A bill for an ordinance approving Service Plans for the creation of six (6) Title 32 Metropolitan Districts, the Loretto Heights Metropolitan District Nos. 1-5 and the Loretto Heights Programming Metropolitan District. Approves six separate Service Plans for the formation and establishment of six Title 32 districts: Loretto Heights Metropolitan District No. 1, Loretto Heights Metropolitan District No. 2, Loretto Heights Metropolitan District No. 3, Loretto Heights Metropolitan District No. 4, Loretto Heights Metropolitan District No. 5 and Loretto Heights Programming Metropolitan District, in Council District 2. The Committee approved filing this item at its meeting on 7-30-19.
Tunis Lebanese Council 744 has passed. Councilman Hines, will you please put comfortable 745 on the floor? I would love to. It's somewhere I move. Bill 745 for adoption? Yes. One final consideration. Yes. I would love to place it on for final consideration and do pass. All right. Thank you, Mr. President. It has been moved and seconded. The required public hearing for Council Bill 745 is open to me. We have the staff report. Well, good evening, everyone. I'm very pleased to be here. I get a chance to stand up for a while and I'm going to be giving you the staff report for Council Bill 745. My name is Andrew Johnston. I'm with the Department of Finance. Council Bill 745 is an ordinance approving six service plans for a new metropolitan district supporting redevelopment of the former Loreto Heights campus in the southwest Denver area. The districts are Colorado height metropolitan districts 1 to 5. And then there's also a sixth district that's called the Loreto Heights programing Metropolitan District. Together, the service plans are being submitted for City Council approval on behalf of ACM Loretto six LLC pursuant to the requirements of the Special District Act, Sections 32, Dash one, batch 201 and more, particularly 30 2-1, Dash 204.5 of the colorized Colorado Revised Statutes. The service plans contain the District's purpose, powers, requirements and financing plan. The district shall be responsible for compliance with the city's municipal code. Rules, regulations and policy and all other applicable law districts shall ensure that the District's public improvements are designed and constructed in accordance with the standards and specifications of the city and other governmental entities having jurisdiction. Tonight's public hearing is about the service plans for the metropolitan districts. It is not about the the small area plan that is also concurrently happening and will be at land use and land use. Transportation Infrastructure Committee tomorrow and at a public hearing next week, September and September 16th at city council. The the plan for the the area illustrates a mixed use mixed income multigenerational hub for the community serving both existing neighborhoods as well as for any future residents and new businesses located at the redevelopment site. The development plans include a variety of office retail, diverse resident and diverse resident. Residential uses, affordable housing, multimodal options, open space, historic preservation and the adaptive reuse of buildings are also top priorities in the plan. In fact, the plan Creation Hall is slated for adaptive reuse to create 69 affordable housing units for residents that are 30 to 80%. A area median income, additional affordable and attainable housing options are expected as well. The small area plan's commitment to affordability, connectivity and community is is the culmination of a year long process of listening to the registered neighborhood organizations, neighborhood citizens, local community leaders, historic Denver, Denver Public Schools, Loreto alumni and the former property owners, the Sisters of Loretto. The community led process involving over 1300 participants yielded an outcome with significant community assets, which would need to be developed and maintained through time. The communities desired improvements and the basic infrastructure and utilities totals nearly $97 million. Part of the answer to support the desired outcome is the creation of multiple districts with specific purposes and enough financial capacity to provide the opportunity to fund upfront construction costs plus the associated maintenance of the improvements through time. While the small area plan approval is not up for approval tonight, the City Council is being asked to consider approval for the service plans for the Loretta Hite Metropolitan Districts, which will assist in the implementing of the small area plan as approved by as proposed for City Council approval in the upcoming weeks. The metropolitan districts are an implementation tool and approval of the service plan does not approve or affect any zoning or land uses. The six proposed metro. Out in districts organized to work efficiently together are being organized to work efficiently together to enable financing, construction, ownership and maintenance of certain public improvements at the site. The districts will have three different areas of responsibility is anticipated. District number one will be the management district responsible for coordinating the previously mentioned activities for for the site and districts. Two through five will be the taxing districts, generating revenue to pay for cost of installing and maintaining public infrastructure. Arrangements for financing, acquiring, constructing, operating and maintaining public improvements will be created among the districts after creation. The sixth District is a programing district which will overlay the entire inclusion area and specifically assist in the programing of activities and facility maintenance of community assets on the site, including, but not limited to the plazas, the Grand Lawn and the campus quad, as well as the following structures currently known as the Administration Building, the MAVEN Stanton Theater, the indoor pool, the former campus