No, it would be the same memory allocation will suck fire $36,000 to buy. Oh, okay. They would get zero.
So I'm like yeah, that was the seller. I'm happy.
Tickets to Treasure Island,
which I do
next Saturday are going so excited. I'm like onstage, the whole recognize you I don't know anything about this. Oh no.
I have a flyer and I'm in Treasure Island at the Columbine health systems. Been Saturday.
zoos are helping getting calls
we're doing like I'm not getting so it's very late at everything's kind of we're all
and most lady says let's go.
I don't know if people online can hear us. Yeah. All right. Let's
check that
everyone thank you for connecting with Lucy
never miss an opportunity.
I honestly I completely forgot about it. Get back to it. It was like recording in progress. I made a connection with her and I was like I mentioned thesis till
from here, but it needs both of us. It's recorded though. So we do need on this hold everything develops.
So we're gonna do our best with the technology today.
A good way to do it. I tried to print them.
Save a tree yay. Hello, everyone. My name is John Singleton. We're here for the June affordable housing board meeting. It's crazy. It's June. Okay. We will go ahead and start off with roll call. Make sure we have a quorum Bob. Here. Jen. Here. stuff here. John, here. Okay, we're good to go. We will be recording this meeting for the two people who are not in attendance today. But
I heard she lit when I was in the bathroom.
I believe she was on vacation and Ed's plane changed and he couldn't make it.
So we heard from both. So then, we will also do an agenda review for today. Our agenda is basically centered around Brittany and Megan, having a discussion about both homelessness, some of the responses and the housing strategic plan. We will do our part three credit discussions led by Sue we were going to do a little bit of a competitive process debrief. I think the people that I'd like to hear from the most are not here today. So I think we may kind of just like touch on what we're looking for and what we could get out of this at the end of this meeting and then kind of just delay it for next month. If we have time.
I do have to scoot out early just
then that
makes even more sense that we will we will push that so we will go ahead and get started. We won't delay too much. Moving on. We will have citizen participation. Obviously the great and Marilyn Heller is here. Miss Maryland would you like to say anything?
I have one thing on our league of women voters has a South Larimer discussion group and a few weeks ago we had a panel on Metro districts which some of you might be interested in and it was recorded. So if you wanted to view that our website is L W. V dash Larimer county.org. And as we know that's controversial things. So that was pretty interesting. And that's it.
Thank you very much. I don't know what the rest of these people I have. Sorry. I'm not familiar. Is there any other public comment? That anyone out there we'd like to make? Janz autopilot is clever name.
An autopilot a device.
An otter device. Not familiar with the speed of technology.
Okay, we will call that a no go from Kevin and Jay Jones. Hey, we will have approval of last month's minutes. Anybody have any issues that they would like to discuss? Common Issues. Doesn't it come from the side? Okay.
motion that we approve minutes as written.
Second. I can't. Ah, well, we'll still do, Bob. Jen. Yes. Yes, John. All eyes. The motion is approved. It's, I guess we're live we could do hands and we could do all voice votes all sorts of cool fun stuff. But I mean, it's just not quite ready for that yet, I guess. Next we would turn to business and economics. But at least that way everyone hears me twice. Bringing you on come on up and let us have it.
screenshare
This is the room while I do what were your phone six. Oh, that's great. Yeah, I was actually excited definitely talked last time we were in
pletely forgot about it. And when I saw it I was like But seriously
you want to be all just get well, I have a friend here Oh yeah. Are we gonna do Widodo five days later and you want to be sure to get one of those. I don't even ever got to rock. Michigan said the Pops. Okay. Mostly because I invented it. So you did
should see understood. Yeah.
What do you feel comfortable? No.
Then I can turn it seems reasonably. Hello everybody. I know some of you been to all of you. I actually used to be bored for a number of years ago and it's really good to be back. I have not been back since I've been in this role. So it's really great to be here. I am Britney's of you. I'm the city of Leeds specialists for homelessness in a position that is just over two years old. We're gonna talk about that a little bit more. But what I'm what I'm hoping to do as I have just a few slides, kind of a lot of information, but it's just meant to be a bit of an overview. What is our role in homelessness? What is the city do in my department, social sustainability versus other departments versus what's kind of for nonprofits and other agencies. Where do we focus our time? What are the collaborations, just a sort of general overview and then I would like to leave more time than not for just questions and discussion from you. So you might recognize some familiar names on this slide. But there has been sort of a slow movement in our department toward this housing and homelessness team. So for many years, this team consisted of exactly one person. So Sue has been sort of the trailblazer in housing in our department for for a long time. And then Megan and I both joined at around the same time, about two ish years ago. And we very recently added a fourth, another Megan, a fourth team member. First time we've had a program assistant. She's part time with us and it's been already just wonderful to have this extra piece of support. And we decided last year to really kind of formalize this as a team because a lot of the work we do obviously it's very overlapping and you know, we wanted to make sure it worked doesn't stay to silos or disparate. So sort of formally made this housing moments as team as of 2022 within social sustainability. So one of the I think, more complex things about homelessness response in our community is the system is really complicated. Who does what, when, why, how. And so I get asked a lot What even is the city's role? And so the city's role is bigger than this. This is what I would classify as being my role. Mainly, I put in these three buckets. There's a lot that falls in these things as well. And there is other work that's done by the city that I'll touch on more. But from our department, I think it's really important to note that we don't do any direct service provision at all out of our department. So the three buckets I usually share just to really simplify our funding, convening and policy. So we request funds every year from our budgeting process, or from our ARPA, federal relief. funds we have right now for homelessness and 100% of the funds that we get for those processes go back out into the community. So the only funds we keep in the city for homelessness are for position, positions, funding for salaries, everything else goes back out so we grant money back out so for 2023 We have $955,000 in ARPA, which is a lot more funding than we typically have any year that is contracted with seven agencies across 11 contracts, and I'm happy to talk more about those. We also have this one that snuck in our general fund offer that's $100,000 just to one contract, one contract and one agency. So total of 12 contracts, and just over a million dollars this year for homelessness initiatives. So a big piece of our work is in this umbrella. What are the priorities? What are the gaps? Where do we have the most impact with these funds? It's never enough I'm sure it's coming comes as no surprise to any of you. So how do we figure out where the money goes? Where's the impact? Where do we where do we think we can have the most positive influence from from the sponsor community so a big part of that is kind of working through that part is actually process convening I think for me is one of the biggest pieces of this work, because one small piece of this puzzle comes out of my department, and then there's other city departments, other organizations. And I think it's critical that we all collaborate in nearly every way to be successful in this work. So collaboration I think is one of the main things I do build partnerships. Collaborate, we can be a lot of meetings when someone is struggling with something a department or agency who needs to be there to help brainstorm that and work them through that. So it's often there's challenges that offer Galleria for example, who needs to be in the room and how can we support having that conversation and working towards solutions? So we have a lot of things like that brought to us that we help coordinate conversations and committees and teams, whatever it takes to work through whatever those issues are. And then policy is a really big one and I just gave two examples here. So affordable housing policy is one example which is which is you know, Sue's day to day focus. And then an example I gave up enforcement is an important one because I think people often have a lot of questions about enforcement. We talk about homelessness. How does that play into this? And an important piece of that is what are our policies around enforcing certain codes and wanting to help really move toward and continue to be really people centered. So how, what is enforcement and how can it actually be used only when absolutely necessary, and not as a first step? First off when someone is struggling or is on how's it isn't doing something that may be against code, but they really need something besides enforcement to help get them on the right path. So a lot of conversations are on our enforcement.
So this is just my slide. You can't hold up but it's just a collaboration key, like I said on the last slide. I do so so much work with so so many people. So I just wanted to put a slide out there that shows kind of just a small number of the main partners I work with it's it's not an exhaustive list. There's a lot of internal work that happens because homelessness work touches nearly every department in the city. So we have lots of different teams that meet that have different focus areas. And some of the main departments I work with are up here so the second one is actual areas TV he met the trails and visitors amenity team, and they're the ones that coordinate all of the camp cleanups. So worked with him quite quite a lot. Rangers police code compliance, that's sort of the more enforcement arm and so that enforcement doesn't come out of our department but is more in some of these other partners. And so making sure we're all on the same page, we're all saying the same thing. We're all kind of following the same framework and philosophy. And so those are just some that I work with regularly, and many external partners and that's just a list of a few of the main partners we work with, I think are probably most common partnerships come from homered Alliance, I think just because of the sheer amount of programming that they do, and they're essentially the only agency that serves everybody so there isn't it's not just for men or just for women are the victims of domestic violence. They really are open to all. So I think just the sheer volume of programs and people they serve as a reason to that outreach Fort Collins being the one and only street outreach program. We have a close relationship with them. And Fort Collins rescue mission is that as a main partner because of them serving single men, which is our number one highest percent population. But I work a great deal with these others as well. And this one is very hard to read. But this is just a small sampling of current projects. I'm not going to go into all of these, but I'm happy to talk about any of them if anyone's interested. So seasonal overflow shelter is the program that we create every year it often looks a little bit different every year in the winter, because when it's not winter, we're generally turning people away from from shelters because of lack of bed capacity. And the city steps into the winter to say how can we avoid that happening when it's really cold and dangerous outside? And these screens are actually easier to see to this is the hardest one to see. And so that's that's our winter shelter process for getting more beds in the community during the winter. There's a current process happening to create a county wide strategic plan which is actually being led by Homer Alliance, but the city is a partner in that work. It's brand new, it hasn't started yet, but it's um it got funded through the state. So that'll be coming in the next two years. The tactical team might also point out as being a team that's only been around about six months. And a lot of the partners that I showed in that last slide are part of that team we meet every single week. And that's really focused on the urgent emergent, recurring mitigation, what needs to happen this week. And so we talked about locations that have been problematic hotspots. We also talked about people. There is some confidentiality that makes that a little challenging for different agencies to be engaged in that but as much as people are able, there's this person who we keep finding, we want to help who can how can we all kind of rally around this person and get them housed? And so we really try to also focus on people specifically and not just camps or just not locations. And this team actually worked collaboratively was able to get someone from 20 years of homelessness. He finally said yes, I will put myself on the housing list and got housing 20 days later, which I know is a rare case but just amazing work when we all are in the same room, having the same conversation. So that team has been really phenomenal and many others. Oh, I'd also point out the hope team. I think just if not everyone has heard of it or knows what they do. It's the homeless outreach and proactive engagement team. It's a brand new team out of police services. That is led by Sergeant Annie Hill and it'll be five of them total by the time they're they're filled out but it's three recurrent members. And they're really focused on all things homelessness, they want it to always be the same officers that respond to people experiencing homelessness to like we were talking about trying to help build trust. They all say the same thing. They're consistent. They get to know the people build those relationships, and they're really focused on resourcing and support and outreach way, way way above consider considerations of enforcement. So the acronym again, it's hope and its homeless outreach and proactive engagement. Sorry. And then happy to talk about any of these but I don't need to get into all of them. And then I would just share tensions and challenges in this work are many folds. And I'm sure a lot of these don't come as a surprise, but five that springs to mind instantly. For me are these so natural spaces and maintaining safe and accessible spaces for all residents, and that includes everybody housed on housed housing, unstable children. Accessibility. So this is something that comes up a lot in this work, because natural spaces tend to be spaces where housing and house interact a pretty great deal. Visibility of homelessness is a really important tension in this work, because we have noticed as trends have kind of have shown maybe not in the data, but anecdotally that unsheltered homelessness is becoming more a larger issue more visible, that tends to lead to having a little more leverage to actually build solutions because when people see it more, there tends to be a little more energy around doing something about it. And so the visibility can be a real asset, but then it often leads us to want to fix it really, really quickly. And rush solutions are often not going to be a long term solution that works. So that's a real tension that there it's great to grow that leverage, but how do you make sure that you also don't rush the solution in a way that is not only beneficial for everybody? Housing First is a challenge for lots of different reasons. And there's also a tension with harm reduction which I'm happy to talk a little bit more about. But communities tend to have a tendency to be all in on housing bursts and put all their funding into housing and not retain enough funding for supportive services. And so there's some tension between how to how to really balance housing person promotion. Strategy is a constant conversation, how do we make sure partners are on the same page? It's a it's a, it's a tough one. We all have different perspectives. We're coming from different, you know, people who are guiding our work with different perspectives and angles and funding and so we've been working really hard as a city and part of that is that convenient, that collaboration, how do we all get on the same page because we're not helping anybody if we're not all in agreement and working for the same goals and facing in the same direction. So that's that's a challenge but I think it's one that I I've been really grateful for how much we all are on the same page in the morning to align in that way. And then assumptions is one that I talked about a lot because I think some of the challenge of this work is just based on people's assumptions of homelessness and why people are on housed and I think that can sort of create some roadblocks for people getting support they need root causes of homelessness. How do we respond? What is system like? How do we enforce and I think that can tend to create some challenges when it's hard to see clearly you know exactly how we got here.
