City Council - Regular Meeting

0:22 – 0:39•CLChris Leh

Good evening. It is Tuesday, August 4th. Tuesday, August 4th, 2026. And we're in a regular meeting of the Louisville City Council. May we have a roll call, please?

0:56 – 2:49•CLChris Leh

Here. All right. Please stand as able and say with me the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right, do we, I'm gonna move to approve the agenda with one change. There may be, people here. We're here for the item 8C, which is a resolution approving Centennial Replat B to facilitate a minor subdivision to combine 1006 Honeysuckle Lane and 1008 Honeysuckle Lane. been a change that's going to require continuance of that. So I would pro

2:51 – 3:08•CLChris Leh

How many do we have? Just one. Just one? Right. I think Andy knows the drill, but three minutes. You don't have to take the three minutes, but tell us what you're going to tell us. But tell us whether you're from Louisville.

6:18 – 6:53•CLChris Leh

Any others? All right. We will move on to the consent agenda. Do we have a motion to approve the consent? So moved to approve consent. Second. Okay. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right, then. The next is council informational comments and committee reports. Do we have any informational comments or committee reports tonight? Yes, council member Kern.

6:53 – 7:45•JKJudi Kern

Great, thanks. Just a quick, I guess, kind of public reminder. This Friday will be the final street fair event of the season. So one last time to gather and listen to some great music. and support the community and organization. I will be there selling tokens, so hopefully I get to see everybody. So I'll, you know, super pitch it. And I just want to give a big thank you for the information and the update on the Sonic Boom race. Next time, please come to the council meeting before the race and do that same excited pitch. I would love to have come down. I didn't even know about it until after. S

8:29 – 11:33•CLChris Leh

Thanks. How about Councilmember Cooperman or Councilmember Heffner? No. Okay. I have a couple of them. Tonight is National Night Out. There were a lot of people over at the police station enjoying that. Thank you for... Thanks to the police department for putting that on and for the people coming out and so forth. The second thing is I believe it is the 20th anniversary of the library. If people remember, there was one ill-fated large bond issue that went to the voters and there was just too much in it. It was to build both the rec center and the library. But it came back, I think it was the n

12:25 – 12:53•CLChris Leh

Thanks. We'll go on to regular business. As I said, we're going to start with resolution number 72, series 2026, resolution approving Centennial 8, replat B to facilitate a minor subdivision to combine 1000 Honeysuckle Lane and 1008 Honeysuckle Lane. Is there any staff presentation on this one?

13:11 – 14:38•CLChris Leh

Okay. I'm going to open the public hearing and move to continue the hearing. for that resolution to Tuesday, September 1st, 2026. Second. At 6 p.m. Second. Any discussion? All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Good. All right. Thank you for that. Going back to item A, resolution number 66, series 2026, a resolution approving final plan unit development, PUD, special review use, SRU, to allow a helicopter pad and associated development agreement for the development of a 371,600 square foot hospital building and a 62,000 square foot medical building on the approximately 39.9 acres located at 900 Rockc

32:00 – 32:27•CLChris Leh

Actually, why don't we, we've done this both ways, why don't we actually ask questions or have counsel questions of you first and then we'll get the applicant up here. Because often those are separate questions. So either on the GDP amendment or the SRU, does anybody have any questions for Matt?

32:28 – 32:53•JKJudi Kern

Yes. Councilmember Kern. Thanks. Appreciate this. It's very clear this was a lot of work, so thank you. And you explained it just fine. It was very clear. I was curious, this is just about the changes to the landscape proposal. Could you tell us, when it comes to the trees, I mean, are we talking about making a change to allow like five less trees or 500 less trees so that we can have kind of an understanding?

33:21 – 33:39•JKJudi Kern

Because I just was curious if there were... ways for them to maybe like meet the requirements of not planting them, just plant them in a different location if Excel is not able to accommodate the trees? Is it that it interferes with some of the Excel lines or equipment to have trees in the easement?

33:46 – 34:03•JKJudi Kern

And has part of this request also the location of the helipad on the west side? I would imagine we don't want too many trees near where helicopters are going to be flying into the hospital. Is part of that like some limitations around that as well and keeping plantings low in that west side of the property?

