City Council Regular Meeting

Good evening Fort Collins and welcome to the proclamation portion of tonight's meeting. The time is now 5 p.m. and we have one proclamation this evening which is declaring the month of July as Disability Pride Month. If you would like to come up and support this proclamation please come on down.

Welcome. Hi. Good, how are you? Thanks for coming.

Oh, welcome. Hi. Good. How are you? Thanks for coming.

We're just working on getting the entire audience now behind me instead of in front of me.

So this is great.

Great to support.

Okay, I think it looks like we're ready. Okay.

Whereas July is recognized nationally as Disability Pride Month, a time to celebrate the history, achievements, contributions, and resilience of individuals with disabilities and to promote inclusion, acceptance, and understanding of disability as a natural part of human diversity.

And whereas people with disabilities are valued members of the Fort Collins community, whose unique perspectives, talents, and experiences enrich our city and contribute to our collective

progress. And whereas Disability Pride Month offers an opportunity to recognize and honor the diverse accomplishments of individuals with disabilities in Fort Collins across all sectors,

including education, employment, arts, sports, science, and community advocacy.

And whereas the City of Fort Collins is committed to fostering an inclusive and accessible community for all residents, acknowledging the ongoing barriers that can be faced by individuals with disabilities and working to eliminate those barriers to ensure equal opportunities. And whereas it is essential to continue fostering a community in Fort Collins that embraces

disability and sorry disability as an integral and valued part of the human diversity ensuring all individuals are treated with dignity respect and equality and whereas the city of fort collins

appreciates the dedicated efforts of disability rights activists local organizations and advocates who work tirelessly to advance the rights independence and well-being of individuals

with disabilities contributing to a more inclusive and accessible fort collins for all and whereas As the City of Fort Collins promotes the Disability Advisory Board as a collaborative body dedicated to advising City Council on matters that enhance the quality of life for individuals with disabilities, promoting accessibility, equity, and inclusion throughout the community. Now therefore, I am Lee Francis, Mayor of the City of Fort Collins, do you hereby proclaim July 2026 as Disability Pride Month.

Thank you all for coming to Disability Pride Month to celebrate this momental occasion.

As Vice President of People First, I can say without a doubt that a person's disability does not define who they are and what they can achieve. everyone, every day, people with disabilities, overcome challenges, reach

goals, and make a difference in their community. In this past year, People First has achieved a lot. We have helped advocate for a house home bill that started in the Senate floor and reached the governor's desk to help improve safety in host homes. We have also spoken with Senator Marchman and Representative Zonick.

We have also attended the Disability Rights Day at the state capitol and traveled all the

way to D.C. to advocate for Medicaid and very important services. Excuse me. We are proud. We are proud of who we are. Our disabilities are part of our story, and they shape us to become the advocates we are today. If it weren't for our experiences, we would not be here right now fighting for ourselves, for our friends, for our families, and for our community. So no matter what month it is, let's celebrate and be proud of our disabilities together because what is meant to weigh us down makes us fly. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You did a great job.

Yes, of course. Anyone else?

Okay. You want to come on? Great.

Yes, People First of Larimer County is here to accept the proclamation.

My name is Rose McClure, and most everybody knows me because I work for the city of Fort Collins.

And all I wanted to say is that I'm very grateful that I have an organization who opened their

heart and open their minds to the people with disabilities in the community and in our departments.

I'm very grateful for all the love and support I have gotten for the last 29 years,

and I'd like to see that keep going. Thank you.

anyone else okay those were lovely thank you everyone all right that is the end of that Proclamation, thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Of course, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Okay, sometimes we do read proclamations in the community and all are encouraged to attend.

The proclamation declaring August 14th through 16th as local heroes weekend requested by

the Fort Collins comic-con will be read that weekend I hope I see everyone at

that event that is all for the proclamations this evening stay tuned for a regular City Council meeting starting at 6 p.m.

good evening Fort Collins the time is now 6 p.m. and I call the regular

meeting of the Fort Collins City Council to order please join me for the Pledge

of Allegiance

to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Francis? Here. Pina Taro? Here. Nelson? Here. Hoven? Here. Patiandi? Here. Fudge? Here. Conway?

Here.

All right. We are all here. I appreciate everyone who has joined us tonight, either in person or virtually. I just want to remind everyone that we're here for the same purpose, which is the future of our community. Will the city manager please provide a review of today's agenda?

Yes, thank you, Mayor. Good evening, everyone. We do not have any changes to our published agenda. We're going to start the evening with a community report from our Youth Advisory Board, and then the consent calendar includes 32 items, and then we'll have four discussion items. First is transfer of grant funds for the DOLA grant award, to develop a new Fort Collins Housing Action Plan. Next, making a supplemental appropriation from DOLA, authorizing a transfer of appropriated funds and approving an IGA for the Transit-Oriented Communities Infrastructure Project or program. And then finally making a supplemental appropriation of grant funds from the Colorado Department of Local Affairs and authorizing transfers of appropriations for the Accessory Dwelling Unit grant program. Those items, I'll just make note, are all in discussion to allow Mayor Francis to recuse herself due to a conflict. And then our fourth item for discussion is waiving the basic development review and associated development standards to facilitate the Larimer County-led plugging and abandonment of orphaned oil and gas wells in northeast Fort Collins. So that's a good news item. And then finally, we'll move into an executive session to discuss potential incentive negotiation approach and strategy. So a full night.

Great. Thank you. Yes, definitely a full agenda. Okay, so tonight we do have a community report from the Youth Advisory Board. So I'll walk them them up.

Good evening, Mayor City Council, Leanne Williams, Director of Parks and Recreation, and also one of the staff liaisons to this board. This is four of our 12 members of our Youth Advisory Board will be presenting the community portraitite and I will turn it over to them. Good evening mayor

and members of City Council my name is Sophie Williams and I'm going to be a senior at Fossil Ridge High School. Good evening mayor and members of City

Council my name is Charlotte Wand and I'm a rising senior at Rocky Mountain High

School. Good evening, Mayor and members of City Council. My name is Annalise Chafee, and I'm going to be a rising senior at Rocky Mountain High School. Good evening, Mayor and members of City

Council. My name is Brooks Foreman, and I will be a junior at Poudre High School. So just to begin, our board is called the Youth Advisory Board, and this is just our community report. To begin with some quick statistics, there are, as Leanne previously mentioned, 12 members of our board spread across the four major high schools of Fort Collins being Poudre, Fort Collins High School, Fossil High School, and of course Rocky Mountain High School. We had a total of nine board meeting this year, a total of four impact projects, and many different meetings in order to discuss those impact projects. In order to elaborate on said impact projects, I'll now turn it over to

Sophia Williams. We had four major projects this year. The first one was working alongside Poudre Fire Authority teaching stop the bleed CPR and AD in high schools we also have a mental health portion where we presented in middle schools about mental health as well as ebikes and environmental awareness where we met with environmental members of the city and also are planning to present to elementary schools and we're a previous project that we're going to work on in 2026 and 2027 is vaping and e-cigarettes. So starting with Stop the Bleed, this year we were able to do our second year of integrating CPR, AED, and Stop the Bleed classes in high schools. Last year we were able to get into Rocky, and this year we were able to present to the entire ninth grade class at Fossil Ridge High School. We had over 25 hours of presentations. We were able to present in all four quarters at Rocky and the first two quarters at Fossil and everyone on the board was also awarded a professional partnership award with Poudre Fire Authority for all of our work.

So this was our first year that we did our mental health project.

It was led by a pretty small group of youth advisory board members. So we had about four people on this committee.

We created a neuroscience and healthy habits program for middle schoolers in Poudre School District.

We created this in partnership with a local nonprofit called the Larimer County Alliance for Suicide Prevention. The goal behind this program was to teach middle schoolers the importance of building healthy habits and also teach them what mental wellness is.

Beyond that, we also wanted to educate them on neuroscience because a lot of emotions and decisions can be traced back to biological patterns in the brain.

We hosted lessons of this program successfully at Blevins Middle School in February, and

starting fall of this upcoming school year, we plan to teach this to more middle schools across the district.

So moving on to our next major project of this year, it was the environmental awareness and e-bikes.

The first aspect is one that we completed during the 25-26 calendar operations year,

in which we sent a letter bringing up the issue for council to discuss in their negotiations

with SPIN, which ultimately had an effect on the results of the negotiations, which led to a laxing in the age-related restrictions.

The second aspect is more future focused, where we are planning on educating the younger generation on environmental awareness subjects in elementary schools.

To that end, we met with an environmental specialist during the 25-26 operations year, and we continue on planning to continue with that project into the future.

So our last project was regarding vaping and e-cigarettes.

So we met with tobacco.

We had a meeting with Jody Radke and Kimberly Baker and we mostly just discussed the negative impacts that these products have on children.

And this is going to be a project that we are very focused on for the 2026-2027 school year.

And we plan to bring awareness and education to our high schools and our middle schools on why kids should be avoiding these products.

and then we also had the amazing opportunity to go to the national league of cities conference this year in washington dc and at this conference we attended a youth portion where we were able to meet with students from all across the nation and together we discussed similar problems that we all face in our cities such as housing and food insecurity and how to deal with them with those

problems in our cities. Another really exciting opportunity that we got to do on the National League of Cities trip was attend a breakfast with our senators. So on our last morning in D.C., we went to a Colorado statewide event and our youth advisory board got to brainstorm questions

to ask Michael Bennett and John Hickenlooper about current events in our national government. Getting these questions answered was really exciting because we got to learn more about not only how our local government works, but how the national government works as well.

Alongside of the conference, we were also able to do some sightseeing in DC, and we were able to go to Georgetown.

Also, we were able to go to Arlington Cemetery in

Virginia alongside the Holocaust Museum and the Smithsonian, which was a really cool opportunity for all of us to

experience and get to see, especially the Holocaust Museum.

So finally, one of the major events of the city as always, as a tradition, we received a guided tour of the monuments from Tyler Marr.

This guided tour began with the Washington Monument and took us to the World War II Memorial,

the Vietnam War Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, the Memorial to the Korean War, the Martin

Luther King Jr. Memorial, the Memorial to JFK, and of course, the Jefferson Memorial. We were intending on seeing the White House.

Unfortunately, it was closed on both times that we attempted to visit, so we couldn't see it. We plan on continuing this tradition into the future.

That is all that we have for our presentation. Well, thank you so much. That was amazing to hear. Yeah, just what you've done and all the work that's gone into it. Does Council have any questions or comments? Councilmember Patyandi and then Councilmember Hope.

Thank you. My microphone is stuck. Thank you so much for the presentation.

I had the pleasure of getting to meet with our chairs the other day, and I don't have a lot of questions. I'm just really blown away by the hard work that you guys have done, the accomplishments you've made.

