Good morning.

Welcome to the City Council of Colorado Springs regular meeting on Tuesday, September 23rd, 2025.

We have a couple people on their way.

We're still gonna go ahead and call roll and just know they're in route from a breakfast this morning.

So will the clerk please call the rule.

Councilmember Bailey.

Here.

Councilmember Crow Iverson.

Here.

Councilmember Donaldson.

In route.

Councilmember Gold.

Here.

Councilmember Henjam.

In route.

Councilmember Linewever.

Here.

Councilmember Rainey.

Here.

Councilmember Risley.

Here.

Councilmember Williams.

Here.

They're all present or in route.

We are welcomed this morning for um by Reverend Eric Strader from First United Methodist Church.

Will you all stand for in the vacation?

Invite you into a moment of prayer and begin by taking a big deep breath.

Almighty God, we come before you today with gratitude for the city of Colorado Springs and for these dedicated individuals who serve on its city council.

We ask that you bless our entire community, from the youngest child to the oldest elder, from the wealthiest citizen to the unhoused one and every neighborhood in between.

In a time of disconnection, oh God, I pray that we open our hearts to one another, that our differences do not keep us from dialogue.

We can never let the differences between us be a threat, but rather yet it leal yield a community that reflects the beauty of your very own creation.

Finally, oh holy God, we lift up before you those who will be participating in this meeting today, the city staff who will support these people, our first responders, community leaders advocating for future directions, and the public seeking to be heard.

We pray that the outcomes will lead to a more just, a more hopeful, and a more resilient Colorado Springs.

Amen.

Amen.

Please join us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

And that one for which it stands one under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

Postpone.

I need a motion.

I need a motion.

Let's vote.

And then motion.

Motion passes.

We'll consider the consent calendar.

These items will be acted upon as a whole unless a specific item is called up for discussion by council members or a citizen wishing to address city council.

Is there anyone wishing to pull an item off the consent calendar?

If none, are we all in favor of the city or the consent calendar?

Have a motion from Councilman Gold.

Second from Councilman Risley.

We're all in favor.

Is it just a thumbs up?

Just a voice vote.

So all in favor.

All in favor.

Any opposed.

Moving on to recognitions.

Will the clerk please read item 5A into the record?

A resolution in support of October 2025 is fire prevention month in the city of Colorado Springs.

Councilmember Williams.

Thank you, President Crow Iverson.

A resolution to support October 2025 as fire prevention month in the city of Colorado Springs.

Whereas the city of Colorado Springs, Colorado is committed to ensuring the safety and security of all those living in and visiting Colorado Springs.

And whereas fire remains a serious public safety concern, both locally and nationally, and the growing presence of lithium ion batteries in many household devices introduces unique fire risks to residents and first responders.

And whereas most of the electronics used in day homes daily, including smartphones, tablets, laptops, power tools, e-bikes, e-scooters, and toys are powered by lithium-ion batteries, which, if misused, damaged, or improperly charged, can overheat, start a fire, or explode.

And whereas the National Fire Protection Association, an FPA reports an increase in battery-related fires, underscoring the need for public education on the safe use of lithium-ion batteries.

And whereas residents should follow three key calls to action, buy only listed products, charge batteries safely, and recycle them responsibly to prevent battery related fires.

And whereas lithium ion batteries store a large amount of energy in a small space and in proper use, such as overcharging, using off-brand chargers without safety certification, or exposing batteries to damage can result in fire or explosion.

And whereas the proper disposal and recycling of lithium ion batteries help prevent environmental hazards and reduce fire risks in homes and the community.

And whereas Colorado Springs first responders are dedicated to reducing the occurrence of fires through prevention, safety education, and community outreach.

And whereas Colorado Springs residents are responsive to public education measures and are better able to take personal steps to increase their safety from fire, especially in their homes.

And whereas the 2025 Fire Prevention Month theme, charge into fire safety, lithium ion batteries in your home, serves to remind us of the importance of using charging and recycling lithium-ion batteries safely to reduce the risk of fire in homes and communities.

Now, therefore, be it resolved by the City Council of the City of Colorado Springs.

Section one City Council hereby recognizes the month of October 25, 2025 as fire prevention month, and urges all people of the Colorado of Colorado Springs to use these batteries correctly to prevent fires in the home and to follow the buy charge and recycle safely approach and to support the many public safety activities and efforts of the Colorado Springs fire departments.

And I heard um Chris Cooper.

Are you in the audience?

And would you love to comment on this?

Yes, good morning.

Councilman President, President Pro Tim, members of Council, Chris Cooper Fire Marshal.

Hi.

Fire Chief Royals here.

So I'll let him start.

I'm sliding in because sorry, Chief.

I didn't get that memo.

Oh, that's okay.

No, no worries.

Um, President Carerson, Pro Tim Grizzly, and Council members.

It's my honor to be up here to introduce Chris Cooper, our fire marshal, uh, because uh this is a really important uh month for us.

I appreciate the resolution.

I I speak about our firefighters, are the reactive side to fighting fire, and our division of the fire marshal and all his staff are the proactive part of fighting fire.

And what they do on a regular basis through inspection, through education, through mitigation is so important for our community because it keeps us from having to respond when we're trying to catch up.

And so the the efforts that they have done, and they're they're actually nationally and internationally recognized for the work that they do.

We have lots of departments.

In fact, I was in Boston uh just over a week ago, uh talking with some national leaders, and they mentioned some of our programs that we have here and how uh respected we are as a community and how we embrace uh the firefighting efforts.

So uh with that, um, I'm gonna pass it over to Fire Marshal Cooper.

I almost said Lacey.

There's a flashback.

Uh yeah.

And uh uh let him talk about his group and again appreciate all their work and appreciate your support.

Thank you.

All right, good morning again, Chris Cooper Fire Marshal.

As Chief said uh this is fire prevention week, and we appreciate the resolution that's been read in.

Uh, fire prevention week goes back a hundred years now.

And uh President Calvin Coolidge proclaimed the first National Fire Prevention Week in October 14th through 10th, 1925.

And it's observation uh in remembrance of the Great Chicago fire.

That fire burned October 8th and 9th in Chicago, uh, which uh killed more than 250 people, left over 100,000 homeless, destroyed more than 17,400 structures, and burned more than 2,000 acres.

That is the most common uh remembrance of fire prevention week.

Uh but at the same time as that fire burned.

There's a fire in Pestigo, Wisconsin, and that was the greatest conflagration in U.S.

history.

And uh that fire burned uh for a total of 16 towns, killing over 1,100 people and scorching 1.2 million acres before it was all said and done.

And uh that fire wasn't nearly as uh prominent because it didn't burn in a common area and they didn't have the the media through uh newspaper and things like that as a way to report it.

But the fact of the matter is those two conflagrations really impacted what we do as a fire service in the United States and helped bring awareness to some of the risks that occur.

And again, that was the start of fire prevention week.

And so I want to speak a little bit about the theme of fire prevention week this year, as was read into the resolution.

It's charge into fire safety, lithium ion batteries in your home.

Lithium ion batteries, why great technology uh is becoming a great uh emerging risk for the fire service.

And they're common in just about any type of electrical appliance now that's rechargeable.

I would hazard to say there's probably over 100 lithium ion batteries currently in this room.

And so it's important that we understand the risks that are associated with those and how we take care of those appropriately.

And so, you know, it's important to know when we buy lithium ion batteries that we buy listed batteries, we buy the appropriate batteries for the device that are you know recognized by the manufacturer, that we charge those appropriately, never leave batteries charging unattended, and that we recycle lithium-ion batteries when they're end of life.

And those things are safe practices that will help us all stay safe moving forward.

I want to recognize the work that's been done over the last five years by our lithium ion task force, which has been a great partnership between our hazardous materials team, Captain Haynes runs out of station 14, our uh education staff, uh, members of Colorado Springs Utilities, Pikes Peak Regional Building Department, some other uh individuals that have really helped us unpack this and look at the risks that are occurring in our community and how to safely deal with those.

In the past five years, we've had over 50, I'm sorry, over 30 uh incidents involving lithium ion batteries that have been reported to the fire department.

I'm sure there's countless others.

In fact, we learned of one just a couple weeks ago and talking with a school principal that at one of our local high schools, a student dropped his electronic bike uh at the front door and it fell over and hit a battery and began the battery hit a rock and began to smoke.

And those are uh I'm sure countless numbers of incidents that we're aware of that could have really become a greater incident for us.

And so we want to really emphasize the risks associated with those and and the safety that goes along and the steps that people can take to uh be proactive and make those safer.

But what I want to do today uh before we wrap up is I want to turn over to Daiko Abe, who's our manager of our community education outreach program.

He and his uh small but mighty staff of four do amazing work in this community to keep our community safe.

Is uh just uh a few things to reference.

Last year during fire prevention, we have extended to fire prevention month, nationally it's recognized as fire prevention week.

But this group does a lot in working with uh the more at risk portions of our community uh for fire safety efforts.

And so this time last year they went to Lamplighter Mobile Home Park and they installed over 147 smoke alarms and 55 carbon monoxide alarms in those homes to keep those residents safe.

Last year as a whole, their team made contact uh through education uh programs with over 24,000 individuals in our community.

Out of that, over 17,000 of those were students in the schools, and so they do great work uh with their small but mining team, make a huge impact.

And so I'm gonna ask Daiko to come up to the podium now and speak with the work he's doing this month uh to educate our community and make them safer.

Good morning, Madam President, President Pro Tem, members of the city council.

My name is Daiko Abe, and I supervise our community education outreach team, our incredible team of fire and life safety educators who go throughout the entire community to ensure uh that we are better, safer, and stronger.

The charge for for this coming month is going to be to charge into fire safety specifically with lithium ion batteries in our homes.

And as we think about the proliferation of these batteries in our homes, our businesses, in our backpacks, work bags, even in our own pockets.

We know that this risk is steadily rising.

My charge to action as we lead into the month of October is very simple.

As we become more aware of this growing risk, um, we are inviting all residents that if you suspect that your battery is damaged, is experiencing thermal runaway, which is that chemical chain reaction that can cause batteries to overheat a short circuit to cause cause fires.

Um we invite you to specifically call nine one one if you uh suspect or feel excessive heat, see or feel smoke or fire.

Um do not attempt extinguish it.

Uh immediately exit the premise, call nine one and and ensure your safety.

If if you see that your battery is showing signs of bulging or swelling, or you observe that it's no longer holding a charge, one of the things that we really want to emphasize is the importance of safely recycling and disposing of these batteries.

Um to your local lows or home depot is is a very safe way to dispose of these batteries to recycle them.

Um, as far marshal Cooper mentioned, only using UL listed or the chargers that came with your device are certainly important.

And also never ever charge your batteries or devices near combustible materials such as your bed.

How often do we charge our our cell phones right next to our bed?

And as our city grows outward and upward, specifically with our micro mobility devices such as e-scooters and e-bikes, uh, making sure that we never store our lithium-powered uh bicycles or e-scooters next to our path of egress, or specifically our path of escape.

So these are all simple things that we can do in our respective homes and businesses to keep ourselves better and safer.

This year, our community education outreach team is going to continue to focus on our highest risk fire home fire risk communities to provide fire safety education and to install smoke alarms and carbon monoxide alarms this year on October 11th.

We will be going to the Quail Hill community and installing smoke alarms and uh carbon monoxide detectors.

We know that that roughly three out of five deaths happen in homes with either no smoke alarm or no working smoke alarm.

And with the increased prevalence of lithium ion batteries and the increased fire risk that they pose, we know that it's very important that these early detection warning mechanisms are in every single home.

So we will continue to make that a focus.

And again, we invite everyone to um charge into fire safety during the month of October and certainly really appreciate the support of our city council on this important initiative.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And I'll bring it back up to the dais for comments before we take a celebration or before we vote.

If you have any comments from the dais.

Seeing none, I have a motion from Councilman Hinjam and a second from Councilman Gold.

And the motion passes none to zero.

So we'll meet in the front for a celebratory picture.

Moving on to 5B, will the clerk please read item 5B into the record?

A resolution recognizing October 2025 is police appreciation month.

Councilman Donaldson.

Yep, thank you, Madam President.

And um, so today I have uh the privilege of reading the resolution recognizing October 2025 as police appreciation month.

And I'll I'll read this resolution, then I have uh an email from Mr.

Tim Lee.

I don't think we could he's traveling, he wanted to be here to speak, but but he's not and then after that I believe Chief Asquez is going to come up and speak too.

So we're lucky to have Chief Vasquez and some other members of our Colorado Springs Police Department here with us today.

So and before I even do that, I just want to say that this is meaningful, extra meaningful to me.

My father, I grew up in an Air Force family, my dad was an NCO and in security police, basically, he was the cop in the Air Force.

They're the ones at the gates when you drive in, they guard the airfields and uh do things like that.

And then my brother uh retired after 20 some years, uh almost 30 years is a police sergeant out in North Carolina.

So uh, you know, I appreciate being able to do this.

And so with that, a resolution recognizing October 2025 as police appreciation month.

Whereas the brave police officers of the Colorado Springs Police Department play a vital role in safeguarding the rights and freedoms of the citizens of our community, and whereas every day members of the Colorado Springs Police Department face the threat of violence and danger, routinely putting their lives in jeopardy to defend others, putting themselves at risk of injury and death.

Whereas our law enforcement officers are the guardians of life and property, defenders of the individual right to be free, warriors in the battle against crime, and are dedicated to the preservation of life and property.

And whereas it is important that all citizens of Colorado Springs know and understand the duties, responsibilities, and challenges of their police officers, and whereas it is incumbent upon all residents of Colorado Springs to show gratitude and appreciation to the police officers of the Colorado Springs Police Department for all that they do and sacrifice to make our city a safe and prosperous place to call home.

Now, therefore, be it resolved by the city call city council of the city of Colorado Springs, Section One, the City Council recognizes October 2025 as police appreciation month and urges all citizens to join us to join us recognizing the essential contribution police ha officers have on our daily lives, dated at Colorado Springs, Colorado, this 23rd day of September 2025, signed by uh Council President Lynette Crow Iverson.

And this really highlights the the dramatic things, the danger, the risk.

But and I I suspect maybe uh Chief Asquez will touch on this.

There's lots of small daily things.

It's just a being away from your kids' activities because you have duty that day.

Um similar to the military, that there are those little sacrifices that aren't the glamorous things that get on the news, but you do them day after day, year after year.

So we thank you for that also.

Now I'll turn to this letter from uh email from Tim Lee.

And if you drive around Colorado Springs now, you'll see these big billboards, and they'll say, uh, see a cop, thank a cop.

They're in blue with white letters, and uh they're on the big billboards.

He's the guy that came up with that idea.

He's a former city councilman, Tim Lee.

You see his names on those uh kind of obnoxious red real estate signs all over Hoffman Lee.

Uh he's the lee on those things.

So uh and he's on the road traveling today.

He wanted to either call in, but he just couldn't make any of it work.

So here's his email.

My vision for Colorado Springs is that we become the safest city in America.

Sure, safest city means more cops, but it also means we're a community of caring and a community of striving.

Where our goal is to be the best of class, best in in class of public safety, best of class in health care, best of class and education, best of class and industry and governance.

And part of having the best of class police department is the retention and recruitment of the best police officers.

To that end, we started the police appreciation month campaign, highlighted by see a cop, think a cop, those signs.

Billboards scattered across the city.

The police appreciation month initiative would not happen without the city council approving the declaration where October is police appreciation month.

And because that is the case, the city council should, he says take credit, but also should uh receive credit or something like that for being so bold in a politically correct world to support our cops as opposed to those who would like to defund the police.

For that, I humbly thank you.

I thank you, us, counsel for uh declaring October as police appreciation month.

There's not a whole lot left here, so hang on.

We started the police appreciation month uh initiative in 2023 as a simple way to let cops know how much the community appreciates their sacrifice and service.

Because as you know, police officers literally don't know if they get to go home after their shift.

Here are our statistics.

In 2023, we bought 20 billboards.

In 2024, we bought 25 billboards, and then this year um they've purchased 30 billboards.

The next year's goal is 40 billboards, and the aspirational goal is to buy every one of those large billboards in the city of Colorado Springs by this company, Lamar, Lamar Billboard, to celebrate our police officers or cops.

Our sponsors rate range from Roy Clemon, who's mortgage solutions financial, our lead sponsor, who enthusiastically supported the idea with $5,000 to one of uh of your very own district one counsel or uh Dave Donaldson who contributed 100 dollars.

And uh and Tim was uh cruel enough to mention I only gave a hundred dollars there, but you have to remember this is city council.

We don't get paid a whole lot of work.

So uh and uh he would be remiss if he did not mention specifically Courtney Fisher with Lamar Advertising, who is the backbone in the brains of the operation.

It is it is uh her coordination, collaboration, and commitment that brings the idea to fruition.

The point is not who the donors are or who much how much they contributed, although we did point out how much how little I gave.

The point is that it was a collective from the broad community who share in gratitude for the work the police do.

The see a cop, think a cop goal is to show appreciation to our cops with an eye toward expressing real things and with a coincidence administrative eye to help with recruiting and retention, because we all know folks would rather work for and with other folks who truly appreciate them.

