I [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] e e e uh good evening everyone um I am calling the study session to order and we will wait um on the mayor's update so next would issue up oh we have the mayor back may mayor's report thank you some computer problems here um did staff already call the role mayor pend no I have not oh no I forgot okay uh um the stud session of uh March 1st 2021 is called to order with the clerk please call the role mayor Kaufman here mayor protin Bergen sure council member bins here council member kums present council member Gardner here council member guber here council member hilts here council member Lawson here council member Johnston here council member Marano present council member Mario Mario present theum there's no uh mayor's update are there any issue updates saying none uh question before is a May um yes I think I heard someone okay um it's council member uh council member I just wanted to see if this would be the time to bring up Governor had sent out a covid remembrance event that would be this Friday so if this was time to bring up whether or not we would like to participate in that it involves changing the color of the lights on the building as well as having I believe the um Sirens at the fire fire stations go off for one minute at 6m I wonder if uh thank you I wonder if a mayor I mean if the city manager could comment on that first you bet um so we've sent that out to the appropriate departments asking them to participate I'm not sure we can change the lights to magenta yet you know the uplights on City Hall we getting going to LED that wasn't a totally smooth transition so we'll check on that but we think we can do the the fire and police and the third thing uh oh uh coming out of communications yes is there any objection uh from doing this okay very well uh thank you uh council member kums we will go forward and participate uh with the governor's request uh for the remembrance from for those who have uh unfortunately lost their lives due to co um are any other um issue updates I seeing none um uh consent calendar item 2A through 2f is there any objection from moving the consent calendar items 2A through 2f forward mayor B council member bsin thank you I'd like to pull 2D please very well okay um then uh is there any objection for moving two a through uh 2 a through C and two uh e through F forward is there any objection seeing none uh they won't move forward uh then item number 2E uh council member I mean sorry item number two D council member bersin thank you um as I had mentioned before um that Monday July 26 is the day that accelerate Colorado begins it begins early in the that morning uh to go out of town um so I am proposing that we move our council meeting to ACC company um the study session on the 19th so we would be having both both of them together like we've done for years and then that would free up the 26th discussion yeah mayor for for the um Council M Coons I'm just wondering do we have um six members of council and mayor intending to go to this trip all 11 of us went last year so I don't know they haven't asked for um none of us went last year because I mean the year that we could go all 11 went so I mean they have not opened registration yet for this year so um I mean I we don't know yet but it would free up that evening if we did go okay further discussion yes mayor uh mayor pend uh yes I would be fine with um moving the council meeting to the 19th and just keep that study session uh to proceed the the um council meeting I think that would work further discussion yeah mayor I'm sorry council member bersin and then who and council member HS okay thank you and it's not just Council that goes it's a City attorney that goes um it's uh the city manager goes I mean it's it's a a large uh group of people from Aurora that go it's not just council members council member Hils yeah sorry are we talking about the accelerate trip or the annual Lobby trip I didn't go to the accelerate trip last year um so I don't know that all 11 went but I did go on the federal trip in March okay just making sure I wasn't confused on what what I was talking about on on what I went so thank you further discussion mayor um U council member Johnston thank you mayor I just wanted to bring up in the in the rules committee which I know we're I'm handing off um to Mayor proem um Bergen with what we already discussed and one of the things that we did get consensus on is when there is a work related um conference professional development or event to be able to accommodate um that in terms of meeting the Quorum requirements by signing in remotely to participate um while I have attended two other times on the accelerate trip and you know I've appreciated the the opportunity to talk to our Congressional Delegation I have a lot of concern that since we already have an opportunity to speak that night that it would be accommodating based on some of the social networking that would take place um you know we we came up with this schedule to have consistency for the public and um we just like to have that discussion if I'm if I'm the only one who has that concern if everyone else if anyone else does but since we could we did talk about in rules accommodating for those those nightly um study sessions forther discussion yes mayor uh mayor P Bergen um so my question is if we do not have a quorum so let's say I guess we need six to run a council meeting and if we only have five then the the I I just think it would create a greater problem for the public because we'd have to cancel the meeting with you know well I guess we'd have notice I don't know if we'd have notice ahead but we I just think it might be problematic and it seems like an easy accommodation to just put it on the 19th mayor um go mcarter this is really silly that this is so controversial we made changes to the calendar last year for the homeless point in time count we made changes because the meeting was too close to Christmas I'm really not sure why this has to be so controversial and why we can't just move on with our night further discussion I would just like to remind everybody that I did discuss this before before we set the calendar this was discussed that our that our accelerate Colorado trip um would be coming up and but we didn't know exactly when now that we have a date I'm just trying to come back and plug it in I mean it was discussed I did it and I've done it I think this is probably my fourth time to bring it up so it's it's not new and yes we did set the calendar for the um for the the public and for us for our schedules but things do happen things do change and I would hate to see us be so inflexible that we couldn't accommodate this trip otherwise like council member Bergen said I mean we may not have a quorum I don't know but possib may could you could you restate um the alternative days certainly since our rules say that we must have two Council meetings per month July we have a meeting a council meeting on the 12th and the 26th I am proposing that we move the council meeting of the 26th up to the 19th to to uh piggyback on our study session which we have on the 19th and this is not unusual I mean we we've done this for years had a council remember we have council meeting uh study session then we have council meeting it's what we've done done for years so it's it's nothing unusual mayor Hils Council M Hills thank you I'll make it easy I don't support this it's 8:30 pm on the eastern time if we don't have a Corum because of some social networking events then that's that's what happens um but it's 8:30 p.m on on Eastern time the only thing that's going to be missed is is social so I'm not interested in changing the calendar for for that mayor Pro sorry mayor Pro um that I mean that sounds good in terms of you know 8:30 at night on Eastern Standard Time to just be able to jump in on a call however typically we start those days very early in the morning um and I I think that might be the day of the flight I can't remember but a lot of times you're you're doing that at 6:00 AM you're so I I I think it's you I I know you you know you've been up all day long you have had and possibly that's the day you have had meetings with the Congressional Delegation and then then you're we're talking about then jumping on to calls at 8:30 at night Eastern Standard Time till whatever time and then getting up in the morning at 6: am for those next meetings I I just don't understand why this is such a huge issue when we have an alternative date being proposed and it's it's easier than H not a quorum and canceling the meeting for the public okay uh further further discussion mayor so it requires it requires a majority vote to change this and there's already two people who have expressed that they're not going to support so I think we should just move on uh is there any objection well I'm getting um feedback uh is there is there objection to the uh alternate date that's been proposed no objection no objection I believe council member hilts uh stated objection well Council I did State objection yes okay um then um I see that I'm sorry who sorry I was I was confused with the wording of it but um I again I think you can do both so I I I I see value with it but I I just think there's a way way to do both so are there any other objections other than two other than two two members uh seeing that that a majority you're in support uh May mayor mayor to change the council calendar it be a unanimous vote oh I'm sorry I stand corrected uh very well then uh the I guess it's not a motion but the proposal fails okay um uh let's see it from the policy committee uh item number 3A item 3A is the ethics ordinance mayor uh counc M Johnson thank thank you um I have I have staff here but I just wanted to to give an overview and um present some information and and have this discussion um I also included some um possible amendments in here as well so um basically you know the history of this is we is I um had a ethics ordinance um in the summer of 2019 um there were some amendments for that um that changed some of my original intent so I wanted to have the opportunity to go back on um and do basically I guess as the attorney's called surgical amendments to address some ethics um the the main substantive issue was um having three retired judges as part of the oversight um entity for for the ethics ordinance um which would have a fiscal note a larger fiscal note than than what I'm proposing now um I'll have um Miss Allen maybe talk about some of the estimates we we found for for having retired judges so this would actually um not have that price tag included with it um basically went in to have it you know very um much in line with our our state rules which the um the electorate the state electorate voted for a number of years ago um so I feel like we're we're capturing that voter intent um council member Marano when I presented it to the fiser committee had um what I really appreciated and liked as a good idea to see if the IEC the independent ethics commission that oversees the state and actually I believe Weld County as well if they could be the oversight entity in this case um Miss Allen and I spoke to the independent ethics Commission in December we met with staff in January and then um a couple weeks ago they met on their own not wanting us in there and they um did not agree to being the oversight entity um the ask was to have um their oversight on the elected body of the Aurora city council and mayor and um they of course are in the state purview and the one exception they they make is I and Miss Allen I I going to have you confirm that it is Wells County um yes County thank you that the elected in W electorate in Weld County um voted on a ballot measure to have all of the county all of the employees and the elected to be under that system um I reached out to um Deana in our um Human Resources talked to our city manager just to get their thoughts of of how they would feel to be under that system and um they you know as we are a city manager form of government really feel like the system that they have in place works well for them that it's it's um staffing has different issues than elected and um they've been able to um work with that successfully in that that model so given that I just wanted to give the background of that um the I as an oversight mechanism was not an option um the other um amendments that we made like I said we're just getting it in line with with the state state rules um to make that consistent um Rachel is there anything that I'm need to include based on our many conversations with the IAC thank you council member Johnston I think you've done a great job covering this um the only other couple of things I might um address would be uh one of the requests of council member Marano to Define financial interest to 5% per year of any investment that's at least $1,000 and that could be ownership in property it could be a contract and so that's a change in the definition section um there's also a change in the GI gift limit from $300 to $75 and then also designating the um Board of Ethics as theth authority to enforce not just make a recommendation for any penalty um I do want to give an opportunity to to council member Marano um we included the proposed amendments like we said we did incorporate that that financial interest into it um council member m I don't know if you feel comfortable to do that now or or after some questions whatever you feel comfortable with uh no uh thank you council member Johnston for tagging me in uh I do appreciate um you're adopting a couple of the um asks that made I'll I'll treat those I guess as like a friendly Amendment then thank you um I did want to uh just bring up two points here um one regarding section 142 5e um that one I think I had proposed just striking that I think the idea being that leaving office should not really Shield you from accountability for breaches committed while you were in office um and I didn't see that that got struck so I was just curious if that was intentional or if that might have just been something didn't get reconciled yes and I actually um talked to to staff even about the best practices for at least the staff and how far they go back and and Rachel I may have have your tag team with this but did they say the best practice was a year there was some some term that they had suggested um of going back so and I'm up for the discussion there were there were um several amendments that council member Marano proposed that I I just felt like we should have a discussion today with with Council instead of me just adopting all of it um but I thought there was I don't know if it was with the state or if it was some of the HR requirements of how far back that complaint goes Rachel do you remember that I don't recall specifically um that particular provision is in the packet on page 149 and 150 and so what it's talking about is when a complaint is an and please councilman bermer cono correct me if I'm not explaining this well um or correctly um but it's basically allowing that uh when complaints are initially filed if it's groundless or frous um it would be dismissed but also 5e is the specific provision that council member Maro asked for that if um a complaint is filed and the elected official is no longer in office that it would be Moot and so it wouldn't be brought forward and I can't remember why or why not we did or didn't we we included it we kept it in there I can't remember why I apologize and council member Marano um I'd like just for organization sake if you if you feel okay with this when you propose that and you and I have a little you know kind of remembering why or why not if we could then ask council members for that feedback under that specific Amendment sure okay so um just opening it up to council mayor do you mind if I sure I think um I do have a question on the 5% issue when do you when you get to on that Amendment so it's a so it's real probably so in other words any anybody who owns a house uh anybody that takes out an auto loan I I would think um explain why why you went with that Amendment and what and what it does um well this was one that I agreed to with council member Marano so I'll just say why I agreed but I I'd like to you know get the original authors but I think when we have Financial interests it was not defined at all so it was very it was vague and open-ended and by having that um yeah yes it may be you know may be a house or it may be something but if it's something that we're voting on that might be related to a house or one of these examples we're showing that you know we want to address those potential conflicts of interest but council member marcoo you may have I don't know if you want to expand upon oh so all home owners have a conflict of interest um elected officials well it depends on what we're voting for and if it impacts us financially was what I felt like the intent was everything we will affects us affects home owners okay sorry I was muted again I apologize uh mayor no my understanding is that this would only apply if we are voting on something that is directly uh in this case it would have to be a home that we own that is directly involved in or you know subject to some kind of uh item before Council basically uh this this that's the intent of this entire ordinance was based basically to you know have us recuse ourselves if we have a vested interest in a question before us um and yeah and the um language uh if you were curious actually came from a constituent of mine here in Ward 4 who is also an attorney and is very passionate about ethics issues so well you need more definition to this because every most things we vote on has an impact on the values of real property on the values of of of homes that that people Al whether we in terms of what we do in terms of law enforcement what we do in terms of fire protection uh everything has an impact and so you have to have a much better definition of of what that means but this is way too broad and it absolutely makes no sense mayor mayor um council member kums perhaps a friendly amendment to that definition section could be an exception for the home in which a person resides and a vehicle used for personal like a personal vehicle which I think is a similar type of exemption that often gets included in this type of defen yeah still I think you well we're we're not in the amendment business here I think we're when the discussion business that's going to have to be done on the any changes will have to be done on the floor um mayor uh C Johnson um as a sponsor actually that's that's what I I would like to to hear um to to see those changes um you know we have under three we have the examples ownership interest and a business um we have the employment I I think that council member kums has a good suggestion so if it's if the concern was it's so broad with a home ownership or a car um to to include that language but I'd like to hear from council member marcoo since that was his original that's perfect oh sorry that's perfectly acceptable to me I think kind of what we're pulling for here council member kums uh is uh kind of exempting personal property if you will yeah and so I'll I'll work on language with with you all to make sure that that captures that thank you mayor May um I'm sorry is it may Bergen yes just so we they're going to make um you're going to make changes not only on on personal property but on real property is that right I believe that was the friendly Amendment no okay well we're not C AR yeah can I just clarify not any real property you own anywhere but rather real property that is the Home in which you live um well it's I think what you're probably to get out his investment property uh versus uh the home that somebody lives in I think often in ethics that's the distinction I think that's made um further discussion mayor Dave guber council member guber okay I've got I've got really big concerns with this when we when we debated this last year you know Charlie Richardson was on Council and uh who had been a City attorney for a long time and um we had long debates over the fact that how do we make sure this is fair how do we make make sure the council members are uh treated fairly how do we make sure that constitutional uh concerns are are taken care of all of those are are gone in this the ability to to uh bring a suit against a private individual who leaves Council uh the and again there wasn't any discussion as to whether or not that private individual would uh receive lawyer support from the city like a cting council member would uh but I guess the biggest thing I have is that this is weaponizing the the entire process the ability for the council to choose uh again we're replacing three judges who who uh who were required to make a statement and as judges be impartial we are now going to have the majority of council pick a lawyer pick an accountant and then pick someone who has ethics experience I think we all have ethics experience and Council chooses those people those people now have the ability to sit in um in Judgment of council members and where before the uh this panel would make a recommendation to council and the elected officials would decide what to do next in this case this board that's appointed by the political majority of council has the ability to implement penalties on a a council member or on a private citizen and there's nothing in here about the Constitutional protections we are creating with this ordinance a new Judicial System outside of the city's judicial system but a new Judicial System it doesn't talk about the Fourth Amendment the Fifth Amendment the 14th Amendment it doesn't talk about protections it doesn't talk about appeal it doesn't you know all of that is gone so what this does is it lets the political majority pick three people and it allows outside organizations to file as many suits as they want this group this political group that's appointed by Council these three nonv non non-elected members will now decide what is frivolous and what is not frivolous and everything that they say you know what I think that's good will be used in a suit against a council member or or a past council member and there's no protections there I mean the you know we we all swore an oath to the Constitution and there's no constitutional Protections in here I would recommend we would go to um you know go to our we have we have a municipal court go to our court and at least ask their opinion as to what do you think about this you know is the Constitution adequately covered in the requirements of this again weaponizing weaponizing a um the the taking away the for those people that are listening that