Thanks for joining us for this weekly joint meeting of the mayor and Denver City Council.

Follow along as the mayor and city council members hear updates from city agencies and projects, discuss important city matters, and hear about what's happening across the Mile High City.

Join the discussion with your elected officials starting now, I think we're going to be able to get the 19th century.

Good morning, Paul Cash from South Denver District 6.

Good morning, man.

Rora Almidrez, Lucky District 7.

Hi, everybody.

Savannah Gonzalez, one of your council members at large.

Good morning.

Chris Hines, Denver's perfect time.

Darren Watson, fine district nine.

Jamie Taurus, West Denver District Three.

Kevin Flynn, South West Denver's District Two.

Good morning.

Great.

Welcome.

Thanks so much for being here.

We do have a short general session this morning because we have a long set of executive session items, and so we will just start with introduction.

So with announcements anyone might want to share for the public who is watching today, and then we'll head into executive session.

But what announcements or updates would any council members have?

Councilman Cashman, I think you might have an update.

Yes, Mr.

Mayor.

I have a bunch of exciting news.

First of all, I know I was told by good friend Councilwoman Albedrez uh spoke about this last night, but the mighty, mighty DU Pioneers hockey team that did win the NCAA national championship for the 11th world record 11th and did it in such uh star-like fashion, uh beating Michigan in double overtime for the summer finals and beating Wisconsin with a comeback two to one victory.

So way to go, Pyo's uh go DU.

Umbe equally, if not more exciting.

For the District Six office is uh uh one of my uh senior aides, uh Masha Liar, uh welcomed her her first child.

Uh we came came uh on to Planet Earth uh this past Saturday.

Um I got I was out of the country.

I got two texts uh at three o'clock in the morning uh EU time.

One was from the mayor when the Paios won the championship, and the other was from actually Jacob was born.

So that was an exciting deal.

And the final exciting bit for District 6 office.

Uh while Mosha's out, uh, want to welcome Alexa Trigo, who is going to uh help us out uh in keeping District 6 under control uh for the next few months at least.

And uh uh the coming up this Saturday, uh the Washington Park East Neighborhood Association is doing an Earth Day event in Wash Park.

So uh get the details about that.

It's gonna be big fun honoring planet.

So that's what I got.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Councilman.

And I know council may have other celebrations coming.

I think there is uh public celebration at DU tonight for the national champions at 6 30.

Uh so folks want to come down to the Richie Center, I think down there is where they'll be at 6 30 tonight if you want to see your national champions.

Other announcements.

Uh Councilman Sawyer.

Councilman Torres was first.

Ah, all right.

I agree.

So polite.

Um, well, you get a special um acknowledgement from me, Cashman as a model college alum.

Oh, we'll recognize greatness when it happens.

Um so congrats to your your hockey team.

Um but uh this Saturday um just agreed.

I mentioned it last night um just for your awareness too.

This was the site of a recent Give Five event.

Um so uh Courtney's uh effort to get volunteers out in the community.

Um Crumley Park is becoming Crumley Park and Community Garden.

Um and this site has a really interesting story.

It's not an actual parks and rec parcel.

Um April, this had been on the market in the early 90s over and over and over again as a vacant lot.

Um, formerly a gas station.

April convinced the bank who was ownership to donate it uh to Denver Urban Gardens, who uh then planted basically a park and maintained it uh for several decades.

Um planting community gardens and food forests in West Denver ever since we passed the West Area Plan.

Um, and this became one of their uh expanded footprints for for both of those things.

Um, and now it'll be named um uh that in honor of uh April and her family.

Um she had gotten even the School of Mines to come down and scan and identify where the old tanks were because it was an old gas station and get them removed, all like donated work donated service, so that I could really be a great um park for the Barnum neighborhood.

So just a lot of really interesting um stuff, um history on that.

So yeah, that's it.

Thank you.

The update.

Councilman Sawyer.

Thank you.

Um a couple of events happening in District 5 this weekend.

The first one is there's a give five mile high event along Colfax, so Colfax Cleanup in support of the Colfax BRT and um those businesses along the BRT route that is currently under construction.

Um so that will be in several council districts, uh, including 10 and um nine and eight.

So five.

Yeah, so four council districts that'll be covered um with some of that work this weekend.

So that's gonna be Saturday morning, and then on Sunday, we're doing our um twice-yearly community cleanup.

So come join us at 8:30 a.m.

this Sunday at Claire Rec Center, where you can get your supplies and some breakfast, and then head out to our half of our just our city-owned parks in District 5, um, which we clean in the spring, and then um we also repaint a number of bus stop benches throughout District 5.

So come and join us for that.

And you can find out more information about both of those on our social media.

Thank you so much.

Uh, I think next I have Councilwoman Gonzalez Gutiérrez, and then I have Heinz Watson president.

Great.

Yeah, um, I'm glad that uh my partner over here is back, um, Councilman Cashman.

Uh so we have been doing the uh registered neighborhood organization feedback sessions.

Um those started last week, and we've had some pretty good turnout.

We um started off in Northeast Denver, uh, and then we're in Northwest Denver, so we were in Mombello, then GES.

Um, but this week we are going to be in Southeast Denver at Eisenhower Rec Center tomorrow, Wednesday from 6 to 8 p.m.

And then we will be in Southwest Denver at College Review Rec Center uh on April 16th on Thursday from 6 to 8 p.m.

And then we still have a virtual option on April 21st from 6 to 8 p.m.

If you go to your city your voice uh webpage on the Denvergov.org website, uh you can find access to the Zoom link and to sign up.

There's also an online uh form that you can fill out if you're not able to make any of these options, but this is following uh the report being released.

