Welcome back to this bi-weekly meeting of the Budget and Policy Committee of Denver City Council.

Join us for the discussion as the Budget and Policy Committee starts now.

Thank you for joining us on this beautiful day.

day. I'm President Amanda Sandoval, Chair of the Budget and Policy Committee. I think we have a

good robust agenda in front of us today. So before we get started let's go around the room and I'll

start on the virtual room first. So Kevin, Councilmember Flynn. Thank you Madam President. Kevin

Flynn, Southwest Denver District 2. Awesome and now I'll start to my right. Jimmy Torres, West

Denver District 3. Flora Alvidrez, Lucky District 7. Chantil Lewis, District 8.

Serena Gonzalez-Cutianez, one of your council members at large. Paul Cashman, South Denver, District 6.

Darrell Watson, Fine District 9. Sarah Parity, your other council member at large.

Chris Hines, Denver's Perfect 10. Awesome, great. And now I will pass it over to our two colleagues. The floor is yours.

Wonderful. Maybe we could start with the slides at the beginning, but before we begin, I did want

to set the tone for the conversation. What we're discussing today is about anti-masking legislation.

And the way I see it, it's not a simple policy debate. It's a moral and constitutional question

about how government power is exercised in the public and what we owe both the people that we

serve and the public servants asked to carry out these policies. This is a continuation of the 2017

Public Safety Priorities Act that was to protect public safety and the Constitution. Moments like

this require us to slow down and ask not only what is legal, but also what is right, not only what is

allowed, but also what is aligned with our constitutional values and the will of the people

that we serve. I ask that we approach this discussion with seriousness, empathy, and a

commitment to our shared values, and that we remember that these are not just abstract questions.

They are playing out in real time in our communities and across the country.

With that context, I want to walk you through the reasoning behind this policy and the values it

seeks to uphold. This policy begins from a place of clarity, not hostility. We believe the United

States has both the right and responsibility to enforce its laws and protect the people from real

harm. Immigration enforcement has a role in keeping our country safe, particularly when it

comes to violent crime, trafficking, and genuine threats to public safety. At the same time, how we

enforce the law matters, just as much as whether we enforce it. Across this country, we are seeing

enforcement practices that go far beyond targeting dangerous actors. Practices that are detaining

people for civil violations, sweeping households and neighbors, and even just suspected individuals.

It's creating fear not only amongst undocumented residents, but amongst citizens, veterans,

and families who have lived here for decades. Some of these practices have caused real harm,

and in some cases, loss of life. This also harms the public relationship with real law enforcement

like Denver Police Department who rely on the trust that they've established for decades and

worked hard on, which is why crime is reducing in Denver. This policy is rooted in the simple

constitutional principle that when government is exercising its power over a person, it must be

visible, it must be accountable, and it must be constrained by law. Masked, unidentified

enforcement undermines due process, escalates fear, increases the risk of impersonation,

and erodes public trust for communities and for law enforcement alike. I have spoken directly

with agents who privately express discomfort with the current practices who fear being publicly

associated with the work they are being asked to do and who feel compelled to hide their identity

to carry it out. That reality should give us pause. Public servants do not work for one president.

They work for the people of the United States. And when people across the nation are rising up in

protest, it's not a partisan moment. It's a democratic signal that something is out of

alignment. This policy does not deny the real safety concerns faced by officers or the real

problems of harassment and doxing, which I take very seriously and believe should be

addressed through existing legal protections. What this policy says is that anonymity should

never be a prerequisite for exercising government authority in public. If a policy requires

officers to hide who they are in order to function, then that policy deserves scrutiny,

not the public. We can secure our borders and uphold our constitution at the same time.

We can protect officers while protecting civil rights, and we can insist that enforcement focuses on actual harm, not people whose biggest offense is seeking a better life.

This policy is about restoring balance between safety and liberty, enforcement and humanity, authority and accountability.

And that balance is not optional in a free society.

It's foundational.

Thank you.

Beautiful.

Thank you, Councilwoman Floor.

I'll be addressed.

Sorry.

So we're going to get into the presentation here, and we'll start with the problem.

So the problem that we're trying to solve is that federal law enforcement agents are wearing masks to conceal their identities

while conducting raids and arrests in municipalities across the country, including Denver.

While masking is framed by the Trump administration as a safety measure and practice,

it functions as an intimidation tactic that can escalate fear and confusion in communities,

which we have seen pretty widespread.

In an exhaustive 100-page-plus opinion, U.S. Judge William J. Young found that masking is used not for safety, but to instill fear and suppress public response and compare the use of masks to the Ku Klux Klan and the desperados of the Old West.

Judge Young, by the way, is a Reagan appointee to the federal bench.

I quote,

ICE goes mask for a single reason, to terrorize Americans into compliance.

In all our history, we have never tolerated an armed, masked, secret police.

You can see an example of what we're talking about in the next slide.

The practice of concealment has several concerning impacts.

Masked law enforcement undermines public trust and conflicts with local law enforcement

to promote conflicts with local efforts to promote transparency and accountability.

It discourages crime reporting and cooperation with law enforcement,

particularly in communities already experiencing strained relationship with government institutions.

Additionally, the inability to identify officers creates opportunities for impersonation,

which proposes serious public safety risks and contribute to vigilante behavior.

This is not strictly an opinion of the left either.

The Cato Institute, which is a libertarian think tank, also sounded the alarm about these risks over and over again.

Sorry about that. I didn't go to your slide. My apologies.

So the proposed solution is tailored and focused on accountability.

It would prohibit enforcement from wearing facial coverings that conceal identity while detaining, arresting, or physically restraining any individual.

It would also prohibit the use of identity concealing facial coverings inside of city facilities.

The ordinance includes a clear definition of facial coverings to avoid ambiguity and ensure consistent enforcement.

The definition is a mask, garment, or headgear that conceals or obscures the identity of the agent or office,

such as belly claps, gaiter mask, and ski mask.

This proposal explicitly preserves law enforcement's ability to carry out necessary and high-risk operation.

It does not restrict undercover work, SWAT duties, or tactical operations.

It also allows the continued use of safety and protective equipment such as helmets, transparent face shields, medical masks, and protective eyewear.

These exemptions ensure the policy balances officer safety with public accountability.

And I wanted to add one. I didn't have a moment to correct this.

On the slide from Sheriff Diggins, he asked that we include Emergency Response Unit, the ERU, which is similar to SWAT.

So we're here in Budget and Policy Committee today, following that staff will engage in

discussions with the Denver Police Department and the Mayor's Office throughout January

and February.

Additionally, we review related to health and safety considerations is still to be determined

and the ordinance would then move forward to City Council for two readings at a later

date.

So happy to take any questions that you all have.

Thank you.

It would go to committee first, right?

Yes.

Okay.

Okay, perfect.

And what committee?

We haven't decided yet.

Okay, perfect.

Okay.

In the queues so far, we have Sawyer, Hines, and Taurus.

Anyone else?

Councilman Sawyer?

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you, you guys, so much.

Really appreciate you presenting this.

A couple of questions around legality, which might be for our city attorney.

John, does this policy withstand scrutiny better if it covers all law enforcement activity as opposed to just federal law enforcement activity?

Jonathan Griffin, Deputy Legislative Counsel.

So it's interesting. There's currently a case in California right now, because this is largely a model after California's law that's debating these issues.

Largely, one of the factors for a violation of this would be that one group was discriminated against.

So, yes, by making it apply to all law enforcement officers, that's usually safer.

There's more complex legal arguments that we can drill down to, but on a big picture, yes, it's better to apply to all officers.

Okay. Thank you. Is that something you all have considered?

Yeah. That's actually what we did.

Okay. So it's a concern to everyone across the board.

Correct.

Okay. Just because you're—

We focused mostly on ICE.

Oh, yes.

Sure. That's the focus for sure, but the problem that we're trying to solve for.

But we did have conversations to make it across the board for law enforcement in general, inclusive of also the sheriffs as well, which is why we had conversations with Sheriff Dickinson.

Correct.

Yeah, really appreciate that.

Is anyone from the sheriff's office or the police office?

Neither.

They couldn't be here, but I'm happy to take any questions.

We are working in partnership with both.

Yeah, I really appreciate you guys doing that.

Thank you.

I'm curious whether our law enforcement officers ever find a time when it is appropriate to mask.

And so I'd love to know from them whether kind of as proposed this is doable.

So if you can pass that along or if they can brief us later or whatever, that would be great.

I will have them brief you, but I did ask what the exceptions might be.

And, well, the question that we asked was, as it's written now currently, so they have the presentation as well as the language,

is there anything that would prohibit or challenge you all to be able to do your jobs effectively or efficiently?