what we have right now is that if we violate something three judges three retired judges will make the decision as to what what whether it's true or not and they would make a recommendation to council and Council would decide what to do frankly we all work for the voters and the voters ultimately have the decision but in this case this new plan three uh people appointed by the majority of council have the ability to implement Financial fines against council members have the ability for a council member to be in litigation for their entire time that they sit here on one suit after another suit I I this is this is ludicrous this is not following the Constitution and I I really believe we need a constitutional review mayor okay I think council member Johnson actually timed in first thank you no I just want to say I mean this was something that I really wanted the first time but it was either that or no ethics ordinance at all you know the independent ethics commission they're they're of the community um I really we I'm I'm defining subject matter experts professionals who have background who can do this work um it you know I I don't want to to be in and you know have this Council where it's like all of a sudden we're going to stop using community in you know we we we use them with our civil service Commissioners we use that um with many different mechanisms um if we find that someone's unprofessional and they are biased uh they can be removed so I um you know I always welcome you know following the Constitution and um you know that doesn't stop at stop at the door but I I really think it's important to have that that Community process as part of this johnon why didn't U you stay with the three judge panel again I'm sorry um well one of it is the the fiscal reality of it um and also some of the um availability and the the challenge of getting three retired judges at the same time to be able to review these issues um and and to be quite honest I my original one before I had to to negotiate had a board of ethics and I had to take that out so I'm hoping um with a little time and some new council members that we can support putting that back in further discussion council member Mar comment on this counc Mar thank you sir uh yeah and that's part of the concern and why we wanted to investigate uh to or to ask rather if the IEC would be able to handle this um from what I read in the backup basically they were very intrigued by the concept but decided not to because we do have some areas where we differ from the state's ethics code uh but I do want to point out that the penalties uh contained within our code currently do mirror those of the states um so whether we do it this way or we do it through the state the penalty is the same you're basically if you are a council member you you commit an ethical violation that benefits you monetarily you are eligible for double the amount you gained through your unethical Behavior Uh back paid back to the city um and then of course uh mirroring the state law there are there's also a section as for as other penalties provided by law which I don't think we actually have any so we're really just looking at the fines in here um goad I'm sorry no that's actually go ahead council member gr council member grber so again what we're talking about is creating a new judicial organization that has the ability to create fines and apply them to council members we don't have the Constitutional protections we don't have the right of appeal we don't have any of the other things that are that are defined within the Constitution that would protect us it's one thing again for the and again when when council member Johnston talked about uh her previous ordinance the reason that her previous ordinance uh had be changed was because she didn't have the votes and and that's why we came up with a nonpartisan group of of folks this is entirely partisan the three people I mean we've got you know the people who usually talk to or many people who talk to us at our Council meetings or the party of socialism and Liberation it's very possible that we would have three people the majority could pick three people from the party of socialism and Liberation to make decisions on financial uh charges against conservative council members and that's ridiculous it should be fair someday we may have more conservatives on Council than we do progressives and socialists and at that point in time it would go the other way we should not we should not make this a political issue we should have unbiased people professional judges and not again a a lawyer an accountant and someone with e ethics experience that's that's that it's ludicrous mayor mayor uh mayor Pim yes so I mean I can appreciate some of the changes um to the ethics ordinance that we previously voted in favor of I do I also have a problem with changing it from the three judges to this panel or board um for the reason stated in terms of political um appointees but I want to point out that we are we've not made very good decisions as of evidenced by our appointee of Harold Johnson to the Civil Service Commission so we are maybe are not the best ones um to make those kind of decisions um as far as the J judges that we I I think there was a statement made of why we're not doing the three judges because of their availability and the fiscal impact I mean there's relief judges that work all over the metro area you know that do that that work for our court that work for other municipal courts I I don't think it's going to be well hopefully we don't have you know suits against ethical um lawsuits against council members constantly so I think it's it hopefully will be an occasional situation and I would think that we would be able to get three judges um so I just I same same as council member grber I do have an issue with the appointees ethics expert is pretty um you know subjective as far as who fits that I don't care if they have a degree or not um that doesn't mean that that person is is going to be um the right person for for this panel so I I I would just hope we could maybe get the judge maybe get judge day's opinion on is it difficult to find judges what is the cost and does he perceive any conflicts with us going this route mayor uh council member Johnson um I I want to go back um you know and address these issues but I'd like to ask City attorney Rachel Allen about the the state constitution allowing for this if she could speak to that um sure um I'm happy to speak to the state constitution so um article 29 talks about um ethics and government and section s specifically um allows for home Ru municipalities to set forth their own um system for receiving complaints ethical complaints um and then the independent ethics commission um this has been a couple of years ago um they set forth I believe it was nine different bases on which um they would look at home roll municipalities to make sure that their process was aligned with um article 29 in the constitution in the State Constitution and um one of those one of those um bases was they wanted a separate body to receive ethical complaints to review complaints to hear complaints but one of the sticking points that the independent ethics commission brought up is that they wanted that separate body to um provide the discipline rather than having Council discipline itself if that makes sense so that was really the idea behind that was from um article 29 in the state constitution as well as that guidance from the Independent ethics commission and I can certainly make that available in the backup um if this moves forward Rachel Mike cofin just a quick question and that is um but I just I even decisions uh by administrative law judges uh the the um defendant has appellant rights I I just don't think I can't think of anything where the uh the defendant in a in a particular action doesn't have the right to appeal and there's no right to appeal here let me look into that um I have not specifically looked in depth as to whether or not um a council member would be entitled to a 106 appeal but that is a possibility um need to look into that yeah well I think the part of the problem would be it it would you know it'd have to be litigated obviously um so somebody would have to have standing if if this were to be implemented um to be able to challenge the decision but just out of fairness just out of basic fairness uh somebody ought to have the right uh to be able to go to a county or district court if they disagreed with a decision and and be able to defend themselves in a court of law further discussion mayor mayor council member Johnson yes I was just gonna say I'm I'm open like I said a lot of the changes that I made and the the spirit of this is whatever the um State rules were and state um the Constitutional Amendment on that and and I would think that there'd be an appeal system with that so i' be happy to get back to you I I do agree that that appeals are are part of an important process too so we'll get back to you further discussion mayor uh council member Lawson um yes thank you um so I guess what I wanted to ask about the the board the board makeup okay if we choose those particular individuals to be the board makeup is there any con or any thought about maybe having an independent Observer um to kind of look at this process and and how these decisions are being made by these four individuals um I think it's important to have another set of eyes of someone who's not who's not knowledgeable maybe on the financial compliance but being able to look at things from a diff from a holistic uh perspective I just think that that's something to consider um I do have some issues with the appeals process I think that there should be some type of section in there for appeal especially as um government leaders if I mean if we're going to move you know that can impact our careers our lives and if we don't agree with the decision I think that we have we should have a right to be able to try to appeal um the decision that there may be some other information that may come out that we might win the appeal so I I think that that's kind of important and then my other question to you so Anonymous um type of um complaints would not be accepted the person would actually actually have to identify themselves if they have a complaint against a covered official is that correct mayor joh thank you um in in my version um the name has to be provided it is not Anonymous and and the reason I had that and I and i' like to have council member Marano talk to his Amendment with that is just working on the The Campaign Finance issues um and and talking to cities who originally such as Boulder had Anonymous um charges I guess you could say um accusations that it it ends up um having you know some frivolous um suits there was a definite increase um I just feel that you know people need to know who is is accusing and and um being transparent for that um but council member Maro and I had a different opinion on that but um I I I wanted the it not to be anonymous in this ordinance may can I just do a followup what if there is intimidation um threats um so that might not you know a person may not do that you know You' be surprised what goes on in the political Spectrum so um what if there's so you might not get some people who maybe want to do the complaint I'm not trying to say hi things but there's a lot of political intimidation there's a lot a lot of threats that go on between people and um they may not want their information maybe in the beginning at least to be you know brought forth so just was asking about that but thank you for your your response thank you further discussion uh Council M Marano thank you yeah I just wanted to follow up on council member Johnston's comments and address your question as well council member Lawson uh my concern was uh frankly what you expressed that folks might get threats or might otherwise be in fear of retaliation um I do understand that we want to limit prolist um you know complaints or eliminate fist complaints frankly uh and I think that that is hopefully something we can accomplish without requiring someone to effectively docks themselves uh as part of the complaint process further discussion May Dave grber counc gr so I guess I don't need permission from the body but um I would like the uh follow up on mayor proen Bergen's comment I would like to have de or a an opinion offered by our municipal judge in the backup packet if this comes to council uh as I mentioned earlier I'm worried about the Constitutional protections we aren't talking about again when we were talking today if there is an issue it goes to council and elected elected leaders make a decision as to what happens in this case we're getting giving a political body the ability to enforce fines on individuals both council members and citizens and and I believe there are tremendous constitutional not maybe not state constitution I'm talking about the United States Constitution uh there are significant problems in that specifically on the defense on uh what's allowed to be said uh uh seeing the person who's Accu accusing you uh and and all of these other uh protections that are in the US Constitution so like I said um I'm request well I I I expect to see uh a decision or an opinion by our municipal judge U at our if this comes back to council forther discussion uh council member Johnson um I'm I'm happy to reach out to judge Day on on the Constitutional issues um in terms of his opinion on judges and a judge who works with judges um he may have an opinion already on on that um since that's his his world but um I I'm in terms of the the Constitutional issues this isn't I don't know if this is necessarily um you know things that they they work on but um you know if he wants to give feedback on ideas for appeals or municipal courts I'm I'm I will reach out to him and have something in the backup mayor I'll reach out to to the judge and and ask my questions to him as well um but as far as implying that that the judge isn't responsible for applying the rules of constitution I disagree with that I think that's exactly mayor council Johnson I never said that a judge isn't going to um have ideas about the Constitution I was just saying in the Municipal Court he's with the rules role that he does they're not necessarily addressing ethics issues as other you know maybe attorneys or or subject matter experts are but he's definitely obviously knows the Constitution and can give his opinion on that uh Council Maro thank you sir I just want to uh state that I'm also interested in hearing about an appeals process so I do look forward to that conversation but I also want to clarify with regard concerns about weaponizing or stacking this you know group somehow um we actually had consider them that's why we removed Council as being the ultimate Arbiter of whether or not uh a punishment was justifiable because that was directly weaponizing uh this process I suspect that uh with a board um uh set up as the ordinance describes I think we're going to do a pretty good job of avoiding that kind of nonsense from happening but I do appreciate the concern I just want to say I think that I just want to say I think it's very poly written and it and it really needs to be in better form before it comes to council instead of really having to be completely Rewritten on the floor am that uh council member grber I think that we get into a circular argument to say that we are going to have three independent citizens uh stand in um uh decision or make the decisions about city council members and they will be unbiased when in fact those three people will be chosen by the majority of Council uh and and uh if if they are going against the minority of council by definition that's biased and then furthermore to give them the power to enforce fines it's it's it's incred it's exactly the definition of weaponizing you take three people that are politically affiliated with one portion of the council and use those three people to enforce fines on the people on a minority of the people in Council that's that's that's what weaponization means further discussion uh council member Johnson thank you um I just want to talk and and I might ask Rachel what page number it is but the makeup of this ethics board including um a person with ethics experience um I think if you have some ethics experience that um at least what I'm looking for in a in as a council person appointing someone that someone is is fair um and unbiased but we are we are looking we're not taking people who don't have any of this background professional expertise um so there comes a point where we just have to decide do we um have a type of government that involves the community on this as many models best practices of Ethics codes have in terms of a um jurisdiction over that or not and I I really think it's important to to have that Community involvement with that that background may may I respond uh Council grber okay so what it said member of the board shall have expertise and ethics acquired through education or experience onor Sentinel today there is a article about a person that's applying to become as a council member uh who has a felony and and the issue is whether or not that felony should prevent a person from becoming a city council member by definition a person who has been charged with a felony has gone through has ex extensive experience in ethics by going through the court process and things like that this definition doesn't mean anything we can certainly put a felon in here and say that felon has uh um experience in ethics acquired through education or experience that's my problem with it that's why I think it's weaponizing this panel mayor mayor can I please uh um okay council member Johnson then council member no please um council member council member I've been actually wanting to say this since it was brought up that education in ethics is apparently not a qualification with respect to ethics um it's deeply disrespectful to any professionals be they lawyers ethicists um accountants to say that the work that they have done to acquire experience and training on an issue does not qual or in a field doesn't qualify them to then be an expert in that field and we don't tend to say that kind of thing about for example lawyers doctors and others so um you know having training in ethics is verifiable accredited training in ethics um you know I would think maybe we could have a friendly amendment of something associated with government ethics specifically because there are so many fields of Ethics but to claim that having experience with the legal system is the same thing as having experience with ethics is just faulty reasoning and shows a lack of understanding of the distinctions between different fields in which people might specialize um so I just I think we need to look at respecting professionals and their expertise mayor mayor uh Cil mayor prend Bergen yes and I I didn't imply that anybody that has a degree would not be qualified what I'm saying is we have seen um you know instances Across the Nation where people are very credential whether they be a doctor a lawyer you know someone uh with a psychology degree on and on that themselves have not conducted themselves ethically or have broken the law so I'm I'm just saying we're we don't seem to have a good track record and so what I would propose is if we're not going to use judges which I don't understand why we can't then um if we're going to be allowing a political Council to appoint these people then I would suggest we do background checks on them and vet them thoroughly social media accounts all of it further discussion council member Johnson um well I just wanted to say um similar to um council member kum's issues that if there is more specific language um you know government ethics something that's more tailored to that background um I'm I'm open to that um I do you know I mean we can always do our our background check of checking social media and seeing who we want to appoint I just I for me I don't want to eliminate someone who might have had some some background in the criminal justice system and then got out and then went to law school and studied government ethics and so I don't want to um put in those barriers I think we should still look at each person as as a person as long as they follow that that background and intent of the language but I'm open if there is um as council member K suggested a a friendly amendment to specify some of that I'm I'm open to that mayor Dave grber uh counc grber so again I wanted to clarify what this says at least one member of the board shall have expertise and ethics acquired through blank or experience so we're not talking about formal education degree or um ethics degree we're talking about some sort of Ethics undefined ethics experience to as far as the people who should be sitting in Judgment of councel I still go back to the three judges uh they can't be City Judges they can't be people that fall under the control of council but um as was stated earlier there are Judges that work throughout the metro area uh as relief judges and those could be called in to to uh to do this and by definition they have a code of ethics as a judge that they would have to follow and it would be very different than having again political appointees uh chosen by the majority of council further discussion mayor B uh council member bin thank you um I you know I I agree with what council member Lawson said you know we are dealing with people's lives here we are dealing um with the possibility of some frivolous um accusations um and and I think we need to think about that it it's not just oh council member Joe Blow you know we're talking about the life the career um so I think we need to be very careful and do this correctly um you know we used to say you know the voters will decide the the voters will do a recall you know if if the crime um reaches that that proportion that that person needs to be recalled um I'm just concerned that we're going to get a lot of frivolous uh complaints we're going to get um with the makeup of this Council and I'm not being mean is just a fact there are a lot of hate groups um that could do it uh this council could flip uh this year it could be a lot of other groups that do it and that council person has to go through this procedure when when it's frivolous now I'm not saying all of them are frivolous some of them could be true but to get to this point that we are now and not have thought of there's not an appeal system my goodness you know why wasn't this thought of um appeals appeals or right um I I I agree that it needs to go to um I don't know some head judge whether