Welcome back to this weekly meeting of the Community Planning and Housing Committee with Denver City Council.

Your Community Planning and Housing Committee starts now.

All right, we're on air. This is the Community Planning and Housing Committee of Denver City Council.

It is February 3rd, 2026, and we have two action items today, starting with a rezoning at 385 South Nunei Street.

We'll start with Councilmember introductions.

I'm Sarah parody one of your council members at large and I will go

Hello there. Good afternoon. I'm Diana Romero Campbell Southeast Denver district 4

What I'll be there is both lucky district 7 Chantel is district 8 Amanda Sawyer district 5

Stacy Gilmore district 11 Jamie Torres West Denver district 3

And do we have anyone online? I don't think so okay the first time I have is actually CPD

I don't have anyone up at the table yet.

Yeah, you're up.

Sorry, I didn't know if you knew you were first.

Thanks, Joe.

Yeah.

All right.

My name's Joe Green with Community Planning and Development

and as you said, we have a rezoning at 385 South Zuni Street.

Jumping in, we'll go over the requests,

the location and context,

little bit about the process we've been through this thus far and then get into

the review criteria so the applicant is looking to go from B1 with specific

waivers to the property that limit a lot of what that B1 does to emx3 which is a

mixed-use district in the urban edge context that allows three stories of

height and a variety of commercial office and residential uses B1 in

general allows a lot of office residential and commercial uses but in

this case a lot of those are waived but I have a slide up about that in a couple

seconds the applicant in this case really just wants to make to use the

existing building as a medical office though obviously if the rezoning passed

redevelopment would also be an option and getting into the location and context

It's in Council District 7, Councilmember Elvides' district.

It's in the Athmar Park neighborhood in this big shopping center, the Alameda Square shopping center.

As you can see, there's a lot of different zone districts kind of surrounding it.

To the west, you have ETUC.

To the south, you have a single-unit district.

To the north is mixed use.

And then just across the street, you have a Costco business center, so really big, big-box development

with lots of parking.

So the waivers waive a lot of different commercial uses.

I listed them all out in the staff report,

but there's about 20 to 25 uses that are not allowed

because of the waivers.

One of those is medical clinic,

which is a specific interest to the applicant,

but there's a lot of other ones as well.

It also limits the total floor area.

The first floor has to be 2,500 square feet in size.

It allows the second floor to go up to 1,800 square feet,

and then it also limits the height to 32 feet.

The requested district goes up to 45 feet, three stories, so a little bit taller.

The existing land use as a single unit, I believe it's being used for an office use.

To the south, you have single unit.

To the west, you have single unit immediately adjacent.

To the north, there's a property owned by the city,

which I believe is being used as a day shelter or a cold weather shelter.

at the moment. And then across the street, again, you have the giant suburban style commercial area.

Here's a picture on the top of the current building. It looks like a house or a duplex,

maybe, but seems to have been used for commercial uses. A picture of the property to the south,

which is kind of a lot of single-story, single-unit homes in the area. And then across

the street again you can see that big shopping center. So the informational

notice that we received an application went out in early November. We went to

Planning Board on the 21st of January. They voted unanimously to

recommend approval. We've received no public comments thus far about this

rezoning from RNOs or any members of the public. Looking at the review criteria as

As you all know, there's three review criteria that we have in the Dead Rezoning Code that

we must find to be true to say yes to rezoning, starting with consistency with adopted plans.

There are three currently adopted plans for the area, but the Southwest Area Plan is in

progress and will go to City Council before this rezoning goes to City Council.

So that one will be the adopted plan guidance when we go to City Council.

So we'll walk through that as well.

Plan 2040 has a lot of different goals about mixed use centers, making sure that they're

quality info and they're consistent with surrounding areas, that there's a big network of mixed

use centers and corridors.

Promoting infill development where we have the infrastructure, encouraging mixed use

communities where people can live, work, and play.

So we find it to be consistent with all of those goals.

Blueprint Denver lists the area as urban edge, which talks about small, multi-unit, and

Multi-unit and commercial areas embedded within one to two unit areas.

This is a relatively small scale mixed use district that would fit in next to the one and two unit residential areas and has protected district standards.

This blueprint then listed as a community center and says it could go up to five stories.

The applicant is only requesting three stories, so I literally think that fits better with the context of the surrounding area.

but it would provide a mix of office, commercial, and residential uses.

So we think it meets this plan guidance.

Blueprint Denver also talks about rezoning out of former Chapter 59 zoning code.

So this would meet that plan guidance.

It does kind of just barely fit into the requirement to have an equity analysis.

