so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] hold tight i'll be here with you all night i'm getting lost in your eyes [Music] can you hear hear me me hear me [Music] i'm getting lost in your [Music] can eyes hear me can you hear me [Music] to [Music] close to me [Music] can you hear me can you hear me now [Music] [Music] do [Music] [Music] do [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] bye the regular media the aurora city council for monday march 8 2021 is called to order with the clerk please call the roll uh merrick if we could we do the announcements oh i'm sorry let's go ahead and do the announcement first for the call-in line all right thank you good evening the city council welcomes feedback from residents at council meetings on both matters appearing on the agenda and during public invited to be heard for those watching on channel 8 please call seven 855-695-3475 and when connected and for those already connected press star three to get in the queue to speak do not forget to use press the star before the three star three you will hear a prompt confirming you are on the line to speak to an operator and then be able to continue listening to the meeting until the operator comes on to take down your information and the agenda item you wish to speak on residents who would like to speak on a specific agenda item have not already been screened please press star 3 to sign up before that item is called by the clerk if you'd like to speak on public invited to be heard please press star 3 immediately to get in the queue those that press star three after we begin publicly invited to be heard will be placed on the public invited to be heard portion at the end of the meeting depending on the volume it may take a few minutes to be connected to the operator so please be patient as long as you heard the prompt after pressing star 3 and can still hear the meeting you do not need to press it again the operator will get you as soon as possible thank you uh will the clerk please now call the roll mayor coffman here mayor pro tem bergen council member berzins here council member coombs president council member gardener here councilmember grouper here councilmember hiltz councilmember hiltz here okay got you thank you councilmember lawson here council member johnston here council member marcano president and council member president there's a quorum with governor polis last friday on the west steps of the capitol on friday evening it was the year anniversary of the first individual who came down with coven in the state of colorado and we've lost a very significant number of people very tragically since that time so we're we're a little over a year now of uh of experiencing cobin so i would love us like us all to take a moment of silence to remember those who have been lost due to covet thank you and now would you please rise and join me in the pledge of allegiance i pledge allegiance to the flag the united states of america and to the republic uh executive session update we discussed we discussed uh matters related to water to economic development and to an expansion of arthur with that public invited to be heard clerk do you need time for that to set up for that mayor do we need to do the approval minutes first or no oh i'm so uh approval of minutes uh approval of minutes for december 21st 2020 uh a motion question to approve the minutes of december 21st uh to approve the minutes of december 21st i have one change on page 21 where it says uh mayor kaufman stated it was not a proposal and council and council was discussing a council member marcano's proposal actually it may have compensated uh this i mean i know it sounds minor but if you if you read the the um the part about it it will make sense so i just want to change then stated it to stated this was not a proposal uh is there any objection to that uh seeing none are there further amendments to the minutes from december 21st um councilman coombs just the motion was lost and not for or the second was lost and not bursting okay stand corrected uh um councilmember lawson seconded uh the motion to approve the minutes for uh december 21st 2020. um with the clerk please call the roll mayor kaufman yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember coombs yes councilmember gruber yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember marcano yes council member persians yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember mario yes councilmember lawson yes and councilmember hiltz yes the item passes we have a motion to approve the minutes for uh january 25th 2021 mayor so moved by councilmember gruber seconded by councilman coombs to approve the the minutes of january 25th 2021 uh discussion uh seeing none with the clerk please call the role on the adoption of the minutes from approval of the minutes from january 25th 2021. mayor kaufman yes councilmember johnston yes councilman marcano yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember mario yes councilmember grouper yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember hiltz yes councilmember lawson yes mayor pro-tem bergen yes council member coombs yes the motion passes um i need a motion for the um approval of the minutes from february 8th 2021. mayor moved to approve them some of why are we getting that feedback moved by council member grouper seconded by councilmember seconded by councilmember mario to approve the minutes of february uh 2021 discussion that's sitting down with the clerk please call the role on the approval of the minutes from february 2021 mayor kaufman yes councilmember johnston yes councilman lawson yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember gruber yes councilman member mario yes councilmember coombs yes council member hilts yes council member mercano yes council member gardner yes mayor pro tim bergen yes the motion passes public invited to be heard our first our first speaker tonight is judy you have three minutes go ahead good afternoon council i wanted to start off with talking a little bit about the eliza mclean report that came from your request the first thing i'd like to say about that is that i'm a little unnerved by the fact that the group writing in the report never went physically to the site where the incident took place it seems like they should have at least visited that if they wanted to complete a report that was accurate the other things regarding the report is nowhere in the report does it ever say that police or fire personnel murdered eliza mclean yet that is the narrative that seems to be out there going around and around that someone from the police department and members of the fire department need to be held accountable for that also with regard to what came through the report with regard to the actually with the coroner's report it talks about one of eliza mclean's heart blood vessels was 25 the size of a normal one which the coroner listed as contributing to his death another thing that was listed as contributing to the death was intense physical exertion caused by his decision to resist police but nowhere in there does it indicate that police officers caused the death through the carotid control hold the other thing that i'd like to talk about with with regard to the coroner's report is the therapeutic levels of ketamine the therapeutic levels range from 1.0 to 6.3 it appears that the level in eliza mclean's system was 1.4 so that would indicate that he did not die of a ketamine overdose and that is another narrative that keeps flying around out there that he was overdosed with ketamine but that doesn't appear to be levels of overdose the other thing i wanted to talk about with regard to that incident was how the group came to talk about the crime statistics in the area officers who regularly work in that area know that that convenience store that mr mclean was walking away from had been robbed multiple times now when there's in their statistics where they talk about the crime rates um that included headquarters all the people who call reports into the police department and those reports they get taken at the front desk are included in that crime rate so that would skew the crime statistics for that entire area so there is a bigger crime rate in the area that mr mclean was walking around in than as indicated in that report the only other thing i really have to say at this point is that i think the city and the police department need to stop pushing forward the narrative that eliza mclean was murdered thank you next up is crystal you have three minutes go ahead okay hi can you hear me go ahead yes okay um hi thanks for allowing me to speak this evening i am also here to comment on the elijah mcclane case and i'm just going to do a brief introduction of who i am i was raised in aurora pretty much my entire young life i attended war public schools k-12 i'm now in my 30s i'm a nurse i'm a mother i'm a wife support individual justice we want nothing more for justice to be served when it's when it's deserved i'm a believer in science in fact and while i have compassion a compassionate and empathetic heart i'm having a hard time with the plain case so i'm here today in response the false narratives and the lies that are being told our police department is being targeted i've reviewed the body footage in its entirety and keeping up with all of the news and the factions don't support the belief that elijah mcqueen was murdered by the epd or emergency personnel and like the previous commenters have said about the coroner's report you know while the carotid maneuver was used there's no rep there's no indication that there was any trauma as a result from these officers actions um these officers have been cleared by both the department and the district attorney the coroner's report showed that mclean didn't have any reasonable dose of ketamine in his system so that's clearing emergency response team so i guess i'm just here um just i just felt like i needed to say like it's absolutely devastating and an absolute tragedy what happened to mclean it was a perfect storm a series of very unfortunate events as judy had mentioned the area that this took place is statistically proven to be high in crime the convenience store to which he was walking from the history of being robbed the call was made by a concerned citizen and given all the facts the ap apd had every right to contact this person to make sure he wasn't one of the bad guys so just isn't this what we want uh from our from our law enforcement to make sure that the bad guys are not in our neighborhoods causing trouble i mean of course mclean was not not even close but being a police officer you do not have super powers to know this information ahead of time so there's a disconnect that i've seen um like an unreal expectation between our citizens and law enforcement and i guess we just need to decide do we want them to protect us or do we want them to leave us alone and not be proactive