It's actually that simple.

Uh respectfully, Tim Lee.

And um, with that, I'd ask uh Chief Asquez if he'd like to come up.

Well, thank you for having me.

Uh, President Crow Aberson, Pro Tim Risley, and all of counting members.

Uh, thank you, uh, Councilmember Donaldson.

I got to first point out something before I kind of make comments uh on the appreciation, and that's all of the officers at the back of the room who refuse to come up and sit in the front row.

You are a restaurant, they've got to have their back to the wall, they've got to be even leaving me hanging in the front row after all the fire department left.

Uh, but really, why is that?

Why why do officers do that?

Um, there's a reason for it.

I think the reason is very simple and and and very observable, and that's through a history of service in this profession with this uniform on with this gun on and all the tools that we carry around.

We have those tools for a reason, and that is because we're here to protect a city.

And by putting ourselves in a position always to do that, sometimes not even thinking about it, just simply going to the back of the room and taking up a stance of protection.

Uh it's a symbol.

This uh it's truly this this honor is truly about what our city is like.

Um we we have this city who certainly has some vocal opposition of police, but that's so minor in this city.

Everywhere we go, we get thanked.

Everywhere we go, as a matter of fact, this week, many of you will be at the Medal of Valor with me.

Really celebrating what our officers do because on a daily basis, and we look at things that are happening in our world on a national level here in our country, in our state, and certainly in our community, I think we find so often the ties constantly to police, because a safe city is a thriving city, a safe park, a safe, you know, good driving streets where police officers are trying their best to monitor traffic and make that safe environment for drivers.

You mentioned sort of those mundane things that we do on a daily basis.

Sometimes it isn't exciting, sometimes it's going to, you know, a fraud or somebody stole something that you know out of somebody's yard.

But those touch points are incredibly important.

We're doing sergeant interviews this week, and one of the things that a lot of these uh patrol officers who are seeking that sergeant role talk about when we ask about community service is that they want their officers to understand that every single call for service, every single call for service is sometimes just the opportunity to be out there and interact with a kid.

Or show great support to something that's happening to our community member.

And so what I would want you to know is that you have a exceptional police force.

You have a passionate police force, and it's not just our officers, but our civilian staff who are doing a tremendous amount of work to make sure that the city thrives, to make sure that we're caring for the victims of crime, to make sure that processing paperwork and fingerprinting people, which is critical, so that our officers can do their job in an exceptional manner.

That's being done 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

We have passionate folks out there doing great things.

And this also means the world to us.

So thank you so much for all that your your support shows.

I appreciate it.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chief.

And um Madam President, I I'll hand it back to you.

I have one final thing I'd like to point out, but just open it up for comments.

Councilman Hindum.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you.

Um, Chief, and actually really to everyone here, um, it is important to for us to be appreciative of the work that you do and the sacrifices you make.

And I appreciate all the comments that have been made.

And I also want to say um that I think it's important for each of us to look at our how do we express that gratitude in our behavior.

And so reminding us that we each have a responsibility when we get behind the wheel of a car to pay attention to the speed limit, um, when you feel ticked off that somebody cut you off to not go into road rage.

You know, to do the part that we can to make our community safe.

And we rely so much on our on our police force and our fire and military and so many people who respond on our behalf.

We also have personal responsibility.

And I just wanted to make that note that that's an important way that we can help um our officers and uh and all of us to have a safe city.

So um thank you very much, Chief.

I have a motion from Councilman Donaldson and a second from Councilman Gold.

And if uh before we vote, um the the final thing I'd like to point out, Madam President, is that um uh you know this this resolution does talk about, and then in the email talks about the risk to police officers.

And um, in the back of the room today, um deputy chief Jeff Jensen is back there.

And I want to point out that his brother, uh detective Jared Jensen was killed in the line of duty as a Colorado Springs Police Department detective almost 10 years ago.

It'll be 10 years in uh February, this coming February.

So you know, I I would ask that we just have a moment of uh of a silence that we stand and recognize uh his sacrifice for the police force if we could before we vote.

Sure.

Thank you.

So again, we have a motion from Councilman Donaldson, a second from Councilman Gold.

Let's vote.

That motion passes nine to zero.

So we'll come back down for a celebratory picture, and if you want to bring in all of your

And if you want to bring in all of your ideas.

Moving on to item 5C.

Will the clerk please read item 5C into the record?

A resolution recognizing September 27th through October 5th is Creek Week 2025.

Councilman Hindum.

Thank you.

So first I would actually like to invite Mary Wilson, who I believe is here, who works for the Fountain Creek Watershed District, to please come to the podium.

She has a few slides that we'll just start off with to kind of uh let you know what this resolution is going to be about, and then I'll read the resolution.

Thank you.

Welcome, Mary.

Yes, thank you.

Madam President, Council members, it's an honor to be here speaking today.

Really appreciate it.

This is gonna be kind of a creek week, Fountain Creek watershed district speed round.

So I apologize if I skip some things, but uh we'll get going here with the presentation.

So a little bit.

Well, I have a clicker, but I don't think he's gonna go.

Next slide.

A little bit about our mission.

We are the stewards of Fountain Creek Watershed at Fountain Creek Watershed District.

So our values are protecting and enhancing the health of that watershed through a variety of things, including management, engagement, partnership-driven solutions, collaboration, all of this in commitment to long-term resilience of that watershed, its vitality, and protection of its diverse communities.

Next slide, please.

So this is the watershed in its whole.

It looks kind of like a chicken tender, so we lovingly call it the chicken tender watershed.

But that is Fountain Creek watershed.

And it starts all the way in Palmer Lake, goes all the way west to Pikes Peak, and then goes all the way south down into Pueblo, with Fountain Creek in the middle as the main body of water in the middle of the watershed.

The district is turning 16 this year.

It was established in 2009 by the state legislature.

Our current funding comes from Colorado Springs utilities.

It's a $50 million funding source that is starting to run out, so we don't currently have sustainable funding.

We are pursuing that through our nine member governments.

Next slide, please.

So a quick snapshot of the Fountain Creek watershed.

If you hit next slide, it should pop up here with some information.

Oh, and it comes in one at a time.

Awesome.

So it's 927 square miles.

This is quite a large area to cover, but one thing I want to bring your attention to is actually the elevation change.

Starts at the top of Pikes Peak at 14,115 feet and goes all the way down to 4,695 feet in 71 miles.

This does cause a lot of extremes in slopes, soil types, temperature, bunch of other things all in all to say.

It is very unpredictable, and that makes it the second most studied watershed in the US, which is pretty cool.

Next slide.

So this is a cool picture.

I love this picture.

The picture on the left is actually the administration building at Colorado College taken before Colorado was a state.

This is because Fountain Creek was ephemeral, which means it wasn't flowing continuously.

It wasn't flowing all the time.

The picture on the right is a little more recognizable.

This is our beautiful Colorado Springs with lots more trees.

That's because we now have water flowing through Fountain Creek continuously.

Next slide.

Next slide.

This is, as we like to say, the list that keeps us up at night at the Fountain Creek watershed district.

So these are all of the watershed risks that we are facing, that we are educating about, that we are attempting to tackle through collaboration and project management, including population growth, drought.

That's the map off to the right.

It's usually updated about once every two to three weeks.

It did change drastically in the last two to three weeks, unfortunately, to become a little worse than we were hoping, that does lead to post-fire condition concern and wildfires.

Another big concern with Fountain Creek is sedimentation and erosion, and I have some photos of that coming up as well.

Water quantity and quality, invasive species.

And one other big thing that we've been seeing, especially as of late, with Colorado Springs deciding to become Seattle for a little bit, is the increasing frequency and severity of storms.

So when they do come, they're worse and they hit harder.

And when they're not here, it's more noticeable.

Next slide, please.

So Fountain Creek, I mentioned it earlier, predictably unpredictable, as that second most studied watershed.

The picture on the left shows the severity of the erosion problems that we're facing.

That's actually eight feet that disintegrated on the side of the bank after only one storm.

And in the middle, that building, this is the Pueblo part of the watershed, likely to fall into the creek with the next storm or two, depending on the severity of it and also the erosion concerns.

The picture on the right, this is a well-intentioned attempt to control said sedimentation and erosion issues.

So community members who live on the sides of this watershed are bringing in concrete slabs and building them up against the bank of the river in an attempt to keep the erosion at bay.

Unfortunately, when the water comes in, it comes in really high and really fast, and it carries all of that concrete away downstream with it.

Next slide.

So our district is managed in a few different mechanisms.

We have a board of directors with all jurisdictions represented, and this is where our funding comes based proportionally to population size.

We have a monet monetary mitigation fund advisory committee.

So this is the Colorado Springs utilities funding, a technical advisory committee, and also a citizen advisory group.

The citizen advisory group is open to the public, and we have those meetings once a month.

So you are more than welcome to join.

And we have our calendar with all of the meeting links for that.

Next slide.

Outreach and education.

We have quite a few outreach and education events on the agenda.

But we have a few other ones to mention as well.

The Children's Water Festival we attended at UCCS last Friday.

We taught over a hundred fourth graders about pollution, littering, and water quality in about three hours.

It was definitely a whirlwind, but super fun.

We basically just got to throw powder in water, and they loved it.

Scoop the poop events, native plant promotion, pollinator parties, rain barrel sales, and presentations just like this one.

So we we've got our hands in a lot of pies, and we're doing the best we can to teach the community about what is a watershed, what does our watershed look like, and what risks are we facing?

Next slide.

All this to wrap up with Creek Week 2025.

So Creek Week is the largest cleanup event in Colorado.

It's a nine-day trash cleanup event.

We have over 50 public events to choose from.

So the events are cleanup locations anywhere in the watershed over the course of that nine days.

Community members can enroll online to become a crew member and show up day of or sign up beforehand to join in their crew leaders crew.

We also have a couple of private cleanup groups as well.

I think we're about at 30 signups for those, usually schools and workplaces, who are using this as an opportunity for bonding and teamwork and collaboration, all while giving back to the community.

As we like to say with Creek Week, pick a date, pick a location, and pick it up.

All this to say thank you on behalf of Fountain Creek Watershed District, myself and our executive director Ali Shuk.

We appreciate your consideration of Creek Week and the education of becoming watershed warriors.

Thank you so much, Mary.

That was really well done with a lot of uh lot of information shared in a in a really really great fashion.

Um I would say to you all uh as I'm currently the liaison from the city of Colorado Springs, the different member governments have a seats on the board, and uh we are managing these uh these dollars, the 50 million that that uh Mary referenced, that is kind of uh continuing to be used to address some of that the mitigation of the challenges and and and the pictures that you saw.

It's in critically important work, and we've learned a lot as a city around um development and the impacts of stormwater and how development impacts uh this watershed in a in a pretty significant way.

So if you're interested in water, um come to one of their brew shed uh you know conversations or liquid lecture, liquid liquid lectures, sorry about that.

So fun.

Yeah, and uh and and go out and be a part of the Creek Week cleanup.

So I'm gonna read the resolution um recognizing September 27th through October 5th as Creek Week 2025.

Whereas the city of Colorado Springs is fortunate to have extensive and diverse natural resources, such as forests, grasslands, riparian areas, lakes, creeks, and a wide variety of open spaces, and whereas the Fountain Creek watershed, including Fountain Creek, related wetlands, existing trails, and recreational facilities is a unique watershed that is important resource and asset to the residents and visitors of the Colorado Springs and Pikes Peak region.

And whereas the Fountain Creek Watershed District is partnering with the City of Colorado Springs, Colorado Springs Utilities, El Paso County, Pueblo County, the cities of Manitou Springs, Fountain, and the towns of Monument and Green Mountain Falls, along with numerous community organizations to coordinate the 12th annual Creek Week Cleanup, which will encourage the protection, restoration, and maintenance of the Fountain Creek watershed.

And whereas this nine-day litter cleanup effort kicks off in Fountain Creek Regional Park on September 27th and runs through October 5th, 2025 through the watershed.

And whereas Creek Week programs and activities are designed to raise awareness about the littering issue within our watershed to encourage organizations and individuals to collect litter and debris to make Fountain Creek and the watershed cleaner and safer.

And whereas businesses, churches, schools, nonprofits, neighborhood associations, youth groups, service clubs, and individuals are encouraged to form a creek crew to clean up at Creek Week Project site.

And whereas Creek Week litter removal activities will reduce pollution in our creeks and clogs in our waterways that can lead to flooding, provide for a safer drinking water supply, and enhance wildlife habitat and property values.

Now, therefore, be it resolved by the City Council of the City of Colorado Springs.

We recognize September 27th through October 25th as 11th, excuse me, 12th annual Creek Week in Colorado Springs, and encourages our citizens to help protect, restore, and maintain our waterways by participating in Creek Week activities, dated this day and signed by our council president.

And I would say before we uh vote, and um I'm gonna make sure our uh CSU CEO joins us for the picture because utilities is an important part of this.

Um, Councilmember Lineweber, I'm I would love for you to say a word about the trout that are act that can actually be found in Fountain Creek because this is one of the reasons we need to keep that waterway so clean.

Well, um, for years um a lot of pollutants and stuff have washed down our waterways.

And um the mentality in Colorado Springs is how quickly can we get rid of this water?

And the reality is we were just flushing the toilet down on Pueblo.

Literally.

That means all of our waterways, our streets, um, the oil that you changed uh your car, um, when it would rain, all of that would gather up and then go downstream and really just really just kill all kind of wildlife and stuff like that.

And so uh I'm happy to report that we've had a number of brown trout, which are hardier fish um that have um um started to populate and stuff like that.

And Coral Parks and Wildlife has now started a whole program of introducing um other types of fish, and this is important.

Um the dart and the other one is um anyway, the the these are native species to that.

What's important about the the dart and the other is that they're a food source for brown trout.

Very important.

And so uh brown trout tend to not get larger until they become predators and begin to take bigger bites.

And so we need that for to be able to catch larger fish.

So there you go.

There's a little bit of thank you, Councilmember Lymeweber.

And I do want to just make it really clear.

We are no longer flushing the toilet creek.

In fact, the water that CSU puts into the creek is now cleaner than the water, the rest of the water.

It truly is, yes.

Just want to make sure that's really clear.

With the habitat restoring like it is, it's demonstrating that we have shown great success.

And I would like to note that at our November community advisory group meeting, we have Colorado Parks and Wildlife presenting on their fish introduction restoration efforts.

So if anyone's interested in attending, it should be a good time.

Okay, shall we wait for a photograph?

Well, we have to vote.

Oh before we have you never know what could happen, right?

Um other comments from the dais, we have a motion from Councilman Gold and a second from Councilman Rainey, and we'll vote.

And the motion passes nine to zero.

Now we'll meet down from the street.

Moving on to Friebd, will the clerk please read item five D into the record?

A resolution recognizing September Oops, sorry.

Oops, wrong one.

A joint proclamation recognizing September 2025 is suicide prevention month.

Councilman Vineweber.

All right, I'm excited to be here at the podium.

Thank you, Council President Pro Tim.

And no, Council President and Pro Tim Rosley and the rest of council.

Um I'm really excited about this.

This is really at the heart of why I'm on City Council.

Um my personal story is eight years ago, I had a year at Anglers Covey where we had two employees commit suicide.

And uh through that experience, I reached out and try to find resources and things that could help me as a business owner do a better job with my family and with my co-workers and um so forth.

And I struggled with finding resources.

There just really wasn't much to offer back then, and it really wasn't much of a uh it wasn't a great thing.

And then two years ago, when um the mayor race was happening, I um would ask questions during that time about why aren't we elevating mental health?

Why aren't we bringing more attention to mental health in our community?

Because we're leading the state in suicides.

Well, today, I'm happy to report through efforts with the city that um we've actually had an 18% decrease in suicides last year.

And um, I believe it was a direct result of a lot of the efforts that kind of taken place by a lot of key people in this community, key organizations such as UC Health, Changeline, uh Pikes Peak Suicide Prevention, Next Chapter, hey neighbor.

We've had a lot of different groups that have really kind of come together.

And so we're doing this joint proclamation because uh Mayor Yemi has really joined in on this, and I particularly want to just recognize Thomas Thompson, who's really been at the core of really orchestrating all the collaboration, all the gatherings, all the weighing in, and how do we how do we move the needle on this?

And I think um today we're excited to say we can actually demonstrate that we have moved the needle.

Yeah, I would just add too, I'm thrilled about that 18% number.

I'm also thrilled by the fact that we have seen over the last year a sixty percent decrease in teen suicide uh completions here in El Paso County.

And those of us who've been the city for 10, 20 years know when that was uh a very high concern.

And so I I wanted just to express today uh to you just gratefulness, gratitude for your partnership.

Uh I know as a council and as city, sometimes we're like, well, mental health really isn't under our purview.

Uh but when you decided a couple years ago that mental health was a priority, and you came out publicly and said that, and when you support resolutions like today, and when you undertake uh trainings like I saw you do about a year ago, where you uh we had Cass Walton here sharing uh better suicide language to use as leaders, that stuff emboldens conversations and it creates a normalizing around it.

So I just want to appreciate the part that you play.

