City Council - workshop

I'll have a lot of questions, so let me do them in chunks here for a little bit. So I had talked to Sarah previously about this. We were getting kind of a binary choice. It's the whole Monty or it's just the bare minimum on utilities. And I'm glad at least we're to a discussion where we're talking that utilities is going to happen and it needs to. So there's going to be some questions for Public Works as well, John. So the question I've got At this point then is if we go for the full Monty, the 18 million, this is four phases. It sounds like and that's a couple of blocks per phase. If I'm coun

Thank you. A question on the sidewalks. If we do utilities only, and I think I'm leaning on you here, John, if we do utilities only, in pulling up the utilities and replacing the utilities, do we impact the sidewalks that are existing?

Fair to say every block will have the sidewalks torn up to the building.

I vaguely remember that there were pigtails and I might not be using the right word here, but that there was a state or federal requirement that we go all the way to the building to replace some items that were lead. related items and that we were going to have to do that if we substantially tore up the sidewalks.

We had talked an awful lot about heading from the 500 blocks up. The business owners and Buckley and the potential condo development up on 14th, the 1400 block. These lend me to sit there and say it'd be a little bit easier to start out on those northern blocks, do some of the amenities, and let the southern blocks see how those go for a year or two as we work our way towards them. Anything that would prevent us from doing that. I knew I was going to get public works.

I always like the answer, with enough time and money, we can do whatever you want. Anything to add there, John?

Yeah, great, thanks. That'll be enough for my first round, thanks.

Thank you for the presentation. OK, so I'm curious, did you do a impact study on the economic effect it would have on downtown businesses at all?

OK, thank you for that answer. OK, so. We're familiar with Pagosa Springs doing their project. Now they had a lot of state funding because that was kind of pushed upon them. What's the possibility for state funding on downtown Main Street? And have we looked at what kind of funding opportunities besides raising our property taxes? Sure.

Mayor, could I follow up on that just with one question? Quickly, because Shirley needs to go and then Jessica. Yeah, that's fine. So removing or approving something or removing something is much less than changing something. Fair to say?

Okay. Thank you. So I had sort of similar questions, I think, as my colleagues, but even including the $7 million number, which also sounds low to me. I remember 2016 numbers. being like about $10 million a mile. And that's a long time ago in terms of design and building. But then it seems like the other estimate B seems high. And so I think I have the same sort of questions like there's not a middle of the road or it seems like you have A and we have B and not in between. So where can we, and is that the, I guess the question some of my colleagues are asking about The Mr. Potato Head analogy?

That was helpful. Actually, I think, you know, just listening and trying to understand the priorities of the community for this project, because it seems to me like drainage would be part of infrastructure, like basic infrastructure. not something that would be an amenity. Is that not? So anyway, I guess as we evolve, like it seems to me like you can't, like you have to include drainage in the project as part of your estimate A. So I don't know. And I imagine that's not a small number. So the other thing I had a concern about was the timeline. You talked about four years. Is that, I mean, it j

No, but the noise, right, the vehicles coming in and out. I mean, I understand that you would do it piece by piece or maybe you leave half the street open or you, you know, create traffic flow. But the reality is, you know, people for the most part are coming down Main Street to enjoy it. And if you're, you know, want to take your family out to dinner and there's, you know, jackhammer going right there, it's equally disruptive, even if it's not exactly in front of your street. So I know that that's something that we'll have to take into, you know, pretty.

Okay. All right. That's all I have for the moment. Thank you.

Yeah. Hi, thank you for the presentation. Sorry I'm remote today. I have a few questions and I think a couple comments to just Because this process is a little different than some of the other projects that we have seen come through as Council. When we were talking about this originally, we didn't really have any real idea as to the costs, and so that's part of the reason we had that resolution come through is that we wanted to be able to say, like, can we find $7 million to do the utility improvements? Can we find $18 million to do it all or no? Can we only find 12? And then. After we know wh

And do we have $18 million between the two of them to cover this over the next four years?

So I think for me, knowing like if we if we don't go through with this, what is obviously repercussions? We are water lines break. We have issues. You know, we're pushing off. I mean, we're already overdue to replace all these, so we're pushing it off even longer. And then if we do do them, what is getting sacrificed, I guess, down the line? I think that would be good to know. I'm not asking you to answer that this very second. I don't know if you have that information.

Did I see that those were 1.5 million placeholders in those subsequent years? And that money would be dedicated to utility lines downtown?