in keeping our community safe and we can't have gold so as i said before this is a very sad situation but the people continue to believe this fly and they just should not be accepting this unfounded allegation that elijah mcclain was murdered so thank you thank you for your time and all right next is suzanne go ahead suzanne you have three minutes hi um just quickly i wanted to recognize the council members on the council who identify as women on international women's day and i also want to speak to the legend of mclean case college mclean was not murdered he died there was a huge factual legal and emotional difference while in the end we found out that mr mclean was an innocent young man and his death was a terrible tragedy there is no way those officers would have known anything about him by just looking at him this is not the movie minority report it's real life they didn't know him convenience stores are frequent targets of robbers convenience store robbers often wear a mask to cover their face convenience store robbers often carry and display handguns or fake guns that look real to intimidate the clerks this is a group of data that police officers frequently encounter together colfax and billings is not a safe neighborhood it isn't the worst but it is well known to any officer on the department who has ever worked patrol that there are definitely criminals in that area and that those convenience stores are historically targeted by robbers so the officers that might got a call of a suspicious person near a convenience store wearing a mask that is a suspicious person and when they went to contact the person the person matching the description that person refused to cooperate with them now in retrospect we understand why however there was no way they would know that at the time if officers were trained to just let people walk away from them whenever they are contacting someone as a suspicious person hundreds of thousands perhaps millions of crimes would not have been interrupted and wanted persons not arrested for warrants from for everything from shoplifting to murder the ignorance of the general public and the hate-fueled emotional hysteria socialists have made a mockery of the truth in this case when i say ignorant i mean untrained inexperienced and misinformed the public does not generally understand perception reaction time the public does not generally interact with criminals on a regular basis and therefore doesn't understand all that goes into assessing a given suspicious situation the public doesn't understand how body-worn camera video is not an exact record and there can be problems with timing on sound and video framing the public doesn't generally spend six months in training or has any experience to use as a point of reference for reviewing police activity the public doesn't have the time to do the research to educate themselves and that is completely understandable but the public therefore cannot influence the decisions of police leadership or elected officials for that matter who should understand the whip and breadth of things the public does not know the truth is that sometimes god calls home someone home at a time and place that seems particularly tragic but that doesn't mean that anyone did anything intentionally wrong or even acted in error ma'am you're talking about a trial in the court of ignorant public opinion these officers have been villainized without merit thank you next up is doug you have three minutes go ahead i want to thank the city council for commissioning a recently released report the three conclusions they can draw from the report are that the police did not use any excessive force the firefighters did not overdose elijah on ketamine and nobody murdered elijah mclean according to the coroner elijah most likely died because he had a heart condition and the exertion he expended fighting the cops caused him to have a medical crisis that was his decision if he hadn't chosen to fight the cops he wouldn't have died from his heart condition but because he fought the cops he served if he'd survived he would have been arrested for multiple felonies he wasn't a sweet angel he was high in marijuana and possibly lsd which he'd used in the past lst couldn't be proven due to medical procedures after his death but his extraordinary strength and drive to continue fighting indicates that he was profoundly altered by drugs elijah mcclain decided to fight the cops for reasons known only to him during this he tried to disarm a police officer the police were restrained in the use of force against him there was no allegation in the recently commissioned report that the police excessive force there were no marks on his neck to indicate that the crawdad injured him in any way the police did not murder elijah mclean after the firefighters started treating elijah mclean he was given ketamine to calm them down the amount of drugs in this system after this dose was at the bottom of the clinical range he didn't die of a drug overdose he died of a heart condition the firefighters did not murder elijah mcclain the lie that elijah mcqueen was murdered continued to victimize his family in the city don't spread this lie don't entertain the lie the city leadership needs to push back against this lie with all their effort because elijah mcclain was not murdered thank you thank you next is uh jennifer jennifer you have three minutes go ahead good evening i'm calling regarding the william mcqueen case i am one of my main points is that if the city is unhappy if the city council is unhappy with the eight-second response time of officer of orchard then i would like them to request if they go through the city of awards shoot don't shoot virtual scenario training i think it would be illustrative to them as to how long it takes to truly make a decision and how easy it is to make the mistake as to whether human is or is not a threat according to the foreign there was no trauma to mr mclean's neck regarding the carotid hold there was an intense physical exertion that mr maclean participated in that contributed to his cause of death and one of his heart blood vessels was 25 is the size of a normal heart vessel which contributed to his death nowhere in the recently released report mentioned by this body was there mentioned that elijah mclean was murdered by anyone no police are fighting no there is no claim anywhere in the report that police are fire smelled murdered with some appointments officers have been cleared by both the department and the district attorney they did not order elijah in the claim officers who work in the area of colfax missions are aware that that convenience store has been rugged multiple parts in fact i believe one of the officers within the building street is murder street because of how many grants that take place on that street there is random undocumented street crane in the neighborhood focused around drug and alcohol use mentally and mentally homeless people who frequent the area the crime rate link map included in the report is deceptive some might wonder if it is deliberately disruptive the data set includes police headquarters which shows the most that shows up as the most crowning location in the city that is due to the fact that reports should will frequently be generated with the headquarters as the address for administrative reasons the inclusion of this address use the relative primary again some might wonder if this was done deliberately removing these numbers shows that the crime rate in the area of the reclaimed arrest are very high the swappiness of this including this address and will report consideration of crime rated data makes you wonder if the rest of the report includes such sloppiness ma'am your time is up writing the report thank you very much have a good evening thank you that concludes the people signed up for public invited to be heard uh the question we force now is the adoption of the agenda uh can i have a motion for the adoption of the agenda mayor dave river move uh it's been moved by councilmember seconded by [Music] to adopt the agenda the discussion and i have an amendment that i would like to move the last public invited to be heard that i would like to move item 20a and 20b after item 21 and item 20a is reported by the mayor item 20b as reports by the council that will give if a council member wishes to comment on any of the public invited be heard that would give them an opportunity to do so mayor pretend i object to that because we have as part of our general business of doing council business reports are done at the end of the meeting and we have public invited to be heard at the beginning we have public invited to be heard during any single uh agenda item and then we have an additional public invited to be heard at the end but reports um should be part of the the general business of the council okay first there has to be a second for my amendment or it fails by virtue of not having a second is there a second uh okay seconded by uh councilman combs uh further discussion on the amendment uh seeing none with the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of the amendment uh to uh put item number 28 and 20b after item number 21. mayor kaufman yes councilmember berzins no councilmember coops council member hilts yes council or mayor pro-tem bergen no councilmember lawson yes council member mario yes council member marcano yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember gardner no councilmember gruber no who knows okay the the motion passes with four no's married you're mute oh mayor dave gruber i like mick comment uh councilmember i would like to uh postpone uh our vote on 11 g which is the military family open and vote resolution the regulation has undergone significant change uh and it has been introduced to the education committee uh i would like to modify the uh resolution so it matches the amendment and then bring it up at our may 24th meeting uh is there any objection uh uh seeing none uh then that will oh sorry i just want to clarify may 24th not march may thank you that's march 20th march 24th well i mean may was fine as well with justin i think the legislature would be out of session of course i don't know this year yeah um objection just clarify okay uh no objection then um uh what item is that i'm sorry item number 11t id number 11g will then be on the um calendar of four uh march 24th uh are there further amendments uh seeing now the question before us is the adoption of the agenda as amended with the clerk please call the world mayor kaufman yes mayor pro-tem bergen mayor pro-tem bergen yes sorry this keeps bouncing on me councilmember lawson yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember grouper yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember coombs yes councilmember johnston yes yes councilmember maria maria council member hills yes the motion passes next uh uh item before us is the adoption of the consent calendar