Uh, just as we have named all these different partners, and really what we're celebrating today is it's it's a celebration's a funny word, David, because uh we're not saying, hey, this is great, we're done.

It's but it is good, I think, to mark when progress is made.

And so this is an opportunity today to highlight the great work that's already been happening for decades and years in our city by so many individuals and nonprofits and organizations who are laboring so uh diligently, many of whom are filling rows in this room uh to see that that percentage continue to go in the right direction.

So uh I'm honored to be a part of that today, and I'm grateful for your role in leading out in this.

We've had so many different programs that we've kind of come together on, and it's it's a nationally recognized problem.

The attorney the uh Surgeon General actually coming out and saying that loneliness and isolation is the number one epidemic in America.

I mean, that was quite the statement.

And um, and so we've kind of worked to cut to combat that and uh through our um neighborhood gatherings.

Um we we can't say enough about thanking every individual, every family that hosted one of those neighborhood gatherings to really kind of address that isolation and loneliness piece.

Um really this was a community effort, um grassroots, and um and then everything from um 988 is a new tool that people can use that you can call in to immediately get some kind of help and service.

That was a key part.

And then uh Pikes Peak Rising 360 was another tool that we've got launched off the ground.

Um there's just been a number of different efforts and a number of different agencies that have really kind of leaned in on this, and I think today we're just happy to say we're seeing results.

Yeah.

And so we're here today to read this joint proclamation between the council and the mayor's office.

And so anyway.

Does Cass speak before before we do this or after we do this?

After we do this.

Okay, thanks.

So we're gonna read this and then uh we're gonna invite Cass Walton to come up and talk about that, and then um we'll return it back to um to you at that point.

Okay.

All right, so the City of Colorado Springs offers this joint proclamation, suicide prevention month, September 2025.

Whereas suicide is a serious public health issue that affects individuals, families, and communities across our nation, including our community, and whereas in 2024, El Paso County experienced 155 deaths by suicide, an 18% decrease from 189 in 2023.

While this progress is meaningful, every life lost to suicide is a profound tragedy.

Every death leaves a ripple of grief that touches families, friends, colleagues, and neighbors, and whereas firearms remains the leading method of suicide in El Paso County, underscoring the importance of safe storage as a proven life-saving practice, and community campaigns and trainings are helping residents recognize warning signs, response with care, and a reduced access to lethal means in times of crisis and whereas the city of Colorado Springs remains committed to preventing suicide and promoting mental health.

Since taking office in 2023, Mayor Yemi Mobilotti, First Lady Abby Mobilotti, and Councilmember David Lineweber have made mental health a top priority, leading to the launch of Pikes Peak Rising, a regional initiative that expands education, strengthens partnerships, and builds social support systems to prevent suicide.

And whereas through efforts such as Pikes Peak Rising 360, the Pikes Peak Rising Business Collective, Hope Workplace Certification, Thousand Neighborhood Gatherings, and its partner organizations, mental health professionals, and advocates are promoting connection, reducing stigma, and expanding access to resources, including the 988 Colorado Mental Health Line.

And whereas the City of Colorado Springs is an active partner in advancing the work of the Suicide Prevention Collaborative El Paso County, which began five years ago and has grown into a coalition of health systems, nonprofits, schools, military leaders, faith communities, businesses, and government partners, all working together to prevent suicide and build a connected, resilient community of hope.

And whereas National Suicide Prevention Month is an opportunity to raise awareness, honor those affected, and encourage all residents to take action by taking a training, participating in a safe firearm storage class, connecting with neighbors, and sharing 988 resources.

All of us can contribute to a safer and healthier Colorado Springs.

Now, therefore, the mayor and City Council of Colorado Springs do hereby recognize September 2025 as suicide prevention month in Colorado Springs and call upon all residents to promote mental wellness, support those in need, and work together to save lives and strengthen our community.

In witness of the mayor and President Pro, uh President Lynette Cro-Iveson.

All right, back to you.

Did you have a cat?

Oh, do you want yes?

Yes.

Yes.

So I'm gonna invite uh Cass Walton to come forward.

And uh she's gonna talk um about um what well tell us what you do.

Yeah, and I forecast as I just wanted to mention we we read the phrase government partners.

I want you to also know what a strong partnership it's been with El Paso County uh public health.

Uh really, this has been something that we've, as a city has been trying to support the work that they've been doing.

I know they have some representatives here as well, but I just want you to know that partnership's uh alive and well as well.

Thanks, Cass.

Thank you.

First, I just want to thank Mayor Yummy's office and Councilmember Lineweber for sponsoring this proclamation.

We are deeply grateful that our city leaders, such as you all are recognizing September as Suicide Prevention Month, a time not only to remember those we've lost, but also to focus on what it takes to save lives.

While we celebrate the encouraging 18% decrease in suicide deaths over the past year, we must remember that even one life lost is too many.

Research shows that every suicide affects an average of 115 people, and it increases the risk for those exposed to that loss.

Behind every statistic are families, friends, co-workers, and communities forever changed.

The recently released coroner's report reminds us that suicide is preventable when communities work together.

Last year, nearly eight in ten who died were men.

One in four had a history of military service, and firearms were involved in 60% of deaths.

Through the Suicide Prevention Collaborative of El Paso Counties, partners from healthcare, schools, businesses, the military, faith communities, and local government are joining forces.

Together, we're making progress through expanding education and trainings like mental health first aid and QPR, building stronger connections in workplaces, schools, and neighborhoods, providing postvention support through the Lost Team to families, schools, and organizations.

These efforts are saving lives.

But sustaining this progress requires continued investment in public health and prevention.

As we stated in the proclamation, today we encourage every resident to take action, complete a suicide prevention training, practice safe firearm storage, reach out intentionally to someone who is struggling, advocate for strong public health funding that keeps this work moving forward.

And always remember, if you or someone you know is in crisis, you can call or text 988 or visit 988 Colorado.com for immediate confidential support.

Together, we can create a community where every person has hope, support, and a chance to thrive.

And if there's one you haven't yet taken, I encourage you to do so and share it publicly.

There are many issues that can divide us, but I believe saving lives and cultivating a community of wellness is a place where we can all stand together.

Thank you.

Okay, good second.

So back to you, President.

Councilman Hingham.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um Cass, thank you so very much for the work that you and the Suicide Prevention Partnership do.

Um it is a partnership and it takes so many.

I want to highlight an action that anyone in this room can take.

You reach out to Cass, and if you have a group, be it in your business or in your neighborhood, or whoever it might be that you meet with on a regular basis, she will come or her staff will come and do a lovely fun training with you about suicide prevention.

It's very powerful, and um, we just need each other.

Really, that's the bottom line.

We need each other.

And there's so many people I see who I would love to recognize.

I'll I would forget someone, but I just thank you, Dave and Thomas, and um uh just so important, and I appreciate um in particular Dave and the mayor's office.

But Dave, for you for really elevating the conversation, and 60 percent.

That's that's massive.

We need to continue that.

So thank you.

Councilman Gold.

Um, thank you, Madam President, and thank you, Councilmember Lineweber and Mr.

Thompson for being here and presenting this.

I'm gonna try not to get too choked up when I say this.

Um the last Thursday in 2020 twelve on January, the last Thursday in January, I sat on the floor with a good friend of mine as she was building a baby basket for a soldier, a fellow soldier who was gonna have a baby.

The following week on February 1st, I got the phone call at eight in the morning that Deborah Dyson had successfully committed suicide via a firearm.

Um she was active duty soldier, she was a mother, she was a wife, she was best friend, and we lost her, and we lost her at a time where we didn't talk about suicide prevention the way we do now.

And um, my heart is honestly quite full as I look around the room and I see the sincerity in everybody's faces as we have this very difficult proclamation.

So I want to say thank you to everyone uh for being the community that cares.

Um life is too many, and uh that one life impacts so many, and uh we can't afford to lose our residents, we can't afford to lose our friends, we can't afford to lose our neighbors.

So I encourage you to do whatever it is in your power, whether it is simply an act of compassion in the grocery store or walking down the stairs or an elevator to be that good neighbor to offer um that kind care that lets people hang on for one more day, um, take the classes, ask the hard questions, take mental health first aid.

We are experiencing a crisis where only kindness and compassion and sincere humanity will save us.

So I ask you that we um that you help all of us so that we have no more loss of life and um we honor those that we have lost like Deborah Dyson.

Thank you.

Seeing no other comments from the dais, I need a motion.

It's a joint proclamation, so no motion is a good thing.

No motions are needed.

Okay, so it's a proclamation, so we won't be voting, we will just be meeting you down front for a celebratory picture.

Thank you.

And and I'd like to invite the all the organizations that have been a part of this to come forward and be a part of the picture, please.

Moving on to 5E, will the clerk please read item five E into the record?

City Council appointments to boards, commissions, and committees.

Airport advisory commission.

There were two vacancies on the airport advisory commission due to a resignation and an expired term.

And on September 4th, Councilman liaison Kimberly Gold and Councilman Liaison Roland Rainey interviewed applicants with the aviation director and commission chair.

Councilmember Gold or Rainey, do you have any comments?

Seeing none.

This seat rotates between Mill Street and Shooks Run neighborhood associates.

The middle Shooks Run Neighborhood Association has endorsed a member to fill the seat.

Councilman Liazon Brandy Williams has reviewed the candidate.

Councilman Williams online.

Do you have any comments?

I do not.

Thank you.

Special district improvement.

Councilmember Tom Bailey with input from the SIMD unit administrator, reviewed applicants, and recommended qualified individuals for appointments.

Councilman Bailey, do you have any comments?

I'll just say thank you to all the people that apply for all of these things.

We have a motion from Councilman Gold and a second from Councilman Lineweber, and we'll vote on these as a whole.

And the motion passes on a voted nine to zero.

Moving on to five mayors business.gov.

And it will be available live on the city of Colorado Springs.

Facebook, Instagram, X, and LinkedIn.

The start time is 8 15 AM.

Another major plan uh priority for the city and the mayor.

Uh we are working on a shortage on winter shelter beds to make sure that people do have uh safety in the extreme cold that we expect between November and February.

Um working closely with the Springs Rescue Mission and very grateful for local philanthropy who is stepping up to help us in that mission.

Um tomorrow is a big day for uh Clara Springs Fire Department.

It looks like they've departed, but we are opening station 24 in the northeast side of our city and councilman Bailey's district.

Um very excited for that.

Uh opening station 24 on the 24th.

Um and finally, some news that just came in yesterday that does impact um a lot of military families here in our community.

Um TriCare uh did make the decision to keep children's hospital in network.

So I know a lot of people here worked hard on lobbying that.

Um so thank you for everyone's efforts, and we were successful.

That's all we don't have any items called out the consent this morning.

Any utilities business we'll move on to unfinished business.

Will the clerk please read item nine A into the record?

Appointments to the Pikespeak Library District Board of Trustees.

September 22, 2025, the joint appointment committee convened to appoint a board of trustee to the Pikes Peak Library Board District.

I'm bringing this item forward to reconsider council's action regarding the appointment of Mr.

Kuneyuki to fill the seat of the trustee whose term has concluded.

We will now hear from the public.

Please limit your comments to three minutes.

And we will start with Pam Mayor.

Hello, Council Member.

Can you make sure the green button is on yes?

So I shall press it now.

We can hear you much better.

Thank you.

Well, this action surprises many of us.

I am a reading at the Rock member, a volunteer at the library that we volunteers have put together.

I hope you will reconsider today's vote.

The process is important, and we're not seeing an open, transparent process take place at this time.

It's just surprising to me that this hasn't been handled smoothly and openly when there's so many good candidates out there that are not being given the same look that this person is being given.

So I my question is why?

Why is this happening this way?

You have the power to make this go away.

And I'm asking that you do so.

That's all I have to say.

Thank you.

Veronica Baker.

Council, I'm here today to raise concerns that remain unaddressed.

Concerns absent from Councilmember Line Weber's Gazette editorial yesterday, which is troubling.

There is a false narrative that those opposing Mr.

Kuneyuki's nomination to the PPLD board are against him personally.

We are not.

And if so, then your duty is to ensure a fair, transparent process that builds public trust in those overseeing millions of taxpayer dollars and key public resources.

This process is broken.

The joint appointment committee's attempts to clear guidelines have been repeatedly undermined by the county commissioner members Carrie Geitner, Lori Nelson.

Meetings, public meetings have been canceled, candidates not interviewed, political preferences asserted.

Only two strained meetings have been held.

At the September 12th public meeting, the committee agreed to reopen applications and start fresh.

But within days, that decision was reversed.

When decisions are made publicly and quickly undone behind closed doors, trust erodes.

When one candidate is given more opportunities than others, trust erodes.

When public meetings are delayed or canceled abruptly, trust erodes.

This 10-month vacancy we've had on the library board is not a stalemate by chance.

It is a strategy to wait out opposition.

Meanwhile, citizens who have no vote and who serves on the library board bear the consequences.

We have consistently spoken for all of El Paso County, from the underserved East Side to branches like Ruth Hawley, and we are now especially concerned for Cheyenne Mountain's future.

It is a mischaracterization of our efforts to suggest we only care about one part of town.

As of today, no meaningful changes have been made to the process to restore trust.

Your vote today will decide whether to endorse a broken process or demand one that is transparent, fair, and worthy of public confidence.

Our citizens deserve nothing less.

Joe Pelka.

Good morning, counselors.

My name is Joe Pelka.

You've heard me speak before.

Of course, a lot of things I've spoken about deals with Rock Rimman, but there, as the previous speaker mentioned, there's a whole lot of greater issues going on.

But this is a very personal issue for me, because after using the Rock Ruman library for 29 years, as well as four generations of my family using that library, it was unjustifiably closed.

And we know it's unjustifiably close because less than a year later, suddenly they found the money to buy two other libraries that were actually utilized a whole lot less.

So let's talk about trust.

There's an old saying that trust is easily lost and hard to regain.

And believe me, trust is a critical issue with the library board, with the library district, with the county commissioners, and with this body, because you do have oversight over your appointees.

So two weeks ago, the JAC decided that it would be best to start interviewing new people.

A week later, approximately, they suddenly there's a decision to go back and resubmit a person that was previously rejected by this body.

So the question is what changed?

What with the candidate change?

Did the resume suddenly change?

If you really wanted to go back and start looking for it, seems to me that after one candidate's been rejected, you'd want to go back and start looking at the other people.

There were over 50 applicants.

They're all very excellent applicants.

Why not go back and find someone else?

Or were none of those candidates the right candidate?

Did the present candidate pass some type of litmus test that the others didn't pass?

It makes you wonder.

What is the driving force behind this?

It's been like 10 months since we should have had someone to uh reappoint or appointed to replace the current opening.

Ten months this is dragged on.

Suddenly, in less than a week, there's a sudden change to try to get someone that was previously rejected to now be voted in.

Regardless of the facts, it doesn't look good.

So I'm very ignorant of those.

But the appearance looks terrible.

And I hope you keep that in mind that appearance is everything.

You're being asked to make a decision, almost a forced decision.

Be very careful about what you do.

I know you're tired of this process and probably want to move it on.

Well, we're tired too.

But keep in mind it's better to make no appointment than a bad appointment.

And it's going to do nothing with restoring trust with the public with this body and with the library district.

Thank you very much.

Jackie Ostrom.

Hello, my name is Jackie Ostrom, and I appreciate the opportunity to come and speak to you.

I live in 80907.

And I think one of the things that concerns me is that Mr.

Kuniyaki didn't even know that his name was going to be put forward for a vote again.

He was completely blindsided by your president counsel here and Kerry Geitner bringing this before their committee.

They didn't even speak to him.

He thought when he was voted down, that was it.

So what is going on?

What is going on with this committee that puts forward this person that was not part of the reapplication process you asked for?

Why are you doing this?

And just as others have said, you've broken our trust.

We don't trust this committee of four people.

This seems like junior high school girls, Miss Lynette Crow Iverson and Carrie Geitner deciding for some unknown reason that they want to put forward this precious man.

He's a good person.

Nobody has any problem with this man, but you've broken the process.

Why are you doing this?

If I were Mr.

Kuniaki, I would say I want no part of this being blindsided and being put forward again.

It's ridiculous.

Why aren't you looking at the other applicants?

Catherine Zukis.

So my name is Catherine Chukis, and I encourage you as council members to discuss what you have appreciated about the Pikes Peak Library Board appointment process and what are the lessons learned for any PPLD board appointment vote, regardless of there being a vote today or not.

The nine of you on this council will be asked to do this again very shortly.

And again, of all the property tax mills that you're responsible for as elected officials, the PPLD library mills are 44% of these mills.

And from a property tax discussion, any PPLD board discussion should really represent 44% of your time on any financial matter.

PPLD board affects property taxes.

And in that way it's different from any other boards that you, as council members make appointments to spend your time with this appointment.

11 days ago on September 12th, a process was outlined for appointments.

It was a long discussion, and all four JAC members participated in the conversation.

Dates and process were clearly outlined for appointing two members to the PPLD library board.

And there will be candidates brought to you for a vote in early December.

Have you heard about this process?

And if so, how did you hear about it?