It's just over 10,000 square feet in a nest neighborhood.

So it has lower educational attainment and median household income

than the median of the rest of the city.

There are less income-restricted units in this area.

There's not a lot of diversity in housing costs

and less missing middle housing than the rest of the city.

This rezoning would, if residential was built here,

it would require income-restricted units to be built

so it could help contribute to that.

So we have one older plan for this area,

the Athmar Park Perimeter Plan.

It talks about business growth and revitalization, especially in areas along the fringes and

the edges of Athmar Park neighborhood.

This is on the northern edge.

It encourages businesses to remain in Athmar Park and more mixed use areas near transit

corridors.

This is just over a half mile from federal, so the potential BRT in the future.

And it has bus routes just to the north.

And then in progress is the Southwest Area Plan,

which has lots of different policies focused on the Alameda

Square Shopping Center.

It talks about small and large cultural businesses

that serve the community.

It talks about encouraging new businesses as infill

development or in underused areas.

This lot could be considered underused.

And it talks about infill development on vacant properties

or upon existing buildings and structures.

So we think it generally meets this plan guidance.

Southwest plan also is carrying forward the community center

future place designation.

So that guidance is the same with up to five stories in height.

We think that it does meet the public interest criterion

by implementing adopted plans, talking about mixed use centers

amenities come throughout the city and we do find it to be consistent with the

neighborhood context zone district purpose and intent it's an appropriately

scaled mixed-use development and has predicted district standards that can

improve the transition to the adjacent neighborhood so with that we do

recommend approval I'm available for questions applicant might be in the

building. She tried to wait for her outside to put her in. She planned on being here,

but she's not currently in the room. Awesome. Thank you, Joe, very much. We do have our

District 7 member first in the queue. Thank you so much, committee chair. Thank you for

working with Heng to get this application in. Could you tell me a little bit of like

when did this waiver get put in and like why a waiver like this would be put in? Yeah, usually,

I guess my understanding is at some point there was a lot more kind of negotiation with neighborhoods

about zone districts and exactly what the zone district would allow when rezoning. So there'd

be, we have lots of old PUDs and waivers that are like really specific, like this could be,

I've been working on one that says like it can basically be a Walgreens and nothing else.

It looks like this one is 1984.

So it's been in place for a while.

Is that answering?

Yeah, I've had no reason.

I don't know specifically.

They're very specific about not wanting this type of facility, a medical facility?

So when I was looking at it.

What was happening in the 80s?

I don't know.

Yeah, I don't know either.

There's a lot of uses that it doesn't allow.

Like an apothecary is not allowed.

I don't know specifically why this one.

I guess I'm just curious because maybe dispensary is the only thing I can think of that the

neighborhood might not want or something, but that wasn't happening in the 80s.

Anyway, this neighborhood doesn't have the social determinants of health, which includes

a medical center.

And so definitely supportive of that and have talked to the applicant.

I would say that RNO was concerned about this being next to the cold weather shelter and the city eventually getting it to make like one big shelter.

And so I would like to reach out to them and get a letter of support and with their concerns before it comes to full council.

But I was just curious about where that waiver first came from.

They don't really explain in the waiver itself.

And so I don't really have a great answer.

All right. Well, thank you for that. Thank you, committee chair. That was all I had.

Great. Yeah, thank you. I have Council Member Lewis next, followed by Torres.

So I actually had a very similar question because the hearing aid store just stuck out to me.

Like, who does know when I hear an earring aid?

I know.

What's happening?

I guess I had some questions.

So maybe the 80s were like, I don't know.

I feel like they just like went through the list of D1 uses and were like, no, no, no, no.

No. Someone was in a bad mood.

Yeah.

That's literally all I wanted to know.

And hearing aids is very specific.

If anyone watching knows.

Council Member Torres, followed by Sawyer.

Thank you.

So that waiver list, it waives against those kinds of things being used on site.

Is residential?

Has that been?

It doesn't seem to be waived.

No.

Okay.

Okay.

Looking at Blueprint, which I think is the most significant for me, it continues.

Has that continuity of that.

Was it Community Corridor?

Community Center.

Community center. Yeah. That feels appropriate to continue that through.

What was the question I had? Oh, I was just going to make a point.

Council would have to approve a purchase of the property if it were to, if the city were to consider buying it.

So it's not just a done deal, right? Like it would happen without you knowing or the community knowing.

So there's to be a public interface around that.

Thanks for that reminder.

I'll definitely make sure to communicate that.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Yeah, thank you.

Council Member Sawyer.

Yeah, thanks.

I don't have a problem with this.