I ask what the city's sort of official position is as to the root causes of homelessness, what those are.
This is sorry, this is the app so this is the next slide just says questions. So cool. Happy to keep tiny sorry, no, no, you're you're perfect. Um, should I stop sharing? Sure, sure. Yes, that's a great question. And I don't know if there's what I would call an official city stance on root causes. Um, you know, we talk a great deal about just the cost of housing and the the inability of wages just not keeping up with health but rising cost of living. And so there's a long list of root causes and I you know, there isn't this package of what we've kind of officially landed on as a city but really acknowledging that for many, many people, it has to do with cost of housing, wages not being a living wage for most people. And then of course, some really common factors include medical debt. So when we talk about is the healthcare system and how that can really lead to this outcome for people. I think one thing that I when I think about assumptions, we often often hear the assumption that substance use disorders will lead to homelessness when we know generally, it's not the cause of homelessness for many people, many people actually fall into substance use once they become unhoused. To cope with that trauma. So that's an example of one that I would not consider a top root cause although it can be a reasonable for many people. That's great. Thanks. I guess like kind of clarifying what I was getting at is like it seems like the city understands that homelessness is a systemic problem. is not an individual verse. Yes, yes. But I would agree with
so I know and the one time, talent we have, a lot of times there's surveys and stuff that works. We can help identify the specific cause of homelessness. So just curious if we had any mechanism to kind of track not once every two years because the point in time count is, if we're honest, pretty underwhelming, and its efficiency and effectiveness. So wonder if you could speak to kind of talking to that, at least as a way to possibly combat the reception? Because it doesn't matter if someone got into substance afterwards. If someone sees the visibility aspects when you tie the visibility of like, root cause. People don't see that they didn't see the whole story. They see the end of the day. And so being able to talk about that. And then the other question that I want to give to the question and the other one was consistency and compliance. I think that's a big part of the visibility aspect. We can say all like it is a it's a very tough balance between visibility and how the neighbor sees it set causing plans said they're breaking the code. And then it's like, what do we do kick them off. So it's doing something that's maybe slightly annoying to this one neighbor who's talking about that? That's about so you could talk to that a little bit in terms of our consistency, code compliance, and understanding the process.
Can you say more about your question around the Point in Time Count
it's not good. We do it's not good. It's not there's too many people to hide. There's too many people that get this there's too many people it's it's done in a in a bit of a well, we need way that one night in January, to go out and try to find every single and speak with every single unhoused person a tire city is unrealistic. I get the point. I get why they do it. I've participated in more than one and it is very underwhelming in terms of their ability to actually get data, find people find the people who need the help the most. You get the most visible obvious people and that's not that's a minority of people. And so it doesn't help us to really fully understand and have all of the details around how you could support that group. And so is there something that the hope team or the tactical team more than anybody could do to try to build more of a database of information around these people? Especially when, you know, I was walking in library Park last week, police officer pulled up said have you seen these two unhoused people that I'm looking for? And it's like, okay, what is their goal? Do they actually go through it just check to see if they have warrants? Are they actually trying to make that connection? Like you were saying and build a database of information to help us better guide the service? Yeah.
I think I would probably speak in general to our data process to first get that. So the point in time count is known widely to be an undercount. Everybody knows that is not a good count is not the numbers are not accurate. But I it's won me over a little bit over the years for the reason of have the ability to point in time counts to help us really understand not only our own trends, but trends against other communities in the country. Because we all do it the same not, but it's the same process. It's in the middle of January, but everyone does the same thing. And so I think we acknowledge clearly it is an undercount. These numbers are not the numbers we work with. So we don't use point in time as our be all end all we look a lot more to better data systems. But we do use point in time to really look at those trends. So it just we all are struggling this one night in January, but we all did. And so So how does that look compared to last year? Even if the numbers aren't accurate? They're the same system that we use last year. Something that can be challenging about all of the data is as it gets better, it's harder to continue to compare against previous data. So this year's point in time, for example, unsheltered numbers went up and outreach Fort Collins said this is the most extensive count we've ever done. And we think the numbers are possibly higher because we did better. And we don't know that. And so I think it's, it's probably better data, but it'd be it can become challenging as it gets better to continue to compare apples to apples. So just we acknowledge that that's not great. But it's helpful for the little you know, the ways that is and they have started doing it every year. So it used to be unsheltered every other year and the COC has that doesn't work for us we want to do even if it's not mandated by the federal government, we are doing both counts. Every single year. So they do they do it yearly. Now.
There are requirements for certain funding, you have your community do it so you
like have to do it. And unfortunately that also means that the funding levels are often based on those counts which we know are undercounts. But yes, I mean, it's a requirement of HUD for a COC to do a point in time count. So we tend to look a lot more to the HMIs data, which is the Homeless Management Information System. It is a much better data system didn't really, you know, skyrocket and use after our northern Florida Continuum of Care came online in 2020. And I would say about that data kind of same that it's been hard to establish a baseline because every year there's more and more and more agencies that report into it and the numbers go up and up and up and up. But it's because there's getting better and better. And so I think we're starting to get to a point where we there's a baseline where it's most agencies are reporting into it now. And it's just it gets a lot more lawyers. So outreach Fort Collins does report its HMIs not everyone they engage with says yes, that's, that can be a challenge,
but it works. It tends to be the most service assistant are the ones that don't get recorded. Right. Just Just curious, you know, you don't have to necessarily answer which putting that on your plate. Like how do we address that? Yeah,
that's something we need to talk about a lot. Because I think a lot of the systems we have in place are supporting that 90% And it's that 10 unsheltered, most resistant, better, it's harder to create systems that work. Do you think it's 9010? I think based on point in time count data nationally, it's 9010. But I think that's so but we generally see that the data says about 10% Chronic in communities, but take that with a grain of salt. Um, and so we talked about that a lot. And I think that's a big part of what we're looking at with the tactical team, we created the hope team OFC the patients of building relationship with service resistant people to acknowledge is not their fault. There was a cent for a reason. They need help. They're not getting there's, there's trust issues, there's trauma. And so if all of these groups know about the people and what's already happened and who's talking to them and who do they trust, we know that there's a person in one of our parks who screams every morning and neighbors call police. But our report Collins has told police this person says it helps them stay healthy to like let some of that rage out in the mornings. And so now we all know this person's name and time and location and if someone needs to respond to its outreach, work on says my beliefs, for example. So I think increasingly really trying to work collaboratively to build trust with that, you know, percent of people that just mean time build relationships, and they're not going to say yes, on day one, I'll sign your paperwork. It takes it can take months and months and months and loggers time. So I think increasingly how do we all get the same page and send the right people and say the right things and if it needs to be the same officer and not a different one, then we'll make that happen. So increasingly, really trying to focus on how to support that patient better. And it's, there's no there's no one's perfect answer. I know usually doing what we can to help build that trust.
So So I heard that there's a bunch of different places put into that other database in my which was things um, are there any duplications of people or do you? I mean, is it a case where they get somebody's name, the work that you're talking about or is it it's pretty like somebody
a if you can, you can see I've entered I've entered into there and you can definitely tell if you ever duplicate I'd say it's pretty legitimate in terms of being able to identify independence, we actually have straight up adults, okay. And if you can, you can leave that let you need lectures, or tape to do social anything you can put in there. It builds out some there are do eventually but say, no, no. You're doing great. There are duplicates eventually at some times, but it's it's usually stripe, very, very hard to dodge.