Did you get a call from a JAC member?

Was there a public meeting where it was discussed?

A document?

Do you would disagree with this process or not?

Please discuss.

Again, something happened in the two business days between September 12th and September 17th.

An agenda item for today was set in a um and in a yesterday in a public meeting, President Pro Tem Crow Iverson said she forgot to mention that she intended to share motion 9B to put Mr.

Kenny Yuki on the library board.

Forgot, or didn't have the ability to verbally state that given the tone and the tenor of the meeting for the JAC on September 12th.

Or maybe she received a phone call from another JAC member because that was publicly discussed that that's allowed.

JAC members can call each other.

Or maybe she got a call from a city council member.

Or maybe she just objected to the process that was agreed to by the other JAC members.

Please discuss.

Something also happened between September 12th and September 19th.

Councilmember Linewamber wrote an opinion piece published in the Gazette yesterday.

Was this written before or after learning about the JAC process?

Please discuss.

Again, you're appointing people who directly make decisions about taxing our property.

And again, I just need to think about my days since September 12th.

I've had conversations in two public meetings where you were not in attendance, where people have approached me interested in applying this October for the open PPLD Board of Trustees positions.

They're coming to me to talk to the talk about these uh opportunities.

I think they're out there.

You're gonna have great members, you'll be voting on them in December.

Allow that discuss your process and allow for those votes of two members to happen this December.

Thank you.

Good morning, council members.

Yes, I'm speaking on behalf of the public who pay taxes to use the library.

It's astonishing to me to find out that the Pikes Peak Library District has a more about a $55 million annual budget.

It's funded by Mill Levy, it's funded by the taxpayers that you represent.

Whether or not you use it, you pay for it.

That's your choice.

Commissioner Geitner expressed her dislike for having to pay taxes.

And because she never uses the library.

I will quote, oh, I used to take my kids there all the time when they were young, but we haven't, we don't use it anymore.

Wish I didn't have to pay taxes for it.

Well, okay, there are thousands of miles of roads in Colorado Springs that I will probably never drive on, but my taxes pay to for the upkeep of those roads.

Where do we go with a $55 million annual budget?

Publicly funded entity.

And I find out it's run by a volunteer board of trustees with no compensation and therefore no accountability.

In what universe does this make sense?

That there are no qualifications for becoming a library trustee, that there are no, you don't have to know anything, apparently, about finances.

Might be a good idea if you're handling the running of a public entity that everybody pays for.

Just saying, be careful.

Be very careful who you put in charge of these things.

And it is up to you.

Thank you.

Jennifer Walker.

Hello, council.

My name's Jennifer Walker.

I'm a mom.

I have kids in college and all the way down to first grade.

So I run the gamut.

I'm here because I'm representing a lot of other moms.

I met them this morning at drop off.

They can't be here today.

They work, they have other things.

We've been attending meetings like these for a year, trying to squeeze it into our busy lives.

Any of you that had young kids know how difficult it is.

And yet we're trying to make our time to be here every time, every meeting.

We weren't allowed to speak, we weren't allowed to do anything, and we were actually publicly accosted by uh Carrie Geitner.

She like literally was like, I'm not going to be bullied by all these people here.

All those people here are people that care.

These are your constituents.

These are the people of the city.

And she has made it absolutely clear she doesn't care what you think.

She doesn't care.

She doesn't even, she even said she will not even interview people that come from certain parts of the city because I know I don't like them.

This is the person in charge of the JAC committee.

She has her own personal bias, her own personal agenda.

I don't know why she doesn't like people from the Rock Reman area.

We're nice people.

We're a wide range of people.

But she won't even talk to a candidate from our area.

And she made that perfectly clear, unapologetic.

Things are going on behind the scenes that I don't understand.

Why, why at that JAC meeting that they say, here are what we're gonna do?

We're gonna open these qualifications, we're gonna put it out on the library board on the city board so people know about it.

We're gonna bring two people forward.

And then two days later, we're like, oh no, I'm not going to let anybody have any opinion except for me.

If I don't like the person, I'm going to dig in, and she basically said, I don't have to let anything through.

I can stalemate as long as you want until I get my way.

That's not representative of these of us that are coming from work, taking off days to come in and try and just be representative.

We cannot be bullied by someone acting in their own self-interest without any regard or respect for the people of this city.

Please stand firm on your commitment to a strong, fair and representative board for the Pikes Peak Library District.

It means a lot to our families.

It means a lot to future families.

We need people that hear the common people and care about them.

Thank you.

Stephanie Behill.

Morning, Council Steph Vihill, Executive Director for Citizens Project, and thank you for hearing us out today.

We are a locally based nonprofit.

If you're not familiar with Citizens Project, we do civic engagement and voter education.

And I want to start my comments today by really uplifting the Save Rock Remon Libraries and COS Reads Coalition.

These folks are a quintessential example of exactly the sort of citizen engagement that I've actually heard members of this council say so often that you really want that you regularly hurt for quality, um, constructive citizen feedback about the decisions that are facing you, especially when they're really difficult decisions.

And so I really want to uplift them for working so hard on this.

Citizens Project has a twofold interest on this issue.

One is policy and the other is process.

The policy issue is that we believe very strongly in equitable access to resources.

So neighborhoods that are uh underserved or that have had resources taken away from them, they really need to have those restored.

I appreciated hearing from Councilmember Donaldson when this came up in this uh body before that this this body deserves a commitment from an applicant for this uh board of trustees that they're not going to close any more branches and that they're going to reopen the one that was closed.

And if we can't get that, then in my mind, it certainly seems to me like the rallying cry of this organization that his form specifically on this issue is not being heard.

And the process issue I have significant concerns with.

We you you've heard everyone say this already, but um it has not been very transparent.

Um we've had uh promises made and then walked back.

Um, it definitely seems very odd that there was one member whose vote was conveniently flipped and who was featured uh in the mainstream press this weekend uh talking about it.

Um I I really have concerns with what um I heard from the council president about so I'd reached out to y'all, I heard back from you, um, uh madam president, which I appreciate, saying that um you'd spoken to your attorneys, you weren't breaking any laws, everything was being done above board.

And I was sort of surprised by that because I don't think anyone is suggesting that laws were being broken.

If we thought that, we wouldn't be in here, we would be filing a lawsuit if we thought that laws were being broken.

But I would encourage this body to have a much higher standard for how you conduct your interactions with the public than just whether or not you are running a fall of sunshine laws.

I think you can do a lot better than that.

And I'll just quote um, Madam President specifically, you had said in your email to me, and this is a direct quote I'd like to understand your concerns as we have another vacancy in January and would like to be in line with the citizens for the next appointment.

And I'm just gonna invite you to consider you can do that today.

You can do that today by not um rushing through this applicant who you've already rejected and who the people have made it clear, the people who are most involved in this issue and are very well educated on it.

They're they're doing what your civic engagement program teaches citizens to do.

It's to learn the process and connect with y'all and give you constructive feedback.

And so I'm gonna ask you today to listen to that feedback.

You can take this off the agenda, you can go back to the drawing board, talk to some of these other applicants.

I thank you for your time.

Carna Powers.

Um, our last two newsletters share the timeline of this application process.

May 27th, City Council rejected the appointment of Mr.

Kenny Kuniuki to the PPLD board on a six to three vote.

Then, way back later, Friday, September 12th, the joint appointment committee agreed to restart the application process for both Doris and Debbie's trustee positions, recognizing council's May vote.

Five days later, Wednesday, September 17th, City Council's agenda appeared with an item calling for a revote from Mr.

Kuniyuki, despite joint appointment committee's public decision.

Again, five days later, Monday, September 22nd, the Joint Appointment Committee held a meeting to renominate Mr.

Kuneyuki just one day before today's vote.

This is out of sequence.

This information has been shared widely from Cheyenne Mountain to Northgate.

People across the county are concerned and are paying attention.

I want to share a story.

See my granddaughter out back here.

My granddaughter Ava was playing quietly in another room.

When I checked on her, she had a food mustache.

I gently told her, oh, before I could say anything, she said, Grandma, can I have a snack?

I gently told her I knew she had already helped herself and that this was wrong.

She burst into tears.

We washed up and talked about how mistakes are for learning.

I doubt she'll try to sneak a snack first and ask permission later again.

Why do I tell you this?

Because that is what is happening here with this application process.

The same kind of sneak.

First, the J joint appointment committee publicly agreed to restart the application process on October 1st.

Then a vote for Mr.

Kuniuki was slipped into today's agenda.

Finally, the joint appointment committee held a last-minute meeting yesterday to gain permission after the fact.

This may not break legal rules, but it is still wrong.

I won't let my granddaughter act this way, and you shouldn't condone this process either.

Mr.

Kuniuki and any applicant deserves to be treated respectfully.

They should not be considered to an open, they should be considered to an open, transparent process.

They are not pawns.

Kenny can and will likely reapply, and you might choose him eventually when the time is right.

But do not diminish him or this council by appointing him today in this shoddy fashion.

Please insist on a clear and transparent process.

Say no to today's appointment.

Councilmember Williams has asked our attorney to um express the process.

Um, the meeting on 915 where we had that meeting, we did not know at that time that we had to either pull back nominations or we had to wear refirm at the time.

So she's asking you to express the legal process from the very beginning to the very end and how we are here now.

Well, I I can't give the entire history of this process because it's it's been a long time.

There have been a lot of meetings.

I'll give you just the very basic outline of the legal nomination process.

So the what we call the joint appointment committee is a committee formed of two council members and two commissioners.

They meet and make a nomination.

There really aren't a lot of rules in the statute on how that's done.

So it's been done mostly by tradition.

The committee's made some different decisions this time, but it's within their purview to do that.

Um the commission, the committee committee met yesterday to reaffirm its nomination of Mr.

Kuniuki, and that's the nomination the council has before it today.

It takes six votes uh to confirm that here.

So I'll bring it up to the diaspora questions.

Comments.

Councilman Williams.

Thank you, President Crow Iverson.

I would say of most of all the boards that we handle and um commissions that we oversee, this one is probably one of the most difficult just because it involves the state of Colorado.

And I know there's a lot of complaints with how this is happening, and how can you have people overseeing this amount of money without necessarily qualifications?

But the state is involved with this as well.

So I realize that Ms.

V Hill is not necessarily in the same capacity, but she's in the room, and if if you know she knows people who could get this changed at the state level, I think that is a big conversation to have.

But that doesn't mean, as we were told, that we're not following the laws, we're still following the laws.

I think one of the pieces that makes this um different, and again, the seven of us aren't part of the JAC.

So when the JAC meets and they have a conversation, that's independent of this.

Um, I was well aware that this was happening.

I was actually asked to interview Kenny as he was the nominee, then I felt it was appropriate at that time.

And and we had a great conversation about libraries.

And I know there's probably a lot of you in the audience thinking, how was that possible?

But I encourage you to talk to Kenny.

And and I'll tell you right now, if if everything he told me wasn't true, that's a different conversation.

But I'm trusting that people who put themselves in this position who volunteered to do this without compensation, and who have made it this long through the process, if if he's not honest and trustworthy, that's a different conversation.

But I'm I'm taking him at his word.

And I'm taking him with the fact that he wants libraries, he wants physical buildings that people can go to and have books and you can congregate in.

And if we find out that's not the case, that's a different story.

But that was the conversation that I had with him.

So I appreciate all of you coming and your interest and your passion.

And again, if if this needs to change at the state level, that's a bigger conversation, and that involves a different group of representatives.

So I appreciate your time and energy.

Thank you.

Councilman Lineweber.

Yes, I just want to state that um I signed a letter that I disagreed with the closure of Rockwomen Library, and I still do today.

Um I would like to find a process and where we can get a community center/slash library opened up in that part of our city.

I feel it's a lacking resource in that community, and I fullheartedly support that.

Um my original take on Kenny, um, I felt like he was completely qualified.

I have always felt that.

But the one piece that I um was uncomfortable with is like I didn't feel like he understood all the politics that was kind of going on.

And and so because of that, I decided, and it was a hard vote.

It took me a long time to actually decide.

I I remember that day.

And and so I ended up voting against him.

Well, as I've gone down this process, I've noticed that this has become extremely political, and perhaps it's time to have someone that's not in the political fair.

And I've changed my mind to have someone that's a little bit removed from that.

Even today, we only have representatives here that are around the Rock Riman Library.

We don't have anyone else from the rest of the city here to speak against Kenny, not a single person.

Every single person here was Rock Rem and Library.

This has become political, and this process has taken too long.

And this this is the moment where I have come to the conclusion that government needs to get out of the way and let people do the job.

Let people do the work.

And uh too often we've we overhype things, we we we shout up here back and forth with different viewpoints.

Part of that is a healthy um correspondence.

But at this point, I feel like Kenny just needs to get on the board and we just need to move forward.

And with the next nomination, we'll we'll move into the new process that we've kind of discussed.

Um, but we need to move forward, and this has just been too long, too political.

We need to get the library board strong again.

And so I believe Kenny from his non-political perspective would completely help that effort.

And that is why I uh will be changing my vote.

Councilman Gold.

Thank you, Madam President.

I would like to remind everyone that you can be 100% within your legal rights and also 100% wrong.

And I say this because we have an obligation to the public.

We have an obligation to process and an obligation to trust.

I really appreciate those who came and spoke and said that this is not about Rock Roman specifically.

This is not about Kenny specifically.

Um I appreciate appreciate that just because it is part of the bigger picture.

And uh Kenny is quite honestly a wonderful candidate.

He has served our country through the military, he has served from Poland to Singapore and has decided to make Colorado Springs his final home.

Um he is a man who has embraced multiculturalism, speaks several different languages, and is actively pursuing a PhD.

He is a great candidate.

But this vote today is more about process than it is about a specific candidate.

And for me as a counselor, I would rather delay a process to correct a process to build public trust.

Thank you.

Councilman Bailey.

Thank you, Madam President.

Just a couple of uh couple of things from me.

It's important to a lot of people, but to me, it seems that the process is just a tactic to ultimately get what you want.

And the what I'm hearing, what I heard last time, the the opposition to the nomination last time is different from what I'm hearing this time.

It's not Mr.

Kunayuki, it's something else.

Now it's process.

If you don't get what you want, there's a couple ways to deal with that.

And one of them is just let's just delay.

If we just keep delaying, maybe that's where we're gonna go.

I I disagree with that.

I think the process is fine.

I think we have a committee that's supposed to appoint people, and we can either choose to um accept that to ratify that and and appoint somebody or not.

The process is working, and we have a candidate in front of us.

It's it's disingenuous and discouraging to me that we're throwing out there a somebody said the word, somebody used it.

A litmus test.

The litmus test seemed to be the only candidate that can ever be acceptable is one who promises to put a library back in Rock Riman and never close another library.

If we had all the resources in the world and we could promise to do that, that would be a great thing.

But to go into something with that preconception, you know, I'd like to say I came on city council making sure that we would fill every pothole in the city.

It's not gonna happen.

We don't have the resources to do that.

We don't have the ability to do that.

So anybody who promises that is at worst lying to you, and at best just very naive.

And so to and to ask for that kind of commitment, I I think that's a little problematic for me.

So I supported this nomination before.

I'm gonna support it again, and I look forward to the process working when we fill other vacancies on this in on the uh Board of Trustees for the library, just as we do with everything else.

And please, even if you believe it deep in your heart, open your mind a little bit and consider that there are a lot of people who are working doing things that you don't necessarily see.

That there are people who are looking at these things who are studying them.

It's not something that just happened over the course of a couple days.

It's something that happened over long periods of time.

Lots of conversations happen, and people are qualified, even if you don't agree with them.

And that's what the nomination process is for.

Councilman Hindum.

Uh thank you, Madam President.

So I actually want to go back and and reflect back uh in November of uh first of 2024, an email that was sent to um the what was then not a call to joint appointment committee because we didn't have that process then, uh, but to the liaisons who were serving um uh for the library district.

Um it came she came from Julie Smythe on November 1st, 2024, and she was the chair at the time of the uh uh governance committee for the board of trustees.

And she basically just gave the the timeline at that point that um July the governance chair advises city and county of upcoming board vacancies, and August, the position opens um Monday of August 5th.

In September, the position closes at midnight, September 9th.

Um meet and greet candidates with the September board meeting, and October uh the govern governance committee at the time they don't do this any longer, won't won't be doing this any longer, reviews applications at the October meeting, applications and recommendation letter to city council and county liaisons with their recommendations and interviews are then scheduled and conducted.

Um November December is the formal appointment at city and county meetings set by each body, and then November January of 2025, the new trustee would be put in place.

That obviously didn't happen.

Um and then basically from January until about May when this body did vote, um, and as did the county commissioners on uh the appointment of Kenny Kunyaki, which took quite some time to get to that point.

Um, and then of course the process has changed in the meantime because there have been a lot of questions, and I think you're hearing that process is very important, and it's true.

The state statute um needs to be revisited.

I think there's a lot of things about this process in the library board that um need to be revisited.

But nonetheless, here we are.

Um I'm gonna go back again on December 10th of 2024.

I sent an email to the administration of the district at that time because that was our process to inform which of the recommendation uh recommended applicants that I would like to consider out of those 50, and there were 50.