So if it's a million and a half for three years, that gets us to 4.5 million. Why is it almost three more million to do it with this? What does this include that yours doesn't?

Okay. And so did you estimate that it's going to be about the same, $7.3 million?

So if we decide to move this forward and we say, okay, we want to go forward, we think this is important, would it affect your other projects that you're planning to do over the next four years? You know what I mean?

I think that that's important for us to know too. Is there anything detrimental that would get pushed off because we're pushing this forward? I'm not saying that there would be, but I think that's a good question. And then in terms of the OK, so then we look at that for the 7.3 and then in that 7.3. Sorry, I'm kind of now I'm all over the place on my questions. That includes it looks like $280,000 for curb ramps. In that option A and sidewalk remove replace as street restoration after the utility deck. So basic ADA ramp work right is in a.

Okay, but it's not the full accessibility package. So if we just went with the base, does it meet current ADA for every block we open or it only replaces what we tear up?

Okay. And then, okay, that makes sense. In terms of that, like, $18.2 million cost estimate for B, Jose, I guess I'm wondering, like, you know, when you talk about the streets, you know, 2015, I think that it would be important for us to see like, ideally, what do we have to work with? And then, you know, getting a budget that staff can go and say, okay, this 18.2, that's like pie in the sky and would be everything, but we don't need every bench in every block. We don't need, like, obviously I'm not wanting to change things that are like, you know, drainage improvements, ADA improvements, thin

Well, I think that's important. Like city counselors didn't tell the construction company how to build the rec center. We had professionals do it. We had community input and then they built the rec center. You know, city counselors shouldn't be telling us like it's not our job to pick and choose what should be where. It's our job to set financial priority. This is important. The utilities are super important. It's also important that we're in ADA compliance as one counselor, I think. And then, you know, we have our, you know, drainage issues solved that we've been having. We have, you know, al

A few more questions. Oh, sure, of course, yeah. Sorry, I thought it was left over, I apologize. Just for example, right here in your presentation, you have some examples So radioactive material offsite disposal, 10% of full cost. What does that mean? You have like some examples here of scope of the project. So I mentioned that one, but just in general, could you explain that whole paragraph?

That's right. And that's included in the $7 million. You made some assumptions. Okay. And that's how we got the $7.3 million.

Okay, I think that does help. So as we are, you know, just fleshing it out, obviously we would have to, you know, make sure we have the budget for, you know, the things that, however we approve it. But I do think it's really important that some of the things here that you have as like estimates for streetscape improvements that I believe are actually probably more fundamental to the project, like drainage and lighting, electrical are included in the major renovation. I guess I just need to be clear about that. So drainage is not included in estimate A or like the electrical is not included in

OK, that helps. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor.

Well, I'd like to thank you for setting forth the plans and coming up with some cost estimates because when I first came to council, this was like a real big unfunded mandate, which it still is. And if there's options of not passing the cost down to all taxpayers and maybe just taxing the businesses who benefit from the new drains and all that, that would be something I would be in favor of. Because I don't want to raise the cost for all residents of Durango to pay for improvements downtown. And this gives me a more clear estimate of what is included in this project and the scope of it. Becaus

Yeah, I remembered my last question. It was just more on the next step so. If we don't take any direction today and no one puts anything on the new agenda, staff isn't going to seek funding. We're not going to do anything further. What decision do you need from us before our budget retreat in order to start talking about potential steps forward in moving this along?

How long do the 2026 estimates stay valid? once they stamp them? Is it just like today, this week, or is it?

Is there any benefit if we decide to go forward, is there a potential that the PD City Hall and this project like overlaps? You know, I know we talked about it could potentially be more expensive starting on the north end of Maine and going backwards, but is there any cost savings there? Any overlap that would be PD City Hall, Buckley Park, expansion things that we're doing or not expansion, but you know what I mean? The master plan there. Is there anything now totally different or yeah, likely not.

Thank you. Thank you, Marty, for the presentation and the other groups. What comes to mind, you mentioned that there was a program to assist residents from the larger companies that were going to pay into a fund. It has a name, but I can't think of what it is. Yes, and that's to help residents, but it doesn't do anything on the commercial side?

I would be curious to hear from some of our commercial vendors. I don't know if they've had an opportunity to weigh in. I feel like we've had lots of communication with constituents and interest groups. Has there been any feedback from the chamber and some of those folks?

Okay, okay, because I imagine it could be quite impactful for them. And that's all the questions I have. Thank you.