item number 10 a through f um a motion mayor move to approve items 10a through f uh it's been moved by councilmember gruber to approve vitamin 10a through 10 f a second second it's been seconded by council member mcconnell um discussion uh as seeing none when clerk please call the role on the adoption of the consent calendar item number 10a through 10f mayor kaufman yes councilmember burzins yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember gardner yes mayor pro-tem bergen yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember muriel yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember coombs yes councilmember hiltz yes the motion passes and may or do should we vote on item 9a for the reconsideration of the resolution oh i'm sorry um please read the title of item number 9a line a is the reconsideration of resolution 2020-24 to suspend certain council rules uh motion may remove to approve item nine eight been moved by council member gruber second by second uh council second by councilman mcconnell to approve item number nine a discussion uh uh seeing now mcclick please call the roll on the adoption of item number nine a council member hilt yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember coombs yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember gardner yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember johnston yes and council member yo yes the motion passes now 702 the council will stand in recess until 707 pm giving a staff time to set up to call in line we are now in recess [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] our council is now back in session uh public invited be heard mayor roger do you have anybody on the line uh public invited beer i think we already did public and ready to be heard okay there's not uh okay there's nobody on the line for that mayor right now okay well we have another one listed uh resolutions with a clerk please read the title of item number 11a 11a is the intergovernmental agreement between aurora and colorado department of transportation resolution 2021-1 a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado proving the integra governmental agreement between the city of aurora and the colorado department of transportation cdot for funding of the highline canal trail project motion a discussion uh seeing none with the clerk please call the roll on councilmember berzins yes councilmember coombs yes councilman gardner yes councilmember mcconnell yes member mario yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember hiltz yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember johnston yes and councilmember gruber yes the motion passes now please read the title bottom number 11b item 11b is resolution 2021-11 a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado approving the intergovernmental agreement between the city of aurora and arapahoe county regarding gun club road and alameda avenue improvements motion here remember motion to approve 11b removed by uh mayor protects johnston okay it's uh i've been moved by um uh mayor patron bergen seconded by uh councilmember johnson to approve on number 11b uh discussion uh saying none uh with clerk please call the roll on the adoption of item number 11b councilmember gardner yes councilmember johnston yes mayor pro-tem bergen council member marcano yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember hilts council member mario yes council member coombs yes councilman gruber yes and councilmember lawson yes the motion passes now please read the title about number 11c 11c is resolution 2021-12 a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado approving an intergovernmental agreement for water delivery between the city of westminster colorado and the city of aurora colorado acting by and through its utility enterprise motion mayor councilman congratulations enough to approve 11c uh it's been moved by councilman mcconnell seconded by ems because of our clues to approve our number c discussion a scene known by the clerk please call the role on the adoption of item number 11c councilmember coombs yes mayor pro tim bergen councilmember marcano yes councilmember berzins yes council member mario yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember hilt council member johnston yes councilmember gardner yes the motion passes well with glue now please be in the title bottom number 11d 11d is resolution 20 21-13 a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado expressing the roar city council support for the intergovernmental agreement between adams county colorado legal services the cities of aurora thornton federal heights brighton commerce city westminster and north glen and the city and county of broomfield regarding contributions toward a landlord-tenant legal service program motion mayor councilmember combs move to approve 11d move by councilwoman calling second or by second sorry i'm sorry um yeah second by council member hilts council that's moved by councilmember seconded by councilman uh to approve our number 11d discussion mayor uh mayor burton yes um and i want to say that although this is a good program i will not be supporting it because i don't believe in using taxpayer dollars for legal services to not to another organization further discussion yeah uh councilor combs can we have staff briefly describe what the program does please um jessica presser thank you mayor just a brief overview of this item again an intergovernmental agreement with the different jurisdictions within adams county to provide eviction prevention at the county level through the court system this uh iga covers the cost of trained attorney and paralegals to work with folks um to provide uh different options for folks to help either prolong eviction or prevent eviction uh and uh there's been about 68 households that have been served in aurora over the past few years and so this is uh continuing those services as described in the question before is the adoption i have a question manpower tim yes uh can you tell us if we have a rental assistance program and how much monies have gone towards that program to help with evictions sure so councilmember bergen we do have a rental assistance program that we did start back in june of 2020. we've used a variety of different funding sources i can't recall the numbers exactly offhand but i believe we're up around about 680 different households that have been served within aurora with a few million dollars and they're gonna be around three million dollars served at this point and that is ongoing um and we're getting ready to work with this state as well so if folks do need rental assistance or landlords have tenants that have not been able to pay that program is available and ongoing and the information is on our website great thank you so much i appreciate it further discussion uh sitting now in the question before says the adoption of item number eleven d with clerk please call the roll councilmember berzins yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember hiltz yes councilmember coombs yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember gruber yes mayor pro tem bergen no councilmember gardner yes councilmember johnston yes and councilmember mario yes the motion passes without now please read the title to item number 11e 11e is resolution 2021-14 a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado to fund the committees crisis center inc for the year 2021 using marijuana sales tax funds motion may remove to approve 11 by uh councilmember gruber seconded by second by councilmember coons to approve our number e uh discussion but seeing none when clerk please call the role on the adoption of item number eleven e councilmember lawson yes council member hilts mario is muted yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember berzins yes council member yes council member gardner yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember coombs yes mayor pertin bergen yes councilmember gruber yes the motion passes well clark now please read the title bottom number 11f 11f is resolution 2021. a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado expressing the aurora city council support for the 2021 funding of aurora comprehensive community mental health center inc homelessness prevention and assistance programs motion mayor uh the council member comes move to approve 11. it's removed by council member coulomb second and by second councilman o'connor to approve item number 11 f discussion seeing none uh with codependent role on the adoption of item number 11f councilmember lawson yes councilmember mario yes council member marcano yes mayor pro tim burgin yes councilmember coombs yes council member gruber yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember hilt and councilmember berzins yes the motion passes um when the clerk now please read the uh okay uh item number 11 g has been uh postponed until uh march 24th uh uh during the regular meeting 2021. with the click now please read the title item number 11 h 11 h is resolution 2021-17 a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado approving the first amendment to intergovernmental agreement between the city of aurora arapahoe county and south aurora regional improvement authority regarding gun club road improvements mayor motion uh mayor for tom bergen motion to approve eleven eight moved by uh mayor pretend bergen seconded by gruber second by councilmember gruber to approve item number 11-8 discussion are seeing none with the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of item number 11 each council member hilts councilmember johnston yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember yes councilmember gardner yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember coombs yeah councilwoman gruber yes councilmember berzins yes that the motion passes please explain number 11 i understand it has to be divided in two parts yes ma'am item number 11i is a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado amending the contribution rate to the fire police pension association defined benefit plan administered by the fppa for re-entry firefighters and establishing the contribution rate for the fppa hybrid plan and fppa money purchase plan this resolution was split into two separate resolutions there's originally one so there's going to be one that applies to re-entry firefighters in the statewide defined benefit plan and the other resolution that applies to all other firefighters uh if we could have a motion for the first resolution to re-entry firefighters in the statewide defined benefit plan let me ask the question of the city attorney and that the fact is that we haven't noticed this earlier could you explain the legal ramifications of that and it's contained in our the entire both resolutions are contained in your package so they're both there they're both showing you're simply splitting the vote into two pieces okay so uh