We're just confirmed. Okay. Mayor, we are ready whenever you are to begin. All right. So, are we broadcasting? Yes, we are. All right. Great. Let's go ahead and call the Tuesday, July 14th, 2020 regular session to order. We can go ahead and start roll call. Mayor Bagley. Here. Council Member Christensen. I'll come back to her. Council Member Hidalgo-Fairing. Here. Council Member Martin. Here. Council Member Peck. You can't unmute. I see you there. Council Member Rodriguez. Here. Council Member Waters. Here. And Council Member Christensen is in attendance. Just stepped away to wash her face. So, she should be right back. Great. All right. Well, Council Member Hidalgo-Fairing, you want to start us in the pledge, please? Sure. Are we ready? Ready? Begin. 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. I think that was probably the best pledge we've had on Zoom for a while. Good morning, Pledge, with my class, class 22. You might be our go-to person. All right. So, let's go ahead and briefly remind people that anyone wishing to speak during first call public invited to be heard or in a public hearing under item 9, you will need to watch the livestream of the meeting. There will be these instructions for how to call in to provide comment. They will be displayed again, just like they are being now at the appropriate time. Comments are limited to three minutes each. I will be timing and I'll cut you off if you hit the three-minute mark, no matter how awesome your comments are terrible. So, let's go ahead and move on to item three. Do we have a motion to approve the June 30th, 2020 regular session, minutes? So moved. Second. All right. Council Member Martin, I'm sorry, Council Member Martin, one had made the motion. Dr. Waters seconded it. Is there any debate or changes? All right. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed say nay. All right. The motion carries six, with six of us four and Council Member Christensen, absent therefore abstaining. All right. Let's go on to agenda revisions and submission of documents and motions to direct the city manager to add agenda items. Is there anything Council Member Peck. Thank you, Mayor Bagley. I know that we've been through this before, but I want to revisit a motion we made earlier. And if we do not reconvene in July, in the council chambers, I want to move to direct staff to add the second reading of Metro districts to the first regular session in August. I'll second that. All right. It's been moved and seconded. Any debate or discussion? All right. Council Member Waters. I'm going to vote against the motion. I think it's a bad idea to get that out ahead of bringing people back together again. Unless, unless I, unless there's something in the queue, something to come before us, that's an application for a Metro district. And I guess what I wonder what the point is before we create an opportunity for people to weigh in the second time around people in this case, the public. So I just, I don't think there's a need to rush it. So I'll vote against it. All right. Seeing councilor Peck. I just would like to address that council member Waters. I don't feel that it's rushing it since it is the second reading. And we have had input. Since about October or November of 2018. On this issue. I don't feel that it's rushing it. So from both sides, from every side, from professionals, from developers, from residents, from staff. So that's why I'm making the motion. It is the second reading and I don't feel that we are rushing it. Thank you. All right. Let's go ahead and take the vote. Or we can keep debating it, but I would, I would recommend council member Martin and council member Waters count their votes, but we can keep discussing it. I would just like to say that it seems premature to me because the economy will change. And we already know the economy is changing and it doesn't seem to be. Appropriate to make it difficult to amend the situation where. You know, we just don't know what the needs of the city are going to be in a year. So I'm going to vote against it and I don't care whether it prevails or not. I'm still going to vote against it. I call the question. That's not what I meant. Council member Martin. I was saying, what I was saying is that you had the winning votes for just a few seconds. Welcome back. Council member Christensen. I guess we're waters. Do you want to see something else? All right, let's go ahead and there's no further debate on a matter. So let's go ahead and vote all in favor say, I. I'm sorry. Time out. Time out. Time out. Point order. Point order. I'm calling on myself. All right. Council member Christensen, welcome back. While you were gone, there was a motion made by council member Peck. To bring back the issue on, on Metro districts to the first regular session that we are in council chambers. No. What was it again? We are bringing it back. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. According to staff, we should be able to go into council chambers in July at what point the Metro districts would come back. However, given a situation where we cannot because of the virus, I am asking that we bring it back in the first regular session in August. Regardless. In case, yeah, in case we can't bring it back in July, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We're on WebEx still or zoom. Exactly. Okay. Anyway, that was moved in second and council member Christensen. Okay. Yes, I'm in favor of this. We've, we've been talking about this since November. Of last year. We've heard from everybody in the world. Developers. We've had special sessions on this. And before that we talked about it for the previous year. We're on the second hearing and it's one of the many, many things that we've been putting off. And I would really like to have it come back. Yes. So I'll be voting for this. All right. Let's go. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed. All right. Motion carries five to two with council member waters and Martin against. I have another motion. Okay. Councilor Peck. Thank you. I know that we discussed this at council comments. I think councilman waters brought it up, but I want to move it forward to direct staff to put the RV safe locks on the August fourth study session agenda. I would second that. And what, what, and what did you just to hear about it? Councilor Beck. I think we can move it forward to direct staff to the, to see to ask staff if we can get input from them as to whether they can be ready to bring it back on a regular session. I know that we can't. I'm not sure we're ready to vote on it, but I would like to have an update on it at the study session and an update perhaps from hope who is doing this. And see then if we want to move forward on a regular session. Right. Yep. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks very badly. I did express concerns about the RV ordinance. And it's been almost 11 months. Since we gave direction to staff to bring the, the ordinance on RV parking back. The council. And I, and I said then, and I'll say again, I understand why it's been delayed because of the safe lot discussions, but I just need some clarification. I think that the, the hope proposal. Did not include RVs. And the city. Whatever, whatever conversation the city's been in. Does not include RVs in terms of safe. So if, if I'm mistaken. Then I'll, then I'll stay and correct it. But I think that's what I've heard when we heard these presentations a few months ago. So if, if, if there are no RV safe lots in the queue for either hope. Or the city, then I wonder what we're going to do on, you know, study such. Councilman waters. Thank you for bringing that up. The whole point of the study session from my perspective is to actually discuss that with the, with hope. What they need because they have been mentioning that. This is an issue. And that, that is actually why we had some of those special sessions. And I think that was, I think it was the summer of 2018, I think it was. And safe lots, both for RVs and for cars came up. So I, I, this would be nothing more than a presentation. As to where we are from Jeff sat or with RVs, because we've all had emails, et cetera, that that is becoming a big problem again. And hope has expressed the need for RV. So for me, it is. It is a presentation as to where are we, do we need them, what are they, et cetera. That's where waters. Well, I would vote, I would vote to support your, your direction to staff. If it was about more than safe lives, if it's the ordinance. As, as part of the discussion of where we are with the ordinance, but to bring that, since we gave direction, what's upon a time to bring the ordinance back. Certainly safe lots would be, it would fold in or spin out of a discussion on the ordinance, but, but to discuss RVs or have a presentation RVs, once having given direction to staff to come back and review the ordinance, I'd rather use that time to read the ordinance and then what relationship same plots or RV might have in relationship to an ordinance person. Do you want to women the motion then. If you'll accept a friendly amendment that I would amend, or I would a move that we amend the motion to include the beginning review of the ordinance and the relationship of whatever we do with the ordinance to safe lot. Or any other. Okay, sounds good to me. Council member Christensen. I would, I guess I'd second that too. Councilman waters. I was a little confused about this too, but I believe that hope has been reconsidering this. What, what they were doing originally it's safe lots was going to include some cars and a few RVs and now they've sort of split off. It's my understanding. And they are opening a par, a car only lot. But the, the safe lot would all, would be, I believe, a lot of, of the, of the, of the, of the, of the, of the, of the RVs, which are, as we all know, the continuing problem. And so I, I, I also was very confused about this for the, and for the last few months. So yeah, I would support this. Council member Martin. Thank you, Mayor Bagley. I have a question for assistant city manager Marsh. I have an idea about leasing land. From the county at the fairgrounds. Before we set a date for this, should we see whether that's gone anywhere? Just because she's here. Mayor Bagley and council member Martin, you're correct. We did have that conversation around the opportunity for the Boulder County fairgrounds RV. And we also talked about the, the fact that we have, the city fairground. I think there are some pretty significant limitations on how many days that folks can actually use that facility. But certainly I could speak with Karen, Ronnie and see if we could talk to the county about options for their RV lot over there. And I don't know if we have done that today. other than than that would certainly inform the debate. Okay, Brian, you're muted. You have rarely muted yourself. I know. But yeah, I said, Councilmember Christensen. I lip read. So, Joanie, if we're going to talk to them about the fairgrounds, why don't we talk to them about Alaska as well? Because that's a possibility that somehow has gotten lost in the shuffle and I'm very, we're very interested in making use of that facility, which is now being just wasted. Thank you. I guess the other question is, Harold, I guess my question is, would that be something that would push you guys off at all with your time frame? If we did this on the fourth? I know that they've met and we and Ellie Burton, the group met a couple of weeks ago to continue this. I think we can come back and provide updates and go over timelines and what we have discussed. So I think that's reasonable. All right. Then the question is, we're asking for city staff, the motion is to bring back the ordinance for discussion on the 4th of August. So all in favor say aye. Aye. Now I say that's assuming the world doesn't change, John. Correct. All opposed say nay. All right. The motion carries unanimously. Anything else, Councilmember Peck? No, thank you, Mayor Backley. All right. Seeing nobody else, let's go ahead and move on with me. Yeah. City Manager's report is trying to be fancy with my space bar. It doesn't work. Go ahead. Yeah. I don't use it either. So I'm going to share my screen with you all, talk about a couple of things, then turn it over to Jim to give a financial update. Can you all see my screen? Now we can. A map with a lot of colors. So generally, this is the John Hawkins website that really talks about what's happening in terms of around the country to give you a sense. This is one of the sites that I look at to show you what kind of data you can get off of this. I'm going to go to the county where my mom lives. And you can see they've had one death under eight cases. They were really for the longest time sitting in around 30 cases. This has really been something that they've seen an increase within the last few weeks in terms of their location. I think the one thing that you really see, that this map really highlights, is really what you're starting to hear in terms of what you're hearing out of the state of Texas in terms of hospital capacity, what you're hearing out of Florida, believe Louisiana, and you can see where those increases are coming. We've all heard about Arizona in California in terms of what that's looking like in terms of those cases. I say this because when we say if the world doesn't change, one of the things that's really been interesting to me over the last few days is when you look at some of the things that are happening in some of these states. So obviously in California, the governor has, and they're doing this by county, but there's only a few counties that didn't fall under this in California where they basically have limited a number of services that were opened and moved restaurant services to outdoor dining only, eliminated some of the personal services that were going on. And so you see that in California. What's interesting is if you said, well, what state's probably the opposite of that it is Texas. And the governor of Texas recently came out, issued a masking order. And then in a lot of his interviews basically said we've got to get these numbers under control. If we don't get these numbers under control, I'm going to have to go back and issue another stay at home order.  