It's time for this biweekly meeting of the Finance and Business Committee of Denver City Council.

Join us for the Finance and Business Committee starting now.

And it's the final day of September when uh Tuesday, September 30.

You've reached the Finance and Business Committee of Denver City Council.

My name is Paul Cashman.

I serve as uh the vice chair of this committee.

I have the honor of filling in today for uh chairperson Sorana Gonzalez Guterres, one of our at-large representatives.

I also have the pleasure of representing District 6.

We have some folks arriving a little bit late.

We have some folks online right now, and I'm gonna go online first, see if uh council members Watson or Lewis might be there.

Hi, good morning, Councilwoman Lewis District 8.

Thank you for being here.

Okay, we'll wait along the way and see if others join us, and I will complete introductions by going to my partner to the right.

Uh good morning, everyone.

Uh, Diana Romero Campbell, Southeast Denver District 4.

Great.

Well, our agenda today is a combination.

We have a couple of action items uh regarding the purchase of some properties on Tremont Place downtown.

Uh we're going to start off with uh welcoming our uh our auditor uh Tim O'Brien and his team uh to talk to us about the uh 2026 budget for Denver labor.

So if you'd like to uh have a seat and uh introduce uh the the assembled throng and the floor is yours.

Well, thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

Um, I'm Tim O'Brien, I'm the Denver Auditor.

To my right is Cindy Labrano.

She's my uh business manager.

To my left is Matt Fritzmauer, he's the executive director of Denver Labor.

Valerie Walling, deputy auditors in the audience, as well as Mike Brandon is my communications director.

So I'm gonna ask Cindy to walk through the presentation that we have, and then we'll be happy to answer any and all questions that the uh committee may have.

Before you get started, we'd like to welcome Council President.

I'd like to introduce.

Oh, Councilwoman Tanville, Northwest Denver District Right.

Johnson Delver Labor.

Thank you.

Good morning, thank you for having us here as Auditor O'Brien mentioned.

I'm Cindy Labrano, the business manager for the auditor's office.

Um, I think you have a presentation of our uh slide deck.

Uh the vision of our office is to deliver value and impact for Denver, and we follow the highest professional standards.

The mission of our office is to deliver independent, transparent, and professional oversight to safeguard and improve the public's investment in the city and county of Denver.

Our work is performed on behalf of everyone who cares about the city, including its residents, workers, and decision makers.

Next slide.

Uh, we have a brief agenda today.

We're gonna talk a little bit about the duties and requirements of the auditor's office, our uh city charter, our uh local and federal labor law compliance, uh the budget allocation that the mayor suggests, and uh Matt is gonna talk about a little bit about the Denver Labor budget and the need for a litigator.

Our next slide goes into detail a little bit.

Of the auditor's office, um our office is driven by city charter article five, which establishes independence of the auditor's office and authority and duties while conducting audits of the city and county of Denver.

Um I'll pause here a little bit and kind of jump back and forth a little bit, but I just want to mention that uh the importance of our work is to keep the city agencies functioning at the highest standards.

And um, our next slide, our next bullet there is the enforcement of city wage ordinance, which includes the prevailing wage, civil wage, and minimum wage ordinances within the city, and then federal enforcement, which is the oversight of the Davis Bacon Act, on behalf of contractors and subcontractors on federally federally funded construction projects, such as the airport.

The importance of this work obviously is based on serving the citizens who work in the city of Denver who experience wage theft reduced benefits or misclassification of their rates.

Next slide.

We're here to request that our budget remain flat.

Last year we were given a 16,196, 607 million dollar budget in 2025.

And the mayor has suggested a decrease of 3% of our budget for the coming year.

This really clashes with our independence, steps on our toes regarding the management of our budget dollars.

And we just want to challenge that suggestion of a budget cut of the 3%, which roughly comes to about $500,000, just over $500,000.

Our next point is that, you know, the mayor and the finance department really don't have any oversight to dictate who we can or cannot hire.

Again, based on the city charter, we need to be able to hire based on our discretion, based on our workload.

We're currently down several staff, and it really impedes the ability to continue work throughout the year.

We have an aggressive audit schedule as we do every year for 2026.

And with the inability to hire at our discretion, this really doesn't allow us to complete our scheduled audits.

But really are doing the work that the office is meant to do based on their charter, based on our independence.

We can go to the next slide.

Next slide talks a little bit about our Denver labor's need.

And so I'm gonna turn that over to Matt because he can do a much better job than I can at explaining that.

Thank you.

So Matt Fitzmaler, executive director of labor.

I'll talk about some of the risks that we are facing in our office, particularly in regards to wage enforcement as a result of the proposed budget cut.

And I'll actually talk a little bit more broadly than the need for a Denver labor litigator, although that is extremely important.

Last May and June, I believe, City Council passed an amendment to our ordinance allowing us to do co-enforcement grants to trusted community organizations.

And the instruction we received was to ask for a 120,000 dollar line item in our budget for this year.

We did not do that because we think that we can just absorb it into our flat budget, get those co-enforcement grants out, expand our reach, especially in the high-risk populations, like immigrant workers, especially as these workers are understandably more scared than ever of uh relying on the government for help in the workplace.

Um that our ability to make those grants is extremely at risk as a result of this budget cut.

Um, we have also adopted some really proactive enforcement strategies in the last two and a half years since city council passed the wage theft ordinance, expanding our authority.

We run towards the hard cases, the cases where people are not likely to be able to get lawyers, but where violations are going to be widespread.

Again, especially in the staffing industry among undocumented people.

I think all of you have probably seen in the news our work enforcing the rights of people at strip clubs in Denver.

These cases, the result is that we are doing more than ever.

We're collecting more money than ever.

We're enforcing the rights of more people than ever.

So we have about a month left in our tracking year, which runs through the end of October.

Last year we set a record and enforced the rights of 4,505 workers.

This year we're already at around 5,800.

I mean, we're seeing these massive jump ups as a result of our proactive strategies.

The problem is the hard cases is where the law gets made.

It's where the restitution amounts are higher.

It's where the issues are larger.

And so we also have more appeals.

Again, especially from, I would say, companies that make a business practice out of violating the law.

The city attorney's office has been unable to meet our needs.

I have a lot of respect for the city attorney's office.

They know that I am saying these things right now.

We've talked about it very frankly.

And the solution that we've come up with is that we should contribute an amount of money to get a litigator who were entitled to 50% of their time.