And the answer was no, as long as we have the...

Exemptions.

Thank you kindly.

That were in there, like SWAT, medical masks.

Yeah, you.

Yes.

Those came directly from them.

Yeah, it's fantastic. I really appreciate that. I am curious whether, have you had a chance to talk to anyone in the state? No. Okay. Would you mind doing that just to kind of get their feedback? Because we also have Colorado state officers too.

That we need to kind of, I think, stakeholder.

You're not wrong.

So if you don't mind, that would be awesome.

The exemptions, I think they make a lot of sense.

I'm curious whether the federal government's action would fall under those exemptions as well,

in which case we're not solving a problem at all.

I don't know.

John?

Yeah.

He still keeps him.

Jonathan Griffin, Deputy Legislative Counsel.

So trying to think of the right way to frame this.

There are arguments currently, our bill's a draft, so it's hard to look too far in advance

and kind of provide specific guidance.

This issue has come up in the California litigation and the, geez, I lost my train of thought.

What was the question again?

Is the federal government going to be able to claim that they're using one of these

exemptions, in which case we're not actually solving a problem?

So one of the claims that has been made in other litigation is that the federal government

currently should not be masking, that there are actually things in their laws that say

they should be identifying themselves as soon as possible.

So that would end up being somewhat of a legal claim and a dispute for a judge to handle.

But no, at this point, there's nothing about this that they could, that they, I mean, there's

probably arguments they would make depending on what the final bill looks like.

But no, not at this point.

Okay.

Great.

Thank you.

And then one more question, if that's okay.

District 5 has a lot of borders.

Yeah, it does.

Right.

So most council districts border unincorporated counties, other cities, et cetera.

and the borders get very, very confusing.

And so I'm just curious whether you have talked to or stakeholder or discussed how that would

work in terms of like literally not knowing, well, two things, literally not knowing whether

you're in Denver or in my case, the most kind of frequent example we see is Aurora,

unincorporated Arapahoe County, right?

Because you can cross the street and you're in Denver all of a sudden

and cross back over the street and you're in Aurora

or you're in unincorporated Arapahoe County.

So I'm a little, I'm curious how that would kind of,

how you see that working.

And additionally, curious whether you've had conversations with them

or stakeholder them.

Yeah, I would say how I see that working

is if they're using a judicial warrant,

should say what city and county they're in.

So that should be pretty easy for them to figure out.

And if they're not using a judicial warrant, they shouldn't be doing that.

But we haven't stakeholdered other municipalities, but we can definitely reach out to them.

We're open to it.

Yeah.

Okay.

Really appreciate that.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Councilmember Hines?

Thank you, committee chair.

Thank you for the presentation.

Councilmember Aledrez, as you opened, you created some framing,

and I totally agree with the framing that we live in a constitutional republic

and we have a constitution.

The constitution says that we have certain rights.

For example, the right to assemble, the right to protest,

as the woman in Minneapolis had that right to assemble and protest, and many others.

So I'm not trying to limit this conversation to one individual.

The Constitution is everyone's job, particularly the federal government.

I mean, the federal government is the holder of the U.S. Constitution, and so it is, you know, I think that's good framing.

I think it's also important to note that, just as an aside, a city's core job is public health, safety, and welfare.

As in, that's what we do.

We do police.

We do sheriff's department because we're a city and a county.

We do fire department.

So this applies more to municipality than the federal government.

But also in framing, we give certain people the right to kill someone.

They're law enforcement.

And we do that in exchange, I believe, with an expectation of a higher standard.

If someone can take someone else's life legally, we should have the opportunity to hold that person to a higher standard.

standard, the training and support for that individual as an individual and collectively

should have a higher standard as well. And so one of the things that we do, I believe,

well as a city, do we do it great? I mean, do we do it perfect? Maybe not. But I think one of the

things we do well as a city is when we have someone who is in law enforcement, we hold them

to a higher standard, but we also give them our opportunity for the public to know who that

individual is that has the legal authority to potentially take someone's life. And I think

that's the scariest and most problematic thing of what's happening now at the federal level.

So that framing I think is really important.

And so I wanna, thank you.

That said, I wanna make sure that it's legal.

So it's good to know that there are already

some challenges at the federal level,

that federal law might already prevent head coverings

from law enforcement might already prevent

or it might be illegal for people who are theoretically law enforcement to be unidentifiable.

So I wonder, I think my thought process was kind of down a similar vein of what is the legality?

Is there a case law, maybe this is also from Mr. Griffin,

Is there a case law that allows us to put law enforcement as a community separate from the public because we are intentionally holding law enforcement to a higher standard?

The earlier question was about all law enforcement versus federal law enforcement.

I'm also the question of can we limit something specifically to law enforcement or is that too specific?

Jonathan Griffin, Deputy Legislative Counsel.

I'd actually almost say it's too broad.

I mean, there's specific areas certainly that we're allowed to pass laws regarding that effect of law enforcement.

We've seen the city do that already in certain areas.

It honestly comes down to the details and what the language itself actually says on a final bill.

Okay, fair enough.

Okay.

In a specific law enforcement, I don't know about it at all.

We never know.

Right.

Right.

And so the question I was maybe poorly asking was, can we apply it legally to law enforcement?

is that a class that we can do that survives a legal challenge?

So, but I think you answered it as best you could, at least at this point.

Do you have any thoughts?

If you do have thoughts, if you could go to the microphone, let us know who you are.

Hi, Mika Brown, city attorney.

I agree with John. The devil is in the details and how it's written.

Okay. So I encourage you to write in a way that survives a legal challenge.

I don't know. Obviously, I think you would do that as well.

So I don't know if I'm telling you anything new.

I think like Council Member Sawyer, I have similar concerns.

If we will have a challenge from the federal level,

just because they want to be unaccountable

and they want people to have vigilante justice and the ability to murder.

And that's not okay.

That's not what we want in our democracy.

And so, and then the only other comment about going across city borders,

I mean, if you drive 25 miles an hour in a neighborhood street in Aurora,

you don't get a ticket, but you could in Denver because 20 is plenty.

So, it's very frustrating.

that political subdivisions sometimes change rules,

but hopefully our law enforcement officers know what city they're in.

They are meant to be held to a higher standard.

Can I just respond to that really quickly to say,

Council Member Hines, I feel you so deeply on that.

But I will say we have mutual aid partners.

And so I think that's really more the question I'm asking

because what we saw during 2020 was our mutual aid partners came in

for the racial social justice demonstrations,

and they followed their laws, not ours.

And that is, I think, an issue of state law right now.

And so I think it's more than just like, do they know?

Whether they're in Denver or unincorporated Raffaul County,

it's more like when they are coming here as mutual aid partners,

whose law are they following?

Thank you for that clarity.

That's a good point.

Thank you for clarifying.

I didn't make that connection.

And I also have the same concern about if we exclude Metro

and our police department, why wouldn't the immigration say,

oh, we're a special operation too or whatever.

That makes sense.

I don't think we would exclude anyone, including mutual aid.

But I want to thank you for your thoughts and comments,

especially about the Constitution.

It's funny because when we were sworn in,

I remember calling the clerk and asking,

are we swearing in on the city charter?

Or are we swearing in on the Constitution?

And he was like, no, you're swearing in on the Constitution.

So that means a lot to me, and I know it means a lot to all of us.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Council Member Torres and then Council Member Kesha.

Thank you.

Thank you both.

This has been, I think, a national conversation about ICE being masked

when they're conducting operations.

So I appreciate you trying to figure out a way that we can get, I think, in between what we're seeing and the problems that it's creating.

One of the issues that I see is whether or not, like, how do we enforce it?

Like, ICE has already violated state law in conducting operations near a courthouse.

I don't know the results of what happens when that happened, who serves them.

I don't know what the penalty.

So what happens in this case?

Because they're very willing to override or completely ignore local policy.

So just curious about that.

Yeah.

I'll have John speak to it because we did speak pretty extensively about what does this

look like from theory into practice.

John D. Griffin, Deputy Legislative Counsel, has written law enforcement, Denver Police

Department would be the ones enforcing this law.

So we would send out DPD at an action that ICE is doing.

It's reported that they're masked and DPD will do what?

Arrest them in theory.

We're violating the mask policy that we have.

We're violating our city law.

I definitely want to talk to DPD about how they'll do that because they're going to come here and they're going to be masked.

Like that's, I think we don't have to fortune tellers to know that ICE is going to be doing that.

You said they're going to come here.

I didn't hear anything.

And they will be masked.

Oh, masked.

Got it.

Yeah.

Or they're going to claim it's part of the, yeah, the method.

Let's see.