it's judge day or a judge in Denver or or somebody to to look at and Rachel had had mentioned the state constitution the US Constitution what are we what are we dealing with here we're dealing with people's lives uh you know and if somebody wants to say oh you know marshia did $80 instead of 75 let's file the lawsuit against her you know let's file an Ethics complaint against her really really are we really that petty that we're gonna go through this yes we need ethics and yes our community absolutely needs to know that who they voted for um is is a good person and will'll follow the rules unfortunately I think we get swept into all the trash that's going on in Washington now on both sides of the aisle and we're people are coming down and thinking everybody is alike you know if you're a politician in Aurora if you're a county commissioner if you're a state legislature you're all Crooks you know I found that out walking knocking on doors and I'm sure the rest of you did too um we're not all crws we all we're not perfect either you know we all do the best we can and I honestly I think this this is so long and so much hasn't been thought of yet that we need to get a legal opinion from a judge a constitutional judge or somebody and and rewrite part of this and then bring it back and let's go at it again but I I just I do agree with with the mayor a lot of this is a little rough and I really don't want to see it go forward until it's it's smooth and the Kink's worked out and we can all agree because we all agree that we need ethics and we need our community to believe in us but I I see this now as it can just be pickpick pick pick pick at each other this group says this this group says this um I know other other councils um have had issues with this they they file complaints on each other yeah now I don't want that to happen I don't want that to happen let's go back and get it done and get it done right solve the problems um get an opinion and then and then come back and let's talk about it instead of spending all this time picking at each other and it's that's not the way to go further discussion uh council member m thank you sir um Rachel if I could ask wasn't isn't the vast majority of what's before us here already in our code this was that was the part that was passed last year right including the lack of appeals process yes most most of these are um just slight changes and we kind of walked through those changes um at the beginning sorry okay counc please continue all right thank you yeah I just wanted to clarify I meant in 2019 not just last year all right and um you know what go ahead council member grber council member the point I think that council member Mar made a good point and that is is that we do have an existing ethics ordinance right now all of us fall under it this isn't something that needs to be done right away because we're all s all under all under that ordinance the fundamental difference between that ordinance and this ordinance is is that the panel of Judges would make a recommendation to council and Council would decide in a public meeting as to what to do from a from a whatever ever that sentencing would would be uh in this case what we're talking is is this this appointed group of polit these political appointees would make a decision uh that would result in financial burdens on Council Members that's not trivial that's a huge difference fundamental difference and that's one of the main reasons I think that we need judge day to take a look at this discussion uh council member kums and council member Johnson um I was just going to say this isn't the the panel is not the main difference there are several major differences which I'll leave it to council member Johnson to op hon since she was actively involved in making them and proposing them to begin with and members of this body asked to have them out at that time when this was first proposed in 2019 and I don't think at that time in 2019 that anyone was expressing concern over the lack of an appeal process oh sorry uh council member council member G then council member Johnson please okay so again that that when we put this ethics uh ordinance in place uh there was never a financial burden on there so the right of appeal was not necessary as a matter of fact the only thing that council could do at that point was to censor a a council member take a council member off committee or things like that uh this is fundamentally different because it imp it imposes a financial burden if you have that now you need the right of appeal uh council member Johnson thank you to be clear I agree 100% that there should be an appeals process and we will put that in here absolutely Johnson if I could ask you this why don't you pull this work on it bring a version back as opposed to uh asking the members to move it forward uh when they are so many changes being discussed right now mayor I agree that with the issues brought up it would be unfair to bring it right to the floor without the council looking at those changes well then I then you agree to pull it then so I well I don't want to use the word pull it I'm going to address these issues I'm going to talk talk to have all the council members get have an opportunity for feedback I don't want to use the word pulling it um I do want to bring this forward um absolutely appeals processes importance um but you know when we're talking I find it interesting that we talk about the concern of politics with this but the previous version had it go before Council um at the end which just seems like the ultimate conflict of interest um so you know it's it's concerning to me that we bring that up as an as an argument um however bringing something to council to vote on something with colleagues that we're have issues with that that is political as well so I I do you know we had we based this on the rules that we the majority of the previous Council approved um put in basically the amendments to model after our state Constitution and the ethics that the voters wanted the voters spoke and wanted that so we modeled that including our own type of independent ethics commission that is comprised of community members okay so if if I understand you right you were not requesting that I move forward at this time I I do I I never feel um in that it's appropriate if there's so many so much of these concerns to do this just on the floor um but I it's I don't want to say I'm pulling it I'm going to come back I'm going to bring um address those issues particularly the appeal um and then talk to council members and bring It Forward mayor mayor uh mayor yes so I thought the last ordinance that we did vote on had the the the judges you said that it was the council that was going to make those decisions it ahead council member Johnson and and actually if I could have have just our City attorney so she can um have that subject matter expertise talk about the judge's recommendations going to council Rachel could you speak for that sure so that's a difference in the current code and this proposed amendment um is changing the from a panel of judges and that panel of Judges would re recommend a penalty and then Council would ultimately decide on what that penalty is whether it's censure whether it's twice whatever thei Financial um amount at issue is um and then the change that we're proposing here or sorry council member Johnston is proposing here is changing that to a citizen Board of ethics and that board would also um would also enforce um the code of ethics including whatever penalty comes from that and that's because the independent ethics commission that's kind of having that truly independent board looking at ethics complaints hearing them and imposing whatever enforcement mechanism um and so that's sort of where that idea came from thank you so um and I I can I can understand why you wouldn't want Council to impose the fines or the violations but again I still don't see the the issue with having a panel of judges and then the panel of Judges um they do this every day in court would assign whatever penalty so I just wanted to make clear that it wasn't just coun the council doing all the ethics themselves there was in the last ethics ordinance that we voted on and I voted on was a panel of Judges so the distinction is who gets to assign penalties and I I I probably agree that should be independent of the council but I think it should be the judges personally okay well I think uh the sponsor has said that she will continue working with members uh on a new version and bring that new version forward at a at a latter point in time um so I'd like to close out on 3A since we're not going to be um uh deciding whether or not to move it forward this evening uh and go to item number three uh mayor I mean um Council M Johnson um thank you um I just wanted to make sure um council member Marano since if there were any other amendments that you wanted us to discuss at this session yes uh thank you um I did want to uh continue the discussion around um limitations basically um again council member guber um mentioned it thinking I guess it was already in but it is not yet this is still point of discussion that I think we should have uh with regards to people leaving office having committed ethical violations that enrich them and then not being able to be held accountable simply because they are not in office anymore I think that sets a dangerous precedent it sends the wrong message that you can basically get away with it if you time it correctly um and that's not something that we should basically allow through a loophole whether intentional or not um and then there was the com uh the another concern I had with regards to uh someone filing the ethics complaint uh whether um I guess maybe Rachel can speak to this a bit in the research she's done um if it has a chilling effect when uh one side has provided defense but the other side um does or Council and the other side is not um is that something that in your experience has intimidated people from pursuing ethics violations or no um council member of Marcano it's it it's a delicate B right because you want enough information for the accused to be able to defend themselves to know what the complaint is about and then you also want to protect whoever is filing the complaint from retaliation and so if we haven't struck exactly the right balance here um in this I you know please um we're trying to um would be open to uh any additional um language Rachel if I can ask you one question on a related issue and that is what when we talk about uh having jurisdiction over a former member on a s i get it if it's a criminal matter but I I I really question somebody who has left office that on an Ethics matter we would have jurisdiction to bring them back in So currently the way that the code of ethics is drafted Mr Mayor um section 142 subsection five e um talks about the matter has become moot because the person who is the subject of the complaint is no longer an elected official So currently um as soon as someone leaves office um they are no longer bound by these ethical rules right and I think as I remember I I'm not sure at the state level I know at the Congressional level that um uh members are no long former members are no longer subject to the jurisdiction of the Ethics Committee in the Congress mayor Dave Council grber so I go a little bit further on that I think we're going to need and and again going back to the judge because there's two points here first I'm a little bit insulted that that to to think or to make the implication that because someone has announced that they're not going to run again that they are going to run off and do it make an ethical violation uh in order to um take money we only have two council members that have announced that they're not going to run and I don't believe either one of them is going to do something un ethical simply because they're not going to run so I think I I don't like that argument at all the second point I want to make though is that what law is going to be used that says that Council has the authority to take money away from a civilian or even a council member for that what what laws there I could see garnishing wages from Council but you know and again I I would like to have the judge's opinion as opposed to uh our local attorney's opinion on that one okay uh further question mayor council member MCC yeah I just want to clarify I wasn't calling any individual person out in fact I hope this law is never actually utilized um I just find that very strange how personal that got uh that's all I wanted to say further discussion uh seeing none uh there is uh we're not considering it in terms of moving forward at this time uh the sponsor is pledged to work with members and to bring it back at a at a latter date uh item number three uh B uh lobbyist registration ordinance mayor counc Lawson hi um mayor um I got Rachel on the on to help me out with this but this was brought forth in 2019 the summer of 2019 um it did not pass so I wanted to bring it forth again um as you know we're growing city um we are getting lobbied um as on issues development on all kinds of you know we have nonprofit groups lobbying us and I think it's really important to have this in our transparency toolbox that we're having people actually show on a reporting system that we are getting Lobby it's not a perfect system like anything else but I think in order if we're trying to get government trust we're trying to have let the let our constituents know you know how we're making our decisions even though most of us will say we're making our independent decisions we're still getting information from people from the outside and they're still providing us information that could influence our decision on an issue that comes before Council um this particular ordinance will basically require individuals and um there's two Provisions that we changed and I just tweaked those um basically in uh two- 951 um what is what is a lobbyist so what is lobbying so essentially last year we had ex what excludes lobbying this time we actually are focusing on not on who the individual is but we're actually focusing on what are the activities that would lead to a disclosure so that's one piece of it um also who is lobbying the the individuals who we would consider a lobbyist um I did tweak that 501 3c's um they although they are limited by the IRS definition to Lobby we still get lobbied by them and 5013 uh 501 C4s as well so that in there is basically saying in that section about a lobbyist is essentially that hey you might want to understand that you know some of you are underneath the IRS requirement you might want to think about you know you are lobbying us and you will need to be following this disclosure but you will have to be you know careful on how especially 5013 C's how you're um how that's related to the guidance that you are under with the IRS um this system would be um about $1,000 to implement With Our IT services we would require to have a person to actually do some of the regulation piece on this and um we do have an FTE this person wouldn't just be doing lobbying they would be doing the campaign Finance our ethics if this you know the ethics goes through and the lobbying disclosures and registration system as well the reports would be quarterly so if you know the reports would be due July they would be due in October January and I'm missing one other one um but they would be quarterly the quarterly reports if you look in the city of Denver currently they have 147 um organizations and individuals that are registered they actually require a fee to register and if you're late with your reports they actually charge a fee for the for their reports being late um some of those same individuals that are on that Denver report if you go into the looking their lobbyist registration are some of the same individuals that Lobby here at the city of Aurora so um I I hope that I really hope that we can have a discussion about this when I brought this forth last year in 2019 I didn't get hardly any responses from any council members of why they would object to it and I'm hoping to have a discussion today um especially for some of the council members that were on Council in 2019 of why you object or maybe why you still object or maybe what we can do to better this or um support this again I think that you know if we're trying to gain this transparency we're always talking about transparency we're all talking about public trust this is one Avenue that we can actually do this and have report and actually have people understand in our in our city how we're being influenced who's even talking to us even if you're not influenced by that individual but just who is coming to us and talking to us about the decisions that come before us and um providing information so that's the basis of this Rachel I don't know if I've have it I know there might be specific questions but I don't know if I have missed anything or anything like that um council member Lawson I think you've provided a great overview and I'm available if there's any specific questions that I can help with discussion mayor uh mayor for Tim yes um and council member Lawson I think when when it was brought up um the in I guess in 2019 I did I think I had a couple questions um on what who qualified as a lobbyist and you talked about the 5013 C's tonight so I like would for example m behavioral would that be cons would they be considered a lobbyist that's one of my questions and then um and then I had asked in 2019 if you had gone out um for outreach to various lobbyists you know representing both sides all whatever to get a pulse if they had any any uh concerns about the ordinance okay Rachel I don't know I don't have my my little cheat sheet in front of me but um I think that my high Behavioral Health they would be would they would have to actually um if they lobbied us they would have actually have to be required to file a report so and council member Bergen there was a couple lobbyists that did reach out to me of course you know being in this industry lobbyists don't want to report I mean I'm just G to be honest with you they they don't want to do this so for whatever for whatever reasons but no I um there's some lobbyist that reached out to me that said they had some concerns with the current draft that we had okay so I have not council member Bergen went out with this draft this draft hasn't changed too much but just with those two Provisions that I um just suggested to you um in speaking tonight okay and mayor just follow up please yeah so so you haven't done Outreach to the lobbyist that you said a couple have have given you some feedback and I I don't know if that that would be beneficial or not um I just want to it it sounds good to me I I really don't have too much of an issue with your ordinance um my my question was just from the lobbyist perspectives again I wanted to Define who who it falls into that definition of a lobbyist but then just wondering if they had any negative um kind of or or constructive uh input council member I mean council member May Bergen I mean it's going to be I I can try to get a sample but it's going to be so different diffult with so many people we're talking about develop I mean that's a large sample um for me to kind of weigh in I'm just going to be honest a lot of a lot of people a lot of lot people who have to file disclosures they probably don't want to do this um period because they don't want to have to do a disclosure um but I mean there could be by the time if this moves forward I can probably get a a kind of a sample but I can't just tell you and again it might be challenge to me question to me who are you actually doing the Outreach to there may be some something said you're doing favoritism for one or the other and I don't want that so I would have to try to figure out you know what what would be the proper way to do that um and again I haven't thought about that but that it would really have to because I don't want to look upon like I'm choosing lobbyists that like this because I know them or that's a good point counil Lawson quick question and that is so say I'm a small business owner I went for 17 years in Aurora and I want to meet with my council member because I've got a concern about maybe an ordinance that's coming up or I've got some regulatory concern that I want to talk to my um council member about and do so do I have to register no okay mayor you have to think about this is tied with money tied with monetary with money not an HOA you know it's not tied to because um a citizen has the the you know First Amendment right to speak to their government official so that that has nothing if you look in here that has nothing that's not applicable so if I paid somebody to represent me that person who who who's not a business owner but is being paid to contact council members obviously that person would have to register am I correct yeah that's kind of a subcontracting um agreement that's kind of a subcontracting kind of situation yes further further discussion mayor grber council member grber uh council member Lawson I I like the idea of of registering having the lobbyist register I'm I'm good with that I'm concerned about some of the specific implementations of it and how that will work for example visit Aurora uh the Aurora Chamber of Commerce the Aurora Economic Development Council Aurora Medical mental health uh citis all of these organizations come to us and ask for money all of them are businesses 501 c3s 501 C4s uh um and um I'm concerned that they would each have to register I'm also worried about the government Affairs people that actually work for an organization UC Health at an shuds has got government Affairs uh the Medical Center of Aurora we've got different different companies have uh uh their own people they're not lobbyists per se they're employees of the company but if they come and talk to us I'm concerned are they going to have to register lobbyist or are they going to be independent of that because they're not being paid to do it outside of the company because they're an employee of the company so so I and I'm worried about about some of that tonight we've got Colorado legal services that are going to come and talk to us I think it's a 501c3 the person that's talking to us is specifically their lobbyist so they're going to ask us for money tonight would they be required to have registered as a lobbyist before they come into talked to council tonight so I when I've talked to some of the companies they're scratching their head to say I don't know whether I'm I need to register or not does it does again does visit Aurora need to register as a