The Brighton City Council held a study session on June 9, 2026, beginning at 6:00 PM, with a joint session with the Planning Commission for several items. The meeting covered appointments, housing needs, comprehensive plan updates, legislative updates, parks and open space code amendments, a reservoir purchase agreement, and a waste hauler licensing ordinance. Key decisions included moving forward with the housing action plan, the comprehensive plan draft, parks code amendments, and the reservoir agreement, while the waste hauler ordinance will proceed to first reading in July.
Let's go ahead and get started. It is our study session for June 9th, and I will ask Councilmember Collins to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance. Okay. First up we have administrative items, uh consideration of appointments to the Parks and Rec Advisory Board and the Downtown Development Authority. Mr. City Manager, who's gonna talk to us? Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. Our deputy city clerk is here to discuss this item with you. Thank you, City Manager Martinez. Good evening, Mayor Pro Tem and City Council. Uh the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board is recommending the appointment of Jamie Archaletta as a member of their board. If you don't have any objections, a resolution will be prepared for your consideration at the next city council meeting. Any comments or objections? Sounds like you're good. Okay, and then we have uh city staff for the downtown development authority is recommending the appointment of Erica Horiuchi, Christina Ziegelbaum, Willie Strohmeyer, Christina Geiger, Michael Cox, and Dearan Naughty All as members of their board. Aaron Herrera is here to answer any questions if you may have if you have any. Okay, questions for Aaron for our inaugural downtown development authority board. And if there's no objections to that, a resolution will be prepared for your consideration at the July seventh City Council meeting for them. That would be exciting, can't wait. So we will go through all three of the items that engage them in the joint meeting. So welcome tonight to our planning commission. Glad that you're all here tonight. Or glad that many of you are here tonight. So first up, our housing needs assessment update. Uh and I'll mention that the mayor is still in Poland, so that's why you're stuck with me tonight. Housing needs assessment update and the housing action plan, Mr. City Manager. Thank you, Mayor Pro Tem. At this time I will ask our affordable housing coordinator, Sean Wyman to uh introduce our consultant and this next item. Good to see everybody. I am joined by Andy Ratchford with Gru and Groon and Associates. Uh Andy and his team wrote the housing needs assessment in twenty twenty-three, I believe it was. Ladies and gentlemen, I was here to talk about ADUs, and this is kind of a continuation of that work, I think. So first going to quickly walk through this addendum that Sean mentioned, and then transition to a pretty high-level overview of some proposed strategies to include in a state required housing plan. For a little more history, I guess. The first assessment was a couple years ago, before uh recent state legislation passed. So rather than redoing everything, Brighton chose to create an addendum to hopefully get it approved by the state, so you're in compliance. And the three topics that are required to be discussed and evaluated are essentially accessible and visitable housing, supportive housing, and displacement risks. The addendum itself doesn't change anything that was in the prior recommendations or the estimate of needs. This is simply filling a few gaps that are now required. The first one of those topics just mentioned accessible and visitable housing. As communities age, uh housing design becomes increasingly important. So the addendum estimated a need that was roughly equivalent to about 10% of Brighton's housing stock are 1,800 units. What this means, accessible housing per the state laws, basically housing that complies with the Fair Housing Act, as well as meeting universal design standards that can accommodate the needs of pretty much anybody, irrespective of their age or physical abilities. And I'd say one of the key takeaways that's in the addendum is that this isn't necessarily just a new construction issue. Brighton probably has many homes that could better serve residents with mobility needs through either modifications or retrofits. So thinking forward as far as housing policy or planning, um, some of the focus should probably be on both new housing as well as modifications to existing units. Supportive housing essentially combines housing with services that help people remain stably housed once they have a unit. So whether that's behavioral health support, uh case management, child care, etc. The concept is you have affordable housing paired with services to keep people housed once they get housing.