ballot initiative that I don't know anything about.

We're taking a position on this.

So I'm addressing what Andy is saying here, that if you're going to voice your opposition to the ballot initiative, then that would come from Andy Lee, not from this board.

Well, I'm against the ballot initiative. We can totally take a stand.

I'm not going to take a stand because I don't know that much about it. I think the idea is people are sick and tired of driving on roads. Yeah. If it gets on the ballot, will it pass? I think it will. I think it probably will. So now the state is gonna lower their revenues to try and scare, it seems like a weird scare tactic. And so I'm not sure that I would be in favor of that either. So I guess what I'm saying, Because I'm not going to take a position on either of these things. So if you guys go into that meeting, you should make it clear that you're not speaking. Unless you guys can both agree, I think we would need some more time. I'd need to research it some more before I take a knee-jerk position. Because that seems like it'll pass. That triggers that. It's kind of a shot to the foot in terms of revenue.

So let me, I hear what you're saying, Matt. Let me just clarify for a second. If 175 passes, see the FY26, 27, FY27, 28? That money will go to roads, period.

What's the current roads budget?

I don't know.

Is this over and above the current road budget? Yes. Okay.

So that much more is gonna go to roads, period. 1430 doesn't change that. It just changes where the money will come from. And the state has to reduce those taxes, gasoline excise tax, fuel excise tax, road usage fee, vehicle registration fee, late fees, and road safety surcharges, because those things have to go to the general fund. They have to go. So like 1430 doesn't change the amount of money we're spending on roads because the ballot initiative determines how much is spent on roads.

So then by them decreasing all those fees, they're going to try and lower that number of $1 billion. No. No, I don't understand why they're trying to lower all the fees.

I'm showing it here. This is why the Tabor cap is so important and structurally critical to how we spend money for services in Colorado. Sorry, don't mind me. This is our general fund. Okay. And Tabor establishes how big this can be year over year. That is a constitution. We cannot change that. Okay? We have all sorts of things that we pay out of the general fund. The things that we pay for with fees come out first. Boom. So then our general fund is smaller. So like CPW lives in fees. Then we have to pay Medicaid. That is federally mandated. That comes out of the general fund. Then we have to pay for education. That comes out of the general fund. And then we have everything else, which includes things like public health, like any money we get from the state.

I don't know if Candace could be more articulate about that.

The point is that we have money that comes to us through the state, and then there are services that the state provides on their own that don't come through the county. This amount, we can increase or not calculate in the TABOR cap through ballot initiatives. So when a ballot comes to us, we can say, yeah, we want to collect that amount of money and it doesn't have to be applied to the TABOR cap. The point is that of this money that this amendment would collect, this much would have to come from the general fund. It does not increase the general fund. It has to come from all of these other things that we're paying for. We can't get around that. And so what the state or so what is being talked about in the legislature proposed by the governor's office is, hey, then we have to reduce that stress on the general fund. So we have to collect fewer taxes because those things have to go to other transportation related services.

Like the DMV is a great example.

This one is saying you can't spend it on the DMV. So the state still has to pay for the DMV. And they have to take it out of the general fund. So they're trying to reduce the amount of stress on the general fund so that things like K-12 schools, hospitals, public health do not have to be cut. And they're creating a separate fund to try to relieve this fund. So everyone is against this because the people who are proposing it do not understand that the consequences will be to these things that live in the general fund.

How does reducing fees, so it just puts the money, how does reducing fees help? Can you just explain that one more time?

Yes, yes.

Kind of dense.

No, this is why I drew pictures, because I am as well.

That's very complicated. Okay. We're going to reduce fees, how does that help? Just in real simple terms.

Yeah, yeah, look, because it changes this line, A little lower.

And that is where ballot initiative 175 gets all its monies from those fees.

It will get this amount of money. Oh, yeah, sorry. Initiative 175 gets its money from all other things than these things. This is what the legislature has the power to decrease. It can't decrease all of these things. things even with that reduction this will still be collected okay in other ways because of the Tabor cap here's the tricky part yes exactly no not not because of the Tabor cap but because there are already all these other funds there are already all these other funds that some of this money currently goes to That's how you can have $1 billion and only 264 is coming from the general fund. It's because the rest of it is coming from these monies going to other funds and coming out of other funds.

So they're trying to basically hamstring this ballot initiative.

I don't think they are. I think that what they're doing is actually like they say that they're trying to scare it off of the ballot but this doesn't actually scare scare them this is not this is not a threat to this generating the money and spending it on the things that they wanted to be spent on this is just trying to protect schools and hospitals frankly which is why every other commissioner can work they can

have strong opinions against this and so by reducing all these fees and taxes now they're proposing going to the ballot and trying to increase trying to get some more revenue maybe through a graduated income tax or is that part of the plan too or is that going to be discussed that's fully separate this happened on friday this this was proposed on friday

The graduated income tax is not being proposed by the governor's office. That's a fully separate group. But that graduated income tax would go, would be outside of the TABR cap, and could be a supplemental to these two things, and child care. So it wouldn't actually solve, the graduated income tax would help, With this, I think the graduated income tax could produce like $2 billion in its first year, which if you look at this, I mean, it becomes like almost one for one. So if the graduated income tax doesn't pass, but this one does, then we're even in a bigger hole.

And so what are you guys proposing to, to what position are you proposing in this meeting? Will you take a position for the county and are we allowed to voice our opinion on a ballot initiative as a board? Because I would abstain until I know more.

That's fine. What's being talked about at noon is this one.

Again, I would be an abstain vote.

I wouldn't take a position

weighing in with cci for cci to take a position no it is counties it is a steering committee so the county has to speak with one voice yeah described differently in the meeting i was in yesterday what today's emergency meeting is about but it's a steering committee meeting so steering committees there are two different ways to vote each commissioner can vote on their own or but But no county does that. No county does that because it's a lot of complicated math for CCI, frankly. And so that's why they ask that we do our work here and we speak with one voice as one county. So you can go and do that, but it usually takes them a couple of days to actually figure out then what the vote was. And this is being heard in committee. It got heard in committee yesterday and it will be don't be heard in the legislature today.

But we're not really allowed to vote on anything in here. So you know my position on it would be an abstain that leaves the two of you to voice your opinion. And that would be our county position.

Yeah.

It sounds to me like you're both in favor of House Bill 26-1430.

I'm actually not.

You're not?

No.

I was not trying to explain my take. I was trying to help you understand what is going on. So none of that had my this is good, this is bad. That was on me trying to explain just what is the reality.

So this position that you're proposing to take would be on the ballot initiative? What position are they asking them to take?

1430. This is, so CCI, during the legislative session, they take positions on bills. Sure. Okay, well, the ballot initiative is a ballot initiative in the fall.

We can't take a position.

We can do that. That's not what I'm asking us to do. I think we should have a work session if we actually want to start taking positions on things that would be on the ballot. And it's way too early, I feel like, for me. for all of us to actually understand what any ballot initiative is going to fully do for us to like look at the whole ballot at noon is my 1430s time. I really don't. And the reason why definitely comes from a place of privilege. So I respect what the governor's office is trying to do and how they are trying to alleviate the general fund because the consequences of all of this huge consequences with just 175 slightly less consequences but still significant if they can even pass 1430 the people who suffer are our kids our teachers and families and people who have the highest health needs i would rather that we solve tabor And I think the only way we can solve Tabor, based on how complicated it is, is for stupid things like 175 to pass and for us to feel the consequences. Because right now it's just like this concept of people are like, oh, well, Tabor, I get a refund. And that's all they understand about it. And so I can withstand the suffering that 175 would initiate.

I think most people understand that TABOR means the state can't raise taxes without a vote of the people. I think most people understand that. And they're very popular and very hard to dismantle.

Anything they collect above what they budgeted for gets refunded. So if there's expenses that we have that are above and beyond what we budgeted for, TABOR pretty much puts a big stop in that.

And look over here. So if you look to the middle right in the red, the Tabor cap lowers if there's a recession. So when the state collects less money, they can spend less and less money in the future. So as our purchasing power goes down as Coloradans, if there is a recession, then the state can also spend less money on the things that it spends money on. Even though typically in a recession, the needs of the people increase.

Do you understand that?

I think that that is a backwards way to provide services as a government. So I don't think that people actually understand that.

Outside of the Tabor conversation, this is a very backwards way of making space by reducing the fees collected to go towards transportation and roads. then moving it from the general fund into transportation and roads it's basically a band-aid fix something that is going to be put on the ballot and it's absolutely backwards to me and it seems like reducing funds for roads and transportation to cover money that we're going to put from the general fund into roads and transportation is somewhat absurd to me and it's also from the temperature that I gauged in the room yesterday. And they want to push it through anyway, which raises concerns with me ethically at the state level.

So that's my personal reason I feel against it. We need more funds for our roads.

They need to fix the pie and how it's sliced up.

But this isn't the answer. So that's mine. I understand where your concerns are. They're going to take from other vital services to fix

a great example to me of government fixing problems that they're creating themselves and it doesn't seem the right way to go about it so that was my personal take on it and I'll probably learn more in this meeting today that's why I think it's important for us to be in there because it will have real-world effects here in Lake County and unfortunately unfortunately for staff and public involved we might need to pause this meeting so that two of us commissioners can go and attend this emergency meeting and be voices for the people in this because it will have real world effects here in lake county is there a vote today at cci uh-huh yeah we're expecting the position of things yeah well it sounds like each year i don't want that for different reasons yeah yeah yep which you know is essentially a county position yeah totally

may ask about just the schedule today. Are we going to take a recess at noon? Yes. To 1, and then we'll reconvene at 1. Yeah.

This was a really long way of explaining we're going to take a recess, because we have to, and why. So I apologize to staff and to the public for the unscheduled recess in today's meeting. But we feel it's really important for Lake County to have a seat at this table.

Yeah. And I want to, I want to, I agree, I'm sorry this is going to happen. It has never happened since we've been seated, so one time, we'll ask for apologies. Money will come to us if 1430 passes.

That's a good thing, right?

For roads.

I have a lot of questions about that, and I want to be able to ask them at this meeting.

I'd like to attend the meeting as well, not just the two of you. So I wonder if we can get through. We've got 20 minutes. Can we get through? And who's this public?

Oh, shout out Public Health. We had measles cases last week and during the last week and a half. Their diligent hard work and amazing response efforts, I feel, have really contributed to that staying As contained as it did so huge shout out to public health shout out to finance team getting more and more dialed in with our audits every year strong work. yeah.