And I shared this with Charlotte and Sophie, but I think what's really cool about this group is that they've come up with these initiatives together. they're implementing them, but they're selecting programs that can be handed off and continue in perpetuity outside of the Youth Advisory Board. And I just think it's really special that you all are giving that gift to your school communities. And so long after you graduate, the work of your

board is going to continue to make our high schools a better place, our community a better place. Just, I think I said this last year, but when I was in high school, I was nowhere near doing the cool stuff you guys are doing. So thank you for your time, your effort, your passion. We're very,

very lucky. Thank you very much for the presentation and congratulations on everything that you have accomplished. I am particularly impressed with your work with e-bikes. Transportation for young people is extremely challenging to get to work or babysitting jobs or whatever that may be. I am particularly interested in the safety lessons that you've implemented for ages 14 to 16. And maybe it's more of a comment than it is a question, but it would be really helpful as we address e-bikes moving through the calendar year to just keep working with you and really understanding some of the lessons that you've learned in order to incorporate them into your program. So thank you.

Councilmember Nelson.

Thank you again for your presentation. This was really cool to see your work and we all had the opportunity to have dinner with you earlier. It was really great to get to know you guys more on a personal level. I wanted to name that I think the work that you're doing is so important. We were joking about lowering the age of council to 14 from 18 when we were having dinner. but there's something to the fact that your brain right now works differently than people who have more maturity and more lived experience. You can identify opportunities that we simply can't. So we need you in our community and we need you to do the things that you're doing because your perspective first matters, and it also is something that no one else can bring. So you're doing the work and you're making our community better, and you're doing that in your own time so we really really appreciate this thank you our

community is better because of it anyone else i'll just echo my thanks for your dedication to the city the youth advisory board took a pause during the pandemic and i just think it's come back stronger than ever the thoughtfulness and time and passion you put into it is very clear and evident So thank you so much for your time dedicating to serving our city

Yeah, I just wanted to echo everyone else's sentiments I think everyone here said it better than I could but thank you guys for your efforts and keep up the good work

Okay, thank you now

We will move on to the public comment portion of our meeting. Will staff please play the public participation video

There are three ways to participate in city council meetings.

In person in council chambers, online via Zoom, or by phone.

Anyone who wants to speak during general comment or for any particular agenda item

should sign up in advance at fortcollins.gov slash councilmeetings.

You can comment on any topic, including other agenda items, during the public comment period.

Or you can comment on specific items when they are brought for consideration later in the meeting.

However, you may only speak on an agenda item once, either during general public comment or during that item's specific discussion.

During the meeting, the mayor will call by name those who have signed up to speak in the order they signed up.

To participate online, connect to the internet on your computer or mobile device and join the Zoom meeting.

The link and instructions are on the meeting agenda and in your participation confirmation

email.

Click the Raise Hand button and leave it raised until called on.

To join the meeting by phone, dial the number shown on the meeting agenda and enter the meeting ID.

Press Star 9 to raise your hand. Please note that public comment is not permitted about any items that could be appealed to

City Council, like certain kinds of development projects. information and resources about how to participate in the development review process are available on the city's website. Finally, please remember that

public comment is not a question-and-answer session and all comments should

be addressed to City Council, not to individuals. Signs and props must be 11 by 17 or smaller and may not block anyone's view. All speakers and audience

members should treat everyone with respect and dignity, maintain a welcoming environment and avoid actions that could be distracting.

And please enter and exit council chambers quietly if the meeting is still in progress.

Okay, to ensure that we have accurate information to follow up on public comment, we do ask speakers register to speak prior to 530. If you registered online prior to 530, your name will be displayed on the screen at this point we have 26 people signed up before 5 30 wishing to speak and because of our full agenda tonight everyone will have two minutes to make your comments for those in chambers please approach the podium as you see your name coming up on the screen you don't need to wait for me to call you up for those online please raise your hand now so we can easily find you and be prepared to speak as we call your name at the beginning of the comments please state your name and general address we do use the timer when the green light shows you can begin your comments when it shows yellow you'll have 30 seconds and at red will kindly ask you to stop please know that if you speak about an item during general public comment you will not be permitted to speak a second time on that item specific I will now begin calling speakers as reminder current members of boards and commissions should identify themselves and indicate whether you're speaking on behalf of yourself or the Board and Commission okay so we will start with George and then John good

evening mayor and council I'm George Grossman chief leaster at happy luckies tea house and I live in district 1 I am also a part of Foco parking for all paid on-street parking does not solve our parking issues what is the real problem We and I say we deliberately because we as small businesses see parking as a system that is broken We believe there are three core issues garage maintenance employee parking and overall parking capacity This paid on-street parking proposal solves none of them Garage maintenance is already being addressed According to the our city website and the most recent parking staff presentation to the DDA board expanded enforcement increased fines elimination of the courtesy notice, higher permit fees, and improved enforcement technology in the garages are expected to generate about $700,000 per year in additional revenue. Parking staff have requested $1.2 million. In just two to three years, the city will have the funding needed for garage maintenance. Employee parking is another issue. As far as I know, the parking capacity study has not been released publicly and employee parking was not a part of that study. The Economic Health Office had to survey Old Town businesses to learn where employees actually park. At Happy Lucky's, my employee was told only an employee, not the owner, should complete the survey. Even though some questions required information, only an owner would know. If that guidance was given to other businesses, any conclusions will be based on flawed data. I planned on a two-minute and 30-second speech. Finally, there are six recent case studies posted on the FocoParking.com website. Each is a cautionary example of recently introduced paid on-street parking producing unintended consequences and subsequently being removed. As you prepare for the August 11th work session, I hope that we can reach out as a community and continue our conversations. Thank you.

Next we have John and then Mindy. And we do have two podiums, so feel free to use both. John?

Thank you, Mayor, Council. Whoops, I won't get too close. I'm here to share some important information on this decision that you all may be facing to abandon the Halligan Reservoir Water Supply Project and get into the Northern Integrated Supply Project, also known as NISP. We have four quick points to make. Quickly about me. I've been in Fort Collins and a utility customer for 32 years. I'm a PhD ecologist who has been engaged in water work with cities, ag users, and conservationists for more than two decades. And I've worked specifically on the Halligan project quite a lot over the years for more than 15 years. Here are four reasons you should not abandon Halligan. First, affordability. NISP has become a $2.7 billion project and the costs continue to rise. And even to consider that we might know more than the six cities who have already withdrawn because of costs, I think is a real fallacy. And so the lower risk, more guaranteed water supply future is with Halligan. Point number two, reliability. We have senior water rights to store in Halligan Reservoir, an existing portfolio. there's one other user in that in that reservoir we can control our future with Halligan with NISP if there's a whole lot more unknowns and a lot more uncertainty here to NISP is a higher risk point three environmental responsibility your staff at Fort Collins utilities myself and many others have worked to make Halligan and environmentally responsible project environmental responsibility is an important thing for the city to do. Point four, save the pooter. They are encouraging the city to get into NISP after 20 plus years of fighting NISP. They fight really well. Their dreams of doing more with that $100 settlement than you guys can do with Halligan is a fallacy. So happy to be a resource to any of you going forward if you have any questions for me. Thank you so much. Thank you. Mindy and then Leanne.

Mindy not seeing Mindy all right Leanne and then we'll go to Christy good

evening thank you I'm Leanne Tiemann 6600 Thompson Drive South Fort Collins and well 46 years ago we bought a store in downtown Fort Collins and we watched as JC penny pulled out and Woolworths pulled out and downtown was desolate at At one point, our store was one of two open on North College Avenue on 100 Block. Families like ours worked with blood, sweat, and serious Mostly tears to establish a beautiful, welcoming, joyful downtown. And paid parking is absolutely the opposite of the culture. And that's the thing I think we're missing. You say that you've had studies with other similar cities. There's no city similar to Fort Collins with a culture, again, that we've established down there. No wonder it's on the best places to visit. but that's the reason why.

You are to represent your citizens, and I think the voices have been very clear. This community totally opposes on-street parking and being penalized to shop downtown. I have a lot of people in my age group. My research shows that 60, pardon me, 20% of the population in Fort Collins is over 60 years old. And I've talked to scores of them, and they all say, it's not worth a hassle, Leanne. We probably just won't go down. So please, don't destroy the culture that we've established and ruin that beautiful culture, the welcoming. Your video said you want a welcoming environment? So do we, downtown. So please, don't ruin our beautiful culture and our economy.

Thank you. Thank you. Christy and then Jan. Oh good evening. I know you're tired of seeing us the same faces saying the words old town and parking all the time. We represent though 120 businesses and that's growing. 11,000 signers of our petition and growing and thousands of customers that come past our counter every week telling us to tell the city please don't do this. Three of you separately told us, don't worry, it'll only be about a year and a half until the community gets on board and gets used to it. While that right there is admitting that there are negative consequences to paid on-street parking being implemented in Old Town. Also, how many of us small businesses are not going to be able to withstand an estimated year and a half of decreased traffic and sales, let alone an increase in customer complaints? The following, till my time runs out, are just examples of why the city is not ready to implement this and make the decision for paid on-street parking. Lack of financial transparency and a concrete paid on-street parking plan with goals. College Avenue Reconstruction Project is already going to be incredibly lengthy and very painful for downtown businesses and residents. A parking study is being used that was conducted on a Wednesday and Thursday during a snowstorm in a slow month of the year that took no downtown employee parking data into account. We continue to work on a database ourselves of examples of communities like ours that implemented paid on-street parking and marked it as a failure. There is no concrete plan to address employee parking downtown yet. Unless implemented until 11 o'clock, it has worse consequences for daytime businesses. the city has no specific plan to combat the thousands of negative comments that this issue has garnered online including hundreds of people who say they will come downtown for sure not at all or less often and if they do they will not linger the city itself admits eight or nine out of ten of the citizens are opposed to it listen we know there's maintenance and there's issues please keep bringing us to the table so we can discuss all right next we'll go to jan

not seeing Jan we'll go to Sabrina oh Jim great and then Sabrina will go to you

my name is Jan Claude Felder I'm from Rigdon farm I'm here to speak about the the

just a second

I'm here to speak about the pigs that are being allowed into our area. Our beautiful park that used to be that we used to sit in and put our blankets down, watch free movies. It dwindled away because of the water source shortage. But now the neighborhood HOA has taken into their home hands to put pigs in to take care of the problem with some weeds that we have. It doesn't take care of all of them. It takes care of only one weed. There's going to be 15 to 16 pigs in our neighborhood. They were 35 feet from my window last year, our bedroom window and our deck that we spend so much time on. I'm so disappointed because of the smell. the noise, the habits of pigs that you want your kids to even see. I want you to please change the zoning so that we can have a decent place to live. We can keep our doors and windows open. We want to smell fresh air again. We want it to be a neighborhood.

but promised that we would have a park, and it was supposed to be agreeable with the HOA,

that it was supposed to be attractive and for the use of all. And it's not. It's a mess. And I hope that you will change your mind on this subject. It's really disturbing. Thank you. Thank you. Sabrina, and then Peter.

The marginalized status that any person can achieve is disability, be it through genetics like my daughter or a car accident like my partner or a work accident like my aunt or grandpa or a botched surgery like my mom or any other number of things.

