City Council - Regular Meeting

Well, good evening, everyone, and welcome to the Thursday, August 6th, 2026 regular meeting of the Boulder City Council. I'm going to go ahead and call us to order. Can we have a roll call, please, Alicia?

Thanks so much. All right. Well, our first item is open comments. So, Alicia, if you can go over our public participation guidelines, please.

Thanks so much, Alicia. All right, we've got 11 people signed up to speak. Each person will get two minutes, and I will be strict about that limit in the interest of fairness. Our first three speakers are Lynn Siegel virtually, and then the rest of the speakers are in person, starting with Lara Gonzalez and Paula Palmer.

Thank you for your testimony. All right. Our next three speakers are Laura Gonzalez, Paula Palmer, and Evan Ravitz. Is Laura present?

Okay, our next three speakers are Paula Palmer, Evan Ravitz, and Rob Smoke.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Evan Ravitz, Rob Smoke, and Hanalei Lanner.

Thank you. Now we have Rob Smoke, Hanalei Lennar, and Jorge Figueroa.

Thank you. Now we go to Hanalei Lanner, Jorge Figueroa, and Brigid Mark.

Your time is up, but thank you for your testimony. Now we'll go to Jorge Figueroa, Brigid Mark, and Henrietta Gregorio.

Not seeing him, let's go to Brigid Mark. And just to note, if you have a sign, it can't be held higher than your head. It has to be your head height or lower. Thank you.

Thank you. Our last three speakers are Henriette Gregorio, Michelle Rodriguez, and James Duncan.

Thank you. Now we have Michelle Rodriguez and James Duncan, and then we'll let Jorge Figueroa go.

Thank you. James Duncan and then Jorge Figueroa.

Time is up. Thank you. Our last speaker is Jorge Figueroa.

Your time is up, but I'd welcome you to send the rest in an email. That brings open comment to a close. Thanks, folks, for coming and speaking to us. Nuri, do you have any responses from city staff?

All right. Thanks, Neria. Any questions for city staff following up from open comment? Yeah, Tysha.

Thank you. I believe I also made a request to get more information around the poor chambers component. So just wanted to flag that that was not only a staff and right relation builder, but there was a request by council to get additional information as that transpired. It was It was my understanding that we were waiting for the meeting with Ernest House Jr. to get that, but I just wanted to make sure that that correspondence does get to us in an information packet or whatever the most appropriate vehicle is.

Okay and then on that note are there any we didn't hold any tribal consultations in 2026 unfortunately and I was curious if planning has already begun or when the planning process will become for tribal consultations in 2027.

Okay, and it would be wonderful if we could also include CU Boulder. We did hear that feedback that they would like us to coordinate across so they didn't have to travel so far. That's one question. My next question is around, a commenter brought up Caterpillar, and it reminded me of the inquiry that we received in May 2026 regarding Calendula's investments in oil and gas, which breaks our current rules, Cisco's current investments in private prisons, which breaks our rules, Microsoft is also invested in private prisons, and State Street is invested in tobacco, firearms, and private prisons, a

Okay. And I just, I mean, okay. I'll wait for when I have my whatever minute to give comment. Thank you.

All right. Seeing no other hands raised, we do have the opportunity for very brief council comments about open comment if people would like. Does anybody have anything? Taisha.

Thank you. One, thank you all for coming to speak and open comment. It's been a component that has been missed. As the Noblest Boulder City representative, I have heard from residents that I had the privilege of meeting in 2025 around the escalating settler violence and also from the Israeli government. just sending out thoughts, prayers, and hopefully policy change to our sister cities so we can model the sisterhood that you so rightfully deserve. I also wanted to lift up the concerns around the investment portfolio. This is a governance issue. It shouldn't have to come up from We hire a comp

We didn't do that. I just was doing a stopwatch.

Okay, I would like to make a quick request that next time we have the thing up here so I can see the time. I was wondering why it wasn't moving. So I'll just quickly say I look forward to more information on that permanently affordable housing thing. Thank you.

Thanks. And just before I wrap this up, I'll just say, Jorge, thanks for coming. I appreciate the chance to talk to you the other day. Thanks for shining a light on the challenges there, and we are in communication with the shelter about how to improve things. So I appreciate that. And with that, that brings us to the end of open comment. We are going to go ahead and recess until the start of the business portion of our meeting at 6.30. So we'll see you all in about 28 minutes. GO AHEAD AND FIND YOUR SEATS. ALL RIGHT. THANK YOU. LOOKS LIKE PEOPLE ARE FINDING THEIR SEATS AND THANKS FOR QUIETING

Any questions or comments on the consent agenda? Perhaps a motion? Make a motion to pass the consent agenda. Great. We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please raise your physical hand. That passes 8-0. All right. Let's do our call-up check-ins, please.

Any questions or comments or desire to call this one up? Seeing none, let's go to the next one please.

Seeing none, let's go to our last one, please.

All right. I'm not seeing any, so that wraps up our call-up check-ins. Let's go to our first public hearing, please.

Take a deep breath after all of that. Nuri, I'll turn it over to you to get things started.

Thanks so much to you all for the fantastic presentations and all of your work on this. So let's have council questions. And if I can ask folks to keep them to one or two, certainly at least for the first round, we got to 63 people we want to hear from in the public hearing. So does anybody have questions? Rob?

Just one quick question. Do you have the number of electors that are within the DDA boundaries? Residential, property owners, leases?

All right, I got Tina and then Matt. I've got one. Tayshia.

Yeah, on the, and thanks for all this information and all the work that you did putting this all together. For the bond measure, could you remind us what the impact would be for a residential property as well as the impact from a TMF and the early childhood tax? Certainly. And also the timing when each, when residents or businesses would feel the impact of those taxes?

The time, like when will we anticipate them?

Did you have a follow-up on that? Yeah, I did have a follow-up.