as a lobbyist so Rachel you want to help me out with this because with my cheek here I would say oh go ahead I think so much of it really hinges on what's the definition of lobbying and that really um kind of Hing is on communication um for the purpose of aiding in or influencing the covered official to favor or oppose recommend or not recommend V vote for or against or to take or refrain from taking action on an official action and then that official action is also defined it's in page 183 of your backup and it really comes down to four things so it's any kind of um ordinance or resolution any legislative matter development application contract um with the city or um a permit or license and so I I hate to give you the pat answer of well it depends it really just depends on what they're talking to you for if it's trying to influence and is it on an official action mayor if I could respond so so Rachel I guess my my concern is is that we we could we could create an ordinance where people are violating the law and they don't know whether or not they're violating the law because it's not it's not clear to them if the Gaylord if the people at the Gaylord come to me and say you know or any one of us to say can you help us with uh Tri County Health to open up if I can go through many many companies in the in the uh area that would come to me to say hey I'm trying to do this or my idea is to do this um would every one of those conversations from those companies uh you know that that you know is this zoned properly is this uh um um it boy I I just how do we make sure that the people who are who are talking to us clearly understand that they are lobbyists because the last thing we want to do is to have uh again Salin R is coming to talk to us about a development in um painted Prairie and and they're asking us about you know what do you think about and this has not happened but what do you think about you know this type zoning what do you think about you know these building codes and and should the building codes be modified because we found a better way to do it and we can't Implement that way because the technology that we're going to use wasn't created five years ago but now it's there it's better it's cheaper but it's not in your code is that a lobbying um um is at a lobbying meeting and and again if Lenard does that uh uh and they're working at painted Prairie is painted Prairie now responsible for lobbying because lenar is is asking for that in their place if and again Aurora mental health I mean I'm sorry um um UC Health if they come over and say um you know we're talking about the water pipes and we're talking about the massive replacement and that giant project we're doing for the drainage out there to replace the old old old drainage if they come and talk and say Here's my concerns about the drainage and here's how it's going to cost we have a different way to do it if their if their government Affairs person is talking to me is that lobbying or is that a company you know that that you know a constituent company in city of Aurora talking to me about a concern that they have because if it is lobbying and I don't report it and it's found out that you know did you know if somebody asked me did they talk to you yeah sure we had a long discussion about that pipe and how expensive that pipe is well they didn't they didn't write down that they were a lobbyist so now they're in violation and now not only can you not approve that pipe because it was a legal request but we're also going to find or apply some sort of punitive measure to auror M or to um UC uh Health uh because of that and and then if I go to the to the um government Affairs person and and you know to say by the way I can't approve it by the way you're being sanctioned by city council uh for talking to me how's that going to go over so I guess council member LW what I'm asking for is that it need I would like it to be very clear for for us to be able to understand who a lobbyist is but more importantly for a person or company talking to us understanding that they are a let me just say if I could interject council member Lawson and sure maybe to address that point and that is if you limit it to say uh individuals that are third parties that in other words they're not employees of UC Health they're not you know they're not uh The Business Leaders that they are uh either independent contractors or or or or third parties that are in a lobbying firm that it'd be limited to there be a lot more Clarity if if you limited to that because if you get into um if you expand it beyond that we do like Aur mental health has uh an in-house lobbyist um it's um and so I think that n a clear narrow definition would help counil Lawson okay mayor um and I take your um your your comments in council member grber as well but all of those examples that you provide at council member guber are not lobbying I mean that's giving you information but I know and there and I know you've been in Congress and you know what lobbying is about when i' I've been approached will you support I I've actually I mean people that is lobbying like that's when someone's saying would you consider would you think about I mean this it's those examples just kind of giving you um mayor can I just speak just from my take on it exactly you've had a different experience but I'm just saying there's those those those particular examples that you provided that's just giving you information yeah lobbyist give information because they are experts in their field to provide us information and I understand about the clarity I can kind of look and see Rachel I don't know how much more we can go into being clear but I'll let you speak upon that but there's certain language that you know that you're being lobbied and and that's just my personal opinion I think we've all had that c Lawson let me tell you can I have can I have Rachel speak mayor before you speak please okay Rachel please um thank you members of council um I think that likely in those um scenarios that council member grber presented the initial conversations would not require registration but once those conversations pivoted to an official action so drafting an ordinance um a specific development application specific contract um or a specific permit or license and asking for specific action on those that's the point at which registration would be required mayor um May P so I have a question on that um and because we we meet with business people developers that do just provide information like you know can we meet and I'd like to tell you about my develop velopment that I'm proposing and then we get you know this is what it looks like here's the site plan and and they leave without asking for anything they're just presenting that information do they register as a lobbyist I think it depends on where in the process they are if there's a pending development application and they're asking for a recommendation for or against or an approval then potentially they would need to register if it truly is informational only then it's not lobbying and it doesn't require registration okay so are we clear on if it's not asking for something approval I guess in our in our process than than anything before that is just informational okay yes that's that's how the ordinance was intended to be drafted Rachel I think if we at the state level um that if you're say a business owner and you you know you ask somebody to vote against a bill or you ask for something uh to take action on something you're not counted as a lobbyist so I this is this is this is really new territory and it's really um going to be difficult to Define to say okay um I want to talk to you about my de well of course when somebody talks to somebody about the development I mean if they're the business owner I I get the third party person um the the person who is a a lobbyist and you know by all definition I get that but boy this this really expands into pretty fuzzy territory mayor can I just speak at the state level the state level is tied to monetary people are getting paid to do the lobbying so that's that what's in this one um and then when you're talking about like a business owner or you're talking about AARP they could be considered a volunteer lobbyist so you have to understand at the state level that's tied to monetary people getting paid to influence so I just want to put that on the record there so then it's not the uh the business owner that comes to that once uh that's trying to get a license or something like that is doing it him or herself it's if somebody's doing it on their behalf and they're getting paid for it am I correct in that mayor are you talking about at the state level no I'm talking about in your in your proposal I don't think that that's what that's saying but Rachel can you help me with the the guidance on that um sure the the specific definition for lobbyist is um in the backup it's in section two 2- 952 subsection 5 and that's on page 182 of the backup and it it outlines there um who is and isn't included in terms of their actions on an official action before Council uh and then council member Johnson so I guess what I'm hearing and and frankly council member Lawson what you're saying I I agree with 100% I think that in the city of Aurora there are probably less than 20 lobbyists that I know of probably less than 10 you know people that I know when they talk to me uh they're being employed to talk to me and and um you know they're carrying a message for somebody else um and and I have no problem with them registering I have no problem with them identifying themselves and and putting them on the registry going back to the larger discussion though is to visit Aurora and 501c3's uh um specifically 501 c3s 501 C4s are you know maybe a little bit different but 501 c3s I don't consider when visitor roora talks to me about an issue with the restaurants that that that's lobbying or the Chamber of Commerce talks to me about concerns of part of their their membership I don't consider that lobbying and and yet within the ordinance I think that they would have to register and I think that and and again so so you know you would have visit Aurora list all of the all of the hotels in the city of a well they have more than just Aurora but all of the hotels that are members Chamber of Commerce list all of the members that they have ADC list all of the members that they have and but I don't think that's your intent from which what I'm hearing you say versus what I'm reading are two different things I think your intent is to identify those less than 20 people that do this as a profession well council member uh Gruber I I as Rachel said it has to be within it it depends like those examples that you provided a list of hotel that is not lobbying um I think the definition is pretty clear but it obviously I don't know how much more clearer I can make it um I I guess I could look at it more but I I just don't know to me it's pretty clear th those examples that you provided would they would not have to register so may um oh sorry Council Council johnon I'm sorry I thought you paused so please finish sorry about that Council Lawson go ahead council member Johnston okay thank you I don't know why this is um I mean I understand this is New Territory for us but but council member Lawson besides you know professionally being a subject matter expert on this with the state looked also also at Denver um which has this and a lot of the examples that we've had um they Lobby in Denver and they they have to do this in Denver so in terms of like oh can you make it more clear literally it's the IRS definition that council member Lawson put in um yes you know maybe we need some education which just like with with campaign Finance maybe we you know have some some educ to to folks who are interacting with us to make it clear but I I would not support any changes because we're we're following IRS regulations in terms of some of the examples I support the c3s being part of that because if they're meeting the definition of lobbying then they need to do that you know we talked about visit Aurora which I know you know they're not a registered lobbyist right now but if if they would Advocate on You Know The Lodgers tax which they benefit from and we would take some voting action on it absolutely they should should be counted on that so I think as long as we just go back to council members Lawson's ordinance and read what the IRS definition has provide some education to those who might be unsure that it's it's good as is further discussion mayor C so I just want to be clear that something like for example putting together a petition that community members sign or putting together an email that community members could send is not covered under the um because it says lobbying excludes Communications who are not otherwise registered and who limit their activities to appearances for the purpose of giving tests Tony or providing information so it doesn't cover that issue of organizing community members to provide testimony or to contact Council by email so is the intent to include those activities as lobbying Community organizing activities I I would say no according to my read on it Rachel you're legal interpretation because I'm not an attorney Rachel if they're beginning paid though to do that right so again I think it all really hinges on those definitions four five and six lobbying lobbyist and um official action and so um and so as as council member Kum said lobbying excludes those Communications for giving testimony and then to the mayor's Point um likely they're not there um sort of in an employed capacity right um they're not self-employed um or they're not employed or otherwise they could be they could be registered lobbies for other purposes um or let's let's just say that they're they're firm that's what they do uh but and they're instead of uh having they're they're expending funds on behalf of their client they're getting paid for it but but they're doing essentially um what was um described as um activity by council member CS yes thank you mayor I think that's a great Point um they really have to meet all parts of that definition five for lobbyist which is for the purpose of engaging in lobbying their scope of work um is lobbying and um again they're they're sort of employed or their their scope of employment includes that further uh discussion bins counil member bersin thank you I I have about three questions so if you'll allow me to do them all thank you um we I we've all seen uh people on Facebook um and one of them is in a leadership position saying you know um calling one or two or three of us out by name saying they better vote this way they better vote to do so and so and so on so you know is that lobbying or is that bullying or you know if those if those people are calling us out and saying how we better vote on issues you know do they need to register they're I mean they're not only lobbying they're bullying council member Bergen are you saying that they're with an organization or you could say they were with a a party uh a group yes I I I think for me and Rachel I I mean I might need your help I just think that we're getting into all of these examples they really what this is supposed to capture um those type of issues are not addressed in here because that's not what this is trying to capture okay um getting back to what Rachel kept saying is that um depends on the conversation dep you know it depends on depends you know and we all understand that but who makes the final call who do we make the final call I feel like I've been Lobby like like you said council member Lawson you know you know but do we make that final call if somebody just says here are the facts here's the blueprint you know I just want you to have have the facts have the information then we're not being lobbied so we shouldn't we shouldn't do anything about it well this is my hope that I'm hoping that if this passed that people who are doing these activities will register and Report the activity however I think it's the Dual diligence of this Council Council members to say hey um are you registered you know or something if they feel like they they are being to me you know if you're being lobbied I mean there's there's very particular simple language to me um that knows that they've been you know to see if someone needs to be registered or not so I mean to the due diligence of I'm hoping that the law would be follow followed of course and of course this would be training and and actually doing Outreach and doing FAQs and getting out and doing training stuff I mean those type of that's this is the ordinance but after that you have to provide information beyond that to help assist people to understand what what when the registration requirement is started implemented Etc I mean that's that's part of this process so but I would hope I think there's some due diligence upon council members as well to say hey are you lobbying um are you fee to to register no no okay Denver Denver charges a fee Denver charges $50 for individuals and $75 for organizations okay and that's that's not a lot but my last question is on it's uh let's see uh section [Music] 29543 B and let me just tell you it's on page on our backup it's on page five uh at the top of the page B um the name and total gross income for lobbying received from each client or other whom the lobbyist Lobby during the previous quarter um why is that our business and what income they get for lobbying it's not how that is viewed as what is the amount of money that they are getting from their income that they lobbying us as of elected leaders of polical officials so that is our business I mean that's a part of the disclosure I mean if they're lobbying us they're getting paid to do so this is what this is about they're getting paid to do so so they should report how much of that income or whatever that they're receiving to Lobby us on an issue or matter and that's where the true disclosure really comes out to me you can I'm sorry no is that just standard or is this IRS or is this what Denver does or Denver does it state does it and I don't there's some Provisions at the federal level mayor Kaufman you might know more about that um in terms of the federal level I'm sorry no in terms of them of lobbyists and I'm sure that they do they have to report um any amount that they're on a disclosure that they're getting paid to Lobby un covered official you know I can't remember that I do know they have to report you know um I think you're right in in that but but there are reporting requirements for federal obvious um but they do not extend to um individuals uh who um are lobbing or or contacting members of Congress as to their own interest and and it it's only those that are representing somebody else that are required to report uh further questions uh concerns discussion uh council member CS so I just wanted to um mention briefly the just the fiscal impact and the discussion of lobbying and campaign Finance falling under the existing vacant Deputy clerk position and I just want to register some concern about that I think there was already a need for a deputy Clerk and that was expressed that the that the clerk's office was somewhat underst staffed prior to campaign Finance getting passed and prior to this so I just would have a concern that maybe we should not rely on the current vacant Deputy clerk position but also add another one given the massive amount of additional stuff that we're expecting that is not for me a reason not to support it um I think that lobbying registration is important campaign Finance requirements are important and I just don't want to be overburdening the staff by taking a staff member whose position was created due to existing burdens and just adding really big stuff on top of that rule so I would like to suggest that we look at having um an additional staff member rather than relying on that vacant position and Council Kum that's a good point um I was just kind of going on the recommendation that was given to me and and council member um Johnston um from um Roberto that but I agree that this is a lot of work because they're going to have to do the implementation look at the systems check the reports and so it probably will require at least another half FTE if not um you know one full Deputy City Clerk and maybe a half FTE or something to do this job I mean I just don't I I agree with you on that so that that is something that I would have to get another I see Jason's on the line but I don't know what the other fiscal we might have to provide another fiscal note on this council member Lawson I'm on the line can you hear me okay can hear you so uh so just to be clear the the there is no Deputy city clerk position current Cy it does not exist we are creating a reclassified position from Barb doll from those of you who recall Barb doll being in the office has she departed from the city so the idea would be to reclassify that position to a higher grade position a deputy city clerk that was not a position it was a different management analyst position prior to the idea being that the deputy clerk would have a broader skill set more ability to handle uh issues like campaign finance and the lobbyist ordinance or any other issues that are coming on with the council we fully agree that there are um you know with an amount of items that are being put forward for the counil for the clerk's office to handle that we would need to have the appropriate Staffing we saw this as an initial step to be able to uh understand the issues because campaign Finance has just been put underway we have a new clerk ktee who can also speak to this Rodriguez but also just as an incremental step before we stepped up with two more other folks who wanted to at least get a first position which was a deputy clerk with somebody who had an Advan a higher skill set with more experience who may be able to handle these items uh and had more experience with these items first and then we would probably be back to the council in in the 2022 budget or either a supplemental if we needed it if this ordinance were to be enacted um in a supplemental in probably the fall or the summer supplemental to uh to address any staffing needs but we wanted to take the incremental step of first doing the reclassification to a deputy which currently does not exist further discussion mayor Dave grber yes grber so I wanted to go through some more examples because the examples are really where the rubber meets the road as to how are we going to implement this we spoke earlier about visit Aurora being a lobbyist organization and visit Aurora's membership uh uh as being the client and