This is a reminder that all meetings are recorded and available on YouTube. transcribed and indexed can be watched at a time that's best for you subscribe and stay informed on county decisions. we have public comment we have a limited time there's a lot of folks in here today so maybe we'll get through as many as we can and if there's more comment we'll take those up again at one o'clock public comment is available for residents wishing to speak on an agenda item or another issue not on the agenda to make a public comment residents may request to speak by raising your hand in person using the raised hand feature in zoom or sending a message in chat. The chair will call on the public in order. Comment is limited to three minutes, not including board questions. Action, if required, will be assigned to county staff. The chair may also ask that public comment on specific agenda items be held for later in the meeting. In certain instances, public comment will not be accepted, such as on public hearing items noted on the agenda. Does anybody have a public comment? Anybody in the room want to raise your hand? Yes, sir. Just tell us your name real quick. My name is Ken Olson, and I just want to make sure that I can have some comment with regard

can we take comment on agenda items two and four even though they're attached to public hearings i mean ideally you'd make that comment in public hearing but uh you know given that i don't know if you have somewhere else to be or what your uh uh schedule is today wait for the public because yeah there's this going to be this pause so yeah if you could wait that's probably best mr olsen mr olsen you uh okay will you be available to come back at once

Yes. OK. Anybody else in the room have a public comment? Mr. John Tepe?

I have the same on the same topic.

OK.

So if we're going to postpone that to one, then I'll make that adjustment. OK.

Thank you, guys.

I'll now go to online. Jane, would you like to make a public comment today?

This is Jane Harrelson, 172 Rafferty. The county lost roughly one to two million a year running the pool. That was claimed at the April 14th work session. And I dispute that claim. That loss was not shown on publicly posted Lake County financial statements from 2004 through 2020. That loss is not shown within two separate core requests for all the receipts of work done in the Aquatic Center in 2020 and 2021. Despite the confidence expressed behind that publicly made statement, the County Public Records Department replied with an estimate of approximately five hours and more than $200 to compile the record response for that specific CORA request. So either past administrations were not following generally accepted accounting principles or the current administration is making a claim that isn't substantiated according to the readily available public records. If county officials truly believe that one to $2 million a year was lost to the pool, our pool, to be accurate, please conduct an independent forensic audit. Thank you for listening today.

Thank you, Jane. Thank you, Jane.

Matt, would you mind if I respond?

No, I don't.

Thanks. Jane, the records that you're looking for are from 2020, so they're not in our current Tyler accounting system. Hence the high amount of hours we would have been pulling those records together. We don't have them in a digital accounting system at all, number one. Number two, we did actually spend five and a half hours looking for the information related to the court request that you submitted. And in doing so, the most information we could find showed that it was likely two million or more for running the pool in total. The comment I made was through discussions with staff. I certainly don't peruse the records 2004 to 2020 as a pool isn't something we're actively working on. And so I just misspoke in the meeting. I had talked with staff, and just from talking with them, they were saying over the whole course of the pool, there's likely one to two million. I went back and followed up with them. And so I'm a human being. look at a lot of numbers and these aren't even in the accounting system i look at so i do apologize i wasn't trying to be misleading in any way i didn't have any data in front of me i took the meeting from my car before training in glenwood so i do want to apologize jane i wasn't trying to be misleading in any way um that had just come from conversations with staff and so i do apologize i'm not perfect and i i wasn't trying to be misleading to your groups or towards a pool. I'm just a human. And I do apologize. So I'm glad you brought it up. But I do want to be able to respond and take ownership of I was wrong in that instance. But we didn't over quote you on the time it took. We actually spent all of the time pulling together the records we could. So if you did want to pursue it, you would have this.

Thank you, Candace. We appreciate your clarification.

Thank you. Apology accepted. And I apologize for saying that you were gaslighting us. I misspoke plenty myself.

OK.

Thank you.

Glad we got that cleared up. Thank you, Jane. Thank you, Jane. Thank you, Candace. Anybody else online like to make a public comment today? I don't see any. It's about 10 minutes to noon. I'm not sure we have time to get into this public hearing.

That's my sense, too. I mean, it doesn't sound like there's going to be much comment on the model traffic code, but I don't know. There's so many people, and once you open it up, it might be best just to recess now and come back at 1.

It might be a little cleaner. What if we tried to sneak in 6 and 7?

Public Service Recognition Week and public work could speak in those two issues. I can't imagine that there's that much discussion.

We're going to go out of order here and we're gonna move to item number six, discussion and consideration. Would you be ready for that, Candace?

Yes.

Okay, discussion and consideration of a proclamation recognizing May 3rd through May 9th, As Public Service Recognition Week, this will be led by Candace Brines, our County Manager.

Thank you. So it is Public Service Recognition Week. We took some time this week to provide breakfast for staff. And we are really excited to say thank you. We all wear a lot of hats here. And so we are asking for you guys to accept this proclamation. And I might let one of you read it if you don't mind. Yeah.

You ready?

I'd love to.

Lake County Board of County Commissioners Proclamation of Public Service Recognition Week, May 3rd to May 9th, 2026. Whereas public service is essential to the strength, stability, and day-to-day function of Lake County, and those who serve to do so, do so with a commitment to their community. Whereas Lake County employees provide critical services from public safety and road maintenance to health services, administration, and community support, often with limited resources and high expectations. And whereas in a rural mountain community, public servants are not only providers of service, but also neighbors, problem solvers, and trusted points of contact for residents. and whereas the work of public employees is frequently called out behind the scenes, requiring adaptability, professionalism, and a strong sense of responsibility to the public, and whereas Public Service Recognition Week offers an opportunity to formulate, to acknowledge and thank those who have chosen careers in service to others. Now therefore, be it proclaimed that the Lake County Board of County Commissioners hereby recognizes Public Service Recognition Week, May 3rd to May 9th, and expresses its sincere appreciation to all public employees for their continued dedication to serving the residents of Lake County. Be it further proclaimed that the board encourages residents to recognize the contributions of public servants whose work supports their safety, well-being, and quality of life to the community. I move.

Mr. Copeland. I second that. Two votes. Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

It is hereby proclaimed We will move to item number seven. Discussion and consideration of a proclamation recognizing May 17th through May 23rd, 2026 as National Public Works Week. Led by Michael Irwin, our Public Works Director.

Okay. The week of May 17th to the 23rd is recognized as National Public Works Week. With this year's theme being limited in service, powered by community. Public work professionals play an essential role in maintaining the safety and infrastructure and quality of life within our community. By issuing a proclamation in recognition of this week, we formally acknowledge the dedication and critical contributions of the Lake County Public Works Department.

Thank you, Michael.

OK. I'd like to read the proclamation. Proceedings of the Lake County Board of County Commissioners National Public Works Week Proclamation, May 17th through May 23rd, 2026, rooted in service powered by community. Whereas public works professionals focus on infrastructure, facilities, and services that are vital to the sustainability and resilience of communities, as well as to public health, a high quality of life and the well-being of the people of Lake County. And whereas these infrastructure systems, facilities and services could not be provided without the dedicated efforts of public works professionals who are engineers, managers and employees at all levels of government and the private sector who are responsible for rebuilding improving and protecting our nation's transportation water supply water treatment solid waste systems public buildings and other essential structures and facilities that serve the residents and visitors of lake county and whereas it is in the public interest for residents and civic leaders to gain knowledge of and maintain a continuing interest in and understanding of the importance of public works and public works programs in their communities. And whereas the year 2026 marks the 66th annual National Public Works Week sponsored by the American Public Works Association. Now, therefore let it be proclaimed that the Lake County Board of County Commissioners And the state of Colorado hereby designates the week of May 17th through May 23rd, 2026 as National Public Works Week and urge all citizens to join with representatives of the American Public Works Association and government agencies in activities, events and ceremonies designated to pay tribute to public works professionals, engineers, managers, and employees, and to recognize the substantial contributions of Lake County Public Works in protecting public health and safety and in advancing the quality of life for all.

I second it. I second it. Second. To vote.

Aye.

Aye. We now officially proclaim May 17th through May 23rd is National Public Works Week and we really appreciate you and the crew. Thank you, Michael.

Yes, a huge thank you to you and your team, Michael Irwin.

As I'm sure everyone appreciates us in Public Service Recognition Week. So if anybody online would like to express their gratitude, I think that does it. Can we put the CCI meeting up here on the big screen?

Yes, it's not a public meeting.

Oh, it's not a public meeting.

So we'll have to meet Kate. Excuse me. This is Sonia Michele with Excel. I'm not quite sure where the raise your hand feature is, so I apologize for jumping in. I just wanted to clarify, are we picking this meeting back up at 1 o'clock and we need to dial back in at 1, or is it a different meeting you're going to have?

No, we're good at 1 o'clock. Thanks for asking, Sonia. To clarify, we're going to pause this meeting from 12 to 1. We'll probably pick up here, let's say 1.05.

Okay. Okay. So we should dial back in then.

Please.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Sonia. The meeting is now paused at 11.55. We'll resume at 1.05. Would it be appropriate? 105 will now resume our public Lake County Board of County Commissioners on May 5th. Thanks for understanding our pause and proceedings. We are going to start with a public hearing. This is a public hearing regarding ordinance 2026-02, an ordinance for the regulation of traffic and vehicles. by the County of Lake, State of Colorado, adopted by reference 2024 edition of the Model Traffic Code, with amendments repealing all ordinance in conflict therewith and providing penalties for violation thereof. So I'll go ahead and open the hearing. We will now open the public hearing for public comment on Ordinance 202602, an ordinance for the regulation of traffic and vehicles County of Lake, state of Colorado, adopting by reference the 2024 edition of the Model Traffic Code with amendments repealing all ordinance in conflict therewith and providing penalties for violation thereof. Anyone wishing to speak may come forward. Please state your name and address for the record. If you prefer to leave your address off the record, just state if you live in the county, that would be fine. Some people don't like to give their address to the public. Comments are limited to three minutes per speaker. Please direct your comments to the board. We'll start with anyone in the room like to speak on this ordinance, the traffic ordinance. Anybody online like to speak on the traffic ordinance? Hearing none.

I'll move to close the public hearing.

Thank you. I will second that. To a vote?

Aye. Aye.

The public hearing portion of the 2026-03 ordinance is closed. Or excuse me, 2026-02 ordinance. And we can now move to discussion on the board.

I'm fully in support of this. I appreciate the work session, and I will be voting in favor.

I agree. Can I get a motion, please?

Did we need to hear anything from County Attorney Madhouse?

Yeah, I mean, I can just clarify there was pretty robust discussion on this ordinance at the April 7th meeting. Sort of the upshot of all that was there was really no consensus to move forward with the OHB portion of that. So that was removed entirely from this. So other than that piece, the ordinance as was presented at April 7th was is is the same i don't know if the sheriff has anything to add on those since i work quite closely with them to update our model traffic code i think we're into the 2010 version now so a couple of iterations behind yeah sure comment we're just working with uh the attorney's office to finalize the uh buying the schedule so it's in line with uh model traffic code yeah

Very good.

I will move to approve Ordinance 202602, an ordinance for the regulation of traffic and vehicles by the County of Lake.

I will second that. To vote?

Aye.