We've gotten some really good feedback from folks uh about the report.

They really appreciate uh the the considerations that are being proposed.

Um but we also know that there's still a long road ahead of us, and so we're excited to continue to uh get feedback from the community and look forward to that ongoing process.

Thank you so much, Councilman.

Uh next up I have Councilman Hines.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um, two upcoming things.

First, um, we are in our perfect 10 office finalizing uh community benefits fund.

Um in previous years, we've had uh uh application for community benefits fund of up to uh 20,000 dollars from my office.

Uh someone uh an organization can apply for up to $2,000 uh for uh something that is in Perfect 10.

Um some of the previous uh awardees have been uh letter cleanup or uh graffiti removal or unification um in uh in district 10.

Um so uh we should have that out in the next couple weeks.

Uh that's upcoming, and then the second upcoming event, uh, which will predominantly be in district 10, but a little bit in district three as well, is um August 2028.

We'll be hosting the Democratic National Convention.

Um Mayor, I want to thank you, Council President, uh, Councilmember Watson and uh the uh chair of the Democratic Party of Colorado and about 30 people, including several people from the mayor's office, uh, went to New Orleans, Louisiana last week and last weekend uh to uh to give uh people educate them on why Denver is the best spot for the DNC in 2028.

And I think we have a good job.

So thank you, Mayor.

Thank you so much for your amazing contributions.

Great to see you.

Um next up, Council Watson.

Uh thank you.

Um Mayor Johnston.

Um want to concur with uh Councilmember Hines.

Um it was a fantastic uh four days, and uh and if folks around the table um question whether Denver parties, I'm telling you, all the other municipalities through uh some kind of mediocre little party um or the DNC team, and um I think we uh brought it down so for all the folks within the city that pulled together multiple events um to highlight why uh going west is what we should be doing in 2028, and while the mile high city should be the choice in 2028 for the DNC.

Um I think there was little um question um once we left Melanie.

So congratulations and thank you so much to the mayor, council president Hines, and everyone else um in administration that aren't here pull that's gonna see Emily there um helping to throw down as well.

Um I wanted uh to reshare it with community that on Thursday, April 16th at 6 p.m.

at St.

Charles Recreation Center, which is uh 3777 Lafayette, um we will be having a um public safety um dialogue with community.

Um we've had um uh I would say um seven um shootings across the city.

We've had uh three in district uh nine, um two folks in district nine have lost their lives.

Um actually three folks in district nine have lost their lives.

A young man that was shot at um at a park for um Easter celebration um lost his life um uh succumbed to his injuries.

Uh I think it was last night.

And so as I shared yesterday, these are um um tough times for families.

We sent out our heartfelt um condolences to the families who are harmed and for the community to know that we're gonna be there to sit, listen, and find ways together to make sure our communities are safe.

Thank you, Councilman Watson.

Um Madam President.

Thank you.

So all you I think everyone knows how much I love La Rasa Park and it's opening um May 1st in time for Cinco de Mayo.

Um so May 1st um is the ground opening, and then May 2nd is the Chicano Pride ride.

So if you know anyone who has a motorcycle, um, you can join me there.

There's five thousand motorcycles that show up at La Rasa Park on Saturday morning at like 10 o'clock or something.

They come from um San Harley Davidson, which is in Westminster operate 88th in Washington, and then they go to another place and then they give all proceeds to LAC Martino for education for uh recipients for a foundation.

So it's near and dear to my heart, and just want to say thank you to the administration and thank you to public um to parks and rec.

We were told we weren't gonna have the Chicano Pride Ride this year.

We were told we weren't gonna have Cinco de Mayo this year.

We were told we weren't gonna have a lot of celebrations at La Raza Park.

And because we had no snow, they knew it was important to us, and so they worked and were opening it May 1st.

So May 1st at 38th and Navajo at 4 30.

Um Carlos Castanera, who you met will start start the ceremony and give a blessing and then all kinds of community activities.

So and then um Brent Webster Mariachi Brown will be playing.

So hope to see you on Friday, May 1st.

Thank you.

Uh any other council members who have announcements we missed.

Great.

Um I'll just close with two added uh thank yous.

One is yes, thank you so much to the council members who came to work on the effort for the convention.

For those of you following at home, we are one applicant for the convention.

There are five finalists.

We'll work on making the case over the next several months.

Also important to know to folks at this table and folks from home.

We did not use any city resources for either my or our team's support to travel there or to uh host events there.

We're raising separately for that.

So I think it's a great opportunity for the city financially.

It could be up to $500 million of investment in the city if we're successful, but we're not using city resources to pursue this bid.

We're doing that uh separately.

Uh second one is one underscore what Councilwoman Sawyer mentioned, which is we do have cleanup effort this Saturday.

Love to have you join as part of our Give Five initiative for all those folks who love Colfax uh in Denver.

It's a great chance to love on Colfax a little bit more and help us make sure it is clean and sparkling as we're in the midst of getting construction done and keeping those businesses open and active.

And so uh we're meeting 10 o'clock uh Saturday morning at uh Pablo's Coffee on East Colfax.

So if you want to come join us, uh come in there, grab some coffee, grab some gloves, we'll get to work and uh help support the street that you love and the city you love.

So uh with that, I think that is all we have on our agenda for this morning on the general session.

We do have an executive session agenda, so I will now entertain a motion to move us into an executive session pursuant to DRMC 234A36 and 7 for the consideration of pending and potential litigation and changes in state law and legal advice related there too.

So moved.

All those in favor?

Any opposed?

Great.

With that, we will enter executive session and thank you so much to members of the public for joining us and have a great Tuesday.