So cities Houston, Dallas in that area, starting to say the same thing again seeing it in Florida. And so I say this because, you know, I talked to you all last time about the numbers and what impact the numbers really have in terms of how we continue to move forward. And there's some anxiousness from a long term perspective in terms of what happens in those other jurisdictions, what that means to the national economy, how that could potentially impact us, and what that means to really how we look at the 2021 budget. And so to go from here, I'm going to show you what's happening in the state. So on this slide, these are by reported date and by count. Some people say, well, if you go to this website, this looks different. I toggled off of the three day moving average to say, what does it look like on a daily basis. And so what you can see, again, is a peak, you can see the decline, you can see the secondary peaks that occurred and have hit this point here where at low point, there's about 100. This is the state of Colorado, 115 cases reported on June 13. You slide over here to July 9, 620 cases and you're seeing this drop again in this chart. If you want to see what the three day moving average looks like, it'll take a little bit to refresh the screen. Sorry. Again, what you're seeing is this is a smoother curve, but you're seeing sort of the same thing occur, but the three day moving average, when you take this high point, it's drawing it up. So that's why I tend to look at the case counts. And those are the individual cases that come into play in my computer's freezing. So the other chart back here. So again, this is what it looks like with the case counts. The other chart that I wanted to go over, and just I'll stop here when you look at number of deaths, you can definitely see the decline. You can see that we've actually had some days where we haven't had any, or for the most part, it's been below five. When you go to this chart, so this is the positivity data. And so what you really look at in this is when you go to this point here, you can see that the percent positive in the number of tests was a 2.34%. When you look at this, it's risen to 4.84%. As we've had more tests being produced. And then it's at 4.25. So these are the numbers that they're looking at when you see a lot of those executive orders. And you hear the governor talk about this and what the transmission rate is going to look like and what that looks like. So now I'll take you to Boulder County. When you look at Boulder County, again, attention the scale here. You can see this high point here. You can see this high point, which we all talked about what occurred in Boulder on the hill. You can see the decrease. Then you can see the cases starting to bounce again. And then we have another peak at about 25 cases in Boulder County. When you slide to this, this is a five-day rolling average percentage of COVID-19 PCR test. Again, you can see the curve moving where we want. But I think, again, what you saw in the statewide data is you see this dip and then you see the move up. And then you start to see it move up again. I want to talk to Jeff to see how much of that is really a product of the fourth and what we saw. Again, this is the total number of testing. So when you look at testing capacity, you do see that in Boulder County, we do have the ability to hit that 500 test capacity that they talk about in what we need to hit. We've obviously hit around 650 on a couple of occasions. In the most recent number, we went above 500. So that's, again, a good sign. This is the new cases on the five-day average. So again, you see this peak that occurred that we talked about that occurred in Boulder. But again, you're seeing this other peak occur as we were starting to move down. In somewhat of a similar fashion is what we did before. But we've bounced back up. So those are the things that when we talk about moving in to protect our neighbor that comes into play that we have to watch. This is, again, another interesting one. So I've been sort of showing you what's happening in these two communities in between Boulder and Longmont. So if you remember, we really hit that 500 number much earlier. And then we held it around 530. We've now moved to 568. Boulder was catching up to us. And now they're ahead of us by 20 individuals that's in this number. So you can see what we're starting to see in terms of the tracing and when they talk about the events that are occurring in other locations. The other piece that's really interesting to us that we're starting to see, and I want to dig into this a little bit more, is if you remember when we looked at the ethnicity component of this, this was actually closer to 40%. And so what we're seeing is those rising cases occur. It's actually dropping this percentage here for the Latinx Hispanic population. So we want to dig into that data a little bit more and see what's happening as we continue to move forward. I think last week it was almost at 38%. And so now it's at 37. So we're trying to recognize what that data looks like and what that's going to mean for us. Again, you can see just to let you know, really hit hard in the orange category, which is associated with long-term care facilities. We didn't see it for a while, now we're starting to see it again. So those are things that we really want to watch for in terms of the data. And then at the end, this really talks to you, this shows you what we're seeing in terms of the hospital piece. Again, this is in the red. This is probably a product of elected procedures that we have going on. We saw that it was in the green prior to elected procedures being allowed to occur once they were it moved. And then you can see the available ICU beds. I don't know on this chart what that looks like in terms of COVID patients. What I can tell you is we've been working with the county on a data set that we talked to you all about that is taking multiple sources of data and bringing it together. That could also be something that we can look at for a leading indicator. We had the meeting today in terms of bringing staff together and creating the governance structure because that data gets pretty specific. We have to be really careful with how it's utilized. We're all bringing various individuals from throughout our organization together in a user group technical expert setting so they can help advise us in terms of how they would like to use this. But in what I saw today and I'm going to look at it more tomorrow, there's some really good data in terms of what we're seeing that we can start layering that on top of this to get a better understanding of what's happening in the community. So obviously, if you remember a slide that Jeff Zayac showed you all, Colorado is doing better than most places. I will tell you what's interesting is I was driving across the country for funeral last week. There were literally locations that I went to where you wouldn't even think that it's occurring. And what's interesting is to see how people are now reacting to that and how those states are reacting to that. So I put a list on what I'm tracking in terms of data. This is sort of the data geek in me coming out to really see what are we seeing in those communities now in terms of increases. So again, what I said before, what we're now seeing is that all states are really anchoring in on the data. And there are a number of states that are starting to pull back that have pulled back and some are threatening to pull back based on what they're seeing in terms of the data and what that's going to look like. So again, just encourage everyone as we're doing this to wear your mask and do what you can with social distancing. We all want to support our local businesses. We all want to continue to be able to enjoy the facilities. And that's going to be incredibly important. I say all of this because that's now the lead-in to Jim and how we're looking at the financial situation because 2020, we've got a good handle. 2021 is a completely different story. And we're going to have significant financial issues to deal with in the 2021 budget. So are there any questions for me in terms of the data before I turn it over to Jim? Councilor Pack. Thank you, Mayor Bagley. Harold, just some of the charts that you showed us, it went out to 710 instead of 714. Was there not a significant increase between 710 and 714 that it wouldn't be on the graph? No, that's the way the data comes in on some of these charts. Some is more real time, so they actually can take you out to the date we're on. Others, it's not, and it comes in a little bit later. So some of these charts will lag. And again, these are all charts that anyone can find on the CDPE HE website or the Boulder County Health Department's website. So they're really in charge of the data, but there is a lag to some of these. Okay, thank you. Councilmember Hidalgo-Farang. Harold, has there been any discussion on predictions of what would happen once we start opening schools per se? No, I think that's, you know, that's an interesting piece right now. And it's all over the place. And you're hearing any number of epidemiologists and others come in and weigh in on that conversation. I noticed that Dr. Fauci was one and they had a panel that talked about it, haven't had a chance to read it. I think the one thing that I am consistently hearing in terms of that is really the protocols that are in place, social distancing, mask wearing, and those types of issues are going to be incredibly important. And I think what they're learning, they're learning new things daily. There was a recent study that was released that talked about younger people and how they respond when they get it and really talking about the connection between smoking and vaping. And so the younger people that smoke and vape actually can have a really serious case versus what was typically thought because of the impact on your lungs. If there was an interesting story, and this is kind of why they're really hitting that younger demographic right now, there was a story. A doctor, I think out of San Antonio, they had a COVID party where really they took someone who was positive and they were, I guess it was to see who would get sick. And there was a 30-year-old that just passed away. He was one of those that got sick. And I think, you know, what they said in the article was one of his last words was, I should have taken this more seriously. And so that's where you're seeing nationally this sort of push on that younger demographic because that is, if you, I'll show my screen with you one more time to answer your question. You look at this, this is in Boulder County. And so when you look at the number of cases you have this traditional curve, can you all see it or no? Now you can. So if you look at this by age group, you know, you have this curve that looks like this. But then you can see that age group of 20 to 29. Look at the state's numbers.  I don't know how much of the 10 to 19 is in what you would call the 16 to 18 category. But I think that's what you're now starting to hear more in the public conversations. Okay. And then so I just, I had an NEA meeting on workers' rights, health and safety, as we're reopening schools. And the message over and over again was the four Ds, physical distancing, deterrence, disinfection, detection. And it's not either or, but really it has to be happening throughout anyone who has interaction with the public. So I think if you're out there grocery shopping, think about the four Ds. And that's, I mean, we all play a role in that. Yeah, we do. And I had this question from early or yesterday on the LADP meeting. When I look at the numbers in our organization, we have about, you know, let's say a thousand people that we've had somewhere at home. But you know, around 36% of our organization never stopped working. And many of those are police and fire. I think the last number I had, I've heard is we were below 15 cases as an organization. And it really is about following those protocols and managing those safe practices to ensure not only the safety of your of our workforce, but also the residents of our community who go in there. So it looks different. And I think those are the things that everyone needs to keep in mind. And something I'm hearing from different outlets is sometimes three feet is okay if you have a mask. You know, that in our conversations that we've had, I've always heard six feet. You know, unless I was asleep at the wheel somewhere and three feet was slipped in. And where would that have come from? I don't know. So the order from our Boulder County is if you can't adequately social distance, which is six feet, then you need to wear a mask. And that's the county order. So if you're inside of six feet, you need to wear a mask. Okay, thanks. All right. Thanks, Harold. Let's go on with Jim Golden. Looks like he's ready. Thank you, Mayor. Jim Golden, the Chief Financial Officer. Last week, late last week, I sent Council email actually two emails, hopefully got to see the correction, but I did give you an update on our May sales and use tax collections in my normal monthly email. Wanted to now update our revenue shortfall projections. We haven't talked about these in two months. We didn't do any any update after the April collections. So in general, we've been since COVID went into effect, we've gone through about four collection cycles. The first one was February, which sales had already taken place, but the collections would do on March 20th. And those came in down 1.5% from the previous February. March was up 6%. April was then down 12.7%. And then last week, we saw that May was up 1.6% over May of 2019. So after five months now, year to date, we are down 0.6% for our total sales and use tax. That's breaking down between sales and use taxes. It's a growth in sales tax and a large decrease in use tax. We have 2.4% growth in sales tax and a 15.5% drop in use tax. And use taxes has been down in pretty much all of the major areas. Primary employers down the most, vehicle sales, that's out-of-town vehicle sales. There is a difference, I think, that we see in out-of-town versus in-town. There's also a delay in the receipt of those monies since they go through the county. As you know, it takes up to 60 days to register a vehicle and sometimes that's when that money is paid versus sometimes right at the sale. So anyway, those are down 22%. And that's pretty significant. And then building permits are down almost 9%. Our budget projections for 2020 were that would be up 3.46% over 2019 collections. So even though we're down just 6 tenths of a percent compared to the previous year, our amount of our shortfall underneath budget for total sales and use tax is about $1.2 million after five months. Obviously a lot less than what we were talking about in projections back in April and May. But still, it's a significant decline. May was up 1.6%, but there were two major sales tax audits receipts that we received. And that had an impact and we don't receive those type of audits regularly. So it's hard to look at that and consider that and do in projection. So if I back that out, we are actually, we're down 4.8% over the previous May for our basically our typical sales and use tax collections. So it was a strong month, but at the same time, what we were projecting is that in that June would be down 28.7%. That's the projection that are made two months ago. And then the rest of the year, we would be down 8% for the final six months of the year. So really our projections certainly were maybe too conservative. We didn't didn't know what exactly to anticipate at that point in time. The other thing about is that we were probably optimistic about how long we would be going through this because we really thought that we would just be hitting the second half of the year and dealing with a recession that would put us down 6%. So obviously we're already into the second half of the year and still feeling the impacts of COVID affecting our business sales. So my new projections at this point in June projecting will be down 7.9% and then following that final six months of the year down 6%. We did have some businesses reopen in May. We will get the full impact of some businesses being open in June that weren't open all of May.  