Marty, thanks so much for all the work here, and thank you to Rachel and, sorry, Andrea? Audrey. Audrey, sorry. I really appreciate you guys' work on this as well. So I'm having a hard time lining up. potential costs here with the potential savings that we've got as well. And so I'll just run down my list, and I think you've heard this from me before. Sure. Okay. So at this point, I've got about 70K to 100K in savings that are going to happen just from reduced tipping fees if we start diverting organics and yard waste at the same time.

Yeah. And with the caveat, this is all estimates. I understand. We're ballpark.

You're fine. You're fine. I totally understand it. I get corrected by other folks as well. So, yeah, I talked to Table to Farm and got some very broad fuel savings for the driving. Bondan Landfill is a 40-mile trip. Table to Farm is a five-mile trip. So we're saving about $25,000 in fuel costs. You weren't there when I was doing the calculations, but there's a ballpark number, and we can verify that later. We've got $80,000 coming from the disposable bag fees right now that supports the leaf collection, pumpkin collection, Christmas tree collections, correct, and some education funding? Yes. B

It could be, we could pull together some estimate if we devote the time and resources to it.

Yeah. Okay. One other component then is we've, I think we've asked for 2 million from the producer responsibility program. We've said that that might be what they could reimburse back to us. That would be a high end.

Okay. So those are there. And then we've got infrastructure costs, obviously new bins and dealing with that, drivers and trucks. But at this point too, we've also got a private business that is able to do some of this and could potentially ramp up to cover this. We could contract out with that business.

And I agree with you. You can't have all the set numbers at this point in the game. There is a piece where what's crazy numbers and we're never going to go in that direction. And what's a viable shot? I think all of council in the past has kind of talked about if the producer responsibility program can cover our costs for implementing of composting and we don't add anything to our residents, that might be a very good way to approach this whole thing. Yeah.

Last question, and maybe for the 20th. Every other week collection, how does that affect us in regards to cost savings? Because these bins may be large enough that they don't have to be picked up every week, or they could be picked up seasonally if we're talking about decreasing bear traction and some other issues.

Thank you, Mayor. OK, so you know on this page it says what Council needs to decide now versus later. You know, I was wondering if we could have a third option that is just a recommendation of what our residents can do without forcing a rate increase on them. Yeah. Because that would be my preference not to try to increase what they're already paying monthly and maybe give them some guidance in how to do composting.

That would be excellent if we just, you know, Make that an option on this page and I would feel good about that. You know we we all need to think about. Sustainability of the Earth, but the same time we gotta think about the fact that the cost of living here in Durango has increased a whole lot. So yeah.

Yep, thanks. Thanks Marnie for the presentation. I appreciate all the options and research that went into it. I think there's so many different options here. It's a little overwhelming and so looking forward to recommendations from you guys for the policy options next at the next Council meeting. I have a couple questions. So trash recycling is an enterprise fund, and I know there's some different rules and stuff that go along with that when we get the EPR payments, which we haven't gotten any yet, right? We don't know what that's going to be for us. Is that correct?

Do they have it's not just it has to go into our trash and recycling enterprise fund. Is that correct?

And we don't need to, it's not like we have to refund customers with that money, correct? We can use it to offset costs and maybe not raise recycling costs in the future. There's lots of different things, correct?

But you said that you feel like the intent is to reimburse residents for recycling costs, yes?

So essentially what you're saying when we get the EPR, the residents will see that $10 charge but then reimbursed through EPR and then we're going to potentially add an additional $10 for composting if we make that a requirement.

but they would see another fee for composting.

And if we decided not to do that, their bill would be $10 cheaper.

Yes. That's what I meant. Not me. Not me. All of us. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. I just wanted to make sure, like, do we have to refund the customers? Can it be used for anything trash and recycling related? Not trash, but recycling. You know, I was trying to figure out the rules of that EPR.

Well, and I've been approached by numerous people in the community that are kind of using this in tandem. Like you're getting this EPR, you know, reduction for this so we can add this without a cost. And I want to be clear that it's not like that's not the same. I mean, yes. potentially like net zero or whatever in the end, potentially we could, but they're two separate things.

I think my biggest that I have a couple big like reasons why I'm super supportive of this and you know we have our sustainability goals that we're not close to meeting yet. I do think we either need to revise them and take an authentic look at them and say this is what we can budget for and this is what we can actually can commit to or we need to start doing things like this that are actually going to like start piecing away at them. And so I think if Council decides to not go forward with. you know composting and that sort of thing that needs to also be said like that's the same breath like o

Yes, and then my next question content seems in my research now is very quick and it wasn't like super in depth, but contamination and education failures are usually like where a lot of cities struggle. Rushing fines when they're not ready to, you know, deal with those things and before real outreach to is there like a plan for that? Is there money considered for that when we're looking at all this stuff?