The exemption in here, tactical operations where protective gear is required for personal

safety or physical safety. I could totally see them making the case that that's why they're

doing it as well. So just curious about the enforceability and kind of what happens on

our side when that happens because it's going to. That, those exemptions I noted are mirrored

in the California legislation.

Is there anything else from that legislation that's different

or even similar to what you've drafted?

So those were directly from DPD and the sheriffs.

So they were mirrored, but they also came directly from our folks internally

about what was necessary in order for them to be able to not be buried,

have barriers, excuse me, in their roles.

And then John can answer the second part of the question.

Yeah. And John, when you come up, I'm also interested if you, I think you said that California's

law is being challenged. What's the nature of the challenge?

John Griffin, Deputy Legislative Counsel. So for the first question, largely where the

differences lie are on things that California's regulating on the state level. And they get

involved in some requirements about how local law enforcement should act. Ours, because we're already

on the local level, we're kind of silent on those, but big picture, they're doing the same thing.

California's legislation is being challenged under the Supremacy Clause largely that as the

Supreme Law of the land that ICE agents are above being, or whoever, that any federal agent is above

local law enforcement laws, that the localities can't legislate in a place that the federal

government's already arguing or already right now it's being heard in California district

court.

Thank you for that.

And just for my colleagues info, California's bill was signed September of this year.

Last year.

Sorry, last year.

Yeah, it is the new year.

2025. I'll send a link so folks could see that language. The only other one I think similar to

Councilwoman Sawyer is hearing from DPD and DSD. I did notice it felt like and maybe that was just

municipally the state California's law asked local jurisdictions to adopt a new policy.

I'm assuming that's what this is or do we need each department to adopt an internal policy

because each police and sheriff have operations manuals.

Does that need to be in there, or is it enough for us to have the ordinance?

That's a good question.

I'm not sure of the answer to that.

Maybe.

We're good.

We're good.

You might want to stay there.

Just stay there.

I'm not staying up here.

Yeah, so essentially that was kind of what I was getting at.

the California bill kind of talks about things that they want local law

enforcement to enact since our law city council and are powered with health

safety and welfare. This would fall within just the, yeah, yeah,

it would cover both. And I believe as the council members spoke,

I don't want to speak out of turn,

but I think DPD already has some of this stuff in their man manuals already.

So yeah, without getting too deep into the details,

this would cover any law enforcement action in the city, whether or not there was an additional manual.

We don't have like an additional requirement that says you have to update your manuals.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up we have Council Member Cashman with Parity on Deck.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thanks for doing this.

I appreciate you talking about us promising to honor the Constitution.

I think we should see if there might be money in the central fund to send a copy of it to the White House,

because they don't seem to understand what it says.

Can you go to the exemption slide, please?

Yeah, to me, that doesn't say that SWAT gets to wear masks.

That just says they can carry out their operations.

Is the intent to say that they can be masked?

The intent is to ensure that Chief Diggins and Chief Thomas are able to be able to carry out their work without being impeded.

And so when we asked about the carve-outs, it was essentially what needs to be exempted in order for you all to be able to do your work.

And they said that this was sufficient.

So I think the understanding is they could use masks during a swap operation.

I think I just, I'll trust them.

Chief Thomas and Sheriff Diggins, I just like in this as it moves forward a sentence just saying that we still expect them to not be masked unless necessary to preserve life and limb.

That's exactly right. And in the conversations we had with Chief Thomas and Sheriff Diggins, that was exactly what was shared.

And I think that is something important to say.

So I appreciate you bringing that up.

And I also think wearing a transparent face guard would prevent almost anything.

So maybe we can look into, can we put something that that's the preferred,

they'd have to prove otherwise that something else would be needed than a transparent face guard.

Yeah, and I, as Councilman Torres said, I don't expect this to do anything.

But what it – to do anything as far as changing ICE behavior, but what it would do is clearly state our principle as to how we believe you do behave in a situation governed by law and constitution,

which again, I mean, every day we see that not only ICE,

but the administration in D.C. is ignoring day by day by day.

So thank you for bringing this forward.

Thank you.

And you're probably not wrong in that folks will probably defy it,

but I think we still move forward in it.

Without question.

Thank you.

100 percent behind you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you.

Councilmember Perry with Watson on deck.

Yeah, so you guys went way out ahead of getting this into drafting, because I know you've been working on it for quite a while, and now there's a lot of cities starting to talk about it.

So as you've seen, I just saw a toolkit from Local Progress about this.

And the one kind of suggestion that I wanted to lift up from that that isn't already here is the idea of also including a badging and identification requirements,

So making them identify themselves by name and badge number when asked and also wear an identifying badge and not conceal it.

That's within our power to do, which I think it is.

But God knows, again, I try not to be a lawyer in this room.

So I think that, you know, that would be sort of complementary to the masking piece.

And I know we've had so much confusion in community where people have tried asking various federal agents, you know, who are you?

What agency are you with?

What are you enforcing?

and they just absolutely won't answer, which are, you know,

and we know that our own officers are required to do that by their policies,

and that has occasionally been imperfect, but what it has been, that has been pursued.

So, yeah, I want to just say that that is a real concern,

and I think there's confusion when ICE agents use the word police across their chest.

That's very confusing, and I had the opportunity to speak to an ICE agent recently,

and I looked at their badge and you can barely even see there is a number, but you almost have

to have a microscope to see it. And so it's not visible and it's not something that our communities

know to ask for. Um, and I think that's very important. So thank you for elevating that.

And even in the photo that we showed earlier in the presentation, you can see that there is no

badge, um, on this gentleman. And so I think that's a really good point. I really appreciate

you bringing that out bringing that up um councilwoman parity yeah so i'll leave that for you

guys to discuss but i thought that was a good compliment potentially um and then i just would

i was looking at i pulled pulling the draft up from legislature i just want to compliment the

drafting i think it's actually um i mean i looked at it with that same eye that i think councilmember

sawyer is bringing about like the exceptions and um whether they will swallow the rule and whether

they are going to be sufficient for our local law enforcement and all those things and i will say

understanding

with a

jaundiced point of view that of course these federal agencies

are going to do anything they can.

First of all, they're not going to follow it.

Second of all, they're

going to try to argue against it in court in various

ways. I agree that

as drafted, it would

accomplish what we want it to.

The exceptions, they can't

argue that they're undercover if they're not.

If they're out in public doing a thing.

Maybe

they can argue that protective gear is required for their physical safety because they're so scared of doxing or something like that.

But that's not really the intent of that exception.

And the rest of these just don't really apply.

So I think, you know, a good faith would not allow them to be masking.

So it does follow that it would accomplish something.

So I just really appreciate the good drafting.

And, yeah, when I looked over the site, it had no quibbles or anything like that.

So thank you so much.

I appreciate that.

And I think what you mentioned about doxing, there are laws around that as well to protect them.

And what you brought up about needing this as a tool.

This is just another tool in our chest of things.

And our constituents are looking at us to see what are you doing?

What are you going to do?

And I've gotten that question since January of last year.

And we have to do something.

And whatever.

Exactly.

So I appreciate that, your remarks about that.

The other thing I was going to say is that this actually highlights something that is going to be relevant to our next presentation,

which is that I learned, and I actually don't know that I completely understand this,

and I've been thinking about it a lot, that anything throughout our code that uses mandatory language becomes like a municipal crime.

And so because this uses mandatory language, even though it's in the public enforcement priorities area,

it would create something that could be enforced by Denver police, just as the animal offenses and all those things do.

Very fascinating.

even though it's not located in the criminal code.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up we have Council Member Watson.

Thank you, Council President.

Thank you so much, Council Members.

And just the act, and I've read through kind of your draft.

I know it's going to go through many other iterations.

Just the act of you all bringing this forward,

being thoughtful in your collaboration with public safety folks as well.

This is necessary.

I can tell you within our communities, having masked law enforcement folks puts everyone at risk.

It puts our law enforcement at risk, and it puts our communities at risk.

We know, masked folks over the history of this country, what they did to our communities.

We do not feel safe.

and as less legislators and both of you taking the lead on this,

the nitty-gritty, we're going to get into it all.

We'll make sure John and team ensures the legalities of it

and let them do as they do,

but know that what you're doing is necessary.

And I so appreciate your thoughtfulness.

And I look forward to this coming to the floor

and becoming something that we as a city put our stance on

and say that mass folks terrorizing our communities will not be stood.

We will not stand for it.

So I appreciate it.

I appreciate the thoughtfulness of the bill.

And I look forward to reading through it

once it's something even more solid

and going through the specifics.

But definitely necessary.

And I appreciate both of you for doing this.

Thank you so much.

So I have Sawyer and Taurus back in the queue,

but I'll just ask one quick question.

When we come back around the committee,

I was just thinking about the process of this.