Dropped our second half estimate from 8% to 6%. Basically just on the activity that we've seen over the past two months. If there's a resurgence of the virus, there's no guarantee 6% would probably be too optimistic at that point. I want to jump in while he's moving through this. So when you saw me show, when I showed what was happening in the rest of the United States and you talk about things like use tax and you know that's really the money that a lot of these corporations invest. If they start getting hit where they have other locations and have financial challenges and concern, we're concerned that that takes that use tax piece and makes it a bigger issue for us. Is that a fair statement, Jim? Yeah, yep. There's a lot of equipment purchases and things that haven't been taking place during the COVID. But we were projecting two months ago an $18 million shortfall across about a dozen funds. We're now reduced that to $11.33 million. If you do have the information that I sent to you this afternoon, you'll see that broken out by each of those funds. The largest revenue shortfall is $5.88 million from reduced sales and use tax. That's five different funds that are impacted by that. And then also we have projections of a little over $4 million of revenue shortfalls in the general fund for a variety of revenue sources. A good deal of that from recreation revenue to $2.85 million of it. But also a number of revenues and I've expanded this to be more than just COVID impacts. It's really since we're dealing with our budget and making our projections at this point in time. We are including in our estimates now any revenue source that we don't think is meat and budget whether it's because of COVID or not. And we have had declines in some other revenue sources that probably aren't related to COVID. But we've worked those into these projections as well. So franchise revenues are impacted. We have investment revenues down, some development revenue down, fines and forfeits, utility disconnects, union reservoir fees, other licenses and fees as well. So in the street fund we are still projecting will you lose about $475,000 from highway use tax. Lodge is fun. We've kind of increased our projection that would be about $350,000 shortfall for the year. Then what we've done in now in looking at these new projections, most of the funds are have lower projections than they did two months ago. Obviously all the sales and use tax to five sales and use tax funds are impacted by these projections and are down at a lower amount. In the golf fund we actually have had a real risk surge in golf revenues since we opened up the courses and it's really made an impact on our projection there. We were had a $400,000 projection two months ago but now we've got it down to about $130,000 shortfall. And then we have a couple of small community services based funds with the museum senior senator. So that's one that we're going to have to spend a lot of time on trying to really figure that one out. And the other one that I think is really going to have to take a different look operationally is the lodger's tax fund. I think Jim put this in in his information where they've made a number of adjustments but when we talk about how long the impact of some of these things are really going to hit some of these funds the lodger's tax fund to me is going to be one that's going to have one have potential issues for a longer period of time simply because we know that businesses generally have been restricting business travel which is a big component of our lodger's tax. We really think based on what we're seeing that's probably going to continue for some time until the numbers start evening themselves out or they get a some kind of vaccine which if you've heard the data recently there's even questions about how long immunity lasts. And so you take that then you take travel generally and they're projecting that to be down. I think operationally we're going to have some issues. So I say this to council because this is one I think we're going to have to dig in with with the Visit Longmont group and really have some conversations about what this is going to look like over time. All right great thank you. Councilmember Christensen did you have your hand up? First I wanted to thank you Jim. I you said you worried that you'd made too conservative a projection but as we most of us learned from our 20s to 30s it's always a better idea to assume you're going to have a lot less money than to assume you're going to have a lot more money. So I it's better to know you know to to assume that things will be worse and be pleasantly surprised that they're not quite as bad as we thought. I do have a question about the COP made payments for the four city buildings for Twin Peaks. Are we going to be able to make those payments? May I badly councilperson Christensen yes in fact that I did I do give you an update on that every month in that email and it it's it's about the only good news I have right so I can assure you that that payment has no trouble being made when you look at them sales tax activity the village at the Peaks it's up it's been up in each of these months and the three anchors up there are obviously having significant sales activity because they all fall into the categories I've identified as as being strong performers so in addition most of that's being paid by property tax anyhow and and I believe the assessment for that area went up for this year so it's in great shape. I will go back to your first statement though because we are it's a struggle right now Harold and I and the staff are have to to consider how to put together a budget without being too conservative because it's one thing to be conservative right now trying to get us through 2020 but when we got to give you a balanced budget that means that we have to reduce expenses if we're going to be too conservative and there are implications of that and and that's something that we're wrestling with now is we don't want to be too conservative we prefer to be in a position where we can react to what happens versus having a significant impact on services and then if I'm too conservative I've impacted our budgets dramatically and the services that we have available to provide so that's a that's a struggle right now. Yeah I appreciate that because you don't want to prematurely cut things off it makes for worse problems in the long run and also it makes people you know it's it doesn't help the spirit of positivity that we need all to have at this time but I do appreciate what you're saying and I know that you and Harold and all of the financial people must be having an extremely difficult time because once again you're always predicting the future but this is a future that none of us can predict so I know you're doing the best you can and I appreciate your monthly updates and thank you. To Jim's point this is probably the hardest budget that I think I've ever had to deal with because there's nothing about this that any of us know. It's not a typical recession and and to his point I would be really clear if we're too conservative then we're digging in and cutting and then if we perform better then it's how do you retract out of it and what's the impact of those cuts. If you're too aggressive then you set yourself up for another problem that you have to deal with so that's what we're really going to spend a lot of time on and at the same point anything that we get in better performance and I really wanted to hit this one hard for the community and our staff the better we perform this year and and so it went from 18 to 11 and the more savings we have this year that then helps us understand what the fund balances are going to look like next year and allows us to take you know where we may push things a little bit if we know we haven't a fund balance but if you don't have enough fund balance then you have to move into that conservative realm. Jim again who's that? Dr. Waters? Thanks Mayor Bagley just you know a reflection of what Harold just shared I think that would be code for wear your damn mask wouldn't it? If we want to have a strong second half of the year we need to do everything we can to keep our businesses as vibrant as possible yes with your head are you shaking your head yes yes yes I mean so I just want to reiterate I reinforce the the relationship between this discussion and what you talked about a few minutes ago in terms of infection rates and whether or not we're going to have kids back in school and on and on and on and what happens with our local business in your commerce but I do have a specific question relative to I appreciate Jim the report and I appreciate the detail both earlier in what you sent today I just want to clarify in my mind that I'm understanding this the one point I'll be just under 1.5 billion in savings from freezing of personnel the only other place I see that is in the public safety fund there's a $323,000 savings there the combination is about 1.8 against the 11 million uh 11 three right that we're now projecting are there any is that does that account for all of the hiring freeze freezes uh because I didn't in the others I know the others are generally projects and that we've got we've reflected personnel savings from personnel and those two funds is that the way to interpret this well it's uh councilman waters it is correct that that is the two places where we have probably the most frozen positions identify all positions throughout the organization are being reviewed if they go vacant as to whether or not they can be filled or not a director will decide whether they even want to bring it forward to ask the city manager for approval there's not as many in some of these other funds probably that are being held back simply because like you said most of them most of the other funds are project-based and have the we have the flexibility to hold back on projects it does not in these other sales tax funds the street fund does have some certainly has some some positions in it but it also has a lot of projects that they were able to have the flexibility to hold back on we do have some other areas that that we are are holding back on positions they're just probably not as significant as compared to the the amount of savings that are needed in in those those two funds because it is the most significant area is a pain for us really are those two funds are are going to that have basically mostly salary and benefits from them that's why most of this of the freezing is taking place in those two funds so just follow along we heard David David bell last week I think it was last week comment that we lost Jamie our ranger up at Button Rock which I didn't know which and I don't know very well but it seems to me that was a big loss based on what you know what interactions I had and and I know that in a subsequent conversation with David learned that we that our senior ranger out at Union had submitted his resignation or retirement letter and the reasons for that I think you know at some point would be useful for people to know you know why we are losing seasoned experience really good people especially in areas in natural resources but is it safe to assume that Jim that that would David would come you know make the proposal that those are key positions to fill given everything we talked about last week and what's happening in our parks and natural resources or our parks and green spaces and and the pressure under which our parks staff is working that we we wouldn't vacate those and then freeze those those but those would be those likely positions that would be filled even as we're not filling out is that fair to assume I think those two of those if not three are open so I think that to answer that question and I think that's a great question um we basically look at these in terms of the critical nature of this and really you know you start health safety welfare when you're evaluating these and then you look at the operational pressures on various departments to make that decision because we know we have to keep the savings example I will give you and and how we do this public safety they had two open 911 cons specialist positions they said we'll we'll freeze those since then we've had a couple of we've lost a couple well we didn't freeze those because we need to really monitor minimum staffing and those are some of the hardest positions to fill so we went ahead and posted those so they could go through the process and we went through that evaluation with Rob and Mike on all of those positions and when do they have to go into academy when does the expense start so we can get as much savings as we can but also manage that staffing level and then look to 21 to go what are we holding in case we have to have something that's vacant because the last thing you want to do is fill positions and then have to make a different decision in 21 yeah so just well I guess one more observation and I'll shut up in public safety as I look at the the projected savings from freezing positions one could view that as as a COVID induced defunding right I mean obviously you're you're you're reallocating resources that would have gone to public safety in addition to the positions in public safety we we chose not to fill with police officers but we chose to fill with drug specialists and case workers etc right when we had given up a number of positions yeah direct funds to service areas other than criminal justice is that fair yeah so when they went through on the budget last year they repurposed some of those positions into that and those are conversations that they're continuing to have yeah so just as we go forward with budget or you know we see positions being filled understand all those scrutinized very carefully position by position based on health safety etc yeah they all they all come to me thanks all right okay anything else Harold all right let's move on then to first call flexor let's move on to special reports and presentations the water bond about sorry those are my dogs the water bond ballot question public information presentation mayor and mayor bagley members of council dale rademaker deputy city manager i'm gonna open up this this item for you tonight you know the issue before you tonight is really a presentation and to provide information to the city council in in alignment with and following the direction that you gave us back on march third to take steps to prepare for a potential ballot issue on the november 2020 ballot regarding the issuance of of debt in our water utility to fund critical infrastructure improvements that are needed to again to continue to ensure our ability to reliably provide clean and safe drinking water for the entire community i think the other thing that we're all aware of who are acutely aware of is during the pandemic in the in the downturn both economically as well as socially in in in what we're able to do you know it's a difficult time and and we understand it's a difficult time for for many in our community however similar to efforts that the the country undertook even during the great depression it's times like these where communities come together to really focus on those key critical aspects of their infrastructure and to ensure the future of them so with that becky skull who is our communications and marketing manager in public works and natural resources i'm going to turn it over to becky she's going to take you through a very brief presentation and a a short video that we have prepared in order to begin that effort of sharing information with the public so becky i'll turn it over to you okay um hi everyone i'm becky skull as dale mentioned and good evening to mayor bagley and members of the city council i'm here as he said to talk to you about public information plans to inform the community about this potential ballot question this fall and as he said you've directed staff to prepare that resolution and next month staff will be back with that for your review and your decision about placing that item on the ballot this fall meanwhile in the public information arena we've been busy developing a plan to get the word out to the community about this potential ballot question and also to provide answers to them about questions that they might have regarding rates the funding process and exactly what system improvements would be occurring these would be improvements to deal with aging infrastructure it would be maintenance requirements that we have to continue to have the reliability and the quality of the water we're providing this community and finally any kind of capacity expansion that's needed to continue to serve the community now dale mentioned the COVID-19 pandemic and you're all well aware of how we've had to change the way that we communicate with one another in the community and we're we're also considering that as we're looking at our plan and so part of the reason that we have this video that we're going to share with you this evening is because we are finding that