I think it's one of the points of the system. Yeah, there you see oh, this person has popped up in Greeley and we're calling service services. Yep. And so that you everybody's like, yep, that person's in our system. We're
and if that person goes to Georgia. Oh, they can see it in there too. That's a national database. So. So if someone were to and I haven't recorded into it, so actually really appreciate your your take on it. But if someone were to say, I'm willing to give my information, but I'll only tell you my name is John Smith 10 times that could duplicate but usually if someone's willing to share information they're willing to share. Generally at least a birth date or
that's the kicker. Beyond that, and I think that's the hardest part of this entire system is you cannot do that you cannot enter somebody without that mission. Oh, right. And so that's, that tends to be like to what we're talking about and this is the thing that really gets my getter is just looking at the HUD housing first policy, which I understand the motivation behind that. But comparing that to being able to spend money on supportive services. I think it's pretty dang clear, at least around here. Housing is expensive. You all obviously care and deal with that. It's ridiculously expensive. And so trying to Housing First, the number of people here so, you know, making sure that we're appropriating the proper, proper money but you speak to how the city looks at how they're how they record, report, engage, and influence in order to shift some of that mindset funding from odd housing first to supportive service. Spin, or is that something to say
those as soon as you have another question about it
is that ones that go Yeah. I mean, that's for my for my annoying, or so go.
I've got I've got another question about that.
So how do we focus on supportive services? I mean, that was one of the tensions between you know, we could say let's take all the community's money for all homelessness services and just put it all into housing. And what you know squeak create, but what have we left behind for supportive services and a lot of communities don't leave any money behind? Because they really and I think there's, in an ideal world, we're doing both housing first with supportive services, but I think that can be a challenge to fund both of those things. And so a lot of communities say we're going all in on housing, and it ends up down the line not being as high retention, as you want to see because they haven't left the money for supportive services. And so it's an ongoing conversation is really, no, go ahead.
I want to clarify some terms. Of like Housing First. Supportive Housing, services, right in my mind, please. They're in our community. We have very much invested in the idea that in order to be so successfully, how someone transitioning out of homelessness, it's housing plus services, with a housing first mentality, which is basically like removing barriers. So I just want to make sure like the idea that it's one or the other or that they have to be right. Housing First doesn't mean support because I don't know those things can go together. Right. And we you're gonna have all the services in the world if there's no housing, it doesn't help. Yeah. All the housing, they don't have services that's not going to be successful. So I think like that, you know, that is why the investment and the consideration of best practice for like the combination which was permanent supportive housing, which is very expensive, right, both the housing and the services are expensive. But the say the benefit of having that we have in northern Colorado COC and being involved in HMIs is that that type of housing is most successful for people who are willing to engage in services. Which is what the HMIs system is tracking, which is what, for people that are actually going to be successful and housing so. So, and that's, I mean, that's right, there's, so that's one of my questions about how B as the data, is, you know, it's only as good as it can be. It's really hard data. That is what it is very hard for so many reasons. Measure in general. Yeah, it's funny, it is changes it is a people go in and out of homelessness a lot of daily basis. Yeah. And that families, challenges families are living in very unstable conditions that can change in a day you happens there situations and so but so I think there's different solutions to all these different types of situations and different people and so we can say, but I I've always believed like, oh, we should look at the data. And that should tell us we should be investing in this type of housing because we have X type of population in our community, but that's, it's just, it's not so simple. I think it can help us prioritize.
People are different. So you may be wanting meetings from a different service in Java may be needing more the home, right version, or the service. Yeah, and I'm one of the 10 or 20 Different people
ya know, one of the questions we get a lot because furs for housing is very specific for you know, as you said, you know, single male right now is the highest count. And that's what permanent supportive housing has really targeted in our community, which makes sense, but are and families have a completely different solution and really don't have a good grasp on that. And like how do people ask, is the next PSH going to be families isn't going to be the same population where was like, I want to know like, what the biggest need really is, and that's what we should be investing in and building and I don't know how to, there's so many people looking at it and working on it, but how do we figure
that out?
I think families and children is the hardest to track because we know if we look at bento, there were 1300 ish children that were reported as homeless in the district. But if you look at the actual 1300 13 100k through 12 students were unhoused. This was a couple of school years ago. But if you look at the data on how many youth are showing up, it is not here that number and so I think families and children is one of the most important drivers you know, where they're often doubling up living in Italy housing
and family housing. The definitions don't match up as part of the measurement problem. I
I think my question in terms of the overlap between we could call it visibility I guess and enforcement. It's just the disconnect between like everyone in these kinds of presentations that I've ever talked to everyone on social system. Well, it seems like they get it they're awesome. There's like planning going on. But that doesn't seem like it. Like trickles down to day to day enforcement. And so if we can say we know the Point in Time Count underestimates, we know there are not enough shelter beds. We know there is literally not enough housing, even if everyone avail themselves of every single service that exists. But at the same time we have a policing system that still criminalizes people for existing when there's literally nowhere else for them to go. So how does this conversation get to the police department because I know from anecdotal experience homelessness is my area of expertise and interest on this board that we can all sit around and say great things in this room but that's like not what it is like on the street for people who are on housed who are interacting with the police. district specific or do you think that no, I
think that's everywhere.
But I think we can talk about like, oh, the police department is great and they're having all this data, but it that's that's not like on the street really true.
I felt like district one formerly district one I guess it's District Six now I don't know if library Park area so
day one still exists. Yeah. They
did for a while there have this specific people that I know that I spoke to that after like it was a few years out the engagement that you were familiar with, specifically, that they had kind of honed into knowing everyone they engaged and so it was the same two people that would go out there and that I thought was really impactful. But that is this sliver of a much bigger piece.
Yeah. And I guess like that's part of one of my specific questions about the HOPE program is why that's if that's outreach and proactive engagement. Why that's how it's in the police department instead of something like really expanding outreach for Collins or just a a contact that people can have that is not with law enforcement because it can be the nicest cop in the world and for a homeless person that is still not in Okay, that's the interaction form. Yeah, yeah. I've literally I've done like hundreds of hours of like one on one conversations and research with people who are on house and I've never met a person who has said that they've had a positive interaction with a police officer even if it's there being the most supportive person on the planet and so just how that how that gets down to on the ground when we see a person who is sleeping outside it's the summer we know there's not enough shelter beds and they're
still getting camping tickets. Like, you know, I want to add to I worked with a capstone student this year, and she quoted your paper and said it was like the best paper she ever wrote.
Yeah, that to people because it's
just really, like there's literally nowhere for people to go. And the the answer is still like, well, we have to disappear these people somehow because they're gross, and we don't want to see them and like what, what do we do like i i When the Northside was at one center during COVID was getting shut back down. I was in a city council meeting were Emily Francis bless her, was like, she just brought up the point like so you're telling me we have this many beds right now. And we know that there are this many people who are unhoused that leaves 100 people that we know of who literally have nowhere to sleep. And we are going back to making it illegal to camp everywhere in the city in the middle of a public health crisis. And it was like all of city council and a bunch of city staff and everyone was like well tourism unfortunate but you know, like what?
So I was there at several council meetings. People got up, and they were when we had that big police. When was it November of two? Yeah, when they cleared it and there were so many people.
Yes, it was after the Murphy center was no longer open on the weekends any longer. So that's the enforcement what? And it was explained in a way that made a lot of sense that it wasn't that they were being cleared out because they are criminals because criminal activity was happening. It was becoming unsafe for them to be camped there, but the way that it came down is was unfortunately, those leads to actions pulling everyone out.
Throw their stuff away. Yeah. And that was that was kind of the bigger thing for me. You know, geez, you just, they hit How long did it take them to get that backpack or whatever, right? They just threw em now. I don't know. I'm just saying given an example. Whatever their their material possessions were at the time. So what So how are we addressing the people that that spoke at council saying that this is such a bad thing? How does that relate to anything new that we've done to actually do the visibility? Right, well,
it just it still feels like there's a schism between what the city wants, and how it's how sometimes this enforcement action and coming back to that is reacting to it. Yeah.
And I guess maybe to try to make at least my Brambilla specific question is just for things like the whole program. Is there a conversation about why that's what police if it's proactive enforcement and not law enforcement response? In terms of having that the more not tied to the law enforcement system? Unless it is a response to someone who is like clearly breaking? Um,
I have so many thoughts about conversation and I don't so put me off when I don't know how much time I
am watching you. You have we're going to work five o'clock, five o'clock reading off. So I'd like to leave you I'd like to give you at least five minutes just go. Go go.
Um, great question about the whole program. And before I jump into that, I think in general I agree with your assessment, and I think it's getting better. I do. I do not know if an unhoused person would sit here right now and say the same thing so that this is my perspective as a person who's not unhoused experiencing that. I think there are concerted efforts to make it better. A lot of the stuff that I mentioned about our teams that meet and collaboration is new. I think this position existing has really allowed the city to just have more capacity to have these conversations. We have a lot of the things that you know, I'm not direct service. I'm not the one out and forcing, not out in the field, but I have the capacity to bring those people together to talk about what are we doing and saying and how are we enforcing or not? And so I do think the last couple of years slowly. It's been a huge asset to have the person who can who even has the time to convene those groups and so I do think it's getting better. And I think it's as well. And the specific reason for the hope team is a great question of police. What I will say about that is it came directly from Chief of Police, who I really appreciate his work in this space. He just was kind of brainstorming some things that he felt like were not working and one of them was homeless enforcement in general. And he called me and he said, I have this idea and I want your thoughts and his perspective, and I don't want to speak for him, but just when we chatted was that it felt like if there was a call about anything related to homelessness, whoever was on duty would go and they might not know that person, have a relationship with them. They don't necessarily have any sort of background in social work or mental health for it, but they're going to show up and do their best. And he said I just think there's a better system. And it's because a he said I want to reallocate funds to create this team. So it was just he wanted to have it be in blue because it was his idea that it was so disjointed within police that it wasn't consistent. And so I think it's the police get called to these locations and incidents, and they want to respond when they get called. But they want to make sure it's done in a way that makes more sense. And so I think it's that they are increasingly working. So they've gotten to the point now where outreach Fort Collins can actually be dispatched directly from 911. So somebody calls 911 And they explained the situation and the dispatcher assesses that it's not illegal or it's not an imminent threat built directly dispatch Oh MC, but the challenge with that is that they are not 24/7 they are not in the entire city and police are and so they really will if it can be OFC it will be but if it has to be policed, can it not be the same five officers every time who are trained in social work and mental health and have done I mean Annie, the sergeant for this team has worked in this field for over a decade. And so candidate least be people who have that background and interest and skill set to respond in a way that is consistent. Make sense? So
good, good, good, dangerous. I mean, if it's assessed wrong, or things change quickly, right, this
LFC will often call not often they increasingly don't have to call police but they will call police assist if something comes up they often will respond so
it's good to have least in body their person there to know maybe how to deal with somebody who's a little bit more.