So what is the average? You used $500,000 and then $1 million for commercial properties. So what is the average cost of a commercial property? Why would you use $500,000?

I guess, let me rephrase. Why I'm asking is because is 2 million also there? I mean, I just want to know the most... Businesses will pay in other words and they do pass it down so it does affect small businesses and Tara I think we probably can do the math that if your property is worth two million you would you would double the one so how many? Properties in the city have that was what I'm saying just a few a lot or is 1 million the average We probably don't have the numbers.

I'm happy to provide that awesome as a follow-up Tina was that everything okay Matt and then taisha

You said one or two, so I'm going to use two. A question about the bond. I noticed in the bond language and in the presentation, much to my happiness, I see South Boulder Rec Center listed as the number one item. I guess, does that mean anything to the voters, that if they see the South Boulder Rec Center listed as one of six items and number one at the top of the list, Does that mean that that is the top prioritized facility to be replaced? Certainly maybe with regards to rec centers. Is it now ahead of North Boulder Rec Center in terms of the queue? So I think voters want to kind of know wha

Okay. I appreciate that. My next question kind of circles back to the DDA. I'm kind of curious, has any city ever declined to put a DDA on the ballot following a process like this? I know there's a bunch of DDAs around Colorado, and I'm wondering if that's ever happened.

I do have a colloquy. I was just reading about the DDA in old Colorado City that they're thinking about. And can you just tell us sort of what didn't go well in that scenario?

Before my question, so have other cities and more importantly states or cities had DDAs that were impacting restricted funds? So for example, the CCRS tax and some of the others, if it meets a certain threshold. Oh, in terms of sales tax? Yeah.

Do you want to follow up with your regular question? Yes, I would like to.

Great. Thank you. I don't think it will affect you. So my question is around the scenario planning and how water, extreme heat, food, and energy was considered in those projections. We know that, especially when you said 30 years, just the Colorado River alone, which is one-third of our water supply, the long-term projection on that is anywhere from 6% to 45%. So I was just curious how the financial scenarios that you presented incorporated the actual water supply and the impact that that would have on potential sales tax revenue. Thank you.

So point of clarification, I specifically asked if the Colorado River projection of 6% and 45% had been considered in the 30-year projection. I heard you say climate. I'm specifically asking about water.

But thank you. I was just asking specifically if those numbers had been. Thank you. And again, I do understand that industry standard does not typically incorporate water supply at the scales that we are going to need to moving forward. Thank you.

Thanks. I'm going to take the bond measure for 400, please. So I've heard some concerns from community members who want the H-1 West Center to stay where it is. But my understanding is that that option is practically challenging due to life safety requirements and prohibitively expensive given that building consolidation is a key part of getting to a financially feasible facilities portfolio. Can you just speak a little bit more to why we're hoping to co-locate it with the North Boulder Rec Center?

Thank you. And I'm not sure who this next question is for, possibly Nori or somebody else. So we received an email from the president of the Boulder Police Officers Association in support of the recreation and safety bond. But the bond also impacts other departments like Parks and Recreation, Fire Rescue. Have we heard of groups like Local 900 and Play Foundation are also supportive? And are there any others that have suggested that they might be supportive of this measure?

Great. So a couple questions I'd like to surface some information for the community. So if we do place the DDA on the November ballot and a majority electors do vote in favor of it tell us what the next steps are for realizing the DDA please.

My 1A question, that would have a public process associated with it, including a public hearing, is that correct?

Great, thanks. My second question is, one of the things, what's that? Oh, Nicole's got a colloquy, go for it.

It's just related to that too. With regard to kind of the start point, right, when does the incremental, the growth start accumulating? Is that like from as soon as voters say yes? Is it after everything's in place? How does that work?

Right. And actually my next question is essentially a colloquy already on what you just asked. One of the things people have been wondering about is whether the first edition of the Sundance Film Festival will be included in the base year for the sales tax. Can you speak to how the base year would be calculated if it moves forward on a roughly anticipated timeline?

And therefore include the first edition of Sundance? Correct. Great. Thanks for answering my questions. All right. If, wait, did I? Sorry, Matt, did you have a follow-up?

Isn't it preceding? Isn't it the preceding year from the formation? Right, I think you said 2027, June 30, 2027. Wouldn't it be 2026 to June 30, 2025? Or 27 to 26? Yes, okay, so I think we have the order. Yeah, just checking. Great, okay. Did you have something else, Tara?

All right. Seeing no other hands raised, we are going to go to the public hearing. So Ely should, I think, I'm not sure if everyone heard the guidelines before. Why don't we do those again to be safe?

Okay. Well, while she's pulling that up, I'll note that unless people are pulling time, everyone will have two minutes to speak. And I will be strict about that in the interest of fairness. And we will also expect people when they speak to speak to the topic of the public hearing, so on one of these five ballot measures that we are considering. And if you're pooling time, we'll need for your poolers to be present either online or in the room.

Thanks, Alicia. I'm going to call three names at a time. If you can move towards the front as your name is called. Our first three are Robert Mathias, Don Poe, and then Sylvia Werba. So, Robert. Is Robert Mathias here? Not seeing him, then Don Poe.

Your time's up. Thanks for your testimony. All right. We've got Sylvia Werber pooling with David Farnan and Andy Saylor. Are they present? All right, I got Andy, do we have David? And David's online, great. Sylvia, you've got four minutes.

Time's up. Thanks for your testimony. And we did read the letter. Thank you. So thank you. Okay, our next three speakers are Jennifer Mabry, Laura Gonzalez, and Martha Piper.

All right, we've got Laura Gonzalez and then Martha Piper and then Dakota Seufer. Is Laura here? Not seeing her present. We'll go to Martha Piper.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Dakota Seufer, Rex Reinhart, and Eric Adal.

Thank you. Now let's go to Rex Reinhart, Eric Adal, and Robin McClurge-George.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Erika Dahl, Robin McClurge-George, and Emily Reynolds.