we will be doing a lot of the work we typically would do in person with large groups or groups of any size in the community through a virtual format and we find that video is a really effective way to keep people informed and to clearly and simply get the word out and so we have already sent an email to organizations within the community just to let them know about this possible ballot item and to make an offer to have staff attend any meetings that they have virtually or to find other ways to share factual information with them now and in the months ahead likewise of course we're following the traditional communications plans that we always use to inform the community and these are going to be done in both English and in Spanish and these are anything from a news release to a social media post it's also things we'll be reaching out through the city line and other targeted newsletters using social media doing things through the cable access channels neighborhood outreach and you name it we've tried to make sure we've got everything possible to make sure this is being communicated as broadly and effectively as possible if we've missed anything we'd love to hear from you to let us know who else we don't have on that list so that we just are as thorough as we can be let's get back to the video that we have to share with you this evening and it's kind of a soup to nuts video it's got information about the source of our water it's clean safe and reliable drinking water so it explains where it comes from then it talks about how we collect treat and distribute that water we also include some information specifically about some of the needs that we have within the system to either renew or replacing some of these aging whether it's the infrastructure the pipes the buildings the equipment and also how we need to explain and expand our capacity excuse me to expand the capacity finally includes some information about this potential ballot question and it includes some reasons that people might be in favor or not in favor of approving this ballot question now when you see the video I want to make sure you know that we're working right now to get some closed captioning in place so that this video will be available both in English and in Spanish and it will be ADA compliant and we'll have that completed in the next day or two days we're going to share the video with you now it runs about four and a half minutes and when it's finished Dale will come back and talk to you about ways that the city council members can be involved in this public information process and we want to ask how you'd like to participate I also want to mention we've got some staff on hand so if you have any questions after the video technical funding communications we're here to answer those questions so I want to thank you very much for your time this evening and I'd like to ask Susan will you please start the video the city council may submit a question to voters on the November ballot asking for approval to issue 80 million dollars in water bonds to finance the renewal of aging water infrastructure and maintain system reliability and quality these are critical citywide system improvements that benefit water customers today and into the future a clean safe and reliable drinking water supply is always critical it's of particular importance during times of emergency such as the COVID-19 pandemic long once water is clean primarily because it comes from a very pristine source within Rocky Mountain National Park that clean water is then stored in Ralph Price Reservoir which is surrounded by the 3500 acre Button Rock Preserve in the mountains west of Longmont to be ready for the communities used throughout the year after the water leaves Ralph Price Reservoir it is delivered to our two treatment facilities Nelson Flanders treatment plant which is the primary treatment plant for the city as well as the Wade Gattis treatment plant which is really used in an emergency basis and for backups when necessary the city's Wade Gattis water treatment plant was placed in service in 1983 that plant now is reaching the end of its life cycle and the capacity that it currently provides will have to be replaced the city recently conducted some engineering studies to determine what's the best way to replace that capacity we had the choice of either replacing Wade Gattis or expanding our Nelson Flanders water treatment plant and the the best option at least cost for us is to expand the Nelson Flanders water treatment plant which was placed in service in about 2005 fortunately that plant was actually constructed with expansion in mind so that makes it really an efficient option for us in addition to expanding the Nelson Flanders water treatment plant there are other planned upgrades in the potable water treatment system over the next couple of years this includes potable water tanks that are aging now and have reached their life cycle and miles of pipe that will also need to be replaced in 2019 the city council approved a five-year rate schedule that contemplated selling bonds to spread out the costs to upgrade Longmont's aging water infrastructure over several years that rate schedule supports issuing up to 80 million dollars in water bonds without voter approval to issue the water bonds needed projects could be delayed and system reliability affected think of water bonds like taking out a mortgage on a house paying for improvements with water bonds helps acquire needed assets and infrastructure repairs now while spreading out the cost of those improvements over time to avoid rate spikes this keeps rates more predictable for users using water bonds to finance the infrastructure improvements also results in user rates that are initially lower than if cash were used to fund the improvements this spreads out the cost of these upgrades more equitably across both current and future water customers these are all considerations to keep in mind when voting here are some reasons why a voter might be in favor of this funding request and here are some reasons why a voter might be against this funding request a yes vote would allow the city of Longmont to issue 80 million dollars in water bonds to be used along with existing fund balances and adopted rate increases toward renewing aging water infrastructure and maintaining system reliability and quality a no vote would mean bonds would not be issued adopted rate increases would still take place those rate increases plus existing cash balances could be used toward renewal projects but other funding sources would need to be found the safety and reliability of Longmont's drinking water is essential to our community we ask you to spend some time researching the issues ask questions if you have them and most importantly come out and vote vote vote learn more about the water bond issue at longmont colorado.gov slash water hyphen bonds election day is tuesday november 3rd well council i i hope the uh the video played a little better for you than it did for me out here in the in the the the sticks as they say um i really appreciate the staff that worked on that and i think they've done a great job and i think it does tell a uh both the factual and an accurate story of what's needed and why it's important um you know i do want to emphasize as well and council many of you are aware of this is you know the decisions to reach the point of beginning the financing is really way down the line this this this this whole effort starts with master planning and engineering analysis years ago and it takes many many years to get us to the point where we're actually ready to to now move forward with some of these critical infrastructure projects as becky said uh you know staff were always interested in city council how how you would like to be involved in the process and again this is all still predicated on your making a decision in august as to whether or not to place this issue formally on the ballot what staff will be working on is that ballot language along with the resolution to effectuate that placement on the ballot in november we'll be presenting that to you in august for your consideration at a regular meeting um likewise council has historically also passed a resolution of support on on issues that they are bringing forward for the public to consider and uh likewise that that is of council interest staff would also get that resolution prepared for your consideration in action uh likely uh early in september the last thing i also need to mention is um on the legal side of things uh both local and state fair camp praying practice laws restrict the use of public funds to advocate for the passage of any particular uh ballot issue or information coming forward and there are exceptions to that law um for example um work that we do ahead of the uh ballot issue uh being placed on the ballot is is we have greater leeway on what we can and can't do once the ballot issue is set again by action of the council then we're quite restricted on what we can do uh the video that you just saw had has been reviewed by our legal staff uh we all do find it to be factual and and equally based with regards to the pro and con um comments in there and importantly city council you as individual members um you do have greater latitude on what you can say and do and so again staff is interested in how we might be able to support um uh actions or or efforts that that you might be interested in undertaking you know this is the first time we've tried a a ballot issue in in this type of a situation and um so we're all in a little bit of uncharted territory right now but I'll uh I'll leave it at that if council has any questions we will try to field those well I guess my only question is Dale so do you need and Harold do you guys need us to do anything take a motion about whatever regarding um uh give do we need to direct you to go ahead and take necessary steps in order to promote this prior to going on the ballot and then in fact prepare it for the ballot is that what you're doing and members of council I think at this point this evening again unless you otherwise directed you you gave us that direction back in March we're continuing to follow that direction until and unless you change that course and so yes the the the video that we prepared we're ready to begin uh with the uh effort of sharing some of this information with the public we wanted you to see it first before it is out in the public arena and then importantly um uh just to let you know that we are working to repair the resolution and the ballot language as well as a resolution of general support those are the two items again so tonight if you don't want us to do that it'd be good to know we'll stop doing it um otherwise we're sort of in auto mode moving towards that uh action that we will have in front of you in august all right so well so rather than opening up for questions etc is there anyone here who does not want staff to proceed with the direction that we just heard all right so that said is there anything else that's okay councilmember peck thank you mayor bagley so um dale correct me if i'm wrong but both in the packet as well as on the video uh one of the main questions that are going to come up with uh what is it going to cost the individual so that's going to be the main question we're all going to get and i want to make sure that in our marketing technique what we as council people with all these hundreds of emails we're going to get um that we give the correct answer so when you bring that back in august can you explain the rate structure how long it's going to take to pay off these bonds so that i find that people want hard solid facts so they know what they're voting for so thank you for that and councilmember peck will be sure to do that and and and to answer it briefly tonight the rates that you have already adopted for the next five years are sufficient to cover the debt service for the 80 million dollar bond issuance that's what i thought uh dale we all have very short memories so i would like to be able to say that in a in a very succinct manner thank you all right councilmember christensen no i i also i just think people need to understand what you just said dale that what because the question we will get no doubt is but you're already raising the water rates and now you want us to pay for more stuff so please try to explain that in the video so people don't go wait a minute what are they trying to pull now um because we're not trying to pull anything we're just trying to repair stuff that has to be repaired so but people you know all of us need to be reminded exactly what was decided a year ago things like that thanks all right is there anything else from council all right thank you herald thank you dale uh good luck can keep pushing all right let's go ahead and take a five minute break actually let's take a three minute break while we go ahead and open up the first call public invited to be heard line mayor we're ready for you and you are ready we have several people who have called in today all right we all back i believe we are missing poly i'm sorry councilwoman christensen all right well let's go ahead and start here she is i see her all right let's go ahead and start with the first couple if you might have been heard how many people in the queue i'll start with the first caller mayor that caller your phone number ends in 328 i'm going to unmute you can you tell us don how many are in the queue real quick there were eight mayor all right perfect caller 328 do you hear us yes can you hear me yes if you could state your name and address for the record you have three minutes my name is chris boss leg i live at 1609 19th avenue i just wanted to put in my two cents for the dismount zone that you're going to vote on later tonight with the parking cut down for the non restaurant businesses in the downtown area i was hoping that you guys would not put the dismount ordinance in effect so that we could get more people that are not driving cars down to the downtown area and not have those non restaurant businesses suffer further thank you very much thank you all right the next caller your phone number ends in 452 452 yes i'm ready for that we could get more people that are not driving cars down can you mute your live stream for us because we're hearing that in your i'm doing that yeah yeah i'm doing that okay all right thank you you may begin okay good evening mayor baglan city council member sherry malloy 2113 range view lane i'm calling in to speak to ldc updates concerning the protection of riparian areas and habitat and species protection a bit of historical context on august 14th 2018 council gave final approval to the first set of updates to the ldc in 17 years a year later on september 1st 2019 these new standards became effective when the updates were approved in fall 2018 council also directed staff to include riparian protection amendments and to develop a sustainability evaluation tool to be used for assessing development applications as a result this section of the updates was not included in the 2019 standards this made sense because the wildlife management plan wmp was also due for an update and would better inform this section of the ldc the public process for the wildlife plan began in march 2019 and was completed last fall 2019 well we're finally here after comprehensive public participation the consultants constructed a plan that has been thoroughly deliberated within city staff from with city staff from planning natural resources and sustainability legal has also reviewed it is it perfect no is it good yes is it better than the current wmp absolutely bold hair said perfect is the enemy of the good the results of long months 2018 customer satisfaction surveys survey found 74 percent of residents rated promoting natural areas from development is very important clearly