So if we were to have it where,

if you were to write the ordinance

that they were to be able to get detained, right?

So if a ICE enforcement or a federal government agency

comes in, they have a mask on,

our police officers would arrest them.

That next goes to the DA.

So we need to make sure that the DA is,

because then the DA is the one who actually follows through

on the charges, so the police, right?

Yes.

Yeah.

I want to just make sure that they're here.

And how does that work?

I guess I just don't know how it would work with having charges against a federal agent.

I don't know if those federal agents also take an oath.

I know that our police officers and our firefighters and our sheriffs do.

Does anyone know? Do federal agents take oaths?

That's Marley.

Marley, do you know federal agents or anyone?

Good afternoon.

Marlee Bordowski, city attorney's office.

They do have to take an oath.

And if someone is charged under this ordinance, it would come to our municipal courtrooms

and the city attorneys rather than the DA's.

Yeah.

So if they take an oath, can we get a copy of what they take?

Because it would be interesting.

I have my oath on my office, right?

I know what my oath is.

I know what the mayor's oath is saying.

I don't know what their oath is, so it would be interesting to figure out,

would it also violate the oath that they took,

and would it violate our municipal ordinance?

Does that make sense?

I'm happy to get you a copy of their oath.

Happy to do that.

And when you say, just so I'm clear, you say, would it violate their oath?

Is it the masking piece, or is it?

Okay, okay.

And or being charged at a municipal level by not following our rules, right?

Like I can't go into Westminster and be like, hey, I'm Count's president.

Give me all these things.

It's like an ethics violation.

So what other violations would it violate?

Okay.

Happy to pull that for everybody.

And again, thank you all for working on this.

I don't think this is an easy conversation for any of us to have.

It's not a conversation I thought I'd be having in my career.

So thank you for leaning on this.

And I also support, just want to make sure that we have all the T's crossed and I's dotted

because if we lean on this, this will be an example for other places around Colorado.

And you could also target us in other examples of the right.

That's exactly right.

I'm glad you brought that up because for Councilwoman Alvedris and I,

this is the right thing to do, but it doesn't make it not scary as council people.

to be able to move this forward because you do know that it puts a target eye

back.

And as you've seen the administration and how they operate,

it can be very scary.

Exactly.

And we're moms and correct care about our lives and our children.

And so do all the people that are being terrorized.

And so do the agents that are doing this.

And we all deserve a chance.

Thank you.

Except Councilwoman Sawyer.

Thank you, Madam President.

Really appreciate this.

And Councilwoman Torres, Council Torres' question kind of got me thinking down a different path that I want to just make sure I understand.

And John, that's another question for you.

Is enforcement of this law going to be in violation of our other laws?

That's a big question.

Right?

because our other law says that we will not do anything to participate in

or assist in immigration-related enforcement, right?

And so right now, the policy of our police department,

at least as far as the raid at Cedar Run in my district went last January,

the police department refused to go entirely.

The Denver Police Department was not there.

And there were two reasons for that.

Number one is our law.

Number two is the fact that the police department believes,

our police officers truly believe,

that their presence there escalates things in terms of fear in the community.

And their goal is to create trust in the community.

Um, and so if they are, their view is that they are there, that breaks trust with the

community because they should not be there at all under our law.

Right.

And so if they are tasked with enforcing the mask ordinance, then they are present at a

place where our other law says they should not be present.

That's why I'm asking the question.

Yeah, it's a good question.

We'll keep looking into it.

I mean, my first thought on that would just be that if you are acting in violation of a law, then you're not acting in your official capacity.

And so we would have something.

I'll look more into it.

For this right now, I'll look more into it.

We did review it initially, and that's why this also applies to—I know we're using immigration as an example because that's by far the most prominent example, but this does apply to all federal activities.

but we'll look into seeing if there's anything in between those two that causes a violation.

I really appreciate that. And I would just say that I fully agree with you, right? That

what the federal government is doing in terms of masking is absolutely inappropriate.

The question we are asked to consider as city council members by this policy is,

is this going to solve the problem, right?

And my concern is that it isn't

because either our police officers don't go, right,

because they're not supposed to go under our other law,

or they go and then their presence there

breaks trust with community and causes concern, right?

because what we saw was an incredible amount of chaos happening at Cedar Run

with multiple federal agencies, not just ICE,

and a space where the Denver Police Department's presence there

would have made things worse, not better.

What is the other law that you keep mentioning?

Our immigration law.

Our, our, our the, the 2017 law that I mentioned earlier, the protect, okay.

Correct.

You know, one thing that comes to me for the second part of your question about the breaking of trust,

I would imagine that if DPD shows up and ICE is acting in the behavior in which we've seen them do so in many communities,

and DPD is actually they're protecting communities, it might be a trust.

The outcome could be trust, yeah, versus a lack of trust where communities are seeing DPD as being on the same side as them.

Yeah, I think they're underestimating the chaos that occurred that day.

I don't think it's quite as simple as like an us versus them kind of a thing.

There was a lot going on there.

I just, I'm, I really appreciate this and fully support it in theory.

In operation, I'm really concerned that this is going to create more problems than it's

going to solve.

I do think it's a valuable statement on our morals and values.

And I think that that's right.

But as a law that is going to be on the books for the city and county of Denver for the

next hundred years, it has to, it has to be right.

And I'm just, I'm really concerned about the, like, the actual on-the-ground implementation of the enforcement piece of this.

I think philosophically I'm willing to be wrong in the future in order to protect our communities now from the terror that they're experiencing in real time.

So, we'll see.

Okay. Marlee can help answer a little bit of that.

Marlee?

Marlee Borgowski, City Attorney's Office.

My concern with it is not the Public Safety and Priorities Act.

What that act says is that we cannot use city funds to assist in the enforcement of civil immigration laws.

So if DPD showed up at Cedar Run and helped them or provided crowd control or even traffic control, even something as minor as that, that would have violated that ordinance.

So I'm not concerned about that.

And I think in talking to them throughout that day, they didn't show up because they didn't want to get involved and they didn't want to, you know, exacerbate a bad situation rather than fear of that ordinance.

My bigger concern, frankly, for everybody, and maybe the details in the drafting, and I can certainly work with John, is the allegation that if DPD goes in to arrest somebody, that they are now violating federal law by interfering with their ability to do their duties.

So that would be my big concern for the police officers.

But, you know, I don't think it's insurmountable.

It's just something that you all need to think about as you draft us.

Absolutely.

For yourself or John, is there an ability to cite them instead of arrest them?

Yes.

Yeah.

There is?

Yes.

Because that might be a better solution, and they may not have to be present,

because I know we do citations without being present.

Absolutely, and we do citations after the fact, too.

So there's, you know, during protests, it's all chaos and all of that,

and so we can identify somebody who did the wrong thing and cite them later.

So that is also an option.

That's an option.

That's helpful.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. I think we'd have to move on.

Okay. I'll say just a few things for follow-up for the next time.

One, to Councilwoman Paradis' recommendation, a New York congressman drafted No Secret Police Act,

and they have language about the component of identifying yourself

and the element of Denver Homeland Security that that officer is working for

or whichever federal agency they're working for,

and then wearing an official insignia that's clearly visible to others.

So I would look at what was drafted there and how they worded that

to figure out kind of what works.

The other might be also mirroring what we already have in place for Denver Police.

There was a lot of effort put forward to make sure that DPD provided a card when asked, that their name was visible, that DPD was.

So we might also even look at just what's already in our standards and codes for our law enforcement that we have as a standard for anyone doing law enforcement in the city, whether they're federal or local.

So just two recommendations there.

And the other one is the effective date and just really would hope that it could be sooner than January 1st, 2027.

If this is passed and like it's gotten all of the questions answered, that it basically be upon effective vote of the council.

Absolutely. Thank you.

Thank you.

Is that SB 627? Is that where you're?

No, this one, I don't know the number of it, but it's called the No Secret Police Act.

I'll send you the link that I found.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Any last burning thoughts, questions, concerns about this?

Anyone?

I just have one quick thing because I feel

like everybody's asked all the questions

and made some great recommendations to look at.

And I just want to thank you both for taking this on.

Because, you know, it is, it can be scary,

but at the same time you're taking on this issue

that is going to be incredibly important to many people

in our community and I think we can figure this out.

And so I'm glad that we're taking this first step

and bringing it to budget and policy

where you're getting all this feedback

and then continuing the work going forward.

And I look forward to seeing it in committee.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam President.

Thank you.

Thank you all.

Next up we have municipal sentencing policy

by .

Why don't you guys just come around?

You guys want us to do it?

Yeah, do you want to click your answer?

Yeah, everyone can do it too.

We'll start, we'll start off.

Okay.