OK, we'll take you off the second. All right, now we're going to go to, well, quiet in the audience, please. All right, we got Robin McClurge, George, Emily Reynolds, and then Doug Hamilton on line.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Emily Reynolds and then Doug Hamilton and Aiden Reid online.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Doug Hamilton, Aiden Reed, and Jackie Richardson online.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Aiden Reed, Jackie Richardson, and Lynn Siegel online.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Lynn Siegel, then Yvonne Castillo and Mark Heinrichs in person.

All right. So Yvonne Castillo, you're up next.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Mark Heinrichs, Evan Fryrich, and Annie Dornbusch.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Evan Fryrick, Annie Dornbush, and Margaret LeCompte.

ALL RIGHT. NOW WE'RE GOING TO GO TO ANNIE DORNBUSH, THEN MARGARET LACOMTE AND CHRISTINE BRESKEL.

Thank you. Thank you. Now, Margaret LeCompte, Christine Breskell, and Noah Maruska.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Noah Maruska, Frank Reinhart, and Mary Gorman.

Thank you. Now I'll go to Frank Reinhart, Mary Gorman, and Suzanne Bott. Is Frank here? All right, let's go to Mary Gorman.

Thank you. Now we have Suzanne Bott and then online Bev Baker and Alejandra Beatty.

Thank you. Now we're going to go online to Bev Baker, Alejandra Beatty, and Rachel Peterson.

Thank you. Now we have Alejandra Beatty, Rachel Peterson, and Carla Colleen.

All right, Alejandro, are you able to speak? All right, why don't we come back to her in a minute after we go through the other virtual participants, which are next are then Rachel Peterson, please.

Thanks. Now we'll go to Carla Colleen, Tenzi Abietze, and then we'll check again on Lynn Siegel and Aiden Reed.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Tenzi Abietzi and then Lynn Siegel and Aidan Radin.

Thanks. Now we're going to go to Lynn Siegel.

Thank you for your testimony. Is Aiden Reed online yet? Do we see him?

Okay. Well, we'll check again later potentially. All right. So now our next three in person are Tammy door, Andrew Shoemaker and Casey Easton. Turn the, turn the. There you go.

Thank you. Now we have Andrew Shoemaker, then Casey Easton and Deborah Moulton.

All right. Now we'll go to Casey Easton, Deborah Malden, and Yvonne Bennett.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Deborah Malden and then Yvonne Bennett and Christopher Shears.

Thank you. And we're hearing some snaps occasionally, audience. Please no auditory things. If you want to show support, you can use jazz hands. We have Yvonne Bennett, followed by Christopher Shears and Chin Liu.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Christopher Shears, Chin Liu, and Cheryl Liguori.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Chin Liu, Chair Liguori, and Bill Shrum.

Thank you. I'll go to Cheryl Liguori, Bill Schrum, and then Mike Mills online.

Thank you. Now I'll go to Bill Schrum and then Mike Mills and Carol Joplin-Jack online.

Now we're going to go online to Mike Mills, Carol Joplin-Jack, and Jadri Wood.

Thank you. Now we've got Carol Joplin-Jack, Jadri Wood, and Daryl Monley.

Thank you, CJ. Next, we have Jadri Wood. And I'm sorry if I am mispronouncing that. Virtually.

Thank you, Jadri. Next, we have Dariel Monley. in person and right after that Terry Berndtchich in person. Darielle, are you here? Okay. I don't see Darielle so we will go to Terry.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Jim Gentile, Montserrat Palacios and Lindsey Shaw.

Your time is up, but thank you for your testimony. You can send it to us if you'd like. All right. Now we're going to go to Montserrat Palacios, and then I understand we have Alejandra Beatty and Aidan Reid online now.

THANK YOU. ALL RIGHT. NOW LET'S GO TO AIDEN REED AND THEN IN PERSON LINDSAY SHAW AND MARY SNEWAZ.

Thanks so much. Now we have Lindsay Shaw, then Mary Snawaz, and Emiliano Le Carrera.

Your time is up. Thank you so much. Thank you. No, no, no. Sorry. No applause. No applause. All right. Now we got Mary Snewas and then Emiliano Le Carrera and Daniel Howard. And quiet in the audience, please.

Thank you. Now we have Emiliano Le Carrera, Daniel Howard, and Lynn Soka-McCaleb.

Thank you. Now we'll go to Daniel Howard and Lynn McCaleb and Brian Marone.

Thank you. I'll go to Brian Marin, Edward Connolly, and Benita Duran.

Thanks very much. We'll speak to that in a minute. Right now, I've got Edward Connolly, Benita Duran and Terry Takata Smith.

Thank you. Now we're going to go to Benita Duran, Terry Takata-Smith, and Jonathan Singer.

Your time's up, but thank you for your words. Thank you. All right, now we're going to go to Terry Takata-Smith, Jonathan Singer, and Mackenzie Selke.

Thank you. Our final three speakers are Jonathan Singer, Mackenzie Selke, and John Thayer.

Thank you. All right, we've got two people left, and we're getting some noise over here. I'm not sure what's going on. Alicia, do we need anything to do anything here? We don't have a record of it, so I'm sorry, we'll not have an opportunity to speak. Okay, please quiet. All right, we've got two speakers left. We've got Mackenzie Selke and then John Thayer.

Thank you. Our final speaker tonight is John tear.