the clerk just read the uh title for 11i okay am i correct yes okay motion on eleven eye mayor dave gruber move to approve eleven i part ah i'm sorry if it's broken in two parts uh is is that acceptable with the clerk of the city attorney yes with the city clerk it is 11 a 11 11 a 11 um 11i 11 and i part b okay uh uh motion on 11 11 i part um a uh to approve uh 11i uh day part a uh discussion uh sitting down the question before saying is the adoption of uh 11 i part a uh with the clerk please call the role council member gruber yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember mario yes councilmember hiltz yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember coombs yeah council member gardner yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember lawson yes and councilmember marcano yes for the first resolution 11 ia okay now please read the title of item number 11 i part b so 11 i part b would be it's the same resolution but this one applies to all other firefighters versus the one that you just voted on applies to re-entry firefighters motion mayor uh councilmember mcconnell move to approve 11 ib moved by uh councilmember mcconnell's second one uh councilmember coombs to approve item 11i part b uh discussion uh sitting down with clerk please call the roll on the adoption of uh item number 11 i part b councilmember lawson yes councilmember hiltz yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember coombs yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember johnston yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember mario yes councilmember berzins yes and councilmember marcano yes the emotion passes will the clerk know please read the title vibe number 11 j item 11j is a resolution 2021-19 a resolution of the city council of the city of aurora colorado to award city funding from the city's homelessness program to the aurora flexible housing fund program for 2021 at the current funding levels motion mayor uh councilmember comes to approve my council by councilman coombs governor lawson to approve on number 11 j uh discussion mayor mayor bergen yes in our presentation that was given during the study session we had discussion on data and outcome measures i just was wondering um when would we get that report please just a compressor [Laughter] so councilmember bergen um we are changing the program up quite a bit based on the audit report and findings and so we can certainly provide you numbers from this past year from 2020. it's going to not be as accurate because of covid and we have been doing rental assistance and other things during this year but we can certainly get you some data from this past year we have had the program on hold since about october due to the rental assistance and making changes to the program so the accurate data will probably be reflective of 2021 once we reopen the application um after this is approved okay so we can get data for the what the portion that you have for 2020 and then in 2021 would we get it in december yes we can do that at the end of the year we'll be absent a couple months but certainly we can um we can provide an update even before then as well okay great thank you the time is now 7 28 the council will stand in oh no okay um a further discussion uh seeing another question before says the adoption of vibe number 11 j will the clerk please call the roll uh councilmember hiltz yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember marcano yes council member mario yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember coombs yes councilmember lawson yes member berzins yes councilmember johnston yes mayor pro tim bergen yes the motion passes uh the time is now uh 7 29 the council will stand in recess uh until uh 7 34. roger can you do the announcement for the call in line please yes thank you residents who would like to speak on an ordinance and have not already been screened please press star three now and before the item is called by the clerks well if you're in line and would like to speak on an item an ordinance please press start three now for those watching on channel eight please call eight five five six nine five three four seven five be connected and then press star three don't forget the star council will take a short five-minute break to allow for additional speakers to sign up again be patient and stay on the line until an operator is able to take down your information as long as you hear the prompt after pressing star 3 and can still hear music hold you are in line to speak to an operator thank you [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] do [Music] [Music] okay uh the regular meeting of the year city council is reconvened uh please read the title of item number 14a item 14a is ordinance 2021-08 an ordinance of the city code of the city of aurora colorado adding an article to chapter two of the city code pertaining to the regulations of lobbyists mayor a discussion mayor all right councilmember lawson um mayor um we had a pretty robust uh discussion about this at the study session next last week but i'm bringing this forward because this adds another transparency tool in our transparency toolbox that will allow the public to know how we're making our decision-making who's in our city how we're being influenced and i think that's really important in terms of gaining more public trust and also and um okay and um actually uh allowing the public to know what kind of lobbying activities are being influenced by us on council so i hope that my colleagues will support this um this ordinance thank you further discussion um mayor pretend mayor uh pro-tem bergen um what did we get a second i i do oh was there i'm sorry was there a second uh yes mayor that was me oh councilman mcconnell was the second that's right okay um just uh uh regarding the 501 three season fours um so i just want to be clear if it's a non-profit that is lobbying us for money for a program they would have to register correct that is correct okay thank you councilmember lawson further discussion seeing none the question before says the adoption of number 14a with the clerk please call the roll councilmember combs yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember mario yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember hiltz yes mayor pro tim bergen yes the motion passes well sorry now please read the title of item number 14b item 14b is ordinance 2021-09 an ordinance of the city council of the city of aurora colorado amending article 2 of section 130 of the city code relating to exempting menstrual care products from sales and then use tax motion uh counselor holds motion to approve 14b it's been moved by councilmember hill seconded by second partner councilman gardner to approve item number 14 b uh discussion let's see um councilman hills i was just going to say this did not have a robust discussion at study session so i don't have anything to add other than i think this is a good day to be having this conversation so thank you further discussion as soon as the question before says the adoption of item number 14b with clerk please call the roll council member gardner yes councilmember lawson yes council member yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember hiltz council member coombs yes mayor pro tim bergen yes council member berzins yes councilmember marcano yes sorry councilmember johnston yes the motion passes well clearly now please read the title of vibe number 14 c item 14 c is ordinance 2021-10 for an ordinance of the city council of the city of colorado amending chapter 26 adding article 3 referred to as temporary caps on fees for food delivery and other related matters uh motion mayor councilmember gardner uh motion to approve item 14c removed by councilmember gardner seconded by um councilmember cools to approve item number 14c uh discussion mayor um airport bergen yes i support this just a question on is there an end date oh it says june 30th correct that's correct thank you uh further discussion i've seen none question before says the adoption of entrepreneur 14c with clicker please call the roll councilmember lawson yes mayor pro tim bergen yes did you get that yes thank you councilmember hiltz yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember gruber councilmember johnston yes councilmember coombs yes and council member mario yes the motion passes will clear now please read the title of item number 15a item 15a is ordinance 2021-07 an ordinance of the city council of the city of aurora amending article 4 of section 130 relating to the modification of the exemption for long-term lodging motion mayor move to approve 15a it's moved by uh councilman gruber second by second councilmember mcconnell to approve item number 15 a uh discussion see you know with cleveland please call the roll on the adoption of item number 15a mayor pro-tem bergen yes councilmember muriel yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember burzins yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember coombs yes councilmember hilts the item passes third now please read the title vibrant number 18a item 18a is a reconsideration of resolution 2020-22 review of the powers granted to the city manager by resolution 2020-22 motion councilmember mcconnell to provide number 18 a um discussion a sitting down when the college please call the role on the adoption about number 18a councilmember gruber yes councilmember mario yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember coombs yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember gardner yes councilmember mercano yes councilmember hiltz yes councilmember lawson yes and councilmember berzins yes the motion passes look now please read the title of item number 19a item 19a is consideration to reappoint two members of the planning and zoning commission and schedule interviews for one vacancy mayor uh mayor tam bergen uh yes motion to uh reappoint esther tercius and gail uh jetchick to the planning and zoning commission uh further nominations nope uh seeing none the question before us is the adoption of i'd like to second that okay oh i'm sorry uh it's been uh moved by um mayor den bergen sector by councilmember gruber uh to approve item number 19a uh further discussion uh so you know when clerk please uh call the role and the adoption of item number 19a mayor kaufman yes councilmember marcano yes councilmember coombs yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember gruber yes councilmember gardner yes member johnston yes council member yes councilmember hilts and council member persians yes the motion passes to reappoint esther and gail to the planning and zoning commission code now please entitle live number 19b item 19b is consideration to appoint one member to the aurora commission for seniors mayor uh mayor pretend bergen motion to appoint george bain to the aurora commission for seniors second uh it's been been moved by councilmember bergen second