We could click.

We'll wait for it.

When I start, I can start with you.

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

All right.

You ready?

All right.

Oh, I'm here?

Okay.

Sorry, just intro the, or do you want us to do that?

Yeah, go ahead.

Okay.

Because I'm switching.

You're all good.

Okay, thank you, colleagues.

We just, we decided to bring this back through budget and policy again.

This is the issue around our municipal sentencing parity with the state,

sentencing for similar types of offenses.

and just hot off the presses, like maybe less than two weeks ago, the Supreme Court did make

a ruling on this. And the last time that we were before all of you, that was still going through

the process and there had not been a resolution. Now there has been. And so what we've asked is

the Office of Municipal Public Defenders to come and provide an update of what that now means,

what is going to be happening in our courtrooms because of this ruling.

And then the three of us, Councilwoman Lewis and Parity and myself,

are coming back to continue the conversation about what that means for ordinance changes that would need to happen.

On top of the fact that there are still some lingering questions out there around other types of municipal offenses

that we have in the city and county of Denver that may not be captured under the state.

So there's just there's a lot there. And so this is just us coming back to provide an update at this point.

I did notify Marley from our pace from the city attorneys.

We notified the courts as well that we were doing this and provided those slides.

And I apologize that they were a little bit late coming. But this is just, again, restarting that conversation.

We're not prepared to go forward right at this moment, but we intend to continue moving forward following this meeting.

With that said, I will now turn it over to Councilwoman Lewis.

Thank you so much. I appreciate that.

And then we'll jump in with the historical context.

And this is a slide that you all are familiar with in terms of Denver's general penalty for most municipal crimes.

You might recall that before 1982, it was 90 days and a $300 fine.

In 1982, there was a charter amended that was recommended by city council, which moved it from 180 days and upped it to $999.

In 1993, in connection with the summer of violence and the media coverage around their crime wave, it was up to 365 days and $999.

And then in 2017, it was 300 days and still the $999.

$29. With the exceptions of two things, the seven class one offenses at 365 days max,

and the second exception was the eight class two offenses at 60 days max.

And this is, again, just something that we've presented to all of you before in the reason why

we're bringing this forward in the first place. In 2021, the state passed a law that I actually

personally worked on alongside folks from all the different various partners. We're talking

our not judicial, I shouldn't say that, not judicial partners, but our prosecutors, defense,

folks that are in the victim assistance space. And that is where we came to Senate Bill 21271,

which changed the sentencing structure for these types of low-level crimes. And so I just want to

just reiterate that this actually came at the request of Governor Polis at the time for our

Commission on Crime, Criminal, and Juvenile Justice Commission and I was part of that

commission and so we were tasked with taking this on and the main folks that worked on

this to look and looked at all of the sentencing structures were our from the state office

of Public Defender's Office and the District Attorney's State Council. So we had both sides

taking a look at this, doing a deep dive, which came to the solution with Senate Bill 271.

So the point of that is that the contrast between Denver and the state, Denver has basically

had an across the board sentence. We've never had that kind of process to look at things

crime by crime in a more nuanced way, whereas the state dug in very, very deeply in 2021

and kind of lined everything up all throughout the state code. So there's a big difference

in kind of how well considered the state sentences are versus our Denver sentence that's pretty

much just this one size fits all thing. So our problem statement today, wait, can we

go back here, is that, as you guys know, the punishments for the same conduct for these

lower-level offenses, nothing in the felony kind of category, is just really, really different

under state law versus our Denver city law. And the Colorado Supreme Court has now said

that that is unconstitutional. So our municipal sentencing ordinances, to the extent that

they cause a sentence for the same conduct that's higher than state law would allow,

are unconstitutional. And what's been dawning on all of us as soon as I saw this opinion,

I thought this is going to be just a nightmare in the municipal courts. And we'll go into that a

little bit more. But essentially, if we don't apply this rule across the board and clarify it

in the text of our ordinances, it's going to be litigated case by case by people who are facing

low sentences, who may be represented by the public defenders, or in some cases may make a

little too much money and be trying to hire like a private municipal defense attorney.

It is going to be very chaotic if we don't take action to line things up with what the

opinion says and figure out how to apply that opinion to our city law.

We're going to be going case by case for years probably.

And this is just a reminder that part of the problem statement is that the longer the sentence,

the bigger the collateral consequences.

although we now have this secondary problem, which is complying with the Supreme Court opinion,

because they have now issued their ruling.

All right, we're going to turn it over to our experts.

You can take it.

Drive it.

Thank you, Madam President, City Council members.

My name is Colette Tevet.

I'm the Chief Municipal Public Defender for the City and County of Denver.

I'm here along with Rachel Mercer, who's one of our senior attorneys at OMPD,

and was the author of the amicus briefing in the camp case on behalf of OMPD and the Aurora Municipal Public Defender's Office.

So on December 22, 2025, the Supreme Court did issue their ruling in the city of Westminster v. Camp and city of Aurora v. Simon.

And in this case, the defendants in those cases were charged with theft of less than $300 and trespass under the municipal code.

And in state court, those crimes would be charged as petty offenses.

The maximum penalty would be 10 days in jail or a $300 fine.

And here, the penalties were much higher.

So in Westminster, for theft under $300, and in Aurora, for trespass, the penalties would be 364 days in jail or a $2,650 fine.

And so what the Supreme Court said is that the hiring municipal sentences for identical conduct are preempted by state law.

And what that means is when you have a municipal ordinance and a state statute that prohibit the same conduct, state law limits the punishment that can be imposed.

So state law prohibits cities like Denver from imposing harsher sentences for the same conduct that is being punished on a state level.

It is a state interest. And the court in, we call it the camp decision, found that state law preempts higher municipal sentences for the same as conduct because state has an interest in maintaining identical, uniform, criminal sentencing throughout the state of Colorado.

and allowing higher sentences in the municipal court impedes the state interest.

So now the impact would be we have to look at the Denver Municipal Code

to see what laws are identical to the state's conduct

and which ones are currently unconstitutional.

And so the question becomes, what do we do next?

And the answer is that we really need to amend our city code.

because of the Supreme Court's ruling, our code needs to be amended to ensure that our sentences

for the same conduct are really aligning with state law so that our code is both fair and it's

enforceable. Because right now, there's a legal question about whether our city's code is

enforceable against people who commit crimes in the city and county of Denver because those

sentences attached to the crimes have been preempted in many cases by state law. Not in every

case, but in a lot of cases. And the difficulty is figuring out which crimes have new sentences

and which crimes have the same sentences that they have written into our code.

And can I be crystal clear about something? Because this is a question that I had.

When you get a constitutional ruling, there's no implementation time. Like,

it's the Constitution. It applies. Sometimes they're even retroactive, which is another issue,

because those are fundamental rights. And so even though we didn't know that this was an aspect of

the state constitution, it has now so been held. And so immediately, defendants are going to be

able to argue, even though it says 300 days on the books, that is an unconstitutional sentence.

And so our prosecutors, public defenders, and judges have to implement this immediately.

So we basically have law on the books that does not match what the law actually is. And you can

imagine why that's not so good. And a lot of these sentences at the state level went into effect on

March 1st of 2022. So almost all of the cases currently pending in the municipal courts right

now are going to be impacted by this Supreme Court ruling because it's saying a lot of those

sentences are actually different than what they are on the books. So there's a risk that our laws

are not enforceable right now. There can definitely be challenges to them in individual cases, and

there's also a risk that defendants will receive illegal sentences because the municipal court

judges right now are being left to figure out what is the sentence for each crime and to interpret

the laws and compare our ordinances to the state statutes to figure out what the maximum penalty is.

So the immediate impact of this, and we've seen this firsthand in court in the last two

weeks, is a lot of confusion.

We have to advise clients every step of the process as to what crime you've been charged

with, what is the maximum penalty for that crime, so that the client knows as a matter

of due process what they are actually using, what they're being accused of, and what the

potential penalty is, but also so they can make decisions about how they want to resolve

their cases.

Do they want to take a plea offer? Do they want to go to the judge and say, I'm going to plead guilty and let you, judge, go ahead and pick the sentence?

What is the sentence that's on the table for a particular crime if I plead guilty?

I just want to underscore this as well. I'm like the lawyer translator.

Again, these are federal constitutional requirements.

And so if a public defender does not tell or a defense attorney does not tell their client what the maximum possible sentence is and they take a guilty plea, their constitutional rights have likely been violated.

So if they don't know what the sentence is, because there's sort of an argument both ways about whether it's directly comparable to a state law or they guess wrong and a judge goes the other way, then that person can come back and try to withdraw their plea later on.

So, again, imagine the level of chaos with that.

So when she says we have to, per the federal constitution, they have to, just to be clear.