All right, well, thanks everyone for coming out and speaking to us tonight. We really appreciate you taking the time and sharing your thoughts with us. So we have five separate ordinances to consider here. My thought is generally to take them in the order that they're presented to us, but I'd like to make an exception if council is willing which is to start with ordinance 8761 regarding collective bargaining for firefighters, if that would be all right. And I can kick us off just by saying to our union representatives who are here, to Brian and the rest of you, so appreciate you sitting down a

I watched some of these guys start as firefighters and now they're speaking on behalf of the entire union, I love it. I'd like to make a motion to adopt ordinance 8761, submitting to the electors of the city of Boulder at the regular municipal coordinated election to be held on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026. The question of amending the Boulder Home Rule Charter to add a new section 73, collective bargaining for firefighters, creating a charter guaranteed right for full-time fire department employees to bargain collectively, specifying the form of the ballot and other election procedures and set

Second. We have a motion and a second. Did you want to speak to that at all?

Sure. Brian said something and I wrote it down and I forgot, but it was basically, it's communication. It's collaboration. And I'm just really happy that everybody was able to sit down, our city manager, staff, and local 900, and nip this thing in the bud before it even had to go for a signature. So I'm really stoked for everybody. Thank you.

Very good. Not seeing any other hands raised. Alicia, can we have a roll call on this, please?

Very good. Well, congratulations and thanks again and look forward to seeing a successful outcome on the ballot this fall. All right. Now, well, let's go back to our first one here, which is Ordinance 8758 regarding the RECREATION SAFETY AND CAPITAL PROJECT BOND. IF WE CAN GET THAT LANGUAGE UP THERE, I'M SURE PEOPLE HAVE A COUPLE THOUGHTS ON THIS OR I DON'T KNOW WHO WOULD LIKE TO GET US STARTED ON DISCUSSION OF THIS ITEM.

I wanted to just make a motion for us to consider. I would like to make motion to adopt Ordinance 8758, submitting to the electors of the City of Boulder at the regular municipal coordinated election to be held on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026, the question of authorizing the issuance of general obligation bonds for the purpose of financing community recreation, safety infrastructure, and other capital projects, specifying the form of the ballot and other election procedures, and setting forth related details.

Do we have a second? Second. Second. I think Matt got it. So we've got a motion and a second. Nicole, would you like to speak to your motion?

Yes. I continue to believe that this is something, I don't know if the community is going to support it, but we've got a lot of people and groups in community that are ready to get behind this measure, including our Police Officers Association, including the Play Foundation. I believe our Parks and Rec board was supportive. I see at least one member back there. So we really do have a lot of people here who are advocating for this measure. The polling we did, it wasn't spectacular, and at the same time, we didn't know that all these groups were going to come forward and support it. As Oh, gosh,

Yeah, I thought what Nicole said was spot on. I'll just add that, you know, We can Monday quarterback this and how we got there till we're blue in the face, but that doesn't change the situation that's presented directly in front of us, which is massive needs of capital infrastructure. And we have really one vehicle to do that. We've exhausted many other options to look at figuring how to do this. And there's two things, cheap, fast, good, pick two. And we have needs that are urgent. So we have to do it fast, which means are we going to sacrifice quality or expense? Well, it's going to have to

I'd like to make an amendment to the language to include, instead of aquatic, what is it, aquatic paraphernalia.

So you're talking about the description of the South Boulder Rec Center?

Yes. I want to, yeah, is this the time to do that? Okay, I would like to add a lap pool. and a children's aquatic area, as opposed to just the general, what do we have, aquatic, somebody tell me, amenities?

Yeah, okay. Well, maybe we can start with a question to city staff.

Michelle, did you want to speak to that?

Okay. So pool and then children's aquatic area?

But we already did have community engagement, a lot of it. So I thought we did.

Okay. Let me just say one more thing. I promise this is it after this is if we want to pass this ballot measure, we need the South Boulder people with us, or it already pulled poorly. So not at least even saying a lap pool, I'm worried that, you know, I brought it from six lane, this, this, and that, down to a lap pool. So I feel like putting the word lap in there would be a good thing.

The rest of the specificity, I think we're... Allie, did you want to speak before we...

So the question from Tara is, are you comfortable with the language about a lap pool, I think, Allie?

OK, take it back then. I'll just do lap pull.

And Nicole's got a burning point or question.

Allie, I just, well, Michelle, whoever can answer this. So as I understand, just thinking about the design, right, we're dealing with just some different things than when it was first built in the 1970s. Like, for example, we didn't have gender-affirming restrooms at that point, right? We didn't have such an aging population so that, for example, a caregiver might need to go into an area with somebody. And as I understand it, thinking about just the site design, there may need to be some reconfiguration in order to accommodate some of these 2020s, 2030s kinds of requirements, right? So if we w

Okay. Thanks for answering that. Tayshia? Well, I think we're about to get the formal amendment. So why don't we get that motion on the table and then we can, any further discussion. So do you want to, okay. I think what you're looking for Tara is to move to amend the motion.

I would like to amend the motion motion. I would like to move to amend the motion to add a lap pool. I'm not even doing this right. Help me here.

To replace the words aquatics amenities with a lap pool.

You're so good to me. To replace the words aquatics amenities with lap pool.

Okay. That's what I'd like to do. That's the motion.

I'll second that. And now we can have discussion. So we'll just start. Did you want to speak to it? I think you already did. I did. Okay. And I think a little additional specificity to give comfort to folks that we would include a lap pool with the South Boulder Rec Center rebuild is helpful. That's my thought. Go ahead, Taisha. Thank you.

I concur with that thought. And again, if the high school wasn't using it as their primary practice area, I might feel differently. But since that is one of the key uses of that area, I think we need to be specific. And although I appreciate the comment that we have been very consistent with a strong track record, we have not been 100% consistent. And so in these times of tenuant and trade-offs, et cetera, I think it's very important that we get specific about a community need that has been there. And I don't want to have a whole lot of community engagement around it more. Let's get it on the

Ryan, you've had your hand up for a while. Do you want to speak right now?

Mayor, I just had a general comment in support of this before we got into the amendment. So I like the amendment, but... Should I wait? Maybe I should wait for the general comment or just do that now?