by uh councilman raccoons um bill point um george bain uh to the aurora commission for seniors uh further discussion uh seeing none uh with the code please call the role and the adoption of item number 19b let mayor kaufman yes councilmember yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember marcano council member marcano i think you're muted yes thank you councilmember mario yes it's a member gardner yes member gruber yes councilmember johnston yes councilmember hiltz yes yes mayor pro-tem bergen yes councilmember coombs yeah the motion passes to appoint george bane to the aurora commission for seniors glory now please read the title of it number 19 c item 19c is consideration to appoint one member to the aurora fox arts center advisory board motion mayor councilmember mcconnell move to appoint judy josso to the aurora fox advisory board second is there a second mayor uh it's been moved by councilmember mcconnell seconded by uh councilmember coombs um discussion uh so you know with the clerk please call the role in the adoption writer number 19c mayor kaufman yes uh councilmember coombs mayor pro-tem bergen yes that's the member of grouper yes councilmember hiltz councilmember marcano yes councilmember mario council member mario yes councilmember berzins yes councilmember lawson yes councilmember gardner yes and councilman johnston yes the motion passes to appoint judy to the aurora fox arts center advisory board right now please read the title vibe 19d item 19d is removal of council appointees to boards and commissions and removal of civil service appointees and mayor we do have one individual who is in line to speak for this in the call in line uh very well but let's have a motion first please mayor by councillor berber i hereby move the removal of commissioner harold johnson from the civil service commission as a consequence of falsifying information on his application and during his interview for the position second is there a second second gardner uh it's been moved by councilman grover second by uh uh councilmember gardner to approve on number 19 d um the calling uh public invite to be heard one moment roger you're unmuted now and you have three minutes go ahead well jan are you muted on your phone you are live can you hear me we can't go ahead can you hear me okay yes um mr johnson was unanimously approved to serve on the aurora civil service commission i've had the opportunity to hear from mr johnson do some research and learn more about him and i believe that he should be allowed to serve his full term in the aurora civil service commission all right thank you further discussion mayor dave gruber congresswoman so the fundamental issue is that the members of the um of the civil service commission must be beyond rep their integrity and character must be beyond reproach and that's where we have an issue here so during the um interview process for candidates we were not aware that mr johnson had been terminated by his previous employer the denver fire department so what he what happened was is that on his resume or on his application under employment he listed that he was retired from the denver fire department and then during questioning uh he was asked specifically and in response to a question by council member coombs he said that as a black man who tested for my position with the denver fire department when i retired i left with the rank of captain that was demonstrated and demonstratedly not true because he did not retire he was terminated furthermore during other questions by other council members uh mr johnson again missed the opportunity to clarify the fact that he didn't retire and that he was terminated what i would like to do i don't i think it's important for the public to understand that um mr johnson went through a major process with the city of denver city and county of denver and the city and county of denver came with a you know came up with a finding and we're not going to debate that finding tonight that's not our position but it is important i think for the city council and for the public to understand why i'm bringing this forward this information was made available to me uh after our the meeting where we nominated him and by the way i'd like to mention that he was nominated and he was elected on to the council on to the commission unanimously so once this information came to light um i apologize for not knowing it sooner but i believe that that the only thing we can do is take action to remove him so this letter was from uh christopher lujan deputy director of the department of public safety of the city and county of denver it's a departmental order of disciplinary action for harold johnson who at the time was a captain in the classified service on the denver fire department captain johnson this is before the deputy director of the department of safety to approve disapprove or modify the chief of the denver fire department's recommendation involving you on 7 july 2015 the chief of the denver fire department tendered his recommendation of final disciplinary action where he determined that you should be terminated from employment with the denver fire department and the city and county of denver the basis for chief tade's recommendation is that you violated several of the denver fire department code of conduct rules guidelines and directives when you won dangerously compromised the safety of others in the department through the negligent performance of duties two exhibited extremely offensive lewd facilities and disrespectful communication to staff and three lied to internal affairs about a firefighter's request for representative representative from his her direct supervisor in a meeting that you ordered with her in chief tate's recommendations he found that you engage in a gracious misconduct that resulted in the violation of 13 departmental rules for which the appropriate penalty shall be termination personal to my review of all the facts of the case the verbal and written statements made by you and other witnesses and the evidence collected by the department i find by the preponderance of evidence that you did violate 13 departmental rules and based on the seriousness of your actions a penalty of termination is appropriate so again i don't think it's appropriate for us to debate uh his his uh termination i've spoken with mr johnson and mr johnson uh claims that these events didn't happen and that he was treated unfairly by the city and county of denver and i think that uh for those that are interested if you google his name at the denver fire department you'll see several articles uh that have been written about him and about what the accusations are my point is is that we do not have the personnel records we do not have the ability to call witnesses and furthermore it is not the responsibility of the aurora council to determine whether or not the decision from the city and county of denver was made appropriately what we are responsible for is identifying whether or not someone misled or lied on their uh first off on their application to the city and second interverbal testimony to the city in both these cases i believe well it's not i believe mr johnson did in fact misrepresent his how he left the city and county of denver and i believe that that greatly affected uh the vote for him uh further discussion mayor uh councilmember johnson thank you mayor i will not be supporting councilmember gruber's proposal to remove mr johnson when this first came to light i said that it was important to hear from mr johnson hear his side of the situation um and and get that information he we do not have on our application if you have been terminated we do not have if you've been disciplined when i'm looking for a civil service commissioner i want a person like mr johnson who has the experience of a being a civil service employee and you know we have to we can talk about reforms and changes that we need to make to our department to our recruitment to all of those processes and when mr johnson interviewed he he interviewed and was was the top applicant he was my number one choice and i'm not i'm not going back to change that i think that if we really want to make changes in the type of people that we get into the academies on the discipline hearings and all of that that we need to have someone with mr johnson's experience i know that council member gruber said we're not going to go into this the the situations that mr um johnson ended up leaving the department but he still put it out there and he said to google and then with that you still get one side you get that perspective of you know the media take on take on it um the fact is is that you know it takes a lot of money and resources to appeal a huge system there are you can also google denver fire department the city of denver and institutional racism and discrimination and you'll find information on that as well so i really hope that that my colleagues can remember the interview that mr johnson had he was accessible to all of us to talk to i've reached out also to people who know him i believe him and i will not be supporting the effort to to remove him from the commission further discussion yeah councilman gardner thanks mayor um so a couple of things um first i want to read from the city of aurora employee handbook about halfway through that document it states the intentional or knowing falsification misrepresentation or material emission of facts including but not limited to city insurance documents and other city forms employment applications personnel records time reports information pertaining to an official investigation including but not limited to making full disclosure of facts known by the employee to any investigator in an investigation conducted or requested by the city and lastly any information related to city business and and why that's important here is as as classified by the city of aurora hr department civil service commissioners are temporary employees of the city per the city handbook uh giving false information on an application or any other information related to city business is punishable by termination now you know in this case on the application he actually didn't have to put in that he was retired um he could have put his dates of employment uh with the denver fire department uh but but he chose to put in that he was retired um in addition when questioned uh during his interview process again reiterated that he was retired so both in writing and verbally he violated our employee handbook and why that's important here is a regular city employee and i use that term in quotes would be terminated for giving false information on an application now in this case this individual is a council appointee so of course it becomes a political process and the normal rules that apply to all other city employees won't necessarily apply to this person and i think that's wrong you know we're going to probably hear several strong man arguments tonight