Yeah.

So for example, if somebody gets arrested on a Friday night, we're there in court with

them on Saturday morning if they spend the night in jail, and I have to sit with them

and say to them, okay, you've been charged with trespass.

On the books in Denver right now, it says that the maximum penalty is 300 days jail,

but I think the actual maximum penalty is 10 days.

and the confusion even in that moment that we are seeing, much less when we're later in the process,

we are taking a plea deal. We're trying to tell them you can take an offer, you can take a plea

deal for 10 days in jail. I have to be able to tell them as a matter of due process, they have

a right to know what is the maximum sentence that I'm facing. Am I receiving the maximum penalty

when I take 10 days in jail or is the maximum penalty significantly higher such that this is

a really great plea offer that I should really take. So the judge is also involved in that step

of when we accept a plea deal, the judge is supposed to also tell people what on the record,

what is the maximum penalty as part of the advisement that's required both by the Constitution

and by the rules of procedure. Rule 211 requires a full advisement of what rights you're giving up

and what crime you're pleading guilty to and what is the sentence. And so, yeah, as Councilmember

Parity was saying this is resulting in case-by-case litigation. We've got defendants taking offers one

at a time, and we are going through every case trying to figure out what is the sentence for

this offense. And there's a risk that the pleas will be invalid because they're not being properly

advised. Here, I just wanted to share an example of what our plea paperwork is so you guys can

kind of see a tangible example. This is for a trespass plea. You can see you have to list the

client's name at the top. You have to list the crime that they're pleading guilty to. And then

you have to see it's highlighted the maximum penalty. It says right there, because this is

one of our old plea paperwork, it says 300 days jail and a $999 fine. I think at this point that

is inaccurate and that should say the max is 10 days jail and a $300 fine because of the cap set

by state law. And so the judge also signs the plea paperwork along with the lawyer and the prosecutor

and the judge is supposed to ensure that that sentence advisement is correct. And right now

we've got a lot of questions about whether we're correctly advising people, and that's a problem for pretty much everybody involved in the process because we're all signing this.

And so maybe if this is wrong, if this person pleads like this, they could maybe challenge this plea as illegal because they weren't properly advised.

So I wanted to go through a couple of examples of some of the offenses that are being affected.

One of the most common ones that we see right now is trespass.

I went ahead and put up on the left side is the ordinance language from our Denver municipal code,

and on the right side is the language from the state statute.

And you can see the language of these two codes, these two laws is very similar.

One makes it a crime to knowingly enter or remain upon the premises of another

when the consentant to remain is absent, denied, or withdrawn by someone who has lawful control of that space.

and under state law, a person commits trespass if they unlawfully enter in or remain upon the

premises of another. Basically, there's just two very legal ways of saying it's a crime to commit

trespass to be in a space where you are not lawfully entitled to be after you've been asked to leave.

Since they're the same and they're both prohibiting the same conduct, the penalty under this Supreme

Court ruling should be the same. But right now, on Denver's books, it says that the penalty for

trespass is up to 300 days in jail and a $999 fine. But under state law, the maximum penalty

for that same code section that I just put up, it's a petty offense and the maximum is 10 days

jail and a $300 fine. So we've reduced the penalty by 30 times, but we haven't yet changed our

municipal code. So this isn't written down anywhere. That's the problem. But I think legally,

this is very clearly the appropriate sentence is a maximum of 10 days now.

And so that kind of gets into what the camp decision is saying is that if the laws prohibit

the same conduct, they don't have to have identical language. It's just if they prohibit the same

conduct, then the penalty should be the same. I'm not going to read this one, but we've talked

before to many of you about our theft laws. Here in Denver, we have a petty theft ordinance

that is almost identical to the state's general theft statute.

Since they both prohibit basically knowingly depriving someone of their conduct

with the intent to keep it, to take it away from them.

Of their property.

Of their property, sorry.

Since they both prohibit people from taking property with the intent to really keep it

and to deprive the other person of their property,

the penalty for theft under our ordinance and under the state code should be the same.

Because the Denver code right now says that no matter how much property you take, whatever

the value of the property you take, whether I take a $50 cell phone or a $500 bag, it's

always 300 days jail and a $999 fine.

That's always the penalty under our code as written.

But the penalties are a little more nuanced under the state law.

If it's under $300, it's a maximum of 10 days in jail, $300 fine.

If it's between $300 and $1,000, which is where municipal theft should max out, it's

120 days jail and a $750 fine.

So it depends on the amount.

So now what we're having to do in court is try to figure out what amount was allegedly

taken to figure out what is the appropriate penalty because our municipal code doesn't

align with those amounts of property values.

And then another offense that we talk about a lot that's been a big issue across the state

and is definitely frequently charged in Denver Municipal Court is shoplifting.

We have another separate ordinance that prohibits shoplifting specifically in addition to our

petty theft ordinance. It's phrased a little bit differently in that it specifically addresses

goods that are set out for sale in a store and if you go into a store take the goods with the intent

to keep them and avoid payment then you're guilty of shoplifting. The result is the same for

shoplifting as it is for petty theft because they're both forms of theft they're taking the

property of another with the intent to keep it or to deprive that other person of the value of the

property and so therefore the shoplifting penalties should also be capped under the camp decision

at the same levels that 10 days for if you take something worth less than $300

and 120 days in jail if you take something worth more than $300 and up to $1,000.

There's been some discussion about whether shoplifting is different

because it is more specifically addressing the retail context

and it is not phrased as identically to the theft statute under state law.

But the reality is that the shoplifting ordinance is prohibiting the same kind of conduct

as the theft statute, and so the same result, it's the same result.

And indeed, our state theft statute actually specifically says that shoplifting is a covered

form of theft under the state statute, 18441.

There's a section that says, and this has been in effect since 1971, when the code was

kind of reorganized, but it says that if any law of this state refers to or mentions larceny,

stealing, embezzlement, false pretenses, confidence games, or shoplifting, that law shall be interpreted

as if the word theft were substituted therefor. And in the enactment of sections 18.4-401-403,

it is the intent of the General Assembly to define one crime of theft and to incorporate therein such crimes.

So this language makes it clear that the theft statute is intended to apply to shoplifting behavior,

and there are other specific ordinances, statutes as well, that also talk about stores and retail theft.

And then the last offense that I just wanted to kind of put as an example for you guys

of the confusion that's happening right now, because we're trying to figure out what municipal

ordinances line up with state law to determine what the sentences should be. And we have

a lot of different offenses tucked all throughout our code, because as Councilmember Parity

said, anytime it says something is unlawful, that can be charged as a crime. You shall

not do something. So we have, for example, a park curfew violation ordinance, which specifically

addresses when someone goes to a city park after hours. Usually it's like 10 30 to 5 a.m.

This is because you're going or remaining in or upon the park at a time when the manager of the

park has said that you can't be there. It's just like trespassing. It's just more specifically

worded. And so I think the result here is that the maximum penalty for park curfew violation is just

like trespass. It's a petty offense under state law. It's a maximum of 10 days instead of the

current 300 days jail that's on the books. So this is just an example of how complicated and confusing

things are getting and why we need help from city council to clarify what the law and the

sentences for all these offenses, because there's a lot of different sentences like this.

And then I just wanted to reiterate again that higher sentences are still available

for more serious offenses.

You can definitely go up to 300 days in jail as allowed by our city code as long as the

offense aligns with the more serious offense at the state level.

One example that I think we've all talked about a little bit before is assault.

Right now we have a simple assault ordinance on the books.

It says it's just a crime to assault or inflict violence on another person.

unclear whether that lines up with a state assault statute. In that situation, we may need to tweak

or amend the ordinance to clearly align it with a state statute. In this case, you could align it

with third degree assault, which all we'd have to do is add some kind of bodily injury or requirement

that the person experience pain. Any kind of pain is enough to say that then this would be the same

as third degree assault, and then you could have your maximum of 300 days. So there's still a lot

of room for city council here to prosecute people for more serious offenses and have

longer jail sentences. It just can't exceed the cap allowed by state law. And that's true

in domestic violence cases as well. You can prosecute to the full extent allowed by state

law. All right. So this is the same proposed solution that we came with before. It's just

that now the vast bulk of this is being required by the Colorado Supreme Court and the state

Constitution, so it becomes more urgent and more clear what our job is. They've sort of taken a lot

of the, in other words, we're no longer being charged with deciding what these sentences should

be because the Supreme Court has told us that as a matter of equal protection, we can't exceed

equivalent offenses under state law. What I really want to emphasize, though, is that this is like a

core legislative function, and when courts go to interpret criminal statutes, they often look for

legislative intent. You know, like they're trying to figure out what is the legislative body of the

jurisdiction and what were they intending to prohibit here. And so it really is our job,

if the alignments are unclear between the state code and our city code, to clarify and to make it

very, very clear for everybody who's trying to operate in the courts what those alignments are.