I just wanted to say, I have one question, but also just wanted to say, this is why in

2010 we've got a new zoning code, right?

And it is, it's got its own problems, but what it doesn't do is create this list of

things and then let people like cross off what you don't want to have happen in that location.

Like this is why it is in our adopted plans to try and move everything out of the old zoning code

and into the new zoning code because this kind of weird use restriction stuff is messy. Messy. So

just lagging up for you guys. Do you know what like what is going to go? What medical is going to go

here? She wants to have just one physician, like a family physician. Oh, interesting.

That's useful. Okay, cool. Great. Thanks. I'm your doctor. No, I'm not.

You're taking patients. I have 99 problems, but a list ain't one.

Sorry, guys. I'm really old. Okay. Can I get a motion in a second and some thumbs up?

Second. Moved by Alvedo, seconded by Sawyer. Thumbs up to go to the floor, Torres. Thank you.

Okay. All right. Thank you, Joe. Really appreciate it. And tell the applicant to stop running from

wherever she's coming from. Next up, we have a presentation from our colleagues,

Sawyer and Gilmore, about some changes to the property tax fund that I know,

the Property Tax Assistance Program, to use its proper name, that you guys have done a great job

teeing up for us. I think we all know this is coming and already to hear about it. Yeah. Well,

so this is Matt's black belt project, so he's going to give you the presentation.

Melissa and Ian, do you guys want to come and sit at the table? Please. I have to leave early.

You're like, no, I do not. I love the delegation. Councilman Gilmore, you have anything you want

to say before we get started? No, I'm just really excited that after like two and a half years,

we're finally here. So go ahead. Cool. So as has already been said, we're here to discuss some

property tax relief program updates. Matt, introduce yourself for the record. Oh, apologies.

Matt Walter, senior counsel in District 5 for Councilwoman Amanda Sawyer.

The purpose today, not only to provide you updates on the proposed ordinance, but also

some updates since the program was shifted from Denver Human Services to the Department of Housing

Stability in 2025. Some quick background here. The Denver Property Tax Relief Program provides

a partial refund of property taxes paid or the equivalent in rent to qualifying Denver residents.

You can see that the minimum payment received is at least $372, but the average payment is about,

from the 2025 to 2026 program year, is about $1,200 instead. Some additional background of

programs at the state level that people often confuse. The property tax exemption for senior

citizens and that's aged 65 and older. Now this is 50% of the first $200,000 of the value of the home

is exempted from property tax. The key difference here is that this property must be owner occupied

for 10 consecutive years, which is different from our program, which is only for the previous year's

taxes. The property tax deferral program allows senior citizens, active military, and those who

exceed the 4% tax growth cap to access an interest-bearing loan to defer partial payment

of their property tax as long as they keep re-enrolling and remain eligible.

So here's the background historically as the program was administered by DHS.

You can see here between 2020 to 2024, the amount of applications received goes up over time.

You can also see a disparity in the amount of rebates paid. Some common reasons for that are

listed there on the left. Either the application was incomplete, the address was already claimed,

the address was outside of Denver, the applicant's AMI didn't meet the eligibility, or they had

already received the rebate. And now some background from the more recent past, after it was moved to

host. On May 1st, 2025, they opened their new application year. And between May and December,

there were 3,193 applications. As a reminder, that's only kind of the first half of the

application year. The program year runs from May 1st through April 30th of the following year in

2026. And of that May to December batch, 1,467 applications have been processed and approved.

Hosts made a few changes with the program. They contracted with two local nonprofit providers

following a competitive procurement process. Those providers have been fantastic at getting

out in the community, doing outreach events, helping people apply in person on site. They've

also operated call centers to assist with applying over the phone for people who might

find the internet application challenging.

Here's just a quick map of applicants by neighborhood, which Host was kind enough to provide.

And then here are the current eligibility standards.

So this is how the program is administered today.

Homeowners with disability, homeowners 65 and older, and homeowners with children all

must meet 60% of area median income or lower to qualify.

Renters with disability and renters 65 and older, you can see here it's a little wonky

in the ordinance as it exists today.

It's 25% of area median income for single renters and 30% for households of two.

Other key things to mention, again, I already brought up the program year is a little different

from the budget year.

It is paid in arrears, so you are applying to get your previous year's taxes, which you've already paid back.

Social security benefits are not counted as income for the purpose of eligibility, but the state's adult financial program benefits are.

And that gets us to the proposed changes to eligibility criteria.

What you'll see here is the changes are presented in red.

for homeowners, it's still homeowners of disability, but you'll see that homeowners

drop from 65 in order to 62 in order. This is to align with other definitions of what is an older

adult of other programs administered by the city and federal level. Also, the council members

decided to add a new eligibility criteria for homeowners who are a surviving spouse, non-remarried.