We'll get to you. Great. Okay. So we've got a motion to amend on the table. It's been seconded. All in favor of the motion to amend, please raise your physical hand. We've got, that looks like eight. So that passes eight zero. So the motion has been amended with Tara's amendment. And so now we're back to the original motion as amended. Does anyone else want to speak to that before we vote on that motion? And Ryan, this would be your chance.

Thanks, Mayor. I just had a couple of things to add to Nicole and Matt's good comments in support. So, you know, just for clarity, this is an opportunity to fund all of the facilities citywide in a way that is going to be the lowest cost over time by getting at it, this worsening deferred maintenance now. It's going to get us passed. competing for resources between the police station, firehouses, and rec centers. And it's not gonna require that we spend the 400 million, but it's gonna create the chance now to make this happen. And I also wanted to just acknowledge, there's a lot of people whic

Well, we've gotten a lot of pushback on this and it's polled poorly. And I do understand why. And I don't disagree necessarily because we haven't really, in my opinion, done our due diligence in regards to transparency and details of usage, what will we do with the money, and accountability, assuring that we'll use it for what we say we will. which is why I'm excited that we have this amendment. So originally I probably wasn't going to be for it, but I'm so excited about this amendment that I'm taking it back, and I'm going to say yes to this for that reason, because we're being more specific

I just wanted to get specific on what I would love to see with that reporting and transparency, specifically just more budget versus actuals on a regular and ongoing basis. I also have some concerns around how we're going to prioritize, and that piece is not there. We'll have five seats up for election in November, so I'm hopeful that Some of those conversations can happen now, but it will really fall to those who get elected since that will be the majority of council at that time. I also have concerns around the safety center, just recognizing that policing receives a significant amount of ou

Yeah, so I am going to support this, but I also am appreciative that we're looking to make these budgets clearer, and particularly the formation of a citizen advisory panel I think is critical because we just don't have... enough visibility into our community and we need to get more people engaged in our facility and deferred maintenance plan so that we become more practice at talking about it in a regular scheduled way and are clear how we're heading out and maintaining our buildings 20 years down the pike. As I've mentioned before, I think the school board just does an excellent job on this.

Thanks, Aaron. Thank you, Nuria, for talking about having transparency moving forward. I hear the community's distrust loud and clear and lack of transparency. I do want to point out that we didn't get here over the last decade. This started in the 70s. We didn't have a replacement fund for our facilities. 2021, we had our first facilities our comprehensive facilities plan. And then we've been adding to those replacements since we got hit with COVID. We had a flood. Those pulled out some of our, our funds from the, our reserves from the general fund. This wasn't a linear change. situation but

Thanks. I'll call on myself. I'm supporting this as well. This bond will is critically important for deeply valued community amenities with South Boulder rec center being right at the top of the list. And if we pass this bond we will be able to rebuild the South Boulder rec center with the amenities that people are expecting, and that's incredibly important. They're also very important for our first responders, the two fire stations that it would renovate or replace are in desperate need of that work, and the public safety building is also very desperately in need of it. So these are criticall

Thanks so much, everybody. All right, let's move on to 8759, which is about the residential vacancy excise tax. Can we see? It's already up on the wall there. Would somebody like to get us started? Matt?

Go ahead and make a motion to adopt Ordinance 8759, submitting to the electors of the City of Boulder at the regular municipal coordinated election to be held on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026. The question of raising taxes in the City of Boulder by the adoption of a vacancy excise tax imposed on homes that are occupied for 183 days or less per year, with such amount to increase annually in accordance with the Denver Aurora Lakewood Consumer Price Index Act. to support general city services specifying the form of the ballot and other election procedures and setting forth related details.

Second. Very good. Motion to second. Do you want to speak to it?

Yeah. I mean, I've been a long advocate of this really since I got on council. And so I think it's great that we're at this place where we can look at not just thinking about change behavior. But in many ways, this is repatriating sales tax revenue that would otherwise come to our community if these houses were occupied. If you want to have a long-term lease, great. People are spending money in our city. If you want to have short-term leasing, great. People are spending money in our city. But to have a house to just sit on it empty is actually causing more harm to the city than is necessary. A

Yeah, you know, we talked about this a couple years ago, and it took some time to get it on the ballot, and I'm hopeful it's successful. I also did want to appreciate our partnership with BARHA, the Boulder Area Rental Housing Association, that provided feedback and made sure that we are considering some of the different things that might happen and unintended consequences and thanking our legal staff who assured all of us that those exemptions are possible so that as we learn. Also, you know, we'll be able to measure or Define empty homes will be coming up with ordinances and we'll be able to

Thanks any other comments before we go to a vote.

Yes, Nicole Yeah, I'm still no I I continue to think that a fee is a better approach here for myriad reasons that I've already stated many times over. Don't need to reiterate them tonight, but I do appreciate what folks are trying to do here. I do think community will pass it. But yeah, I feel like I still need to advocate for that one more time, even though I'm going to lose.

All right. Seeing no other hands raised, let's have a roll call, please, Alicia.

Thank you. Can we go to ordinance 8762 now, please? So this is about changing the calculation of the city's debt limitations. Would anybody like to start on this one? Tina?

Can I just make a motion? Yeah. All right. I move to make a motion to adopt Ordinance 8762, submitting to the electors of the City of Boulder at the regular municipal coordinated election to be held on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026, the question of authorizing an amendment of the Boulder Home Rule Charter to modify the calculation of the city's debt limitation as set forth in the ballot, specifying the form of the ballot and other election procedures and setting forth related details. Second.

Yeah, I think this is a good idea just to come in line with the other municipalities around us, and it also benefits the city. I thought the staff did a good job explaining this.

Another thing that we're doing that is in alignment with our long-term financial strategy work, so thank you, staff, for all your work on putting this together and giving us another way to try to get our budget to a better place.

Thanks. And I'll just note that this is bringing us in line with all the other Colorado cities and how they Approach this as well any other comments before we go to vote Seeing none roll call, please Alicia Yes, sir.