about how this has to do with council not wanting to give second chances and and things like that and you know frankly um those who come forward and state their heirs and their mistakes in the past those that have said i want a second chance i've messed up in the past that's who we should give a second chance to uh recently there was a potential city council candidate uh in the aurora sentinel who stated i have a record and i have left that in the past and i i want to be different um as as councilmember marcono stated last week the individual that applied for the civil service commission uh had every opportunity to state that he was terminated he could have given the circumstances around his termination he could have explained why that termination was wrong why he was unjustly terminated and then said why he is going to be different in the future and he could have explained why his expertise and his past experience is important for the civil service commission going forward instead he chose to list himself as retired he verbally stated that he was retired and in fact in a media interview indicated that he reached out to an attorney to determine if he could list himself as retired thus acknowledging that he knew he was being studied this isn't about second chances this is about an individual who is by classification from the hr department a city employee giving false information on an application that would result in termination for every other city employee but by the mere fact that this is a political process this individual will most likely keep his role on the commission because of politics thanks further discussion yes mayor uh mayor tim bergen uh thank you mayor and i i'm very troubled by this because i did vote for mr johnson um to be on the civil service commission i had no idea that he had been terminated from the fire department um in the city and county of denver and i learned about that after we made the appointment what troubles me is that he did state on his application that he was retired as previous council members have stated as well as in the interview and then in a media report he actually said that our council knew that he was terminated and and that we still appointed him and i had no knowledge i think none of my colleagues had any knowledge of that as was stated um you know what's really important is this is a civil service commission it's a really critical position where honesty and transparency and objectivity are very necessary you this position um is a commissioner making decisions on hiring people to the police department to the fire department and they're they are looking for some of those attributes that would make them um valuable to the city of aurora the type of people that we want to work for the city of aurora not only do they make those decisions but they also participate in disciplinary hearings and i i really doubt that he could be objective in those disciplinary hearings and even if he could i think it it taints it because someone who comes forward in a disciplinary hearing will probably um you know could probably sue the city for um for a decision made if it was not in their favor um i i i want to read what was in uh the termination letter because this is troubling to me um in his termination letter the department wrote that he was being cut loose due to your repeated use of racial epithets epitomes your pornographic and sophomoric comments at work your demeaning treatment of women your commitment to your personal cell phone over your duty to your crew and citizens and your inability to tell the truth have no place in the denver fire department or department of safety that is concerning to me because of the falsehoods on the application and in the interview and then this being such a critical appointment and i i really had hoped that mr johnson would just withdraw his application and i'm sorry that i you know had to read that because it's it's i'm sure humiliating but that that has to influence my decision as to who we should put on um such an important commission so um i'm sorry but i will be voting to to remove him from the commission versus adoption of item number 19a councilman coombs we didn't hear you ask for further discussion and i think there is i understood further discussion um so i have got some overcomes um i think that when we listen to the kinds of things that were written and even the tone of how they're written um it brings into question for me whether we can really say definitively that those were not that the termination and the approach to mr johnson johnson's termination was not um you know what he claims it is which is character assassination grounded in issues that people had with him that superiors had with him um and we you're right uh councilman gruber we don't have the personnel files um so all we have is the media's word and mr johnson's word and i don't think that we should allow for a person's character to be assassinated and partake in doing so um based on only partial information and so i'm not going to be and as far as the subject of whether or not he lied again he did not he was not asked did you retire so i think claiming that he intentionally lied and withheld information is also unfair um so i am not going to support his removal further discussion mayor councilman gardner it is factually incorrect that we are relying on a media report we have the several page termination letter from the denver fire department listing out the reasons for his termination so to state that the argument in favor of removing him from the civil service commission is based solely on media reports is is incorrect um and i think that's that's really important to point out uh this is not based purely on media reports further discussion later uh councilmember lawson um originally i um i had an issue with what um mr johnson had put on his application that he was retired i actually contacted because i had to think this through actually contacted mr johnson today um before our meeting and had a long discussion with him and like councilmember gruber said there are we don't have the personnel on file so there's no prove or defend type of issue there however i do believe that there is something um with that termination um and again it depends on what you believe in the letter i i i believe mr johnson on some things that he has told me about that particular situation um i will listening to him um i think he gave good answers i don't think you can always believe what the media puts out because the media is always going to get the high profile stuff out of whatever the issue is without really knowing the in-depth of situation that's going on and again originally i was going to go for termination of mr of not allowing him on the civil service commission but after talking to him today and looking at and discussing with him the issues and he actually addressed my questions very bluntly and i think as council members we did not ask him the question and i mean that's the onus of whoever however you want to defend your your questioning were you terminating me if that's a question that we need to address but i think what i think for me he has provided he will be good on the commission i think when you look at um you can't just say well because he did this and it's not a good thing but i do think that there are some circumstances behind that particular issue so i was going towards actually not supporting mr johnson on the commission but after i had a long conversation with him and really discussed the issues and concerns i had i will be supporting him continuing on the civil service commission further discussion mayor david uh councilor so i just want to point out the irony of what we're discussing here because it sounds like mr johnson has the votes to stay we need a super majority uh to remove him and based on the people talking we don't have that but again the irony of this is is that we are appointing mr johnson to the civil service commission and giving him the authority to write the reports that were used by the city and you know very similar to the process in the city and county of denver but to write the reports uh from the city like the city and county of denver to remove officers or to revoke the appeal of officers and firefighters who have lost their job in the city of aurora so what we are saying by not believing and again it's not a media report media wrote their reports off of the written reports by the city and county of denver but what we are saying here is that we don't believe the fire department and i've spoken to mr johnson too and i heard what he had to say and and frankly i you know i'm i'm a retired air force colonel i've had many people work for me before and you sometimes you have to take what people say with a you know again with a grain of salt this board that reviewed him was the civil service commission in denver it was the senior leadership of the police department and to to target to fire someone who is who has risen to the rank of captain will require the support of the mayor the mayor won't write the letter or sign the letter but the mayor will give permission for one of the underlings in the city to sign that letter so again the irony of us putting a person on city on our civil service commission and giving them the authority to write the letters that we are saying we do not believe from the city and county of denver is is ironic um yeah thank you i think everyone's pretty much covered i'm also not going to be supporting the removal um from the get-go i thought that you know there was more to this and that it was important to get his side of the story i didn't know if that was going to be in a study session or with one-on-one conversations i also had a conversation over the weekend and will not be supporting the removal or the rescinding of the appointment whatever the terminology is further discussion mayor uh councilwoman thank you as all of you all know i was originally strongly in support of removal um i did have a chance to speak with harold on a couple of occasions i've probably spent about an hour and a half with him on the phone over the last since really this whole thing began um and i have to say what he told us or me rather um was compelling because i have had similar situations with people in my own family people in my friend groups uh deal with and i've had you know some questionable things happen on the job in my best as well um i i strongly empathize with what he uh with his side of the story so my original biggest gripe was that this is you know i hate finding out basically about the stuff through news media this was not disclosed early on it's not part of our process and i think that that's something that maybe will that we frankly definitely should change uh so that folks can be a little more forthcoming especially since our interviews are set up with you know a pa in a panel where we each get one question um and it has to be the same question um to every