And there was conversation. I think originally the thought was they would not be uniformed? Yes, that in itself just and they decided that they decided to be uniformed, and I don't actually know why that is. There was conversation around a little bit
that game plan. At that point, it's technically an escalation. And so you're using a uniformed officer at that point who is trained to not necessarily continue to escalate and is trained to de escalate but still have that next step level pretty in order to kind of be like oh FC to allow obviously the state hands off so they can keep the like, neutral partner position, as my understanding
is there not to say that the organization's already getting funding for homelessness related things through the city don't deserve lots, lots more money. But are there any conversations about just extending the pool of what it means to be a homelessness service provider like I think about places like the library or other places that are public spaces where I work for a nonprofit, the grain project, or that's not our purview at all, but we operate a community garden for unhoused people are explicitly welcome. And so we ended up basically being like all of our staff is doing all this additional training to know how to like, you know, be sensitive and just to having I guess, a more holistic understanding of what it means to be someone who provides some kind of service for people who are on housed and just training and funding and things like that from the city. Yeah,
it's a great idea. We talk about it a lot. And I don't think there's one easy answer to that, but we do talk about, you know, if you create a homeless resource guide, do you put libraries and community centers on it or not? Right, and so, conversations we have a lot, but I think with cities funding, we are increasingly moving towards funding being competitive. It hasn't always been and so I think there is sort of increasing. Thank you. Thanks, John.
Not that this conversation stayed longer than I should have, because
it's great. I think, increasingly, we're wanting that funding to be through a competitive process with a panel to get at that a little bit more. I think, what are our requirements for funding? And so I think more and more we're working towards having that be more consistent, at least from the city's funding perspective. I think as a community that's that's a bigger question. But for us, I think wanting to do more of that.
What I heard though, was a kind of good suggestion, or maybe one of you know, maybe we could help co sponsor a big training for anyone who wants it, like help ask homeward Alliance or someone to help us do that so that the growing project would have access.
Yeah, and like we just seek out our own like CPR mental health. First Aid Narcan, but like if that was just wider,
like our maintenance techs, that has property managers, people that aren't direct service providers, but do have actually a lot of interaction, right. Have that specific training, and that is, uh,
yeah, hopefully. Yeah. Then I know OSC and the hope team, or at least in general will do those kinds of trainings. But there isn't just generally there isn't a big training people can come to to learn those about those things. It's you can reach out to them, but I like that idea that maybe haven't be a two way street to
doesn't seem like I reach for Collins is going to be able, at some point to expand to either wider geographic scope or more time we've been talking about like, Yeah,
they did it. They expanded to Midtown, which, essentially now they're willekes to Trilby along the college corridor and the only spot where they kind of go out is like the Home Depot, Walmart area. They're not currently looking to expand further. But I would not say that's off the table into the future, but they expanded twice, within about a year and a half.
And it's just been
but I don't think it's off the table. into the future. They get a lot of questions from city of Greeley and city homeland and they're like we're not even in all the Fort Collins yet because their work. Yeah, I think loved ones about their own street outreach there. They had outreach actually come to their city council. Brad bro to their director came and talked about their programming. And I think just something that would go back to on enforcement in general, is what I was just getting at is that it's getting better. And I think there's an what's interesting about you know, we have this weekly tactical team and a lot of different conversations around this the dynamic can change if even one person changes, their perspective is different. And so there's a lot of fluctuation, but I think we're in this really sweet spot right now where we all I would say are very people centered. All the team that individuals I work with, kind of want to just write a ticket to write a ticket that doesn't feel good. That's not why I work in public service is to write tickets, you know. And so I think we're really, like I said, it's getting better and content and really having very consistent conversations about Yes, it is illegal to camp in the city. So when we encounter someone who's camping in the city, that's the first sentence it is illegal to camp in the city. There's so much nuance to it. Camping tickets have not been written in years. Because we know there's not enough shelter beds, people are doing their best. And so people do get tickets written. Because there is a balance between keeping the city seat safe and clean. And then if someone is, you know, is not leaving and there's a site that's become dangerous and there's bodily fluids and there's needles and it's right in a natural area. There is a really tough balance there. But I think what's really hard to see us that enforcement generally around homelessness is not step one. Like the Murphy center cleanup. There were many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many steps that happened before that cleanup happened. That was not like day one first conversation we have to go clean this entire area. I mean, there were so many things we did and tried to do and collaborated on because nobody wanted. Like, we don't want to clear people out or take their things generally tried really hard. And I'm saying we like the city. I'm not the one coordinating the cleanups, but to not take people's things, not throw stuff away. It's hard for everyone involved because they are directly there with the people when they know that they're struggling and doing their best. They just need somewhere to sleep. So enforcement is just not really ever step one. And it's all the other things I think, see. We are like what can be tough to not get to this point. And so I think those steps I think we're trying to stretch out a little more. We have an app that we're using more regularly where it might be there. Someone can't be here, but they're open to resources they're on by nameless they're waiting for housing. They're just trying to you know, wait that out there, whatever. Could we just we make a note this person has been working with with resources and they're cooperative and they're on the list. Ofc knows them. They're not a threat. Can we give them a little more time? We don't need to clear them out today.
So So one of the things then at the council meeting was there were a lot of people said, but it didn't sound like there was any response back. So it wasn't a really a communication. It was you know, it was the people yelling and then Council just hearing versus somebody explained and maybe that's not where councils the meeting supposed to be anyway, but it would have been really nice, I think to have somebody explain maybe what some of the things were that that are taking before something happens. Right? It again, it's not really for the council meeting to do that. But what should have been something that somebody was able to talk about on the other side to give a reason why because there were at least 10 people that had gotten up for that i
That was the last I know at a time. The last little thing I was gonna stick in is whether or not the city has either an interest or an obligation or whatever to do more in terms of public outreach, just about public education, just in terms of like the enormous amount of stigma that people have about homelessness and why it happens and things like this. The most
visible people are the ones that are probably the ones that represent this same bias that people have more than bonds.
Yeah, and I think there's also a champion there. There were I don't want to give specifics, but some examples of some really visible things going on. We got tons of calls and emails and a lot of the work happening with them is completely confidential. And so yes, I think there there could be a way to share more generally about some things that are happening but there's often an interest I'm a neighbor, I don't know exactly what's going on. I can't you know, we can't share there is I think it often sounds like but are they really you know, yeah, I you know, I can't share any but genuinely, I think it's often very confidential. Yeah. What is that bigger picture that could be shared out? We are going to city council in September. It's been a while since we had a homelessness conversation with council and really hoping to get from them a little bit more on where they're at and where priorities and is there an interest from them on more public education? What could that look like? And I love that idea. And I think is there a way to do that issue a little more zoomed outward. We still can't give specifics on situations because there's just a lot of confidentiality but but a bigger picture, but I think for that combination in September. That's a big part of the reason I want to go
to oh, sorry, my,
this is gonna say to add on to that because I feel like what what is also challenging is there are you know, then a large shelter gets verbose and it is now the responsibility of that developer to answer every question related to homelessness in the city of Fort Collins, because of that solution that is being proposed in that particular site. Yes, like it was when we were proposing permanent supportive housing communities and all of a sudden, every issue around homelessness is now on this one projects responsibility and it would feel if there's like a to be able to say this is City Council is invested and has a priority in housing and addressing this with race or you know, have something because I do think it's an unfair burden. Because ultimately, that's what Council and our leadership wants are these, you know, these variety of solutions, shelter, housing, all these things, but it is a heavy lift to put that on those projects to, you know, because NIMBY is one thing but then like, also having to address you know, all the everything around homelessness for a single project is just a lot. And just like
how urban and like vitriolic that feedback is about homelessness in particular,
it's just because people are scared, right? They have a
lot Yeah, because they don't know they only see they only see one loud person is very visible in the middle. And they don't understand the entire history. But how many people like talk to him and that that person is just loud and perfectly or? Anyway, we it's Bible four we could go on this forever and we coach to this is why you're here. And this is why we love having you here and we would love to have you back because having this conversation have a big attendance today but this is kind of like one small step of trying to like, have a conversation that's more about the human aspect and less about just what's bothering you today.
And if there's any things you can do around your meeting in September
with a pencil or anything,
or other things, perhaps I'm noticing that, you know, this board is really interested in educating the community and we have that ability. It's one of the specific duties assigned to this board. So if there was any interest in CO hosting something or whatever I think we'd be interested in hearing about that.
Yeah, I think biggest takeaway just I think, you know, at least from my perspective, and our ability to have these important conversations and get aligned and you know, I can't control what city council wants to see. But I think within the work that I coordinate, working really hard to, like I know we all come from different perspectives, but how can we align? I do think it's getting better. So if there's ever things that come up that you think that there's an education piece that's missing or something that you aren't seeing or are seeing, please let me know. Just like you've done my contact info is on the last slide. So I'm sure that will go out. Email me call me every 30 seconds. 30
seconds. 20 seconds. Oh, so So are you missing funding? Sorry, no, you're
just I am CO or vice or whatever it is. Yeah, it's not cool. Anyway.
You can become the are you missing funding? So we had this conversation last time about 14 issues. Well, and the other meeting before that about $40 million, or 44 to $6 million. We're not I know this short, but you know that but are you not getting some of the funding that would be helpful to address any of these things in other words, you know if so, well, I
mean, that's, it's been a huge difference through the pandemic with really funding. Yeah, it's never enough. I mean, there's it's just it's never enough, but it's made a huge difference. Like I said, we have about a million this year. That's more than double what we typically have. And so as we're heading toward the end of our funding, that's the time when we're going to start really having that.
So as we start talking about the budget, yeah, you might remember this conversation.
We can get these slides. Oh, absolutely.
Well, let's see who has asked
for. I'll reach
out anytime. Any other thoughts or questions?
Very much feel.
For first time back to a portable housing,
not the last thing we kept her
alone. But soon I planned for that. So I didn't see we
we changed the agenda slightly too, because we moved that conversation about debriefing the competitive process. Oh, all right. That's it. We kind of poured that time so
we kind of we're gonna guess it's my honor.
Well, nobody's seeing any of
you not pay attention to the man behind the curtain, right. Click on the dots and open up and share three dots open and
open our browser.
Screenshot zooms.
Did you say you want me to shut
up like flexing his muscles.
Like whoa, whoa, okay.
Maybe we're looking at system No.
Now what's going on?
No. Wake up. I swear I didn't even touch anything.