But despite this, disability is the marginalized status that consistently receives the least public support and empathy, a fact that extends to our town and politicians on all levels. Did you know that as of this year, my daughter's education funding is now controlled by a man who thinks her genetic condition is caused by Tylenol and thinks that people with ADHD belong in concentration camps? You obviously don't control that guy, but you network with people who control how the state of Colorado responds to these things. The previous iteration of city council even unanimously endorsed the man who decides if abusive disabled individuals in our town is charged as a hate crime. For those who aren't here for that public comment, he doesn't. But most importantly, you control how Fort Collins handles disability rights. You decide if the wait list for accommodative housing in this town remains 10 plus years long. You decide whether or not to use construction contractors who block sidewalks in places where there are no safe alternate routes for people with mobility issues. You decide if the city employees will face consequences for blocking sidewalks with their work trucks. Those, among other things, are all real things happening in this city today. And you decide what to do with the email in your inboxes. The attached file is a partial audit of accessibility in the city of Fort Collins buildings, complements of Cripple Punk Alliance. Fort Collins is doing some nice things, but there's still a lot of work to do, and we're happy to advise on it. You are the ones who decide if you let that work sit undone, or if you put your money behind today's proclamation and make this a truly safe and accessible city. Thank you. Thank you. Peter?

I'm back here. Can everyone hear me? Yeah, go ahead. Hello, Council members. I'm Peter Bershon, co-founder of Cripple Punk Alliance, and I grew up in Fort Collins. Your proclamation regarding disability is met with apathy. The Olmstead decision mandated that disabled people have a right to live and receive care in their own communities. Then that was in 1999. On July 20th of this year, the Department of Justice released a clarification on the Olmstead decision, taking the stance that they will no longer require meaningful enforcement of the Americans with Disabilities Act or ADA. Many city of Fort Collins facilities barely meet ADA standards as amended in 2010, and few private businesses adhere at all. With this level of deprioritization of disabled community members now leaves me to wonder if Fort Collins City Council can make the right call to ensure the ADA guidelines are included in city legislation, to review and bring up standards, bring up to standard all city facilities and properties owned by the city, to put disabled people and other marginalized communities first when making policies. We don't want performative gestures. We need real support through the protection of our human rights. In order for disabled people to stay out of institutions, the community needs to support them and accommodate them. Do you believe I deserve to be in Fort Collins? Do you believe disabled people deserve to live in Fort Collins?

Will you take meaningful steps to keep us in Fort Collins or will you sit idly by as we are sent to institutions?

show us you value us, not through a proclamation or a disability pride sidewalk, but through meaningful action. Thank you.

Thank you. Next we'll go to Adam online. All right, Adam, go ahead.

Great, thank you. Good evening, Mayor and Council members. My name is Adam Mahan. I'm a regional branch director with Elevation's Credit Union, representing our branch in Old Town located on East Mountain Avenue. Thanks for letting me speak tonight. I'm here to express our concern with the proposal to implement paid parking in Old Town and to advocate for maintaining convenient, accessible parking for residents, visitors, and local businesses.

As a financial institution, we see firsthand how people use Old Town services.

Many of our members visit our branch for quick transactions, ATM access, account assistance, and brief meetings that may last only 10 to 15 minutes. Asking them to pay simply to access their financial institution creates an unnecessary barrier and a negative experience for members who already contribute to the vitality of Old Town. Old Town's success has long been built on accessibility.

The city has invested significant time and resources into encouraging foot traffic, supporting local businesses, and making Old Town a destination, introducing paid parking risks, creating friction for the very people we're trying to attract.

When customers have other options available, even small inconveniences can influence where they choose to shop, bank, dine, or spend their time.

Our concern is not only for Elevation's members. We are also concerned about the broader impact on the locally owned businesses that help make Old Town unique.

Many business owners and community members have expressed similar concerns and that paid parking could discourage short visits and reduce accessibility to Old Town destinations. We understand the city is seeking solutions to manage parking demand and address system costs, and we appreciate that challenge.

However, we believe there are alternatives worth considering before moving to fully paid parking. At a minimum, a short-term parking option or a grace period would help to ensure access to essential services. We respectfully ask the council to carefully consider the impact on businesses and employees and residents. Thank you. Next we'll go to Barbara and then Leith.

Hello, Mayor Francis and Council.

I'm Barbara Krupnik-Goldman.

I live in District 6, and I'm here today speaking on behalf of the Fort Collins Sustainability Group. My comment relates to the Colorado Energy Office Impact Accelerator Grant, which I think

is the sixth item on the consent calendar this evening.

The FCSG is pleased that Fort Collins has the opportunity to accept this grant.

As stated in the ordinance, this grant is intended to help Fort Collins with implementing measures that extend beyond state requirements for existing buildings in order to reduce emissions from our local buildings that are under 50,000 square feet. These funds should be used in ways that yield measurable greenhouse gas reductions. Over the past two years, the city staff has already studied, done outreach, and developed at least two versions of a building performance standards policy.

And a pilot trial has already been run.

One, we are hopeful that receiving this grant, along with that work that has already been done, will facilitate the adoption of an effective building performance standards ordinance.

The heat waves, drought, and wildfires that we are experiencing right now outside our

doors make it urgently clear that we need to act to reduce the harmful emissions that are heating our planet and building performance standards is one way to do

thank you thank you leave and then Michelle

thank you City Council and welcome fellow animal advocates from around the world who might be watching at home right in our backyard there were two laboratory animal testing facilities you would never know it they have no signage There's blank buildings. What is animal testing? It's exposing animals to chemicals, medications, procedures, and other things that cause permanent damage, permanent trauma to these animals. And it's very unnecessary, as we have other methods of non-human, we have other non-animal methods of doing these tests.

Earlier this year, two beloved politicians, Andrew Baisnector and Kathy Kipp, were part of a bill to force laboratories to offer animals up for adoption once the experimentation is over. But the experimentation still happens. That doesn't stop the experimentation. Also earlier this year, a group we all love to hate, but I'm very fond of, PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, came into Fort Collins and shut down one of these laboratories. And we are excited, but it still happens. And in April, a group of activists went up to Ridgeland Farms, which is just outside of Madison, Wisconsin, second largest breeder.

We were met with extreme violence from law enforcement. So violent that one of the activists said, this is more violent than I've ever seen in the military. They ran out of pepper spray, they ran out of pepper balls, they knocked an activist unconscious. What are they hiding? We still have one laboratory in Fort Collins and we're going after them. You could help us. Please make a law to ban animal testing in Fort Collins. We have other methods and to finally 92% of all animal research Experiments do not translate data to human. Thank you. Could you just say your name and general address?

We Could you say your name and general address?

My name is Leif Youngs, and I'm from district 6. Thank you

All right, Michelle and then Kimberly

Hi, thank you mayor and City Council for the opportunity. My name is Michelle Johnson, and I am in district 2 Rigdon Farms to be specific and I looked through all the materials everything that we've been working on for the last several years and the material that city staff prepared and I realized I could come up here and go on and on about all the stuff that you have read and it's a lot I want to provide my support for that project I'm also on the HOA board and have been for just several years I've lived in Rigdon Farms for over 20 years and participated as a resident and all of the projects. What I really wanted to say was I wanted to give some praise to city staff for all of the work they did putting together these materials. I was blown away the last couple days just downloading and reading and going back through the kind of materials that we got in that packet and I know it was a lot of work and I appreciate them partnering with us. they have partnered with us in the past when we did the native grass conversion. We were one of the first subdivisions to step up and we worked with some really, really phenomenal employees. And we put in our pseudo crosswalk on Ziegler Drake Road through working with staff. And I find that partnership very beneficial to us as a very large subdivision. I think this is a unique kind of project and i appreciate everybody having an open mind about it what i also appreciate was that our our i would call not call him a vendor he is our partner and that's christoph meyer um alo terra was suggested by city employees that was who we went with and we've enjoyed that partnership as a resident i would only wish that all residents would partner with us on this project

for a more favorable outcome. Thank you. Thank you. Kimberly and then Angie. Kimberly Connor,

Human Services and Housing Funding Board, but not speaking for the board at this time. Today, I'm here to bring awareness to a deepening threat to free speech. This week, the White House has made public statements essentially declaring leftists to be terrorists. As a socialist myself, this concerns me as it should you. In a speech from Marco Rubio, he directly targeted anarchists. For those who don't know, anarchists are essentially libertarians of the left. The term literally means without rulers, people who reject hierarchy and believe in the people leading themselves. In his speech, Rubio goes on to describe anarchist styles of sharing and distributing resources in literature as material support of terrorism. This is not an idle threat. Last year, 22 people faced terrorism charges for their association with a protest at an ICE facility where one officer was injured. One person who did not even go to the protest received 30 years because he moved a box of anarchist literature. The state used this literature and participation in a book club as proof of organized terrorist activity. The sentencing judge directly stated that he was giving the maximum sentences because the state wants to send a message to anyone who shares a similar ideology. This is an attack on free speech and dissent, an attack on all political ideologies that don't align with the state. The White House has increasingly conflated Democrats with Socialists and Socialists with Communists. They fearmonger about anarchist violence. They are naming everyone from the DSA to the National Lawyers Guild as having ties to Communist terrorist groups in Cuba, and they have directly stated that they will use local law enforcement to fight this rise in supposed left-wing terrorism. When you see the U.S. government declare it will use our local police against terrorist threats when they are arresting people for literature and can't differentiate between political ideologies, you should feel directly threatened. So I will ask you as council members to create stronger barriers between local law enforcement and the federal government. Basically, don't allow our police to cooperate with federal investigations into nonviolent actions of local politicians. Thank you. Remember, first they came for the communists. We'll go to Angie.

And then Keith.

ANGIE DIXON, I AM ANGIE DIXON. I LIVE IN DISTRICT 2 AND I AM HERE JUST COMMENTING ON THE PIG CONSIDERATION FOR RIGDON FARM. I AM A RESIDENT OF RIGDON FARMS AND I HAVE LIVED THERE FOR 10 YEARS AND I AM SUPER GRATEFUL TO OUR HOMEOWNERS ASSOCIATION THAT REALLY DOES TAKE EVERY MEASURE POSSIBLE TO CREATE VERY SUSTAINABLE, VERY ECOFRIENDLY MEASURES FOR OUR VERY LARGE AREA. They were one of the first neighborhoods to make the transition from our bluegrass to our native grass to really reduce our water needs. And as being one of the first to take that approach, we definitely had some bumps along the way that took that transition longer. That also affected in not a great way just the image and the beauty of our neighborhood. You know, people would be like, oh, my gosh, what's happening to Rigdon? What's happening over there? Which isn't fun to be a part of, especially when you know that the heart of everyone, it's in the right place. So I feel like we're getting into that same situation with the hogs. I think weeds with deep roots that are noxious are common to Colorado. And I just hope that in this case, instead of people learning on the shoulders of us and our mistakes, that we could take a few minutes to learn from others. Boulder and Jefferson County have very large neighborhood grazing programs that I think they could be just a model that we lean to as we take this approach. So I just hope to moving forward that if this does if this permit does move forward That there are some measures in place so that this really does benefit the entire community and not just a few Thank you. Thank you Keith

And I'm gonna Jana

Hi, I'm Keith Pecoraro, I am a Regden farm resident and an HOA board member I'm just standing up in support of the project with the pigs

I think it's a thoughtfully considered, long considered solution.