This came from a lot of pure city research in other cities that have a similar provision for

normally it's surviving spouses of veterans, but the council members thought that for any

surviving spouse not remarried going through that circumstance, this would provide a significant

change to their financial status. So it made sense to just leave it open. And then in general,

an uptick from the 60% area median income to 80% area median income for homeowners.

For renters, you'll see here the caveat along the bottom. The proposal is to phase renters

out of the program by April 30th, 2030. And in the meantime, the definitions were aligned

with what was done to the homeowner group as well. So for renters with disability, it

remains the same. And for renters 62 in order drops down from 65 in order. And then to just

clean up that unnecessary difference between 25% versus 30% AMI, the decision is to propose

30% AMI for all renters in the meantime until they're phased out of the program.

Here's a quick breakdown of the beneficiaries. So historically under DHS, it was 60% renters

from the 2023 program year, 40% homeowners. The largest use category was 65 and older and

disability was the second highest use category. Since the program has been administered by host

that those numbers have largely remained the same, but are a little different here. You can see

approved to date in 62% renters, 38% homeowners.

Total applications received, though, is 59% renters, 41% homeowners.

And again, those two biggest use categories is 65 in order followed by disability.

And estimated budget needs for the 2025-2026 program year.

So for 2026, the budget was allocated $4.9 million.

And again, that just comes off of HOSA's best projections on what will be sufficient to meet the tail half of the 2025 program year and start the 2026 program year.

Timeline for the ordinance.

Obviously, this was because of the budget implication was part of the budget process.

In the fall, some discussions with DOF and the mayor's office came to budget and policy on November 10th in 2025.

We've just done some briefings with council members and we are here today at Community Planning and Housing on February 3rd.

And it would follow the council process after.

Should it pass, Host is confident that they'd be able to implement the ordinance changes in time for the upcoming program start in May 1st for the next application cycle.

And that leads us to questions and discussion.

I will note you'll also see on your copy there are a bunch of other slides here with some additional information should you want it.

But with that, I'll turn it back over.

Thank you.

I actually don't have anyone in queue yet.

Okay.

Alvedra is followed by Louis.

Thank you so much for this work.

Amazing.

I think this is exactly what we need to help displace people.

So thank you.

Overall, sounds amazing.

I have one question about, I'm looking at the appendices, Brothers Redevelopment and

Community Economic Defense Project, the amount totals.

How much of that goes to admin, is allowed to go to administrative costs?

I don't know that we have a hard cap, but we try and keep it at about an 80-20 split,

and I can get you an exact number based on their budget that's currently extended through

December right now.

Okay.

But as much as possible.

I'd love to see more on that.

I just want to make sure as much as possible is going to the actual need and not getting

caught up in administrative costs.

Yeah.

We did, when we amended these contracts for 2026, we did a big push with both agencies

to sort of whittle down the budgets that we had imposed in 2025 to put as much towards

the rebates themselves.

But I can't get you an exact breakdown.

Yeah, 20% seems high off the top, thinking about other contracts that I've asked that

question about, but-

I say that as a maximum, too.

I'm not sure if it actually meets 20%.

Thank you all for the work.

Amazing.

Really excited.

Great.

Thank you, Professor.

Followed by Torres.

I just wanted to tell you both thank you, but also tell you both thank you.

I obviously had a briefing and I don't have any questions.

Thank you for the work that you're doing.

I couldn't have done it without the council members, but also without Ian and Melissa.

Host has been critical to this whole process.

Thank you.

Yeah, so I will just say, Matt, fantastic job.

Congratulations.

And just a huge thank you to Ian and Melissa.

Both of you have been with us through this whole process in lockstep.

And, you know, this is really our single tool to help homeowners stay in their homes and age in place and maintain that generational wealth.

And we know that that is where we are seeing current residents,

longtime residents under threat in our city.

And so it was a really hard policy decision to phase out the renter piece.

But we feel like this has been in place for a very, very long time,

long before TRUAA ever existed, long before we had a number of other supports.

And we do feel that this is the right way to go in terms of helping support our homeowners on that.

So it was a tough one.

But really appreciate you guys.

Thank you.

Great job, Matt.

Yeah. All right. Then Torres and then Proton.

Thank you so much. So I'll just reiterate one of the questions that I had during the briefing was the phasing out of renters and how quickly that happens.

Like, what are you kind of tracking in terms of metric?

I'm wondering if, Melissa, you provided a map of owner applicants and then another map of renter applicants.