See, now if we were modeled I'd already upset you. Okay. I have to wait and do it later.
Anything but the arrow back the whole time? Are you are you guys ready to take a break? Okay. All right. I have so many slides. Probably mostly. We want to have a casual discussion because these are topics y'all have heard about before. So stop me. I'll plan to go pretty quickly through things and just stop me when you have questions and we'll get to as much as we can. So we've got on deck tonight, favorite land use code updates and our second favorite rental housing program. Land use code went to council for our work session may 23. Was that just last week? Yeah. Last week, and rental housing program will go to council for first reading on the sixth which is coming to the third person the third first screening of fat so I will update you on the latest and greatest on both of those. Anybody like already fully up to speed watch the work session on land use code you know everything already. Or do we need a little background? Background backgrounds? All background you got it. So we have been over the last two months re engaging. Any members around land use code updates focused on housing. We share with council an update on how that reengagement is going so far. takeaway here. Attendance has been pretty good at the events that we posted. We sent out 97,000 postcards to everybody in Fort Collins. So we're glad that the attendance has been pretty good at events. However, we do know that we need to do some more targeted and specific outreach to folks that we are not seeing very much based on their demographics. We're seeing a lot of folks over 5055 folks who own their homes predominantly white. This is not out of the ordinary and a large kind of broad public engagement process. But that's what we plan to do. With June and July is now we know who's showing up. How can we hear from other folks from renters from our BiPAC communities from lower income households, from younger folks. That's really who we need to hear from to balance out the conversation. And here's some additional perspectives. So we'll be working on that in June and July. We have been getting some pretty good feedback about the walking tours. We did a series of 12 walking tours to to in each council district we're planning to host a kind of general tour in June, for anybody who didn't want to host one didn't have an opportunity to come. But these were basically for a group of 15 to 20 folks with a host who was willing to let people on their property and actually go through and measure like, what can go here and what are the setbacks and what does it actually look like? And it's been a really useful way to help people understand what land use codes do and how they regulate what people see in their neighborhoods. So it's been a really great opportunity to kind of get hands on with folks and I think that's been appreciated by them. I know we've had I think six of the seven council members attend at least one of the walking tours. So that also really seemed to help Council kind of get kind of a more physical sense of what these regulations are and what sorts of things we're talking about when we're proposing changes. Yes.
Could you say who didn't? wasn't able to attend? No, they're gonna be able to make up an attendance.
I don't know if they'll be able to come on the June I don't remember if it's six who have come or five. So I don't want to put the finger on anyone because then we can encourage them to join. Yes, yes. And there was a lot of good discussion at the work session. other council members who had attended encouraging others to attend if they hadn't been sharing their experiences. So we were able to have the whole work session with them last week, three hours of kind of deeper conversation about all of the land use code work. And I think that was really helpful to kind of have them talk to each other about the value they gained from participating in those walking tours. So hopefully, they'll take their colleagues up on a suggestion to attend.
What I heard just feedback from the walking tours was that people were really surprised at what would be permitted under the current code. So just even start, well, they had way
to actually flex already on this, oh,
when people just don't know what like, if you're not building something, there is very little reason for you to know what's in the land use code, right? So it makes a lot of sense that people don't really know what could be built on their own property. They have no intention of developing it. They're just buying a house they may not even know or care that you can build two or three units potentially. It's funny how that works. So where we are, it's now June so we're shifting from some of this kind of broader engagement, a lot of talking about what's in the current code, what was in the repealed code, and starting to shift into what could some of the changes look like? What could some of the alternatives be? This is the the exciting part. For me, it's like okay, so what are we going to do with all this feedback and what directions could we go? I'll show you in a minute how we talked to counsel about that. And I'm curious to hear your discussion about where you think code alternatives should head so starting to shift away from the repealed code and toward what are the alternatives we want to consider for changes to the code that we could bring to council for adoption, still planning for late summer, early fall, or the adoption schedule on that? If all goes according to plan
so I have a Yes
sure. I'm scared to ask. Don't be scared. If
it's there, like double jeopardy on the repeal process. Can it be a thing where just if it comes back, and the same people are upset that we're just stuck like forever and ever in around you?
There is absolutely a risk? Yes. Yes. So there's there's no kind of prohibition or limitation on the referendum process. So you could continue that process if it didn't meet the constituents.
But Council doesn't have to agree to the reference. They can go around that is that.
So last time, at least, they had two options. They could either send the question to the voters or repeal their own action.
Okay, so that was it. So the only other action would send voters if if this occurred again, it would probably we would have to send it to the
voters, or they would repeal Well,
again and again.
Yes, yeah. And that's it is absolutely a risk. That's a, you know, a feature of the local democratic process in a lot of ways that we can protest the actions of an elected body that a group of citizens disagrees with. That's absolutely folks right to do. We're hopeful that the process we're going through really trying to listen very carefully to what was not meeting what folks were looking for in the initial repealed code and trying to make adjustments and be very transparent about the entire process. We're hoping that makes a difference. I don't think anybody wants to be stuck in that kind of cycle. I don't think that's, you know, the best use of anyone's time. So hopefully, we're all kind of coming to the table and doing the work necessary to come out the other end with something that's a compromise solution that will work for the community. That's the goal.
And one of the biggest complaints was that people felt uninformed, and they didn't know what was going on. And it's hard to say that now when every single person received a postcard,
yeah, I can't imagine there'd be as much gusto
so I think it was 6300 people or 6500 people opted signed right.
Now a lot of those are much less misinformed now.
Well, and 4000 or so were certified as appropriate. So they did get the requisite number but not all 600 Not 6500 were eligible sectors.
Well, but I'm trying to do a little bit of math. And my understanding was that we had you had 80 is what was sitting up there, right. People on tours now I know that we've met other Miss Brady attendance
on the walking tours. Yes.
Okay. Then go back to that. So again, so we've got I think this was brought out in some other meeting and I don't know if I watched the meeting or not this.
This before was different issues.
This is what we saw super issues.
Okay, so anyway, thank you go like this. So it's but but percentage wise. We've got 600 people, divided by 6300 people, okay. 10% of the people that said no to this thing. signed up for the thing. They're not even participating right there not even choosing to participate. So so now you could argue we're this is kind of where it was before. Maybe there wasn't enough outreach last time. But now for crying out loud. We've done a lot of outreach or you get in that week. You've done a lot of outreach now and is there some other way to reach the people that really you're saying no, are they just gonna say no again, because they just want
to say no, again, 90,000 postcards
and 97,000 Yeah, so
I feel like I get what you're saying. I feel like there's never gonna be that's gonna be the people in this room.
Well, there's semesters in grad school and planning about how to get people to participate in the public process.
It is we are not the only community that really, really challenging. I mean, if we if we think about voting, except percentage of people in the country, so council needs to say that.
I think yeah, I think that's important right there. council needs to say, You people have signed up for this Why didn't you attend the one of these things because I can see right here that only 600 of you showed up all the other 5900 or whatever it is people why didn't you show up?
But I would argue that not to get too distracted. But if we had to city council members that voted against it, because they felt like there was a lack of communication or lack of awareness, lack of engagement. If you can't get them on board, that would be a sign of failure. If you can get them on board, it's nine nothing or whatever. The number is Seven Awesome. Yeah, it's not straightforward. Then I think that that shows with the 97,000 get seven nothing. I feel like you've done your job to inform their spending of dang year to get all this stuff going through and all the work they're doing. They're the experts. Can you trust them? I know what you're saying. But I feel like we need to study. Yeah.
I feel like at this point, if every member of council is not willing to stand up and say sorry, we've done great outreach. Your concern at this point? is like, not holding water. If every single one of them isn't willing to say this at this point. I think that will be extremely disappointing.
I mean, I think this actually gives the opportunity no longer blame it on the outreach process. Yeah, and are gonna have to say, here are the things that I don't like about the code. Yes, that was totally lost. Last time anybody was blaming the process, because that was sort of, in my opinion, that was a little bit of a easier strategy than to say, like, yep, we, you know, we had to actually read it and have reasons Yeah, so that's gonna be I think that's going to be really interesting to see where this discussion goes. And what I'm sure Megan will talk about this, but it feels like there's a lot of support out there for, you know, affordable housing projects, higher density affordable in really specific locations, and more incentives for those to get built. But like no duplexes across the neighborhoods. So that's dangerous, right, because the city said we the solution has to be all the things just we know we can't there's not enough resources to build enough. Affordable a few before double housing projects to solve the affordability issues. That's not going to move the
needle. Your scrap scrapping for this for some money, I'm scrapping, right, but so we're all scrapping the same.
Well, one of the points where the revision was to try to make incentives that would be attractive to not only affordable producers, but market rate producers,
which was the whole point, which is why people were talking about oh, you're just a developer giveaway. It's like because it's not a one size fits all solution. Anyway, obviously, you know, this, obviously we care about this. I guess if you were to see more questions I would ask her one. Do you feel like City Council has a better and more engaged perception and understanding of the nuance of this issue at this point in the process than they did when the code was voted?
Actually, I think even during the development of what is now the repeal Code Council spent a lot of time on this and dug really deep into the nuances. We spent I remember June of 2021 Three hours with them on like the intricacies of setbacks and incentives and design regulations. And I think they understand, I don't think that there's like nobody's gonna go write a code, right. Like that's not Council's role to go write the code regulations. But why the change was proposed what the change was proposed to do and what we thought the impact of the change would be. I think they understood all of those things. And I think they continue to understand them, and now are trying to find a position where what they're hearing from their constituents and what they understand about land use regulation. can meet somewhere in the middle. That's really what's happening is constituents and residents. People are upset about a decision that council made and they understood what the decision was and maybe not the amount or volume of frustration that that choice would result in.
I don't envy it. It's a tough position. It is, especially because some of them are up for reelection.
I don't want to go down this pathway, but I would say we heard from a council person earlier this year. That was very clear, they did not understand. And I will just say if there's something we can do if we will be really the A's. Some some specific stuff that we could point them in your direction to specific questions. I would just say that's something I would like to do. Please do. So we'll just leave it at
that. We have we've had we have three rounds of one on one conversations with council members during the first part of this process. We're happy to have additional one on one conversations with council members about any issue they want to dig into. So yeah, again without pointing the finger at any one council member in particular that is work that staff is very happy to do at any time.
Just a very small data question percent of rent versus own in the area.