we specifically address the issue with the um uh lodger tax and the increase in the lodger tax so under the under the law the lobby the lobbyist would have to register that would be you know the CEO of the uh visit Aurora uh the name business so on who reimburses retains or contracts with the lobby is to Lobby on any official action so that would be every Hotel member of the uh organization on Whose behalf of the lobbyist lobbies on the official action again every hotel in the city uh by whom is the lobbyist paid and be paid for by such lobbying it would be every hotel in the city uh and um the matters an official what I'm saying is is that it it there's a lot of information for the visit Aurora to do their job we're going to talk later about the uh uh uh expand extending the delay in uh the meal service charge that delivery companies pay so you know I guess that would be the Colorado Restaurant Association would be behind that and every restaurant in Aurora would be uh the the companies that are being supported by their request for us to consider it uh and like I said earlier we've got Colorado Legal Services briefing us tonight and that and that becomes interesting because Colorado legal service is going to be asking for $225,000 for us to support every tenant who goes to court in the city of Aurora and they're lobbying on their behalf so you know again under under the rules it would be they would have to identify every client that they have in Aurora who will need support by the Colorado Legal Services my point I'm just trying to show that again I agree with the concept of what we're talking about but it becomes very very burdensome um and I want to try to think through those burdens um I've said that before and and I've made my point so thank you further discussion by seeing none um uh is there um so let me I'm just going to go through um the role here uh and and so the question is is whether or not to move uh item number um 3A um I'm sorry 3B forward uh council member Lawson yes uh council member hilts council member hilz yes Council M gr council member grber no not in this form council member Gardner yes uh council member Mar yes um council member John yes uh council member bin yes yes yes very well uh uh I'm Number uh 3B will then move forward uh I number 3C Aurora flexible housing fund program May mayor I was also a yes yeah oh no I I went down till I got six votes this okay got I mean till I got six individuals to support we we uh by the advice of the City attorney we do not take votes I just have to get a sense of the council uh as to whether or not to move something forward um with that I'm going to take uh the time is now 8:28 uh we will we will stand in recess for five minutes and we'll reconvene at 8:33 [Music] I'll be here with you all night [Music] [Music] [Music] SC me now [Music] [Music] I'll be here with you all night [Music] [Music] can you [Music] [Music] me me now feeling I'm I [Music] need Scream you hear me can you hear me nowar [Music] Z session um item number 3C uh rural flexible housing program Atlanta Dalton me mayor good evening folks um I am here presenting on the flexible housing fund um I'll go ahead and share my screen if that's okay Katie can you give me the shareability please yes one second how do I give her the ability to share her screen not change Ru sign privileges you just go over this and it gives you the option okay always you click on there we go no not to Lisa Horton oh my God you can take it back we can give it to someone else do I do it who do you want to give it to Lon not allowing me to change my screen oh well um we'll just go ahead and move forward with this so um as the mayor said my name is Lena Dalton I am the homelessness programs manager for the city um we're going to talk about the flexible housing fund this evening uh the purpose of the fund is to remove Financial barriers that households face to maintain or secure permanent housing in a high cost low vacancy rental market um so this is specifically for folks that uh have don't necessarily fit the federal funding guidelines um or definitions of homelessness um but are still at risk of uh being homeless or are currently experiencing homelessness uh this helps us with the Ci's over our all goal of engaging in homelessness prevention as well as making homelessness brief rare and non- reoccurring some of the history behind this is that in the summer of 2017 uh Council approved the additional 2% special sales tax on recreational marijuana sales and this tax was approved to fund the homelessness program ongoing um as far as the uh Aurora flexible housing fund also formerly known as half or house aora partnership um there was an internal audit that was conducted on the house aora partnership uh in 2019 um in 20 and 2021 um as a result of that audit there were several things that occurred one of those things was new policies and procedures have been put into place new application and application process all payments will be driven through the city rather than uh through um providers in the community there's a new documentation process in place as well uh this was very much modeled after a wellestablished flexible funding program through mdhi or the metro Denver hom initiative uh the funding is specifically the 2% recreational marijuana tax revenue so um this is not a separate fund this is a program that's brought through the uh 2% recreational marijuana tax revenue fund uh the proposed allocation for this specific program is 575 ,000 and the hope is that this will serve a minimum of 12 people per month and the reason I put the minimums rather than the maximums is uh the maximum expenditure is $4,000 per person per year so if you uh divide that out per month that's approximately 12 people or a minimum of 12 people but the hope is to serve many more uh the funding can be utilized for anything from application fees security deposits pet deposits relocation onetime movein costs if folks have rental aers those would also qualify motel hotel studies would also qualify while waiting for the applicant uh permanent housing unit to become available um one of the things that was brought back from the audit was pet deposits or one-time pet fees that are covered through this specific program many times the pets weren't registered with the city of Aurora and so this would also cover that pet registration fee uh eligibility requirements there are three different things um either literal homelessness so someone that's residing an emergency shelter transitional housing a safe haven or a place not meant for human habitation such as like a camp a camper or vehicle RV um or they're at risk of becoming homeless so an individual or family currently renting in the city of aora that are at imminent risk of homelessness unless they receive a financial assistance to stay in their home um they also have to show that they can sustain housing past the um past the time that they receive this funding and they have they cannot be over uh 80% Ami so how does somebody access the funding uh we are working with our Community Partners and all of those Community Partners that we currently have agreements with in the community um would be and have attended this specific training um are eligible to uh have sit with a client and have them uh fill out the application and um that application then comes to the city of Aurora to decide whether or not it's approved or denied based upon um the criteria I just previously explained um application approval process everything will be approved through the homelessness programs um Department priority will be given to firsttime applicants however people can apply more than once as long as um the eligibility criteria are met but they cannot exceed that $4,000 um it's a requirement for eligible candidates to be able to M maintain their housing once again and that documentation does need to be provided for um for us to process their application in the city all funding will be distributed through the city of Aurora's um and issued by the city of Aurora uh there will be no longer uh Partners will no longer be able to issue the funding um the data and outcome measures so some of the things also that came came back from the internal audit was how do we know if this program is effective so some of the different outcome measures that we're looking at are number of households assisted number of individuals assisted what types of program or excuse me what types of assistance are being utilized uh what percentage of participants are able to maintain their housing after 12 months uh and what percentage of participants that receive relocation assistance remain out of the city of Aurora and housed in whatever community that they were um they relocated to um so the question tonight is does council support moving this forward and it would be a $575,000 allocation of marijuana funds for this specific program um to assist those that are at risk of becoming homeless or currently experiencing homelessness discussion questions mayor um mayor Pim sorry I didn't have my video on um I just have I'm good with this I just have one question on the eligibility requirement and on literal homelessness that definition the last sentence uh has doubling up with a housed individual or family also qualified so if you if you're living with if you're living with a family or a friend in a house you still qualify for the homelessness yeah so yes so if they are an individual that has been displaced due to eviction or something of that nature and they are doubling up in someone else else's home but it's not a permanent solution to the issue that they're facing they would qualify for this this funding okay and I get that I guess if it's like temporary so they're they were caught in a situation and then they're having to live with someone temporarily then you would be able to provide assistance but this is not for someone who lives with a f i mean if if you're TW 21 years old and you go back home and live with your mom and dad you wouldn't qualify would you I mean your mom and dad would help hopefully would help you I would hope that would be the hope uh but if someone is if if their situation is such that if they didn't leave their household and they would be homeless that would definitely be a time that we would want to Institute this funding okay I I yeah I don't I guess I just had trouble with the hous with a family because I think there should just be a parameter around that maybe you already have that as part of your eligibility anyway of how you would Define that because again you know you there's probably a lot of people right now that um unfortunately due to covid don't have imp employment but they maybe just graduated college and they're living at home with the parents but that that person would not be the type of person right that would qualify for this uh correct so we we would really be looking at that the Ami as well as being able to sustain housing post receiving the funding as well as ensuring that their situation was such that if they were to leave they would end up in a situation where they would be having to utilize the homelessness service system thank you so much further further questions discussion mayor Dave grber counc guber I support this as well the only issue I have is in the financial the financial obligation uh definition in the ordinance itself and that's section one uh city council approves making a funding Grant of $575,000 the aable the Aurora flexible housing fund program for the year 2021 I would prefer if we could add that it will come out of the marijuana fund so that we specifically identify which of the many City funds uh the the funds will be drawn from and I would defer to Tim Joyce on that I don't see that to be an issue Mr Joyce I think we can do that with the amendment thank you okay um does that Mr Joy does that have to be done on that has to be done on the floor then right if we're making an amendment to an ordinance yes it has to be an amendment on the floor okay mayor if I could this is still draft and and if we you know discuss it tonight and we make it tonight and the amended language shows up on the floor wouldn't that suffice Mr Mr um Joyce that one I'm not sure I just I think be on the safe side I think let's just do it on the floor because I think otherwise it needs to go through the whole process again mayor um mayor pretend it's this is a resolution right not an ordinance that is correct so I thought you could make the change but just um we can't you still amend resolutions I don't I don't think the amendment process between a resolution and ordinance is different but let me defer to the City attorney and we'll bring it to you as amended tonight so you can't so you can't vote on it tonight but we'll we'll put the amendment in okay very well is there any objection to the amendment I seeing none okay uh further discussion I seeing none is there any objection uh to moving uh item number threee forward seeing that item number threee will move forward um mayor I'm sorry that's item number uh 3C uh item number 3D menual care products uh sales tax exemption um Mr vaugh yes this item was a requested to be brought forward by council members Gardner and council members hilts um the U it's pretty straight Bo is just the sales tax exemption for menstral care products annual impact would be a $230,000 reduction in revenue from this exemption uh Denver has implemented this exemption uh no other jurisdiction in the state has at this point some jurisdictions outside the state have implemented it uh other states and cities the definition after U comments from the management finance committee and uh the business Advisory board has changed to be menal care products um and is the same definition that is used by the streamlined sales tax um that's uh kind of more more common nationally and it's very much in line with the IRS definition um so with that it's fairly straightforward uh discussion uh mayor council HS thank you yeah this one's pretty straightforward I just wanted to provide a little background um you know period poverty is is very real and it's not something that we talk about as much in the United States but since the co um pandemic has hit it's been exacerbated and so I just wanted to throw out a couple of fastbacks coming from a couple different polls that have been done by different menstrual care product companies and since covid one in three parents are worried about their ongoing ability to afford period products and one in five teams have struggled to afford products or were not able to purchase them and 61% are using them for longer than they should which puts them at risk of um infection in TSS and it's not covered under Wick snap or Medicaid and so I think there's a real need here and so happy to answer questions but I think again this is pretty straightforward um but I will leave my co-sponsor council member Gardner to to weigh in as well further discussion mayor CER uh thank you just wanted to mention a couple of other um pieces of information and it is in the backup I just want to um reemphasize uh the first is last year the IRS expanded the definition of qualified medical expenses uh to include menstrual care products so really this is um you know in addition to the reasons council member Hils covered uh bringing us in line with um you know the IRS considering these medical products and then also we did present this to the business Advisory Board and um they they don't have a retailer on the business Advisory board however they did reach out to the retail association and there wasn't a lot of concern uh that uh reprogramming POS systems would would incur cost because um again the these already have tax advantage these products already have tax advantages under the IRS and so POS systems are already designed um to separate these products out um so uh again I think it's pretty straightforward um and you know we kind of were able to get byy in from um from from quite a few um stakeholders so uh looking forward to hear what my colleagues have to say further discussion mayor uh mayor portam uh so council member uh Gardner you said that the that these products are um included in in the um I forget the name of the acronym but for the welfare programs no for um for flex spending accounts so they're under IRS they qualified medical expenses uh so you can use your health savings account your flex spending account those types of um accounts and so they're considered qualified medical expenses okay well then I guess my question sorry my question might be back to council member hilts um have you checked with our with state legislators on on the other issue or maybe with the County Commissioners on if if this could be if these products could be included you know just like you would if you're buying food products for those are those are federal programs the ones that I was referring to so no I did not but but there is I me I would love to see this go Statewide don't don't get me wrong there is no state state ta sales tax exemption am I correct in that that is correct that's correct very well further discussion mayor ptim yeah I wasn't speaking about the sales tax exemption I was just speaking about these products being um part of when if someone had what what's the program called when you Wick snap I was answering your question with I was answering your question with my comments and then I think it switched over to the sales tax exemption okay okay gotcha so my my answer to you still stands okay thanks further discussion mayor Dave grber council member grber when we talked about I support this when we talked about this uh we were talking about the Point of Sales Systems and the fact that the large stores of Safeways King Super Walmart uh already have their computer system set up to identify these products so it'll be relatively straightforward for them to eliminate the sales tax the concern that we raised at uh the management and finance committee was some of the smaller stores uh we talked about um you know some the mom and pop stores and the the stores that aren't related to a chain might take a little more time in order to get the UPC code that's on the back of each of the products loaded into their system so that they would understand understand that taxes aren't going to be applied so my question Trevor is for you and just to repeat what you said in MF is that we will the city will be providing some flexibility for these smaller companies to make the change uh could you explain that yeah and I imagine this will be probably a CH an ongoing challenge as it usually is with u exemptions for particularly those that are in general merchandise or grocery store retailing um you know I think a number of the small retailers might just have these you know in their systems as general merchandise or just key him in at the register so uh we're going be sending out notifications to the the you know to our retailers through our tax system to try to uh you know get them up to speed on this being out there and and really there's um um not a not a necessarily a penalty to anybody that you know say would mistakenly continue to collect tax on these items just the problem is it doesn't really um have the effect that that you want with the exemption if they continue to collect tax but they just need to turn that tax over to the city if they do mistakenly collect tax um and if it's pointed out to us you know if somebody sees them collecting tax or we discover it on an audit when we we do an audit with the business we'll we'll make sure to educate them to let them know to discontinue collecting tax on them thank you Trevor further discussion bersin Council bins thank you I just want to make make it clear that does this does this or does does it not include the grooming and hygiene products listed here it does not it does not okay okay so re really I mean I support this too but really we're talking like dollar a month $150 a month something like that so yeah sure I support it thank you thanks Trevor further discuss I seeing none is there any objection uh to moving uh item number 3D forward seeing that item number 3D will move forward item number 3E West Minister water delivery agreement Donna juel or Don juel I'm sorry yes um good evening mayor this is for the record Alexandra Deputy dor for resources is unfortunately sick tonight and so I'm sitting in for her she apologizes for not being able to be here but we'll hopefully be feeling much better soon um the agreement presented here is a simple straightforward agreement as many of you know when a water rate has changed from agricultural use to municipal use the entity changing that water right must maintain historic return Flows In Time place and amount Aurora and Westminster both have return flow obligations on Little Dry Creek Aurora has water available to meet those obligations as and and is in the process of building the necessary infrastructure to be able to measure and account for the return flows as they return to the stream Westminster does not have the necessary Water Supplies on Little Dry Creek Westminster does have Water Supplies on Big Dry Creek and the South plat that can be used by Aurora to meet its return flow needs pursuant to this agreement Aurora and Westminster will exchange up to 70 acre feet of water annually which will help Westminster be able to meet its obligations andela and Aurora meet ours another term and condition that is applied in a change of water rights case is that the applicant for the change is usually required to demonstrate that the irrigation water originally used for the on land is no longer being used for irrigation on that land generally this term is met by drying up the land and providing proof of dry up to the state dry up does not mean that nothing will be grown on the land it means just that nothing will be grown with the water that was changed off of that land Westminster owns the Baja Ranch and has agreed in addition to the exchange of water that it will cooperate in good faith with our requests to achieve the maximum amount of dry up on the Baja Ranch that is allowed under one of our water rates decrees the water rate decree obligations can be complicated and burdensome um by working with Westminster in this this manner Aurora not only benefits but also continues to be a good neighbor and build strong relationships with other cities in our Basin both Aurora and Westminster benefit from this agreement I'll stop there and take any questions uh discussion questions seeing n the question before us um is whether or not to move item number 3E forward is there any objection to moving item number threee forward forward I seeing none item number 3E will move forward thank you