I gave 13 names.

They had submitted some names to us.

Um Mr.

Kuniacki was not one of them, not one of the names I submitted.

Um, and then at about that time, I started um trying to communicate with uh uh liaisons over at the county.

I did have um good communication here with uh with President Crow Iverson.

Um, but I never received a response.

And um, and then on May 27th, as we know, uh his appointment was surprisingly to me, actually uh turned down on a six to three vote.

Then, as you've heard, on Friday, September 12th, uh the joint appointment committee agreed to restart the application process for both Dora's and Debbie's uh seats, which was great.

I was thrilled.

We have an agreement, we have a process, we're gonna take new applications.

Um at that meeting, the chair of the JAC, uh Commissioner Geithner, um uh highlighted council's failure to move forward with the appointment of Mr.

Kuniyaki in May, essentially um making a retort at me about why this has taken so long.

It was really my fault because I had apparently lobbied this council to vote against him, which is just simply not true.

And even if I had, that would have, you know, I mean, that's what you get to do in politics.

I mean, there's nothing wrong with that, but I had not done that.

Um there was no recognition on her part of how long it took to get to that May vote.

She said numerous times, many times, you can go back and watch it.

The group actually did film this meeting, and it's available to watch on um Facebook uh on their Facebook page.

But she said numerous times, and she's not wrong.

This is a political appointment, and we don't have to follow a process.

We don't have to do interviews.

We don't have to have um applications come in.

And as council member Gold just said, something may not doesn't have to be um illegal to make it wrong.

That's not exactly how you said it.

But I got your point.

It was a great one.

And and I think it's about good governance, is really what we're looking at.

And um, and I just haven't found this uh necessarily to be good governance.

Um you heard outlined, I won't state again, um uh the process from um 10-1 to actually uh what the new appointment process uh will be, and there will be on 10-1 a notice of applications going out.

We thought for two um applications, and Kenny could have certainly applied again.

Uming that so this this uh did come on our agenda.

And um, I actually called and talked with Mr.

Kuniuki last night.

We had a very nice conversation.

He really is a very lovely man, and um uh I I appreciated the conversation we had.

Um I I talked about that comment that this is really a political process, and it's true, he's he is willing to step in knowing knowing that that that is the case.

But when I when I told him why I would be voting against him, and that, and and by the way, I I did vote against him before because he really wasn't in my top 13 originally and wasn't in my top four when we um when we met as a joint appointment committee, um, but that it was really about process.

He said, he surprised me, he said, I agree.

I agree.

He he himself, he was reached out to by our boards and commissions uh person uh to notify that he would be on the agenda today.

But he was not, uh to my knowledge, um, he he said he was not contacted by our president to to let him know.

He did start getting calls and people uh talking with him, but he was a little confused as to why.

Um so I that's just that's those are the sort of that's the data as I can tell you.

Um council members here are clearly making their decisions as they have a right to do um based on that.

I appreciate you all coming out.

Um we'll see how this goes.

Uh regardless, we will have to do this again in January.

Um we may be voting on one, we may be voting on two.

Um, but it is a very important board uh managing a tremendous amount of taxpayer dollars that has been stated here.

And so um, with that in mind, uh I I will be voting no.

Thanks.

Councilman Donaldson.

Yeah, thanks, Madam President.

I want to thank uh the citizens that came to speak today.

Um do any citizens that are here to speak on this not live right there in Rock Rimen?

Okay, so so uh representative Vihill.

Thank you for being here.

Um I think you have said it very clearly.

Um I think you have said it very clearly, you've laid it out for council while why the right decision is to either table this or vote no and have both uh positions filled through the application process, which is gonna start in a week, uh whether we vote yes or no today, that's gonna happen.

So this doesn't save anything.

Um for those who say, well, we just need to do something to get this over with.

We're we're about to restart the process for one.

If we were to vote no today or table it, we would we would restart that process and get to.

And what that would do is it would restore confidence to some degree in in city council from the citizens.

They would feel like they were told something, and then that's what happened versus you were told something and then we switched it because we found a way to do that.

Um the idea that the citizens here just want to postpone this.

I I think the citizens here would have been very happy is the very day after Mr.

Kuniyuki was uh voted down, if the JAC had met and and started receiving applications, right?

There's no desire to postpone.

If anything that has happened, you know, on on the other side, uh, postpone this, drag it out, and then some up here have become very tired of it and and willing to change votes.

Um there were three points I made uh to my colleagues that I I that had voted no last time and and and have signaled that they may vote yes today.

One was that by reversing our decision today, council will demonstrate to the county commissioners that they don't need to compromise and find a solution.

The council also agrees with, just wait, and we will reverse our decision.

And that's about what we're gonna do today.

And this is uh almost a trend.

We we saw something like this where we flip-flopped on the city auditor.

There was a condition uh to be hired of a CPA, and then we turn around and reverse that and and switch that.

And now we're about to do it again.

So I don't think this is good for the institution for city council.

We look like we can't make a decision and stick with it.

As I've said just a moment ago, another position on the PPLD Board of Trustees also needs to be filled.

So an application process is opening up right now, even if council approves Mr.

Kunayuki.

Doesn't it make more sense to continue with our previous decision and see what we get in the new batch of applications?

Mr.

Kunayuki may be one of those two or may not.

But it will look fair.

It won't it won't be the process which you have clearly described, where one thing is said at the JAC and then a few days later it changes.

Mr.

Kunayuki may submit his application again if still interested.

There may be better, more mutually agreeable candidates that will be will apply.

And thirdly, this is if we do this, it adds more confusion to the process.

Just on September 19th, the JAC announced with citizens present listening and and hoping they can believe what they hear, um, that we were that they were going to open the applications back up to both positions.

Council now voting on Mr.

Kunayuki a second time after that announcement with our president and councilwoman henjam participating as members of the JAC further erodes citizens' trust trust in the process.

So we really gain nothing by doing this, right?

Mr.

Kunyuki could become a uh PPLD board of trustee member if that's if that's how it plays out by going through the process.

We gain nothing by doing it, but we lose something.

We we lose credibility for one thing.

It again, it's a flip-flop, and we should not do that.

There are decisions council will have to make, which citizens won't like on some things, perhaps on taxes, things like that.

But this is a uh this is an unforced error if we do this.

So I would ask my colleagues to um continue with your previous votes.

We will restore confidence uh in citizens and the outcome in the end, if Mr.

Kunayuki is one of the best candidates, he can still be appointed.

Councilman Williams.

Thank you.

Um I would like to you know reiterate that this process was put in place um from the state down to the next level.

Um from the state down to the next level.

And I did initially vote no.

But I welcomed the opportunity after that because the nomination didn't die.

And it was brought up.

Now that we've gotten this far, you should interview Kenny.

You should have a conversation with Kenny.

You should, you know, dig deeper.

And I think if there's a way to create the process where the state stops and then council and the county commission takes over, I think that would be very helpful.

And I would like to say for the the CPA, I don't know if uh councillor Donaldson is talking about the requirements, you know, from the previous council to this council.

But for those in the audience that may or may not be following that as much as this, um, the the ordinance actually changed from the first time we voted to the second time we voted.

And uh I'm since we're throwing out quotes, uh a wise man changes his mind and a fool never will.

I think you you're not gonna want people that don't look at things in a different way.

And I'll admit that you know, I I wanted to hear from Kenny that libraries were important.

I wanted to hear that that those things would happen.

And like I said before, I'm not part of the JAC.

I'm part of this council, and we get to react to the nominations that come to us.

So this is the nomination that has come to us.

We were given the opportunity.

I think as those of you in the room know there was a lawsuit pending.

So we also had to be cognizant of that, and a lot of dominoes fell such that this conversation could happen.

This vote could take place, and I can only speak for myself, but I'm not doing this to be rushed.

I'm not doing this to get it over with.

That wouldn't be fair to Kenny or anyone in this room, or even you know, the process.

I wasn't in the meeting on the 12th.

I wasn't part of the decisions that were made on the 12th, but I am part of the decision today.

And had that meeting happened in a different order, this would be a different conversation.

But with the process that city council is given, this is following the order of operations.

So I'm looking forward to having bigger conversations about the library.

Heck, at this point, I'm looking forward to being in the meetings in person.

So thank you all for coming.

And um, I look forward to strengthening our libraries in El Paso County.

Councilman Braine.

Thank you, Madam President.

I just got a question for our city attorney.

Uh earlier, as you were explaining currently the state statute and the current process.

Once again, I I need clarity here.

And the clarity I'm seeking is despite the fact that there was a meeting and then there was a decision to move forward with the nominee uh in the JAC meeting happened thereafter.

Is there any state statue against that currently?

No, there's very little in the state statutes about this process.

So there's nothing that would explicitly prohibit the way the process has been right now.

Is it that answer your question?

I mean, I have received the question is it okay that this was noticed for this council meeting and then the JAC had a meeting after that?

And I believe the answer is yes, because the open meetings law only requires that we notice our topic 24 hours in advance.

So not every detail has to be finalized by that point.

Things can change.

Okay, thank you.

Councilman Hingum.

Uh thank you.

Yeah, if if I could, uh it's true.

And and uh Ben, you I actually asked for your legal opinion on this after I found out that this would be on the agenda given the JAC meeting had had its meeting, had determined a process.

And so I was taken by surprise, actually.

Councilmember President uh Crow Iverson did call me on Wednesday morning to let me know this would be on the agenda, but I had previously not known that um members were interviewing Kenny.

Um at any rate, I did ask for just a legal opinion.

Is this okay?

And you provided one, and you you did say that the state statute is silent as to how to treat a failed nomination.

Um you you did some more research, and um fundamentally you you I think gave, and I could read the email, but you gave um uh recommendation that I think that's why the JAC met again on the Monday after was just to make sure all the bases were covered.

Um which we did.

I mean, we met, it happened, and it was a three to one vote.

So again, nothing illegal, state statute is not super clear.

Um and reminding that as uh as uh Commissioner Geitner stated, this is a political process, and so that's what you're seeing today.

Thanks.

Seeing no other um questions on the dais or comments on the dais.

I have a motion from Councilman Risley and a second from Councilman Lane Weber.

We'll vote take a breakup.

And the motion passes six to three.

Before we move on to item 10, I've been asked for a 10 minute uh okay.

We're going to move on to item number 10, new business.

Will the clerk please read item 10A into the record?

A resolution recognizing the partial donation of approximately 54 acres of land to the Colorado Springs Municipal Airport.

Good morning, Troy.

Good morning, council members.

Uh Troy Stover of Peak Innovation Business Park, the director of the business park.

Um the item before you today was uh presented yesterday uh for your review, and I'm glad to go through the presentation again if you would like or answer questions.

Is there a council member that want to go through the nope?

You don't need to go through it before again, and I don't see any questions, but I do have a motion from Councilman Risley and a motion from Councilman Gold.

We'll vote.

Okay.

And the motion passes none to zero.

Thank you all.

Before I move on to our public hearing, um, I just want to make an announcement that we um have a hard stop at 12 o'clock with a lunch with the mayor.

So we will be wrapping up at noon.

Our citizens' comments will start around one o'clock, one oh five.

For those that don't want to sit through the hearing, you can come back at one o'clock for citizens' comments.

So 11B, um public hearing.

Will the clerk please read a little 11B into the record?

Ordinance number 25-75, amending the zoning map of the city of Colorado Springs pertaining to 7,000 square feet located at 2402 North Devta Avenue from two family mixed use neighborhood to answer from two family to mixed use neighborhood.

This is second reading in their public hearing.

So today's hearing will proceed as the following.

We will have an applicant presentation, public comment and support, public comment in opposition, applicant rebuttal, closing staff comments, and back to the dais for questions, deliberation, and decision.

Um good morning.

All right, good morning, President Crow Iverson and members of city council.

Uh my name is Bill Gray, and I am a uh staff member with the city planning department.

Um and in as introduced, this is a rezoning of the property that is addressed at uh 2402 North Nevada.

There we go.

All right.

Um the owner of this uh property is Moxie Sweets LLC.

Um the LLC is represented by uh Mish Heredin, um, and she is here um this morning.

Um the zoning um of the property uh currently is R2.

Um as you can see on your screen, uh surrounding property um within a two-block radius of the proposed uh site is R5, uh MX M R2 and R6.

Um the existing uh use of this building is uh residential um uh commercial.

Um it has had a um commercial uh a I guess it it is had a residential slash commercial use uh in the building uh since the 19 uh 60s.

The building, as you can see on your screen, does have the characteristics of kind of both a commercial building and a residential building.

The proposed use that has been considered as a part of this rezoning is a small neighborhood commercial use.

And in order to formally establish that, the zone map or property would need to be rezoned.

The proposed rezoning is MXM.

The MXM zone district is a zone district that was that is in the city's development code that's in its purpose is for neighborhood serving commercial office institutional and residential uses.

So it is a mixed-use zone district.

The purpose of this rezoning is to facilitate that small scale commercial use as the property has been used.

Again, the um the use that has been considered or is being considered for the future use is a small personal and business service.

More specifically, it would be massage, uh, fitness, wellness, or salon and spa.

Um the proposed um uh area surrounding um the zoning is um as you can see on the screen, it is a mix of land uses.

Those land uses range from a single family to two family to uh directly across the street to the south is uh Penrose Main Hospital.

Um if you kind of extend two blocks east or west, you have a school, you have a church, you have a community center, uh two blocks uh east of this site is uh the Bond shopping center, which is a commercial center.

And then uh yeah, the predominant uses uh surrounding this are uh single family uh two-family uses, but um the characteristics of this area generally would fit the context of uh mixed uh mixed use.

Um in the review of this application as it relates to the proposed zoning and surrounding uh uses.

We do think that it fits in terms of its use, scale uh and um density.

Uh the project is compatible with plan COS and the North End uh neighborhood plan.

And I should note that because this application is only a rezoning, there would be uh a necessity for any future use of the pro of this property to go through development plan andor conditional use uh review.

This application was submitted to the city in February of this year.

It was ready for the public hearing track on uh in July when it went to uh planning commission.

Uh this applic uh this application has uh had the required uh stakeholder uh involvement.

There uh the property has been noticed uh three times.

Uh that notice was uh a 1,000 foot buffer and also notification to the old north end um HOA.

Um during the um uh initial review and the second review, we received no uh formal or written public comment uh for on this uh on this request.

Um we did uh receive an in an email inquiry um before this went to planning commission.

They had requested additional information.

We provided that to them and got no further response.

Uh we also received several phone calls on this application.

Um staff explained uh the content of the request and those on the uh the phone indicate they had no further issue or concern uh with this application.

Um and then lastly, um, of note uh when this application did go to planning commission, it was on the uh consent and uh consent agenda, and we did have two individuals pull that uh and the planning commission heard this application uh uh as a public hearing um uh regular public hearing item.

So um the application uh review criteria, the zone zoning is reviewed against uh these criteria that are listed on the screen.

There'll be two slides.

There are first slide covers the first seven conditions and the uh the second slide covers the uh remaining three.

Um after review of this application, staff did find uh in its staff report that the application did meet the criteria for rezoning.

Uh and also during uh planning commission's uh hearing that and their review of this application, um, they are forwarding a recommendation of approval to city council by a vote of eight to one.

And uh finally uh on the last screen are the optional motions uh for city council if you should uh one decide to approve, and the second if you would decide to deny the ordinance.

And that would conclude staff's presentation on this application this morning.

Thank you.

Now I heard from the applicant.

Hello, good morning.

Thank you for uh seeing my project.

Um I think the slideshow is coming up there in a second.

Um I um this property is here at 2402 North Nevada.

I'm the homeowner, and um the proposal is to rezone to the MXN for a small personal and and business use, which also has little impact of change to the existing community.

Um just the right thing, okay.

Um so it uh it we're proposing to use for health and wellness practice for the community for massage, personal training, and actually focusing on a 50 plus community and maybe some select beauty services.

So the zoning would um continue for the original use of this property when it was built in 1956.

It was planned to be a chiropractic office along with a home combination, and um prior to my acquisition, it was a photography studio for 20 years.

Um the use complies with the land use and zoning objectives um again and has little impact of change.

Um there's no building construction changes at all.

And um the location is on that northwest corner of Nevada Avenue and Jackson Street.

Um it borders the hospital zoning area there.

Um it's adjacent to medical offices and Penrose Hospital.

It's on that ER side and next to their parking lot.

And as Bill mentioned, um, it's um two blocks east of the Bond shopping center.

It's near the Lincoln Center at major intersection at Cascade and Jackson.

Um there's some businesses along that Cascade Corridor as well.

Um it is located on a main arterial of Colorado Springs, um, and it's located of course next to a major regional hospital.

Um, I did have a video that um I was recorded just of that intersection, if there is someone who can um show that just to give you a feeling of what it's the view there.

So in the view is from across the street, the property is there on the right.

Um, and it is a fairly busy intersection.

And then thank you.

Um, and this just kind of gives you a little bit of a view more of where it's located there.

Um the proposed use actually matches how it was historically been used, and it's been used as a business since the 1960s.

Um again, it was built uh in 1956 to be a chiropractic clinic, and then was a photography studio.