applicant so i think things like this uh as we can tell by our unanimous uh confirmation originally get through so i said that to basically to say this um [Music] we don't know everything that took place in denver we know that that department does have a history with racial discrimination and lack of representation that's in the news media as well and i think that he answered the questions that we had for him during the interview very well in my subsequent discussions with him he actually provided some great insights into what he thinks we can do to fix the lack of representation in our own civil service and i am on the side of letting him have a chance to prove us all wrong with our suspicion uh before we for uh move forward based off of in fact what effectively boils down to what he said she said since we don't have those records so uh was not easy for me to get to this point but that's where i'm at further discussion [Music] this is not a he said she said this is a letter of termination from the city and county of denver saying you were fired for the following events following that this member put on his application that he was retired and not terminated and said he was retired and not terminated it's nothing close to he said she said we have the facts the facts are very blatant it's just if we choose to ignore those facts then that's what we do there uh councilman gardner thank you um the the mental gymnastics that i'm hearing tonight um are actually really disappointing um you know several of my colleagues are turning this into a discussion as to whether or not he was justly terminated from the city and county of denver and he may very well have been unjustly terminated but that isn't the point the point is that he lied on an application that action would lead to termination for a regular city employee and i certainly hope by keeping mr johnson on the civil service commission we are opening ourselves up to a lawsuit by past employees that have been terminated for falsifying an application or future employees that are terminated for falsifying and application further discussion mayor um it council remember hills uh it's moody mario councilmember thank you um yeah you know just to echo some of the comments that have been made um i think it's it's a reality that people face in terms of not being able to um afford the legal representation to defend themselves in situations like this and i think that is one of the most compelling concerns i have um you know i can't speak to again all of the personnel files etc of what transpired um but i do know when it comes to um systemic exclusion systemic racism um when people don't have access to legal representation they're not able to defend you know their their character in a legal way and so you know i think that is it it's hard for me to overlook that fact because you know those and the thing is like i i'm not gonna tell this african-american man how he navigates situations you know so for us to try to i guess um put ourselves in that shoes as though it is such a simple um a way to navigate decision making after something like that um is on your quote record you know is it feels inappropriate to me personally um so i don't feel comfortable um type being hyper focused on on the way that he navigated this in a besides this news and besides like understanding these systemic barriers i think we were all very much impressed with the experience that he brought to the table um what he could contribute to um our civil service commission moving forward um and i think it'd be interesting to see somebody who who has personally faced some of these systemic issues in um in this role to be part of the decision-making um process moving forward so um i don't support removing it and you know i think um to council member marcano's point about our process i'm sure we all did what we thought was our due diligence um and had every opportunity to find out more information and we all came up empty-handed and so you know to to i guess reactively not acknowledge that we also had a role you know as council members and not um finding out certain information um and that there wasn't you know there may be a flaw in our own process i think um is something worth uplifting as well so i won't be supporting the the motion [Music] um yeah so i think i just want to further highlight what council member muriel mentioned because councilman member gruber said this is the reports he'd be writing are like the ones that were written on him but realistically they are not because he did not have the resources to appeal his termination we spend a lot of time talking about the importance of due process for folks in the civil service and as someone who did not have access to that due process mr johnson brings that perspective that experience of what it would mean to be deprived of that due process um he was deprived of it due to economic circumstances not due to lack of a process but that's also an issue again representation really matters and makes a difference we know it makes a huge difference in these cases and so for him to not have had that and for us to now say that we're going to make decisions on the basis of a situation where someone did not get to access due process seems really questionable to me given all the conversation about the importance of due process that comes from this uh commission further discussion real quick i just need to deflect on that because i spoke with mr johnson as well and i need to point out that a captain in the fire department is represented by the union so he had union representation if he could have convinced the union to uh to carry that so as opposed to in aurora where you hit a certain rank and you're not supported by the union captains in the denver fire department are supported by the union and he could have gotten representation another discussion mayor mayor john johnson talking for i'm sorry uh thank you um yeah i'm i'm really puzzled by the comments that are being made because we we voted for mr johnson in the appointment so it was not a race thing for for it wasn't for me wasn't for anyone that i think is on this council um we we took his interview in good faith we found out that he lied on the application he lied in the interview and then he told the media that we were told that he was terminated which is another lie and his termination letter um the three points one dangerously compromised the safety of others in the department through the negligent performance of duties two exhibited extremely offensive lewd vicious and disrespectful communication to staff and three lied to internal affairs about a firefighter's request for represent uh representative from her direct supervisor in a meeting that you ordered with her and then found in violation of 13 departmental rules i think that if this was all false he would have had the union represent him in in legal action against the city and county of denver the city and the city of aurora we're sued all the time i'm certain the city of denver is sued all the time so i think there was if this if there was a legitimate reason to not be terminated i truly believe that he would have had legal representation whether it be from the union or you know someone that would have taken up his case and we're putting someone on the civil service commission that needs to have good character great character and i'm afraid we're making a mistake issues are continuing to bring up so i again because i talked to him in depth and asked questions i got more information denver fire department management is on their union runs their union their management does so literally mr johnson had management who wanted to have him off of denver fire department also be the same entity and person that's on the union um so no he didn't he did the the union um isn't always fair i love my unions but they're not always fair and there have been issues racially um and then the makeup with management on it there there's a lot around this and that's why it's important to talk to him about that he also never went as councilmember coombs said talked about due process he never went to the civil service commission in the city of denver that was also mentioned so we can keep as soon as things are continuing to bring up about the allegations and all that i will continue to raise my hand because i talked to him and i got that information thank you mayor i think everything's been said but not everybody said it um who's next i'm sorry councilmember muriel that's a memorial since i get to i have the privilege of um repeating uh and seconding what other people said i i think councilmember johnson uh kind of beat me to the punch um in having conversation and just scratching the surface a little bit about um what what has happened the the makeup of our union versus the makeup of the union in denver is wholly different and and that power dynamic changes um that structure and so um again back to systems back to how those systems play out in in decision making that is a flaw in this scenario um and and so it's you know i don't again i don't think it's okay for us to draw that same conclusion um you know regardless of you know um or i guess irregardless of that fact so we we have to acknowledge that persons customer reversals thank you um i i appreciate you all saying that you talked to mr johnson um but you know he's the one that we're we're talking about tonight to remove possibly remove did any of you go to the denver people that worked with him and and asked them what you know what the story was why did this happen or did everybody just talk to mr johnson did you get the other side of of the coin i haven't heard anybody say that you talk to denver so i i just want to kind of want to bring that up i am concerned about the other commissioners how are they going to handle this if they know that a fellow new commissioner wasn't wasn't quite honest on his application and thought this so hard to stay on i i'm concerned that they they're going to have an issue with that and then we're going to have more vacancies i you know i've been thinking about that what would i do in that position because they we have some wonderful people on the commission that have been straight up with us and now we have a questionable application so i think we need to think about that further discussion uh councilmember combs so i did receive some information from folks saying you know from denver that they felt um that mr johnson was hard to work with but again i think we have to question what role does implicit bias play in those types of assessments that we make of people and so nothing that i heard convinced me that mr johnson was wrong in what he shared with me in the conversations that i had with him um and so yeah for me yes i got information and i felt weighing that information that what mr johnson was bringing forward was correct and i hope that our commissioners are willing to work with him i also want to point out that