That would be approximately $110,000.

That would allow us to process the important cases that we're doing.

I'll just give you two examples.

In late February, we issued determinations finding tens of millions of dollars in restitution owed to workers at two strip clubs, Rick's Cabaret, Diamond Cabaret.

We haven't been able to process those appeals to a hearing officer yet.

Those decisions have been appealed.

We want to go to a hearing, we want to keep this process moving, but we haven't had the litigation support we need to do that.

As another example, um uh we have been investigating retaliation at another strip club.

We used our subpoena authority to demand information that you all granted us last April.

The club challenged that authority, and we haven't been able to process this dispute either to a hearing officer because we need more litigation support.

And so we have this real bottleneck in the important work that we do, which we could address with a flat budget, but not fees.

Um it's at risk with these forced reductions in addition to the independence points that Cindy made.

So I think that's what I wanted to share.

There are more examples, but I hope I've given you all an idea of the picture.

And I think we are happy to answer questions.

Yeah, I think if I could close, Mr.

Chairman.

Um, you know, we are committed to saving money for the city.

We recognize the, you know, the dilemma that the city is in financially, you know, today.

Um, I believe that the mayor, neither the mayor nor the department of finance has the authority to cut my budget.

That's the council's job to you know decide what the auditor's budget should be or should not be.

Um so uh I will be asking if if this 3% cut goes through in the mayor's budget, I will be asking the council to restore those dollars to the auditors' budget.

Um, further, I think you know, some of the directives that are coming out of the Department of Finance are really impeding my ability to do the job I was elected to do.

Um we have difficulty getting approval to hire staff in vacant positions that are already authorized in the current budget.

Um so um it's outright interference in my opinion, and it's uh it's a difficult environment for us to work in.

And and if I could add one more thing, um, I forgot to mention our budget is 16.2 million dollars, but we have a lot of people who are paid in whole or in part out of the airport enterprise fund.

So we've got a team of seven that does prevailing wage compliance work at the airport.

Um, all these people have furloughed without complaint to be part of the solution, but we do expect that of that 16.2 million, we will recover from the airport, approximately 2.2 million this year that will go back into the general fund.

And that 2 million number is pretty steady over the last three years.

Well, thank you for the presentation.

Um start with council president uh Shandoval.

Thank you.

Um, uh I've asked the city attorney's office about splitting the um attorney, and they've told me no.

So who at the city attorney's office do you have that has said yes?

I don't think that that's actually been agreed upon if I'm correct.

So we I I have had discussions um over the last year or so with Deanne Durfee, Matt Malbarger, Katie McLaughlin, and then we had an initial meeting with the new city attorney about three weeks ago.

I think it was her first week.

And what was Nico's did they agree?

Um they they've been good to work with.

We're going to, they're going to try to get us more litigation support, but I think we all agree that the ideal solution is us contributing some money to support the work.

That's let me ask a just a quick question.

Did they agree to splitting the attorney?

Because I've heard that that's not an agreement.

I could be wrong, but do you have an email or something that shows that that's the agreement?

Not an email, but I remember asking about that specifically, and they said that that was not abnormal and I thought would be doable.

Yes, I'll follow back up on that one.

Um, so with the $500,000 that is being asked for 2026, how many employees is that I'd say it's a half a dozen.

That's all right.

With fringe and everything?

No, it's probably three to four.

Yeah, I'd say three to four, depending on the position.

Because we have several various levels that are currently open.

And so what positions are you looking for?

Because they like um even a council aid, right?

Like a council aid in our offices with retirement fringe and all of the other, it you know, it doesn't cost what you what you put down on their salary, it cost more.

Of course, so what kind of positions are you looking for?

Can you paint a broader picture for me?

We currently have uh lead auditor, elite ISR auditor open.

What's that salary range?

That salary, Valerie might have to help me out there, but I think it's probably about one ten plus about 30,000 with benefits.

Yeah, 40.

So depending on what insurance plan they pick, right?

Yes, absolutely, and other considerations, of course.

And then we have two senior auditors open.

What's that salary range?

That salary range is closer to 90, okay, I believe for starting senior.

We have three positions open in Denver Labor, two techs, which are currently at an hourly range, they start at $29 an hour, which comes to about 56 or 58,000, I believe.

Yeah, they're not salary.

They're not salary, and their benefits typically run a little bit less, closer to 25,000.

And then we have uh analyst open at Denver Labor that starts at about 76, I want to say.

It is, I just want to add one of those tech positions is specialized, and it has to it's really focused on approving fringe benefits for city contractors.

So about half of that would be covered by the airport enterprise fund.

Okay.

Oh, yeah, that's true.

Yeah.

So the additional is the analyst, which starts at about 76, I believe.

Okay, and then for you, Auditor O'Brien, are you participating in furloughs?

Are you writing a check back?

Absolutely.

And and all of the staff are participating in the firm.

Yeah, they don't have a choice.

Like my staff doesn't have a choice.

My staff has to furlough.

Um, but you even elected officials don't have to furlough, you have to write a check back.

So it's not like I don't think any of our staff here have a choice.

It's all mandatory.

We're in the same position, and it's up to us as electeds to see if we write a check back.

Right.

Um, if I could, excuse me.

If I could say one other thing, auditor O'Brien also has elected to keep two of his appointee positions open.

So to be part of the solution and keep our you know budget as low as we can, I guess, for personnel costs.

So that's a you know, very large uh expense that we're kind of holding on the side.

So that's in addition to the 500,000?

Correct, yes.

Okay, so um one of the comments that you made was that we all it's challenging to do your job with less right now.

I would say it's challenging for me to do my job with less right now.

Um, we have impacts to neighborhood plans that are going to be pushed out because community planning and development.

Um we have trash service that doesn't get picked up, and we all do constituent services.

Um, we have permits that are gonna be not looked at, and so I would just um I would encourage you all to say we instead of I, because I it's all of us in this together.

You're an independent elected um auditor, we're independent electeds and we all are having to do something, so it's not just one agency that is having a hard time and asking to be do more with less, it's all of us, right?

And um, for me, this is not the first time that my staff has had to do furloughs.

This is not the first time that my staff has asked been asked to do more with less resources.

Um, and so when I'm looking at this, I'm thinking more holistically and asking how could we have um what's best for the for the residents of Denver, and I do understand that um a $500,000 impact will impact your um agency greatly.