We're at about 46 ish percent rentals. It really depends on your data source anywhere between 40 and 50 is a number I would believe what if it comes from the census is one thing if you Google it, it's another thing if the city's data is a little different, so between 40 and 50%, sort of national, less than that. We're higher than kind of average because of the presence of a large university. So in a large university town, that makes a lot of sense to have
a higher percentage or mentors. I'm sorry, to Boulder.
Need to look at that. I'm not sure but 65%
used to be kind of the national average and it is going down
of homeowners homeowners.
Okay, but it has been ticking down a little at a time but that's a huge number to move. Yeah. It's a national segment.
So, Megan, if you're, if you if you're gonna get to this stop me, Kevin, if not a request that we added because this is something that came up in our housing provider. discussion was that there's sort of now the thinking of splitting, like here are things in the code that are going to impact housing capacity. Here are other things in the code that are going to impact and incentivize affordable housing. whereas before we were like capacity leads to affordability all things you'd love to hear about. What are the
so well, yeah, we framed this up in our council and talked about this. Like we've got these guiding principles. One of them is housing capacity. One of them is choices that fit in with the existing neighborhoods. So this is that kind of dichotomy I was talking about people are are concerned about whether things will fit in their neighborhoods or places they care about. And we also want to have more housing choices. Ah, how do we make that decision? So we set this up as kind of a quadrant exercise for council where on the top left, we're really focusing on housing capacity, maybe more so than we are on how things fit in not that we don't care at all, but we care less. Bottom left is kind of your status quo. If neither of those are really important on a given issue. Maybe we don't change anything. Top right. We're trying to maximize both of those things as much housing capacity as we can get with as much compatibility or things that fit in as we can get, knowing that that's intention, how can you try to maximize both of those and be transparent about what you're trying to do? And then on the bottom right, is less emphasis on housing capacity and more on things that fit in the existing context. So where are you fall on this might determine the kinds of code changes you would or wouldn't support? So for each of the main topics we talked to counsel about, where do you think we should hit? Because we don't want to spend all our time over here if you want us to be over there, right? Like writing code takes a lot of effort and work we want to create multiple options. For people to consider. But we want to make sure it's headed in the right direction before we start spending time on what should the actual code requirements be? So we set this up for them and talked about each issue. Yes.
I don't know if this is I'm having a squishy thought. I think that the concept of like fitting in with the existing character of the neighborhood is one of the things that, to me seems seems like one of the biggest points of tension with the assumption that certain land use, certainly it uses certain zoning types. are automatically going to change the character of a neighborhood and surprisingly surprisingly, to me, that's like duplexes. Like just the idea that well if automatically of duplexes are allowed my all of my houses around me are gonna get wiped and these huge duplexes are gonna go up instead of like, the house next to me has not changed at all. It's just now zoned as an over under duplex. And it looks exactly the same as it always did. And so, I guess to me, it's like the total subjectivity around what existing character means and people's assumptions about how a specific type of housing is automatically going to change the character like obviously, if a 12 storey apartment building goes in next year, single family home that's change, but just because it can be a duplex or a triplex next door, you're assuming it will change the character, but that's not necessarily substantiated.
And maybe it doesn't have to, depending on what the regulations are, right? So like, that's really what we're trying to tease out, like from engagement and you'll see some of these things as we go through, like the things that we're hearing that people aren't aren't okay with and that that can be a place to create a regulation. Like I'm worried about shading, like okay, then like, let's really look at height and how that's going to affect shading will five feet make a difference or not to the feasibility of a project and to the impact on a neighboring property, like we're getting down to that level of detail with the regulations and like, well, if we reduce height by two feet Does, does that resolve this issue or not? And that's why we want to make sure we're headed in the right direction because that takes so much effort to be able not only to do that or create the regulation, but then to be able to explain it can show visually what the impact might be. Is all like additional work that has to happen to be a part to share that
with the comments is the thing I don't like is more people. Yeah, yeah, that's the change to the neighborhood,
right? Yep. So and that that's legit. Like that as a thing that we will hear it's a thing we already are hearing. And that's where the guiding principles come into play,
and the existing code, right, so Kristen, and I have a giant development being built under the existing code in our neighborhood. So it's not like nothing can happen under the existing
was it pretty tough,
worried the quarry 300 and some you're still worried
about that four storeys tall,
right? Sure. If we look right at
that every day, addressed by that every day, right?
And that's, you know, so it's not affordable homeownership rate luxury under the existing code. So, just I think that's a really important point that it's not like the existing code won't allow anything. Yeah.
But it is maximizing the capacity for that site. Yeah, an infill site. It's really like there are a lot of reasons but that could be an appropriate place. And that's probably why it was zoned to allow the number of units
and there's not that many city with that high density zoning exists adjacent. District correct. So
stop interrupting you know.
30 seconds more I asked you guys to do this. So well. I'll go through each of these things. We can stop briefly on each one see where you want to spend your time. When we're talking about accessory dwelling units, when and I'll just share with you the kind of tenor of a conversation with counsel and the direction that they went. I'd love to hear where you guys are. And we'll just kind of go through that way. Maybe I should ask you what you think first and then tell you if council agreed with you or not. Would that be a more fun game for
Yes. Frustrating. One
this is this is not about we're not deciding either six of these. They're fine. I don't know. Um, yeah. I'm trying to make sure that we save some time for rental stuck to Yes. Okay. So top left, allow accessory dwelling units everywhere don't require parking. Don't pay too much attention to shading and privacy, regulations, etc. That would be your kind of most focused on capacity least focused on does it fit with the existing character various degrees of limiting whether we keep the existing code or not like limit where you can do it require parking for it. So I guess really the questions here are do you allow accessory dwelling units everywhere? Do you require parking for them? I think it's pretty clear. Regulating for shading and privacy and some of those things are things that we would think about anyway, but are also very important. So I don't think we're going to not think about those. So ad use everywhere or some places are working yes or no.
Is this a guess what they suggest or what we want?
This is what this is where you are right like I'm taking the temperature of the affordable housing court here.
On top right.
Yeah, I agree. Okay, it's
park tonight as clarifying as parking does not have to be like you have a driveway space, off street.
So okay. It can be a driveway parking space or a garage parking space. However in the current code, and there is a parking slide, nice. In the current code, a tandem space doesn't count. Oh, so you can't have a space behind a space to count as its own space. And that's part of the current kind of regulatory structure. So if if we were to change that, then you could have two garage spaces, two driveway spaces, and that could account for some counting some parking requirements. So that's one potential way to do some of this balancing. Like how do we allow more housing choices and more housing and more places, and still make sure that there's off street parking by designing regulations that might be a little different. So counsel was generally in this kind of top right ish corner. I think there's we're starting to hear especially in some of the more kind of neighborhoods that don't really have alleys. They've got like lots on cul de sacs and like, maybe an internal accessory dwelling unit is better than adding a whole other structure in the backyard. So there's this conversation happening right now about our internal accessory. Dwelling Units better than detached in some contexts. So I think we'll be exploring that further. Yeah,
I assume that part of the issue here with which people don't like factor in when they object to this is just because an adu is allowed everywhere in the zoning code. It doesn't mean your particular lot is big enough.
To fit right. If it's allowed everywhere, all 10 houses on the street
yeah, like I think that's people are like, Why don't we have like it's gonna get crammed in and it's like, well, if there's not room just because the zoning says that it can be there. That's not the only thing that you have to look
at. Yeah. And I think the timescale of development is another thing that's really hard to, for people to instinctively get, like some of the research or or reporting we're seeing out of California that has really done a lot of work to remove barriers to accessory dwelling units. It's been five or six years and now we're starting to see more. More people have bigger uptick and accessory dwelling units, but it takes a long time for the physical environment to change. It's a big investment for a homeowner to build an adu. So, you're right, not everyone who can will. So that's, I think another piece of the conversation. Yeah. So you guys are apparently well aligned. There. We want to see more accessory dwelling units, internal external, who knows we'll be exploring that. This one
flexes.
So we're looking at here at two to five flexes are missing middle housing, duplexes. triplexes, quad plexes small multifamily buildings. So a lot of what we heard here is, again, changing the feeling or fabric of an existing neighborhood. Whether or not those additional units could be short term rentals and a desire to kind of lock down or short term rental regulations, their concerns about parking and lots of concerns about the potential of kind of even unintentionally encouraging scraping an existing structure to put up a new structure that's more units. So from at least from what I heard in the community engagement, I would say that the scraping conversation I don't know a better way to say that, like, the deconstruction of existing buildings, and short term rentals and parking were kind of the three big issues. So we could do a few different things here. Depending on where where folks want to head allowing them and what the repealing what the repeal code did is allowed duplexes in some places allow triplexes if one unit was deed restricted, affordable for 99 years so like there was already a bit of graduated and if numbers of units built in, depending on zone district, but you know, we could liberalize where these plexes can be built, make sure they require parking, make sure they regulate for shading and privacy. But some of the other things in this top right. Talk a little bit about trying to get a little more nuanced with you know, how are we incentivizing or encouraging the incorporation of a structure if it's already there, because there's nothing that's going to preserve the existing built environment more than keeping a structure that's already part of that environment. And there was a lot of concern about what a new code that allowed more would result in and applying short term rental standards or increasing them. We need to do some legal work with our friends in the attorney's office to figure out what kinds of short term regulations could be applicable and how we would regulate and monitor that but that's something that we could also look into. So are this differences from top left to top right, just more specifics, like more nuances of it working and build like more if we allow that and also do these things would it maximize? Both of those four instead of only focusing on capacity? Can we focus more on the built environment character as well? And so this is what I'm talking about with like, here are all of the concerns we've heard here is how a code can maybe address some of those, is this a more workable solution? That's ideally where we're trying to, to find is wherever that spot is.
So it's everything's going to be tough, right?
Like no, I mean, this conversation. Yeah, I mean, this conversation with counsel, there were some who were like, yep, top rep. Right. Looks good to me. I'm really glad you're incorporating the, you know, encouragement to preserve existing structures, somewhere down on the bottom right. They're really concerned about allowing additional housing that's not an accessory dwelling unit and existing neighborhoods. So that's going to continue to be a tension point, I think.
So are we supposed to get in or?
No, I'm sorry. I'm sorry to do this. Let's, uh, well, maybe. Yes. Let's catch it then. All right,
you got Yes. Oh, I'm HOAs Oh, that's not the slide. It is. I promise. You just can't see the
No. Oh, yeah, there it is. I see it.