library, and the preservation of a historic cemetery as potentially open space. The new metropolitan districts will be responsible for coordinating the financing, acquisition, construction, completion operation and maintenance of all public infrastructure and services within and without the services area, including without limitation street and sidewalk improvements, parking infrastructure, water, storm drainage detention and sanitary sewer improvements, landscape and irrigation. A public plaza and traffic and safety controls and improvements. The new metropolitan districts will have the power to raise revenues pursuant to the Authority's grant by the Special District Act up to the following aggregate limitations. Districts one through five can impose up to 50 bills for debt, up to 15 mills for operations and maintenance. And then separately, the programing district will have ability to impose up to 20 mills for programing and maintenance, specifically for the community assets called the Plazas, the Grand Lawn, the campus quad, the administration building, the Maven Piece Theater, the indoor pool, and the former campus library. The current programing district is not authorized to issue any debt. The total estimated cost of the public improvements necessary to serve the contemplated development are approximately $97 million. However, the district financing model does not achieve all the project funds required to cover the project cost of the nearly $97 million worth of improvements. The basic infrastructure of roads, utilities, drainage. Supporting the proposed development is estimated to cost about 43 million, while the costs of realizing the community hub as recommended by the community process is estimated to cost an additional 54 million. The outcomes desired by the community support the outcomes desired by the community. Support the concept of the mill levy parameters that are greater than the model service plan parameters in order to provide flexibility to future residents and constituents of the districts and provide the level of infrastructure, public services and programing desired by the community. The service plans include an increase to the maximum debt service melody and an increase to the maximum operations, maintenance and levy. Under the service plans, the change is to increase from 40 mills to 50 mills for debt. And. An increase of from ten mills to 15 mills for the maximum operations and maintenance melody. In addition, a separate programing district will be created to provide a mechanism to maintain and activate the community assets through time. Ultimately, these increases alone are not enough to meet the capital requirements of the community assets. So an application for tax increment has been submitted to Daera seeking further support for the community assets. Additional financing tools will be required to cover the project cost gap or a reduction in the desired community. Assets will need to be considered. The city views the metropolitan districts and additional financing tools as a successful approach to achieving neighborhood and citywide goals of affordability and equity. Without such tools, development projects often result in higher purchase prices and lack of public amenities. Approval of the service plan establishes the following There is sufficient existing and projected need for organized service in the area. The existing service in the area is inadequate for present and projected needs. The districts are capable of economically providing sufficient service to the area within the proposed boundaries. The land and proposed development to be included does and will have the financial ability to discharge proposed indebtedness on a reasonable basis. The facility and service standards will be compatible with the facility and service standards of the city. Once again, the approval of the service plan does not approve or affect any zoning or land uses. City staff recommends approval of the service plans. And with me tonight is the applicant and representative Mark Wicker. Wick I always your name sorry mark with two quick events and I'd like to invite him up here just to give a quick statement. Well, I think we have you signed up on in our public speaking. Oh, you. Do? Yep. Okay. Okay, then that is the end of my staff report. Okay. Thank you very much. We have 13 individuals signed up to speak this evening. First is Mark were Cavic, if that's what it says right here. So I'm hoping that. That's right. Go ahead. Thank you. And yes, it is Mark Wood Cabbage. And good evening, President Clark and members of Denver City Council. My name is Mark Wood Cabbage. I am a partner at West Side Investment Partners. We are the owner of the Loretto Heights campus at 33,001 South Federal. Tonight, as Andrew mentioned, the Metro District's service plan is in front of you for approval. That is all just as a little background here. West Side purchased the property of the campus in the summer of 2018. Since that time, we've been on a holding pattern very intentionally. And the other thing that I want to point out to the council is that we only decided to purchase the campus after an exhaustive search was performed to try and maintain the campus as an educational facility. So we are stepping in only after that occurred. But since that time, we have been working in collaboration not only with the community but also with the city on an area planning process. And although that's not in front of us tonight, there has been an extensive and exhaustive outreach to the community as far as trying to find collaboration for the future of this project. And as Andrew mentioned, that does include about 1300 different participants in ten different steering committee meetings and four different public hearings. And there were also two online surveys. You know, unfortunately, we understand the trend in the in the city of Denver right now is a lot about mistrust. And that's precisely why we took out a practice for a letter