Have you thought about a supplemental?

So there always is an opportunity after we pass the budget and we approve the budget for the following year.

If there is something that comes up that's that um say payout of PTO, right, which is the hypothetically not talk about your work, um, that there is an opportunity to do a supplemental.

So in your time, have you ever had to go down that route to do a supplemental?

And it have you looked at that opportunity to say, hey, right now, this is the budget that we we have what we'd have to live within, and then um workshop what it would look like to come in for a supplemental in maybe 2026.

Um we have not had to go down that road in the past.

Uh obviously that's an option for us, you know, if we feel that we're constrained um that much.

You know, I think there's really a principle at stake here, which is cutting the auditor's budget.

Uh so it's three percent this year, maybe next year it's 30 percent.

Maybe you know, 10 years from now, we you know cut it by even more.

Um, and again, I think I know the charter says that the council shall appropriate to the auditor, you know, the funds necessary to do the job, something to that effect.

Um, and you also says that the city council should appropriate the funds to do civil service to hire our um firefighters and our um police officers.

It also says city council should appropriate funds for the clerk and recorder.

It also says the city council should appropriate funds for there's five.

So the auditor is one of five.

So that that charter responsibility keeps coming up, and I will just say I have never told you reminded you of what your job is as auditor.

So it it doesn't land right when I keep being told what my job is as the city council person who oversees the charter of what our charter authority is.

I know what my charter authority is, and what I've heard is it can be subjective.

My idea of what appropriating enough funds for you to be able to do your job might be very different than what your idea is, correct?

Um city council with 13 independent elected, does not have your budget.

My colleague here who represents the entire city of Denver, does not even have a fraction of your budget, and so for an independent body, we make up less than one percent of one percent of the budget.

It's not even close to 16 million dollars, and so we represent a lot of people and we do a lot of work, and so I understand that we all are needing to have the resources to be able to do our jobs and be able to do them in the manner that we need to have them that we feel like is really important to be able to do the work that we do.

And I'll just say I've been um reviewing the charter.

I take my charter authority very seriously.

Um I got sworn in, same thing with you, um auditor O'Brien.

Um so I'm very aware of what the charter calls out for us to be able to do our job, and I'm also very aware of all of the other responsibilities that we have falling amongst city council.

Um, it's hard when you have to make a budget amendment to come up with what is needed for the budget to find.

So if we're taking to give to you, we have to take it from another agency, we have to take it from another service.

It says, like it just can come out of nowhere.

We literally would have to find a line item and or a fund and take it from there and move it over to you to to the auditor.

And so that's that's really challenging in a time when we're seeing temporary rental service go down.

It's very challenging when we're seeing evictions go down, it's very challenging when we have public comment every Monday night for family shelters for some of our vulnerable families that we don't have a family in that family shelters out there for them.

Um, so I feel like probably all of us on city council right now probably feel a lot of the weight of having to do a lot with less or more with less.

Um, we don't have a lot of the services that we have always um relied on.

One of the things that we get to do at City Council is land use, and we've been told by CPD that our legislative um that we won't have as many uh as big of ability to have um legislative rezonings done because they don't have the staff, and that's clearly called out in the charter that we have land use authority, so we are also being told that we're not gonna be able to do our job, and I I have rezoned, I rezoned my whole council district for accessory dwelling units before the city, so that would mean that I don't have the opportunity to lead some of those projects.

Um, so I understand I I just want you to all I think that right now we all need to stop and think about the other people that we're talking to and how this budget crisis is impacting all of us and impacting the whole greater good of the city.

Um so those are my comments.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

Uh before we continue with the two, I'll welcome uh council member Gonçalves Guterres, Councilmember Watson, thank you for coming.

Uh, next up uh council pro Tamron Romero Campbell, then councilman Gonzalo's good characters.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um thank you.

Uh I just wanted to ask for clarification.

I was uh is the 500,000 um that you're looking for, the positions that you had mentioned, the three to four positions, are those vacant positions that would then not be filled.

Are those what we're asking is that our budget remain flat from that from from this current year?

And not be reduced, and the amount of reduction is 500,000.

And the positions that you named are those filled positions or vacant positions, those are vacant positions, but the reason we mentioned that is because the finance office has placed a hold on positions, and we don't feel like we should have to go through them to hire as an independent agency that you know circumvents our authority.

Okay, um, and then uh, and I don't know if you had mentioned this and I might have missed it.

Um, did you have to did anybody in the auditor's office did you participate in any of the layoffs?

There were no layoffs, um, so current number of staff that you have in the auditor's office now.

I believe it is at 91.

I may be off by one count.

Okay.

I think we're down about 10% right now.

So there were, there's always some amount of churn.

And so there were some open positions that we kept open.

And there were some resignations or other exits.

We have seven vacant currently.

Two we did receive approval to hire for, and then our two appointees are vacant.

So a total of nine at this moment.

Um, and then just for clarification, um, I was trying to track the 2.2 million that you would get back from Den.

Can you explain that just a little bit more?

Uh it doesn't come back to you, it would go back to general funds.

For savings or I just wasn't quite sure how that circle of dollars went.

We get a general fund appropriation.

Um the work that we do at the airport, whether it's an audit or you know, some of the labor law enforcement we build the airport for, and then those dollars go back into the general fund, and it's seven positions that basically are doing that work for the if I heard correctly, there's seven positions that are.

And then there's an allocation within the office based on what work you do.

Some of us contribute more than others, some are 50%, some are 20% per month.

The auditors based on the audits that are ongoing at the airport will change every month, potentially, until that audit is completed, and then the next audit begins.

And there could be more than one airport audit going on at a time.

Their cost is 100% um allocated based on that audit.

So if they're working on two audits, it might be 5050.

Got it.

And yeah, and just out of curiosity, how many audits do we have going on at the airport right now?

Three, thank you.

Um, and are there projected to be?

There are in the future, or is that just pretty standard?

I just tried to um it does change.

I don't know what the projection is in the plan upcoming, but but it it does change periodically.

Sometimes there's more, sometimes there's less.

Okay.

There's always at least one.

But there's always, right, at least one audit.

At least one.

Okay.

Um, and just to give you an idea, uh, we average about 4200 audit hours a month combined approximately, and it's typically about 15% of that time is then at DIA, sometimes a percent or two more, sometimes up to 18%.

Okay for audit work.

Great.

Um, thank you.

Thank you.

I don't have any other questions.