34:41 – 35:06•JKJudi Kern

That's kind of what I was going for. Thank you. So we can all understand the scale of the greenery that will still be part of the existing plan. I appreciate that. Thank you. Oh, actually, one other question. Is there anything with the SRU, and maybe the applicant will talk about this, for the helipad where the local airport, RMMA, is involved and notified just because of flight pattern and all of the issues that we have with flight school flights over there?

35:20 – 35:34•DFDeborah Fahey

Continuing on Council Member Kern's question. Does the helipad eliminate some of the proposed or required green space that was originally planned for the development?

35:48•CLChris Leh

Okay. Thank you. Other questions? Great. Council Member Cooperman has questions.

35:57 – 36:21•JCJosh Cooperman

Great. Thank you. First, I was just wondering, are there any sort of timing issues with construction of the infrastructure external to the site and the development of the site itself? Or is that not really within any purview that we're considering?

36:33 – 37:13•JCJosh Cooperman

Okay. No, that's fine. I was just curious mostly. Okay. Then I had a few questions about parking and circulation. Yeah, so first of all, if you look at the parking lots, there are typically sidewalks on the edges of the parking lots, but there are not sidewalks sort of in the middle of parking lots so that if you park in the middle, there's a nice way to get out of your car and walk on a sidewalk to the hospital. Do we just not require sidewalks that take you from parking in the interior to the site?

38:05 – 39:02•JCJosh Cooperman

Okay, that's helpful. So then in terms of bicycle circulation, the place where I could clearest make out most clearly where the bicycle parking is was a PDF on the pedestrian amenities. And so that one showed some bicycle parking on the south side of the hospital and some bicycle parking on the north side of the office building. So maybe part of my question is, are those the two sites where all the bicycle parking is aside from this little bit that's interior? And then my broader question is, Those two bicycle parking sites have basically no access to them from any of the bicycle lanes or path

39:57 – 40:19•JCJosh Cooperman

Okay. That's helpful, too. Okay, so then just two more little questions so that that bicycle path that bisects the site goes through the future location for hospital expansion I assume it would just have to be rerouted in the future if necessary.

40:29 – 40:41•JCJosh Cooperman

There's no public transit to the site, but if public transit did come to the site, is there infrastructure to support that possibility?

42:05•CLChris Leh

I had a question. Was there a referral made to the Front Range Passenger Rail District?

42:28 – 43:08•CLChris Leh

No, I understand, but there is, you know, it's not a long distance between the train stop and Red Tail Ridge. I... I don't know that there is at least an option from a planning standpoint of a future kind of shuttle between those two areas. I wouldn't expect necessarily that's going to be run by the Metro District, but I didn't notice it in the transportation plan or any of that yet. And there is, so.

43:29 – 43:57•CLChris Leh

My recollection is that there was, at one time anyway, some concern about maybe it was an RTD concern, maybe it was actually an applicant concern, about whether there was going to be enough area around the hospital entrance to be able to have a stop for buses should that ever occur. Do I have that right?

44:32•CLChris Leh

I don't see any questions from our online council members here. Why don't we hear from the applicant?

1:08:49•CLChris Leh

Thank you very much. Council members, do you have some questions? Yep, Council Member Fahey.

1:08:56 – 1:09:17•DFDeborah Fahey

I just have two quick ones. One on that ribbon and garden area, assuming that that's all going to be ADA accessible? Okay. And could you point on the map where you mentioned having a second MOB? Where would that be in relation to the one that's there?

1:09:32 – 1:09:56•DFDeborah Fahey

So that would all still be on that little ribbon? Okay, then my second question was when you're talking about the energy and reliability, we know that we are having some issues with electricity right now. Do you propose having battery backups or some kind of backup system in case the power goes out?

1:10:50•CLChris Leh

Thank you. Other council members? Yeah, council members.