Um, and just to give kind of a outlook, that's the overview.

There is parking available.

Um there are six spots on the the left side or the southwest side that um is gravel, and then there is also parallel parking available on that north side.

Um this is the floor plan that's been in existence since it was built.

So it was built with many treatment rooms already in existence, and there is a kitchen and break room and then an open space, um, which could also exist as a therapeutic treatment room.

And on the upper level, there are two other large areas that um could also be used for a treatment room, waiting room, and um a couple of bathrooms.

And then in um the city land use plan in 1991 actually showed that it was zoned uh a color purple, which uh represents a large community or large neighborhood commercial center that it could be used for that.

Um, and then I just did want to note there was an article in the paper that was written about kind of opposing, and I just wanted to bring up you know the concerns that was um brought forth in that article.

The the concern sounds more as if they're worried about what will happen in the future.

Should I sell?

And my understanding is that it would be um that it would be uh limited in what it could be used in the future because of the property's modest size and its character.

Um so I'm understanding there is no risk uh for of a large or incompatible business moving in there.

Um and then basically our goal is to serve the community um to try to provide health resources, enhance the neighborhood with some positive opportunities.

There are other types of businesses.

I don't know of uh too many that have more of a wellness approach, and um that's kind of our focus, and it does have a minimizes impact um with the community at currently because nothing's being changed.

Um and um that's my presentation.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Now we will move into public comment and support.

Um and you have three minutes, and our first one up is Steve Evans.

Hi, my name is Steve Evans.

Um Misha's dad.

We my wife and I we're in favor of this zoning as people who live in the immediate vicinity of the property, and as a community member who has personally benefited from the health and wellness services, Michelle has provided.

This rezoning is not a disruptive change.

Yeah, uh rather it is a practical step that reflects what the property has always been.

A piece where small business activity is supports the health and vitality of the community.

Respectfully, ask you to support her in the rezoning.

That's it.

Thank you.

Carol Evans.

I was speaking for both of them.

Okay.

So those are the two in support, and we will move on to an opposition.

Um Dutch Schultz.

Good morning.

Appreciate your time that you put in as council members.

I'm Dutch Schultz, president of the old North End Neighborhood Board.

I'm here to speak about uh 2402 North Cask uh North Nevada.

We are in full support of the current owner continuing in the operation that they have been in for 19 years.

Unfortunately, the owner has been caught in a crossfire between zoning possibilities and the neighborhood organization.

MXN is not a good zone.

We're not here today to try and redo that.

Retool will be visited, revisited soon by the planning department, and we'll address those in detail then.

The problem is MXN neighborhood has a huge laundry list of possible uses.

And if you grant the rezoning as shown today, you're gonna open that up to a future owner or even the present owner, having uses that are not compatible with the R2 and the people adjacent to it.

The lack of public input uh from owners nearby is understandable.

The owner just wants to continue doing what they've been doing for a long time.

Nobody's in opposition to that.

It's the zoning you're going to impose.

Let me use an example.

The problem with NXN is it assumes that scale, as they call it in the ordinance, is the important factor.

Scale meaning size.

And let me use a somewhat absurd thing, an example.

Suppose we were trying to zone this for a brothel, all right?

And we said, oh, it'll be okay.

And if you read the actual ordinance, if it's small enough, it'll just be a neighborhood brothel.

You can see the absurdity of it.

Well, the same thing applies.

The MXN allows bars, it allows restaurants.

The statement that it's too small for bars and restaurants is counter to what it actually says in there, that the small size is what's desirable.

So what's the alternative?

Don't have time in three minutes to do that.

However, Mike Anderson is on the old North End board, and he will discuss a viable alternative to granting MXN zoning.

Thank you.

Mr.

Anderson, good morning, my name is Mike Anderson.

I'm a member of the uh Old North End Neighborhood Board.

As Dutch explained, Owen has no issue with the property continuing uh to be used for uh uh spa and personal health services as proposed by the property owners.

In fact, as Dutch mentioned, um and does support the current proposed use.

Um but we are here today opposing the rezoning because of the board uh because of the broad range of incompatible uses allowed by the MXN zoning being proposed for the property.

Many of the uses are not compatible or appropriate for an established historic neighborhood.

Uh amongst the 29 different uses permitted in MXN, uh, as Dutch mentioned as bar, hotel motels, restaurants, uh retail sales store, automotive sales, auto rental office and lot, self-storage, detox center, and mining and extraction.

Yes, oil and gas extraction is allowed in MXN has a conditional use, but it is allowed.

The problem is that with the rezoning the MXN or two MXN, the neighborhood would be vulnerable to all these potential new uses that are inappropriate for an established historic uh neighborhood.

We understand the proposed rezoning is to get the property in compliance with some current massage therapy licensing and zoning regulations.

And there about we believe there are some other ways to accomplish this without uh a rezoning of the property.

We believe instead of a rezoning, the items should simply have been or sh or can still be a use variance.

Now we know the staff doesn't like use variances, but we think a use variance that continues the R2 zoning of the property, but allows the use of the property for the provision of personal health and wellness services would be very, very appropriate.

And as section 7.5.527 uh of the UDC uh states that a use variance can be authorized, and I quote, when a necessary hardship would result from the strict enforcement of established regulations, then quote.

Um we are surprised that the use variance was not mentioned as an option in the staff report.

Maybe there's some other technical reason why that we're not aware of, but we are surprised by that.

In addition to that option, though, on final note, um the the staff write-up suggests that any neighborhood concerns about the uncertainty regarding the right the wide range of allowable uses under MX would be mitigated, uh, since any new use would require a development plan or and and or a conditional use that offers us very little comfort since consideration and approval of a development plan for MXN zone property is done administratively.

Uh there are no uh public hearings, there's minimal notice, only posting of the property, no mailing, uh, and it's at the manager's discretion as to whether there is even a neighborhood meeting held.

Similarly, conditional uses under the city's UDC are heard by planning commission and uh do not go to city council.

Um, we've noted that the staff write up indicated that the uh property was in compliance with the old uh north end neighborhood uh master plan.

That master plan does state that uh it and recommends against zone changes from residential to non-residential, and it specifically says discourage resistance residential zone changes to non-residential use.

So we do believe that it is it is not in compliance with the uh um with the uh the rezoning is non-compliance with the own and master plan.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

That is the end of public comment.

Um we'll move on.

No, no.

We're in the middle of a hearing, sir.

Okay.

Sorry.

The applicant will have a five-minute rebuttal if you would like to um re come up for five minutes, you may thank you.

I can appreciate the concern um for there being uh uses for the future.

Um, and I have consulted counsel on um that possibility, and because I am a resident in the area, and um most of the people that I work with are residents in the area, and uh we definitely want it to be compatible to the neighborhood.

And as a massage therapist wanting to be as compliant with the city with some of their regulations, this my understanding that this is the best route along with submitting a conditional use, which is the next step going on.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So I'll move it up to the dais.

I have a comment from Councilman Risley.

Thank you, Madam President.

I do have a couple of questions.

Um may be more geared for staff to answer.

So Bill, I don't know if you'd want to be prepared to answer these.

Stand here.

Could you I I guess I'll start out, and this may not actually be a question for planning, it might be more a question for the attorney's office.

I'll pose it and then you guys can decide who wants to respond.

Um is it typical?

Is it sort of uh standard operating procedure to include opinion pieces in the public record?

In other words, the the article that was in the Gazette was included in our packet.

Is that typical?

Um it was a public comment made.

We wanted to make sure that council had all the information or commentary that was provided during the review during initial and planning commission review of this application.

So it would have been just like providing you an email I may have received from somebody.

So I think I think it's appropriate to be part of a public record for council to determine how much weight do you want to put on this opinion piece versus somebody's um written email comment that they may have sent the staff.

So it's been discussed a little bit, but because it was in our uh uh packet and because it's been discussed on the record, I I just want to make sure I understand a little bit more of the article speaks, and we've heard from some of the other uh uh speakers today about conditional use that could be allowed on the property, and we heard a little bit about the process that that might be followed to allow a conditional use.

Could you expound on that a little bit?

Uh certainly.

So the MXM zone district um uh uh has a list of permitted um conditional and uses that would not be allowed.

Um, for example, in the MXM zone district, a personal and business service use is a conditional use.

So that would require the application or the applicant to file an application, describe um what is uh proposed, and uh and address um how that use um would be uh compatible with um existing zoning uh use standards that may be applicable applicable to that.

How does it meet uh development and dimensional standards of um the zoning uh uh zoning code and then also if it does have impacts to the neighborhood, how are they addressing those impacts?

And then finally, does the city infrastructure support the the proposed use?

Um that um application would be submitted.

Um it would be noticed um at time of initial review.

That notice would be 1,000 feet from the boundary of the proposed uh site, and we would also notify any homeowners association when within a thousand feet, and uh then the property would be posted.

Uh once that application would be ready for uh public hearing, the same kind of public notice um standards would be um would be completed, and then the the application would be uh presented to uh planning commission for them to review and make findings that it met the criteria for approval of a conditional use.

And I think the purpose of that conditional use is to say, all right, yes, zone districts do have some uses that may be more intense than others and may have a higher possibility of uh affecting other other people or other properties.

And the point is is that um it's that that should be done in a public review process and the applicant should be able to provide that information that demonstrates that they comply and address the impacts of the proposal.

And if a decision were made by planning commission about a conditional use, could that be appealed to city council?

Uh yes, it can.

Yep.

And so just so I'm clear, the comment that was made before that the notification about a conditional use would only be posted on the property.

What I heard you just say is that anyone within a thousand feet would be notified of that.

Is that yeah?

Is that so if somebody proposed so if an application for either a development plan or no where it was a permitted use and they just needed to file a development plan to establish that use on the property, or they needed to go through the conditional use process, both of those application procedures require that property owners within a thousand feet of that property are notified, and then the property is posted.

And I I would add that any administrative decision by city staff on a development plan is a is an appealable um decision.

And then also one of the criteria that is evaluated, um I think just like in a conditional use, is there's a criteria in the development plan uh section that has a civility is what per is what is proposed fit the character um size, scale, other uses of this property.

So just because something may be permitted, um, it does have additional standards that may apply that may prove that it fits or it doesn't.

And Bill, is it also correct that if the planning department staff felt like an application, whether it was a development plan or a conditional use application, uh had the potential to be controversial, does the planning department staff have the ability to elevate that automatically to a public hearing process?

Yes, we do.

So either, yeah, other I would just add uh as a public process, or it could elevate it just to have a neighborhood meeting just to see what what might be said about the proposed application.

So in terms of the process relative to a development plan or conditional use, um my understanding is based on what you just said, there would be a number of checkpoints along the way that would allow both public comment, public input, um purview and oversight and and transparency into what's being proposed uh as well as uh decision making process that involves um multiple public bodies, if it were appropriate.

Is that am I recurring on that correctly?

Um in terms of potential uses on this property, uh can you give me a ballpark of the square footage of the lot?

Do you know that offhand?

Yeah, the property size is 7,000 square feet.

So 7,000 square feet.

So yeah, developed site with about a 3,500 square foot building on 7,000 square feet.

The building occupies a considerable amount of the parking.

So I I think there's a there would be factors that may limit some of those uses taking place on us on a small site like we're considering today.

So if I've got a 3,500 square foot buildable pad, let's call it, and um let's say it doesn't get rezoned.

What's the height restriction for vertical construction in the current zone district, R2?

35 feet.

And what would it be if we did rezone this and it was MXM?

MX M, I believe is 40 feet to the 2000s.

40 feet.

Yeah, let me just can I double check.

Yeah, sorry to put that in the middle of the phone.

Well, I'd like to think that uh I have the code memorized.

Uh but I don't, so it's not um one second here.

Building height and neighborhoods.

Building heights for 45 feet, sorry for the delay.

So if I have a 3,500 square foot buildable footprint, and if I can build up 45 feet in height, uh my rough math tells me that that's probably about 14,000 square feet total on four floors.

So again, to put this in perspective, we're not talking some sort of massive redevelopment.

Is that a fair I think that's a fair assessment of just so that I'm clear, the current application does not include any sort of conditional use with it.

Is that also correct?

Yeah, that is correct.

And that was done purposely.

Okay.

Well, I'm of the opinion, and I'll just take the moment to opine since I have the floor.

Um I'm of the opinion that that what's being requested here seems very reasonable, seems very much in keeping with the character of the neighborhood because of the uses that are surrounding it.

Um and I uh as a as a supporter of small business um will absolutely be supporting this and voting in favor of it.

I don't see any reason why this is disruptive to the neighborhood or causes any problems beyond uh what currently exists in terms of the the makeup and the fabric of the neighborhood.

So thank you.

Councilman Gold.

I have a question for the applicant.

On the slide presentation, there was a very impressive photo of a couple that uh is was seasoned that was very buff.

Was that photo?

Uh yes, this one.

Is this photo AI generated?

Um yes.

Thank you.

That's all.

All right, thank you.

Councilman Hindum.

Uh thank you, Madam President.

Um I I have what I feel like is a really dumb question, and either I just am not reading the overall um application of the project well or not, and and I maybe this is a uh a question for the applicant.

Um but what was the project submitted?

I mean, I I don't understand, given that it's been served this way for so many years, I've actually received massages there.

They were great.

Um and I love it.

It's mixed use, it's great, you know, walk in the neighborhoods, convenience near hospital, all those things.

But I'm I'm I'm not quite sure what is triggering the request for a rezone.

I just still don't fully understand what triggered that.

Bill, if you can try um the the application um is required because the applic applicant wanted wants to use this property as a small personal and business service use.

That use is not permitted in the residential zone district that it is, it's R2.

Right.

And so in order for her to be able to do what uh what the applicant wants to do, um, the property needs to be zoned for that um commercial use to take place.

I don't understand what's different about that than what it's been for so long.

I don't get the change because like I said, I received massages there.

I'm I'm hearing the applicant say it's like it's it's been do is she just trying to become compliant with the zone?

Is she trying to be a good citizen and come into compliance with the zone?

I I just don't understand what triggered this.

I think that's part, yes, that's part of it.

Um I think the other part is is that this property has been zoned residentials since the city has had um zoning.

The only time that it had an allowed commercial use on it was in 1968 when the city approved the use variants for that property for it to be a photography studio.

Um it is my opinion that um it has been able to continue in this kind of commercial use area for so long is because they were able to occupy or they were able to use the property under the zoning codes section on home occupations because the proprietor actually lived there, and so when that no longer was the case, then that home occupation use was no longer valid.

But the owner of the property wanted to continue that wellness use that has been there for I don't know, 10 years or more at this point in time.

Um so it really comes down to that the applicant wanted to make sure that this property was in compliance with the land use codes of the city of Colorado Springs in order to keep that going.

And then I also believe that um as part of this, the city had um amended its code as it related to how they license massage therapy and in order for those massage therapists to be legit, they needed to be located on a on property where it was zoned for that type of use, and it wouldn't it that wouldn't extend to the home occupation.

Okay, so the home occupation would just say Mish uh Herodin and her business could be there, but as you saw, this floor plan has multiple I guess m therapy rooms or or you know, or clinic spaces that you know somebody could have an in they could be an independent massage therapist and open up within the and so this is all really about trying to get this property into compliance with the uh land use codes adopted by the by the city.

Um and I think that's that's the bolts of this.

And Michelle, did you want to add anything or did it did Bill cover it?

Okay, thank you.

I didn't quite get all of the steps that made this happen.

And and I hear um from both um Dutch and Mike, they're not objecting to the business that's there.

I I hear that very clearly as well.

Um just trying to come into compliance.

So I guess the final question I have is um, and maybe it's really um for Dutch or Mike, uh, but you're fine with this business, but it's what's listed in the MXN, which is kind of an odd listing of things according to you, is the one thing I heard that was the concern was the use of extraction.

Is the one thing I heard that was the concern was the use of extraction.

Um, you know, what what other things in the in the zoning for MXN uh give you pause or give you a concern?

Yes.

Mike Anderson with the whole North End neighborhood.

Um councilperson, the the the issue that really we're having here is this doesn't require a zone change, as as was just described, there is a problem, uh obviously, but we believe that a use variance is the way to go.

The use variance does not change the zoning of the property, not a conditional use, but a use variance.

So that it doesn't change the uh the underlying zoning, it still would continue at R2.

It would allow the business to continue to operate, it would make it would put them in compliance uh with all the provisions of the of the city's massage therapy licensing requirements.

We believe that a a a use variance is the win-win for everyone.

It removes the uncertainty about future uses, it allows the business owner to do what she needs to do and allows the city to go about its business in the future.

The problem is that you have a zone change in front of you.

But we believe that if the application for the zone change is pulled, if it's pulled, they can come back with the use variance that Onan would wholeheartedly support uh for this project.

And it would resolve the problem that we're trying to describe today.

Okay.

Are you saying Michelle?

Are you would would a use variance work for you?

Is that is that I mean, is that what I like?

Just want to do the right thing here.

My understanding is that it would not allow me to have the business in full compliance.

That's what that's what that you've heard from the city in planning.

Okay.

Okay.

Um so look, uh I we passed retool.