thank you um item number 3F Colorado Legal Services agreement regarding contributions toward the landlord tenant Legal Services Program uh Jessica prer thank you mayor um so uh Colorado legal service is not going to be present tonight to present this I realize the commentary is a little misleading they were present for the horns policy committee uh in the presentation that they did deliver was part of your packet so um I'm uh happy to provide a brief overview this is uh level funding from what was provided in 2018 for this program we were able to provide um you know the outcomes of the program as part of the commentary uh 68 households were served in the Aurora Community um again this is a an eviction pilot program wherein there's a hired Grant attorney or pargal that is part of the court system uh with Co they've still been able to serve folks um a lot of the focus during Co is being uh has been to connect folks uh very quickly with rental assistance um and make sure that they understand some of the moratoriums that have been put in place um so people are partnered up with that attorney or paralal to help them work through the process uh and make sure that they can uh remain housed and there's been about an 85% success rate so this is really just a request to use marijuana funds to continue the intergovernmental agreement with the other cities um identified in Adams County um and just kind of as an aside something that came out of the horns committee meeting um was a request um from uh council member F and council member Johnston to explore if this is a program that could be beneficial uh to Arapaho County as well um from a staff perspective we do receive a lot of concerns um from folks in arapo county that don't have access to this service so just want to make this clear that this uh IGA is just for the Adams County portion of Aurora um and so uh the question for Council is to uh move this forward to a regular meeting in a funding amount of 25,000 uh from marijuana funds for the IGA with Colorado Legal Services questions um discussion mayor uh Mayim um Jessica can you tell me where this organization's funding normally comes from I'm not sure that I can uh fully uh explain that um I believe you know other grants and um assistance programs um most of their services are free to the folks that are reaching out um so I could get back to you with um that information okay well I did a little research so some of it comes from federal from State and then of course those uh County or City municipalities that have signed up um and we don't really get an audit statement I mean I'm sure we don't have an audit statement from them on how what where that money comes from the amount of money I mean to my knowledge we have not received an audit statement from that okay so I know that they received 500,000 under the 20 million 20 million rental assistance program and then they received another million dollars under the next roll out with the $52 million stimulus that's on top of the normal federal grants the normal state grants that they they get and actually we've had moratoriums on evictions um I have an issue that I I personally don't think this is a city responsibility um you know it can be it obviously a state responsibility or County um but it's also a nonprofit organization that Advocates against landlords um and I don't I I think we do a lot for our citizens for rental assistance we C certainly have had spent a lot of money on rental assistance on the um landlord mitigation that was mentioned earlier tonight and and and then we also of course you know agreed with the moratorium so I just don't think we should be giving taxpayer Monies to an outside organization that Advocates really does more advocacy work I don't think they actually pay rents like we help actually pay rents with our rental assistant money correct from my understanding they're referring folks in helping you know with filling out applications and things like that for example uh listed in the backup commentary working with maker housing which operates in Adams County but I mean I think I think you guys do a great job and I think you do that with with the monies that we've been um allocated whether it be through C cdbg funds or through the cares act money that we we receive so I I just can't support giving taxpayer monies and I know it's Mar monies but still taxpayer Monies to an outside nonprofit that gets plenty of money Jessica my comment isn't the primary um mission of this um program to represent to represent tenants in court who to provide legal advice um and then representation and for example if someone um is having an issue uh with their uh landlord or they feel that they're being uh you know wrongly um you know evicted and they contact the city we do not provide legal advice we would refer them to Colorado legal services so that's where staff would have that interaction as we we refer folks over to them for those Services further discussion mayor uh Council MC so I just want to look back to that backup and make sure that we're recognizing that 85% of the people were able to retain their housing as a result of this representation that's 85% fewer people of the total folks they serve that are becoming homeless and so I don't think we can on the one hand say we want to address root causes of homelessness and then on the other hand ignore evictions which are a root cause of homelessness a direct root cause of homelessness so this is homelessness prevention um that's what we're providing here so I think it's incredibly important that we look at those systemic and preventable causes and address those and so I 100% support this and as mentioned support expanding it to cover more folks in our city further further discussion coun mark honnell thank you sir I also just want to add that Aurora is the eviction capital of Colorado and that we are 33rd in the nation uh according to uh eviction lab org for evictions so I think we're wor at the 54th largest city but we're number 33 in the country for evictions so this is something that's very needed in our city and I strongly support this moving forward mayor council Johnson thank you um council member kums and council member marcoo said exactly the points I was going to make so I'll just add that our marijuana um funds that we'd be using were were targeted toward um homeless prevention so there's definitely that Nexus and then those the other points that council member kums and Marano said I I agree with thanks further discussion I seeing none uh mayor pend yes so this organization um Colorado Legal Services they but they Advocate at the state level against landlords correct on on evictions I mean I I understand helping people and I think we do a great job with our rental assistance and our landlord mitigation we've given lots of money uh this past year and we we do so even in non-co years my concern is giving money these are attorneys that we're giv money to that are getting a lot of money from the federal government and the state government them already and they're I mean what about the landlords do do they get any assistance when they don't get their their rent mayor uh council member Jonathan um yes I just want to um address some of that since we council member um kum's BS and I had a more um we had a presentation and we got to ask some questions and I'm page 286 um in the middle of it it does say what the funds would be spent for and obviously not not um lobbying as as part of that um and also you know they're they're Legal Services they're attorneys but they still have to go through the court system um you know through through a judge and um the judge will weigh what the landlord's saying what the tenants saying and there's still that process it's just that right now staff can't provide that service so this is just that mechanism but in terms of like the fairness of it there is still that that court process if I'm Jessica mayor I think that this $225,000 is really almost like a membership thing because because their their funds really uh do you know it's not going to cover very much and it's the funds that I think that the mayor proam mentioned that really truly cover the cost of uh having having these lawyers be able to go to court on behalf of U the tenants uh further discussion that's seeing none uh question before us is whether or not to move item 3F um forward uh is there objection I object uh okay seeing um um the majority um um are in support and so ior 3F will move forward May how do you have the majority I was so am I the only one objecting is that am I is there any any further objections that's correct uh item number uh 3F will'll move forward uh item number 3G funding agreement between the city of Aurora and comm's crisis center Jessica Press thank you mayor so I'm gon to speak to uh items 3G and and 3H just in my general comments uh both of these items are historically what has been Nexus funding where there has been a Nexus between uh you know police and homeless Services um because of the reduction in shortfalls as part of the search charge programs that Council discussed um I believe in November of 2020 and as part of the budget process it was determined that a few of the agencies that have historically been funded with Nexus funds would move over to the marijuana fund and so these two agencies Aur mental health and M High Behavioral Health Care their uh their Nexus Agreements are now U being proposed to be funded with the marijuana funds instead and so U because we bring forward um anything that is uh utilizing marijuana funds these two Agreements are being brought forth um to essentially change them uh from what was historically the Nexus funds into the marijuana fund because they are more focused on homelessness and uh neatly fit within the marijuana fund F uh these will be one-year agreements and these uh funds and these services will then be folded into the homeless Services RFP for subsequent years um and will be um more of a competitive process um like we did for the homeless Services RFP uh in 2020 uh so that's why they're coming forward now um and the um allocation of those funds uh for certain funds to stay in or certain certain programs and agencies to stay in the search charge program and certain ones to come to the marijuana fund um that decision was made earlier and so these are the agreements that are formalizing uh those uh budget decisions so there's any questions discussion seeing none then the question before us is uh whether or not to move um item number 38 uh three I'm sorry well 3G and 3H forward um let me do 3G first is there is there any objection to moving item number three G forward seeing on item number 3G will move move forward is there any objection to moving item number 3H forward seeing down item number 3 H will move forward thank you Jessica item number three I uh council member grber this resolution is to support the military families that are moving into Colorado every two to six years military families are required to leave their base and move to a new base for the children that are leaving Colorado they've already earned the right to compete for a position for the lotteries for the better schools charter schools and so on for the incoming families uh they're typically notified in February March time frame they typically arrive in the uh uh summertime you know June July August uh prior to school and as a result of that they are not eligible to compete for uh these other schools in the lottery so the um the previous Wing Commander at Buckley Air Force Base now it's called a Garrison so the previous Garrison commander and I think specifically his wife has led an effort with uh representative bockenfeld and Senator fields to create an ordinance to allow military families to use the address of the military base where they're going to be sent to as their home address as soon as they get their orders so if they receive their orders in March saying that they're coming to Buckley Air Force Base they'll be able to use Buckley Air Force Base as their home address and then apply for uh schools for this for this Lottery the ordinance I have before you today is based on previous language of the ordinance the ordinance hasn't been introduced to the legislature yet we expect that to happen probably next week there's some final negotiations going on between school boards and the legislature to make sure that everyone is is uh everyone's concerns are Incorporated in the bill if that or when that happens there will be minor modifications to the ordinance I'm bringing forward and th those will be presented when we go or to I'm sorry the resolution I'm bringing forward and those will be discussed at our formal council meeting if Council supports this are there any questions questions discussion mayor uh counc G uh so I support the bill but I'm not going to vote for the resolution um we have a problem process in fiser to uh support state legislation and I don't think we need to do a resolution for it thanks further discussion I support the resolution it's a stronger position uh seeing no further discussion the question before us is uh whether or not to move three item three I forward is there any objection object council member Gardner further objection uh seeing no further objection uh um absent one member item number three I will move forward uh item number 4A a State Legislative update uh good evening mayor and Council uh thumbs up if you can hear me got a thumbs up thank you Luke palano intergovernmental relations manager here to give a brief State Legislative update um there was a email I sent out on Friday afternoon that included several bills that the federal state and Inter governmental Relations Committee discussed at their February 19th meeting as a reminder per Council rules fsir is empowered to take positions on State Legislative proposals on behalf of the city the FSI committee took an active support position on six bills and gave their support for staff to engage in lobby on one additional Bill the next fsir committee meeting is scheduled for Friday March 5th this week at 1 pm uh the first bill that I'll give a brief review on is House Bill 1025 non-substantive emails and open meetings law this bill concerns a clarification under the Colorado open meetings law of the requirements governing communication by electronic mail that does not relate to the substance of public business this bill would essentially clarify that um emails dealing with scheduling and availability electronic communications sent by one elected official for the purposes of of forwarding information responding to an inquiry or posing a question is not covered under open meetings law the uh committee did take an active support position on this bill uh this bill is making its way through the house it has passed the committee and is up on the house Committee of the co Cole calendar for second reading this week um I'll pause in between if anybody has questions feel free to interrupt all right questions okay seeing none please proceed uh the next bill is House Bill 1030 expanding peace officers mental health grant program uh this bill doesn't um expands a state program for peace officer mental health program it's a grant program that includes funding for onse response services to enhance law enforcement's handling of calls for services related to persons with mental health disorders and Social Service needs including calls that do not require a Peace Office offic the committee did take an active support position on this bill uh we do not currently tap into this grant program but this is a program that could assist apd's current co-responder program as well as the new Cahoots mental health program located in Housing and Community Services uh this bill is on oh sorry that's okay I was just gonna say it's on the calendar tomorrow to be heard in committee uh council member HZ just full disclosure um scheduling allowing I intend to testify again this against this bill as written as an individual and not on behalf of the city very well just please okay very well thank you uh please proceed Mr Luke sorry that's okay uh the next bill is House Bill 1046 this is water share right Mutual ditch Corporation it would clarify Mutual ditch corpor ation law and historic operations Mutual ditch companies provide water from many Agricultural and Municipal operations Statewide this bill clarifies that Mutual ditch May operate using traditional ditch operating practices when a shareholder is not using some of their available water they do not inherently have the right to prevent other shareholders from using any portion of the corporation's water rights uh this bill got an active support position from the commit as well and is committee date has not been set yet the next bill we have is House Bill 1075 replace the term illegal alien this bill uh simply replaces the term illegal alien with worker without authorization as it relates to public contracts for service this was included in our state priorities and the committee did give it an active support position this bill also passed out of committee last week and is on the Full House committee schedule Committee of the whole schedule for this week the next bill is House Bill 117 local government Authority provote promote affordable housing units uh this bill clarifies local government's uh ability to promote the development of new affordable housing um pursuant to their existing land use Authority and within their territory uh territorial boundaries again this was included in our state prior ities and the committee did give it an active support position all right we have another water bill Water Resource financing Enterprise Senate Bill 34 this bill would create the Water Resources financing Enterprise to collect a fee from customers of public water supply systems to to finance water projects through grants and Loans municip municipalities that operate public drinking water systems will experience revenue and expens impacts water suppliers would be required to collect fees on behalf of the Enterprise which will entail expenditures increase staff workload and increased costs to our rate payers the committee did take an active opposed position on this bill all right the last bill that the committee did take a position on was uh Senate Bill 62 jail population management tools I'll specify first that the position was to pursue changes through the bill sponsor not an active support or oppose but this bill concerns measures to reduce jail populations the bill would prohibit arrest for many Municipal ordinance violations misdem meters and even some felonies the bill mandates personal reconnaissance Bonds on Municipal cases unless the court believes the defendant will flee or threatens the safety of others and no other conditions of the pr Bond will mitigate the risk of flight or harm uh the bill could negatively affect the municipal court and cause a significant docket backlog due to the failure to appear provision it does directly impact how the court can enforce its own orders by mandating PR bonds the bill however would decrease detain population and lower the the risk of recidivism and requiring PR bonds could help reduce co9 outbreaks of those in custody uh there was substantial debate on this bill in committee the committee was not ready to take a position on the bill um but we did want to allow our staff our city attorneys and our lobbyists to engage on the bill and staff asked for and received a Pursuit changes through Bill sponsor uh position on this one and this one is in committee on Thursday okay let me just speak to this for a minute because I would I would hope that we could join our Chiefs of police uh who are united in their opposition uh to this this bill and given the the rise and I mean it's it's I I understand um uh the need for taking this action during the pandemic the problem is what it does is it locks in um the policy during the pandemic to make it you know indefinite and and I think that's very dangerous and when we look at something like auto theft and how much that's increased during the pandemic because uh we haven't been uh doing pre-trial uh incarceration we just give them a summons summons and release and so I think it's we we were seeing a rise in crimes like that due to this policy again I understand during the pandemic but they're taking this what we're doing during the pandemic and then making it indefinite so I mean I I would hope that we'd reconsider mayor Dave rber CC M gr I I Echo those comments crime in the city is exploding we have uh uh not just car the but larsy burglary uh across the board our our crimes are increasing I I disagree with the concept that it's going to affect re recidivism um I am concerned though that um so many of the things that we consider crimes now will simply not be crimes anymore going into a store stealing something you know many many misdemeanors many felonies lower class felonies will simply not be listed as crime that will certainly increase the amount of crime in Aurora when the time where our our constituents are asking us please do what you can to reduce crime so I don't support this either I would recommend that um Council take a position not to support tonight so that when it does go forward to the legislature we will have our opinion heard and this and this and let me just say that this certainly does not preclude us from uh from negotiating amendments I think it gives us a better position of Leverage um I'm sorry um yes I just want um and and and if Luke has anything to add when this was presented to fizer we heard from both um judge day as well as um Mr Wilson from the public defenders office and although they had different perspectives they both said this needed some work and that they anticipated some amendments so for me as part of the fizer committee um I I had concerns with with supporting it because of all the issues that both judge day and Mr Wilson brought up um Luke I don't know if if any of that has been more finalized but I just don't think we should as a council be premature um with a position while while some of these issues are still being worked out and I can speak to that um I I do expect there to be a number of amendments when it does come to committee I do think that this is an important bill to bring back to the committee um and depending on on the conversations there it it could be possible to recommend to bring it back to council to have the whole the full Council weigh in so I would at this point I I personally would like to see what the amendments are on on Thursday May mayor can I speak um Council Lawson um and just a note just to make a note too this bill was very um controvers I mean we talked about it at CML and