longmont residents highly value protecting nature this council has listened all of you have stated your commitment to respect and protect our natural public amenities and for that many are sincerely grateful tonight it's finally time to do just that and codify safeguards for habitats and species by moving this agenda item forward for first reading ASAP doing so will not only protect our precious natural environment it will provide property owners developers and staff with clear and comprehensive guidelines finally i know you're all aware of how tax the natural resources department has been the last few years and how that's been multiplied significantly with covid button rock macintosh both core creek corridors sandstone union and more have exploded in youth and abuse therefore it is extremely important to proceed with the plan of hiring an environmental planner also vital is fulfilling the point five position for a volunteer coordinator who could help train and supervise citizen scientists junior rangers and other volunteers to help address the ever-growing needs the impact covid has had on the city's revenue is real but so are the human impacts on our natural areas just as we wouldn't put a freeze on hiring for police for the vital safety protection they provide this same mindset must also apply to our natural environment thank you thank you all right the next guest your phone number ends in 637 i'm going to unmute you do you hear me me yes great go ahead yes we can great good evening city council i'm calling again about short-term rental regulations in the city of lawnmower i want to start by saying thank you for having it on the agenda and discussing it tonight i hope that you can enact change that will protect homes and owners their investments and the quality of neighborhood just this morning the airbnb behind us had guests that were playing loud music at 9 a.m and cursing to the extent that we had to bring our children indoors i hope discussions tonight can prevent this and other nuisances from happening in other neighborhoods in long line thank you so much thank you our next guest is 882 your phone number ends in 882 you've been unmuted can you hear me yes i'm scott conlon 1014 fifth avenue and a bicycle longmont board member mayor city council and staff tonight proposed dismount zone ordinance goes before you for first reading as agenda item a day i wanted to highlight three components of the proposed ordinance and there are concerns first it covers first after long speak and then back in may when this was open um it was really discussed between third and long speak um it first to third doesn't have improved alleyways in some sections and have no alleyways at all the sidewalk between first and second avenue on the west side of main is currently a bike and pedestrian detour used by the city and then third um there are no controls to cross kaufman at second or first avenue as well the ordinance doesn't address avenue sidewalks it's kind of interesting that that doesn't exist but it seems reasonable that it should include the avenue sidewalks in the ordinance but they're not addressed and the ordinance as written proposes a fine of up to 300 dollars and for collins the dismount zone fine is only up to 75 dollars after a written warning and in longmont the second offense for resisting arrest is 150 dollars 150 dollars so we really don't think that this is equitable to say that biking in the dismount zone downtown should be twice as much as resisting arrest your second time around in addition those who currently violate the the voluntary dismount zone are also those who are least likely to be able to pay for a fine addressing and educating those in this population is really key so i'd really like to hear from the council how they're going to determine how ldda is going about taking care of this for this population let's go along my conducted zone survey in may june 2020 asking many of the same questions were asked in the ldda's 2012 dismount zone survey overwhelmingly the respondents were mostly cyclists were foreign enforced dismount zone however they clearly wanted a downtown to be more bicycle friendly we wanted the city to address main street motor vehicle traffic concerns the ldda to encourage not discourage cycling downtown and provide positive bike friendly route signage and wayfinding especially in the alleyways if main street is for cars and trucks sidewalks for pedestrians and where the cyclists are to go please provide clear and safe route for cyclists to take the alleyways for local travel to restaurants and businesses downtown we ask that you restrict the alley alleys to service vehicles and owners only and prohibit general motor vehicle traffic while we applied the plans for costment street improvements it is currently not a low stress street now because of the diagonal parking in kimbark street is worse has been referred to several times by staff is not being bike friendly i strongly encourage you to have staff meet and work with these and other issues with the bicycle community before we get this ordinance in place thank you thank you our next guest your phone number ends in nine four nine hello yes you've been unmuted can you hear me yes okay mayor bagley uh before you begin please state your name and address for the record thank you my name is my name is ruby bowman 1512 left hand drive long mon mayor bagley mayor protan red regus and council members i sent you my comments for the riparian code update and i hope you had a chance to read them i'll briefly restate them again one select the four four collins review criteria one through eight but amend item four to include key youth areas for migrant songbirds and key nesting areas for grassland birds two require the inclusion of the content criteria for the species habitat conservation plan in the development handbook and the land development code the criteria should remain in the code three include the code revisions that are on page 13 of the red line draft version in the land development code they concern noise impacts limitations on redevelopment building height restrictions window design to minimize bird strikes and the use of native plant species four for definitions under important plant and wildlife species please include cpw's list of species of greatest conservation need which is contained in the state wildlife action plan and finally hire the planning department's environmental planner please fill this position as soon as possible thank you for listening goodbye thank you our next caller your number ends in eight two zero you've been unmuted do you hear me yes i do great please state your name and address thank you my name is catherine baylog and i live at 1920 spruce avenue i have been calling in about short term rentals since we since we have one in our backyard this house has caused us to feel like we have no privacy or security just this morning my children and i were in the backyard and heard the f bong being thrown around for about 15 minutes straight from the new guests that are staying there every week it's someone new that we don't know and they don't care about the neighbors that surround them they're on vacation thank you for bringing up the short term rentals into your conversation this week thanks for listening and helping us out i hope you take into account property owners that have to deal with new guests in short term rentals every week and please try and um adopt something like other cities around the country have like new york la miami beach by banning short term rentals under three or six months so we don't have people in our backyards that don't care about us that are new every single week vacationing and partying thank you very much for listening thank you our next guest your phone number ends in three two three you've been unmuted uh jamie simo 525 east 16th avenue thank you mayor and city council for allowing me to speak tonight i'm here to comment on item 11d on tonight's agenda the amendments to the land development code first off thank you so much to city staff and consultants for getting us to this point it's been a long haul but we're in the final stretch as we've come to realize even more strongly during this pandemic our open spaces and natural areas are critical to public health including mental health and so we must protect them in the wildlife that calls them home therefore i ask that council direct staff to prepare an ordinance amending the land development code city staff is asked for direction from council on seven questions in the event that council asks staff to prepare an ordinance i'm in agreement with city staff recommendations on these seven questions while the revised land development code protections for riparian and streams creeks and wetlands habitat and species are not perfect specifically i would prefer if the additional riparian setback protections of height restrictions bird friendly windows and native landscaping recommended in the wildlife management plan were incorporated into the code perfect as the enemy of good these revised requirements are miles above the protections in the previous version of the code and there's no better time than now to begin implementing them thank you thank you all right our last guess your phone number ends in 034 you've been unmuted can you hear me hello yes can you hear me yes we can go ahead state your name and for the record my name is timothy ray bariden and i'm actually a property owner in longmont i'm not a resident um i hope that's okay yes um so i feel like even though i'm not technically a resident that doesn't mean that you know that i don't care about the city because i very much do the better the city does the better my business does and so you know therefore i'm very much for uh for the city there and for downtown and the development and all that because i think that's good for everyone um so i just had a couple of quick points uh one of them i might be slightly long-winded and i apologize in advance um first i'll preface um i've had oh and i didn't tell you my address uh 240 main street long line um that's actually uh an apartment building right there on main street so i've had an air bmb in dember for three years and i know air bmb gets a really bad rap sometimes but i i'd like to differentiate make a conscience conscious differentiation between irresponsible property owners and responsible ones um like i said i've had an air bmb for three years i have very strict rules and i have zero tolerance for guests who don't respect my neighbors and thus i get no complaints one of the rules that and i also live in denver by the way um one of the rules in denver that i think is a really great rule is if you get complaints from your neighbors then that tells you a uh your air bmb is bad for the neighborhood and b you're not a responsible property owner or and or business owner and people need to treat that as a business uh so i would say that rather than a band-aid fix of restricting time periods uh three six months restricting people based on if they live in the city or own a business in the city etc etc to me that's a really good rule that kind of covers the spectrum because just because someone is restricted to three or six months doesn't mean that their guests are going to be respectful of the neighbors i think in if uh an air bmb or short-term rental whatever the platform may be if they enforce uh good behavior then i think they'll get good behavior and if they don't enforce it then they won't get it and so therefore it could be potentially bad for the neighborhood and they need to lose their license um one other thing that i had is uh i noticed my building right in front uh between second and third avenue there are the loudest cars that race up and down that little one block strip i assume they slow down as they get further up main street because there's like the pedestrian crosswalks um i'm wondering if there's any way to restrict the speed limits and enforce the speed limits right outside my building because i'm trying to uh promote an enjoyable living space that's quiet and peaceful and sometimes it's very difficult with the extreme uh like drag racing basically is what it sounds like uh whether that's actually true or not it's mayor bagway i'm gonna i'm gonna your your past for three minutes i'm gonna have to cut you off i do appreciate you i do appreciate you speaking welcome welcome thank you always welcome all right thank you thank you all right i believe that was our last uh last person correct that is correct mayor great and that will close first call public invited be heard let's move on with the consent agenda and introduction and reading by title of first ordinances mayor bagley item eight a is ordinance 2020-28 a bill for ordinance amending title 10 chapter 10.20 creating a new section 065 of the long mountain municipal code creating dismount zones public hearing and second reading scheduled for july 28th 2020 this item did have a revision published 24 hours prior to the meeting because that title was wrong item eight b is resolution 2020-61 a resolution of the longmont city council approving the intergovernmental agreement between the city of longmont the town of berthard the city of broodfield the city of fort lepton the city of fort morgan the town of hudson little thompson water district central weld county water district the city of louisville morgan county quality water district flat river power authority superior metropolitan water district tri-state generation and transmission association and the southern water supply project water activity enterprise owned by northern colorado water conservancy district for each party's consent to terms of conveyance for a certain right of way to the town of eerie and the city of broodfield eight c resolution 2020-62 a resolution of the longmont city council approving the intergovernmental agreement between the city and the united states of america for a national endowment for the humanities grant eight d is resolution 2020-63 a resolution of the longmont city council approving the intergovernmental agreement between the city and boulder county for a voter service and polling center use agreement for the 2020 election eight e is resolution 2020-64 a resolution of the longmont city council approving the intergovernmental agreement between the city of longmont and the colorado department of transportation for state funding for the saint brane greenway trail eastern extension and eight m is except the city of longmont's 2020 water supply and drought management plan all right who wants to pull anything anything customer peck thank you i would like to pull eight a dismount zones all right anybody else see okay customer you don't buy you don't have a ferry i'd like to pull eight c and it's really just for comment all right do you want to make a motion council member you don't have a ferry sure um i move the um consent agenda items um eight a through or i'm sorry b or what is it b through f minus the um c so no a no c i'll i'll suck at that all right all in paper say hi hi hi hi hi i'll pose say nay all right the consent agenda passes unanimously without a and c all right let's move on to ordinances there are no ordinances on second reading so let's go ahead and start with the easy one first council member they all eat all go faring do you want to go ahead and make your comment and offer a motion sure so um i serve as the liaison the council liaison for the um longmont museum and over the time i got to see how this um the application progressed um you know that they're doing really good work and i think now more than ever we need to realize that or take to heart that our arts community our museums are performing arts visual arts they play a role in our understanding of history in historical context so um it you know these are um i'm really excited that they've received