I'm wondering if that could be included in the Granicus upload just to share.

I think because what I'm looking at is that like Sun Valley and Lama Lincoln Park are heavily

renter applicants. And so thinking about them being phased out, it's basically been like a

supplementary program for their rent. And while I understand because the other side of the map on

on the owner applicants.

I've got a ton of other owner applicants.

And it being opened up to 80%, I think,

gives huge opportunity for those folks

to be able to qualify for additional funds.

But I want to also understand, like,

how are we squeezing out renters, ultimately,

out of the program?

Like, what's the pace, basically?

And I don't know if you've thought about

what that is going to look like,

or if you're hoping it's organic or not.

I'm not quite sure.

Yeah, Melissa can add anything I failed to mention, but I guess to answer your first question on the maps,

we're actually working to update the maps for you all to include.

Right now they exclude the May applications, which is actually when we receive the bulk of applicants.

So our host data team is working to update that now and also to give you maps as a percentage of renters and homeowners in those areas

instead of just how many applications generally we receive.

And we're also doing that to engage more homeowners in outreach, especially in council districts where we see fewer applications as a percentage of homeowners in those areas.

As far as a plan to phase out renters, I think we're wanting to see what the engagement for renters looks like now and in our subsequent program year starting May 1st of this year.

But we've discussed a few different options, whether that's taking every month a certain number of renter applications

or deciding a certain amount of funding should only be spent on renters per month

and sort of decreasing that every subsequent month or to wait until a future programmer to make those decisions.

So it's something we're just starting to think about now.

And we're really, DHS did have some data for us, but we had to basically build an application system

so that hosts could have our own data to help inform those decisions.

And we don't yet even have a full year to tell us kind of what the engagement is looking like

between homeowners and renters and haven't had that chance to do more intentional outreach to that end.

When it comes to like a year from now, a year and some months from now,

when does it make sense to come back to committee and kind of talk about what you're seeing?

That's a great question.

I would say as soon as you want us.

I think by April 30th, we'll have a full year's worth of data.

So we can certainly give you updates at that time as we're getting ready to launch the new program year.

So we can at least give you an update of what we've seen so far in just our first year of operations.

That'd be great. Okay. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. I think that would be perfect.

So thank you for that.

Actually, that was my question of being able to come back and see with those modifications and changes,

what that impact is and what that looks like.

are we having our intended effect?

But I also just wanted to thank the sponsors

and to all of you for your work on this.

I appreciate it lowering the age.

We have a lot of seniors and a lot of people

who are demographically aging into being older adults,

myself included.

And those are the kind of things

that I think help people stay in their homes

and will be really helpful for some residents,

I think across the city, but also in District 4.

So I know we're lower in the map on the applications, but as we continue to move forward, I anticipate

that there would probably be more people who would be applying.

So thank you.

Great.

I think everyone has already gone through the queue who's not presenting except me.

So I just have more of a comment, which you all have highlighted throughout and mentioned,

which is that I think it makes a huge amount of sense now that we have direct relief for

tenants to save property tax relief for homeowners and not just sort of call rental assistance

another form of property tax relief and have renters able to apply for these different

programs that are differently missed.

I mean, this is a huge sort of cleanup operation.

And I just want to reiterate the point that I think we have seen so many evictions.

I also am always watching foreclosure numbers and people who are being displaced in that

way, which really is like, I mean, both of those things are phenomenally destabilizing,

but when you see a foreclosure, you're also basically losing, you know, losing that home

permanently, right? Like that person's housing status is sort of forever changed, which really

was driven home to me a lot in representing people in foreclosure. So all of that said,

I just want to make sure, like Councilman Torres said, and like you all promised to come back,

that we're really paying attention to how we're allocating dollars between these different things

and making sure that we're getting the word out

that people are taking advantage of this program

and that we're keeping our eye on

if people are not fully utilizing the dollars

that we've allocated for this,

that rental assistance is where we then put those dollars.

And I know council will do that

because we've literally done that

in budget amendments before

that I'm pretty sure everyone here voted for.

So I know we're all on the same page,

saying that more for the public.

Very grateful to you all for kind of going back

and realigning this with how all of these programs work today.

Just appreciate it.

So with that, we again need a motion and a second.

Moved by Alvedra, seconded by Lewis, just because I looked this way.

Does anybody need a voice vote?

Okay, great.

Thank you guys so much.

See you on the floor.

All right.

And let me see what we've got on consent.

Nothing on consent.

Therefore, nothing called off.

Therefore, committee is over.

All right.

Thank you.

Well done.

You stay.

Thank you.

Thank you.