Um thank you.

Thank you, Councilwoman.

Councilwoman Gonzalez, good job.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you for for being here and handling everything.

And I apologize for for being a little bit late.

Um, so I I had a quick question about the the um, well, of course, the labor division and specifically the wage theft um litigation and everything, and I know I'd come in right when you were talking about the city attorney um piece, and so um so did you give a landscape?

Because I know I I'd met with you all about that particular issue, and so did you provide a landscape of what is happening in the number of cases that we're not able to, or it just takes a really long time, I guess.

Or we're just not able to process and we've been at a standstill for some months now.

Yeah, and if I may, the willingness to litigate on behalf of these workers is paramount to reaching a resolution.

So I I just got back from vacation.

We were supposed to have a three-day hearing involving um what we'd identified as widespread minimum wage and paid sick and other violations.

Um as often happens, right before the hearing, the employer decided they did want to talk settlement.

That was only possible because the hearing was right there, and so we now have a settlement for 293,000 dollars for these workers.

And um, so the uh council president Sandoval, the point you were making earlier about what's best for the people of Denver.

I don't, I don't want to overstate the extent to which we're revenue generating in terms of fines that we bring into the general fund, but we are seeing a new pattern emerge of tens of thousands of dollars a year that we hope to increase.

And the only reason that's possible is because we aren't afraid to litigate.

Um, and then we're seeing a pattern emerge of hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars in unpaid wages going back to people who earn them in the first place, again, backed by the promise of litigation.

Um I really appreciate that work, and I know that um members of our body have worked really hard to increase the protections there for our workers.

And I guess, you know, more of a statement, I guess, than a question and kind of hearing the conversation that's been had around budget and and where everything is at.

I think this is a very difficult time as we went through all of the budget briefings last week and and learned um what will remain and what will be no longer, or what will be on pause, or what will not be funded to the fullest extent.

And um, and I appreciate Council President bringing up, you know, a lot of the different hardships that we're going to see and what that impact will be on people in our city, um, especially people who are in the most need.

Um, and I see people that are facing wage theft issues are not getting paid, that is also essential, right?

And and I think there is something to be said about having to balance all of these priorities, and it goes back to something that I think as a body we talked about very early on, which is the nice the needs and the nice to have's.

Yeah.

And I think that's the challenge that we'll be faced with going forward is what are the needs and what are the nice to have, what are our communities' needs versus things that look pretty?

Um, and and I think that's that's the state that we're in.

And so when I think about our city budget, when I think about the work of the auditor's office or whether it's host or um our HRCP, it is where can we have the most minimum amount of impact on those that are most vulnerable?

And and I would say in the auditor's office, it is in the labor division, it is with the work that you're doing to um to help people with their wage theft claims and and make them whole again.

So I appreciate that work um and know that I can only speak for myself as as an individual council member, but that is something that I am paying attention to is and trying as much as I can to locate within our city's budget.

What are there places that and things that are being money that is being spent on things that maybe could be more on a pause versus the things that are having a direct impact on the folks that need it the most?

So thank you, uh, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

Uh, Councilmember Watson.

Um just for time check.

Uh I'm gonna call this in about 10 minutes.

So we have time for our action items.

I'll be quick.

I have uh pretty much two questions.

I want to apologize to the body.

I had a conflict that I could not get out of, so I apologize for coming late.

Um I missed a part of your presentation, and obviously I um read through the presentation documents prior to coming.

Can you share with me once again the impact of that three percent reduction?

Are you stating that that will have a negative impact on your ability to um to do wage theft um um litigation, wage theft work based on your new response, your increased responsibilities on wage theft.

What's the impact of that 3% um reduction from 2025 to 2026?

I think the reduction slows down what we've I think have momentum with today.

And that it slows down getting people paid, the dollars that they've earned, whether it's minimum wage or prevailing wage, uh, it slows down the litigation process because we need you know, we funding a litigator through the city's attorney's office.

And if I could just stress, I think the moment and the opportunity we have, um our office has a reputation where workers who don't trust the government talk to us.

Um and we all think, I think a lot about undocumented people, but um I can't I can't tell you how much I've learned that it's quite extraordinary that so many entertainers at strip clubs speak to us about their rights violations, a group of people who are really on the social and economic margins and have often um they have learned unfortunately that the government is there to hinder them and their interests.

We are we are able to work with these people to to enforce their most basic civil rights, but we have this standstill, especially with those cases because of the um lack of litigation support, which which is meant to be a factual comment on the resources of the city attorney's office and how our work has grown, and not uh complain about anyone at the city attorney's office.

And and I hear you clearly, and because of uh time today, and obviously I'm certain this will be coming back when um we get to the floor for amendments.

Most likely there will be um um requests for additional dollars um from somewhere within this body.

Um I want to be very clear.

Um we have independent agencies.

My office as District 9 is an independent agency, so is every city council office.

Um we are facing headwinds when it comes to our budget for 2026.

Um, all of our departments, um, every entity, including independent agencies like every city council, um, has agreed to and are, I'm out of my own pocket paying back um dollars uh to the city because I see the impacts to city employees and services, so all of the departments that did reductions.

Uh they are sincerely certain that what they are reducing has legitimate impact to delivering on their responsibilities to the residents of this city.

And so the auditors' impact of three percent.

I'm gonna need a lot more information clarity.

Um as we look from 2019 uh forward, we see an exponential growth within your office.

And obviously, you are doing much much more than you were doing that.

The presentation that I received is not convincing to me that this free percent would have that direct impact on your ability to execute on the powers you asked us to provide to you.

Um, and so I look forward to um having a deeper dialogue once this comes to the floor.

But I know with speaking with other departments, speaking with other council members, each agency, including independent agencies like ours, city council, have taken a hit um because of the budget that we're facing.

Um I think three percent at this point seems reasonable to me, and I look forward to hearing more from your team as this possibly comes to the floor with clear details as your on your impact to actually legislate on the powers that you asked us to provide to you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

Um I do have a question uh for Mr.

Griffin.

So um the the auditor uh brought up early on the over the overriding question of excuse me, does the administration have the legal right to determine the the auditor's budget to make cuts?

I know our clerk has raised similar objections.

How does this get resolved past, you know, if if the agencies don't come to agreement with the mayor, does this end up going to court?

Is there legal precedent?

Can you opine a little bit?

Well, John Peter from Deputy Legislative Council.