this grant i don't know if someone from the museum is here to speak on on behalf of you know the work that they've done or if they want if they want to i think kim was on i'm not sure um but if you wanted to speak a little bit on on what the grant would be utilized for and some of those key things that i think needs to be brought out to the public to put in the public eye is she here i am here hi hello so the grant was actually a joint application hello good evening mary bagley and council members this is kim manajay director of the longlap museum it was a joint application with the library which i think actually made it a really strong application we were one of very few organizations in colorado who got this neh grant and so we're kind of the the everybody is giving us accolades up and down the front range for receiving this and basically what we applied for and received is to be able to bring a lot of the programming that we normally do and translate it to an online context which of course a lot of people are doing and we've been doing for quite some time now since our doors have been closed and the library actually is going to be purchasing hotspots that they're going to be able to check out for people who aren't able to get access to the internet so that's going to be an accessibility issue that we're able to address they also are offering some staff that will be able to do things like instruct people on how to do zoom meetings and things like that how to adapt in this climate the museum is doing a lot of programming where we are taking our early childhood education online we are taking our school tours online and then we're also doing like we're expanding our downtown tours so we've started an app so it's a mobile website that you can access on your phone that you can take a tour downtown and so the initial pilot project for that was a tour that Eric Mason does on a regular basis and he actually did some in-person tours this past summer and so we adapted that for an online program and then we also are going to be developing additional tours for that application so we really are trying to make what we already do well applicable to this online environment and we're very excited to be able to do that and we're very excited to be able to get that funding because it like I said it was only 13 percent of applicants got that so we're very very pleased all right great so let's go let's go ahead do you have a comment you'd like to make council member dago fairy I do actually and and in the work that I've been you know just coming in and seeing their website something I am going to request of city staff is to allow our museum to have autonomy over their their website so you know I look on there and I you know my background was visual and performing arts I majored in in that and you know it is for the artist realm to have that autonomy over the presentation of their work and their their accomplishments and their you know the museum as a whole I would really encourage staff to consider allowing the museum to have autonomy over their website to really branch out and reach and know how to connect with the the public so that is all thank you all right thank you council member all right would you like to make a motion susie um yeah I move um item eight three all right I'll second that all in favor say aye aye aye all right opposed say nay all right the motion carries unanimously all right council member peck would you like to address uh your questions concerns etc regarding a a yes um actually I am going to call on film to once again let our cycling community and the residents know um a couple of things about these drops not drop zones uh cycling zones so um my question is when you went out to get feedback did you engage the cycling community on this on the uh cycling zones mayor bagley and council member peck my name is so being all transportation planning manager with the city of longmont and to answer a question we did we have been talking to them we have a bicycle issues committee that we have um that does outreach to the bicycling community and we've uh appreciated the comment I think we've heard loud and clear that the bicycling bicycling community really wants to see a more bicycle friendly and pedestrian friendly downtown and uh you know a couple years ago we did work with the ldda the long long downtown development authority and kimberley mckay and uh we worked on walking with members the bicycling community members of the um disability uh members of the community with disabilities uh and members of the community that were um very much wanting to see pedestrian improvements as well downtown and and we all walked around with the consultant and did a lot of work to try to figure out how to make the downtown better and I think you'll see that in the incredible amount of dollars that we've invested in the alleyways that are just between main street and kaufman main street and kimbark a lot of time a lot of effort and a lot of resources were spent on putting those together and making them uh an alternative for bicycling and walking quite frankly it's a it's a very safe for both and um I think there's been other there's been some other things where we've done some bicycle lanes as well and uh and uh we've really tried to improve the walking access and you'll see that in the lane closures as well that we've worked tirelessly tirelessly on over the last couple over the last month actually it's been very fast and furious but uh we're doing what we can to try to improve that and I think you'll see in the next we're actually we just released a request for proposals today at 1 30 p.m today for a consulting firm to begin design work on the kaufman street project which is one block west of main street and that's going to have dedicated separated bicycle ways as well as part of it and widened sidewalks great great and then one other question that I've had some emails on I'm sure everybody else has as well is that um how did you come up with the fine of 300 dollars and are there warnings before that and if so how many warnings mayor and councilmember peck I will probably have to defer to Eugene may on this uh for some of those answers but it was something that was an up to limit as far as an up to 300 dollar limit and so um our assumption is that there you know the the fines would start small but that they're that they were kept at that 300 dollar limit and I invite uh Eugene to make any other comments on that if he if he is able mayor and council Eugene may city attorney uh correct it is fines up to I do I would want to correct a comment that we heard in public invite to be heard about um the fine for resisting arrest it is a minimum fine of a hundred dollars and the up to the general penalty which is uh 999 dollars uh you know I I think there's no magic I think that 300 dollars make sure that it's not uh up to our maximum penalty of 999 yet it leaves discretion for the court to impose a fine commit commensurate with violation um you know if we see repeat offenders perhaps you get to the higher range of the 300 dollars um but then again you know the up to 300 dollar language gives the court discretion to um see impose a fine that he sees fit unless they're fined if that is the case okay correct thank you very much and with that I am going to move to uh what was it I move 8 a 8 a I'll second that councilor Christensen um several things thank you for clarifying the um the fine because I was surprised I didn't read it carefully enough too and I thought that was uh like the first time somebody messes up they get a 300 dollar fine um and I do want to thank you Phil for I was on one of those walking tours too with Erin and it gave me a whole lot of different perspective too on what somebody who's blind experiences and I can tell you somebody who's deaf also cannot hear that there's somebody in back of them flying along at 30 miles an hour on the sidewalk that's why it's called a sidewalk that's why it's called pedestrian meaning on foot and so it's not just the bike community it's also the walking community and the elderly community and the disabled community and the community with small children and you know we all have to get along together we can't and now that we've got people eating out on the sidewalks I don't understand how the bicycle people think they're going to be flying along on the sidewalk in the middle of the tables um we just can't have people riding their bicycles in the crowded space and those sidewalks are crowded and we're using them now and the businesses need to use them I would like to amend the um this motion which is that we have now extended that up to 9th avenue and I know some businesses ask for that but really there's very little going on between and I know I'm not denigrating those businesses I'm just saying it is not very busy from 6th past 6th up to 9th well hold on hold on one second let's just fill Phil's gonna clarify what it is what it says real quick Phil I just want to read the it's really from First Avenue to Longspeak Avenue is the extents of the this mountain zone on the on the sidewalks only okay but it seems to me if we if we just cut it off after 6th it would make the bicycle people a lot happier and it would make it um a little more logical because there just isn't there aren't that many businesses that are crowded that have a lot of foot traffic there that would warrant um people not having the possibility of riding on the sidewalks that's all I'm suggesting all right John would you like to make a motion I think we did all right well then I did we did we did you make a move for motion did you move 8a 8a yes all right I'll set I remember who seconded it but I'll second it let's go ahead and vote all in favor of 8a say aye aye opposed say nay all right 8a passes unanimously let's move on to 11 general business item 11a lgid resolution I'd like to move that we recess is the Longmont City Council and convene is the Board of Directors the Longmont General Improvement District number one second all right all in favor say aye aye aye aye the post say nay all right the motion carries unanimously let's go ahead with 1182 resolution lgid 2020-04 a resolution of the Board of Directors the Longmont General Improvement District number one approving the conveyance of property the bowler county housing authority for construction of a parking garage in association with an affordable housing project 518 518 Kauffman Street do we have a motion I'll move approval of the resolution all right it was moved by councilmember waters seconded by councilmember peck and councilmember christensen is giving a hearty endorsement so let's go ahead if there's no further discussion let's go ahead and vote all in favor say aye aye aye the post say nay all right 1182 or resolution lgid 2020-04 passes unanimously I move that we adjourn as the Longmont General Improvement District number one Board of Directors and reconvene is the Longmont City Council so moved all right I moved it councilmember christensen seconded it let's go ahead and vote all in favor say aye aye those opposed say nay all right the motion carries unanimously let's go on to 11b discussion on an upcoming bill for an ordinance amending Longmont municipal code on compensation for disposition of open safe space property I would hope that we have a presentation from staff and asking specific questions rather than just a general discussion but David bell guide us lead us please Mayor Bagley um councilmember David bell director of parks and natural resources we have this coming up as a first reading and we know when council sees disposition of open space it can cause people to ask some questions about why we wanted to dispose of open space so this really was just a quick opportunity to provide some context for this and maybe in a couple of examples of why we might want to carry this forward and then Billy to ask some questions about that so this really came out of the desire of the open space program to carve off a couple of hall slots on the newbie property sell those back and recoup those dollars for the open space program when our attorneys look at the language in our existing ordinance they didn't feel like we had that flexibility so really what we're trying to do is the the city attorney's office and the open space um department are looking to come in alignment so that we have that flexibility so there's opportunity to dispose of certain aspects of open space that really from the negotiation piece we may not want to have to purchase but the family remember was that came as part of the package so really what we're trying to do and achieve in this language is do it we really thought we had the ability to do all the time which is dispose of certain aspects of the open space property um through our ordinance and this language just clarifies that we have that flexibility it makes it look clearer so with that said a couple of examples of that would be like the newbie property where we have a property that we approach the family and say this is a great property we'd love to own this property we'd love to include in our open space portfolio however we really don't want all the houses would you mind carving those off and pulling that out so instead of paying five million as an example we pay only four point five the family could say we really don't want to go through that you just buy the farm or nothing the ordinance language then allows us to buy the the farm of that five million carve off those lots sell them at fair market value return that profit back to the open space um program so that we're not having to manage houses and we actually get to keep those dollars again what we really like to see in the first scenario anyways another example is conservation easements we may approach a family and say we would really like to um maintain this farm in perpetuity we don't really need to purchase the whole farm you're doing a great job farming it we'd like to buy a conservation easement again the family says we really have no desire to continue farming we just want this need to purchase the farm as a whole so we we've purchased that farm for five million dollars and we now own a farm that we have to rent out and we have a neighboring farm like to buy the farming rights on that property and again it's our objective of maintaining that farm in perpetuity um having someone who does a good job farming farm it keep it in the family and the city owns those development rights but the farm family owns those underlying fee rights so they can continue farming in perpetuity so that's really what this is about we just want to give you a chance to maybe ask some questions because when we start saying disposable open space um people do get concerned and this really is again I think coming in alignment with our um legal team to make sure that the ordinance meets our our needs to dispose of those certain aspects that really don't always meet the goals of this program and can provide additional revenue to the program councilmember christensen when I looked at this I thought oh it's not like those things um but I do understand what you're talking about because a lot of times you have many outbuildings or farm equipment that the other uh a new um farm farmer won't need that because they have their own equipment or whatever things that need to be um gotten rid of so this makes sense but I just want to be sure that every one of these would also come before council just as everything whenever we abandon right away it comes before council whenever we lease out space at the airport it comes before council it's public property it needs to come before council is that correct near bagley uh councilmember christensen nothing else changes in the whole process it goes to proud first it has public process there it comes to council for them to approve it so it still is goes through