Um I I support mixed use in our neighborhoods, um, having businesses that are walkable.

This the current use, it seems highly unlikely to me that it would be used for extraction.

I mean, if there's a different or better way to help this business owner um come into compliance, I'm open to hearing that.

Uh otherwise, uh I I would tend to agree with Councilmember Risley.

Um I'm not quite sure the next best move here, but um I appreciate you trying to just do the right thing and follow the law.

And and and I guess you know, in some respects it's feeling a little confusing at this point, but I'm not.

That's all I have to say.

Councilman Donaldson?

Yeah, thanks, Madam President.

And Bill, I I just I have a question for you, and you can probably predict it.

Um why can't we do the R2 with the variance with the use variance?

Um this is my thought on why the use variance um would not fit um, because the use variances are appropriate when um or are to be authorized when there's an unnecessary hardship that would result from the strict enforcement of established regulations.

I guess I didn't.

And then the second would be that um use variance is um that's not applicable if the use is to a higher intensity and a less uh restriction.

And I've and it was staff's uh at least opinion to the applicant that um what she wanted to do didn't meet the purpose of the use variance, nor did it meet the criteria to approve a use variance.

And we suggested that the more appropriate way to um sustain the small scale commercial use that exists on this property was to rezone the property, and that um the zone district that these there were two zone districts that probably fit it was the MXM or the OR.

However, the OR did not allow for personal and business service uses, but in that zone district, you could add a medical office and office or another.

Um so at the end of the day, we advised the applicant to submit for this rezoning because we felt that the MX zone district, in terms of the reasons why it was created in our development code, um it fit.

And that also the development code uh I guess I don't necessarily like this work, but it has some guardrails about how we evaluate uses and how they fit into this um neighborhood.

And we felt that the zoning code would prevail in terms of being able to limit um uses that would continue to be a good fit for this area of the city.

Can council simply restrict uh like we pass MXN um but restrict certain uses that are on that list?

I believe you could, but um, you might want to ask Ben whether or not um that could be done without maybe the applicant asking for that restriction.

Good afternoon, Ben Bollinger City Attorney's Office.

Yes, it is possible for council to put conditions of record on a zone which would restrict the uses.

I do generally recommend that if you're contemplating that that you um ask the property owner about that here at the hearing so that we can get their thoughts and feelings on the record.

Okay.

And is you know, doing this from the dais is a little different than uh asking for the two parties to meet and restrict those those conditions.

I mean, I I would think that would be uh that would be fine with me, and they could just come back in two weeks.

But other than that, I guess I would ask the uh neighborhood association, what are those items on this long list?

And I know you probably didn't come prepared to to list them that you that you think are the ones that should be restricted, and then and then does the property owner have any uh objection to that Mike Anderson Old North End Neighborhood Um Councilman.

I I mean we weren't prepared to do that today to to negotiate that.

I'm I mean I doubt that the the applicant is either, but or uh is either, but um, but it's the you know, I uh uh uh if you look at all the uses allowed through MXM, there are very few that really are uh but we think are are are reasonable or acceptable.

Um but uh but we would be willing to to sit down with the applicant to try to figure out what would work for her and work for us, and we would be uh willing to work expeditiously if that's what's required for the applicant's time frame and for the city council's time frame.

Okay, well I th I think that could be uh a good um solution to this.

Um I don't know if the if the if the applicant because I I also agree really I mean I get it for medical uses on this on this property, it fits right in.

It has exam rooms, it's right next to the hospital.

It makes sense.

If you turn the camera and you you took uh a uh film exactly where I would if I were in your shoes, it shows the hospital and all that.

But if you turn the camera the other direction, you see single family homes, little cottages going up the street.

So it's a different feel.

Um, but ma'am, would you like to just say if you think that is acceptable to you to meet with uh the neighborhood association and just kind of go through the list?

Uh yes.

Well, you could you step up to the microphone.

Uh yes, I'm I definitely would be able and willing to um talk about other options or limitations.

Just you know, want to make sure it's matching within what we're we're trying to do within the well walnut and health industry.

Okay.

And the only other concern I guess I have is it delays the process.

I understand I'm I'm not here in two weeks.

So I don't know if it would have to go back, Ben.

You could you could tell us would it have to go back to planning commissioner?

We could just have them meet or even come back later this afternoon and we can vote on it.

Go ahead.

Yeah, it would be possible to do it later today and vote on it.

Um, or you could postpone it.

I heard the applicant say she's not available in two weeks, so you'd postpone it for.

This is the second reading, so at that point you're pushing it to a third reading.

So you're looking at a six-week process from here to make those changes.

So I guess I would offer to council that uh we we just vote on this a little later today, give the two parties a chance to go through that list of um uh conditions and see which um which the applicant really wants and and and uh strike the others.

So I I would make uh Madam President, would you like to me to do that as a motion or just we have them get together while we have lunch?

Well, we have a motion on the table and we have three council members that still want to speak.

Oh, I didn't know all that.

Um council councilman Williams.

Thank you, President Carol Iverson.

Um I had the exact same thought, actually.

And I know that Bill tell me that size will dictate whether or not you know funeral services can or cannot be used there.

But I think it would give the neighborhood a level of comfort to really go through that list of mixed use items, then thank you, Bill, for putting that together and sending it my way to to really keep it as more of a transition.

Then thank you, Bill, for putting that together and sending it my way to really keep it as more of a transition.

Yes, the hospital's there, and yes, this could add medical purposes, but I think if you if you put our funeral home in there, that would change the complete dynamic of your adjacent neighbors.

So I realize there's a motion and a second, so we'll have to go through the process.

But um, I agree.

I think that would be a way to to balance out what the applicants looking for with what the security that the neighborhood would like, you know, if and when this property is sold to the to the next property owner.

Thank you.

Councilman Risley.

Thank you, Madam President.

I'll just reiterate my comments before we're talking a thousand seven thousand square foot lot with a buildable area perhaps of 3500 square feet.

The reality is that you're not going to uh physically be able to accommodate many of the other uses beyond beyond or besides what's currently used that space is used for.

And um on top of that, we've got a motion and a second to uh move this forward.

Um I understand that there are some others that like to speak, but uh I I think I would call the vote.

Councilman Bailey.

Thank you, Madam President.

I just uh want to express my opinion that we often are told that we haven't spent enough time considering something and that we want to postpone it for later, and and that seems to be a thing.

And then sometimes it's like, well, we can figure this out in the next hour.

We've had this information in front of us for almost a week.

If there was interest in doing this, I'd like to, you know, maybe it's a question for Ben.

Is there a way that council members can express this stuff so we could come prepared with a possible solution?

That's my question.

My I'll come back to that in a minute.

My opinion, however, is that we have employed in this city a bunch of trained professionals.

The planning department has good people who work with applicants to try to do the right thing for their that they want to do in their uh on their property.

And this process has been going on for some time.

We have a citizen who came forward voluntarily saying, you know what, I'm not in compliance, I want to be in compliance.

Can you guys help me out?

And we've come up with a possible solution.

Then we have been presented with the opinions of some other people, well-intentioned neighborhood people who want to put limits on this.

And I'm not convinced that any limits need to be imposed outside of the normal process, which requires a development plan for any other use.

The applicant's gonna have to come forward with a development plan.

If if she sells and somebody wants to change it, there's gonna have to be another development plan.

We've heard about the process that allows for significant public review and our review.

And I would suggest that that is enough.

And I'll come back to Ben.

We'll have this conversation at some point when we can figure out at what point can members sitting up here initiate action so that we can be prepared to take final actions and not be stuck in this.

Well, let's just kick it down the road again.

You know, I'm only gonna be here.

Uh we don't know how long we're gonna be here, but you know, for the next next couple years, we can get absolutely nothing done if we wanted to, because we can just continue to kick things down the road.

Councilman Donaldson.

Yeah, thanks, madam president.

I don't think anyone's trying to kick this down the road for two years and get nothing done.

It's uh simply an attempt to satisfy the two parties to this.

And I think a bar is a very real possibility in that facility in that building.

A bar would fit quite easily, and that's probably the kind of use that the uh neighborhood is concerned about.

So again, I mean, that's our job uh to try to find a solution that's good for all the parties.

And uh I'm sorry if that takes an additional 15 minutes or half hour or half of a day, but it it might.

And so, you know, I would offer, and this is an intervening motion, a motion to postpone temporarily for what is it now.

Uh I don't want to make this later today than it needs to be, but say until 2 p.m.

today, motion to postpone it too till 2 p.m.

to give the parties a chance to look over that list of conditional uses and restrict the ones that are uh amenable to both parties, and then we would we would vote on this today uh with a condition of record uh restricting those uses.

We would have to vote one more time.

It would pass unanimously.

You wouldn't need to be here, but if you wanted to, you could be here.

And that would be the end of it.

Thank you.

Councilman Bailey, and then we're gonna vote on the motion.

We have a motion and a second.

Well, I'm sorry, I didn't ask for a second, because that's an intervening motion to we have a motion for the first and a second for the first that we'll vote on, and then we'll come back to yours.

I would ask the attorney to uh give us some guidance on this.

Table comes first.

And it requires a second.

Correct.

Councilman Bailey.

Does it have a second?

It has a second, Councilmember Donaldson made the motion to postpone to two p.m.

today.

Councilmember Cold, second and well, that must have popped up on my screen.

So forgive me.

We will go to Councilman Bailey, and then we will go back to the where we are in the motion.

I just wanted to clarify that you know 15 extra minutes and extra couple hours, that's all fine.

But how do we decide?

Some days it's all we need is 15 minutes to solve this problem, and sometimes it's we need six months.

And I'm I'm a little little confused as to where the standard is and how we decide just which ones we can solve up here with just a few minutes of thought, and which ones we're gonna be lectured about from either other members of council or people in the public who say that we haven't done enough due diligence to study the issue.

Okay, Sarah, can you tell me who we have a motion from and a second for this motion to postpone until when?

You have a motion from council member Donaldson, a second from council member gold, postpones two p.m.

today.

And that should be shown on your tablets.

Okay, let's vote.

Okay, so let me see.

And the motion fails on about four to five.

Okay, moving on to um you're back to the main motion.

Yep, the main motion, which was I'm looking to see who my I believe it was motion made by Councilman Risley and second by Councilman Donaldson.

Is that correct, Sarah?

No, that's not correct.

I didn't second it.

Yeah, the main motion was made by Councilmember Risley, seconded by Councilmember Bailey.

Oh, I'm so sorry.

It's not on my screen.

Um, I was just looking at you when I said your name.

So, yes, motion by councilman Risley, second by councilman Bailey.

Let's vote.

The motion passes on a six to three vote.

Okay, we're running about 20 minutes behind.

We thought we'd break a little bit earlier.

We do have lunch right now with the mayor.

We were gonna start public comment at 1.05.

Um, let's still stick to that.

Was I not told that five hours ago?

You worked in the um we will resume at 1.05.

I'm here.

Okay, good.

Good afternoon.

We are back in session for city council regular meeting for September 23rd, 2025.

We are now on to item 13, one hour of citizens discussion for items not on today's agenda.

The citizens will have three minutes to share your comments.

I have a look at those signed up.

When I call your name, please come forward.

Please introduce yourself.

Again, please limit yourself to the topics that are relevant in Germany to city business.

And starting with Michael Angelo Crusin.

Hello, council.

Thank you for giving me a chance to speak.

My name is Michael Angelo Crusin.

I'm 17.

I attend Palma High School, and I don't want to be shot.

Not while walking, not while learning, not here, not in May too, not at the Citadel, or driving down the street.

I don't want to be shot.

And not a single one of my classmates want to either.

And for this I have proof.

As you are probably aware, on Wednesday, September 17th, a large group of Palma High School students walked out of school, headed down two blocks, and gathered outside this very building to protest gun violence because if you want to, kids don't want to be shot.

Because if you want oil, kids don't want to be shot.

And willing to bet you don't want blood on your hands when there's another shooting in our city.

The laid back response this city has been having to gun violence is appalling.

And the statement that it's necessary goes against what this country should be fighting for.

We're a military town.

We don't need to be recreating war zones every every other day.

There's a time and a place for that.

And it's not 1224 p.m.

September 10th, 2025 at Evergreen High School, leaving one dead and two injured.

It is not 1156 p.m., November 19th, 2022, at the Club Q Night Club, leaving five dead and 26 injured.

That time is not 9.14 a.m.

September 12th, 2025 at Mesa Ridge High School, when two students were arrested for bringing guns into school, and it left the entire population student population shaken and scared to attend their own homecoming.

Thoughts and price with these tragedies don't help when statistically, two current D-11 high school students will die by gun violence, and nearly 150 Colorado Springs citizens will as well.

That does not count those who will be injured.

This town has been marked so badly by gun violence that not only have I attended two statewide protest tests in my high school career at Palmer High School, but that there has been a news story on gun violence in the Gazette, KKTV and KOTHO every single night since December 19th.

I'll repeat that.

There's been an act of gun violence in Colorado Springs every night before since Christmas.

Wednesday's events show that your students are scared.

And the facts I just presented you with should show you why.

I urge you with everything I have to do something.

Not take guns, not touch the second amendment, but teach about them.

Have mental health screenings, or at least uh offer to have classes about what to do if you or your friend is shot if there's nothing else you believe you can do.

I don't want to be shot.

My friends don't want to be shot, and your Colorado citizens do not want to be shot.

Please help us.

Thank you for your time, Council.

But if you'll excuse me, I'm currently missing my third-hour class.

And I don't think Shakespeare will analyze himself.

Charles Barber.

Honorable President Crow Iverson, President Pro Tam Risley, Council members and staff.

My name is Charles Barber.

I have lived here for many moons.

The answer is insulate, electromotive force, EMF, and magnetomotive force, MMF, on all dynamos, electric motors greater than five horsepower, and engines of our world.

Climate change is a byproduct of magnetomotor motive force, historical, spherical, magnetic flux disturbances, deterioration, alteration, or chaotic manipulation by electric power generating professionals of earth.

Climate change characteristics appear to be real to me.

Glacial melting has not affected me at eight at 9,000 feet elevation to this time.

Availability of food as a basis of cost has greatly affected my living viability.

Wind turbulence, direction, intensity, and velocity have affected my psyche.

Fewer smiles are present upon faces of people I encounter.

Less pleasant vocalizations are encountered in most places.

Perhaps I'm looking in the wrong places to find historical American values.

Thank you for your time.

Keep smiling, if you please.

Steve Lightfoot.

I'll wait till uh the camera's on me, please.

Thank you.

I've came here in a bitter mood, but after waiting four hours and then being turned away for an hour because you had to have your lunch.

Made me realize, like a lot of city councils, you don't respect the citizens.

They would be the first to speak.

Not the last to speak.

If you did.

Your roads wouldn't be so acne-scarred with potholes if you respected the people here more.

I think misappropriation of funds is is in play.

Kickbacks, and you name it, like any city council.

I don't even see a mayor here.

I've been here five times.

I have never seen a mayor.

No corruption here, folks.

The real reason I'm here is Lennon Murder Truth.com is in town.

And in about two weeks.

Giving me support.

To break the biggest story since Christ.

It's the biggest story since Christ.

What's he talking about?

What has he got?

Stephen King getting John Lennon's last autograph.

Yeah, as a matter of fact, I have Stephen King getting John Lennon's last autograph.

Advertise one great big zippo lighter.

Get it?

It's what he looks like with his gun on fire at night.

Biggest story of our lives, no doubt about it.

It's Nixon and Oregon did this to us.

World orders taking you over.

You don't think so.

I know so.

Our government's good with that.

They tried to kill Trump for interrupting their plans.

I can prove Nixon had the Kennedys killed the same way I can prove this.

Communist magazines.

Time and Newsweek document secrets in the bold print.

At least they did until 1983 when I busted them with this.

Why are the roads so pop marked in Colorado Springs?

Everything else about the town is wonderful.

Because the people are too pussy to stand up to the fact that the City Council has not put one pothole repair crew on the streets that just does potholes that I've seen in the 3,000 miles I've been driving here.

It's like the Wizard of Oz, the lion runs out of the building when the when the wizard projects smoke and fire.

The people are afraid to stand up to their government.

Hey, government, uh, why am I breaking my truck and my car?

Because you are misappropriating funds that should be going to pothole repair crews, at least 10 of them every day.

That's what you should be doing, citizens.

Instead, I got to do it for you.

Make a fool of myself when I should be promoting who killed John Lennon.

The fact that nobody has bought my magazine since I've been here means you're all afraid of the truth.

Don't be so afraid, people.

You only have two weeks to find your spine.

Thank you.

Brian Cates.

Madam President, Pro Tem, Risley, City Councilors, former colleagues.

First and foremost, I want to thank you for the recognition that you gave me last month.

I was I was here on the 26th of August.

Uh it meant a great deal to me, to my co-workers, and to my family.

Um I retired two days after that recognition.

And two weeks after I retired, the mayor's office revealed the intention to close the community center that I operated for the past almost 27 years on October the 10th.

I'm appealing to you to employ your influence in an effort to gain a stay of execution for Meadows Park Community Center, if not permanently, then for at least as long as is necessary to engage in the proper process before such a consequential decision is made.