So to kind of answer your first question, um, the mayor uh has the obligation under the charter to prepare a balanced budget uh that looks at all offices, agencies, et cetera, which includes city council, the auditor, and the clerk and recorder's office.

Uh city council, then as was pointed out in the presentation, has an obligation to pass a budget to ensure that um the city operates uh in a state and that the balance of the budget may remains balanced.

Uh as for whether or not there could be litigation as a result of it, um uh as you've seen uh the charter provisions stay in the same as the clerk and recorders to sufficiently run the office.

To my knowledge, that's never been challenged.

Um, and I'm I can't really opine on what would be a sufficiency question.

I think at that point it would come down to really a fact-based analysis that we couldn't speak to.

Thank you very much.

And I'll just to ask the auditor if he can answer briefly.

Do you disagree with that analysis that the charter says the mayor has the right to address the budgets of the independent agencies?

I think the charter says that the auditor will submit through the mayor, the auditor's budget to use the processes that the mayor uh outlines.

Um, that's fine for today.

I thank you very much.

Uh, not just for your your presentation, but the great work that Denver Labor is doing.

I mean, the the money you're you're bringing back to people who would otherwise have been uh cheated out of their uh rightful earnings, is really relevant, and it uh it's a good thing that government is doing for for the residents.

So uh we'll uh hear more about this as uh the next few weeks of of budget discussions go on.

So again, thanks to our uh auditors' team, uh Otter O'Brien, thank you so much.

Thanks for your job.

You betcha.

You betcha.

And we will take a minute to transition over.

I'm guessing we have a team from host and real estate, perhaps.

We have a couple of uh items uh that we need to vote on regarding the potential acquisition of property on Tremont Street.

And uh I guess I'm gonna make it easy on me and turn the floor uh over to uh Lisa Lumley from real estate, and whoever else is going to present can introduce themselves.

Thank you.

Um good morning, Lisa Lumley, director of real estate.

And Jackson Brockway, the capital planning and programming team in Department of Finance.

So do we have it up?

There we go.

So yes, we are here to talk about uh potential acquisition of 1460 and 1480 Tremont.

So we will go through the council actions, the property acquisition overview, and then uh leave room for any questions.

So the first is a resolution 251425 to approve the purchase and sale agreement.

It's with the family, a number of different entities, including GSC LLC, Great Falls Family Limited Partnership, LLLP, Tremont Lewin Properties LLC, and Ruth Ann West, um, for the Tremont acquisitions.

And then Bill 25, 1426 would be to appropriate capital improvement program contingency funds to provide the funding to acquire then both of the Tremont parcels.

So if you can see the red dot on the map in relationship to the web building there, um it is actually two parcels.

Total is approximately 12,500 square feet.

There is a small building, this is the former good year.

Um the building's 4866 square feet.

The building really is a non-issue for us.

We're looking at the land.

This is in council district 10.

Um, the zoning is DC, and again, there are the list of the multiple sellers.

The purchase price is 2.5 million dollars, and the source of the funds would be capital improvement fund contingency that we'll get to in a minute.

So we are looking at this, um, and uh Adam is here to speak to um any questions you have regarding affordable housing and hosts, but this um is uh definitely supported in our downtown area plan that is just uh recently been um wrapped up, if I'm not mistaken, right?

Yeah, um, but by acquiring these properties, then our goal would be to work with one of the pre-qualified developers that we recently did the RFP with and bring in um bring in a partner to work on an affordable housing project in downtown.

Um this would be a great connection to the 16th Street Mall.

It is walkable, it's transit-friendly, and again it's zoned for that high density.

Um, the second request here is uh companion for 2.525 million from contingency.

I want to pause for a minute and just say real estate is starting to draft our purchase and sell agreements a little bit differently that you will see going forward.

We'll have the purchase price, but then we are trying to include some closing costs, just and then increase that maximum contract amount, just so that if anybody sees settlement statements and it's more than 2.5 million, you all know why, and um we have given you the heads up about that.

So that does include 25,000 for closing costs, and again, this will align with the use of the capital contingency.

So our timeline is here today, mayor council next week, city council um on the 13th, with the companion um second reading on October 20th, and then the RFP, we would real estate and host would work together to prepare an RFP fairly soon after that.

We'll look at the timing of the end of the year so that we make sure we're sending it out at a good time to get the best responses, and then um from there start the construction project as soon as we can.

And with that, are there any questions?

That may have been the most council congratulations.

Um, I'm a I'm gonna start off real quick with a question.

So when you're talking about the capital contingency fund, we have a general fund contingency fund.

Is this a separate element?

Will you talk about that, please?

Yeah, absolutely.

And the reason I ask uh Councilwoman Alvidres, who couldn't be with us this morning, expressed a concern uh about taking money from contingency in these difficult budget times.

So I want to address that.

Yeah, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to that.

Um CIF contingency is is a separate fund that lives within our capital improvements fund.

So this has no impact on the general funds specifically.

Uh, each year when we put together the budget, when in which council approves does include a percentage um of base revenues uh that are used for contingency purposes.

So our full contingency policy is available on page 604 of the budget book, but principally it is available for things like emergency repairs that may come up, exceedingly high bids on a project that we receive, or it can include things like uh really changes in agency work plans or uh unique opportunities uh which often we do see in the real estate space.

Um, and so generally within the first half of any year, uh, we we tend to not touch or use contingency at any point unless there is some type of emergency need that arises.

Um, as we do get to the second half of the year, and we have uh more or less clear line of sight uh for the rest of the year.

We we have um both this year and we have in the past um found these real estate opportunities which can be hard to project project or predict um in an upcoming budget cycle, and that's why um this was recommended as a funding source for this option.

Um so is there a percentage, in other words, you aim for 10% contingency.

So where are we at this point with the contingency?

And uh yeah, and we've got what three three months uh left in the year.

Yep, that's so that's a great question.

So um contingency is depending on the year, it's usually between four and five percent of base revenues.

So contingency in 2025 was 7.4 million.

We actually haven't used any of our of our 2025 contingency um at this point in the year.

And it will, if there is money left, it will roll over, I assume.

Um that is correct.

Money left over would roll um into CIF fund balance.

Um we generally when we yeah, when we roll those numbers forward, we we generally um uh for our revenue projections in the year, we don't count it for the upcoming year, um, but that would create fund balance to be used in in future years.