the whole disposition process but this allows us to get disposed of a portion of at its fair market value rather than the whole property so yes to affirm me it's exactly what you're asking us does for waters thanks very badly um david um I like the process of the prep review and then coming to council I do have a cure in the paragraph or two below where that's detailed we're maneuvering um in the in section whatever here uh under process for i era for a maybe uh refers to in no event shall the sales price be or transfer be less than the original purchase price in the in the example like the newbie property right uh when you if it's five million dollars for the you know for the parcel with whatever assets are running how do you determine what the what the fair might just do it you could do a fair market price which would be appraisal um but that would be less than the purchase price for the property right mere bagley um councilmember waters that's exactly what we're trying to to kind of clarify here so again on the newbie property where we have a housing lot which if we as the open space program they do not have a desire to own a house and rent a house and we could at the beginning negotiate that off we easily can get a account on what a one acre lot with a single family home um in that area comes with so we can get a pretty good value for the housing lots and for the open space itself so you're right that price for that lot would not be the price of the whole property so that's really we're allowing what this new language allows us to do it really makes it pretty clear that we're trying to keep the open space program whole by allowing us to carve off that housing lot sell it at that whole market value and return those dollars back to the open space program so the that original purchase price is then reduced by what the fair market value that lot was after the purchase as opposed to taking it off at the beginning of the purchase okay so that first sentence and second sentence look a little conflicted I see the reference to fair market value and then I see the reference to no sale price or transfer less than the original purchase price but um that's not that's not conflicted I there's two documents should be attached there's the 2000 um in 11-10 and there's the new to the 2020- nothing which is the new language and that new one has struck out um that however shall not pay less than that okay so i'm looking at portion no portion and I think the new language um Dr. Waters is for the fair market of the property or the interest conveyed so then we can take that interest conveyed which is the house lot or the house I was looking at the wrong resolution thank you so exactly what you saw is what the attorneys so I appreciate you saying that because you really did just clarify what the attorney's office um really saw it as well and I think people in this business for a while have you know interpreted the way we thought it was meant to be interpreted and as we work with our attorneys they said that doesn't make a lot of sense so they've they've adjusted that language I think you've looked at the new language it allows us to do exactly what you're saying okay thank you that we should have been reading the right one all right great thank you very much David we appreciate your update all right you all right let's go on to a discussion on update on short-term rental regulations hurdle-deserve presentation yes there is um Joni who's doing that one Dawn Burchett yes Mayor Bagley members of council Dawn Burchett planning manager I do have just a really brief presentation and I also want to make sure that I introduce some of the staff that are also on tonight so that if there are specific questions that I can't answer hopefully we'll have the right people here to be able to do that and I don't know if the presentation has started here it comes so we can go to the next slide with me tonight we have Shannon Statler the code enforcement manager as well as Dane Hermsen senior code enforcement officer and Brian Schumacher the principal planner for the city we are here tonight to just provide a quick update on some of the str items that have been going on here in the city then to also see if council has any direction that they would like us to act upon and so we are specifically here tonight to make sure that if council would like us to proceed with any code amendments or changes that we get that information from council so that we can start working on that with our legal staff next slide on the screen right now are some program highlights for the short-term rentals the program began in January of 2019 we currently have 80 active permits in the city of Longmont the map that's in the on the right hand side of the screen shows the boundaries of the city of Longmont as well as the dots indicate the location of the short-term rental so that we currently have license in the city of Longmont during the last 18 months we have had nine code enforcement complaints that have come in related to those 80 permits and then we have had 54 calls for service to our police department for 30 of those short-term rental property addresses but i want to point out that while we got the call for service information from the police department we cannot tell you that all of those calls for service were related to somebody using the property or that address as a short-term rental we just asked for the calls for service related to the addresses that are licensed for short-term rental and then finally we wanted to note that in 2019 the lodger's tax generated was had generated for just over $14,000 from the short-term rentals that were licensed in 2019 next slide as you've heard tonight under public invited to be heard as well as at past city council meetings we've had a number of people speak with some concerns related to the short-term rental program those have been of two sides i would say one has been people who have felt that the regulations have not been strict enough the other have been related to people who feel the regulations are overly burdensome and so we've tried to identify kind of the common concerns that we have heard over the over the last 18 months that the program has been in effect for example we have had issues where people have been operating without licensing in a permit we've also had people concerned about the residency requirements both for and against the residency requirements we've also had people that have talked about that own property similar to the gentleman that spoke earlier tonight in the city but that are not a resident or an actual person to be able to meet the requirements for being able to operate a short-term rental here in the city of longmont and then finally we've had the neighborhood complaints about the you know noises and what we've termed party houses where we've had complaints with marijuana loud music things of that nature and just really not being good neighbors and so those have been some of the concerns that we've heard from both sides of people that are interested in short-term rentals next slide in our communication we did make a recommendation for a change to the residency requirement based on some of the problems that we've had trying to enforce to be able to enforce that and then finally this is a policy decision for the city council we will proceed with whatever direction the city council provides us tonight on what changes if any you would like us to bring back to you we would just want to make sure that we get specific direction so that we can do that correctly and quickly to get that back to the council for consideration don't can i just ask quickly just what is your specific recommendation pertaining to the residency requirement certainly mayor let me grab my communication so it's on page 220 of the packet and staff made a recommendation um to amend section 15.04030d 23a governing residency requirements for short-term rental operators we would allow property owners who live outside the city or who have a home in the name of an LLC to obtain a permit to operate one short-term rental we could also in the regulation could require property owners to list a local contact or a property manager that would be a requirement for issuing the permit for that unit that we think that would do two things one it would allow the people who own rental properties within the city but for example we have someone who lives up north of town in boulder county just outside just north of 66 that owns a rental property on the south side of 66 and they have had short-term rentals in the past this would allow them to be able to have that unit the other concern that we've heard from some of the neighbors has been the inability to to get property owners to handle those complaints by having maybe a property manager or a company that is listed even for those people who don't live within the city limits hopefully that would be a way to try to get someone to from the ownership to take responsibility and address the concerns that are coming from a house that maybe isn't being a good neighbor those were some ideas that we have thank you and that is uh all that we have for a presentation mayor so with that again we're here to answer questions and take direction councilor councilman martin um yes don um i am wondering and i probably should know that this about the existing ordinance but i don't um what are the what kind of teeth does this thing have you know if if a property owner is advertising their short-term rental as a party house so that you're it's going to result in a stream of of code enforcement complaints and uh desperation on the part of the surrounding residents which we've seen that we have in a couple of cases are there any any teeth into this into the into the law the new law where uh you know if there are if the number of of violation reports gets to be too high than that than that uh house can lose its short-term rental license i mean obviously we wouldn't want um you know there'd have to be cause right when somebody responded to a complaint there would have to actually be something going on as opposed to um you know just so many calls happening but are there any teeth that would that would prevent a tenant who is or a landlord that is not managing the property responsibly to lose their short-term rental license health member martin um i'm gonna ask dane who is on the phone to also speak to this but there is a section in our code where we have the ability to renew a license every year i think that we might want to look at that to make sure that there is an ability for us to not renew a license that comes up for renewal every year to make sure that we are legally sound and making that determination and protected as a city but i would also ask if dane's on the line still if he could speak to kind of the the violations or the any of the the teeth that the teeth that are there in the current license or in the current code for enforcement dane i think he just dropped off oh um excuse me his hand is raised he's raising his hand oh there he is thank you console woman martin can you hear us dane i can hear you guys can you hear me there you are go ahead okay mayor bagley council members so as of right now there are any means we have to monitor party houses or how many violations someone would have and all we can do is really advise people to call the police if people are violating that's kind of that's certainly something we could try to look at um but as council member martin was pointing out it really has to be based on the actually finding the violation couldn't just be based on people calling in every little thing they they hear that they don't like um you know all right council member christians we've been doing this now for 18 months and uh if you go on um verbo or arabian b there are at least 400 arabian bees listed for long month and yet we only have 80 registered and of those we have no way to know whether they actually live here whether this is their primary residents um now we want to um in the the recommendation is to increase this by allowing people who don't even live here and uh llc's to i end a long month and continue to assist place citizens who actually need to be able to buy housing or rent housing full time why are we favoring people who don't live here over people who live here this doesn't make sense to me this is a problem all over the country i went to an nlc conference uh that councilman councilman redriguez also came to with um a um it had to do with arabian bees and all of us thought that this would help us cope with the problem of um of short-term rentals but actually it was delivered by um experience and a company that works for them doing data to prove that this doesn't cause problems and the mayor of seattle who's got had a huge problem with this telling us how to cope with it well the quite a cop with it is not to let it keep continuing to grow and i would suggest we need to double down on regulations because right now what we have is all over the country there are uh hedge fund managers and uh commercial real estate companies buying up little properties in like long month and locally we also have realtors buying up properties i know there's one realtor on the east side of town who owns eight arabian bees uh in my neighborhood so they're not even listed on this map um these people have the ability to completely displace or to largely displace properties that people could buy and live in and build some equity for their lives and do better than they're doing now or they could rent them but now they're not going to be able to do that because people from outside who live in boulder or denver or texas or wherever want to be able to buy up houses here and turn them into um one night to thirty night hotels and that i don't want my neighborhood commercialized i don't want anybody's neighborhood commercialized in long month i want us to be able to live in a neighborhood not something that's rented out by the night that's not a neighborhood anymore and people all over this country are really angry about it and fed up and it causes problems with the taxes it causes problems with displacing children who could be living here and going to the schools so i would not vote for us to be allowing people from outside here to buy up land in boulder and rent it out and commercialize our neighborhoods i want us to double down on regulating them thank you we're gonna we're gonna call i'm gonna start calling on people i would just encourage people to maybe make a motion if we're gonna do it because we can all share our thoughts but again we're we're seven different people with seven different opinions and unless there's some direction to staff that is coherent that four of us agree with all we're doing is having a discussion okay we're gonna make that motion that we do not approve this suggestion by staff to allow LLCs from outside to purchase property in long month do i have a second yeah a second no LLCs absolutely i have some discussion though all right so let's go ahead and let's deal with that motion first okay so is there anybody who would like to comment on that specific motion before we take a vote dr waters thanks very vaguely um is this you're gonna limit this to LLCs or any non-residential owner of a property because it because it seems to me that then we gotta we gotta be more explicit LLCs or any non-owner occupied to meet the criteria in the ordinance would be would not be permitted or something like that so i'll be quiet if somebody wants to amend that but i but i think we ought to broaden it from just LLCs to anything that's non-owner occupied all right councilmember martin yeah i was really happy with the idea of limiting it to well LLCs and other corporations and the reason is that i have a couple of constituents who are property owners in long month sort of one one family are snowbirds