I'm requesting that you work with Mayor Yumi and the public to vet the misleading claims that the center is not viable and can be sufficiently replaced with other providers and sister centers.

It's understandable to me that you and the mayor rely on the chiefs and the department heads for recommendations, and that you would have little reason to question them.

But in this case, please ask yourself if offering not just Meadows Park Community Center, but each of the only four centers that exist in this city of half a million people to offer that for defunding, as the Parks and Rec department did for the 2026 budget, and seeking closure within only one month of the announcement, and two and a half months before next year's budget even takes effect.

Again, without any prior discussion or public input, ask yourself if that passes the integrity test, or if perhaps ulterior motives are behind this action.

There are other budget saving measures that are reasonable.

Deferments of uh raises of projects of car replacement.

Closing a community center is permanent.

We only have four.

Denver has 30.

As outlined in my op-ed that ran in the Gazette this past Saturday, need exists, as does funding and alternative business models to allow continued operation at a high impactful service level.

We don't have to rush.

I only have 12 seconds, so I do have to rush.

Please consider it's set to close on October 10th.

The budget meeting for the public to weigh in is the 27th.

We need more time.

We have the budget to do it.

Thank you.

Lonnie Miran.

Councilman Dominic.

That's a question of Mr.

Cates.

Yes, sir.

And Mr.

Cates, you you said you had to rush there at the end, or is there something else you wanted to add to your statement?

May I?

Yes.

I would like to hear it.

I would I would like you each, and thank you for that, Counselor Donaldson.

I would I would like to have you each consider having your public service legacy include serving those most vulnerable and in need of support, not taking an important lifeline away of investing in public gathering spaces that prevent crime and victimization, not removing them from the city grid.

Improving quality of life, not reducing it, supporting the needs of residents most in need, not following a staff recommendation that is not in the best interest of this demographic.

Prioritizing service delivery impact, not revenue generation.

That's not the role of city government.

And addressing the mental health crisis, the income disparities, and the gentrification challenges plaguing some of the most established and diverse neighborhoods of Colorado Springs, including Stratton Meadows.

Meadows has played an instrumental role for the city for 44 years.

There are now less than 17 days to act.

I'm going to will you.

Thank you.

Councilman Gold.

Mr.

Cates, when we did your resolution recognizing your retirement, I knew that you would continue to be an advocate for the city.

Little did I know how quickly after retirement you would need to be an abogent.

You and I both for our city.

And even if I did, I couldn't execute that alone.

But I want you to know that I I hear you and I see you.

And please keep rallying folks to fight for the right thing.

We need more people like you.

So I just really want to thank you for your comments and your continued service for advocacy.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Lonnie Mira.

How can I get everybody to see this?

That's Matt.

Oh, got a cameras too, or some way you can take a picture of this perfect shit.

Anyway.

Brian was uh talking a little bit.

And uh what I'm doing here is this is called meadows.

That whole area which you're seeing in that map.

You got all those people down there.

You got retirement people living there, you got uh military people have been in there, and you got all kinds of citizens from all over living in Stratton Meadows.

We uh the Stratton Meadows open up.

I went for several years on Bob Isaac, make peace, and then we're mayors back then, and I fought the center to help him open it.

That was only an open field, a grocery store, a liquor store, and a barbershop.

That's that bill it was.

There's nothing down there for the kids or any families.

You had to go clear to South Nevada to ride a bus.

People now that strat meadows, you close that down, scroll that center down.

You're not just the center, you're hurting the public in there.

You're you guys, I hear you talking.

Well, I want to do this for the public, I won't do that for the make safety.

I want to do safety for the public.

Well, what safety you can give them when you close a good center?

They count on their foods there.

See you go there for seniors.

We have our uh daycare programs are for daycare people.

We have our pastor kids, we got a karate guy who comes in and trying to teach kids karate south offense and protection.

Yeah, you closed that door, you're gonna close everything in our neighborhood.

It's not gonna be fair to the public.

We we you know how I feel right now.

Uh missing me, but we voted you guys in there to help us.

We voted you guys to trust you.

And you want to turn around and do this to us, then when it's election time comes, what do you want that you could do?

Just compell it.

Would you vote for us?

Will you vote for us?

Do you think it's right for us to vote for you if you can't help us?

That's why I see it.

These people need the help.

Take a walk down.

I invite everyone years and years ago to come to the center, come to our meetings, come to our breakfasts, come to our dinners and parties.

We we we do Thanksgiving to the parties, we do all kinds of parties.

Brian was nice to help.

Diane uh uh was there before him, and we did everything we can to help the neighborhood.

The we got the our police department come down and talked about safety to our neighbors.

We got Hill Silver Key coming in and helps out our seniors.

We had them do the the medicine program with the V VA came in and did shots and stuff for our people because they couldn't get to them, so they came to us.

Now you stop and think what I'm trying to say.

You throw that down, you're closing everybody else who was in it involved.

So out of common currency, I like to get at least think about it before you close it.

And you only got the why can't they live for the year to give everybody a chance to find the complex hillside?

You're gonna be not gonna be fair to Hillside, you're gonna be here west side because these people they're overloaded on their districts.

There, there he is.

We have a comment from Councilman Risley.

Thank you, Madam President.

I wasn't sure if uh Councilmember Holder.

Okay.

I I appreciate your comments very much.

I just wanted to be clear on on a couple of thoughts, though.

One, um you're addressing this as if it's a decision that council has made.

And I just want to be clear that it's not a decision that council has made, it's a decision that the administration has made.

So I'm wondering if maybe the chief of staff would want to address some of those.

We invited you guys down there.

The mayor, do I see him out here?

No.

So I see him go around the center, no.

Perhaps him?

No.

Staff would like to maybe address some of your comments about services and and the plan that they that they have for that, because again, this was a decision made by the administration, not by council.

Just want to be clear on that.

But once you're I'm sorry, you just need to come to uh to the before you decide to close those doors.

Come down, take a walk through the and see what's the what the centers are all about.

Don't just go with your hearing, what you see.

You need to come down there.

You want our vote, you want us to support you, then support us.

Appreciate that.

Are you gonna allow her a moment to speak or sure?

Yeah, thank you, Councilman.

Um, it was a very difficult decision to uh put forward the 775,000 dollar savings from the community center.

It is one of the last um reductions we chose to make.

Uh unfortunately, the community center is uh only recoupes about 10% of its costs, and that made it a pretty big ticket item.

Um we have actually looked at a lot of the suggestions that were made by other people today.

Uh, there are no raises this year, for example.

Um, we are taking employee furloughs.

We did lay off about one percent of our staff, and so all of those are very, very difficult decisions and nothing that we take lightly.

Um we understand those are people's livelihoods.

Um, similar with the community center.

The reason Meadows Park was chosen was partly because of the age and expense of the facility, um, mostly because of the level of usage being so much lower than the other.

You know why that lower community centers?

You would like to know why that's that low?

I do because Brian and the staff over there, they they they help them.

They didn't charge, they didn't surprise line up and charge them to get those door.

The the doors were open to anybody came through those doors.

They didn't say, Well, we can't take you because we can take your name, we gotta do a charge on you.

They didn't charge that people down.

And if you like, I got six, seven hundred uh a hundred and some big signatures, and uh and all those signatures, that should mean something.

And Neil, um I'm sorry, but you know, you guys way back when I'm I'm sorry, and Bob Isaac and I mean here because I they they were they took time to look to look hear us out, talk to us, and visit us.

You guys don't.

You guys sit on your chair, listen to it, hear people, and then and judge it.

You don't come down and see us.

You want our votes when this lecture time comes, then come and try and help us keep our center open, at least for the end of the year to make some decisions.

Thank you.

We will take that into consideration moving into the budget, and again, we appreciate your advocacy for the case.

I would like to take your sense cutting the center's budget.

Let's cut your guys' budget.

You guys were all volunteers before.

You're not now.

Well, we're trying to cut our budget too.

No, no, I'm just saying, would you like to take just to be volunteers again?

We are volunteers.

But we appreciate your comments very much, and we are doing everything we can to save the resources that we have to do the essential functions of government.

When you close it, you think of what you're doing.

You're closing the seniors down, your closed people has a disability, they come in there for help.

Everything which you're talking about, everything you talk about, oh, I'm gonna do this for the company.

I want to do this for the public.

I'm gonna do this for the public.

And then you turn around and all the people down south end, you're gonna close it and shut them out.

Then you you you're doing double speaking.

Well, thank you for your comments.

Trish Anderson.

Hi.

My name is Trish Sanders.

I am Sanders.

Sanders.

I'm sorry, I had it written down correctly.

My fault.

That's okay.

Um please forgive me because I have a problem speaking my mind, and it's not to be offensive to anybody, but uh I'm very frustrated over this.

Uh I'm with the community center.

I don't work there, I just live in the community.

And to me, the you guys are doing something that's very destructive for our area.

It's one of the lower income areas in town.

And instead of trying to take away from the other three community centers and stuff, and trying to figure out take a little from here, take a little from there, so it's not to shut down this community center.

I'm sorry, I'm just very frustrated.

You're taking away kids, you're forcing kids back onto the street with this because this is a safe place for them to go in our neighborhood.

And this is being really destructive.

I'm sorry.

I'm very emotional when it comes to this.

It's a bad part of town, anyways.

And when you're taking their safe place away from them, we have people.

I do neighborhood watch out there, and I've worked for quite a while with the police department doing neighborhood watch.

I don't get paid for any of what I have done or do.

I do work with the community center, and I don't get paid for it either.

But when you guys gotta take into consideration, you're forcing kids, especially onto the street.

The park across the street.

You we have people and problems with drugs.

There's a situation I had to work with because I had many people in the community calling me because there's teenagers from the apartment complexes and stuff.

11 o'clock to two, three o'clock in the morning.

No parents taking care of them or whatever, and they're going down the street, shooting at houses and stuff.

This is what you're you're releasing these kids into the public to learn because they don't they're not gonna have the safe place to go.

You're ruining it for the seniors in the area that don't have no place to go.

As well as the food banks, you're gonna be closing now.

They have no place to go for food.

Because a lot of the the majority of them don't have transportation to do this.

There's other ways that you guys could have gone ahead and taken away from other community sections to have kept this open.

And you chose to keep these other community centers open.

There could have been I don't know how to say this, and I'm sorry, I'm running out of time.

That you could have charged them put in some type of fees or something for these people to come and pay a little bit extra.

They would have been willing to do that in order to keep this place open.

It's terrible what you guys are doing to these kids in this neighborhood.

You're shutting it down for the the councilman hengem.

The gatherings and stuff in the neighborhood.

Ma'am.

Thank you.

You you have you have actually done a very, very nice job of expressing.

Oh, by the way, also I forgot.

I have I gave it to one of the gals that didn't come back so far, right?

I have a stack of papers of petitions of many, many signatures and uh statements also that I can get and bring back to you guys, but I can't do it because she hasn't come back yet.

You guys have got to rethink this.

This is really kind of backwards what you're doing to this community and the kids and stuff and the seniors.

It's not right.

Ma'am, I think your your testimony and others definitely it's fine.

I just want to finish.

You can have a seat.

We can have a seat.

I just want to thank you, and I and your testimony and others is very powerful.

And I'm sure we will continue to be having conversations about this.

Please.

I think we well, I hear you.

I really hear you.

And a big part of it I'm gonna say is we don't have enough time.

We've getting been given such short notice, and I don't think that that's fair to do anything.

The shortest notice that you guys have given us.

It's not right.

Thank you.

Councilman Gold.

They're calling us down.

That's not we brought because Christmas is coming, Thanksgiving's coming.

And all the holidays come.

What are those poor kids going to do for Christmas?

Thanks for Thanksgiving.

So what's this we were gonna do?

Um, ma'am, I just wanted to say thank you for your comments, and I also wanted to say um you apologize for being emotional.

Um, please don't apologize for being human.

That's the that's what connects us.

Um, as I told Mr.

Cates, please continue your advocacy.

Those petitions that you mentioned, convert those petition signatures into votes at the ballot.

Okay, we need more people engaged in our election so that we can invest in the things that the people say that they want um and not just what internally leadership says.

I also want to give you some confidence that internally there is having uh there is significant conversation, actually, um, because we do understand the devastating effects, and we want to find out how do we still activate a space, even if it's not in the traditional community center space that it has been.

Maybe are there are new innovative ways that we can utilize community members to continue to keep that space activated.

Um we know how vital we we many of us know how vital it is.

It is not something that's lost upon us, and I just want you to know there are many of us who see you.

Can I also say one more thing, please?

I try to get a hold of the fire department and the police department both and try to get them because they know what activities and stuff go on in this community and the area there.

Unfortunately, they weren't they're not allowed to, I guess.

Um make comments or just step in on something like this, but uh that was was what I was hoping to be able to get to wake you guys up for this area and stuff.

Councilman Henchum, I got one more thing, and I'll say that.

We need to move on to Jessica Yelding, Yeldington.

My name is Jessica Yelvington.

I first moved into the um Stratton Meadows area in 2008 when I was pregnant with my one and only child, and um he went to school.

I'm sorry.

He went to school at Stratton Meadows.

Um, and it is the poorest school in, and it's the poorest school district in all of Colorado.

And um I was because I am 100% um disabled from a car accident long ago, I was able to volunteer for my son's school, and I saw firsthand the children that their parents wanted so desperately to be more part of their life, to be able to go on field trips with them, to be able to spend more time with them after school, but they couldn't because they had to work a lot to try to make ends meet, and they were still falling short.

Um my son uh volunte and I saw firsthand that these children needed positive, healthy adult attention in our lives, and I was lucky enough because I'm disabled to be able to be a part of that and be a part of children's lives.

And I saw the community center come get every day they had people come to get the children after school and walk them down to the community center so that they were safe and then take care of them and watch them and do fun activities and enrich their lives and feed them.

And um, and then when my son decided he wanted to join Boy Scouts, that was something that was normally beyond our reach.

But the community center had a special program because we were so poor that they for they went the they didn't make us pay the dues, we didn't have to pay for books, they gave us used books for free um that we then gave back when they went each to reached eating each new milestone.

I'm sorry, and and they got re free or reduced cost um uniforms, and that was the only way we were able to do that.

And not only did they house a boy Boy Scouts there, but they also housed Girl Scouts, and they let us even do a lot of events together.

So we did a lot of events there.

And when the Trader Joe's started the food program there, we were there during the all of that.

And because I was a dead mother and my my um soon do big ex husband was a den father, we would take food from Trader Joe's every that food giveaway every week.

We would take some and we would go make a dinner for every week's meeting.

So all those poor families that came there got to go eat for free.

And that was thanks to that that all that program.

Um I have a lot of severe food allergies in my family, and because I'm disabled and now I am a single mother at this time.

I have I make less than 200, I make 200 less than what my mortgage payment is alone and in my disability income that's supposed to support me and my son.

And um food stamps doesn't even cover half.

And because of my severe food allergies in my family, with both me and my son, our food costs are higher.

This is gonna be gone because we have been counting on this since for 10 years to feed our family.

I have to be gluten-free.

And and they have, and it's so expensive, and I've been getting, oh, I'm sorry, I went over, but I I just I I urge you to reconsider.

This has been feeding me and my family, not just me, but all my friends and family members.

I've taken extra food from that program every year and distributed to a bunch of families in need that couldn't make it there because they're disabled or because they had to work at the time.

So this is so important.

I'm speaking not only for myself, I'm speaking for so many families that this has helped over the years, including to this day.

Thank you.

Thank you, Jessica.

Um we will now close public comment um and move on to um item 14a.

And I need the city attorney to read item 48 of the record, which will be an executive session.

Good afternoon, Med Mullinger City Attorney's Office.

Uh just a moment, I need to pull the agenda up.

I closed it for some reason.

In accord with City Charter Article 3, Section 3 60 D and its incorporated Colorado Open Meetings Act CRS, Section 24 6-4024 B and D, the City Council in open session is to determine whether we'll hold a closed executive session.

The issue be to discuss involves specialized details for security arrangements, including police tactics and equipment specifications in consultation with the city attorney for the purpose of receiving related legal advice.

The president of council shall pull the city council members and upon consent of two-thirds of the members present, may conduct a closed executive session.

In the event any city council members participating electronically or telephonically in the closed executive session, each city council member participating in the closed executive session shall affirmatively state for the record that no other member of the public not authorized to participate in the closed executive session is present or able to hear the matters discussed as part of the closed executive session.

If consent of the closed executive session is not given, the item may be discussed in open session withdrawn from consideration.

So it takes two-thirds, and if council member Williams could confirm that she's alone.

Councilmember Bailey.

Councilmember Crow Iverson.

Aye, Councilmember Donaldson.

Councilmember Gold.

Aye.

Councilmember Hendram.

Councilmember Line Member.

Excused.

Councilmember Rainey.

Councilmember Risley.

Aye.

Councilmember Williams.

Yes and yes.

Okay, we'll clear the room for executive session.

And just a reminder for Council Member Williams, we are going to sign off of this link and sign into a private through my desk.

Not that it matters.

And that concludes our city council meeting today, and we are adjourned.