there was more of a position to basically see what those amendments were versus just AOS so that was even discussed at CML um before this was even brought to fizer as well so I just wanted to just put that little tidbit in there as well and let me just say if the Amendments get on as as hoped for uh certainly council could if they if there was a position of opposition they could certainly reconsider that and then be supportive of it but they'd have a basis and wish to be supportive of it mayor uh mayor pan yeah I would be opposed to this as well um I I had uh the district attorney John Kelner on my last Town Hall as well as um our Deputy Chief and and I invited them as speakers because my constituents were constantly contacting me emailing me about the rising crime and they were very concerned about the rising crime what was interesting was you know the deputy chief went through all the um the different crimes the increase in those type of crimes and what they were doing about them but it was interesting to get the da perspective because it went back to you know if criminals are a lot of the right or the rising in crime was attributed to repeat offenders and one of the things that came out was that since they're not you know they're not going through trial they're not being um you know they're not going not being put in jail that they are released and they are the same ones committing crime over and over and over and that's why uh a good reason why our stats are so high so I I I think we should take an opposed position wait for the Amendments as the mayor said and then we could take uh you know a support um or a neutral position further uh questions mayor counc I just want to say the whole point of having a position of saying monitoring a bill or pursuing changes through the bill sponsor is that we don't then have to reverse an opposed position or support position that we already had like that's why those positions exist and so I support the recommendation of the committee to use the tools we have available to us to take a nuanced approach and get good information about how this bill CH is over further discussion mayor Dave rber customer rber I disagree with that position entirely the reason we take an opposed position to a bill to a draft bill is to let the legislature know that the city council does not support what is in the bill currently our staff is current and our lobbyists are working with the legislature to modify the bill but the legislator the sponsors of the bill should understand that council is against it unless they make the modifications that we like for us to say that we we want to monitor a bill that we know we don't like gives up any I mean why why have a lobbyist why have anybody at all the position of the council is very very important as a bill is being introduced so again I recommend that that we do not support this bill further discussion I seeing none uh um I'm going to go through the role uh in terms of uh the question before us is uh is to oppose the the bill council member Lawson no no I'm gonna gonna oppose the bill council member Hils Council I'm the same as Angela the same as Angela not with the committee's recommendation C gr I oppose the bill so you're you're a yes on my motion okay uh Council Mard I oppose the bill okay CC member Mario I support the position to pursue amendments through the sponsor council member Johnson same as council member Maria all right council member bin I um I'm yes on your Amendment okay um council member conell I'm administer the sponsor I'm sorry amendments through the sponsor support the okay couns I support the committee's position mayor ptim um I oppose the I oppose I'm with your Amendment mayor see one two three four uh let's see we have Council Lawson council member hiltz Council Rio council member John council member Council M CS was six uh members in um opposition uh the motion fails although we don't do motions on it I don't get this study session stuff mayor ptim yeah just I just want when when we do a monitor we're we're saying we're okay with the bill we're just going to monitor see how it goes but we're okay with it I mean that's my understanding I just it's correct okay no this this is not a monitor position I was just that that is our position though it is a monitor position not it's pursuit to the bill to sponsor it's to it's to for amendments but but it's monitor it's not we're not taking position for or against no yeah no it's a mood question at this point because the the motion failed and uh misrepresenting the position is important respectfully are it's a you want to call it a neutral position is that what you want to call it no mayor no oh sorry I'll let council member Lawson no it is pursuing we're not saying that we support this the commit well most of the committee is not saying that we support this we're saying that we're looking at the the we're pursuing we're looking at the changes that are going to be made through the bill sponsor there are going to be changes made through the bill sponsor I guarantee you on this one because there's too much yeah but it's not a neutral position can't just say that we're going to support you're not opposed you're not opposed to the bill I well that's disagree that was the vote was whether or not you were opposed to the bill you're not opposed to the bill council member mayor can we have the record please reflect um in the minutes that the position that every council member took that did not oppose the bill outright was to support the committee's position to pursue amendments through the bill sponsor can you vote on the question that I put forward you you vote you can put another question forward but you voted on the question that I put forward and and my the the issue that I put forward was to be opposed to the bill mayor yes can I please make a motion to support the position of the committee I think it's a settled question city attorney's office we've just voted I mean okay very well just for time I'll let it occur um uh all those support of the committee's position um signify by um stating your name not all at once okays marono Johnston is there is there um further support for the fizer position very mayor I have a question council member G so a majority of council just said that they want to I guess monitor the bill but pursue changes so what what are those changes that we're pursuing or that we want to see happen that's probably a question for Luke but that seems pretty nebulous to me so I guess I'm curious yeah very well uh staff uh yeah so I we have a number of of people who are actively lobbying on this we have uh members of the city attorney's office who are pursuing who are working with CML on changing some of the language I know that judge day and public defender Wilson are also engaged on amendments so can we answer Mr Gardner's question can we get those sent to council then what the amendments were wanting to see happen because that it wasn't really clear to me from the fiser minutes either and and there might have been more discussion I admittedly wasn't there so yes I can I'll reach out to staff and and find out where they are with their proposals I I'm not sure that they have detailed proposals but I can I'll reach out to STA and I'm not sure if if uh anyone from the city attorney's office can weigh in in terms of their conversations that that they're having with CML and the bill sponsors because the point I'm trying to make is we're saying that we want to take a position to pursue changes but where are we defining what those positions are that we want to see change like that exactly well and And to clarify we're not um if we take a monitor position um staff cannot engage on the bill which is why we have the nuanced version of pursue changes through Bill sponsor when we come to committee too um typically we we just look at the bill as a whole we're not voting on specific amendments it's allowing our staff to to work on the bill but I will I will reach out to um all of those involved and get some clarifications and send that out to councel thanks May mayor mayor Pam yeah I was going to say the same same thing I would like to I mean unless you know what the amendment are I don't I have a hard time saying that you're pursuing the sponsor when you don't know what the amendments are they might I guess what what everybody else is saying is that then they will take a different position but the only amendments we're seeing is is what I'm hearing is the our City attorney with CML not not any other outside organizations correct I believe judge day is also working with the bill sponsor Senator Lee on some amendments he had he had discussed those I think during the fsir committee but I I don't know that the minutes reflected it okay um okay well that position will move forward uh on senville 62 to work on amendments that were that are not disclosed yet um but apparently we're discussed in committee um May uh council member B Hils council member H um on a on a separate related but unrelated item um since we're taking votes on positions that were made in committee I wanted to know if there was a point where I could maybe make a plug to move to neutral on the peace officers mental health bill that was voted on in committee I didn't know that was an option here and so I didn't bring it up then oh very well no okay do you want me to do that now or should I wait till the end of the update oh why don't you wait till the end um okay okay so right now we are I mean you always have I mean that's why it's be in front of study session whether or not we're can move these issues forward this um okay okay thank you um okay um let's see okay um uh I'm Number 3A approval of letter private prison contracts wait I thought I was gonna upate I was theend but go ahead that's okay um I I would like the committee to move to neutral on that bill or no and pursue changes um the the title of the bill and what's in the bill aren't um exactly lining up and with the city of Aurora's move to this Cahoots pilot with the intent to move away from a co-responder program um a bill that centers law enforcement in in that programming and that funding mechanism is I don't think the most appropriate course of action for us to stay in line with what we've already stated as our goals I don't have a problem with funding co-responder programs I I think they have good data coming out but looking at the state of policing in the United States in an aurora specifically having something that centers a law enforcement response when we've already had a lot of conversations around the balance of power when it comes to an M1 hold and fully funding programs and the fact that we do have those Alternatives there are several changes that I um have been in contact with the sponsors on on um and some other stakeholders as an individual person on things that I would like to see changed and I would I would really like to just see if maybe the council was interested in in moving to a neutral and pursue changes they they have been very receptive um to changes I anticipate we will see those changes um or at least some of them but you know in the wake of of sb217 to then turn around and make this type of response the default as opposed to the secondary option is just something that is counter to what we've already stated as a goal for the city council member h a question the the bill does not prohibit though uh the cahoot style response am I correct well well so the way that it's currently written um is that in order to apply for the this is my understanding as in order to apply you do have to have an officer on your board so even a community-based organization has to have that Nexus to law enforcement I've asked um twice now if because this is a peace officers funding mechanism if that will even allow for a non-p police Nexus type of funding and I haven't been able to get a response on whether or not that would be an allowable expenditure my guess is that because this is going through that that particular funding mechanism that that mechanism is going to require that Nexus to law enforcement and again this isn't about co-responder programs not being good programs I think in some places you know that that may make more sense but when it comes to local control even just to to make that be the default and not have that alternative it's undetermined okay further discussion mayor uh couns I just would like to support um that position put forward by council member he I think it's important that we be really thoughtful about how we're addressing mental health in our communities and it's pretty clear and I think we're all aware that uh mental health is not sufficiently addressed and frequently not best addressed through enforcement further discussion seeing n in the question before I'm sorry so I'm sorry can we go back and get and tell us what the position is I I think that it would oh it would be to go neutral and and pursue changes um I mean I would like to see a not support currently but I think I think the intention is there so even just a neutral position as opposed to an active is something that I'm okay with okay is there okay the the question before is to move to a neutral position uh may I pretend so if we move to neutral we're not making any recommendations for changes correct council member Hills I mean I have I'm personally as as an individual and working on some changes I think that's up to the full Council whether or not they would like to disc us pursuing changes as a council which of course I'm very open to and and happy to open that up um so I'll leave that to the full Council I would like to see changes pursued personally yes okay so uh may I mayor mayor prend so I mean if you want changes but that's why I guess I'm just wanting clarification because if if we if we go with neutral we're not proposing changes if we oppose then can we introduce changes to it sure yes okay further discussion uh the question we for us is to um to take a neutral position mayor uh Council Ms I would support the um the decision to also pursue changes provided that and this is a luk question is that if we say pursue changes is that something that needs to be done through staff that staff would be the ones pursuing the changes or can we as Council Define changes that we'd like to see I'll take that one yeah I when we when we go neutral of of course any council member is is able to advocate for or against a bill as a as a private citizen as council member hilts has said I think if we if we want to as the city take a position uh to to to work on the bill that's where we would want to officially be pursuing changes instead of NE or monitor would that be monitor then I I my understanding is we would want to officially pursue changes Monitor and neutral just I mean I monitor all the bills what do you what do you need what I if if if the council would like to seek amendments I would ask for a pursue changes position okay uh council member Hils that works for yep that works for me and Luke I'm happy to connect with you and fizer on what I would like to see and then of course the committee will will make that final determination continue as a person is there is there objection to pursuing changes object Dave okay further further objection uh seeing no further objection But but so noted with u CM r um our position will be to um I'm sorry what what is that position called L it's Pursuit Chang Pursuit changes very well okay I have question because this may I prend we've gone from opposed neutral to support to now and then back to the pursue changes which was the other one pursue amendments that we haven't seen um so you're sure a Pursuit allows us to recommend work on the bill work on the bill yes yes and I I think um in this scenario we don't we haven't defined I mean council member hilts probably has some ideas of amendments but the council as a whole I I don't want to get into a debate on each possible Amendment so I I feel that allowing the pursue changes is what gives us the ability to to then work with Bill sponsors lobbying groups things like that okay mayor mayor uh Council M Hills thank you yeah and and I would say um you know I I'm doing what I'm doing as an individual person and I think when it you know after tomorrow's committee there will be time between the time that it gets out of committee and goes to the floor so whatever comes out of committee I think we could talk about as a council just because I think there's that not enough time between now and then um and I'm happy to chat with anyone on Council about you know my specific concerns um in the meantime too so thank you very welcome thank you mayor for for having that time Dave grber coun grber so Luke I just have a question as far as um um people going in and making uh uh presentations to I I haven't worked at State Legislature before that's normal you know people sign up like they do in our uh for our meetings to make those statements yes okay yes and I can I can follow up with some details on on signing up to testify sure and I I um I may be signing up as well on Senate Bill 62 and certainly will identify that I'm not representing the city of Aurora but myself uh okay um item item number um 5A approval of letter regarding private prison contract C council member hilts I'm just very busy tonight um thank you this is also pretty straightforward it is just asking the Biden Administration to extend the uh private prison ban on to immigration detention centers um which should come as a surprise to No One um in the city so asking my colleagues to join in that support um question to the City attorney uh what is the threshold [Music] requirement and if a majority um a simple majority go ahead yeah it's a simple majority if a simple majority uh wants to pursue this the mayor would sign the letter for them I thought it was 10 you needed 10 do simple majority simple majority okay mayor uh mayor pretend so this is a letter to the Biden Administration to cancel the contracts with privately operated uh facilities detention facilities like goo but we this is a private company that's operated in the for example in Aurora ours I'll speak to the one that is in Aurora um do we even have that legal ability maybe the attorney can address that but the Administration has the authority federal government to shut down private facilities yes okay it's a it's a contract they can they can simply not renew or cancel the contract okay and that would be through Homeland Security specifically or um that's a good question I'm not sure I think it was through y because the detention facilities are under Homeland Security I oppose okay um let me go through the The rle Da grber before we go guys M grber I just wanted I I think um I know our president wants to hear from us and I know he's anxious to hear what the Aurora city council has to say um I suspect this is going to pass and and you'll sign it I just want to make sure and maybe this is to the City attorney that as if individual council members write a letter that specifically rejects this can those individual council members sign it as council members so say I disagree I disagree I disree with the letter you just got from the mayor and the Letter's policy set out in the council rules you always have the ability to express your opinion on that and we can do that as a group on a single letter absolutely thank you now what but um to the City attorney about what about using the city's letterhead I think that's the question and what you would do is you would not use the city letterhead you would use another letterhead but you could sign again saying your personal opinion and if there are multiple Council if so if it came out six in favor the mayor would sign on behalf of council but the other council members that were opposed to it could sign their own letter indicating that they're opposed okay very well mayor uh Council M comes um so if the mayor signs a letter on behalf of the rest of council can the mayor then also sign a letter taking the opposite position of the letter that was sent that's the only thing that sounds confusing to me about that whole process and that is a Unique Piece but but yes what the mayor is signing is this is the position of the city of Aurora he signing as the mayor a as as the representative for Aurora he may have his own opinion that's different further discussion mayor Garder council member Garder uh so a couple things um first I do agree with at least the the spirit of uh the letter and calling out private prisons in general I think private prisons typically have perverse incentives and um I would you know um I think that's something we should move away from generally um however I do want to point out out um you know executive orders and legislating the executive order was wrong when Trump did it it was it's wrong when Biden does it um that's not how we should be making laws or or driving policy in our country um and we have for too long allowed the executive branch um to make laws using executive orders and this is just another example of that um you know so I won't support signing this letter purely because um that this not the role of the the president is uh the legislative branch should be making laws the legislative branch should be uh fixing our immigration laws um you know probably instead of sending a letter to Joe Biden the letter should go to Jason Crow Congressman Crow and he should introduce a bill uh to make these these Corrections um so I just you know it's really frustrating to me the inconsistency of people who called out president Trump for issuing executive orders are now okay with uh President Biden doing the same thing that's it for me further discussion uh I see none I'm sorry bers council member B thank you um I'll I'll say Amen to you uh council member Gardner this should be going to Jason Crow that's why he that's why we uh have him in Congress is to represent Aurora um and honestly I think it's very inappropriate for us to call out a specific business uh and ask for it to be closed um I I don't think we should get involved in that I mean next time are we going to say I think you should close Amazon and Home Depot and um some other company because they're making too much money you know what what are we doing what are we what are we getting involved with but I I want to say how how hypocritical this is for people to be saying to close a company but those same people wouldn't stand up to our working men and women in Aurora to try to get their their companies back open when we sent a letter to Governor polus we only had five people out of 11 council members that signed that letter you wouldn't stand up for the working people to try to get them back their businesses back open