Aye. Aye. We'll now move on to the second portion of the public hearing. We will now open the public hearing for public comment on Ordinance 202602. This is an ordinance concerning fire restrictions, open burning fireworks, and fire ban stages in the unincorporated areas of Lake County. Anyone wishing to speak may come forward. Please state your name for the record before beginning your comments. And if anybody in the room would like to raise their hand and speak on this ordinance. Yes. May I come up? Please. Absolutely.

possibly give out some handouts sure they can clarify first of all my name is ken olson i do live in the county 1833 silveryville court okay thank you you used to sit up here

Beautiful, Ken. This is really nice.

The reason that I'm here today representing and guarding my son, the integral part of running the railroad here in Leadville, is I first obtained a copy of this fire ban resolution from the paper in the Herald Democrat, April 23rd. And I'm not sure what amendments have been made to this point. But the topic here, of all things, is explosives. And sometimes we get a boulder down, a rock down, Big ones. Biggest ones I've seen about the size of a Volkswagen. And that can happen sometimes anytime. We don't know when something might occur, but we hold Type 33 license from the ATF. The other is, there's a few points here. I know that the railroad here uses explosives, and then also the Climax mine.

They drill, they blast, they use gas boosters, explosives. And so I'm not here representing Climax, but nonetheless, the users of explosives, there could be others.

We have a high concern for fire danger on the railroad. It's very important. We have our own fire plan. But with regard to explosives in this ordinance, I take you to the handouts here in which I've got the resolution there.

And there's three items, item A in the states where it reads stage one fire restrictions,

So in a stage one, that's what it states. My proposal needs to read, use of fireworks is prohibited. Use of explosives is allowed only by permit issued by the sheriff. Because on a stage one, ourselves and the other significant users of explosives in the county. Stage two fire restrictions refers to again, reads explosives and fireworks use sale or possession of fireworks and explosives is prohibited. My proposal is, needs to read explosives and fireworks. The use or sale of fireworks is prohibited. The use of explosives is allowed only by permit issued by the sheriff. One note on this is that the storage of explosives is regulated by ATF. And so my presumption is that nobody wants to go up to Climax with a county truck and bring their explosives back down to the sheriff. The third item is item C, open fire ban during high danger conditions. High danger conditions is the highest level county. Reads, engage in any activity that produces or maintains or attempts to produce or maintain spark, flame, or other ignition source from open fire. Open fire, the definition of open fire refers to prohibition of explosives. So my proposal is engaged in any activity that produces or maintains or attempts to produce or maintain spark play or other ignition sources for an open fire, except for use of explosives allowed only by permit by the sheriff. So obviously, we're pushing all the explosives explosive in light county to the so and so that's those are the three items specifically i've studied it hard and those are the three items that i have come up and i was uh thank you thank you sir do you have anything to add uh i would just say that like we're the control of uh

The explosives when they're in your possession is highly regulated by both the state and the feds and probably those use of those that possess explosives would probably know best on how they should be handled and stored rather than whoever else might be held accountable for the storage of explosives.

Thank you. Ken, can we ask you a couple questions? I think Elsa might have a few for you.

Sure. Ken, are there, like, expiration, like, under your permit from the sheriff, do you get a permit from the sheriff's office for your explosives, or is it just ATF?

The ATF regulates the possession and storage of explosives. The ATF, we just had a new magazine put in place, and the ATF's been up to approve new magazine, and the change of use of another magazine. So those are regulated by ATF. And then use of explosives in Colorado, use of explosives regulated by the state. ATF does not regulate use of explosives. So the Division of Public Safety in general regulates use of those explosives.

Okay. I really appreciate these points. This threads the needle really well. Now, I'm curious, when it comes to having the sheriff as only allowed or permitted or permit issued by the sheriff, so is this proposing a new permit system or what is your, what's your take on Ken's proposal? It sounds good to me, but I want to hear from you.

Yeah, I'm wondering if it's easier to address more as an exemption and then to analyze the situation at hand, given what level we are. Where are the explosives being used? Why do we have to take this case by case? A permit process, I think, would be a lot to manage. But potentially, and then also just how long is the permit good for through the entirety of the fire ban? Because this is very specific to a ban versus a permit just to go ahead and use during the entire ban. I think it's a great point to bring up that we do need to more specifically identify how we handle these explosive situations, use of explosives in our county.

Because we have to remember the point of this fire ban is to prevent fires. That's the overwhelming reason for the relevance of conditions and that's why

we would be more than happy to work with the sheriff's office with regard to the key is fire prevention yeah yeah i i really appreciate that point so just though we know how we could potentially amend it heath what would you suggest in these in these three stages How would you thread the line of allowing explosives in certain times by certain people for certain uses that still maintains our safety?

I guess there would be more information on the use. How often do we have to address the situation? Is it once a week, or we have a special project, or is this like a daily thing we might have to encounter during every fire event? I'm not sure what the use would be.

we actually get a real winner for avalanche mitigation. In the summer months, we're talking about it probably being unlikely we even have a rock down that we can't move with our equipment this summer, but we would like the ability to call for a one-day exemption for our company, and we can decide that depending on fire danger and work together. I think the use of the Climax, use this day-to-day.

I'm curious, knowing what the intention is and what the changes that might be better to this for Lake County's day-to-day operations, what do you think would be a good way, verbiage to use to change this? Do you have any thoughts on that?

I think what Mr. Olsen proposed is a reasonable approach, I guess, to his concern is, yeah, if Climax is doing this on a daily basis, you know, I'm not sure how to manage that, whether that's also just, again, a discretion to the sheriff to There's probably only a couple, unless Mr. Wilson or anybody else is aware of anybody else. I'd be leery about just having a blanket exemption that allows anybody to use explosives in a fireman, but yeah. Yeah, I think his proposal is reasonable. I think Mr. Olson's proposal is reasonable. This leaves some, I think, enough wiggle room for the sheriff to sort of, you know, address that permit issue administratively within his office of, you know, whether he wants to, with Climax, for example, to say, go up and look at his operations and, you know, somewhat of a, it's above treeline.

that the fire danger is a lot lower up there, obviously.

And just say, yeah, as long as you're within this area, if you're good, you can take operations, or something to that effect. Just sort of leave the sheriff's discretion to address that. I think trying to micromanage that in an ordinance is pretty difficult.

Our intent is to try to keep the train running on schedule.

entirely possible. We run a high rail pickup in front of that before any passenger train goes up that rail for safety every day. That way we can sleep at night. And so because we do that, it's very rare that we have a really big rock on the slope. But it generally is something in a situation in which we need to deal with it now. And so that's the nature of why we'd like to work with Sheriff's Office with regard to, quote, the nature of a permit. What does that entail? Well, keep a fire from happening. That's the whole point. But maybe not shut us down. That's the key element that we're concerned with. And we'd rather address it now. This is the time.

Thank you, Ken.

So thank you very much.

Thank you. Mr. Wilson, so could we address this in a future amendment, pass this?

No, I think you can address it today, if you choose to.

We could move to adopt the proposed amendment. Yeah.

Yeah, okay. But, okay.

And they've been read.

Yeah. Yeah. We still have more public comment to go. if you guys have any more discussion on this.

Is there anybody online who'd like to comment on this?

Oh, Mr. Seppi.

My name is Don Seppi. I'm from Campground.

I don't know if I have concerns or just questions. But under the old fire ban, well, I guess the first question I would have is, What makes the new proposal significantly better than the existing three-stage fire ban we currently have, or fire ban process?

Is there something that you guys are diligently trying to get in addition to what's already on the books?

Matt, do you want me to address that? There is nothing on the books, is the issue. ordinance behind the fire ban to allow the county sheriff to come in and say, hey, there's a fire ban. You got a campfire. You're getting fined. So without that ordinance in place, there's really no ability for the sheriff to go out and enforce it.

OK. So then my comments would be this. Depending upon the grades of the fire ban, my campground under the existing was is that on the first level and the second level, the campground was exempt because we have fire rings and maintained areas and all that kind of stuff. The concern I have is that depending on how your wording is in the ordinance, it's always been in the past where people had, say, a propane fireplace. So it's a self-contained unit. It sits off the ground. It's propane.

It's good.

Turn it off. It's off type of thing.

Or a lot of campers have outdoor propane stoves that are attached to the outside of their camper.

Or tenters use Coleman stoves or outside butane stoves that they put on the picnic tables to cook. Well, if you list just you can't have fire, sparks, anything that can do this, now all of a sudden my campground guests can't eat because we're in a high fire ban, but they can't the way I interpret what you're saying they can't have their Coleman stove on the picnic table cooking boiling their water or if they have a fold-out cook center on their RV like these little teardrop trailers they don't have room so they always have a fold-out kitchen type thing on the back of the trailer which puts it outside so I am concerned that the wording isn't such that it stops my campers from being able to cook their meals, because a lot of them, even with big trailers and indoor stuff, they're camping, so a lot of units have outdoor cooking facilities that are still propane and totally controllable, but they have a flame, they have a spark, have all these things that you're saying you can't do.

So I'm concerned about that.

Bob, would you like to address that as well?

Yes.

or services already doing. So the stage one fire ban has permitted fires after a stage one restriction. Open fires are permitted only within permanently constructed fire gates or fire permits located in developed recreation sites, or within fully enclosed devices using pressurized liquid, or gas-filled open stoves, grills, and bathrooms. So, I think that addresses your concern.

Don, I think the point is that you're what you've been working under is what this is codifying so you wouldn't get to completely no open flames until like level three where you can't even be smoking outside right and and the point of that is that like by the time we get to that level like we can't we can't institute those levels until there are very specific conditions that require that level that we're moving to. In which case, maybe your campers wouldn't be able to cook outside, but also it wouldn't be safe for anybody to be cooking outside.

Well, according to this, as I see this now, because this is the first time I've really been able to read this, in your own stage, well that's stage two, let me try and find stage three.

It's called Open

in the definitions it helps explain to open fire and open burning under open fire and open burning yeah um i think you have an exemption on stage one and two for propane rings but and that's true because it says that pressurized liquid or gas equipped is exempt from that stage two but in the stage three um

I just question, I mean, use of fireworks, duh, okay. But engage in any activity that produces or maintains or attempts to produce, maintain, spark, flame, or other ignition source for an open fire. Well, the question is, is my gas stove an open fire? If it is, then why are we, I mean, that seems like that's a little crazy to do inside the campground.

when it's an acceptable cooking method by the industry. I mean, I don't have a problem telling people they can't have their campfires.