1:10:57 – 1:11:41•CDCaleb Dickinson

Yeah, I appreciate you bringing up the sustainability questions there. I think it's one of those curiosities of what you guys are planning to do, considering you don't have to follow what was in the GDP. So I appreciate you bringing up a lot of those. And I understand that hospitals are special buildings. They are unique and have different needs than some other buildings. I appreciate you going through that. And So my understanding, the helicopter will kind of live at that hospital because its intent is to take patients that started at the hospital somewhere else if need be, is more the... Lik

1:11:57 – 1:12:40•CDCaleb Dickinson

Okay, so the inbound-outbound is really just a matter of curiosity because from an outside perspective, it flies in and then it flies out every time. That is valid. So, you know, the patient inside of it is what you're alluding to. But that was good information for me to understand that, you know, just when I see the helicopters, it's probably that, you know, someone's being flown to Children's or out to Denver. So I appreciate that information as well. And it sounded like you said, You're assuming less than 100 flights a year. Where are you getting that information? I just know that our commu

1:13:10 – 1:13:40•CDCaleb Dickinson

Great, yeah, I appreciate that. I think the design is, well, are we on comments? The design is fantastic. I really like the front area, so I appreciate you going through. It was one thing to kind of see it here, but seeing some of those renderings of the vision of that space, I hope that comes to fruition in the way you've designed it because it is an important amenity at a hospital is being able to walk around and be in nice spaces, and some of our other hospitals around here don't really have that. I think that's a really... Lovely addition to the medical care.

1:13:44 – 1:14:27•JKJudi Kern

Great. Thank you again. And thanks for all the, a lot of the thoughtful details. I'm one of the people who loves the current Avista Advent Hospital. And a lot of it is, obviously it's the care and the staff, but it's also the healing nature of the environment. And it's indoors and out at the current hospital. So I was curious, will there also be that transition on the inside to feel a connection to the outside? Right now, from the inside of the hospital, you're not even just in a patient room, but in common areas. You're looking outside, you're seeing the mountains, or you're seeing greenery t

1:15:40 – 1:15:53•JKJudi Kern

Nice. I was also curious, so you have the dark green in this walkway, that's where all of the greenery is, and there's a lighter green. Is that to the left, so down to the south? Okay, yeah, so right here. And then in the middle?

1:15:57 – 1:16:24•JKJudi Kern

Okay, so the dark green two components are what will be the initial landscaping plan, and then those will be future? Yes. Gotcha, okay. I was looking at the one that's to the left, which is to the south of the hospital, and how that's the only outdoor space that will actually have mountain views. Everything else is actually looking to the east, and I thought that's where everybody will gravitate to because you can see them do it at the current hospitals. Yes. Okay, thank you.

1:17:04 – 1:17:31•JKJudi Kern

their way to the main door. So that's fantastic that you were kind of thinking of that, like the public access piece of it too. That sounds like a lot of the public access that's going to be coming from 36 and the Northwest Parkway. What about a lot of the public access that's actually coming from like the central or the western part of Louisville, which it's actually faster and easier for them, I think, to not come in from the eastern side. So I'm just curious about that.

1:17:43•JKJudi Kern

Oh, got it. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate it. Thanks. Other questions?

1:17:52 – 1:18:50•CLChris Leh

Okay. Thank you very much. Why don't we take some public comment if we've got any. Do we have any public comment? No. All right. So come back to council discussion. This is there's only one round of public comments. So we've had that time. This is. Pardon me. It's just either hallucinating or there is a car alarm going off behind us. No matter. We'll keep at it here. We've got the PUD and then the SRU. I guess probably best to take them one at a time. Bear with me for a second.

1:19:25 – 1:20:00•CLChris Leh

All right. I think the staff's done a really fine job of walking through all of the criteria. And I think what I'd like to do is if there are any first of all any questions about the Findings that they've outlined for us Relating to the PUD Let's talk about those now looks like Councilmember Heffner has a comment

1:20:02 – 1:20:36•DHDietrich Hoefner

Yeah, thanks, Mayor. I was going to make the same point as the city attorney about the resolution covering both. And while I appreciate that others may still have more questions, I was going to go ahead and move approval of resolution number 66, series 2026. I was very pleased with both the staff report and the applicant presentation. And I look forward to approving this tonight so i'm going to go ahead and make the motion second any discussion about either part of the

1:20:42 – 1:21:25•CDCaleb Dickinson

Well, I'll just state the obvious. It's a little boring tonight. This is so exciting. This is so amazing. It is so important to our community. It's so important from an employee perspective, from a health perspective, keeping a VISTA in our community, if you will, in health. It is just... It's a beautiful concept. It's in a great location, close to the highway, easy to get to, even a helicopter. It is so cool, and it won't be perfect. There will be things about it that are difficult, and it's still like a huge parking lot and all those things that is necessary, right? But it is just absolutely

1:21:29 – 1:21:44•CLChris Leh

All right, then. Somebody want to speak to that from the applicant? All right. Anyone else? Council Member Cooperman and then Mayor Pro Tem.