Very good. Well, thanks everyone for your patience while waiting for us to get to Ordinance 8763 regarding the Downtown Development Authority. Who would like to get our discussion started on this one? Nicole? Do you have a follow-up question?

Yeah, I did. Sorry, I didn't get a chance to ask it earlier. This was just around the timing. I remember reading in the packet that the DDA wouldn't generate a lot of revenue initially, and noticeable benefits are likely to be years in the future. So just wondering, for all the amazing downtown businesses that have turned up for us tonight, reasonably, how long is it going to take them to start seeing impacts?

So when, you know, one of the things in the slides that was showing us sort of the, what we could expect, right, with and without a DDA. So to get to that with DDA level and a time, do you have a timeline there? I see Mark coming up.

All right. Who wants to start the discussion? Tara?

Why not? I'll start. Okay. Great talk today. I just want to say that what made my decision to want DDA was I actually called up different city councils, mayors, who did the DDA in their cities and towns. And Lafayette was very interesting because, first of all, not one city said, I wish we didn't do it. That's first of all. But Lafayette's is a very interesting one. And I just want to take a second to tell my council members about it because I think is very interesting. It says the newly formed DDA focuses on activating vacant sites, supporting small businesses. They have something called the

Rob? Thank you, Tara. So we did get a ton of letters about open space. And I spoke to staff at open space. They've got a $47.9 million budget. Staff was saying that it might, for the first five years of the DDA, it might cost them $100,000. But the net benefit after that is going to help fund them even further. Over 90% of their budget used to go to land acquisition, and now it goes to operations. They're good. Their budget for wildfire is increasing from 3.4% to 5.6% this year. They had no qualms about the DDA. I can't say any names. I just said I wouldn't say names, but they're full support

Thank you. Thanks. I got, thanks Rob. I got Matt and then Ryan.

Thanks Aaron. I've been saying for quite a while that the city needs to move to a mantra. Those of you that watch Ted Lasso, they believe over the door. Ours should be much a little bit more focused, which is yes and here's how versus no and here's why. And for far too long, the city has said no and here's why. And yet, the few councils I've been a part of have been talking the talk about we are open for business. We are saying the taboo word of economic development. We are creating a brand new department to focus on economic development. And yet, here we are. This is where we get to put actio

Thank you to staff and the community partners who have contributed to this really substantial work in building such big foundations. I'm a no and I have an alternative. On the no part, there are a couple of standards that I just don't think we've met that we need to. We do have clarity around the idea of DDA as a financing tool, but we don't have clarity about the underlying policy ideas that it is based on and that it would implement. For example, how much does revitalizing downtown on the Hill call for really concentrating on commercial vacancies directly versus addressing the wider landscap

Thank you. My comments are going to be a little bit similar to Ryan's, but I just want to start with the fact that Plan Boulder and Boulder Progressives agree on something is truly unprecedented, as is the volume of emails that we've received this past week. I've never seen in my five years on council anything like the level of opposition that we've been seeing to the DDA. And that does give me pause to move this forward without more support for the broader community. And that is not because I don't care about every single one of you in this room. Right now, many people in our broader communit

Thanks. All right, who'd like to go next? We got Tina.

Yeah, thank you, and thank you for all coming out. Whether you are in support of the DDA or whether you're opposed to it, I appreciate your comments. One of the things that throughout this whole process has been trying to, first, I think there was common ground, there is common ground about the need to do something in the downtown, which the city council identified as a priority. What we're seeing, as Nicole mentioned, is tremendous opposition from throughout the community. And I don't think I would characterize it as a smokescreen or misleading. I think instead we did not reach out to all of

Thanks, Tina. Taisha, and then I'll go. Thank you.

Thank you, everyone. This has been quite the process. I've spoken to many of you, read lots of emails. I appreciate the staff's back and forth and my fellow council members and various conversations that we've had over the months that we've been considering this. I honor the decisions that have been made by other councils. And again, I think it's important for me. Somebody mentioned taxation without representation. In addition to the restricted funds, which has already been extensively talked about, I also have to mention that our tax dollars and our voters in 1978 created that Pearl Street Ma

potential for improving and transforming downtown and the many vibrant small businesses that are located there. So I do see it as a really valuable tool that could help finance and make transformative investments in ways that would benefit small businesses, the downtown as a whole, and the entire community. So I am in support. I have heard clearly the many people who have concerns around this, and I feel like their concerns have been, voicing those concerns has been really important and has helped us think more clearly and deeply about how this might move forward. So I am supportive of doing i

All right. I make a motion to adopt Ordinance 8763, number one, determining the necessity of establishing a Boulder Downtown Development Authority, and two, submitting to the qualified electors of the proposed Downtown Development Authority at the regular municipal coordinated election to be held on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2026. The question concerning the formation of of the Boulder Downtown Development Authority and a ballot issue to waive applicable revenue and spending limits in the city of Boulder, Colorado, declaring the necessity for an election on November 3rd, 2026 concerning the forma

Second. All right. We've got a motion and a second. I think we've all spoken to this already. So roll call, please, Alicia. Yes.

Um, let's see, you just seconded the motion, but yes, I mean, you can make an emotion to, can I get Robert's rules? Can you do a motion to amend your own emotion that you have seconded?

Okay. So, so Rob, you would have to withdraw your second. Okay. I withdraw my second. I'll second.

Let's hear it. move the DDA structure to the November ballot, but before the city finalizes a plan of development and signs an IGA implementing the DDA, the city will engage in a process that engages our community for the purpose of seeking and incorporating public trust and input.

I like where you're going with that. Can you explain a little bit more the specifics of what you're envisioning?