I mean, I get people canceled because for some reason they can't have a campfire if they don't think they're camping or something. But I'm willing to do that in the highest level. I just question the wording of this. I guess what I'm thinking is I don't see how a gas stove that has a controlled flame in a controlled unit is a truly open flame under the same thing that you're approaching or trying to approach. And I guess, yeah, the Forest Service has their own little thing, whatever they do, but you have to look and see what they're doing. They're enforcing over thousands and thousands of acres of stuff hardly anybody patrolling anything, where what you guys are doing is within a very limited acreage of Lake County private and county property that is much more thoroughly policed. My grass is very short. I have irrigation wells. I haven't had to use them yet for many years. But I have the ability to do all those things. And I have water right there. at virtually every site. So I just question, I guess I'd prefer not to get in an issue with the Sheriff's Department because my guests, who are cooking on an outdoor gas, propane, built, designed, approved grill, not a campfire.

I mean, you know, so I guess that's what my concern lies is

I think by basing your whole thing on the Forest Service, it could be more stringent than it needs to be because this is worded more like if somebody happens to catch me in the woods and I'm clicking the lighter, that's against, you know, just the spark on the lighter, that's against the thing and in theory it could start a fire. Where this is in a controlled situation with designed equipment And if we don't allow that, then all of a sudden I have tenters and everybody else and even some big rigs that have a hard time even cooking their meals or boiling their water.

The way that I'm reading it is that engage in any activity that produces or maintains or attempts to produce or maintain spark, flame, or other ignition source for an open fire.

But then it depends how you define open fire. I've got a gas grill here.

and I've got a metal container around it that's designed to maintain the fire and the heat and everything, and I've got a grill over the top of it, and I've got a pan on it. But technically, I could argue you're calling that an open fire.

Well, open fire defined as any outdoor fire except as expressly exempted in this ordinance. including but not limited to open burning agricultural burning campfires warming fires trash burning charcoal grill fires wood pellet grills fires and wood burning stoves or grates and the use of explosives or fireworks of any kind i don't think a propane cooking stove is going to fall under open fire, by definition.

Well, I guess what I'm asking for is, and I agree with what you said 100%, if that's why I'm sitting here, because what I would feel more comfortable is, is if you actually exempted designed and manufactured gas fuel appliances for cooking or something. Because in the future, Somebody can be arguing with me and trying to find me at my campground because I have guests that cook their breakfast on a butane stove. And so if we could exempt that, even if it's just like you did with your fire rings, inside an established, permitted or whatever your thing was for a camping facility. Because like I said, I don't want to get in an issue where People are saying, that's an open flame. You know, I mean, that's my concern. And this is the time to address it. So if we had an actual exemption, exempting those type of units, I mean, maybe you don't want that happening in somebody boondocking. If there is places they actually boondock on county property, legal. But I'm thinking, like, just like your firing thing, If you could exempt those types of units inside a campground or however you guys word it, that would be great because now all of a sudden I'm not in the same situation that I am at the moment.

No, I agree. And what you're saying is if someone was cooking on their grill, their gas-fired grill at home on their patio, if it was interpreted that they were in violation, could be fine. So can we find verbiage in here that addresses grills, like gas grills? But what you're talking about is some campers have like a backpacking stove. That's a little different because that could be knocked over.

Well, and that's true. But most people, most campers, even tenters, have Okay, thank you. I didn't want to show my age. Coleman stoves or something, you know, and nowadays they're not so much white gas like the old Coleman stoves. They are butane with the butane containers, but it's still a rectangular device built out of metal that doesn't tip it over. You can throw it, I guess, but you can't. It's not like what you're talking about where you have the canister is the base for the stove and everything else.

And I can live with having those

regulated but it's like you're saying with a with a gas grill and a people's yard or or like i said even big big rigs like 45 foot fifth wheels a lot of them have outdoor kitchens a lot of the smaller rigs have outdoor kitchens because there's nowhere to put the kitchen if you don't put it outdoors so they have a like the back of their ring will fold out and you'll have a sink and you'll have a cooking device So as long as we can get those, and I understand like everything you do with charcoal, but you can't just put, you can't turn a valve and turn the charcoal off. You can't do that with a pellet stone, anything. But with a gas, you know, pressurized gas device, you turn the valve and it's off. So that's what I'm really searching for, so that we get some type of obvious exemption for designed, stable, rigs, cooking devices, heating devices. Well, that's cooking, because you're heating water instead of cooking. I agree.

I think that's a good point.

I understand and recognize the language in these codes can read like a foreign language.

They're hard to interpret sometimes. It's not clear. Things jump around. I do believe in the code language itself, what you're asking for is protected.

what i would propose is that we could do some outreach to the community on the county's end that would clearly explain like hey you know if it's got a valve that shuts on and off you're good you know basically like letting people know and know in clear terms that would be hey don't go after your neighbor for cooking on their grill you know or if you're down in the campground these guys are allowed to use their cook stoves in stage one and two and I believe even stage three.

Well, I'm really looking at stage three is what I'm looking at. Can we pause for a second? Stage two, they're allowed. You already have them allowed in stage two because a pressurized gas device is allowed. I'm looking at stage three. And the reason I'm pushing for specific language is exactly what was said before in that you might want to limit a backpacking stone. It still has a valve. You can still just shut it off. but it's not very stable. So it could theoretically be tipped over. And so that's why I'm pushing for more specific language allowing, even in a stage three, these devices to be utilized that you can't accidentally tip over. I mean, that's the concept. Next one. Elsa, did you want to say something?

I just wanted to ask Heath.

Heath, how often, or like, How often do you think stage three in your time as sheriff has been implemented?

Zero. I think just for clarification of language, there's not officially a stage three. We're just talking about an open fire ban during high danger conditions. There's only two stages. But yeah, I don't believe that everyone's seen stage two, so I think this is a pretty rare case. But I was just flipping through the definitions. to address this point here of what an open fire is. And in the current ordinance, it does say it's accepted as expressly exempted in ordinance, in this ordinance, or ordinance from 2012-03. And 2012-03 does go into a lot of definitions of what open burning is, but I don't see the clarity that Don's looking for in the old ordinance either, when it's specific to the definition open fire versus open burn so I think there is some room for there but then the question comes to more of the fire experts to say is that what they're trying to say at this point of this stage is that we don't even want that so can I so thank you so much unless there's anything else you want to say can I just chair can we get back to more of the public hearing format

so that we're actually listening to public comment and then we'll close the public hearing and then discuss um i don't understand what what you're asking me we're doing a lot you're asking me to allow any more back and forth we're doing a lot of back and forth and then like making decisions about what we want to see amended i don't think we're making decisions we're just listening to film i think to get as a point across we needed a little more

I know, and I appreciate that.

I understand what you're saying. Are you ready to close this public portion of the hearing?

No. I think my point is that I appreciate Don. I appreciated the back and forth. Now we actually understand what the request is. We understand how often it is. And then discussion is supposed to happen about what we actually want to see.

After we close the .

After we close the . That's all I'm asking. It's just a little bit.

So you're asking me to close the .

I'm not. I'm just asking for just a little bit more.

Don, is there anything else you'd like to add? I'm good, thank you. Thanks for coming in. Is there anybody online who'd like to comment on this fire ban? Okay, well I guess we'll close the, go ahead now.

Sonia, last time, said she was having problems finding the raise to their hand feature before.

Sonia, would you like to make a public comment on the fire ban ordinance?

Oh, no. No, thank you. I do appreciate the opportunity. Thank you.

I'm sorry. All right.

Well, I'll move to close the public hearing component.

I'll second that. To vote.

Aye.

Aye. The public hearing is now closed. We can go on to discussion. I think you make a great point, Donna. I'm not sure if it's clear that what you're asking for isn't in there. So I don't know how we would go about. Matt, what do you think?

I mean, I think it's kind of a policy decision, really. I mean, we can certainly go that direction. I wish Chief Daley was able to be here today. He wasn't because he had a, you know, just couldn't be here. You know, I would prefer to have some input on him before we made that change because he said we're talking about conditions that rarely, if ever, exist, and from a policy, fire policy perspective that may be in the situation where, yeah, we don't want any kind of fires and that's intentional.

So, yeah, that would be my thought is if you wanted to, you know, take this up when Chief Daley can come back and give you some prior comment, we can do that.

Otherwise, you can move forward or certainly you can direct me to make those changes. My interpretation is that stage one and two are what our primary tools are. Not stage three, the high fire danger stage, which I'm calling stage three, unintentionally, I guess, is just this last tool we have in case if we're surrounded by fires, there's not going to be people wanting to camp. We're dealing with the utmost seriousness of fire danger. And like Jeff said, I don't think we've seen that stage reached here in recent history. And that might be a situation where we'd want to say no to everything. We've got, you know, we're in a, I don't see it happening, but like if it did, you know, that we might want that tool in our pocket to just say no to everything. Unfortunately, we're in the situation where We're evacuating people. We're dealing with so much stuff right now that it wouldn't be a situation where people would even want to come here to camp, I think is what I feel like that stage would come into effect during.

Yeah, me too. I want to be able to keep that tool in our sheriff's pocket to say, no, love that this is safe, but it's not safe enough for our current conditions. Stage two. Stage two, you can't smoke outside.

Yeah. Well, we've been in stage twos before. Yeah, stage twos we've been in. And you guys will still be able to have outdoor kitchens on the RVs.

And I could have fires, fire rings and stuff in stage two. Stage three, that was the one where they shut everything down. And I have seen the old stage three enacted in the past where there was no campfires, no nothing.

It's very possible, too, that this summer with our conditions, depending on weather, we might need to say no thank you to fires of any kind.

Maybe we should table this and get some input from Dan and also clarify what Mr. Seppi is asking.

I'm not a fan of tabling, but I won't move to table personally. I'm fine with this ordinance as is. I appreciate what Don is saying and the nervousness and I am I'm comforted by Keith in knowing that this has not happened in years. So when it does happen, it is actually needed.

Yeah, I don't know if we need to table it. Again, I feel like this, what we've been referring to, or what has been referred to a little bit as stage three, this high fire danger stage, the last call, I do feel like it's going to be, that will be a situation where We're not going to be worried about if someone's cooking their hot dogs or not. That's going to be all hands on deck. We're evacuating where we've got serious issues.

Really high winds. And really, really high winds mixed with all the other conditions. Even an outdoor flame that is controlled with a valve that's on the back of a camper, something gets knocked onto the flame, that's what catches things on fire, is all the other parts around the stove, not just that the stove can be managed on and off. I've seen that happen for sure. So anyway, yeah. Can I throw a curveball out there? Yeah. I love curveballs.

Yeah, I apologize for not thinking of this sooner. Conversation sparked it.

Wait, can we just pause? Keith, I'm so sorry. Yes. I'm trying to be, this is a hearing. Yes. Not our normal banter. So do we have to open up the hearing to hear from the hearer? Thank you. Thank you. OK.

Yes, and this is in reference to these different levels that I think we're throwing out this stage three that I'm not familiar with. And this is in section C. Our restrictions are identified in section B, which is stage one, stage two, and the no burn days, which we haven't talked a lot about. But that's more just like the ability to say today's a bad day to have fires instead of implementing a whole stage. And then this section C is talking about the open fire ban during high danger conditions, and this is during high danger conditions, no person shall do this. It's almost a blanket statement that any time that Forest Service puts us in high fire conditions that this applies, versus like a stage of what we're doing.