he did not say we had a long conversation he did not say i'm fighting to stay on and i have to get this he said you know if it's going to make it harder for you all then i don't want you to prioritize me over um making sure that things are working well so he actually did explicitly express to me that if it was going to be a major problem that he would be willing to um just step back but i don't think we should again be participating in what may be the assassination of someone's character and certainly numerous times colleagues on this call have said he has a bad character and i think it's really unfair and unreasonable for us to be trying to make that assessment and that attribution further discussion mayor i just have to respond to that too so when i spoke with him uh i asked him about that i said that um this could be very embarrassing to you tonight we're going to be uh presenting information from the city and county of denver none of it is flattering and you know if you choose to resign then then this will simply go away and we won't talk about it and he said council member i got four votes he said you can do what you want i got i got you can't get rid of me i got four votes further discussion but see now let me just say that um that he's absolutely unqualified for this position and somebody who has virtually no integrity maybe they can do a great sales job over the phone with some of the members here but they have no integrity and now you're believing them now choose to leave them now but they're going to be making decisions over the careers first of all whether or not people get into police and fire and second if they're able to stay in for disciplinary reasons and let me tell you i think it takes an act of god to get rid of somebody uh in police and fire in a unionized organization whether it's denver aurora with that said i'd urge a yes vote uh with a clerk please call the roll mayor kaufman yes councilmember coombs no councilmember berzins yes councilmember marcano no councilmember hiltz no council member mario no councilmember johnston no councilmember gruber yes mayor pro tim bergen yes councilmember lawson no councilmember gardner yes there's five yeses and the motion does not pass mayor there is nobody in the lineup for public invited to be heard a report by the mayor um i just want to say in the in terms of the appointment process for civil service commissioners i think we should uh rely on the commission to do some inter do the interviews and make recommendations to the council because that's good they're going to be determining who they're going to be working with and i think they're best qualified to do it particularly based on what we've just seen tonight there was an incident last night in i-225 uh where 600 vehicles according to the aurora police department had had blocked access uh to uh the um two i 220 southbound traffic on i-225 between alameda and colfax for the purpose of conducting races first of all let me just say that i don't understand how the police department didn't know this was going to happen in the first place and want to hear from them directly because they monitor social media and if you're going to have 600 vehicles uh collect it at a certain point at a certain time there's going to be a lot of chatter on social media and how do we miss that and how do we prevent this from happening again and so um reports by council um councilmember lawson thank you mayor um first of all i want to say um happy international women's day to all my colleagues on council and to all the women who have inspired me and who are making things happen in their communities in every aspect um so for my pfizer update um federal update the u.s senate passed the 1.9 trillion american rescue plan covet 19 relief package over the weekend and the u.s house plans a floor vote to pass the amended version on tuesday the 1400 stimulus checks could begin to hit bank accounts within days the state update last week state legislators faced deadlines to introduce bills however late bills are expected additional bills related to education transportation police reform and other topics could still be introduced in the coming weeks um as far as rtd can we imagine we have our first um reconvening meeting on march 11. the nlc congressional city the transportation committee had a meeting yesterday to basically kind of go over priorities and discussions about how we want to advocate on capitol hill on transportation issues my next thing is the civic engagement academy my seventh class will begin on april 8th anyone who wants to to be a part of the seventh academy please go to to workforce academy here i think that is all i have as far as my reports thank you uh thank you councilmember lawson uh councilmember gruber nothing to report uh councilmember hiltz uh thank you i don't have anything to report but i did want to say happy international women's day and also i did not time today's menstrual care products vote with this but i do think that is um pretty cool that they they lined up but i also in that vein want to make sure that it is very clear that when we are talking about international women's day and the menstrual care products that we are going beyond the definition of women in the traditional sense to include all who are menstruating in that tax exemption and include both the trans and non-binary community in in that and it just today always reminds me of when i ran and it was me and seven men on the ballot and so give me a little little smile when i think about that um a couple of years ago especially since i will not be doing it again this year so thank you very much for the time [Music] thanks councilman mario uh thank you mayor at my town hall for the month is um thursday the 25th at 6 pm on webex and then a quick rtd accountability update um most of our focus in the beginning of this process was to give legislative recommendations we have been working on with with the transportation co-chairs and with different stakeholders to put forward a bill um house bill 1186 of this session um is um it has a bill number and so um we'll be going through the process of um hopefully pushing it forward and i know that we have our own process through pfizer and that luke has been very involved in the process on the rtd accountability committee so i know he's keeping the committee advised of the progress there so i'm looking forward to see if we can you know push for more um regional partnerships if we can give our tds some flexibility there's there's a couple of things that didn't make it into the final um bill kind of through that stakeholdering process that i think we might want to revisit later down the line specifically on local land use um and i think specifically because it was kind of too broad to you know incorporate all of the different municipalities and their needs so at least through the city of aurora kind of hopefully exploring some of the changes that weren't incorporated into that final bill i'm in happy international women's day council member johnson thank you mayor i just wanted to say at a great town hall if any of you are looking for a topic um we had victor rochelle tom mcmin mimini we had the overview on all the different roads the transportation plans a lot obviously is happening in ward 2. they tailored it for that i had a lot of interested constituents we talked about our repavement schedule our maintenance how that all works and i my my constituents just ate it up so i really want us to thank staff cindy collup all the folks who are involved in that presentation again my town halls are the first thursday of the month at 6 30 so hoping you can join us then and happy um women's day for those who are celebrating and um it's been a great day so far and hope to have a good week thanks because thank you just want to say to ward 3 that we do have our monthly meeting wednesday night wednesday night at 6 30 and it will be virtual so you can find uh how to log in on the city webpage and i hope to see you there thank you gospel thank you mayor our next ward 4 meeting is going to be this wednesday march 10th at 6 30 p.m we're going to be joined by city manager jim twombly for an update on the state of the city and uh by ralph charlotte who chairs these cities veterans affairs commission for an update on their goals for the year and how our residents can get involved and with that happy women's day mayor pratam uh bergen thank you mayor uh the only thing i wanted to say is that obviously our process for appointing to civil service commission is broken i know that other boards and commissions we certainly take recommendations from them i think at this point because we do need to do our due diligence and we have over 20 boards and commissions we certainly do not have the time um as a part-time council that works full-time to uh to go into all the background of every single person that interviews or for for positions so i would suggest that we have human resources do the due diligence for us on the on the back end before we are given those applications and before we interview well um mayor do i get to make a report oh i'm sorry councilman semester sorry about that you're good no worries um so first of all happy international women's day i do want to agree that there is a need for changes to boards and commissions applications i actually had already asked before this incident even occurred that we have questions about conflicts of interest that we have some additional supplemental questions per board and commission for whatever is appropriate to that particular board and commission and i think looking at other types of questions if people want to know if someone's ever been terminated and why on either particular boards and commissions or all boards and commissions then that's a question we can ask but i had already believed before this incident that that was something that we needed um and it's actually something that i had already raised in our committee that deals with boards and commissions so i know that will be coming forward and when we get that on the agenda we'll make sure all of council knows so that whatever issues folks want to include can be included there um and then as for my reports for my outside boards dr cog work session we discussed uh ways that we can regionally address climate and stuff that dr cogg is taking as well as cdot came and gave a presentation about what they're doing um to try to address climate change in a re regional way no report for visit aurora cherry creek basin water quality authority mile high behavioral health care had their rocket socket event where they were able to collect and prepare toiletry packs and socks for our unhoused neighbors and then finally my meetings we just had an award meeting this last wednesday there was the first wednesday of the month at 6 30 p.m thank you everybody and uh happy international women's day meeting adjourned have a good night [Music] [Music] [Music] do [Music] you