Okay, perfect. Those are my questions. Thanks so much, Marnie.

We had a couple opportunities for improvement that we were very excited about.

grant program or through the LTAC specifically.

Thank you. Appreciate it. I love the idea that we ran through this analysis and the results of it are great. Thanks for everybody's work on pulling this together as well. I take your meaning and this isn't about the budgets and this isn't about how people are allocated the grants, but there's two points I guess I'd like to make. It is at times I, as an individual counselor, appreciate the reminders of what are these budgets for each of these individual grants and how they're getting allocated and those things. We've got a lot coming across our plate. I really appreciate the work that you guys

Well, thank you. I really appreciate it because, you know, having gone to business school like you guys do, you know, the fact of continuous improvement and then making the product better is what it's all about. So thank you for all your efforts at that. I really do appreciate it. Thank you.

Yeah, I just had a couple of general questions. How do these kind of access control plans encourage or not encourage annexations, growth? I mean, do they tend to pull growth and development in the direction that these plans are implemented on? Am I way off base?

So it would give developers a little bit more understanding of what they're walking into. So there's more consistency with developments.

Okay. And it seems like a very slow deliberative process that everybody takes a while to get through. When do you refresh the plan then? Or does it get refreshed? Is this a one step and then it's just development comes in eventually?

And so is there a large event if we decide to build something at Florida Mesa and that turns into a much higher traffic area, we're just still doing a traffic study maybe for that piece, right? It's not triggering anything on the plan.

Yeah, I just had a couple of items I wanted to bring up with council. First off, I talked to a member of the CDC and they had not seen any of the city's works. work that had been done and I think the CDC is a really good entity to have reviewed this and seen what some of the code recommendations that came out of this study might have been. So I was hoping we could just have staff. Provide a digital and hard copy of the city's works stuff to the CDC. Didn't know if there was discussion or anything on that. OK. And then. I had a couple of topics I just wanted to talk about in general. The Wilson

We've got Barrow Ridge coming up as well, so we've got more development going on in that area as well. So it seems to be a topic that we could have a little bit more discussion on just so we're understanding it a little bit better and what the implications are.

I just think there's a vast amount of education on the interactions that are happening between city and CDOT and all those I'm pretty ignorant of. So, yeah. And then last, the Joint City-County Meeting agenda items. I'm a little baffled on how we get some items on there and how other items don't go on there. Isn't it usually up to the entity that's hosting?

So would there be any meetings prior to the beginning of the year? And the key topic, I guess, that I'm focused in on, we talked about a couple others, but STR is the short-term rentals piece. I've heard from county commissioners that they're going to be paying specific attention to that in 2027. I think that's a really important issue for us to be talking to them about. And it was one that I was hoping was going to come up in a joint discussion at some point. So maybe we got to just wait our turn for our next time. Usually, yes.

Believe so. OK, alright, well I'll keep a list going and try and fire that out when we know that that's pending. That's all I got, thank you.

That's you in four minutes. That's not me.

Well, congrats on the award and it's always nice to go to Breckenridge if you can get it done. So I appreciate that. How much do you feel or do we know that the increases in ridership are related fuel costs? How much of this is a connection to as gas prices go up, we just see more transit users? Not saying the gas prices are going to go back down. I have no idea about that, but I wanted to see the connection.

Could you scroll back to the previous slides that showed the numbers of riders? It's almost one of your first slides. Yeah, there you go. And so the 2% to 3% increase you're talking about, we're way over that in regards to. Okay. Yeah. Okay. And then we've got passes from the Moravin Foundation for Veterans. Are those getting renewed?

And do you know what those numbers are? How many folks are using those passes?

Okay. Do you know if there's a plan for education out to the manas of the world and the folks who might be interacting with folks who could use these pass passes?

Well, just a person, we use the trolley as well, the bus service, and really appreciate the consistency and the, you know, it's always on time. We've never had any issues with it. And I really appreciate the program. I have no idea about the funding. I mean, that's a huge conversation. But Sarah, I think you and the team, everybody's just doing a great job with transit services. Thank you. And hopefully we'll find this money. So, all right.

Yeah, thanks. OK, so I'm curious. So do you think our ridership has increased the last few years because the routes are well established and that bus stops are more convenient?