1:21:44 – 1:22:22•JCJosh Cooperman

Thank you. I just want to say I'm satisfied with staff's analysis of the PUD and the SRU. I think that the in particular for the PUD, that the couple of waivers are justified. So I would echo what my fellow council members have said, and I plan to vote to approve the PUD and SRU. My only qualm is that I do think the bicycle connections interior to the site could be much improved. Thank you.

1:23:02 – 1:25:11•CLChris Leh

I certainly echo the comment about the groundbreaking. I agree on the comments that have been made by other council members and won't say anything further about those. I think the staff has done a good job about, as I kind of mentioned before about outlining the criteria for both pieces of this resolution. And so I think we can adopt those. And I really want to say thank you for their work on this, because these are massive amounts of work. I want to make sure that the public is aware just how heavy a lift these things are for staff over a long period of time, and it's really a credit to the p

1:33:23 – 1:33:38•CLChris Leh

No, just for questions. Council questions. It doesn't look like we have any questions right now. Do we have any public comment? No. All right. Then back to council. Does council have any...

1:33:40 – 1:35:35•CDCaleb Dickinson

comment yeah I'll be brief I just again this is a really exciting uh project um you know affordable housing is really important to this council to this community certainly to myself um so it's really exciting to get a project of this size uh in this area and I think it's going to be a great area for it and I'm happy I that we can have a density bonus a height bonus you know like making finding ways to make this um more impactful in our community and add more homes and so I'm really impressed with the applicant with with staff and I will say with the direction of this council to to encourage al

1:35:40•JCJosh Cooperman

I will just enthusiastically echo Council Member Dickinson's comments. Thank you.

1:35:46 – 1:36:04•CLChris Leh

Your enthusiasm is infectious. Councilmember Kuperman. All right, let's do a second round of public comment. If we've got one, do we have anybody? All right, back to council. Councilmember Kern.

1:36:04 – 1:36:21•JKJudi Kern

I was just going to make a motion. I was going to move that we pass ordinance number 1935, series 2026, an ordinance approving a Centennial Valley General Development Plan amendment for lot A of Centennial Valley Business Park, filing number 8, final plat. Second reading.

1:36:21•CDCaleb Dickinson

Second. Deb gets it if you're marking it down.

1:36:28 – 1:37:40•CLChris Leh

comments. I wanted to make a couple of comments. One, I think Council Member Dickinson nailed it about the importance of council being United on this kind of project. I think that's terrific I don't think this is a new thing for this council. I think this is something we've been talking about and working toward for some time we've had two initiatives relating to it. We've had a comprehensive plan that discussed it. We've got, I think, importantly, private businesses that are working with council or with the city to bring this together. And I think that's something that a lot of people don't re

1:37:40 – 1:38:25•JKJudi Kern

Yeah, I was going to build on that. I actually think a big thank you goes to the Louisville team in planning and community development because this has been a heavy lift and I really appreciate the incredibly expedited rate that you guys have worked. I think this has come through so quickly from the first time we heard about it. And thank you to Cobell for bringing what I know will be an excellent project having seen your previous ones. I'm sure that this will meet all of those same standards. Also wanted to reassure people, I loved your comment about the traffic impact and that if this was an

1:38:31 – 1:39:36•DHDietrich Hoefner

Yeah, thanks, Mayor. I think the... and the memo supports approval of this, and I'm pleased to do it. I do want to just briefly call to everyone's attention an email we got this morning from a resident. linking to an article about Telluride's experience with doing affordable housing and highlighting a lot of the problems they've had as they've sort of embarked on a municipal effort to decide what kinds of people should live where and for how much and for how long and how much dissatisfaction that has generated. And I think This project is a little different insofar as it's not going to be admi

1:39:38 – 1:40:53•CLChris Leh

Thank you, Councilman Heffner. I wanted to just circle back. There's one thing I'd forgotten to mention. I didn't want to pull this off of the consent agenda, but if you look back at Item 5C, we have decided that we want to use the private activity bonds to participate in the private activity bond program, and that's going to help this project, we hope. That's a program that's been around for a long time, and it has been 11 years that I've been on council, and we have seen those projects or those bonds be provided to other communities over and over again, very gradually. worthwhile projects in

1:41:41•CLChris Leh

There'll be one round of public comment, and we'll give it to staff to present. Thanks.