and now you want to close a a a particular company I I don't get it I don't get it I hope the people at home are listening to what's going on in the hypocrisy of what's going on for the discussion May [Music] mayor thank you just wanted to remind my colleagues and the public that this company is engaged with egregious human rights violations and abuses that have been confirmed and pointed out in reports by ice and the government and also I have no problem asking for the Private Industry private prison industry uh to be shut down generally and I will stand by that and I I don't think that this industry and this particular business should be conflated with small businesses in Aurora because I think that's disrespectful to them to even equate them with the abuses that this company perpetuates mayor mayor uh Council mayor foron um and I just want to clarify my opposition because there's no solution so this is asking the president of the United States to you know cancel all contracts with private prisons and what's the solution we let all the the um I mean a lot of them that are in some of these private prisons have criminal records that could be a danger to society and so what do we do with them I think Denver kind of went through this and they didn't have a solution and I think they had to buy back the buildings that from the from the prisons that they had them in because they had no place to put the prisoners so I I think you know you don't you shouldn't do you should make law that you don't even have a solution for and I agree with council member Gardner this should go to the legislators not to the executive office further discussion um who Johnston May council member Johnson um I just want to to Circle back about the hypocrisy claim um just because C some the majority of council members supported the State Health Department cdph recommendations um as well as Tri count Health uh that that doesn't make us against small business we're we're leaning on the subject matter experts in a in a pandemic and then also we've heard since I've been on Council when we have issues about Geo is not our issue this is this is a federal issue why are we even talking about this and council member hiltz has been leading lots of efforts around this so she's bringing a federal issue Federal letter um to the executive branch that that can make that decision thanks uh further discussion mayor May Council Ms I can see that some of my colleagues are very amused that they dropped the rhetoric bomb and now it's getting responded to um but standing up for workers does not mean sending them into places where they could get a deadly disease that's outrageous to call it standing up for workers and there's nothing hypocritical about wanting to prevent human rights abuses and also make sure that workers aren't subjected to unsafe working conditions and diseases it's completely ridiculous and I'm glad you're amused that the response is further discussion I seeing none uh question before us is the support uh of the letter uh to President Biden uh to close um private prisons let me see um support letter for Biden's Administration effort to council contracts with privately operated Criminal detention facilities and request extension of executive order to private facilities engaged in the business of detaining immigrants um I'm going to call the role on this uh council member Lawson I support the letter council member Hils support council member grber I do not support and I'd like to know when you send this so I can send the counter letter okay council member Gardner oppose Council morio support council member Johnson support counc member bin no uh counc member mconnell support council member CS support May ponos mayor opposes uh um uh majority have Arisen in support uh so the letter will move forward my signature uh 5B temporary caps on fees for food delivery council member Garder so um thank you this is um essentially an extension um previously I brought Ford an ordinance uh to place a cap on delivery fees that was set to expire at the end of this month um you know the the really the the biggest reason for the extension is um the slow roll out uh of the vaccine um if everyone will recall uh a big part of the reason the honors for bringing this for originally was a lot of consumers were moving towards delivery because inperson dining was restricted um it has opened up some since that uh um uh original ordinance passed at the time it was 25% capacity now it's a 50% capacity um however um most most um uh kind of people that follow the the uh dial system expect the 50% to be in place for several more months um and this extends it kind of one more quarter through through June 30th um so pretty straightforward does the same thing is the the prior version um instead of expiring March 31st would expire June 30th discussion Dave grber uh Council grber just wanted to point out that um you know as we discussed when we initially uh pass this the ordinance that uh um the other side gets to decide too that's one of the military military rules is that whatever you do your enemy gets to the side too and as a result of that some of them raise prices uh on the delivery which again the impact was is that as opposed to taking that money out of the pocket of the restaurant the money is now taken out of the pocket of the person asking for the delivery and frankly I I think that's where it should be I'm going to support this with but I want to point out two things first we we are nearly approaching blue if we had if we haven't approached that already and we're talking about you know by the end of the quarter uh um you know we expect the restaurants to be fully operating um I guess the most important thing is is for us to let the companies know that the delivery companies know that this has a termination date so they stop uh taking the additional money from our residents uh as soon as this terminates so if we could um you know again if this passes again if the extension passes we go out to Door Dash we go out to the other companies to say on this date this is going to terminate please don't charge the consumers [Music] anymore further discussion I see none is there any opposition to moving 5B forward I see not it number 5D we'll move forward item number 5c letter over support for lgbtq uh communities uh in Metro districts Council mums yeah so um this actually is something that I worked with council member Johnson on she had brought it to my attention after seeing it in the Sentinel so I just want to thank her for that um I actually had a similar experience to what the individuals in this Metro District had with my HOA um also trying to prohibit me from having Pride Flags um on my personal property um I think it's really important as the letter indicates that we provide people with community support and that we also not have arbitrary rules that RIT free speech um so I will uh let Cy member Johnson weigh in as well C Johnson mayor thank you um yes I hope I hope my our Council can can support this um the ACLU is um currently um suing with West Whispering pin's Metropolitan District um on the basis of discrimination this includes um flags and signage um while the the resident eventually had to go through many steps and and get approval um then there was another arbitrary system to get through of having to renew that that request and you know in in these times it's it's bigger it's bigger than a flag it's bigger than a sign um it's about Community it's about supporting our neighbors it's about um our lgbtq plus folks not not being alienated and and separated because of um some signage that they want to have and you know council member kums and I and mayor proam mgan serve on Aurora Pride board and of course we've um made a lot of of progress with the city supporting our lgbtq plus Community by by supporting Aurora Pride but I think these are the moments too besides events um where we we need to show that that we support um in in these situations too it's just as important so I I hope that we can um send send this letter and statement um for our community for support thanks mayor mayor Pam yes um and I want to say that you know we talk a lot about working um in cooperation with each other as council members and in the spirit of cooperation I'm the Ward six council member Whispering Pines is in my ward I was not made aware of this issue um by either council member Johnston or uh council member kums and I'm you know I just I really wish you would have brought it to my attention I did serve on the pride board for the last two years I'm currently on it and um this is my w I would have you know appreciated a phone call a text an email um to discuss this letter of support um I will support this of course and furthermore you know I'm someone that believes in free speech I believe in a homeowner's right to to you know fly any flag that they want to fly and I just again I'm just I am kind of surprised that I was not even included in this discussion so I wanted to also just see if our attorney could um opine about the um legality of being able to fly a flag a flag of your choice u based on our first amendment rights in the United States Constitution uh City attor this is Brian rulu with the city attorney's office so the U the allegations in this complaint with Whispering Pines uh speak to a violation of the U the federal and state constitutions um which of course prohibit government interference with the freedom of speech and the the Nuance with this uh complaint is that this involves a Metro District which is a a qual governmental U and political subdivision of the state so that's That's the basis for the claim further further discussion well may sorry could you elaborate though because um based on the United States Constitution we have a right to fly a flag right but then you're saying that the Metro District being its own governmental entity can set forth its own rules and if a homeowner signs a covenant that they have to abide by those rules but this is different and different that the Metro District must allow the homeowner correct so under colado state law um you mentioned the covenants and uh HOA for instance and those operate a little bit differently because those are restrictions that a uh are put in the land by private contract effectively those are covenants that roam the land and that an HOA would enforce the distinction that is um at issue in this case is that this Metro District is the body that is enforcing those Covenants okay further discussion mayor mayor uh council member Johnson um yes I I just want to publicly and personally and I'll I'll give you a call Mayor proen Bergen apologize for not reaching out to you um there's no excuse besides it was a week from hell and we quick got this letter out and then I was exhausted and then I I should have reached out and I don't have an excuse I'm I'm sorry you have been quite an ally from supporting even having Aurora pride and having it in in the first place and in um Ward six and you've been definitely supportive and honestly it was just I I should have reached out and it was just quite a week so I just want to apologize for that and than thank you very much I really appreciate that further discussion mayor C comes so I just want to Echo that um mayor prend Bergen there was no personal reason for not reaching out or personal offense intended we whipped this together um kind of just back and forth within just a couple hours before we had to get it in to the packet um so definitely nothing that was intended to say that you don't support um you know I know that you do and I appreciate your on the pr forther discussion mayor council member gardo um I am G to sign on to this letter and I you know I'm glad that we're putting into writing um that we believe in people's ability for free expression and Free Speech because the day is going to come where somebody's going to fly a flag or put out a sign that we don't agree with and you know frankly you can't say you're okay with free speech if you want to shut it down when you don't like that speech um so I'm glad that we are putting this into writing and and saying that this council is supportive of free speech of our of our residents further discussion mayor Dave grber council member grber I support anyone who wants to fly the um any flag that they want again I see that as a freedom of speech issue but I would like to explore with the city attorney a little bit deeper uh the issue of a contract that has been signed between uh residents of a Metro District and the Metro District itself my understanding is is that the Covenant specifically says that due to the large number of flags that people may want to fly due to the diverse political positions that people want to take that we are simply not going to allow any of those within the Metro District other than the United States flag and those required by law campaign uh signs prior to an election so that contract was signed by the residents of the house that want to fly the flag and the Metro District could you describe the impact of that that legal contract because what we're essentially saying is city council wants the Metro District to override a legal contract that's in place and I'd like you to address the appropriateness of that and if I could BR uh yes so sign codes which include flags have to be content neutral so if you say none it's none uh except you know there there is a federal law regarding the American flag being flown and that's an exception if if you begin to have non content neutral if you have more exceptions or you have other issues that are going on any sign code the city sign code uh Metro districts or homeowners contracts on that issue can be challenged that's exactly what's Happening Here the city is not in this lawsuit at all the this is a this is a lawsuit by the person who wants to have their flag and and the district itself and what they're saying is you are discriminating based on content which is not allowed so so that's the issue in that in that case yes there's a contract but but again on Free Speech issues there there's contract neutrality that has to be a part of any any regulation that you're writing so Dan if I could go a little bit further on that then mayor yeah so Dan if I go a little bit further on that and I think council member Gardner brought this point up is that there speech that that um you know members May support and there speech that there's not so if someone decided you know if we if this is overturned and the legal contract between the the residents and the Metro District is overturned then that would also imply that if someone wanted to raise a flag you know said Bernie is my president or the Confederate flag or Thin Blue Line flag um in the same way that that um that the the gay rights play uh the pride uh um flag would be able to be shown uh any of those other uh uh opinions would be able to sh be shown as well is that correct that's correct until they until they write their sign or flag code their covenants in an appropriate way to be cont neutal okay thank you further discussion I see vers thank you um Dan um would this freedom of speech could this go as far as well this could this go as far as somebody feels like that they want their house painted green instead of tan so with this letter they could hold this letter up and say you know this is this is what I want to do go that no no because at some point painting the color of your house is simply a covenant it has no free speech issue uh that's associated with that so so no you can have H and again I want to be careful HOAs and Metro districts if you properly write your covenants and codes regarding signs and flags those can be enforced but the question is did they do it appropriately in this instance okay I I have one more question and I somebody should know the answer to this did Mr um Hendry take this to our Board of adjustments and appeals or did he just go straight to the Sentinel and Council because there there is a Middle Road that he could go I think he went to the ACLU now it's straight to the Sentinel and Council okay so he took it outside of the city instead of trying to solve it within the city further further discussion saying none the question before us is um support for uh is is is support for the letter of support for lgbtq plus communities in in in Metro districts uh is there any opposition to supporting the letter mayor I don't think we should be engaged in contracts between two parties very well I oppose oh further opposition I seeing no further opposition uh um with the um an adequate number of members having resident support um the letter will will move forward with my signature uh item number six call-ups of council policy committee items I seeing none miscellaneous items um see n oh council member grber mayor I'd like to uh I intend to bring to our next formal meeting a recall of Mr Harold Johnson from the uh Civil Service Commission uh there was information that I was made aware of uh after our vote for him that I would like Council to consider uh specifically the issue and and um if you can find this on both a Westward article from about 2015 as well as a cbs4 uh article uh and news story that they did in 2015 uh Mr Johnson was fired from the Denver Police Department when he spoke to us and on his his resume that he provided to us uh the resume said that under employment he listed retired Denver uh fire department uh that was not true he was not retired he was he was the Civil Service Commission of Denver had fired him also during questioning with Mr Johnson uh there was an issue uh or a question that was asked and when he answered he said well when I retired from the fire department now that we know that he was not fired and or not retired but he was actually fired by the Civil Service Commission and he did not rebut that he did not go back in and ask for a hearing a secondary hearing um I I believe that the council has no choice other than to bring that up for a vote and to determine whether or not we leave him on the uh count on the Civil Service Commission so I'll bring point of order to the City attorney and that is um um um how do how do we proceed with this does this uh it it is a a proposal by um cust member breber and so that then does it go before study session can it go straight to the floor what what's does where's the process procedurally my understanding of what council member guber just indicated is he wishes to use his prerogative to bring it to the floor under the council rules at the next meeting mayor uh mayor foron yes and I I agree wholeheartedly uh we were um not aware of of his termination I my question is so the city cannot resend the offer the council has to make that decision correct correct attorney okay City attorney as well if you could do a point on that my understanding is uh that only the city council can um um Can revoke the appointment terminate him from his appointment okay yeah C Council has the power to appoint and to take away that appointment now the the rules actually indicate here that you need eight votes to remove him from that position okay well mayor uh council member Johnson thank you um you know it's obviously a prerogative of a a council member to bring that forward um I if it is brought forward I want the opportunity for Mr Johnson if he should choose to respond I mean he's he's a private person in this position um I just because he did not appeal doesn't doesn't show any guilt he denied the accusations um we have a systemic institutional history of um not we the city um I'm saying Society perhaps the city perhaps Denver you can take it as as you'd like of you know putting putting people of color who've been in positions and having um false allegations against them and I I have a lot of concern with that he he interviewed well he has great perspective um I'm just not going to because of a a a news story and this have a reaction um I I'd like to give him that opportunity I understand if he doesn't I mean this is from 6 and A2 years ago and he's having to go through that not to say I don't take the allegations seriously but I think it's important to just also hear that side and hear that that that perspective especially um when there can be some some racial retaliation that could have happened mayor uh council member Garner that was marono I think oh Council marono thank you mayor um I would agree with that but uh from where I am uh where I'm sitting my what I'm most disappointed by here is that this could have been discussed in the interview and it was hidden from Council um until we were basically made aware of this uh through news media and I think that there was an opportunity uh to come clean with this situation to talk about how it might actually you know how they might have learned from this situation how it might have better prepared them uh for this kind of role to really make their case and to not hide anything from Council but that's not what happened and it's that initial dishonesty that I really take um you know account with so I think we need to do our due diligence here uh and make up for that mistake uh so I'll be supporting this when it comes before us mayor mayor mayor mayor Pim I just saying this is non-debatable uh this one we will have the opportunity to debate this on the floor uh mayor pretend oh okay well I was just goingon to agree with council member Marano that it was more the dishonesty it was in the media we will we will have that debate saying that we knew he said that we knew I'm sorry who council member hilts council member hilts thank you I I don't know if um he's listening in tonight but I think for me when someone comes with claims of you know racially motivated retaliation I believe that and I I don't find myself in a position of how and when they share that so um I I joined Council M Johnston I I don't feel comfortable moving on that now it is not a defense of his comments which were quite gross but at the same time I think there's a larger conversation here and and given our previous conversations about you know do people deserve a second chance and do we judge people based on things that they've said before I think that it at least warrants the opportunity for a discussion if he so chooses um and so happy to Echo that next time but you know saying that tonight as well yeah council member grer does not can can move forward independently on this this does not require a majority support uh there will be a vote on the floor um is are there further miscellane miscellaneous items I seeing none under there any items removed from the agenda if any none uh thank you Council um meeting a Jour all right good night everyone have a good night everyone [Music] he [Music] for