Yeah, so excess in the contingency goes back into the overall uh uh capital fund, and then you determine how much you will set aside for the coming year contingency.

That's correct.

Thank you.

Yep.

Council Pro Temer, Mara Campbell.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, and thank you for the presentation.

My questions are kind of gonna, they'll be the same as they were during the briefing.

Um, if you could tell me a little bit more about the um contingency funds.

If it goes towards this, um they could be used for a variety of things across the city, correct?

Um, so what are we not getting to?

I'm thinking of, you know, there are repairs at Rec Center.

There are um a variety of smaller projects that have been in a queue um for a number of years within I know District 4.

How will this impact those jobs coming to completion?

Yeah, that's that's a great question.

I know we have some time set up to talk about some some projects in your district.

Um I think we're working to schedule some time.

So looking forward to to talking through that specifically.

Um the short answer within uh the the CIF contingency question is it doesn't have a direct impact or or wouldn't take away necessarily from what we could get done in the next budget year.

Um we talked about how contingency is is rolled into future years.

Um we when we project our revenues, um we generally do not count the contingency role into that next year, but it would kind of factor into any future fund balances for 2027.

Um so that is something it's an active conversation we could have about um looking at the work plan in future years.

The other thing I would say is in the presentation we gave to you all last Monday, um, in uh to kick off our budget hearings, is we really wanted to focus this year on um both what projects are are deliverable, what we could get done and and move forward in a reasonable time frame, as well as making sure that our our agency partners um have um enough resources to really deliver those projects and make sure we're not um necessarily overcommitting the time of our of our project managers, and we do feel like the package we've put together uh for the 26th CIP in addition.

Um, if the voters do do sign off on the vibrant Denver bond program, we want to make sure that we have enough capacity to deliver all of those projects, as well as um kind of the work that's progressing that's been funded in past years.

Um so the dollars that would be um this particular purchase of property um is focused on future housing needs.

Is there a reason why this wouldn't come out of host or a host budget to look at affordable housing and land acquisition?

Well, I think there's a combination when we're getting down to the end of this year, where we are looking at those different funding sources.

Um I think we felt like at this point, and based on some of the other projects going on with host, why looking at contingency this late in the year was appropriate.

I know that there had been some questions about DDA and could we have used that to acquire, which we couldn't because truthfully is this was negotiated, that was even before DDA was approved.

Um, and we can't go backwards retro.

Um, although we can once we own it submitted into the DDA, and that can be um considered with the developer partner as part of the capital step in the future, which is also then how we'd look at some of the host funds as well on what they could be contributed uh how they would contribute to that potential development.

Great.

You answered my next question.

Uh I think um I just have to say I am concerned.

I know it's 2.25, I think is 2.5 um million dollars that are being asked for, which I think downtown is if that's reasonable, I don't know what's reasonable, but it's it's lower than other things that we've heard of.

Um what I'm worried about is that um projects that are smaller, more locally based, um, things that have been on the list for a number of years in Southeast Denver, um, continue to get rolled forward um and you know, and never get completed.

And so um I'm worried that we will purchase land, which is you know, a great idea to be able to do that land banking, and I'm I'm not opposed to that.

However, what I am concerned about is especially in our budget year and um as we're looking at projects um that you know, a crossing light won't get completed in Southeast Denver, that we won't get those repairs.

I know that we're hoping and cautiously optimistic for the bond to pass, but if that bond doesn't pass, then repairs at the rec center don't happen.

Um things along the Highline Canal don't happen along Evans and implementation of of our um corridor plans won't occur.

Um, and so I'm I have to say I'm just really challenged from the source of this funding and a little confused as to still why it wouldn't be coming out of host.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

I've got uh the full queue, Councilman Watson, Councilman Lewis, uh Council President of Sandoval and uh Councilman Gonzalez Guterres.

Thank you so much, committee chair.

And I would say Jackson is you know, I think as we discussed um in the budget process, it's gonna be essential for the department to provide kind of the CIP priorities for 2026.

I think that's gonna reduce maybe some questions of concern as far as priorities regionally.

Um the look of this, once again, additional dollars towards downtown may not feel like an equitable lens is being used for the contingency funding.

I think it's important for us as council members to be aware of 2025-2026 CIP, what that rollover is and what the priorities are across the city.

Um, my question to your team is for the Denver area plan, we are moving steadfastly through that process.

Um the downtown area plan, not Denver area plan.

I keep saying that.

Um is this um uh does this meet based on the base um level of uh of suggestions for for land use um within downtown?

Is this section segment listing for housing?

Does anyone have any sense?

I don't know if we have anyone from CPD here, but it will be helpful to see that this is aligned with what we're thinking of for the downtown area plan.

If you don't have an answer today, it'll be great for that for you to have that um at a later time.

We don't have CPT here.

Uh Adam, I don't know if you have that.

Adam's a wizard, but I don't know if you're not five.

Yes, uh good afternoon, Adam Lyons, Deputy Director of Housing Opportunity for Host.

Yeah, you know, I have been involved in the downtown area planning process, and there are a number of draft recommendations in that draft plan now around uh, you know, just residential development kind of generally, especially around affordable housing development, uh mixed use, so ground floor commercial with residential above as well as mixed income projects, um, and then a whole slew of other strategies around preservation, which wouldn't really be applicable here.

Um, but yeah, I can't really speak to the exact land use of this parcel, but affordable housing development preservation is well uh documented in that draft plan.

That'll be a good confirmation, and then one last ask um from um Dr.

Cog's uh needs assessment review that's coming up for 2026 as well as uh host needs assessment.

It'll be helpful to identify really the needs for for housing and housing starts.

Um we know we've seen several developments where housing has been reduced um based on uh the market and the changing in um kind of the the needs assessment for additional housing within the density of our downtown areas across um the country.

So we'll love a little bit more of that uh as this move if if this moves to the floor.

Thank you so much, committee chair.

Thank you.

Uh Councilwoman Lewis, are you with us?

I am I am still here.

Thank you so much.

I just had a I had a few questions.

The first one was I wanted to know if the um if the land would still be owned by the city that that the development would occur on.

I think it has been, you know, again, I think we've talked about councilwoman with host that um we will look at these each project specific um on whether would we sell it versus a ground lease?

Um I think we've talked about, especially for being downtown, we would retain ownership and just keep a ground lease in place.

That can you help me to understand what what goal this like what strategic priority this is attached to for for the mayor's office?