So we're just saying, hey, any time Forest Service announces high danger conditions, which is in reference to weather and the conditions, that this is implemented.

So, that section isn't really saying the specific ban that we're implementing. And this open fire ban during high fire danger conditions spelled out in section C can kind of operate independently of our own fire bans, is that?

Yeah, to me it started to seem a little confusing because once we hit fire in high fire conditions, It's usually related to implementing a stage one ban at least.

So to me this is saying if there's not a stage one or stage two or no burn day and it's high fire conditions that this is another layer that would be. So there's no stage three essentially?

Yeah, no there's not. I don't think this has a more extreme stage that we're kind of playing it out to be right now. I feel like we need to, honestly I would need more understanding and clarification of what where that's coming from and if it's, you know, if this is a Forest Service recommendation that during high conditions in our Forest Service that these rules apply outside of if there's no staged fire.

So there's high danger conditions is a defined term.

So conditions indicating elevated fire risk including when a fire weather watch, red flag warning, high wind watch or high wind warning has been issued by the National Weather Service. Any time a fire weather

fire weather watch red flag warning or high wind watch or highway warnings so no matter what stage we're in it can overlap yeah so it's saying like hey this is ours but please pause all things no matter what stage we're in during these high weather high danger conditions i don't think that even says pause

fire ban during high danger conditions open fire we've already defined as burning stuff outside you know like burning slash piles things like that not co-stoves or propane rings or anything an open fire ban is just engaged in any activity that produces or maintains or attempts to produce maintain spark flame or other ignition source for an open fire or use fireworks all that's no good during high fire danger. I think we're kind of, where I got sideways on this was trying to define a stage three, which is not even a thing. And we don't have, from what I'm understanding now, we don't have that option of shutting everything down if we are having evacuations and in the absolute worst case scenario, we could envision anyone sitting in this room to think of I don't think we have anything above this stage one and stage two.

I mean, this says, an open fire is all sorts of things, including campfires and charcoal grills and et cetera. So you, there would, oh, crap.

It says charcoal and pellet. It does not say. It does not say that.

It says stage one and stage two again. Things that Mr. Sethia mentioned are allowed. Maybe when you have these additional conditions that are super extreme.

But even then, it says it's still allowed.

It's still allowed. I don't think we have anything above stage two that we could even exercise.

There is no time where you could say no flames.

Yeah.

Yeah. see open fire in dangerous conditions, no person shall engage in any activity that produces or maintains or attempts to produce and maintain spark, flame, or other igniting sources for an open fire.

Right, an open fire does not include a cook stove. Right. So there is no, there would be no condition under these proposed ordinance, I would say, you can't have a flame.

Well, that's great. That's a pretty concrete interpretation. I'm happy. I just want to, you know, my concern is that when you guys are no longer the Board of County Commissioners and a new group comes in here, if they interpret it the same way, and that's why I'm just trying to get it so that it's really obvious that no matter who reads it goes, oh, yeah, not just like, oh, well, when we discuss this.

I think we've established it enough.

Okay.

I also want to get back to our parameters. Right, I'm sorry. It's okay. You know, I'd let everybody talk as long as we can. So it's good to have someone who's a little bit of a stickler for the rules. But I think we've flushed this out enough to make you happy. And it's good for us to review it as well. Thank you.

And it's defined, so it's not like I'm interpreting it in a certain way. Because it's a defined term, there is no other arithmetic that gets us a different way than anyone who's sitting up there. I am curious why we don't have that. And I didn't understand. I definitely was interpreting it differently when I read it and when we talked about it. So, Matt, can you speak to why there is no time where we would ban any flames?

I can't. Again, I wish Chief Kelly was here. Sure, sure. I'm not a fire expert. I don't know if the sheriff has any input on that.

I think the stage two restrictions are good enough to survive whatever weather conditions are presented to us.

I've used propane fire rings pretty much exclusively for years now and they do emit sparks you know there are the little fake rocks that sit in there when they

or somebody accidentally taps it while they're walking by, you can see sparks emitted from those propane fire rings. And under this current setup, those are technically allowed through stage one and stage two and the high fire danger conditions situation. So what I guess I want to ask is, is there a way to approve this and then at a later date add a higher level of of exceptional fire danger rules that we could implement in these worst case scenarios that all of us have had to think about a lot more this year and envision, you know, really.

Yeah, I mean, you can always amend your ordinances. I would just caution you, if you're thinking of doing that, that we would probably better sort of just table it and then have Chief Daley come.

They're going to have to go through this entire process again where I don't know how much this cost to publish it, but it was probably not cheap.

That's smarter for taxpayer dollars, I'm all for it. Well, if that's what we're thinking and that you're concerned this isn't clear, then yeah, maybe we wait for time for Chief to come in and we can talk about it at the next meeting. That's my suggestion.

Is that overboard? I think it is. I think we should move forward with this and then ask for anybody who any kind of issues over the summer. The summer seems to be shaping up pretty extreme. You know, come back and tell us if there's any issues with how it's written. So I would call for a motion to... There's also Mr. Olsen. I don't know if you want to discuss this issue. So now, I didn't catch that you wanted to make He wanted to make amendments.

Well, I think a couple things. One, I'm really curious why there isn't a full open-flame ban.

Like the nuclear option.

Yeah, and it makes sense that people need to eat, obviously. But I just I honestly just I'm curious about the safety component not about the impact on people's ability to cook food So I'm just curious of the safety component why we don't have that option and then to like we have talked about this multiple times now and It wasn't until today sitting down talking through it with the confusion that mr. Steffi brought that I actually Understood that that wasn't an option so I am concerned at how this is written, how it could be interpreted and actually used by the community. I think the jargon is important, but either we change the wording to be more explicit so that everybody understands it, or we make some sort of commitment that we interpret this ordinance into a very easy hey, this is stage one, this is stage two. There is no stage three, but under certain conditions, we might say pause these things. So either we need to write an ordinance that makes it clear, or we need to be able to translate the ordinance once we've passed it so that people can follow it.

I like the second option. I do too. I can interpret, spell it out with posts. With pictures. Yeah, with pictures. With pictures. Yes.

With graphics.

And, you know, I mean, we just listened to Sheriff Speckman, who I have great faith in, say that anything beyond stage two, we can get a handle on anything we need to get a handle on with stage one and stage two. So while I, in my wildest dreams, can envision where some random circumstance that's allowable under stage two could still be a problem, the reality of boots on the ground and the actual experience in the room

Yeah, I don't mind asking him at a later date, but I don't feel like I need to pause this to write it into the limits. I just have a curiosity.

Okay, then... And just so everyone's aware, Chief Daley also reviewed this, and I think he reviewed it a couple different times. That's great. He actually suggested sort of the red lines that you have seen that wasn't published, that incorporated ordinance 12- whatever it was, which was a fire permit ordinance, not a fire ban ordinance. We incorporated his suggestions into the revised ordinance.

Okay.

Okay.

Pulling up. I will make a motion. to approve ordinance 2026-3 an ordinance concerning fire restrictions open burning fireworks and fire ban stages in the unincorporated areas of lake county colorado with the following amendments uh in stage one fire restrictions the verbiage explosives and fireworks, the use of explosives or fireworks is prohibited, be changed to the use of fireworks is prohibited, the use of explosives is allowed only by permit issued by the sheriff. The additional change as well under stage two fire restrictions of explosives and fireworks use sale or possession of fireworks and explosives is prohibited be changed to explosives and fireworks the use or sale of fireworks is prohibited the use of explosives is allowed only by permit issued by the sheriff and the final change um under open fire ban during high fire danger conditions that currently reads engage in any activity that produces or maintains or attempts to produce maintain spark flame or other ignition source for an open fire be changed to read engage in any activity that produces or maintains or attempts to produce or maintain spark flame or other ignition source for an open fire except for the use of explosives allowed only by permit issued by the sheriff

Second.

Hi. Hi. Thanks for coming in, you guys. Thank you. All right, thank you. Thanks for your patience. All right. Thank you. Thanks, guys. Moving on, item number five, presentation of the Lake County Public Trustee quarter one report, led by the treasurer's office.

Welcome. It's just our public trustee for one report. Two, I was just letting you guys know balances on bank accounts, how many stuff we have for all of that. The beginning bank balances on the accounts were $10,795.09. Receded in revenue was $5,856.72. Expenses, so reporting fees, publications, payroll, software fees of $5,703.57, bringing the bank balances down to $10,947.99. We had 74 police deeds of trust processed. We have three active foreclosures, one withdrawal foreclosure, and we processed one confirmation deed.

Thank you very much. I have no questions. I have no questions.

I have questions. Why is the bank balance so low? So money's in and out. Yeah. Because mortgage companies, when they send their release deeds of trust, which we process first, then send over to recording, there's those fees. So it's in and out. And then when we have the foreclosures, there's just a set deposit that we receive for the whole process for the foreclosures. Fees get taken out of those deposits and then any remaining amount is sent back to the mortgage companies or the attorneys once the foreclosure is complete. So it's in and out. With the money, it's not something that just stays and then ends up.

Cool, thank you.

You're welcome.

Okay, accepted.

Thank you. Acknowledged. Acknowledged.

So acknowledged. Thank you.

Thank you, Deidre. Thank you, Deidre. Moving on. Point of privilege. Five minutes. Three minutes. Three minutes. That's all I need. All right. We'll pause. All right. We have resumed our Board of County Commissioners meeting at 2.10. We are going to item number eight, discussion and consideration resolution 2026-14. Resolution amending resolution number 2024-35 to update Americans with Disabilities Act and Title 10, Title 11, Title 6, Title V1, Contact Information within Lake County Transit Policies. This will be led by Candace Barnes, our County Manager.

So the only real update we are making here is that our former deputy county manager, Lauren Snyder, is currently listed in this position, even though it's been covered by other staff. But we need to formally update it. In the past, we've only had one person that could serve in this role. You have to go through a training course. And Stuart really wanted to get that training done earlier this year. So he did an online course. and got his certification so that he'd be able to take a little bit of a lift off of Laura, who's historically handled any of our ADA complaints, generally not around the transit piece, or I guess she's handled those too, but what we would like is that Stuart, you know, is also trained to do this, so when there are areas like transit related that could be handed off to him when Laura's busy, you know, that she could be able to do that. In terms of complaints that we have related to services she directly provides, she prefers to handle those just so people only at one point want to contact for their benefits and don't get confused if there are ever complaints related to that. So we're naming both of them in this document. Thank you.

The other thing I'd point out in the resolution There's a section I added here that allows staff to sort of administratively deal with a situation like this in the future when we're just changing a name and we're not really altering the substance of the policy.