I think that my impression is that both those in favor and those opposed want a solution to the weed problem. And I think really it's the only viable solution that's been proposed.

A lot of other things have been tried and failed. And so I think it's time to give this one a go. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Deanna and then Rich.

I'm very glad that you are all here. It shows that you are passionate about living in Fort Collins. I too am very passionate about living here. I've lived here all my life, born in Denver, raised in Fort Collins, and have shopped in our downtown area for 54 years. I work five days a week in Old Town, seven hours per day on average, and I have not met one single customer, business owner, employee, salesperson, or artisan that thinks any good would come from paid on-street parking. But we all have questions. Here are some of our questions in regards to that. What is your current budget? What are you spending the money on? What are you planning to do with the money gained from this? How much is doing this going to cost to implement? And yearly, how much is that going to cost? How much are you expecting to get from paid on street parking? What is your plan for all of us employees who shouldn't have to pay to work? How are you going to make this welcoming to our out-of-town and elderly customers who don't want to use a QR code or won't? who will enforce it how much will that cost how are you going to keep fort collins downtown area welcoming and social what alternatives do you have planned for people who can't afford the additional cost how are you going to reimburse our business owners and artisans for profit they will lose have you considered other alternatives to raise money for the city What are they? When are you going to answer our questions? We hope you will choose to continue prioritizing our business owners and making our downtown area wonderful and social like we do. Thank you for your time. I know you want the best for us. Could you just say your name and general address? My name is Jana Archuleta. I'm in Lexington Green Village West. Thank you. Rich and then

Spencer. Rich Dave, Average Citizen of Fort Collins, 80525. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilors. One question that I had was PRPA let out a news note that said people were supposed to use less electricity yesterday. What it didn't say, as far as I can see, is it didn't say, it told people they can turn up their thermostats, but it didn't say unplug your electric car. so I think there are certain aspects of bias that occurs with PRPA because City of Fort Collins has someone two people sitting on the board City of Fort Collins is a major player in PRPA in terms of the dollars spent and the energy used on item 20 with the sentencing issues I had a hard time reading through some of that. I know there's a trifecta kind of like political AI and ordinance going on, but in some cases I saw grammatical errors that didn't make any sense. In another case I saw $2,650 for 1 to 25 miles an hour over a speed limit and $1,000 for 25 plus. It seems to indicate the wrong activity. Maybe I'm misreading that. On item 23, I was kind of scratching my head a little bit. If I looked for the value of the property on North House, $1.5 million, but it's being turned over for $500. On item 24, I'm not, I don't think pigs are the right answer, but just just don't ask me I don't think I'd want that my my neighborhood item 25 the question is who's the winner who's the loser when the when the city rents out water there's always losers and winners how's it gonna be fair thank you

very much thank you Spencer and then we'll go to Barbara W hi I'm Spencer from district 5 and I'm here to talk about paid parking when I first learned that the cost in America for subsidizing free parking, on the line of estimates, they have $100 billion per year. And one of the higher ones I've heard is $374 billion a year. So for paid, for free parking, the subsidies amount to like whole number percentages of GDP. That's like a

serious cost of living issue for everyone. I've heard people sort of like hand wave away a lot

of studies about the cost, the real cost of free parking. And by saying that Fort Collins is unique and I don't see how it's unique in meaningful ways here. I think what is unique about Fort Collins is that we are unusually good for an American city about having good bike, pedestrian, public transit infrastructure. And when we have that, those sort of things and are effectively charging everyone for the cost of subsidizing parking, we are charging people who are sort of doing the things we want and using public transit. We are making people bear the cost who don't even

use the parking or drive their cars. And we've heard a lot from business owners today, but other cities also had a lot of opposition, but Ventura, the city of Ventura, California

had a very similar thing. And not long after paid parking was passed there, it turned out 85% of business owners in the area were actually in support of parking because they saw increased revenue. The 30% figure that we keep seeing is cherry-picked from a Starbucks during unusual times and isn't really an argument against paid parking. It's more of an argument for dynamic pricing. One thing I'd like to point out is that I do worry with paid parking that we may see more use of disabled spots, and I'm worried we don't have enough because people who weren't using them currently might switch to using them to save a few dollars. Thank you. Thank you. Barbara and

then Jennifer. Okay. Hi, I'm Barbara Wilkins. I live on the south end of Fort Collins. I wanted to talk about parking downtown. The people like it because it's free. I actually have an elderly couple that came to my store and believe it or not, they can't ride a bike. And they said, we like coming here from Windsor and from, you know, other people have told me from Cheyenne and various other places because they said it feels very welcoming here. And I come because that is a free parking thing. And I am elderly. I can't walk that much. And that's why they like

to come here. The second thing I've been told by people are apps that are used by cities to use for getting into parking or whatever, they find very complicated, especially some older people. I mean, I myself have that problem too. And so people are also just tired of adding more and more apps to their phones. If going to another city requires them to use an app to do parking or whatever, people just don't like all that clutter on their personal phones anymore. It's annoying to them. And what I have always been puzzled about why there has never been any discussions on a site or where one could be built because for over seven years, there's been a written agreement made by the DDA to the city of Fort Collins to build another parking structure. And funding was put aside for it of 1.5 million. I don't see that's talked about. There needs to be accountability for not managing parking the way we have had it done. And I'd like to know who is responsible for removing all the gates in those parking garages. I really would like to know.

We need to be a welcoming community and a vibrant downtown. Thank you. Thank you. All right, Jennifer and then Adam.

Good evening, City Council members and our mayor of our great city of Fort Collins. I'm Jennifer Bacard. I live in District 2 in Rigdon Farm, and I am strongly opposed to the idea of having pigs again in our neighborhood. This would be the third year. For one thing, it's really late in the season to implement this, so I suggest if we're going to do it, let's talk about it a little bit more over the winter and implement it next year. And besides that, these pigs are really loud and odorous. And so I have a friend that lives in her backyard, backs onto this area, and she was woken up every single morning last year when the pigs were there. She described as two of the pigs attacking a younger one every single morning. and the younger one's squealing. Fifteen pigs in a little area. It's longer than just like a square. And these are homes that are backing right onto this. And it just seems to me we could find a better solution to this than that. I know they've been doing research and I greatly appreciate our HOA's you know

commitment and whatnot this is the weed that are not a weed it's a net native grass that they want to grow there and they said it was a two years ago such a

success these these are there but it's just infiltrated with the invasive weeds

as well so I don't see how it's actually been successful they say oh it's a

great success everybody's for it they're not my neighbors are against Adam and

then we'll go to Tara my name is Adam Hirshhorn I'm from district 6 mayor or I'm sorry district 2 good evening mayor and council I came to support the consent calendar tonight. That's not my usual fair. I like to protest anything I can get my hands on basically. But the fact of the matter is these are instruments of urgent necessity. Our food, water, power, and fiscal viability are matters that need attending to it's a civil defense matter as far as I'm concerned and so I don't know if I can really cotton to arguments that people who moved to Rigdon farm didn't realize that it was ever a farm or that these aren't just other creatures to share the planet with. I just I don't care about that. I don't.

Thank you. It's an extensive agenda that 36 items perhaps a special meeting. You guys are

working a lot and I appreciate it.

As far as it says so on the 10 with Rigdon Farms, there's another thing that I want you to consider and that's the city itself. Colonel Collins saw it as soon as he saw the lay of the land. We're not a sanctuary city. We are a fort. Defend it as such. Thank you.

Thank you. Tara and then Nadine.

Good evening. I'm mayor and city council. My name is Tara Loveley, and I am a resident of Rick and Farm and also the association manager for the HOA. I have been the association manager since 2018, was immediately hit with the implementation of excess water fees. We understand that we live in a high desert. There's a water shortage that we have to deal with. So we took it upon ourselves to be proactive, as previous residents have spoken. We were the first association to implement a massive conversion of our Kentucky bluegrass to native grasses. You talk about being on the leading edge. We were on the bleeding edge of that process. And so obviously lots of learning curves because no one had done a conversion that big before. And in working hand in hand with the city through a partnership, we were introduced to Alotera, who has been a godsend to us because they are experts in this field and have given us a process to follow of time-proven methods to eradicate invasive weeds. We have tried for the past two summers to use these methods and have both times been met with bureaucracy and regulation from the city to where we couldn't have the pigs in these areas to their full extent to provide the benefit. So we are hoping that you would approve this measure so that we can continue down this path and actually see the success that this method can bring. Because we feel like what we are trying to do is in hand with the goals of the city in not using harsh pesticides and chemicals to eradicate the weeds, but working with nature and harmony to make a better environment. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Nadine? And then we'll go to Adam online.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council. Thank you for your service to our community. My name is Nadine Young, and I have been a Rigdon Farm resident for over 20 years, which is District 2. During these years, I've served on the boards as both residential and master HOA, and as a board member, one of our tasks is to keep the HOA solvent by being fiscally responsible.

When the city changed how they charged excess water fees in 2017, we knew that we could not sustain the green grass with the new fee structure, and we had to look for alternatives.

One of the CSU extension recommendations is dicambra, which is a benzoic acid herbicide.

herbicide. The EPA says it isn't carcinogenic, but there are scientific studies that have linked it

to elevated risks of liver and bile duct cancer and leukemia. The European Union, which has

stricter standards than we do, classifies it as a suspected endocrine disruptor. The pigs,

on the other hand, consume the kochia, turning dense stands into bare soil. Their rooting breaks up the soil allowing them to eat the seeds beneath and to help prepare a clean seed bed for the prairie to recover now i don't believe these pigs are going to cause me to have cancer or develop an endocrine issue i think they're pretty they're they're pretty cool and although i might be temporarily inconvenienced by their presence having survived cancer myself i'll take the pigs any day Let us move forward and show that there are better eco-friendly alternatives to herbicides. Thank you. Please vote for my pigs.

Thank you. All right.

Adam already spoke before, so we will move on to our last speaker, which is Cameron.

Cameron, you're up next. You can just come on. Yeah.

There you go.