Because I've heard the mayor's office say that they were intentional about owning our land.

Um and that was one of the reasons that they were closing some of the sites um in both districts eight and nine when it came to sheltering.

Um, but this seems like it's going in a different direction than that stated um, no councilwoman.

If we keep it released, that means we will own it and we'll just lease it to that developer.

So we would always retain the the actual fee title to the property.

What what would you lease it at?

You mean you mean a dollar value?

I'm again because we would look at look for that to be a true affordable housing development, then it would probably be similar to what we've done with our other host projects, and that would be a nominal ten dollars a year kind of transaction.

Lisa, are you all thinking about an affordable housing developer?

Yes.

Yes.

For this one, we've definitely been looking at affordable housing.

What range right now?

I don't know that I can tell you today or that Adams prepared on a specific range, but we are talking about true affordable housing, not just a development with market affordable.

Okay, that's helpful.

And can you talk to me about some of the projects that have come out of this funding source previously?

Um, well, and let me clarify.

Are you talking about for just the acquisition or the overall project?

The acquisition.

Truthfully, it is, I don't know that we have it's rare that we use contingency, but do you have one?

Yeah, and I actually um when we did a round of briefings, I know council member Flynn asked the same question as well about how we've used contingency in the past, and so um Lisa, you are correct.

We don't um we may not use it every single year, but um, looking back through, there have been several um times reviews contingency.

We did use it in 2024, um, for a similar, well, not a similar real estate transaction, but for real estate use.

Um, that was for the um it was earnest money for the Denver Post acquisition.

Um 2023, there was not use of contingency, and then 2022 and 21, there was uh contingency use for emergency repairs um at the Denver County Jail as well as the Fleet Services Center, um, and then it wasn't used for 2020.

Um, happy to go back and and look for more if we need um any more historicals.

But yeah, that is uh the the historic use of of contingency.

Okay, that's that's really helpful because I'm trying to understand like what what are the triggers that may cause us to want to use this, and it feels like in this budgetary environment that um it doesn't seem like an emergency use in the same way that maybe in 2022 or 2021 in the examples that you gave.

And I think to Pro Ten's point, um it does move dollars away from other projects that may need those repairs with this maybe hyper focus or over reliance on um the bond passing, and so I would be curious about that.

And and if I may, and I I really appreciate the the sentiment and thought around emergency repairs and investments back in our facility.

That has been um a really important emphasis in the 2026 CAP as well as the 2025 CIP.

Um, they're um I'm really proud of the investments we are making in that space.

Um I I could re-um resend the figures out in terms of our reinvestment portfolio.

Um, but it is about 74 million in our our transportation mobility space, about 29 million in the parks and recreation space, um, another 21 million or so we can get you the specific figures um going back into our city facilities, um the and and some of those facilities we've we've talked about that are um especially challenging um are slated to receive funding in in the 26 CIP as well.

So completely understand the the emphasis and focus on supporting the needed repairs we we do need in the city, and the 26 CAP makes a variety of strides there as well.

Okay, thank you so much.

I really appreciate it.

Those are all the questions I have now.

I might get back in the queue if anything else comes up.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Councilman.

Council President of Shanghai.

Thank you so much.

Um, how long have you been working on this project?

Um I probably started they they listed it uh at the beginning of the year, end of the year.

Maybe it was actually almost a year ago.

Um, I think it was actually in 2024 where they had some brokers that I originally was talking to and submitted an offer probably early in 2025, which actually was not transacted, and then the owners themselves reach out directly to me to tell me instead that they um uh would like to just work directly with me.

So it's been almost a yeah.

Okay, um, do we have have you sent us the purchase and sale agreement?

Uh I don't honestly I don't think so.

Happy to.

Yeah, can we see the purchase and sale agreement?

That would be um really helpful.

Um so for host, I have a couple questions for host.

Um in these types of projects.

If we were to purchase this land, um the purchase, it's for 2,500 and then 20 and additional 25,000 for closing costs up to up to what happens, like who's responsible?

How do we get into partnerships?

Because right now I think it's like a rental car space, um, or something.

It's not truthfully people are illegally parking there.

So we're working with the owners trying to work through that.

So who would who pay who pays for demo?

How who pays for all like environmental?

Who pays for all of that?

So traditionally that is all done by the developer that we procure for the property.

So, you know, it's not just the you know, once we convey the property through a land lease or some other mechanism, we would require uh, you know, a lot of due diligence from them before the actual project gets built.

That could be an environmental phase one report.

Uh we'd obviously all want a market study as well to make sure that the plan that we have intended for the site is backed up by the market demand for that site as well.

Um, so it really um it really does depend.

Um, you know, I know that with real estate buying the property, there may be some of this due diligence that they could rely on as well.

Um, but you know, for most affordable housing projects, we do require that the developer really fund the demolition, um, the all the third party reports like environmentals um market studies appraisals um for the for the future development that is one of my just answer council president.

Um Adam's right.

Um normally that is how we would do it.

We've heard a lot um recently, and given some situations that have occurred at another site, we are also looking at the potential since it's such a small building.

Uh maybe we just demo it right out, Pratt.

Um now I will say we've already received um while we still do our own due diligence.

We have received and Goodyear had to provide environmental reports before they could terminate the lease.

Um so are you working with DDPHE?

I mean, there's nothing that is a major concern right at the moment.

So that's the other piece of that.

Yeah, there are no horrible flags coming up.

Okay.

So to some of my colleagues' point, how does this fit in this purchase fit into host five-year strategic plan?

Like, I'll always go back.

I know that this strategic plan is coming up, I think in 2026, maybe 27 for um a new iteration of it.

But how does this fit within that five-year plan to create a more holistic foot like um strategic advisory of what we're doing?

Yeah, I think first and foremost, it's the creation of new units.

So that five-year plan had the goal of creating 7,000 units uh that are deed restricted affordable units below 80% of area median income.

So it would definitely um you know fall into that part of the plan as well.

I think there's also innovative kind of land use structures like the city ownership with um and then a lease structures to where the developer may own the improvements, but the city gets to own the underlying land.

And I think what's most important may not be you know word for word, what's in the plan is that by uh by owning the land and then RFPing it out to a qualified developer, we really get to determine what gets built there and who it serves.

So I think we would be very specific in the eventual RFP of you know, we want to see these income ranges, um, these percent at 30, these percent at 50, and so on.