So what I'm hearing, and I'm even hearing it from some council members, there's some confusion on process from the state statute, like wanting to know the IGA before we even do an LOI. You just can't do that. And I'm also hearing, I want to know what's going to happen, and it's the state statute that precludes us from doing that. So in order to work out an LOI, what we do is we PROPOSED, WE MOVE THE NOVEMBER, WE MOVE IT TO THE NOVEMBER BALLOT, BUT BEFORE WE FINALIZE THE PLAN OF DEVELOPMENT AND SIGN AN IGA, WE'LL GO THROUGH A PUBLIC PROCESS OF ENGAGEMENT FOR THE COMMUNITY FOR INCORPORATING PUBL

I GUESS WITH THE SPECIFICS OF THAT ENGAGEMENT TO BE DETERMINED LATER.

OKAY. SO WE HAVE A MOTION TO, THANKS FOR EXPLAINING THAT. WE HAVE A MOTION TO AMEND. DO WE HAVE A SECOND FOR THAT MOTION? OK, so we've got a second for that. Do we want to have any more discussion on that amendment? Yes, Nicole.

Yeah, I'm not convinced that moving it forward to that. I liked where Tina was going with what she was saying. I'm not sure that moving it forward to the ballot and then asking for feedback to kind of guide it is a signal that we actually want feedback. And I guess part of it is I understand the urgency for the business community. There is urgency for so many in our community right at this moment. But why are we trying to push it to this particular year? I don't understand what sort of the hang-up is, right, other than the urgency that everybody is feeling, whether you're a business or a resid

Yeah, I'll just echo that. I think the word trust has come up a lot. And I know there's a lot of distrust right now with the business community, probably with me. But there's a lot of, I think that it was Bill Shrum who was talking about the need in his comments that he recognized this distrust of government right now. and the incredible need to be transparent. And I don't think that we can be transparent if we move it forward and then do the engagement. The other piece is on the timing, because we've already committed to not initiating the timing until July of 2027. We could have this ready t

Thanks. And Nicole, maybe I'll just speak to the question since I'm on the side of moving it forward. This year is that I would see that we would have as much as a year before getting to the point of signing an IGA. And that feels like a lot of time to do authentic and complete engagement with the public and with the different entities involved. So that's why I'm willing to move it forward this year. Yeah, Matt. Yeah, Taishi, go.

I concur with what Tina said and actually meant to mention that in my comments and I also appreciate the clarification around the timeline that this would only make a two month difference and so it actually wouldn't take another year it would just be a two month and it would allow us to have I mean and again as I said I already feel a way about corporations being able to vote so that's just on the cuff but But I would feel much more comfortable if there was more momentum and agreement from the key partners. The fact that the library wasn't engaged is very problematic. And, again, I really appr

Matt, and then maybe we can get to the vote. I'll try to clear this up. So the plan of development gets done after you pass the DDA. That was always the process, the known process. That's always when and where the engagement would take place, because that's the only time in which you can define the plan of development. So it can't be done on the front end. That's the process in which it works. So Aaron's right. I mean, front running this doesn't really do anything. Because you have to do that work after you've established the DDA. And then you have the sequence. It's the sequencing that we hav

All right. So we've got a motion to amend on the table. So let's have a show of hands, all those in favor of Rob's, motion to amend. And that's four. So all opposed?

OK. So that's a 4-4 vote. So that amendment fails. So now we're back to the original motion, which Matt made. So if we can have a roll call vote, please, Alicia.

All right, so that fails on a four to four vote.

Yes. Any further direction. I think I've heard I've heard what I think is unanimous interest from the council in continuing to move forward with engagement with the community on this topic. Am I wrong about that. Well I mean we could start a process into motion Tina are you thinking about something specific.

So I would like to make a motion to consider the DDA in the upcoming year with the intention of placing it on the next ballot in 2027 by creating a working group. Sorry.

Okay. And, yeah, Teresa, do you want to speak? Because I think we need to.

So I'll just put that right out onto the table then for us to – I'll ask for not a five for us to give direction to city staff to continue engaging with the community about the DDA for the remainder of this council term. And I actually got Ryan first and then Matt.

Thanks. I, yeah, I had, I just had it up for a bit. I just wanted to weigh in on the general question of thinking about looking ahead. My perspective is that the, There has not been a case made that we need a DDA. There's a problem. There's something of a problem statement that we need to revitalize downtown and our local economy. And to me, the first order of business is to get our arms around what is our... What is our policy plan? What will make a difference? What is the thing we need to do? And then if that indicates that we need a program of public investment, then that could point to a D

So, Ryan, yeah, I appreciate that. Right now the thing on the table is whether we're directing city staff to continue engagement with the community on the DDA for the rest of the council term. You can support or not as you prefer. But I would really like to wrap this up. But, okay, Matt's gone first, and then I'll get to Nicole.

So my question has to do with staffing, right? I think a fair amount of staff were expecting this to be buttoned up one way or the other and move on to other projects. So what are we giving up?

I was just thinking the same thing. I think that would be great. So let me change the nod of five to change that to ask staff to think about what next steps would look like, scope that out, and bring it back to us for another check-in in the near future. Sarah.

It seems like we do have a nod of five, though. from the discussion to go forward with community engagement?

I think it's the scope. The question is what the scope is.

So can I just say that we've mentioned the library, open space, all the different entities.

Is that not good enough? We're just asking them to scope it out now. Now the ask is for them to scope it out and come back to us. So we're not trying to figure out the details right here on the dais.

Is that a nod of five, or can that just, like, nod of three? Like, I guess for where we are in the year, right, and what staff has capacity for, and I know you all have spent, what, the last eight or nine days in budget sessions, so.

Just trying to, like, think about, you know, for scoping, like.

Okay, so I'm going to go ahead and ask if there's that nod of five for that scoping. All in favor, please raise your hand. And I got six. All right, so six in favor. So that's a nod of five plus.