It's there, I promise. So, Council is pretty clear that if something applies in the land use code it should apply whether you're in an HOA or not. Yeah, that was I think that was very clear direction we received from them on that. I know there will be a lot of conversation to cut with that. But that was pretty clear. Parking Council's direction here was we want to right size the city's parking regulations. We don't want to require too much parking. We don't want to require no parking. We want to make sure that things work.
So subjective. What you think there is
and this is where sounds like tandem spaces and think like how can we more efficiently use space that's allocated for parking and how can we think about that a little differently. So there are some things that could be done there. Good, affordable housing though. That's the one you guys are really gonna want. Here we go. This is affordable housing. mandatory inclusionary housing came up again, as it always does. When we talk about housing affordability is the solution and the way that so we kind of close to council like this is what we're hearing are some people want mandatory requirements. Other people are proposing a more phased approach like already want to have and they said I remember that we got a memo from you. So we were able to explain that we need to get the base right. What is the density that's allowed? What is the incentive allowed, if it's affordable, like we need to get those things right before we can design an effective inclusionary housing policy if that's the direction council wants to go? They have to make decisions about season lieu, they have to make decisions about impact fees like there is a whole host of other policy decisions they need to make if they want to head that direction, which we're happy to do. But we need to know what the base is before we can do that accurately. So if we want to create a good, workable, mandatory policy, we really have to get the incentives and the base density finished and then we can take another step. They understood that they asked for the memo again, which I will be resending in the coming weeks with some updates. But basically thinking about it as a phased approach and making sure that we've got the basics right so we can then design a better policy if they choose to go that way. And that will be a new council that would make that decision most likely. So stay tuned, more to come on. Parking where we got some clear direction already and like wanted to present it to council is about community input and Development Review and short term rentals. So that one, this one's probably the clearest. We all want housing that's going to benefit the community before allowing additional units. We don't want them to be converted into short term rentals. We want them to be long term rentals. That's part of the reason doing it. So we're going to look at the short term rental regulations through that lens and make sure those are right. So that was very clear, very easy. For community input. It seems that council and this was kind of I won't say unanimous but seemed to be some consensus around. If we have regulations that are clear, and a project meets those regulations. It should be able to be approved efficiently. People still want to have input early in the process, neighborhood meetings people really like them. They don't want to get rid of them. So there was some kind of consensus that maybe we keep neighborhood meetings, we can look at Administrative Approval for things that meet the code, when things don't meet the code. That's where we have more of a tension point modifications. And things like that. So we'll be exploring that more. But there was some willingness to look at a lower level of review shouldn't even say lower level but a review that wouldn't require a public hearing for projects that meet the regulations we've set in the code. So we'll be exploring what that looks like more how to make sure we keep the community input and make the approval process as streamlined as possible, particularly for those things that are doing what we say we want in our regulations. So more to come with them. We don't go back to them until July 31. So we get to hang out with you again before that. And then I can do this one in five minutes.
Vote on the credits do. So you have to have
we do have a forum because to start the meeting, which is all we needed. We still actually have a quorum of four. But and we don't need the everyone to vote on that. We don't necessarily have to do it today, but we can do it today. We have a little bit of time. So here's one question you all
heard the minutes all right from last meeting unanimous. And I completely was focused on knowledge. Yes, we
are checking things. Okay, I'm just gonna leave this slide up. I'm not going to use any of the other slides. I'm just going to tell you what's happening on Tuesday. So in December of 2022, yeah. We went to council with a program that would require proactive rental inspections. That did not go through they asked for another work session. And we did another work session presented three options, one of which was require registration and delay inspections by a year but still heading in that inspection path. That was the one they chose, brought that for another decision point passed on first. Reading and then on second reading, they postponed it requested that staff bring back an option that only had registration, no proactive inspections. So that is what we're bringing back to them on Tuesday. So what this is, is mandatory rental registration so we know where all of the rental properties are, who owns them, basic data about them. It also includes enhanced mediation, education, outreach tools for both landlords and tenants. So it's more focused on education and outreach less focused on proactive inspections. So it's kind of enhancing the complaint based system we already have, and making sure that works really effectively and that people know about it. And they're able to take advantage of not just that, but mediation and other sorts of resources at the same time. So that's what's going to them on Tuesday. We will see how that goes. What questions do you guys have about that? Because I probably have a slide on it. Yes. I would be really
curious to know more about the outreach piece. I know at that council meeting. That was one where you're talking about this like one o'clock in the morning right? That's that's when this vote no was made. Um, one of the things everyone was talking about and councils seem to really agree about was that the burden is always going to be on tenants in terms of the inequitable relationship there if something is wrong, and so if there wasn't going to be proactive and inspections, it seemed like everyone agreed that there could be some kind of proactive like rental tenant education. And I think maybe there were even comments about like, potentially making it a requirement that like your lease has to come with tenant rights info or something like that. So I'd just be curious how that piece ended up. Yeah. So
I think education and outreach kind of splits into both mediation and education and outreach because they're, they're intertwined, particularly if there's a conflict between a landlord and so the proposal we're bringing to council would add engagement specialists specifically for this program to educate both tenants and landlords so like one person focused on tenants, one person focused on landlords and a halftime position that's really focused on reaching out to lower income landlords and tenants, folks in mobile, home parks, people have particular challenges with the system as it's currently designed. What that actually looks like when we get to implementation, so these kind of opportunities for development are some of the ideas we've heard about so we're not designing every single piece of the program until there's a program funded and people hired to implement that program. But it's everything from could it be something like Healthy Homes has where they have volunteers who go in and, and do an assessment like could you do a habitability assessment that's volunteer based because once building code gets involved or a rental inspector gets involved, that's a formal thing that needs to be dealt with. So it can't be done by a city staff person who has like a duty to report or a duty to correct. But could that be something that how do we educate people about what's habitable and what's not? what's safe and what's not? So trying to create those kinds of programs and those opportunities to reach out to folks who might need additional support. So all of that is a piece of this enhanced education. That's part of the program proposed, it doesn't address the power dynamics, in the same way that a proactive inspection program would. And that's a policy decision, and that's the direction that we were given to bring back to them.
So it sounds like just to make sure my brain is melting at this time of day. There will be outreach to both renters and landlords but it sounds like still not yet a mechanism to like proactively let every renter know what their sort of rights as a tenant are,
I think help alleviate that.
It's something that we could offer but probably couldn't mandate the every.
You can't just say like to do. Let's put this piece of paper in your lease document.
Right. I mean, we do that for occupancy right now. And I think that's one of the questions and as we implement mandatory registration, what sorts of information are we then able to share out with everyone who's registering so wanting to make sure that everybody has the same correct information is kind of step one of a program like this, and we need to make sure that we're, we're hitting everyone in the city. So yeah, it's that's going to be a big piece of it. And wanting people's leases to be does a tenant or a landlord have access to lease templates that are easy to find, like we can't mandate that people use those resources, but we could certainly provide them and do more than we're doing today.
Real quick, the Explore low no interest loan options except for
repeaters for building out your shoes. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. So Council expressed a lot of interest in that. Actually making a decision about and funding a program like that would require a separate Council action, but we can do more work to explore what it could look like as part of implementing this and they may request that we come back with more, you know, a funding request for a program if that's something that they want to move forward with, but there was a lot of interest in that. So does
the registry include what the rent amounts are?
It does as an optional question right now. Yeah, there are several questions and let me get to the registration. And if that's feedback that you all have that's helpful to hear, are definitely a feedback.
I don't like giving options, monthly rents.
Unit turnover. average length of tenancy is another interesting rent or stability piece of data, it would be helpful.
But yeah, those are right now proposed to be optional. So yeah, it feels really hard to understand what our inventory is like in terms of affordability if we don't have an accurate understanding of what
rents are, but these for rent is this per unit or per
property, one property there could be
average okay. So with this though, is the oh sorry, is the is the objective to be able to identify our stock or identify are stackable, affordable units?
It is to know more about our rental housing stock, all of it. Yes.
But is there a step? Is there a sub step that we're trying to get to step two of
step two is people feel like they have something they can do if they're a place their living isn't safe? Like this is primarily about health and safety or rental housing and the condition of rental housing. It's less of an affordability specific strategy, although certainly there's a connection with all of that, but this is really about like, we have, you know, a homeowner has a little bit more control over their living environment, particularly if they have additional resources to invest in that property than a renter does. So is there some sort of additional support resources, education, and avenues avenue for addressing safety concerns, or tenants generally? So one
reason Sorry, just because it's really hard to get accurate rent information,
especially on a macro scale when you're looking across the city. It's so so
is there a reason why people they don't people don't want to report how much is
that a speculating too much? I can say when you ask people just in demographic questions, their income, about 30 to 40% of people won't answer that question. No matter how much money they make. It's similar for how much do you rent your apartment for it's financial questions are uncomfortable for people and they tend a sizable percentage of people tend not to answer them, which then makes all of the data you have a little bit more questionable if you know that 30 to 40% of it's missing because people won't people won't answer it anyway. Or they won't register like that's the other challenge here is like how do we make this a low barrier we want people to register. First and foremost, we also want as much information as we can get, but we don't want to be turning people off from registering to begin with. So it is a delicate balance. I think that was the decision for the optional questions and things that feel a little bit more proprietary to a lot of landlords and that's what we've heard when we've asked for some feedback about that. But it's it's tough. We'd like to have as much great information as we can get.
So what is the mechanism now if someone if it's a complaint based system, someone files a complaint, what happens?
The inspector goes to that property conducts an inspection. Edie, like I said, Yes, sir. Yes. If a violation of the property maintenance code is found, then the landlord is responsible for addressing that within X period of time. And then there's an enforcement process if that's not being addressed in a timely manner. So it's, you know, the bones of that system are there the the system as it's working currently needs more resources and more support, and more modernizing to actually function in the way that would best serve everyone who relies on that system, whether they're landlords or tenants. So hopefully this will help us do that.
Well, Doug, says tune in on Tuesday. We could go out on this discussion again, and tune in on Tuesday,
Tuesday's first reading. So if there are things that come up, you know, there's opportunities to speak to them between first and second reading,
which I believe would be the 20th of June. So we won't have another meeting, unless we are directed otherwise. But yeah, the 20 Do you
Megan, do you get the sense that with the land use code updates that there's any chance that things would actually get weaker in terms of affordable housing? Doesn't seem like councils can stay 10 said that would
weaken in terms of technical affordable housing incentives. Yeah. I don't get that sense. That's to the extent that housing supply and affordability are connected, of course that I think is a little bit more of an open question. We'll have to see where where we land with that.