Um, if we want any ground floor activation, we could have requirements around that as well of like you know, nonprofit uh community serving facilities, um roughly this amount of units, roughly this amount of three or four bedrooms.

So we get to be very specific in that plan, which would hit on some of the other strategic planning um items like deep affordability at the 30% level and below family size three or four bedroom units.

We would really get to dictate that before we select a development partner to build the eventual development.

Okay, so in our real estate plan, like we don't have, I know councilwoman um Ortega had always asked about a real estate strategic real estate plan, and I don't think we have, I don't know if we have well, so my answer has always been um, and this is based on um conversations with lots of consultants as well, um, as other cities having this conversation.

It is near impossible to have a one strategic real estate plan, just one plan, because we have so many different needs and purposes throughout, just based on agencies that have physical need of space and land.

So we instead have multiple real estate plans for agencies instead.

So we have master plans for Dottie.

With host, we it's not quite the same.

We work in conjunction with their strategic plan.

Uh I'll say it that way.

Um we have their master plans for parks.

So we have those individual ones that we pull together.

Okay.

Um so oftentimes, if we were to purchase this right now.

You said that there, like I was just looking at the Google site.

How do we make sure that as city owners that it doesn't just sit there vacant for four years by years?

Sure, for a couple things.

I need to go on the record.

So we don't land bank, that's a state statute.

So anytime we acquire it is then very intentional that we are acquiring with a specific project in mind under score on affordable housing that we're we're already within a range of knowing that.

Um I think the difference in not having it sit versus councilwoman, your concerns about other projects that aren't happening, is that um for Adam and I and our teams, we don't have to wait on any other city agency.

If council approves this, we can immediately move forward with the RFP, like we've done on a number of transactions and just get it right in the hands of the developers.

So okay, thank you.

Um in downtown, do we does the city and county of Denver own anything like this?

Have we done this before in downtown?

Not right at the moment.

We have not we've um I can we've got a few, a couple that were on East Corfax that we did, I don't know, four or five years ago now.

Um, but we didn't, and we've got the Washington Street, which there'll be a groundbreaking at the end of this month, which is very exciting, but we do not have anything in the heart of downtown.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you, Councilman Gonzales, good characters.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, I did uh we it was pointed out by our our parliamentarian that there might be a mistake with the dates you all have this coming before full council on October 13th, but we actually aren't meeting that day because it's um Indigenous People's Day, so it's a pay city holiday.

So it would be the 14th for record keeping and clearing.

Um I feel like everyone has asked a lot of the questions that I actually had.

I just wanted to make sure that we communicated that with you all.

Um, as far as the you know, outlook of affordable housing for this particular project.

Um I just I guess my ask would be, you know, can we be kept in the loop on that and what that is going to look like?

Because I think, you know, what at least what my experience has been in just the last few years on council is um there's always good intentions on um affordable housing and and what that is going to look like, and then sometimes it ends up being pretty nominal.

Um, and I worry about that with this being, especially where it is in downtown and all of the activation that is being um lifted up by the administration.

I am just curious, yeah.

I just I have I guess just lots of curiosities of how this that fits how this fits in with that greater plan as well.

Um, and so I I know that's not necessarily for maybe you to answer, and is a much bigger picture of you've got the all the downtown activation, and now we're putting affordable housing, which I'm not opposed to.

Like we should have affordable housing everywhere in our city.

Absolutely, um, but just wanting to make sure that we're not um just giving lip service on something, right?

That that this is actually the intention and that that intention will stay will hold up going forward.

Yes.

So I hear you, and I will say we already are probably behind the scenes having those thoughtful conversations just to make sure that it's not like just this one thing that's plunked down there.

Um, and I think Adam and I both will commit that we are happy to come back as we get closer to that RFP of at least notifying all of you when it goes out so that you know that we are continuing that and and it isn't just gonna sit in language for the next few years.

Okay, yeah.

And I actually on that and the point of like sitting, how how long are we expecting it would be vacant and I think I mean I would say probably by the time we do an RFP and have a response, that alone would be about six months.

Um the timing of it then from there, because I'm assuming again whether it's tax credits and or DDA, you know, there still will be this time frame that we may not be able to start dirt, you know, shovels in the ground right at that moment.

But if we that's the other reason why we really haven't, and especially after conversations with you too, I think, thought about just demoing the building.

We can be it will allow us to maybe manage that site a little bit better um in that interim period of time where the city can still have oversight of it for parking, and again, we'll still need to coordinate even with our CPD friends and how it's used appropriately, but at least um we won't have a vacant building sitting there would be the goal.

Okay, so wouldn't it be housing anybody temporarily anymore?

No, okay.

And I mean when I mean housing, I mean opposite for each.

But no, I think um just and given some of the things again that we've experienced with other vacant buildings, waiting for developers to just be ready to um have shovels in the ground.

I I think that that's where we came full circle that it probably is better served to just take it down.

Okay, great.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you.

Uh we will return to the far reaches of cyberspace and bring councilwoman Lewis back into the queue.

Councilwoman.

Thank you so much joining you all from Cyberspace.

I had one more question.

Um we mentioned the bond.

Is it possible for us to bring this after the bond passes or after we know a decision about the bond?

Oh, question, councilwoman, and I will say no.

Um the truth is this purchase and sale agreement has been sitting for a couple months, waiting as there have been other really important topics coming through city council and as the committees were restructured.

And so um these sellers uh just given some personal reasons of theirs, and they are all out of state.

Um I have a deadline that if this hasn't doesn't move forward or not, um, they have told me that they may go ahead and just walk.

And so that's why trying to put off the approval until after the election.

Um based on the last conversation I had with the sellers, I do not believe honestly that they would agree to that.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Uh so Lisa, what give me the schedule again as it sits, because we're the timeline?

Yeah, we're close to election.

14th would be first reading.

Uh 20th would be second reading.

So by the end of the month, potentially, if if council approved it, then there would be a fully executed purchase and sale agreement.

And we have no room to to delay as your evaluation.

I will say based on the last call I had with them, that would be correct.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

Uh seeing no further questions, um, we will uh I'll call us up in a block if there are no objections.

Uh 25-14-25 and 25-14-26.

Um need to vote or we're ready to move this forward to the full council.

Seeing no objection, we'll see you in council soon.

Um there are five items on consent.

Uh, if anyone needs to pull anything off, please let staff know in short order.

Uh, that being said, no further business.

Uh this uh committee is adjourned.