1:44:37 – 1:45:15•CLChris Leh

Thanks. Council, any questions on this one? I was surprised that there isn't a currency house already. Is this the first one? It's the first. Wow. Because they're everywhere. The currencies, their fingerprints are on so much in our community. All right. Do we have any, do you have any questions? Okay, we take public comment if there is any. All right, back to council. Yes.

1:46:48•CLChris Leh

Thank you, Andy. ANY OTHER COUNCIL DISCUSSION? IF NOT, I COULD HEAR A MOTION.

1:46:57 – 1:47:08•CDCaleb Dickinson

I WOULD MOVE THAT WE APPROVE RESOLUTION 73 SERIES 2026, APPROVING LANDMARK DESIGNATION AND LANDMARK INCENTIVE GRANT AMOUNT OF $7700 AND THAT THE STRUCTURE BE NAMED THE CURRENCY HOUSE. SECOND.

1:47:08 – 1:48:03•CLChris Leh

SECOND. GOT A LOT OF SECONDERS TONIGHT. So any comment or discussion over this? Doesn't look like it. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Great. Congratulations. Our final item tonight on the regular agenda is... Resolution number 74, series 2026, resolution approving a focused preservation and restoration grant and an extraordinary circumstances grant for the James House located at 700 Pine Street. This again is a resolution, one round of public comment. And again, staff, take it away.

1:55:13•CLChris Leh

Council questions? Council Member Curtin.

1:55:18•JKJudi Kern

Do we, and this might be answered actually when the applicant speaks to us, do we know what the intended use of the property is? Is the applicant going to be residing here? Is this their home?

1:55:33 – 1:55:44•CLChris Leh

Any other questions? All right. Any public comment on this? It sounds like there's at least one. Yeah. You want it? Yeah.

1:58:31 – 1:58:47•CLChris Leh

Thanks. Back to, and then no more public comment. Is that right? Just going to ask the planning and building services there to comment on that. Is that something you take care of at permit time or?

2:00:03 – 2:00:22•CLChris Leh

Yeah, no, that's all I wanted to address was to make sure that there was some understanding of that path. All right. Do we have any other questions? If not, somebody want to make a motion?

2:01:43 – 2:02:21•JKJudi Kern

Actually, I'll just actually relay your neighbor's concern that this would be, because obviously this is your home, and let me start by saying thank you for keeping it in the family, for preserving it, and for getting it up to snuff, if you will, and making it a place that you are clearly going to want to continue to live in. It's something that every day all of us drive by and see, so it's going to be wonderful. I appreciate it. But just more from just, I guess, a good neighbor perspective, you'll be overseeing a lot of the construction with your team and your design team. I'm kind of hoping

2:02:37•JKJudi Kern

Thank you so much. That's really wonderful.

2:03:40•CLChris Leh

Sorry, Council Member Heffner. Council Member Fahey beat you to the punch. Any other discussion?

2:03:47•DHDietrich Hoefner

Only because of the internet delay. I was there in person. I'm the fastest second in the West.

2:03:52 – 2:04:08•CLChris Leh

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Come back and join us and we'll make that go away. So any other comments or questions? All right. So all in favor? Just an awkward question.

2:04:09 – 2:04:21•CDCaleb Dickinson

Mr. Vogelsberg, are you of Centaurus? Thank you for all you do for our community as part of the Centaurus band. Just a cool extra little piece. Yeah. He's the band director.

2:04:21 – 2:05:01•CLChris Leh

We've got a lot of criteria. Yeah, it's not part of the criteria. No, it's great. It's awesome. Thank you. You're worthy in addition to meeting the criteria. All right, so all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? All right. City Attorney, any report this evening? Okay. Do we have any upcoming agenda items or identification of future agenda items? Don't hear any. So do we have a motion to adjourn?

2:05:05•CLChris Leh

All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? All right. Thank you very much.