Well, thank you very much. You suck two hours of your life. We very much appreciate
the trails that Rasky so I
so it takes the clock. Yeah. So it's up to you guys. Whether you want to do one more item or not today, we are meeting in July, and this matter could go over to July if we needed it to but it's a busy meeting in July. Not gonna lie. I think we could do this quickly, but it's up to you.
I don't know ready to vote on one thing.
I have some questions.
Should we go?
Let's just give it a let's give me a rough shot. And if we feel like we're dating or having some issues or don't feel comfortable we
can and I have a small prayer that I can go through or not. It's based on the materials that were in your covenant. Yeah.
So she's fine for a couple extra minutes. If everyone else is struggling.
I find that keep going. Will you want to go ahead and if you have
questions, so my questions are just started late. I read the cover memo and my questions are related to
expect so, for
example, Parkside Hill and Impala are on the same trajectory that Paula has 15 units of 40% Ami, like how do we I'm not saying that Impala needs to be credits, but I'm saying and I know we recently have heard headquarters pursuing a huge state credit application with Twitter and 60 units that's going to have 30 and 40%. Ami units. For them, yeah, because I mean, that's part of the negotiation with housing catalyst to be a partner in it. So I just I just, I don't know, how is it? What's the process? It's sort of an awkward process like I have no, I It's totally a worthy project. And that makes sense. But is there a precedent for projects now? are we considering this for 40%? You know, I just want to like, make sure we get ourselves into trouble. So I'm making a decision.
And maybe what maybe the best thing to do is talk about it a little today and then we don't have to make a decision necessarily unless you're ready so um, Impala I understood was not in the was was past the time where it would be helpful to interject more fee credits because their financing is close and close. But it's closing this month. Right. So when when I was serving, I was told that that wasn't really a good place to add extra credits. So and that was the only other project that currently was available for this and when I I haven't talked to headquarter, although they were on my list of recipients that I asked for 30% units, whether anybody had any within the next 18 months. I just didn't find it. So we have this money set aside for the credits. And ARPA allows them to be used for fee credits, but our internal policy has always been just use them for the 30% units. So in order to keep the money in the purpose of V credits, the suggestion was that we could in fact, put them into Hartside Hill, which is a unique project in some ways, because it's a master developer for three different affordable products. And they are hitting some cost as master developer that they didn't anticipate and that this could help the project. But it is up to you whether or not you think we should ask counsel and then we also have to decide amongst ourselves whether or not we should ask counsel for this. Now the risk is that if we do not find a project to commit them to then the city could redirect the money into some other purpose and would not be guaranteed to even stay in affordable housing, although we would certainly argue for it to be so the it's really an opportunity risk. If we don't put them into something now we could lose them. We could wait until next year and see if there's any units available to put them in but if there aren't any again it would go back into the general art bucket for the city to do allocate.
So the art bucket allows you to go be credits for any level but the city policy is 30% Ami,
correct up to 65%. Ami is the ARPA limit. So it's presumptively within the ARPA purview,
but the ARPA fi credits that have been deployed before this have just been to 30%.
Right, because we were using the administrative process. So we could not use the administrative process. To do this. We would have to get Council's permission to do it. And it would be up to them to decide whether or not they would like to allocate it this way. So there's three options one, wait and see if there are any more units and if not, the money goes back. I'm asked counsel, whether or not they'd like to deploy this for 40% units, or I guess give it back now.
We certainly do want to give it back
and also actually the housing manager has told me that we have to do everything we can not to give it back. The credits. Frankly, to be honest, I
just want to use it as my thinking on this. We use it as an opportunity to have conversation with counsel about about being more about V credits being expanded, like we need. That was
correct. So that just provide us an opportunity to show that you know many likes clearly that 30% units will not support the development the rent for the 30% units, you know has to go into ongoing operations. And so that's why we have always provided some extra subsidy to that. And I provided numbers for the 40 percents, it's really not all that much more
rent, and we are certainly in a different climate than we were that decision for 30% between the construction cost and interest rate market. Like there's a 40% rents are
right so so this could open very well could and would open that conversation as to, you know, what should we be doing around the credits now, but the whole point is, you know, we have limited resources, right and so how do we best allocate things, but the fact of the matter is that, you know, at least 40% units could certainly use the same kind of support that the 30 percents could and it might be a way to open the door to that conversation with council, but really, it's about committing the ARPA money before. It is not in our it's not under our control. So, my understanding is that at least now Hartside Hill doesn't close financing until this fall. So we have a little bit of time but counsels taking some time off this summer. We're taking August, most like most likely. So you know we would want to decide this in July at the latest.
So is this kind of Yes. To to approve these for 40% units with the suggestion that that just gets codified as the new.
Is that what you're saying? Yeah, I'm just sort of just want to say like, okay, here, see this example like I just don't want to get the opportunity to go miss that. We're just like, okay, yes, that's needed. Let's do it, and not have the broader conversation. So whichever way I mean, at the end of the day, I'd love to have the when when we're Hartside hill gets the fee credits that they need and get to deploy the dollars. We also get to take the opportunity with counsel to be like, okay, ARPA allows us to, you know, serve higher AMI units. We think that was, you know, it seems like projects are needed that. I don't know
what you are, but money is going to go away, but the need for the 40% units will not. And yeah, we'll be making a budget offer in 25. So it'd be good to know whether or not we can use it for 30% units or 30 and 40. So that's really the time so that would be a really good time to make a code change before or during that beautiful process.
But it's all part of the same discussion, because oh, well, now we've opened the door to doing it. And then I'm just reiterating what everybody said already. But I think it's a great opportunity to now say that, that same thing.
So how long would it take council to make that change? I mean, I assume it has to go through the whole rigmarole that every other thing does. rigamarole
so it's like it would, it would well it would it would be an ordinance change. And it would be a finance change. It would probably have to go to council finance committee and it would come back to you guys for your opinion on an ordinance change. So that's sort of connected conversation, but it's not like if you think this is a good suggestion to council, you can say our recommendation is that you do provide it to heart sidehill and consider providing it to all future 40% units because they have the same need as 30% units and then we could have that conversation with counsel and then if they directed us to move forward, we could do that. And that would take that would take some time. But that time is built in because the next budget doesn't come until 2025. And I
have just one thing to add if I could. So we've in conversations we've been having around the sustainable revenue conversation. The question of what will you do with additional funding for housing has included things like expanding the credits, I think that's a thing we all would like to see happen and resources have been a challenge. So our our kind of policy is direct as the subsidy to the lowest percentage units and kind of work up from there as resources are available. I think here we're seeing a case where there are no 30% units in the immediate horizon. So how do we still follow that policy while the next lowest is 40%? And I think both Christina and Bob, you're making a great point that we all I think know that fi credits could be helpful for other units as well. And we should probably look at expanding that program. Even in advance of funding potentially if we wrote it in such a way that the funding would go to the lowest units that are under development in a given time period. Like we can explore all of that, but I think this could be a way to kind of Telegraph that for council and if that was part of your recommendation. I think that's entirely appropriate.
That's where I'm not I'm not really seeing any debate here on this like we all well, I know how to implement it. I'm not
gonna vote on getting the money, but it's okay, but it's still Yes,
we got a quorum to open the meeting.
And I mean, just bottom line. Obviously I love the idea of being able to take this but we are also virtue signaling wherever you're trying to go with this and trying to direct them as to what we believe is a good use of the funds. What we have in front of us is pretty clear, I think and I think content Hill is a great program. In my opinion. That I would like to definitely see as much support as I can because it's wide ranging. And his multiple demographics as well. So does anybody have any? Stephanie would What do you think I didn't
care for it? Yeah. And I like the language, you know, I think Kristen's willing to make a motion with specific language about like we approve this with, and we're going to be following up with you. Then I like
that. I guess that's my only question is, is there a benefit in terms of your advocacy options to any sort of delay or change or,
and I wasn't aware of the Pedco when do you think those will be
possible apply for state credit in August and then be appointed for financing?
Something happened to know how many 30% units or
no it's been negotiated. But part of these things play into those
mechanisms skew the negotiations if we're saying oh, well, we'll do su 40
Well, we won't just do 40 Oh,
just by being flippant, but I mean, like, if
maybe this will help unless additional resources in outside of our buck come into fi credits, the likelihood that we'll be able to hit 40 Even if it says we can hit 40 is not very likely given the policy to put money toward the lowest percentage AMI units because we spend the fee credit money generally.
So what would happen is if we decide if we ask council and they agree to allocate the remaining amounts that are in the fund now to Parkside Hill, and another project coming forward with 30% units, we would have to go to them and ask them if they would like to use general fund or affordable housing capital fund dollars for those. But it wouldn't be a no necessarily it's discretionary. That the
that's left in the 112,000
but not for eight credits
Yeah, are you waiting for one of the two people asked to do a motion though to
do so I moved that we approve the request to utilize remaining Arca funds for the 40% units. At Hartside. Hill and consider discussion to expand our local feed credit program to also include 40%.
I remember Kristin was I think that was great. I think the first part of it was to see council approval.
I move do
I vote yes. Yes. Yes. Can I reduce the key?
Thank you. So we'll we will talk about amongst ourselves when we'll bring that request to council but we will put it in bringing it forward and seeing what we can do. And maybe it's really
a cue up for the 2025.
Right? Absolutely. And then you know, we can adjust our the amount we asked based on how many units we expect, which I would guess would be like double the amount of 2% units but we could talk about that but
I do think that's gonna start with income average expanding, especially in 40% units. I think those will start to be become more real. Because
because now you've got to actually write them. Averaging really helps that well, we can talk about that again, after this. After this one closes. I haven't gotten the pictures from everybody.
I'm the one who has
photos. Did you send me a photo
but I certainly have a photo
you could send anything drop our face on it will look like that.
I'm sure any photo you send I think I will give the clerk's office and let them figure it out. I will not send the adorable picture of John's child.
My cat I did. Not just
but I just have to be indeed a of you. Thank you guys so much for tuning in.
Well we have these and we need to wear them or we'll like get them at the desk so I
can carry them for you. Or you can you know when we meet in person. You don't have to have them on your you know oh yeah.
Yep. Thanks for staying late. Everyone woke up, especially.
Anybody? Oh, yeah. Second moves to adjourn. Yes. Okay.
I'll second.
All in favor, aye. Hi. Is there anyone Okay, yeah, I'll open the settings again.