and they have a a disabled resident that travels with them and they want to be able to rent the property when they are out of the city and that seems like you know that they should not be able to do that is is a hardship on that family um the other one is that uh us some people who are bolder residents bought a house in long month for their aging parents to live in and the aging parents aren't all that aging and wanted to be the property managers and rent out a portion of the house while they live in it but because their name is not on the title they can't get a permit even though um they would be the ideal situation um in terms of having a resident property manager and it's uh it's you know a nitpick of the title because it's it's uh all people in the same family so uh i would um i would be happy to exclude property speculators from this but i'm not sure that i want to exclude familial situations that are just not quite conventional dr waters thanks very badly just personally i just just an observation and then i'm going to be speak specifically to uh council member martin's comment i was an observer uh when the council crafted this ordinance and um and as i said in the audience and and watched and listened i thought i thought that i thought that many of you were on the council not everybody but you did a really good job i thought with friend the needle um in trying to number one respect what what local homeowners might want to do with their property to generate some income and protect neighborhoods by limiting numbers and with the residency requirement that was only going to be an air bb or a short term rental if it was owner occupied at least six months of the year and the stipulations you laid into this ordinance that that limits what they can do when they're not in residence um so in terms of sympathies here uh you know i i i i do have sympathies for first you know for for residents who live in long month number one number two if somebody's going to be gone six months a year i have no concerns about their renting their property but there's a big difference between having a rental and an str where people could be there those are just very different scenarios so i have no plans about somebody renting to their family or renting to somebody if they're going to be gone periods a year but i do have concerns about non property non residents using their homes or whatever the apartments uh for short term rentals i just i'm wondering in the in the list of of calls we've got a police report how many of those calls were to to rent to short term rentals where there was an owner occupied where it was owner occupied which is the stipulation of the ordinance is it can anybody answer that do we know we do not know but people are allowed to have investment properties in long months so they don't have to be owner occupied if you are a resident you can have one investment property solely as i have no qualms about an investment there's a big difference between leasing a house for a year in a short term rental and i i'm not sympathetic to an investor who's going to use a something in the neighborhood you know on as a short term room i guess i'm in the same place that count member christensen is on yeah i just think we ought to if we're gonna if we're gonna do something with this we ought to be if we're gonna limit uh non owner occupied residents from being else uh being a short term rental you ought to be more than jose those that are just owned by an LLC that ought to be any property used that's not owner occupied or rented on a longer term basis councilmember beck thank you mayor backley so um councilwoman christensen if you will take a friendly amendment to your motion i i would like to incorporate what council member water said that they we will not rent to anyone who is not who is an ally we will not rent to an LLC or someone who is not not rent to i'm sorry we will not permit an str to an LLC or owner occupy something that is not an owner long mount resident owner occupied home does that make sense councilmember christensen you're still muted poli i know that's the spacebar isn't working um the ordinance already says that uh exactly what tim said and i appreciate his support and we were on that same page here it already says that you cannot do that the what we're we're not really having a discussion about strs right now what we're having a discussion is is about uh staff's idea that we should open this up to LLCs and in my opinion that would make it worse my uh so i don't know that we need to do that but if if that's your opinion that we need to clarify it that way then we should say that in addition to well i mean right now we simply don't allow outside entities whether they are LLCs or whether they are uh non-residents of long mount to own anything that does not as councilman waters said that does not mean you can't have uh property in long mount and rent it out you can but you can't rent it out for 30 days or less that's a short-term rental and we don't allow that and so i not sure i i would happily include that as a friendly amendment but i don't think it's necessary i just don't want us to go forward with what has been suggested by the planning department which is that we um allow l make the situation worse by adding LLCs and being basically opening the door to people who are already behaving illegally giving them uh consent to behave illegally okay i i take back my amendment so so essentially the motion's on the table right now thank you councilmember christensen is we're basically going to keep the status quo we're not going to adopt staff's recommendations and we are going to keep the ordinance as it is no no LLCs and we're also not allowing anyone who lives outside of long mount to start doing short-term rentals with properties they've purchased or owned dr waters sorry catzberg christensen okay so when i saw this i thought we were going to have a discussion about short-term rentals and the problems that they're causing instead what we've been presented with is a suggestion by staff that we increase the number of strs by allowing anybody who wants to to buy a property at long mount and turn it into a short-term rental so that's the first issue that we're voting on i do want to have a discussion of short-term rentals because as we can see and we will do we will do that okay right now i'm just i'm just pointing out that we're not doing anything to change the ordinance you're just saying let's not correct all right so councillor martin before we vote what i thought i was oh sorry dr waters yes you were sorry you're just not as you're just you're just you're just not as like predominant my screen go ahead you're up in the right hand corner okay well um uh so if we're gonna if we're gonna do something ultimately if we're given direction to staff um i'm i'm not ready to make a motion on on that direction but um uh i guess i need a better understanding of what have how it is that uh that a unit uh a home or an apartment that where there is no owner occupancy that's not complying with the ordinance now uh and once we know that why there is why that property owner continues to have a license or a permit or maybe they don't and they're doing it illegally and if we know that what's what's keeping us from enforcing the ordinance with whatever penalties go along with somebody who who is inconsistent or not honoring what what we stipulated in the in the ordinance as it exists right now joanie do you want to say something sure mayor bagley members of council joanie marsh so i think a couple of things when it comes to our current code around short-term rentals and the enforcement issues that council member waters brings up so we have found that if you look at the section about who can actually have a short-term rental and we talk about the property owner's primary dwelling where the owner lives six months out of the year i think that you have to recognize that folks may turn in a permit sign and say they're complying with the rules but for code enforcement or any staff to know whether or not someone is actually living in that home 180 days and renting at the 180 days is somewhat of a difficult situation from an enforcement standpoint you'll probably recall we we have you know five code enforcement folks and dain is really our only housing inspector who does the majority of these inspections along with some of our building folks and i think what we've run into is you know as we do with many things when it comes to enforcement is folks tell us that they're meeting the rules however it takes an enormous amount of energy to figure out whether or not they really are meeting the rules i think staff was simply making a suggestion about a change because we've had a number of people get very upset with staff in permitting when they've said hey we have an llc and i think marsh's example was one of those where those folks lived in town they had an llc we've also had um some instances where folks have had long-term short-term rentals in the city live in bolder county and i think some of them have probably contacted members of council hoping to get this changed which i don't think that we've provided them with any avenue of support for that but we certainly kind of struggle with folks who have either been in business or want to be in business and what when they come in to get permitted the answer is no and so i think we're what staff would really like to hear from council is in addition to some of the issues with the nuisances we found particularly i know you've heard from the arabahoe avenue neighbors at every council meeting what could we strengthen so that we could do some additional enforcement around party houses which to danes point becomes very difficult because you actually have to um have a written police report and take something to prosecution so i think our 18 months of experience i would say with short-term rentals is is proven challenging not just for residents and folks who want to have them but also for staff we would welcome any suggestions on how to help us do a better job of keeping the character of the neighborhoods intact and i think one thing that we're doing that hopefully will help us with this is we've hired host compliance who starting in january um which wasn't great timing to go into people's homes this year um they monitor weekly all of the short-term rentals on the website to let us know who's not in compliance and our efforts once we get a little further out of the covid cycle we're in right now would be to start doing enforcement and letting those folks know hey we see you've got a short-term rental you might want to get that licensed and and get your sales tax and start remitting that so we kind of have a bunch of things staff is certainly open to any changes to this code at this point but also keep in mind that um for for dain to actually enforce some of this it has to have the teeth and maybe that is where we're missing some pieces well that's my comment i'll be quiet and yield to to marsha if if if we're gonna air at this point i'd rather err on the side of being more conservative not more expansive or more permissive uh and make it easier for the for staff to enforce and um and take another 18 months to learn our way forward on on doing less not more damage to neighborhoods and and work with residents long month residents who want to use their property in the way that the ordinance was intended here bagley do i have the floor you do okay um so yeah uh i will say i did have uh either three or four families contact me in the last six months or the last six months before the pandemic began um uh all about familial situations or inherited property uh where they felt that they had this property and they needed to be able to take care of it i don't remember there being an llc involved in any of them although it is perfectly possible that there was an llc that wasn't disclosed to me but was disclosed to um the permitting department once we got down to cases so i won't rule that out but i was uh advocating for some relaxations in the policy not because i wanted corporations to be able to come and exploit long month uh or change the character of neighborhoods because i absolutely don't i was advocating for the ability to make an exception for it what amounted to ownership by an extended family instead of by a nuclear family um you know because we were into into eldercare situations or um super you know uh well the one that the one that really kind of broke my heart was a family in boulder who bought this house for their parents and the parents wanted to rent out the spare room and give them something to do and get a little extra income and i didn't see anything wrong with that just because the name on the title was the children and not the parents um and maybe that's too weird a case you know too exceptional a case um for us to do anything about and they're just going to have to deal with going through probate and put the house in the parents name and that would solve the whole problem um except their eventual problem um but uh that was the old that was my only purpose in in advocating for a little more flexibility in these rules and i definitely agree that um you know extending this to LLCs and maybe even other corporations is not you know is not the right response um and uh the other question that i wanted to ask i think uh jony has already answered which is you know if poly can go online and find out who's advertising an airbnb then so can somebody else and i think the answer we heard there was that the city has contracted with somebody who will do that but they haven't gotten started good yet um and i think they should have to do that um and maybe we could even come up with some reporting requirements for when residents are out of town or in town um but uh yeah i don't i don't want in general to to broaden this maybe there should be some process to uh apply for an exceptional permit that would take care of my couple of my family situations too all right councilmember pack first of all mayor batley we have a motion on the floor i would like to call that question um and i think that it would be a good idea to just um not go with the recommendation of LLCs and let's try it and see how that works and come back and revisit it so i would like to call the question on that motion so if you're going to call the question required as a second and we have to have a vote that passes with a super majority does anybody can we just but can we just vote on it councilmember christensen need to vote on it if we just don't follow the recommendation do we need to vote on it there's a motion on the table so let's go ahead and draw it since i put it on the table you could okay that that would mean that we just would not broaden this law correct if you there's no if there's no motion to okay then i would okay then i withdraw this because that will simplify things all right but i would like to have a discussion on what we can do about the problems that we already have okay we can we can do that so i guess my my point is that yeah so again let's hear from staff on so here's what here's my frustration i've talked to a couple of council members about this staff i i would like you to tell us what you think we should do and give us a map ahead that would allow us to say we like it or we don't like it but having seven people at 10 o'clock at night start giving you random ideas on what we should do i think is a no i'm okay 9 43 p.m well i'm just saying that i don't have a problem having a discussion what i want to do is have some guidance because what we do with the pattern i've been doing this nine years now and what happens is that they they give us an idea and then we spend an hour talking about our different ideas and we all get frustrated because there's no cohesive direction at which point we look at staff and