Good evening, Madam Mayor and members of council. I'm Cameron Gloss. I reside in the west side neighborhoods of Old Town. I'm here not to speak to you about pigs, but about downtown paid parking. I just, you know, I don't envy all of you for this task. The city has struggled for decades with this issue of upside down parking pricing, all the investment in downtown parking structures. They're incredibly expensive. It's hard to police downtown parking These are all big challenges, but I wanted to point out some of the other things you might want to consider As you moved towards taking some kind of action on paid parking The first is really the importance of downtown to this community I mean it's a very small land area One and a half percent something like that almost 20 percent of your sales tax revenue it has a huge impact on the economy but not only that it's the regional impact and i think we had heard another speaker talking about how when meeting people from other communities as they come in i've had the opportunity as a consultant to work in laramie cheyenne casper greely loveland And all of those communities love downtown Fort Collins. And you'll be amazed at the number of people, when you talk to them on the street, I tell them on Fort Collins, they go, oh, yeah, I go to your downtown all the time. It's very popular. It's very important, I think, to embrace this notion that people just can't get on a bus or ride a bike to downtown. The main vehicle for them is a car. And I mean the definition of pedestrian from most of the time is somebody that found a parking place So you have to take that into account When I was a project manager of the downtown plan back in 2017, we had a working group on parking and

Thank you. You can always email your comments in. Thank you. Thank you Right. That is everyone who has signed up before 5 30 p.m. to speak during public comment and we do have a separate list for those who signed up to speak during the item specific so we will now end public comment does anyone on council have any follow-up to public comment seeing none council member Nelson sorry I thought for sure that council member

Pat Yandy would beat me to it I'm not used to going first I wanted to

specifically address the comments about the ADA and Fort Collins commitment to the built environment. So I'm an architect in my day job, and so I work in this environment, not in the built environment. The ADA, if I'm, my name is, if I'm Ann's explaining, I don't want it to sound like that. I see you, like, you are a neighbor, you're part of our community, like you have a right as much as anybody else to be in any place in our community, and I mean that deeply. The ADA is civil rights legislation and that can only really be, I mean, the only way to enforce that is a lawsuit, right? And I can feel the city attorney getting nervous. But the response to that is to codify the same type of legislation, at least in the built environment, through the ANSI A117.1. It's the 2017 edition that's the most recent. And that is basically line for line, almost identical to the ADA. And that is in the city of Fort Collins code that is adopted. There are obviously still conversations to have about existing buildings, but all new buildings between that and the Colorado revised statutes. There's a system to make sure that our buildings, our homes, and everything else that we construct is accessible to everyone so one I want to make sure that like I have the chance and this would be offline like I would love to meet with you and the chief building official and and talk about what those specific code requirements are when that comes into effect because there are lines when you remodel a building that if you go sorry I care obviously when you remodel a building like going past a certain percent you have to apply the ANZ criteria so want to make sure that like we talk about that and that can be something offline my contact information is like literally on the city website so please reach out and And also, the other part of that, Kelly, I would love to know what the most effective way to report any routes that are blocked by city vehicles. I mean, accessibility is important. And when that isn't happening, a thing on the app might make sense. But also, like, how quickly does that get resolved?

You're very good at knowing what I'm asking.

Thank you.

Yes, so I would say absolutely we appreciate when people report things to us because we may not be everywhere in the community to see those things. So through our Access Fort Collins button on the website is the easiest way to do that probably. You could also, though, if that app is not an easy way, you can call our main city manager's office number and people can pass that information on that way as well. But I would say the app and we do review those pretty much in real time. And usually within three days, people get at least a response if it's something immediate. Like a blocked access, it would be much quicker than that.

Okay, good to know. So not to say that your concerns don't exist because they absolutely do and I hear that.

But wanting to make sure that you feel heard and then also that we can sort of talk about ways to make our city more accessible for really everyone. That's what I got. Thank you.

Anyone else?

Thank you to everybody who came out. We kind of hit on all the big topics right now. I also wanted to just speak to our disability community.

We celebrated disability pride tonight, I think, in the face of federal actions that

are making people understandably nervous, scared, and feeling discriminated against. And let's just keep the dialogue going.

I appreciate that we've got smart, strong advocates in our Fort Collins community who are keeping us up to date on what's going on and that we have staff who are charged with making sure that our city is doing what we can to take care of our neighbors with disabilities.

So I do just want to know that you've been heard and I am sorry that you are having to grapple with tough news in a month when we should be celebrating all the progress that we've made in civil rights.

But thank you for being here tonight and thanks to everybody for being here tonight.

Mayor Porton. Yeah, thank you. So for whoever was paying attention to know that you needed to do the public comment for parking now when that work session is almost three, four weeks away, excellent job. So really looking forward to that conversation and getting some of those answers on August 10th, I believe it is. And then I'm wondering, looking at the city manager for some of the things Rich Stave brought up, can you just have, it sounds like there were some discrepancies perhaps on item 20 that might need to be looked at. And I know, Mr. Stave, you said it in passing, but as I understand it, AI is not used at all in putting these agendas together. And that is more likely human error if it is an error at all. So the other thing I do want to point out, so the pigs or hogs, I say hog, obviously the first three letters of my last name are pigs. And so I do not have, I don't know, that doesn't make me think about it one way or the other. But this is on our consent calendar, so it's not meant for a discussion item unless someone feels like pulling it. in reading through the item I do really appreciate the work that the planning and zoning board put in and and that whole process and I trust in that process at this point I think it sounds like this may be about five years that during the growing seasons before all the seeds are finally eradicated I do feel like it is an innovative solution but I also see that sounds like it's kind of an easy off-ramp if something goes awry so hopefully it is not does not take that long and it can be sooner but thank you for looking at something that's a little

out of the ordinary anyone else all right seeing none does anyone on council wish to pull and you can set calendar items for individual discussion that's

Thanks, Mayor. I would like to pull number 25, please.

All right. Can you provide a brief explanation?

You know, I kind of went back and forth on if it made sense to just ask questions or if actually pulling the item made sense. This is the consent agenda item around having a framework for determining multi-year water rights leases. And I think I just have enough in-depth questions that I'm not ready to vote yes without getting a little bit more context. Okay.

Is there a motion to approve the items on the consent calendar minus item 25?

Yes. I move approval of consent calendar items 1 through 32 minus item 25.

Is there a second? Second. Motion by Mayor Pro Tem and Assange it by Council Member Nelson. Well, is there any further discussion? All right.

Will the clerk please call the roll fudge yes Conway yes Francis yes Pina Taro yes Nelson yes Hovind yes body Andy yes right that passes 7-0 do

council members have any other comments on the consent calendar I do I wanted to

just briefly address item 23 have it now passed this I just wanted to name the Part of this is the Eco Thrift location currently. I think it's really important to note that Eco Thrift serves a waste diversion function that commercial real estate, or sorry, real estate, I don't know where that came from. Commercial thrift chains just don't. So some of those organizations exist to fund employment or social services that, you know, they fund them through thrift retail and eco thrift. And there are other businesses like that in our community. But eco thrift specifically exists for waste diversion and the circular economy. So this is exactly the kind of business model that our city's climate goals are looking for and require. And I don't think that it's one that can survive on retail margins alone. Because it handles items with negative or near zero resale value, but it does have a really high environmental value. So like transit or libraries, EcoThrift and its peers is economically fragile because markets don't price in environmental value. And I think if we're serious about our climate commitments, we need to support the circular economy infrastructure that makes them possible. So I think this is still a priority of mine and our community and would like to find ways to support businesses like this moving forward. I'm glad for the relationship that the city had in the time that it did with this business. And for those of you on Reddit, there is a list now of businesses that are similar and serve that circular economy. I wish I knew the whole link, but if you email me I can send it to you In any case it I just wanted to name That type of business and I again think it aligns with our priorities. Thank you

Anyone else? Yeah, that's my brother. I just have three quick comments regarding the pigs I like councilmember pig notaro was not I didn't feel like it was necessary to pull the item But there were letters that did talk about concern for the animals and working with neighbors. And so I really hope that the community continues to work together and communicate to make sure that the easy off-ramp, if something goes wrong, can be implemented. I want to congratulate the three interns on item 16. The Strayer Center at CSU is fabulous work. So I'm really looking forward to hearing how those internships that Melanie Haley and Mia get to participate in this year. So congratulations. And I think that's it. Yes. Thank you. Okay.

Anyone else? Seeing none, there are no staff reports tonight. Do council members have any reports? Council member Potlandi?

I will be quick, but I wanted to acknowledge and some of my colleagues might want to add in, but a few of us had a chance to speak with the latest cohort of the Adelante Youth Fellowship, which is primarily comprised of high school and college age students of color from immigrant backgrounds, and they get opportunities to be paired with various employers and agencies in the community and to build their leadership skills. And it was just a very cool opportunity to speak with them last week. I also wanted to mention, and I don't have my right notes pulled up, but there was an article this past week in the Colorado Sun about improved flows in the Poudre River and more consistent flows. And we actually were a party in building the plan. And the city of Fort Collins had a variety of staff members, I think, from natural areas and potentially utilities.

I can't remember all the departments, but they worked on that Poudre Flows plan. And it was pretty cool to see something that Fort Collins worked on get shouted out as a beneficial project in a state newspaper. So thanks to folks who worked on that Poudre Flows plan. Council Member Fudge.

Thank you. So I had the opportunity to attend the Front Range Passenger Rail brand launch back on July 12th in Denver, naming it Coco. So that was a pretty cool event. I got to meet some other city council members from the cities that will have the stations, and they were just as excited as we were for that service to launch. And then just a reminder that this coming, or I should say next Friday, July 31st, from 4 to 7 at Twin Silo Park, The city will be having an event known as kids in the park A lot of cool music activities for the kids food trucks, which I plan on sampling heavily And so I will be there as well if you'd like to come and say hi. So thank you

Anyone else? Yeah, I apologize if anybody wants to look at the article about pooter flows, it was on CBS news It was not in the Colorado Sun. So if you actually want to read about it, I pointed you in the wrong direction

anyone else I'll just add that it's been a while since we've had a regular meeting so thank you for coming and council was busy during the break we just didn't have Tuesday meetings I do just want to say thank you to the city for hosting Fourth of July for our community it seems like forever ago but we haven't had a meeting an opportunity to just thank the community for showing up I know that we deviated from the parade but touch a truck was very popular and I think the community really enjoyed it and it was really cool to see some of those city operations up close. So just thank you everyone for keeping our community safe and enjoying the 4th of July holiday. I also just want to say that we will not have a meeting on August 4th because it will be neighborhood night out. So I encourage everyone to find their closest neighborhood night out. It's on the city website and you can go visit with your neighbors, enjoy beverages and food and get to know everyone in your neighborhood. Council and some of our police services and fire will be out saying hi. So we We hope to see you out there as well.

All right. Next, we will consider item number 25, pulled from the consent calendar for individual discussion. Is there a staff presentation?

We do not have a staff presentation planned, but we'll invite Jen Dial and Nicole Potts-Lint Johnson from One Water Team to come up and be available for any questions.

Great. Would any members of the public like to speak on this item? Seeing none, do council members have any questions or comments?

I'm the one who pulled it. Thank you both for sticking around to answer my questions and also for the hard work both on drafting the framework and also responding quickly with a memo. That was really helpful. But with that additional context, I just still have some questions I guess about if this framework is seeking to solve a problem that doesn't exist. Like to me on the surface, it kind of seems like we're looking at changing the way we've done things that have been pretty successful per the request of a specific municipality. And I understand that regional partnerships are really important, but I also want to make sure that we're not establishing expectations with other entities that might compromise our duties to our rate payers when we're in an increasingly volatile climate situation. So let me see. I had some questions about just the level of objectivity that's currently in the plan about how we would determine what circumstances would make a multi-year lease worth consideration. So I wanted to check that out. And then I also just wanted to really make sure that we've got some robust things in place around if conditions don't end up being what we anticipated when we made a multi-year agreement, that we have some pretty good opportunities to make changes. So I do have specific questions. I just wanted to preface that. So my first question was, are there concrete ways that we would define surplus water upon which we would build our referral for a five-year commitment over the annual that we're currently using?