I like the park curfew example, because if you're a judge or your attorney is on either side and

you're trying to make your best argument, obviously Rachel's lined up a very good argument

that a curfew is really akin to trespass,

that the idea is we don't want people in the park,

and they went in the park, that's a trespass.

I can imagine on the PACE side that they might say,

no, no, a curfew is very different.

It's about keeping people indoors and protecting them or something,

and therefore it doesn't really line up.

And you might have one judge go one way, another judge go another way.

Then those two people have an equal protection claim.

It has to be litigated all the way back to the Colorado Supreme Court.

That takes a year.

I mean, this is cuckoo bananas if we do not just do our job

and lay out what we see the alignments as being.

It's totally in our court to do that,

and we are unquestionably the appropriate body to get that done

because otherwise you're going to be nuanced by nuance by nuance by nuance

and again for years.

So I just want to say that one of the things they would literally be arguing about

would be the legislative intent,

and so the best thing we could do would be to provide some of that guidance.

So same proposal that we've been bringing,

except that now it's much more urgent

and mostly being charged by the Supreme Court.

which is revised DRMC to match sentences to the maximum sentences for comparable state offenses,

we can exercise our judgment about what is a comparable state offense.

And so we should all have that conversation.

We will send back around the chart that we've developed with OMPD that lines out all the comparable offenses.

And if anyone has a concern that we've identified something that's not comparable, we will talk that through.

We can talk about what additional case law there might be on the state or local level that makes it comparable.

We can have that whole conversation, but that's basically what we need to do.

And then for reasons of fairness, this is also very important because we do have some really minor offenses that are only defined under city law and not state law.

So the Supreme Court opinion doesn't apply to them.

And therefore, if we don't touch those, we could end up in a place where trespass is a 10-day sentence, but smoking on the 16th Street Mall is still 300 days.

And that just feels really disparate and really unfair.

So another piece of our proposal is that we need to line up all of our what are basically petty offenses and use that same 10-day jail sentence.

Because if it's something that only the city has bothered to define, it is pretty much per se very minor to the point that the state's not even touching it.

And so for us to leave far more severe sentences for those things when everything else drops just doesn't make a lot of sense and is really internally inconsistent.

And then finally, we recommend revising the language of certain offenses, like the assault example, to make sure that we're aligning the prohibited conduct with a state law that actually allows for a higher sentence.

Because in Denver, we do prosecute domestic violence very frequently.

The DA's office knows we have expertise in that.

And so we want to make sure that PACE can continue to do that, because they do that right now.

and that we're not leaving sort of this mushy language in our current statutes

that creates an argument that only a low sentence is appropriate.

So we are sort of making that more clear, aligning it with the state law that has a higher sentence

and allowing Pace to continue pursuing those higher sentences, which we agree is appropriate.

So yeah, that's what we're proposing.

And we don't have language on this yet.

This is hot off the press, Supreme Court, but we're working on having a bill.

We met with John and Co.

And they are hoping to get us something by the end of the month, which we will not hold you to.

But we do have them work on it.

So if we reach out to your offices to start scheduling one-on-one briefings,

we would be expecting to have a draft before those briefings.

So we hope we can get those on the calendar and then bring a draft when we have those meetings.

So just an alert if you get those calendar requests.

And then stay holding.

Yeah.

And as far as like who...

Be careful, we have 10 minutes.

Yeah.

This is just take just one minute.

It's just the, and it's on this slide, but basically outlining all of the conversations

that we've had to date.

This has been an ongoing conversation, as you can see, since 2024, when some of these,

the beginnings of these conversations, and I think a lot of it has been around what's

going to happen at the Supreme Court.

And so we would go back and forth and back and forth.

And in that, we have been very open to having those ongoing dialogue with the various interested

parties and would continue that dialogue once we do have some written language that we would

want to be able to share with our partners and be able to continue to massage that language

to make sure we're in the right place and we're meeting everybody's needs.

So with that said, we'll go to questions.

Thank you.

First in the queue, we have Councilwoman Torres, then Hines, and then Councilmember Cashman.

Thank you.

Just help me understand the difficulty in talking to your client about which sentence applies to them.

Because I thought it was, you would know based on who was, like if DPD gave them a trespassing charge,

they had designated this was in violation of state law versus local.

But now, even if DPD gives a muni ticket, it's unconstitutional to give them a higher sentence.

So the point is that if you think about the park curfew example, again, I really like that example.

Say someone gets a ticket for park curfew violation.

Again, we know that in court, public defenders are going to say this is trespass, so it should only be 10 days.

Pace, maybe, I'm just using a hypothetical here, is going to say there's something different about curfews than trespass.

And so, in fact, it doesn't fall under the Supreme Court opinion.

And so what do we tell the person?

That they're up to a 300-day sentence or they're up to a 10-day sentence?

Do we have to wait until the Colorado Supreme Court decides, is curfew really akin to trespass?

Or are we going to do our job and take that off their plate?

To be clear, I have a huge issue with a local officer deciding that.

But it's not up to them, really.

Exactly.

Let me ask, Marlee, I don't know if you're the one to ask about this at all.

What should be our response given the Supreme Court decision,

which is the slideshow saying that the Supreme Court decision came

down December 22nd?

Yep.

Okay. So it was just like yesterday basically.

So what's our normal response when something like that happens

that challenges or supposedly challenges our municipal code?

We pivot.

Marlee Bordowski, city attorney's office.

These wonderful ladies laid it out correctly.

We do need to respond quickly.

We have been responding in the moment in the courtroom.

It has been a little bit chaotic for all of us.

I will, and I'm on several calls with city attorneys across the state trying to figure out how to approach this.

I do know, and I can send copies around what Boulder did, and they passed an ordinance.

It's very broad to kind of get at this immediately while we do the bigger, the more detailed work.

So as far as the paperwork that you saw, those have not been changed.

We're just kind of interlineation, kind of doing it in the moment kinds of things.

But we do need to respond.

I feel as though both of our teams are responding well and working through it.

All three of the teams, let me pivot with that.

the courts are as well. They're doing their own analysis and all of that. So everyone is all hands

on deck trying to figure this out and make sure that folks are getting the right information,

getting the right advisements. I would suggest, since I have the mic, that we do some kind of a

task force kind of a thing to dig into the, much like your misdemeanor task force, to dig into the

nuances of these things and maybe come at it as more of a united front. I will also say,

In the DRMC, it's not just every ordinance that says it shall be unlawful to do whatever.

It's also the failure to do an act or the doing of an act.

Even if it doesn't have that, it shall be unlawful.

So there are literally thousands of municipal code violations that could be swept up into this.

So I just want you guys to be aware of that as well.

It does not need that it shall be unlawful language.

I guess my only follow-up is what's the risk in not having something in place now?

given the decision and that we haven't changed anything?

Well, I brought the opinion just to make sure I said this right,

but at the end of the opinion, it says that it does not mean that municipal charges must be dismissed.

So the charging of people can continue.

It's that they can't be sentenced at a higher sentence than the identical state statute,

but we can continue operating our municipal courts.

We've been doing kind of a hodgepodge of, you know, there's very clear ones.

Trespass is clear in most circumstances.

Petty theft is clear.

So those advisements we're getting right.

It's the more nuanced ones that are a little more challenging.

But right now the courts are functioning and we're just dealing with the ruling as we interpret it.

And our offices have been working together to navigate that as well.

I just want to also answer that real quick too, is that I think it is that it is the kind of having to piecemeal all the pieces and having to argue each and every single case, right?

That litigation that's taking place of like, nope, this is a similar conduct.

No, this isn't similar conduct.

And not having it clear in our ordinance that they have clear guidelines to be able to follow.

that's the risk honestly is that we are leaving it up to them to try to figure it out in every

individual case which is I think creating a lot of time for folks on all ends of this right of

being having to go through that whole process and also the fact that you know we need to have it

clear in our language what it is so that they can function properly because we all know like if we

don't have it in our laws, then somebody can act sometimes out of box.

And it can happen in either place.

And I am very worried about people's rights to do process and getting proper information,

even from our public defender's office, and then being able to provide accurate information to people.

So are you saying the same thing that Marley is that task force then ordinance,

or are you just going to run your ordinance?

I think we've done an amount of work over the last year that I don't know that a task force is going to necessarily.

I feel like a task force will prolong it.

I would be very concerned with doing a task force.

There may need to be, and I would like to have an opportunity for us to have a conversation with PACE and even with the courts to say,

okay, is there the broad that we can address immediately?