I'll move to approve Resolution 2026-14, a resolution amending resolution number 2024-35 to update ADA and Title VI contact information within Lake County Transit Policies.

I will second that. To vote? Aye.

Aye. Aye. Okay, moving on. Item number nine, discussion and consideration of resolution 2026-15, the resolution amending and superseding resolution 2024-38 in adopting updated policies and procedures for the licensing and regulation of temporary or special events involving food, This will be led by Eugene Wilder, our public health environmental health specialist.

Thank you. Yeah, we have made some updates to our temporary events policy, mainly to provide clarification. It will be beneficial not only for staff, but also vendors and event coordinators for the ones who are normally reading this policy and trying to interpret it. We have made changes such as editing the purpose statement at the beginning to clarify who the audience is for this policy. We removed some redundant guidance. We had some guidance that was both in the definition section and later in the policy section. We tried to clean it up and streamline it. We added a requirement for mobile vendors to submit electricity plans, which is not a change in how we've been conducting these events. It's just something that was never spelled out before. We have Condensed some language in the license types just for clarity. We did remove the definition of cottage foods due to ongoing, well, there's a bill in the state legislature that might change that. So instead of defining what it means and having to change it every time the state changes it, we're just saying cottage foods as defined by the state. We have added some sections of action. Matt has added some sections on enforcement, on local acts, and license actions, as well as a disclaimer. Thank you, Matt. We've also did some formatting changes to the feed table just to make it clear what people are paying for, what they need to pay for. And we have edited and reorganized the following definitions. Temporary food vendor, special events, temporary events, exempt nonprofits, and we have added some definitions to clarify things.

Lovely.

Good work.

I have no questions. Okay. I would like to make a motion to approve resolution 2026-15 resolution amending and superseding resolution 2024-38 and adopting updated policies and procedures for the licensing and regulation of temporary or special events involving food.

Seconded. Oh, sorry.

Two vote.

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

We're going to get our order down.

I know. Let's see. All right, that passes. Thank you for all your work on that. Sorry. It's OK. Thank you, Jean. Item number 10, discussion and consideration, Resolution 2026-16. The resolution designated certain routes and trails in Lake County as part of the . Should we just officially table it?

This is not on the agenda anymore.

That has been- That was seven years ago. That was hours ago. That was so many words ago.

That has been tabled. So we will now move on to item number 11, discussion and consideration. Resolution 2026-17, the resolution adopting the Lake County Climate Action Plan. This will be led by Duncan Chisholm, our Parks and Rec Director. Hello, Duncan.

Hi, good afternoon. Happy to talk to this if you'd like me to. Thanks for the opportunity to present the Lake County climate action plan for adoption. At its core, you know, this plan reflects something simple. It's about, we love this place and we want to protect it. So Lake County's way of life depends on a stable climate, but we're already seeing changes. Temperatures are starting to rise locally. We're experiencing more wildfire risk, earlier snowmelt, increased pressure on our water systems. These impacts are starting to affect our infrastructure, economy and county operations. There's also a cost to inaction. Estimates show from the plan that Lake County could face up to $1.2 million annually in damages, climate-related impacts like wildfire, drought and flooding. This plan is our response. It's a practical, locally grounded framework to reduce emissions and prepare for the impacts that we know are coming. It's been developed over the last 14 months or so with staff collaboration, community input and data-driven analysis. The plan sets a clear goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45% by 2050. with interim steps along the way. At the same time, it strengthens our ability to adapt, especially those who are in our most vulnerable communities. The work is focused on six key areas, buildings and energy, transportation, waste and food systems, natural environment and recreation, water, and our county operations. I want to emphasise that this is just not an environmental plan, it's a financial and operational strategy. Many of these actions will reduce long-term costs, improve our infrastructure resilience, and position the county to compete for grants and outside funding. Importantly, adoption doesn't actually commit the county to immediate major expenditure. Implementation is phased and flexible, and allowing us to prioritize actions based on resources and opportunities. In closing, the Climate Action Plan is a practical roadmap. It helps us protect our economy, our infrastructure, and our quality of life. It gives us clear direction for maintaining flexibility and fiscal responsibility. With that, staff recommend adoption of the Lake County Climate Action Plan as a guiding Thank you for your time.

Thank you, sir.

I have no questions. I appreciate all the work that's been done on this, both in the county and with our contractor. We're really looking forward to seeing the implementation.

I have no questions. We've spent a lot of time on this subject.

forward to see what comes of it okay i'll move to adopt resolution 2026-17 a resolution adopting the lake county climate action plan i will second that before we go to vote i just want to make a couple comments on the climate action plan which should be called the environmental action plan even if we accomplished all these things and the state accomplished all these things that the effect on the climate is probably So in the climate action plan, there's this big push towards electrification. We live in climate zone seven. Heat pumps work to about 15 degrees, and then they blow cold air. So then we have to implement a second heating source. So that's two systems. This makes building more expensive. The best way to heat a house in climate zone seven is with a gas boiler. And the best way to get your hot water is a high-efficiency gas or propane boiler with a sidearm, not electricity. And you add to that, our electrical grid is overstressed already. Heat pumps work best on the south and southwest side of the home because it's warmer. This is where we generally like to have our decks and our living space. So to me, they inhibit that. They could be under a neighbor's bedroom window running constantly 24 hours a day. I think they're unsightly. That's just my opinion. And then as far as pushing people towards electric vehicles, most people in town don't have a garage to charge their electric vehicles. So are we going to ask them to run power cords over the sidewalks? to charge their electric vehicles while saying that they can't tear down their shed from 100 years ago to build a proper ADU with a garage and a warm place to store it. And that brings me to the point of electrification of our county vehicles. Maybe some of them make sense, but certainly only our cars. No heavy equipment or even medium duty equipment could withstand with lower temperatures here. There's been a push, electrification of some school buses, which has worked out horribly for a lot of school districts, especially in our climate zone seven. And then finally, the anti-idling signage, especially in the school pickup and drop-off zones, if that's something that is gonna be pursued in the future. maybe there should be a temperature exception. We can't ask people to turn off their cars and freeze while waiting for their children. So all in all, it's a decent plan. I just had to make those points.

Could I add something to this? Please. I just want to make the distinction for anyone in the room and online that this is not a regulatory plan. It's just recommendations. Like, hey, if you guys want to reduce your emissions, here's your roadmap to do it. Not, we are going to be bound to electrify our fleet. We're not going to be bound to anything. This is just a... And the CIP is mandated by the state, isn't it? That every county, isn't there some requirement with this as well that we are fulfilling by?

It gives us access to funding from the state.

So I think it's, and so this is just recommendations. It's not going to be something that is going to be binding. The other part that I would like to just I respect everything you said. I have immense respect for you as a person and your thought process. I do want to politely disagree or have our disagreement about, you know, if we do everything that's in this plan, it's not going to move the needle on a global scale. And I think a lot of that thinking is what the future of that kind of thinking is pretty scary to me. if everybody kind of thinks that same thing, like, well, they're just going to burn tigers in a foreign country and that's going to offset anything we do here. I think if everybody takes that approach, we're looking at a pretty scary scenario potentially moving forward. So I do feel like within reason, without putting unburdensome costs on the locals, any changes we can make that do have a measurable difference here, even though they could be offset somewhere else, are still important to me. But I agree with a lot of what you said, but I think I'm a little bit more in the middle of that. OK. Also, did you say anything?

Is there an official vote?

You need to call for a vote. Thank you.

Take it to a vote.

Aye.

Aye. Aye.

Thank you, everyone who worked on this, and we will.

Thank you, guys.

Moving on, number 12, discussion and consideration of resolution 2026-18, a resolution concerning Lake County sales and use tax to expressly adopt exemptions for period products, incontinence products, and diapers. This would be led by Matt Hobbs, our county attorney.

MATT HOBBS, Yeah, this was an ordinance that I prepared at the request of Commissioner Milsa. The county currently has a sales tax on these items. The state statute has allowed counties to individually exempt them. by affirmative action. I think in my memo, as I pointed out to you, the research I've done about nine or so counties have chosen to do that. In terms of timing, if the board does adopt it, we would need to get the resolution immediately to the Department of Revenue because they can only make these changes to their sales tax July 1st and January 1st.

Thanks for working on that.

Parents are paying sales tax on baby diapers.

I don't really have paying taxes on those.

We can all be there sometimes.

I'm going to be more in favor of this. I'll make the motion. Is it my turn? No, it's mine. Okay, sorry.

I move to adopt resolution 2026-18.

Wait, is it my turn?

I think it's a, now it is, yeah.

I'm sorry. A resolution considering Lake County sales tax, sales and use tax to expressly adopt exemptions for period products, incontinence products, and diapers.

I will second that.

Take it to vote.

Aye.

Aye. Aye. 2026-18 passes. Moving on. So we are now the 10th county in the state to implement this. Did I do that right? Discussion and consideration of land use file. Let's focus, folks. Discussion and consideration of land use file 25-0 development and agreement associated bond rider regarding the Xcel Energy Service Facility. This will be led by Melissa Kendrick, Community Planning and Development Deputy Director. Hello, Melissa. Thank you for your patience. You've been here all day. All day.

Yeah, well, thank you. And as you learned earlier, we have a few members from the Excel team that are also online and have been hanging out with us today. So this really meets a condition of approval, as you read. The Excel service facility is under construction, and the site plan was approved in 2025. And it's taken us a while to get here, but one of the conditions was this development agreement and the agreement is between the county and what's public service company. And the purpose of that are for the public improvements associated with that facility so that includes an exhibit see is sort of cut to the chase and there's $213,000 worth of improvements that they need to install and so. There's a performance bond rider that is associated with this. It's part of this approval today. So that performance bond secures that money in case something were to go wrong and the county needed to step in and install those improvements. So I think that kind of summarized it. Matt was instrumental in getting us the agreement to the level it's at right now along with the rider. We can answer any questions and Excel is here as well to speak to this application if needed.

Okay, thank you, Melissa.

Also, do you have any questions?

Thank you, Chair. I had questions for Excel. What is the most recent time that the county has had to actually step in with you all? And this seems like really unlikely, but I just was curious if this happens more than I would expect.

This is Sonia Michele with Excel. I'm not aware that you've ever had to step in. I think this is just a condition of, you know, that has to be a box that needs to be checked. And so we're happy to to produce that bond and, you know, make sure. All intention is that we will do all of this work. We don't, we are, we're ready. Everybody is ready to move forward. So I don't think this would ever be drawn upon, but I'm not aware that you've ever had to step in to complete a project.

Thank you, Sonia. That makes sense. I have no other questions.

This has been vetted by legal and CPD. I have no other questions. That's right. All right. Well, I will make a motion to approve land use file 25-01, the development agreement and associated bond rider regarding the Xcel Energy Service Facility.

Seconded.