Yes, we, on a monthly basis, we're projecting both our supply and demand based on hydrologic conditions. And we're always looking at a worst case scenario, dry year, high demand, average year based on 20 years of data, and then above average supply and demand. And when we move to a five-year, we're looking at those same factors of supply and demand. And we'll be a little more conservative, erring on what's happened in more recent years for more of a dry year, high demand scenario. And we would not want to go above that.

Are there specific numerical thresholds? Are there actual numbers or is it more of a...

Yeah, we're looking at what we've actually yielded of our water supply, every single source of water supply. We look at what we physically yielded in different years. And then for demand, we look at actual demand in conjunction with, was it an average year? Was it a dry year? Was it a wet year?

Okay. And are we seeing, this is just my assumption, but are we seeing that with climate changing that our historical data are less and less reliable as foundations for us making decisions about what things are going to look like five years into the future?

Because I just feel like right now, anecdotally, it seems like things are much more unpredictable. What are the changes with what the yield of water is going to be or the timing or things like that?

We're definitely seeing greater variability and a change of timing and peak stream flow and things like that, which is why we do look at these different scenarios. What's the lowest yield that we ever think we might see? And we came very close to it this year, but because we were conservative, we were still able to plan for that. We are updating modeling. We're looking at updated climate and demand projections that are going to help us better predict when we go to make those decisions on if taking on a demand for five years puts that as any risk or not. We have a lot of data-driven tools to help us do that.

Okay. And then do we have a specific percentage that's been set of our water portfolio that we could commit to leases without reducing resilience?

Annually, we just look at the beginning of the year based on, you know, this worst case, what we expect to see conservatively how much our surplus will be. And that varies year to year based on hydrology. So, no, there is not an exact number like that we would commit to making available every year.

Okay.

Okay. And then I have the question I kind of asked about this, but like if our projections change, but we're not technically in a declared shortage, how would we, like if it's feeling like it's tight, but we're not quite meeting that threshold for a shortage, how with this plan would we react if we were like in year three of a five year commitment to another municipality or another user?

If we haven't declared a shortage, we're meeting all of our customers demands. and so there is not a risk by continuing to meet an obligation of a rental.

Okay. Are there any concerns? This is just more subjective, but, you know, I understand that we would legally have the right to rescind water that we're leasing.

I apologize if I'm not using the right language, but to rescind that lease if conditions change. I saw that you had written that in there. I worry a little bit, you know, when we're talking about things like regional partnerships about being there being some pressure, you know, if we've given a five year lease and we're like, we actually just don't feel comfortable and we want to reel this back. How would we how would we manage, you know, I guess those regional relationships and expectations like that? Because it does seem like the numbers and the cutoffs and things are going to shift depending year by year. I don't know how clear I'm being but how would we navigate if we do have to rescind that lease from somebody that we had had planned to have a relationship for five years

I think the situation where that occurs the whole region is going to be facing a really difficult time and we're just going to have to try to get through it together and communicate more water efficiency. And, um, I would hope that our regional water providers would understand that we have to make sure we meet our customer needs prior to meeting another service areas needs. Um, and they would likely see that they know it's a risk, right? And, um, so it's something that they're hopefully prepared to respond to in whatever way they need to. Okay. Um, and I can

definitely see I read that there were some revenue opportunities for the city and I also saw that there's a potential benefit I could see for our folks who are in the growth management area but are served by different water water districts I think I was surprised that it was Windsor that was the the kind of impetus for us having this conversation like a different municipality that you know, none of the residents are in our city limits. So I guess I'm just wondering what kind

of revenue are we talking about if we extend from the year to year to a five-year with,

say, another municipality? So those terms we do not detail in the framework simply because each agreement needs to be negotiated on whatever variables that agreement needs. Like an agreement's going to be different depending on the party making the request. I can share that with Windsor, they already have what I would see a similar agreement in place with the city of Lublin and city of Greeley in which they pay an annual fee. I believe one is $50,000 a year and another $75,000 a year regardless they use that water or not. And then on top of it is this acre foot, price per acre foot that is reflective of the assessment. And if we look at currently our one year rentals would just be recouping that assessment. So when you're talking about a longer term policy or an agreement, it would add that, let's say $50,000 a year for five years. So, you know, and that's not, has not been negotiated. I'm just giving you an example of agreements that we would look to in negotiating a similar agreement. Okay. And this may have been in

the read before packet, but does, is Windsor just under resourced with their rights for their population or their storage that they have arrangements with, you said, Loveland and Fort Collins and that they're needing to lease water from other municipalities? So they're dependent

on Glade Reservoir, which has now been delayed. Okay. And so they're really just wanting to get as much certainty as possible because they really don't know for sure when that water is going to become available. So that is why they've reached out. Okay.

Okay. I mean, I really appreciate that we're thinking ahead and we're seeing that there is a request and we want to have a plan for, like, how do we navigate these conversations. my understanding is that if we're considering a longer term lease, that it would come to council, that it's not just a yes or no based on this plan. I think my biggest concern, and I've talked with both of you guys, I'm very conservative about water. And so for me, I was like, if we've got a one year lease plan that for the most part feels nimble enough and flexible enough for us to constantly be checking back in and seeing if we need to change course, to me, that feels comfortable.

I would be interested just to hear from my colleagues how they feel about this. But to me, I kind of felt like there were more compelling arguments for keeping what we have, considering unpredictability in climate and, you know, just, you know, the availability of water.

but again I know that I tend to be a much more conservative gal than may may fit the the values of the organization so I would love to hear from anybody who has other thoughts

and thank you for answering all my wonky half-baked questions not half-baked half understood

council member Fudge thank you and thank you my council member Pai Yandi for asking those questions they were not half-baked they were on my mind as well I just want to clarify because I think you touched on it but just to be sure that basically as I read the minutes I think this policy would require that these agreements have a provision that water rentals would not be permitted during level one through level four water restrictions so we would basically say we're entering into those restrictions we're stopping the supply your supply your lease and that's terms of the agreement so that's the case right correct okay I think that that sort of gets at my main concern as well the ability to you know keep keep the water that we need and I appreciate if we have excess helping out our neighbors and generating revenue with this so I think those explanations and the answers to your questions have helped me with this so thank you anyone else

councilmember hoven well as i was just even reading and maybe this isn't fair appropriate of me but just in item 22 talking about water in the arthur's ditch irrigation with um the credits the um the let me make sure i'm calling it the right thing the water supply requirement credits when i was reading the first paragraph on um page 455 and it just emphasized that the water supply requirement represents the anticipated annual amount of water. Just the annual piece in just hearing some of the discussions, it just, that resonated with me in approaching 25, item 25, that if it's an annual process, then it's, I don't, again, I don't, I'm not the expert you are. Just understanding what risks there might be if we enter a five-year agreement. And I guess I'm just erring on the more conservative side, too. And maybe my arguments don't fully align and make sense. But it just seems, I don't know, I just have some additional concerns, I guess.

I could share one example that might help illustrate. for instance this year we know was a really dry year we still had ended up having about or at this point in the year have about 2,000 acre feet of surplus supplies that we've been able to help parks out so even in a really bad year in our near future in the next five years our gap between our supply and demand is rather large unless we get in ourselves into that worst

worst case scenario just something to consider and i appreciate that very much i think being a fourth generation coloradan i've never seen it like this and it has scared me it has scared me a ton so to me i'm like we are in the worst case scenario and that's great that we have such robust supplies, I mean, will we ever see snow again? Those are the things that I really worry about. So I'm not sure how to finish my statement. I'll just add my thoughts.

You know, and Josh covered a lot of kind of my comments. I think that, you know, Fork Kong is a very strong water portfolio. And I think it's hard to, you know, it took me years to wrap my mind around when we have excess water it's not like we're just storing it and we can just store it for 10 or 20 years right and so there is a need to use it and leasing is one great option for that and so leasing it especially to a nearby community that's part of our region that needs extra water right now because of the delay for their water supply I think it absolutely makes sense we have ways to stop if we are really getting into trouble I think that we have the system built in place to know when we're heading in that direction. And I think it's better to move to a five-year plan because it kind of gives everyone certainty and to recoup our costs. So I think it's, for me, I'm comfortable with the proposal and happy to move it forward.

I just have a clarifying question based on what you said. So assuming that Glade Reservoir and or Halligan Reservoir is constructed and we have a different configuration of storage possibilities. Does that change at all what's considered excess supply since I would hope that we would have the possibility to actually hold on to some of our water in store longer term?

Yes, it would definitely change how much we want to maintain in storage and, you know, look at where demand's out into the future. So there is possible. I mean, the, the amount of surplus that we will see will change over time. And that's why we're keeping at this five-year minimum. Okay. Because that will change. Okay. So would this be a plan that

we would potentially revisit if we have some reservoir storage in the future? Or would this plan, just the numbers and things would change within the plan? I think there is a potential

that the policy may need to be revised. But I'd say at least for the next five or 10 years, this framework seems reasonable or is reasonable.

And I would add that each one of these would be brought to council with justification and trends that would show you that we indeed feel that the water is there and available. And again, the risk factor of not having water because of a drought, the framework is built so that we don't have to supply water in that year. So I just, I wanted to kind of lay that out, that you will have, each one of these will give you an opportunity to review the facts and decide if you're comfortable with moving forward. Okay.

It sounds like with some more data and fleshed out. Okay, perfect. Thank you.

Council Member Holford?

No, I'm just listening to the mayor and Councilmember Fudge and the questions and then hearing your reassurance, essentially. It's helpful. So thank you.

Okay. Is there a motion for this item?

Yeah, I move approval of Resolution 202695, adopting the one water utility long-term water rental policy. Second.

It's a motion by Mayor Potem and a second by Councilmember Nelson. Any further discussion? Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll.

Comley? Yes. Francis? Yes. Pina Terro? Yes. Nelson? Yes. Hovind?

Yes. Matiandi? Yes. Fudge? Yes.

Okay, that passes 7-0 and we will move on to our discussion items.

I have declared a conflict of interest for items number 33, 34, and 35 due to my role at the Department of Local Affairs, so I'm going to step out. May I have for 10 we'll take over and I'll be back for item number 36.

Okay, thank you. All right, so on to item number 33. Is there a staff presentation to this item?

There is not. We do have staff available to answer any questions if you have them.

Okay, and do we have anyone signed up who would like to speak to this item?

All right, go ahead. You will have, oh, sorry, wait a minute.

Yes, two minutes.

Rich Stave, Average Citizen of Fort Collins, 80525. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you, counselors. When I read through this, I'm not sure I understood everything was associated with that. The question becomes, when they say a lapsing budget to a non-lapsing budget, is that really an FTE? Are you adding people to do this when you say, I'm no longer lapsing? I'm going to add people to take care of all this. This becomes a new department, new responsibility, new area. I think when someone says, yeah, we do have an affordable housing association that is attached with the city, and their responsibility is to push these ideas forward. And in the context of that, it seems like that's where the budget goes. It's not really a city department, as I understand. And it's really more attached to the city. And I'm not really sure where all this money is going. We're obviously pumping a lot of money at it associated with the tax initiative that went forward. We're spending money already that I don't know that has been collected. But there's a question in where all the money comes from and where all the money goes. I'm not really sure how this works. Thank you.