What are the different options before us?

Because we do need to do something.

I think we need to do it quickly for that reason.

The reason, the difference from the state is that we're not starting in a vacuum and being like,

what should all of our sentences be?

I've been given a mandate from the Supreme Court.

And so they had to do that process because they had to just decide at this date from pure policy,

whereas we are just having to say which two things are the same, and we can do that.

Correct.

Thanks, Madam Chair.

Thanks, Marley.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Council Member Hines.

Thank you.

Denver police can cite state law, correct?

Like we can cite local or state law.

Could we have our Denver police cite?

And it's the police officer that determines the citation, the DRMC or CRS that was allegedly infringed upon, correct?

Okay. So could we have Denver police cite state law until this is uncluttered?

I think that's a question for DPD as well. And we have had meetings with them prior to this. We haven't had a chance to follow up with them again.

And being completely like transparent, I guess about that, Councilman Hines, that I think there was some kind of, I don't, I was not around for this.

I think there was some kind of commission decades ago that looked at just getting rid of any municipal offense that over the state do it.

And there was a lot of pushback against that for a lot of reasons.

One reason we collect fine revenue.

So that would be actually not a minor kind of change.

I think we're probably better off just aligning our offenses.

That I think would be more of a seismic change than what we're proposing, if that makes sense.

Yeah, and I'm not afraid to say we get rid of municipal code.

I'm saying rather than have all these challenges or this uncertainty until we get either legislation or stakeholder and then legislation that we move to state law so that we don't.

Part of the concern that would be is that then that everything would go to the state courts.

And are they prepared to take all of those municipal offenses that were coming to Muni court into the state?

Isn't it state court that is making us consider going to state court?

No.

The state Supreme Court said.

They're saying that they should be the same.

Like that there should be parity.

They're not telling us that we need to charge at the state level.

And to be clear, I don't think council, I could be wrong about this.

I'm not exactly sure if we have the authority to direct DPD on how they charge offenses.

I'm guessing we don't really.

So that would have to be a mayoral decision.

And I know the mayor won't want to do that.

So I just think that, like, that's outside of our wheelhouse as this body, whereas the code is our code, right?

And Council Member Perry, to your point about, you know, there are people resisting reducing the state laws.

reducing the municipal code to match state law

and a fair amount of businesses don't want that.

I think this is my last comment.

This seems to be pretty narrow.

The work ahead of us is specific, but a lot of work, but it's narrow.

We're matching what the mandate is from the Supreme Court.

But the public will definitely interpret this through their lens,

And they'll say, wait a minute, if it's 300 days and now 10 days, you know, like those who go to prison for large scale drug distribution sales, they get out, they get into housing.

This is something that's happening right now in District 10.

They get into housing without a background check because we want to make sure everyone gets housing, you know, without a background check.

They continue.

They go right back to dealing drugs.

and it's hard to get them out of that habitation because of the eviction process delays.

So I see your quizzical points.

I know that my constituents in Golden Triangle and Cap Hill particularly,

because it's happening right around there, they'll say,

wait a minute, the city is reducing the offense time, the penalties, and that's going to further

make it more difficult for us to hold those who want to continue to commit crime accountable.

So I'm just like, I recognize this is very specific, but people will look at it through

their lens and they'll say, wait a minute, what's going on here? Is city council allowing,

criminals who want to continue to be criminals

to just be criminals.

So I just want to be very clear about that.

And if we need help around messaging,

we can help with that.

It's an implementation bill.

We should call it that.

That's what it is.

It's an implementation bill.

It's like when the state passed,

we had to change our parking requirement.

It's the same that the state changed

our telecommunications.

That was just in committee last week.

We have to comply.

I hear you.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Council Member Cashman,

Council Member Romero-Cumbo, and Sawyer,

and we're two minutes over.

Yeah, I'm good. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Council Member Romero-Cumbo.

Thank you. I'll just ask you quick,

and then we can follow up after.

I heard you say, but I was looking for it,

that there would be other petty offenses

that would also need to be addressed.

Do you have an idea as to how many,

and would those also come in front of Council?

So is that something that we go through and approve, or would that be separate?

No, that would be an element of the bill.

And I think we have it in our last presentation.

We had all the offenses, both that we were assessing to be comparable and that only exist as city offenses.

We're all listed in our last presentation.

Today, we wanted to not represent all of that, but just talk about the Supreme Court decision,

because it's a lot to get your head around.

So when we have a draft bill, it will have all that laid out.

And I imagine when we do one-on-ones, which is our intention is the next step that we would have language and we would go back through all the charts again.

But we just didn't want to duplicate that today because this is, you know.

Got it.

That's a lot.

Thank you.

That's what I wanted.

Thank you.

And if you could send this.

Thank you.

Thank you guys.

This is a lot.

I question for Marley.

You said Boulder did a broad ordinance while they were sorting it out, I think was your exact words.

Can you talk a little bit more about that?

Because I appreciate what you guys are doing and I think we should do it.

But I feel like it's being presented to us as the only solution when it sounds like there's maybe a more in-depth solution.

So I'm just curious what Boulder did.

I'm going to Bordowski City Attorney's Office.

I can just read to you.

It's very short because we're responding quickly.

Notwithstanding Section 1, which lays out their general penalties like ours does.

So notwithstanding Section 1, whenever there exists a felony criminal violation where the prohibited conduct is identical to a corresponding charge in Colorado state law, the maximum sentence that the Colorado state law shall control.

And that's what they're operating under now.

What needs to be done for, I want to see the language exactly because it only said felony in there.

and maybe you're more than welcome here. You just email it to me. It's totally fine.

But I guess I'm like what you have said in your testimony today is that there's thousands of

potential things. The list you guys provided to us does not have a thousand things on it. So

like I and my residents have been very clear that they don't think that the state sentences are

appropriate and would prefer something higher for deterrence, which is fine. I think I just,

I'm concerned that we haven't seen a thousand offenses from you guys and you say that there are a thousand in our code.

And you say this has to be done right now.

And you say there's a broader solution while we figure it out.

Like, I just, I'm not comfortable with moving on with this as if this is the only solution when it's not the only solution.

So I feel like the reason for not that we are not recommending that having been,

And I started a meeting about this within like a week of coming into office.

So I've been two years looking at it.

The reason that that's not our recommendation is because it leaves us in the exact same position, if you think about it.

It just says, follow state law.

And so then case-by-case litigation, same exact thing.

We've given no guidance in our code about what lines up with what.

And we're leaving litigants and courts and judges to figure it out case-by-case, go up to the Supreme Court over and over and over.

And so we could do that.

But that's the same as taking no action effectively.

Except that it gives the one thing that it accomplishes.

Well, no, we don't have we even if we don't do this, the Constitution applies.

So we technically don't have to.

We can leave it like it is.

It's just that then we've created a huge mess.

No one's saying you have to pass a law by X date.

But if we the reason that kind of law doesn't the one thing it would help with is if you have a private defense attorney who's not as with it as OMPD,

it would give them a little bit of alert that they should go look at this case and make an argument.

Other than that, it leaves everything the same.

And so I don't think it's helpful.

Is that true? Do you feel like that's true?

It probably would leave the uncertainty to Council Member Parity's point.

The only reason I brought up that there are thousands and thousands of municipal code violations

is the unintended consequence of reduce.

we still would need to do a deep dive to see if a Denver fire code violation has a state identical

statute. I mean, there's things that we are not thinking about other than the ones that are front

and center that we see every single day in our courtrooms. There are still other ones that could

get wrapped up into some legislation that we didn't really intend to. That's my only caveat

I agree with you.

Yeah, I know we're over time.

I just, I feel like the Supreme Court has put us in a really tough spot and we want to make sure that what we're doing is legal and what we want to make sure what we're doing is fair.

I just feel like we're not maybe all on the same page on what that looks like.

And so I'm really concerned that you guys are briefing people and planning to come to council when there is this level of discomfort and uncertainty kind of around this.

So I think when you see the list, it'll be a little more clear, like the actual draft,

and including that we have a catch-all so that we don't have to find every shall or unlawful in the entire community code.

There will be a catch-all that also says for ordinances that aren't specifically addressed

and you just follow whether there's an equivalent state law, those are really uncommonly charged.

And so we think it's very much worth the effort to capture all these incredibly commonly charged offenses,

remove the uncertainty in those cases, and then leave the catch-all for the ones that just don't really call them.

Yeah, I look forward to seeing the language.

I just need to dive in the details on that.

That's exactly what our intention is.

That's why today was to just get everybody briefed and updated on what's currently happening

because it happened so fast.

Thanks.

Okay, thank you all.

Thank you for the great discussion.

And I'll see you in car widener.

Water with this update on