Two of them.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Thank you for your patience. Thank you, Sonia. Thank you, Melissa. Item number 14, discussion and consideration of task order three with Brown and Caldwell as an exhibit to the professional services agreement that was approved on March 17th, 2026. This will be led by Bryce Ulrich, water and natural resources director. All right, Bryce. Hi, Ward. This is just some housekeeping.

guys passed the um professional services agreement already we just forgot to include the task order which outlines the actual tasks which add up to the budgeted amount that i had in my 2026 budget sure i'm moved to approve task order three with brown and caldwell as an exhibit to the professional services agreement that was approved on march

Hi. Hi.

Hi.

Hey, we're moving on. Item number 15. Thank you, Bryce.

See you later. Matt's moving them before I can say thanks to people. Discussion and consideration of the Tourism Management Grant Award from the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade. This will be led by Adam Ducharme, Tourism and Economic Development Director. Hello, Adam.

Hello. We can keep this one quick. So the we have applied for a number of grants using the dedicated tourism money that we have in tourism funds and we apply we apply for grants like this year over year but they're not continual grants so we have to submit applications for each one that we go after and we applied for a grant this year. Looking for a long-term, being able to hire a contractor to help us come up with a long-term solution. potential solution that we can work with for waste mitigation in Twin Lakes. This includes human waste and trash, because as you may or may not know, year over year, the sort of math and the alchemy of who is responsible for dealing with trash and human waste disposal kind of changes. And as it stands today, we do not currently have a plan for 2026 other than the southern fire station and the yellow bag. So if you're in the Twin Lakes, the village of Twin Lakes this summer, there are no public trash cans that you can put your trash. And additionally, the hours and the operations for the visitor center restrooms continue to sort of shift and change as the conversations with the Forest Service and then their staff, the folks that they hire to be able to service those restrooms. Those have become limited. So it used to be seven days a week they were serviced. Last summer it was three days a week. This summer we don't have 100% certainty as to what that will look like, but they were using a lot of volunteer hours from Friends of Twin Lakes and from Forest Service staff who were kind of volunteering their time to help clean up those amenities, specifically the restrooms at the visitor center. But Friends of Twin Lakes will no longer be doing the trash cans or the trash service. Tenderfoot Farms used to accept trash, but that business is closed. And the Forest Service, they're one of their staff members who was responsible for cleaning up those restrooms and kind of doing that work. It's no longer on staff and they will not be backfilling that position. So we applied for a grant to be able to help us meet with partners, including, you know, City of Aurora, everyone who has kind of a stake in this game and come up with a long-term solution. So that is what the grant money is for.

okay yeah this is a twenty thousand dollar grant with a five thousand dollar match yeah but the five thousand dollars just from his tourism and economic development funds not from our well it's a good return on investment anyway sounds good to me same um i will make a motion uh to Approve the Tourism Management Grant Award from the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade.

Seconded.

Two vote.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Thank you, Adam. Thank you, Adam. Thanks, Adam.

Thank you so much. Moving on, item number 16, Discussion and Consideration of First Quarter Supplemental Requests. This will be led by Candace Bryans, our County Manager.

So the only supplemental request we had was Alex Corner Creek's supplemental request for his additional funds for staffing. Alex, do you want to say anything?

Yes. I am right here to answer questions. If anybody has any questions, I spoke at it on length. presented those documents and I'm here if anybody has any further questions on the matter.

Thank you.

Thank you, Alex.

Any questions?

We had a good meeting about this already and identified that we need to make sure that Candace Young is aid. And then we kind of fell into the idea that the additional position, which could be part-time, was basically a unicorn that we're looking for, and that hiring a full-time, an FTE, was the best solution. And that's how it was presented to us. anyone at this table have any agreements or disagreements with that i think is what we should really be just where we're at at this point i think no i think it's hard to have emergency services with just two people an on-call provider with just two people it is and it's a shame that a part-time person couldn't be out there uh be available um

So that part I don't know about, and I'll have to take Alex's word for that.

My biggest concerns arise from when we look at comparisons between Lake County and other counties coroner departments. And I don't see an easy solution for the immediate term. But I think, is it unorthodox to make this happen now and basically on notice that we got to bring costs down in this department somehow because we're spending way more in a corners department per incident than most counties in the state and i would welcome any feedback from candace on this sure i mean in the next budget year alex will have to come and you know present his budget to you guys with his staffing plan um and if you guys decided to eliminate a position then you know whoever's in that position would

be terminated because the position was eliminated so that is an option you know but there could be a human and in that this would be more about how else can we bring the cost to this department down outside of uh payroll um i think it will really just depend where we end up with the facility that we've been looking at and if we can find some other options that's going to bring down the cost anyways and then um alex shouldn't have you know the cost of whatever option we decided to go with before whatever that won't be happening again in his department so those costs are already budgeted for this year that would be a one-time you know cost to get him going so his budget will his overall budget amount will drop next year anyways because he won't be getting the space set up

Yeah.

Okay, so the numbers we're looking at are kind of a one-off for this year because of things that were planned that kind of got a long key.

Yeah.

Okay.

I mean, the comparisons that we made, though, in terms of just payroll apples to apples is what you're talking about, though.

Yeah.

We were just looking at apples to apples. Yeah. Yeah. But, I mean, that is our mechanism. to like, what did you say?

If you want to change it next year, you'll be approving your budget, and that will be that time.

I just don't want that to come out of left field for anyone, any staff. It's important to value our staff and the hard work that everyone does. And I think with this department especially, I want to support them in the best ways that we can. And with respect to the sensitivities around the work that they do, and I don't want these guys to not be able to take a day off. It's like being on a call 24-7 is not sustainable for anyone. It's not healthy. So I'm in favor of passing this now with the idea that we're going to take a continued approach and try to streamline this department and find ways to make it more fiscally

Yeah, in the budget, I'd like to see the facilities piece straightened out. I don't know what we're going to do there, but man, that's been kind of a disaster. So that's all I have to say about that. If we want you to have time off, we want you to be sharp, and we want you to have a functioning department.

Yes.

I will move to approve the quarter one supplemental request. I will second that.

To vote.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Alex, can you just make sure you work with Will and Ashley to make sure we get that added? correctly for you before we get it posted to Phil?

Yes, ma'am.

OK, thank you.

Thank you, Alex. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Candace. Moving on, item number 17, county attorney updates by Mr. Matthew .

In terms of update, obviously what I've been working on, a lot of it was on the agenda today. So it's good to get some of that stuff. Over the finish line, we continue to manage these sort of land use violation cases, I think somewhat successfully. I wouldn't say somewhat, I'd say totally successfully. One we had voluntarily compliance with down south. We had another individual sort of voluntarily comply after the case was filed. I think you all saw that email that was submitted to the court about the fines, which was literally not, that was his read on it, that's certainly not what happened. You know, we were looking for a $50,000 fine, which is just, you know, it's not, the judge would have looked at me, cockeyed, if I had went into county court with a $50,000 fine. So the way the statute works is it's 500 to 1,000 for the fine, and then They use the continuing violation as, hey, if you don't get this done, the $100 a day is going to start. It doesn't retroactively go back years. So that's how that works. Nevertheless, you can plug, which was the important thing. I just wanted to clarify that piece. We have trials set on another one, June 12th. And then we're continuing to work with CPD. There was a list of these sort of nuisance properties or properties with land use violations that we're looking for two or three more to file at this point. So I'm glad we didn't choose to file 10 right off the bat because it would have overwhelmed us in sort of just getting access to the process in the court. TPD sort of sharpened their approach to how they, which, you know, court invariably does that, you know, because especially the floors are under, so they're going to poke holes, whatever you throw at them.

So, you know, we've definitely identified some stuff we can get better on, which is good. The Romer property, I guess that's another update.

So we had two cases on Monday. He continually to work with CPD in terms of what he needs to do. So we dismissed that case because it just wasn't right for purgification. As long as there's this sort of ongoing back and forth, there's really nothing for the judge to decide.

So it was dismissed without prejudice, meaning at some point in the future, We had a roadblock or something that the county could come back, but at this point that case has been withdrawn and he's continuing to work with CPD on what he needs to do to get his property in compliance out there.

We did finally get this CLM, contract life cycle management software, April 27th. I've had zero time to even look at it, so I'm hoping to have some time here either later this week or next week where we can dive in and start setting that up. We continue to work on some policies as well that hopefully in the near future you'll see some record retention policies and some other sort of housekeeping policies before. I guess the other one is, obviously I sent you, just so you're situation aware, there was a construction defect out at housing at 10-2. Sewer line. Sewer line that is,

appears to not have been properly compacted. And as you drive by it, you can see where the pavement has sort of sank in a couple inches around the manhole cover. So we've sent the property notice out to the contractors.

And hopefully, they will just respond and fix it, which I imagine they will. But you never know. That's all I got.

Thank you.

Thanks for all your work. That's enough from you.

Moving on to county manager updates.

I'm going to keep this just as one item today and then next we're all going to run down like updates from staff which we just have a really great set of those. So we have had C4 approach the county with a proposal and I just need to get some direction from you guys so we can move this forward. I figured this was the quickest way to move this forward without making a whole agenda item. So the C4 has asked or proposed to expand outdoor education and community programming capacity through the installation of a yurt on the LCAG property. The Parks and Recreation Department has collaborated with C4 and LCSD to outline a structure, and that would be the yurt that we have that is currently where, can you remind me, where is it? The airport. The airport. Not your name.

Story.

So.

Where do they want to put it? I'm sorry, can you?

They want to put it, help me out Duncan here. At the farm. Yeah, at the farm.

At the farm.

So if we put it out there, it would meet our county standards for safety and durability. It expands public programming capacity. We're definitely serving more people with said yurt, not in storage. It allows shared use for county programs, and it ensures all the construction costs and operation costs would be the responsibility of C4. It also retains county ownership and long-term control of the yurt asset. Should we need to retrieve yurts? future use. So we feel like this aligns with our county goals related to outdoor recreation, youth engagement, community partnerships, and it increases access in educational spaces. So I'm just seeking direction of can we move forward with an MOU for the use of the yard in this way? Or move forward with an MOU.

I know that here it was bought for the golf course for the Nordic skiing and I'd like to see it used there or at the new sledding hole just out in it and so if it does get used there I want to make sure it's temporary but if we ever do get a chance to use it and I don't think they're that hard to put up and take down you do have to have a deck or some sort of base you're shaking your head

I was just going to say, you know, it was originally my understanding for Get Out Door Lead Rock program was going to be based in Kendrick Park. What's that? It was going to be based in Kendrick Park next to the golf course. Where we've struggled is we've never had enough capital to actually build it. On a concrete pad or you can put a deck around it and it's likely unlikely that we will.

What does the MOU look like? Is that anything that's even been fleshed out yet?

It's drafted, which is why I realized we needed to get direction from you guys before doing anything. The point is we're just approving that staff carry on with it to get it in front of us. I'm a major fan of this. The yurt was gotten for gold.