Thank you. Is there a follow-up or any questions or comments on this item?

Okay.

Do I have a motion? MS. Yes, Mayor Patem. I move to adopt on second reading ordinance number 068-2026 authorizing the transfer of appropriated grant funds for the Colorado Department of Local Affairs Grant Award to develop a new Fort Collins Housing Action Plan. MS. Second.

We have a motion by Council Member Patiandi and seconded by Council Member Nelson. Is there any further discussion? Okay. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Pina Terrell. Yes. Nelson. Yes. Hoban. Yes. Patiandi. Yes. Fudge. Yes. Conway. Yes.

All right. Thank you. So that motion passes six to zero. We will move on to item number 34, which is second reading of ordinance number 80 for supplemental appropriation from DOLA. And this is around the IGA for transit-oriented communities infrastructure. Do we have a staff presentation? We do not, but again, staff is available to answer questions. Okay, thank you. Would any members of the public like to speak on this item? Okay. Do council members have any questions or comments? So is there a motion for ordinance number 80?

Yes. I move to adopt on second reading ordinance number 080-2026, making a supplemental appropriation from the Colorado Department of Local Affairs, authorizing a transfer of appropriated funds, and approving an intergovernmental agreement for the transit-oriented communities infrastructure program. Second.

Great. We have a motion by Councilmember Patiandi and a second by Councilmember Nelson.

will the clerk please call the roll nelson yes hoven yes paddy yes fudge yes conway yes piñatero

yes so that motion passes six to zero and then on to item number five or 35 who uh trying to take us way back first reading of ordinance number 101 and this is um for grant funds related to Accessory Dwelling Unit Grant Program. Is there a staff presentation for this item? Once again, no, but staff is here to answer questions. I think we might have some. Would any members of the public like to speak on this item? Yes, Mr. Stave.

Rich Stave, Average Citizen of Fort Collins, 80525. Thank you, Merit Pro Tem. Thank you, counselors. On this particular item, when they're talking about accessory dwelling units, I think there was a whole lot of effort put forward to basically, I don't think the citizens of Fort Collins were really strong on this idea to begin with. So the state kind of took the sledgehammer, came in, and made those changes. But the issue comes now is if accessory, I mean, the logic comes, if it's such a great idea, how come we have to take state funds to promote accessory dwelling units? It doesn't seem to me that if accessory dwelling units is such a great idea, perhaps the people shouldn't already know that. The other thing is when it says in the context here, it says provide eligible fee waivers. I'm not really sure what an eligible fee waiver really means. Does that mean some people that promote this idea are going to get a free ride somehow within the city? It doesn't really specifically state what that means. And I think in the terms of transparency, the question is, what is the purpose of this particular item? But thank you for listening.

Thank you, Mr. Stave. Do council members have any questions or comments?

So I actually saw council member Fudge first, and then we'll go to council member Patiandi. Thank you.

To echo the public comment question, is there already an existing criteria for these fee waivers, or would this be created as part of this?

So the fee waiver eligibility would be created part of the program, and that's something that we could co-create with city council to try and calibrate those fee waivers towards some sort of outcome. And so that would be something that we had envisioned to be part of this program.

Thank you. And then I had a question. We voted on this back in April to go ahead and apply for the grant, and it suggested we were seeking about $157,000 with a 25% match. Now, as we look at the budget in the appendix, it's more of a 34% match. Still the $157,000, but it seems like there's more city funding going into that. Can you explain what the increase or change may have been for?

I think it was mainly to get access to additional fee waivers. So that way we could help support the program better rather than just the pre-approved ADU designs. So it's just to help our application out.

So by adding in more local funding, our grant request was more attractive to the state and made it more likely we would receive it. Okay. There was some question, I think, on whether the climate tax is really appropriate. for the match for this and so I appreciate the memo that was sent ahead of time explaining that I'm comfortable with the climate tax I think the affordable housing funding would be acceptable as well honestly I know when we looked at the strategic plan for spending the climate tax there was a category called healthy and affordable housing and so my reasoning is you know it feels like that's meant to improve our climate by you know making it so people don't have to drive as far live out in the urban sprawl that this this encourages more infill I guess in density so for that reason I'm comfortable with the funding coming from the climate tax so there was one other question that I had and maybe I'll come up with it later but thank you for your for your

response. Council member Patiandi? All right. Thank you for kicking that off, Council member Fudge. I feel less comfortable with the climate tax dollars as the match, and I want to acknowledge that I was one of the either the mover or the seconder for applying for the grant back in April, and I think at the time I was really in the mindset of we need to go for these grant dollars.

I very much am supportive of ADUs. I am very much supportive of ADUs that are efficient. Infill, all of those things are things that I think really fit well into our housing profile.

And I definitely do see the ancillary impacts of infill on climate. That being said, the more time I've had to just kind of process.

I feel like protecting those climate tax dollars to really be applied to things that we see that bang for the buck that our residents have been pushing for with climate, especially since we have specifically prioritized housing and climate we are not calling out as explicitly.

I would feel more comfortable using affordable housing dollars as the match and maintaining the climate tax dollars for things where we can make that really explicit connection. So I don't know if that is a late game shift that we would be able to make if other people on council are supportive,

but that's just my opinion. Yeah. Would you like a response? I would always love a response from you, Clay. Thank you. All right. Thanks, Council Member Punt, Andy. So to explain why we utilize this program as the match is that this is an opportunity to get accessory dwelling units that are meeting those same energy efficiency targets. And we're not appropriating new money. It's a program that's already underway, the dollars are already appropriated. So that project is already underway. And so in terms of impact to the climate dollars, there's no new dollars going to this ADU program as the match. It's already work that's underway. So that's why staff thought that would be a good cash match because it's essentially utilizing an existing program to take it a step further and to help achieve other community goals. And so I just want that to be really clear that We're not asking for additional funding. We're trying to just leverage an existing program. We just have to move those dollars into the account for this ADU grant as the match. So that way we can draw it down to show the cast match. So it's really just kind of a financial exercise. We're not asking for any additional money.

Okay. Thank you for that.

If we were, though, to determine that maybe that was not the pot of money, I hear that was already appropriated, but could things be reallocated or shifted to where it's replenishing previously appropriated dollars if we determined we wanted to do that?

So I'd have to phone a friend on that particular question, some of our grant experts to see what we could do. Because, yeah, I don't know the answer to that question, but maybe that's something we could have ready to answer for a second reading if council would want some more clarity there.

Yeah, that would be wonderful. Again, I'm not going to die on this hill. Like I said, this is a goal I support. I do see the nexus. I'm just wondering if that $83,000 could go further in some sort of direct application or more direct application to climate.

But again, I'm one of seven, and I also want to see if that's even a doable thing. We don't need to spend a bunch of time if it's not something that is even realistic. So more info would be wonderful.

Okay. Yeah. Council Member Hovind. Thank you very much. Mine's kind of similar along the lines. I'm curious, in J, in the ordinance where it says that the money from the 2050 tax will be coming from Parks, Rec, and Transit, is the designed 2030 program a part of either of those categories?

I might see if Brian Thal can, from Energy Services, come up and answer that question. He's the one helping lead up that effort. So, yeah.

Hi, good evening. Brian Thal, Energy Services Director. I'd have to look at that specific bullet in the AIS or ordinance. However, the existing, we call it Designs 2030 project, is currently funded out of the climate tax dollars specifically. So that might be an error, but again, we might need to take a minute to review that.

Well, because I'm mainly asking, can we legally shift those dollars? I think that's more my question.

And I think there might be confusion around the label that we're using there for 2050 tax dollars. As you may remember, there is kind of a 50, 25, 25% split. This is essentially coming out of the 25% climate split. and not the recreation or transit, if I'm characterizing that correctly.

Yeah, I think what I would say is basically that's how we label. We always just refer to it in its entirety. So we are taking it out of that climate portion, but we always label it in its entirety.

OCF. Yes, I get that.

Sorry, it's the parks, climate, and transit tax.

So we always use all of that in the label when we say it's the tax, but it's only coming from the climate portion.

It can be a little confusing sometimes. But that's kind. Thank you. Okay, any other? Yes, Council Member Conway.

Yeah, I was just going to make my comments, which is that, you know, Council Member Padiondi, you know, had me questioning whether we should be using these dollars or whether it was a separate pot of money that we should be going to. I think the city the memo helped clarify it a lot for me and this was in fact a an appropriate use

of that funding in my opinion um but yeah you did I appreciate you bringing this issue up and kind of

making us think clearly about how we're using these funds. And I appreciate staff for coming up and making these budget questions, which are always a little tricky to get straight in your mind, clear. And so I support using this. And I think follow up for the next for second reading would be great just to clarify. But I support going forward with this program using the dollars that we that are mentioned in the agenda.

Council Member Nelson. Thank you. So Councilmember Pat Yandier, also as our other colleagues have already mentioned, I appreciate you raising the question and us having the discussion and digging into this because it to me shows what being a responsible council member is about, right?

Caring for the community and making sure that we're spending our dollars wisely. this is the second time tonight that I get to nerd out as an architect and remind everybody that the built environment is responsible for like 40 percent of annual emissions and I think half yeah so basically half of all almost half of the emissions around the world are linked to

construction or running a building or demolishing buildings so especially given that about a third of emissions annually is generated during the operation of buildings. Anything we can do to tighten that envelope and building envelope, which means like the

insulation around the building and the things that make you have to burn less fuel, essentially,

or use less electricity to heat or cool a building means better air for all of us. There are a lot of reasons why there's, I think, a strong link. having had the chance to think about it, there's a strong link between this program and environmental efficiency, energy use, and I feel very comfortable supporting this the way that it's written. But always, the level of depth and expertise that staff bring to these sort of conversations is really deeply appreciated. The memo helped, and your ability to think on the spot is also always really, really appreciated. So thank you all. I appreciate it. Thanks.

Yeah, Council Member Patiani. And thank you, Council Member Nelson. I guess as a follow-up, and I don't want you guys to knock yourself out and spend 1,000 hours on this, but I know a question from our residents that's come is if there are ways for us to quantify the climate impacts or the emission impacts. And so I know that it would be much more difficult to talk about, you know, how much less people would drive with these ADUs. but it would be wonderful to know with this these more climate responsible or more more efficient edu's what are the payoffs as far as as climate just with an edu with these improvements versus not would that be something that's a reasonable request to get before second reading we'll take

a shot at it and see what we come up with okay yeah thank you yes councilmember nelson um so actually you distracted me from my original comments in the best way in the best way I think the one suggestion again as like architect nerd the one suggestion that I might make is that the team that is developing the plans

carefully consider flexibility and building orientation and addressing changing adjacencies because I think you know we're talking about energy efficiency and the absolute cheapest way to cut energy costs is to figure out which way the

building faces the sun. And then how the building addresses its surroundings, I think is the most

critical way to help it fit its context and be a good neighbor. So I know that there are pre-approved

ADU plans in the city of Los Angeles that address this issue. The designer actually took all of the structural elements and put them in the outside walls of the building so that

there aren't any interior columns or walls that would constrain reorientation.