Thanks. All right, that brings us to the end of that agenda item. Thanks to everyone who came out to speak to us about this and took your time and energy to weigh in. We appreciate your engagement very much. All right, I need to check in with council as people are heading out. It's 1042, so it's late. We have one agenda item left, which is the comp plan. That is time sensitive. I'm hopeful we could get through it quickly, but I would need council. I think we might even need a vote on it at this point.

I'm just going to check in to see if Council is willing to continue with the comp plan item. All in favor, please raise your hand of doing the comp plan item. All right, we got a seven anyway out of eight. So we will go to the comp plan item. So Alicia, this is our next public hearing item, please.

Yes. What's the blue ones again? I'm so sorry. That's okay. What's the blue?

Great. Well, I have a clarifying question on that one. Are those motions exclusive of each other or do you need all three?

That's what I thought. So you're looking for all three? Yes. Okay, great. Any other questions for staff before we go to the public hearing? Not seeing any. Let's do the public hearing. We've got eight people signed up to speak. Everyone will have three minutes. And please do confine your comments to the specific amendments that we're considering tonight. Our first three speakers are all online. They are Carla Colleen, Lisa Spaulding, and Lynn Siegel.

All right. Our next three in-person speakers are Laura Gonzalez, Daniel Howard, and Daryl Monley. I don't believe Laura Gonzalez is in the room, so Daniel.

All right, we're going to go now to Daryl Monley, then Robert Mathias, and then Jennifer Mabry. And then Lisa Spaulding has come online. We'll get to her after that.

So, ma'am, we're considering these specific amendments to the comp plan tonight. If you could speak to those, please.

We're talking about the specific amendments that the presentations were about.

Certainly, if you want to speak to the general text of the comprehensive plan, you can.

Okay, thank you. Okay, now we have Robert Mathias, then Jennifer Mabry, and then Lisa Spaulding online.

Doesn't look like it, so let's go to Lisa Spaulding online.

Thank you. All right. That ends the public hearing. So we'll come back to city council. If we can get those motion language is the language for those motions up on the screen that be helpful please. So as I understood the staff recommendation it was to accept the proposed modifications from the other bodies to understand that correctly.

Yes. Point of order. Yes. So we just had that public hearing, and there's a couple of things that were brought up that I would like to request for consideration. How would I go about doing that? Otherwise, why do we have public hearings just to do it? Sorry, that last part is just because I'm tired.

Yeah. Did you want to ask some clarifying questions based on the public hearing?

Well, specifically the extreme heat component and the street trees. and the tree canopy. So extreme heat and the streetscape. But if I had to die on a hill, I'd die on the hill for the extreme heat one. Thank you.

Okay, thank you. And then the evidence for the history section. Yeah, the... Is that available?

Yeah, the staff has recommended that we accept the changes from the other bodies. And my question is, does anybody want to speak in favor of doing something other than that? Me. Yeah, go for it, Tara.

My good old amendment that didn't make it through. Where is that?

There it is. So they rejected near transit.

No, theirs was conditional. Their response.

No, I'm sorry. I'm happy with small houses on small lots, but I'm wondering, so I just have to accept the fact that they took out near transit. Remember that? And I can't say I want to put it back in. I reject your rejection.

Does having that transit system have a negligible to zero impact because we can manage that through our zoning and also the mandates from the transit oriented communities bill that already puts density standards and bonuses within distances of transit. So it's effectively mandated whether it's in here or not. Is that correct?

They said near a park, near a school. I said, so where? What's the difference between neighborhood one and neighborhood two? Nothing?

I know a slate, and I know I'm probably not going to get the votes, but I would like a more defined difference between neighborhoods. Now we're down to just two neighborhoods, right? Shouldn't we have a defined difference between them? We used to have a lot more.

And specifically straw poll in restoring the language, the words near transit to this?

Yep. Can I ask, and then what happens? Who does it go to next?

So who would it have to get approved by if we made that change?

Did the other two bodies reject it or you didn't get to them?

So I'll say, Tara, I'm not unsympathetic to your idea, but I would like to not ping back to all the bodies on this. Let's just do a straw poll. Okay. So all those in favor of restoring the language near transit that Tara has proposed, raise your physical hand.

Yeah, just you. So that doesn't move forward. Does anybody want to suggest anything else other than the staff recommendation? Seeing no hands raised, perhaps we could start going through motions.

I do support the staff recommendation. I also want to make sure that I have a chance to address the history section because I do have an idea, but it doesn't relate to the passage.

Should we do the motions and then you can talk about it at the end? Okay. All right. Who wants to get us started with the motion? Okay.

I move to approve the conditions of approval to the BVCP update made by planning board. Do I need to read the other parts?

Second. Do you need a roll call on that, Alicia?

Point of clarification, it's just those two or the entire slate? Like on the screen there was just those two. That's it. Correct. Just those two.

Yes. And then I would like to make one comment after this one. I move to approve the conditions of approval to the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan update made by the Boulder Board of County Commissioners. Second.

Got a motion and a second. Roll call, please, Alicia.

Oh, yeah. Sorry. I didn't realize you meant before.

Okay. Just that I listened to the Commissioner's second discussion on the removal of the 50 years of planning. And it was it was clear that some of the commissioners were concerned that the history didn't match their experiences in Boulder But history is sort of an interesting thing that way the versions governments tell tend to be told from the perspective of those in power Which is going to be different necessarily from those who are not in power So I do think this section is really important. I am willing to move it forward without this and And I hope that we can consider doing a council re

We've got one left. Nicole, if you want to keep going.

Sure, bring it home. I move to approve the recommended amendments to the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan update made by the County Planning Commission, Board of County Commissioners, and City Council.

Second. We've got a motion to second. A roll call, please.

Very good. All right. Well, thanks so much to you both. We're getting very close.

Thank you for sticking it out with us. All right, that brings us to the end of the agenda. I'm going to wrap us up close here at 11.24. It's a late one. We'll get back on track with earlier meetings soon. All right, have a good night, everybody.