Right now we have funding that goes through the county to C4 to provide educational services to our schools.

So if it's just sitting there, Why not use it for the purpose it was acquired at no cost to us, but that supports the programming that we are already funding for our grant?

Is there any insurance component to this thing that we'll be on the look for?

It shouldn't be. I mean, we worked on that agreement.

But we can make sure. It's been a while. This has been hanging out there.

There's a line item in that MOU that that C4 is responsible for any sort of measurements.

OK, great. Thank you, Rachel.

That's why I did it on this instead of a full consent agenda item, because it has been hanging out there. I just don't want to make it wait two more weeks to be rescheduled.

So what was the original intent of it with GOLD to put it out at Kenyon Park? My understanding is to deliver some form of education program Not to keep your experience warm and so hot chocolate.

I was misinformed.

I was misinformed.

Wasn't it purchased with grant money? Yeah, for that specific purpose. And we didn't have, it's one of the things that we lack is like indoor warm spaces to provide. What size?

Oh, dang. Yeah, I do like that.

The reason this came up is C4 does not have a yurt, but they have someone who has offered to donate the base, like the concrete and the base to them. And since we have a yurt not being used, I believe that's where... You can go ahead, Michael. Michael, do you have a question?

That year was actually originally bought to provide a place to warm people out at the golf course that we're skiing. And then also some after school or after school after Winners winners stuff for the school kids. I'm sorry. But, um, The only reason it never got put up is because we were having problems getting foundation approval through the building department. And then it just got waylaid put off to the side and never did get put up.

Yeah, can we clarify how, regardless, regardless, I would like to have clarification on that, but If we have a yurt that we're not putting up out there, there is no Nordic skiing right now. This, yurts can come down enough. Can't we allow it to be used until we have a different use for it? At no cost to us.

MOU doesn't give away the yurt indefinitely. Right, it gets it back on.

I'm not a yurt expert, but I think putting them up and tearing them back down, there's not a big used yurt market. You know what I mean? Once they're up and they're used, taking them down in the hopes of reusing them again is not a real common avenue that I've seen personally. I could be wrong on that, but I feel like they're a little more of a one and done situation. People don't really reuse yurts in multiple locations as far as I understand. I'm not saying it couldn't be done.

We used to do it out and around all the time. We did not leave them up in the winter because we didn't have them snow-loaded. So we would take them down. Not that it's great, like I wouldn't buy used yerk, but we did do it.

I've got pros and cons with this. I think there's reasons to do this and there are some concerns I have, but respect, but not knowing You know, the conflicting information about what it was originally intended for is a little bit weird.

Do we know when we got there? That would tell me if I'm going to be able to find brain information on set here.

Brian might have some more information, too.

Full monotone. I just hate to see the dream of skiing at the golf course slip through our fingers. I mean, that was, as it was presented to me, I know we've got conflicting information here, but i understood that it was it was to help because the ski club was kicked out of the golf facility and then it was going to warm up skiers so brian if you could clarify its intended use i just don't want to see it slip through our fingers get established somewhere and then we just forget about it and all of a sudden it's not ours anymore more importantly i think we need to

be really clear on what the original language of that grant was because if we put it up somewhere for something it was not intended for could somebody eventually be like hey you guys owe us for that because you're not using it in the way that we gave you money for that's that might not be the case it's just something i want to vocalize because it's a concern i have brian can you weigh in on this original intent of this thing yeah hello everyone uh so the yurts was purchased to be a multi

Brian, sorry, can you speak up just a little bit? I'm having a hard time hearing you.

Okay. Can you all give me one minute, and then I'll head over to the BLCC room, too?

Sure. Yeah.

Thank you.

Anyone turn it off and back on? That's generally how I trouble you.

No, but Al hates me, so I'm just...

Refuses to look at anything. Everyone at CCI thinks Canvas is one of our commissioners now. It just doesn't participate.

Look, it's not even going after your speech.

No, I know. I'm talking. Ow. Pay attention to me.

Oh, it sees you. Oh, there we go. To address it directly.

Maybe it's only like the fifth or sixth sentence, maybe. I don't know.

You see what I'm saying about letting that slip through our fingers? I know you could put it up and take it down, move it around, but...

I hear what you're saying, but there is like a building there. I would like to see us use that building. I don't know if that's ever going to happen.

The golf course thing?

Yeah.

But if there seems to be...

I know we don't, but like, wouldn't it be great to move in that direction as opposed to building a secondary thing out there? It's contentious. I know, and look, I'm sitting on that and haven't even broached the subject.

No, that was the idea.

That's what I'm doing.

But what if we can't get it and we decide to reestablish the ski trails out there?

What if the year's better suited to the sledding? With a wood stove.

And accessible to people cross-country skiing in the mineral belt.

Right now it's not being used at all.

And we don't have the money to pay it up. It could be rotten. We could pull it out and go, I don't know if the mice paid it up. Brian!

Well, take a breath and let us know what you got. Yeah, so the yurt was purchased to be multipurpose. So back in 2023, 2024, there were a lot of plans to develop the ski area at the Noik. funds that were allocated to parks recreation and open space as an open space project when some of that trail management piece fell under those priorities at the time and it was also going to receive additional support from goal and our grantors just so that we could activate that space for programming to do overnight trips with kids

to slowly start to introduce them into backpacking and they don't have to jump straight into camping in a tent. They have a nice physical building that we could use.

And it would have also been available for rentals because Kendrick, from what the rec department has said, is a pretty popular space to rent out to members of the public.

So it's going to serve multi-purpose.

Yes, it would be a warming space for Nordic skiers as they go through during the winter sessions there when there was a larger focus on grooming down there and then we would use it for our programs to start to get kids out there introduce them to the space and do a little more intro to backcountry pieces and then we did have a grant from the UACOG and I think that one was to get the foundations poured but just like Michael said a lot of the hold up on building it was that we were waiting for. But if it gets placed at C4, I would say it's going to see a lot of usage so that they can expand programming year-round. And through our current GoCo grant, they're doing a lot of environmental education with the kids, so that would bring them to the farm as well to be able to offer those opportunities for them. That's a little bit of the big mixed background on it, but it was that I believe we gave back because we ultimately weren't able to move forward within the timeline of the grant to get the foundation poured. And then it just sat at Public Works for a while before it needed a different storage space and got moved down to the airport. So it's just been lying there. And yeah, I have seen here instead just get moved making sure that there's a base ready for them to get set up.

That was one of the biggest pieces. And then also water access, finding water lines over at the golf course that would reach the location that was designated at Kendrick Park.

That was another one so that we could use it overnight. So that was another one of the holdups that they were trying to search where the water lines were electrical to potentially connect.

named after Elissa Kendrick's father.

Really?

I hadn't thought.

That's really cool.

He worked at the mine. Did a lot of stuff for Lake Cannon. She grew up in Southern Cannon. Sidebar. That's better than a rock. I would like to see this thing used in its intended original use. Nothing against C4, but it's a non-profit. taking control over our year and we've fallen through on our promise the original promise of that thing which is to warm skiers get kids out there in the backcountry they have a lot of buildings you know they have that that would be my preference solution is located right alongside one of the most popular cross-country skiing

paths in the county.

It's not that popular because it doesn't hold that much snow.

What if during winter months they are open to the idea of mineral belt skiers using it as a space to warm up?

I don't think that works because if it was at Dutch Henry, you could go in there and put your boots on, do a little socializing, get hot chocolate. I don't Most people park at Dutch Henry or they park at the Animal Shelter. Most people don't ski that. There's a lot of dog walking in that section.

Not a whole lot of skiing.

Just the thought, because it would make it available. It might not be in the best location, but it could still technically serve as a goal purpose. Hey, if you're skiing the Mineral Belt, there's a spot.

If C4 was on board with that, there's a spot where you can

What a great compliment to our sledding at all and our Nordic trail system if it was that much anyway.

I think all of those are lovely ideas, but the issue that we had before in terms of creating the base and the lines to it is now worse, whereas we don't have money to... Can you say that again? The issue that we had before, which is why it didn't go up, is that Couldn't find lines of water or foundation. And then we got the grant for the foundation, but now we don't have more money to put in a foundation. So the, so like we have the year, but we don't have all the other parts to get the year up where we want it. Whereas C4 has the opportunity to actually put it up. Like, just cause we have it doesn't mean we can put it up still.

Yeah, but a 30 by 30 concrete pad is $5,000, $5,000 or $6,000.

Which, I mean, that's still the issue, though, is that we would have to decide that we want to put that money towards it. And then so that just sits out there. It's not just a building. It's also the operations of the building that I think that we would have to agree to funding. this whole initiative, which is a lovely initiative. I'm not against it.

I just... We have people renting out air tubes all winter. We moved that operation towards that, so people had to come in and warm up, and they see there's some chips and some candies. Did you want to say something, Brian?

Yeah. Not necessarily contributing to that piece for your decision, but just providing additional context There is a longer term plan for Dutch Henry that CMC has been working on for a while too. So that's something that you might want to consider or give a little more info on. I'm not quite sure where they are in that process yet, but there are larger plans for Dutch Henry with the ultimate goal of activating that space a little more, but with different infrastructures.

So say that it were built at Dutch Henry,

then that money that was invested into pouring the concrete foundation would just kind of be a temporary solution as they build whatever their next steps are. So we just want to add that additional context for that piece for government. Yeah, we've talked a lot about it.

Ben's dream. Which is awesome.

We want to see that happen.

But it could be years out.

I think what is, if we were to like remove what it is, forget it's a year, forget it was over. Yes.

Imagine it's not a year.

It is. It's something that the county purchased that the county hasn't used. And there's somebody in the community saying, Hey, we can use that and we can use it for. a group of people who otherwise wouldn't have access to this kind of thing. And we said, no, we're going to keep it in storage. We're going to keep it to ourselves. We have lovely ideas, but we don't actually have any plans to implement those ideas.

That's a very good point. I wouldn't want to do that just because it's ours and I want to keep it. I would want another option, two options, three options. Just see it slipping through our fingers and then 10 years ago someone new is in the position to go, I don't know where it came from. I think it's ours. We're going to do a better job of records keeping.

That is a major shift in how Lake County has been run versus how it's being run now. It's going to be one of our legacies, like previous boards, of how we're leaving things better than we found it. So stuff won't slip through the cracks. The thing I want to offer is that when we go all in on any other plan, the cost to taxpayers are going to be greater than us getting another yurt. The value of the yurt itself isn't just like, it's a yurt. They're really cool things. I don't know if we want to give this away for what we didn't intend it for.

The foundation, someone to run it, Ensuring it all the all the things together are going to be a pretty heavy lift for an already cash strapped accounting.

So if somebody stepping in and say, hey, I can offer services from this year in ways that benefit the community and we're going to pay for it.