So things like exterior doors and windows can be positioned so that clients can flip or mirror or rotate the plans on the site. So those are the kinds of moves that I think that would make those plans genuinely flexible across different loft types. And I'd love to see something similar result from this program because it's a tremendous opportunity I think for our community and we'd love to see

It make the most sense for everybody in every position. Thank you

Okay, any further comments? Yes, councilmember fudge

Sorry, I remembered what I was gonna say and I'm gonna say it so I'll take a little bit different tack and the reason I support this although for the climate reasons that you've all mentioned And I think from what I've little I know now about ADUs, it's really going to be helpful to have these pre-approved designs. Most of the people who are going to be building these are small developers, single homeowners, things like that. They're not going to be major firms. And so just to make it easier for our process to have these pre-approved plans, I think it's something we'll hopefully consider in other areas as well. So just to make it easier and quicker for them to build these units. When I was out campaigning, I came across a lot of multi-generational homes. I talked to a lot of people who said they wish that their young adult children could stay here in Fort Collins, and this can help keep a few families in the city. It's a great idea. And I know it can be hard to find financing for these types of projects as well. So anything we can do to alleviate the cost for them is a good thing. So I support this 100%, and thank you for your help. Okay, last call for comments. Just kidding.

you guys have anything else okay um so thank you uh i appreciate your explanations um i didn't get a chance to read the read before memo but um it does make perfect sense to me if it's already

appropriated program and we could just kind of add this into it that's perfect um i really

uh am supportive of the fact that we can do things that are so important to this council

the environment and um providing housing choice for our community so really looking forward to

seeing the results this might produce. All right. So is there a motion for ordinance number 101?

Yes, there is. I move to adopt on first reading ordinance number 101, 2026, making a supplemental appropriation of grant funds from the Colorado Department of Local Affairs and authorizing transfers of appropriations for the accessory dwelling unit grant program. Second. All right.

We have a motion by council member Patiandi and a second by council member Nelson. Can the clerk? Oh, is there any further discussion?

Yes, council member Patiandi. Yeah, I just I'm going to be voting yes. I think this needs to go through again. I'll look forward to that other information before second reading just to determine if if there are if I have other thoughts, but thank you.

Yeah, really great conversation. So thank you. All right. Can the clerk please call the roll?

Hoven? Yes. Paduyandi? Yes. Fudge? Yes. Conway? Yes. Piñataro? Yes. Nelson? Yes.

That motion passes 6-0 and we will give it just a moment for our mayor to come back.

All right. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. Okay. We will now move on to item number 36. Is there a

presentation for this item? There is a presentation for this item. I am going to introduce Kirk Longstein, who is a senior environmental planner, and it looks like we have a guest from the county joining us as well. Familiar face.

Good evening, Mayor, members of City Council.

I'm here tonight to introduce an ordinance for a waiver from the basic development review procedures under our land use code.

I'd also, you know, throughout my presentation tonight, want to take the opportunity to highlight this is really a good news story for our community

and really closing a chapter on a long, tedious journey.

I'm joined here tonight by Rebecca Everett with Lamar County, and we'll be talking about our partnership through this process as well tonight.

Did I do it? Sorry. This slide really highlights the long history of oil and gas here in Fort Collins. The oil and gas operations within Fort Collins, within the Fort Collins field, it is one of the oldest fields in the state of Colorado.

The operator had been working since 1980. Our community has shared opposition over the years related to oil and gas operations within our community.

With the passage of Senate Bill 181 enabled our community to look at local regulations related to oil and gas siting setbacks from development. And so over the quarter one through the summer, our community had a long conversation around adopting pretty restrictive oil and gas regulations, some of the more restrictive regulations within the state in terms of neighboring jurisdictions.

Since that time, there's been a lot of work done working with the operator and state agencies

related to violations related to air quality. There's been contamination within the neighborhoods that we've worked through with the state, the Energy and Carbon Management Commission. And really that work culminated with the Energy and Carbon Management Commission revoking the license of the operator in August of 2024, which is a big milestone. But again, it did leave us with the next question of now what with the field? How are we going to continue to work to clean up these sites? And so what we'll be talking about is, or we can answer specific questions as related to the first of its kind, I can skip here, the first of its kind grant or intergovernmental agreement with the Energy and Carbon Management Commission and Larimer County and our partnership here locally to clean up these wells. So it's a $5.2 million grant covering 50 wells across Larimer County. There are 10 wells here within the city's jurisdiction. I'll go backslide and show you geographically where those are located. And with the work underway, this is moving fairly quickly. And so we're hoping to start this ball. and by waiving the basic development review procedures, we would remove some of the, you know, submittal documents that would be required as a part of that process, some of the additional admin burden. Ideally, we want to be spending money from the grant on the cleanup of wells and not on administrative studies. The wells, sorry, I skipped a slide. I'll just go back real quick, orient you to this map here. This is northeast Fort Collins near the corner of Douglas Road and Turnberry.

There has been a number of efforts along the way to plug and abandon wells. The Water's Edge neighborhood plugged wells. The developer plugged those wells. We have several other wells that have been plugged and abandoned throughout the way, kind of piecemeal.

There are existing wells, pump jacks within the city's jurisdiction in the Hartford neighborhood, Richards Lake, and Country Club Reserve.

And the tank battery site is just to the west of Country Club Reserve and the Hearthfire site, which is a large source of contamination that will also be a part of this cleanup.

up. And so this is a very long technical slide. Your packet kind of goes through this in more detail. But ultimately what I'm trying to highlight here is based on the intergovernmental agreement and the work and the partnership with the orphan well program from the state, from Energy and Carbon Management Commission, the work that will be overseen by the contractors selected by Larimer County through the grant operation. And then also, well, the oil and gas, or excuse me, the orphan well manager overseeing some of the cleanup work. The standards that are within the code we feel are sufficiently met by the work that has been ironed out within the intergovernmental agreement. So our code is really redundant with the requirements that the state not only will be undertaking but also Lambert County will be leading along the way and so staff's recommendation is to adopt the the ordinance the ordinance on first reading to waive the basic development review procedures and we're happy to answer any questions specific to the operations and to our proposal great thank you is do

we have anyone signed up sorry is there anyone who would like to make public comment on this item? Seeing none. Do council members have any questions or comments?

Council member Conway. So the basic development review for this, like why was that required at

all to plug these wells? We had, going back into the history and I tried to, in the AIS, I tried

to highlight some of the general concerns, but in terms of plugging in an abandonment, the code

was really seen as being a protection for the developers in the community that were doing the work and so as a part of development review wanting to have

additional protections from the development community which are not

traditionally in the space of plugging in and abandoning wells so making sure that the city was providing some additional oversight as a part of that

but when the code Board was adopted. We didn't anticipate this type of grant structure or another government entity taking on the work.

Okay, great. That's super helpful. That was my only question. I would just say as a comment that I talked to a ton of residents when I was running for office about this specific issue.

This was a huge concern that people had been thinking about and working on and trying to organize as a community around for a long time.

And so I'm just super thankful for staff to work to be creative to work with the state the county to really solve a problem

That's been a big issue for people Just worrying about their kids health and safety in those neighborhoods. And so I think this is gonna be a huge Win for the for the whole area and so I'm really excited to have these things Capped and eventually, you know cleaned up it really means a lot to just regular people up in Northeast Fort Collins

Any other comments? Councilmember Fudge?

Thank you for the presentation. I'll just point out that as an employee of the county, I'm just making sure I don't see that there's any conflict of interest in voting on this. It's not an area that I work on at work, and my vote here doesn't impact anything related to my work. So, therefore, I don't think I have a conflict of interest unless anyone wants to object. So, thank you.

Councilmember Fudge? Yeah, I'll be quick, but I just wanted to note that this issue has been being discussed for as long as I've been following counsel since at least 2020, but I no longer.

And so this really is a good news item. I'm excited. I think it's pretty crummy that, you know, a polluting oil and gas company is able to walk away and that the government has to take over. and I'm glad in this case that we are, that we're doing right to make things healthier

and safer up in northeast Fort Collins. So thanks for your work on this. Councilmember Nelson.

Thank you. So wanting to voice my support, very excited to waive basic development review for this item and adopt the ordinance as it's written. And then wanting to first of all thank the Air Quality Advisory Board for the very thorough memo. I know that they'd spent quite a bit of time putting that together. I think it was read and appreciated by all of us. So again, much appreciation there. And then thank you to the county for their partnership in this. It means a lot to be able to make these sort of changes in our community and you all are part of that. So thank you.

I will just say this is a good news item. Thank you for coming and the county for coming as well in this partnership. I think the community has been working on this for a while and it's nice to see some closure around this and moving forward. So thank you again.

Is there a motion for this item?

Yes, I move to adopt on first reading ordinance number 102-2026, waiving basic development review and associated development standards under land use code section 4.3.4 f6 to facilitate the

larimer county lead plugging and abandonment of orphan oil and gas wells in northeast fort

collins second all right i'm gonna give it to my paper scissors i give it to councilmember pot yandy uh we have a motion by mayor pro tem and a second by councilmember pot yandy is there any further

discussion yeah yeah i just um i'm sure all the folks that were here maybe a year and a half ago or when we were working on our rules

that felt like we had some of the loosest standards. I'm sure they just couldn't make it tonight to tell us congratulations. So I'm really excited to close this out. Thank you.

Okay, anything else? Will the clerk please call the roll?

Hoven? Yes. Paddy Andy? Yes. Fudge? Yes. Conway? Yes. Francis? Yes. Pinotero? Yes. Nelson?

Yes. That passes 7-0. And we'll move on to other business before we go into executive session is there any other business to come before council?

I just have one item that I should have updated during our councilmember updates

But I did want to recognize Taryn our graduate management assistant who this is her last regular meeting and will be leaving us I want to get this right to pursue her doctorate at DU for educational leadership and policy studies So just a big shout out to Taryn and all your work And we've really enjoyed having you and wish you good luck in your future endeavors and we can suspend the rules to give her a clap

sorry i didn't do it when more people were here but okay is there a motion to go into executive

session yes i move the council go into executive session to discuss with appropriate city staff

the city's negotiating position for potential business incentives for a project and developing

strategy for these those negotiations and instructing negotiators pursuant to city

Charter article 2 section 11 subsection 5 City Code section 2-3 1 a 6 and Colorado revised statute section 24-6-402

subsection 4 e 1 We have a motion by mayor pro time is there a second second second by councilmember Nelson any Members of the public like to speak on this item Seeing none, any members of council have questions for their discussion? Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll?

Pariyandi? Yes. Fudge? Yes. Conway? Yes. Francis? Yes.

Pinotero? Yes. Nelson? Yes. Hoban?

Yes. That passes 7-0. There will be no further business after the completion of the executive session and the FCTV broadcast will now end. Good night, Fort Collins.

Thank you.