for Loretta Heights to have a genuine community outreach program. In my opinion, the program that has been set forth is the gold standard for what the city should be expecting from all developers as they're reaching forward to other development projects for years to come. Councilman Flynn has reminded me on numerous occasions that Southwest Denver has been overlooked on many occasions in the past, and it's been far too long since anything great has happened in that side of town. It's also clear that the community in southwest Denver is seeking a place to call their own. The community envisions a mixed use. Mixed income, multi-generational development that honors the spirit of Loretto, embraces the campus characteristics and preserves the historic structures, while at the same time the community is not seeking a high density development. To breathe. New life back into the historic campus require a huge lift, and I underscore the word huge. The Loreto Heights Metropolitan District is just one of many, and I underscore the word many tools that will be required in order to make this campus great again. But without the tools like the Metro District, there's no chance of bringing the community vision to reality. In the case, the campus will either rot or be forced to be developed under the current zoning, which neither will bring many community benefits to Southwest Denver. I can stand here in front of you with whole heart and tell you that West Side. I'm sorry, but your time is up. Thank you. All right. And I neglected to call the first five up to the bench, so I'm going to do that now. Megan Bettcher, Lacy Knowles, John Henderson, Maribel Gage and Karen Calamity. If you want to come up to the front and Megan better, you are a first. Good evening, council members. I'm Meghan Becker. I am general counsel for that applicant and I'm just here to answer questions tonight. So thank you. Thank you very much, Lacey Knowles. Good evening to the council as well. Only signals with the Davidson we're. Providing investment. Banking services to the metropolitan district. And I'm also here just to answer questions. Tonight as well. Thank you, John Henderson. Good evening. It's been a marathon, and I'm glad you're still here. I want to talk to you a little bit about special district abuse. I've been spending the last three years struggling with special district abuse, reading, learning everything there is to know. And now I'm sharing the information to try to educate city councils like yourself throughout the front range in the Denver City area. Our experience, we are spending $57 million, $57 million in interest on $7 million worth of pipe on the ground. The bonds that were paying interest on. Explained to the bond investors how excited the community was about spending all of this money and spending all this money on interest. What they failed to say in the bonds is that the election that took place to authorize that debt took place in 2006. The people who voted for that bond debt were eight people who were employed by the developer. The bonds do not explain. That the developer at the first election, which is the TABOR election referenced in the special this in the service plan the first thing they're going to vote on is removing eliminating the right of future residents to vote on their own taxes and their own bond debt. We didn't wake up to it until 11 years had passed. I've heard others say they didn't wake up to it until after 20 years passed. In our case, all of the public elections were canceled for 11 years. Because the developer and it says it in this service plan. Told our residents, you won't be able to vote. You won't be able to serve on the board until we're about 75%. They don't say 75% in the service plan, but they say eventually the residents will get around to being able to vote and serve. That is simply false. Under the statutes, as soon as someone has a contract to purchase property, they have a right to vote and serve on the board. I'm running out of time. I'm asking you all to step back from this. You need two other documents, and you need a better service plan. You need to know what the ballot issues are going to be because when you vote. If you vote to approve this tonight, you are voting to eliminate the right of the future residents to vote on future debt. You need disclosures. I'm sorry, but your time is up. Thank you. Next up, Maribel Gage. Thank you for the opportunity to be able to speak to you. I am a sister of Loreto for 51 years and an alumni of Loreto Heights. College. And a classmate of President Clarke's mother, Janna Maya. And Amanda Sandoval's mother, Mary Helen Donnelly, singer. I have three points I wish to bring to your attention. The first one is the symmetry. There is a symmetry on the northwest part of the campus, about a third of an. Acre. Where 62. Sisters of Loretto are buried from 1912 107 years ago through 1969, when the last burial. Took place. 50 years. Ago. That plot in the. Northwest section of the campus is a sacred space. Of historical. And cultural. Significance. That requires perpetual care. Fortunately, Loretto is involved in conversations with the West Side regarding the future of the cemetery. Part of that discussion will be whether or not the cemetery is to be included or excluded from the metropolitan district. Point two. Above the main. Entrance to the dominant structure, the administration or the Academy Building is engraved. The motto Fridays mores at cultural phase goodness and beauty. As you. Evaluate the redevelopment. Of the campus. May these values inspire you. Does this enhance. The faith. Life of our community? Will this promote goodness within our community? Beauty. Does this plan provide for ample views of this long, beloved bell tower and the. Totality of the administration building. And the chapel, as well as views of the Majestic Mountains to the West? I'm sorry for your time as a. Space. That will allow Mother Nature to nurture all. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, Karen. Calamity and I'll call the next five up. Paul Fisher. You know Christine O'Connor. Sochi. Sochi. Gaetan, Kate Kitten. And Jesse Paris and Bonnie Gilbert. Go ahead. Hello. My name is Karen Calamity. I actually was invited to hear about Loreto. Highlights from Sister Mary Nell. At an event we call Wasted Fridays, where a lot of historians and political people meet and talk about what's happening in Denver and the area. And that was about two years ago. And as a person who grew up in Denver, I was born in Denver in 1957. And I've spent a lot of time in Denver. I I've remembered I've known about Loreto Heights. For years and years. And it's a. It's a very iconic site. It's a beautiful building. And set of buildings on. A on a hill there, the highest point in Denver. And it's got a lot of. Greenspace, which is in short supply. Now, I've had my experience with bad development just. In my own family, and. I've been very concerned about the potential for bad development. On this site. And the metropolitan district in the first place. Is the cart is the cart before the horse. The design has not been really finalized or perfected in a way that would warrant trying to finance it at this point, much less. It was based on this small area plan, which I did not feel was as inclusive as a lot of people are saying it was. We have an instance where this is a beautiful green site, one of the few green sites left 72 acres of green and beautiful architecture. It's not like a, you know, a parking lot that we were hearing about before, you know, terrible situations where it's abandoned buildings. I mean, these are older buildings that are empty now, but they're not not derelict buildings. These are beautiful architecture, beautiful landscape. And I don't see the plan respecting the one of the few places in Denver that has this green space that we need to keep intact with the. Animals, with. The right for people to have bike trails and pedestrian trails and take advantage of the green space. It's heavily dominated by residences and high density buildings, and it just doesn't seem right. Thank you. Next up, Paul Fiorina. Good evening. Thank you, President, and welcome new members. Listen, Loretta Heights is a big part of me as well. I my career started there. I was singing. There with Dr. Brecker. Back in the day. I was. My daughter was born after a performance in 85, after that show. And so I come to to, again, support the fact that this is a pioneer property. This is Denver's highest. And oldest property. This is a property that not only has an educational institution. But a campus. And let's call it what it is. This is our opportunity to step up. And. Make this a campus for the. Arts and humanities. Denver is now and Colorado. Is. Number one in arts participation in the nation after 12 years. Of fighting. Tooth and nail. And, you know, every one of you know that this is your battleground for our nuns, for our Loreto nuns who have come to Colorado first. Established St Mary's Academy then built this place. Now we have an opportunity and this owner has a right of first refusal. Are you familiar with that? There's a statute r0fr right of first refusal. It's time for City Council to pick that up and look at it. This is an opportunity to buy this property as is. With the new money we just got from our Parks and Rec. This is a Parks and Rec issue. This property needs to be transferred. To a51. C3 nonprofit organization. A consortium, if you will. To have at least two of you on the board directing this particular development. And not having become divided. And conquer. That's what's happening here. Dammit! Could you please watch your language in our chamber? And could you please state your name? I've had it. Could you state your name for the record? Okay. I'm sorry. I didn't. Mean to. Sir, could you please state your name for the record? Your name? My name's Paul Fiorina. Thank you. Sir. Anderson Heights is your battleground right now. Right here. All right. Next up, Christine O'Connor. My name is Christine O'Connor. I do not live in the Laredo Heights area. I know some people have been talking about the plan, but you yourself talk nothing. The owner is not going to talk. About the comments to council, not. To talk about the service plan, because and I read it and I have it open here if people want to ask me questions. But I want you to turn this down today for many reasons. First of all, this is self-serving by the developer who will be able to issue bonds in a huge amount that will be paid back by the developers. I know that you all are thinking about the recent audit that O'Brien did about the homeless affordable housing program and all the mistakes that are made and buyers who are buying property without being in that category. I think you would agree with me that prospective homebuyers and future Denver ites need to know what they're getting into here in the service plan. At a minimum, city council should reject this service plan, require the owner to file a new one. That one includes a homeowner buyer home buyer form with large font include specific timeline regarding when the future prospective residents get these disclosures. Spells out what specifically will be disclosed. Some of the things that should be prominently disclosed. One The home's annual property taxes, including the metro district taxes and how it compares to a similarly valued Denver home outside the District two, a breakdown of how much debt residents will pay to finance infrastructure, administration operations, maintenance and programing in the district. Three A prominent statement explaining that no future resident, except possibly if they get on the board, will ever have the right to vote on taxes and debt. And fourth, information that residents will have the right to serve on the district board as soon as they enter a contract to purchase property. Second, I would like you all to turn to Article two, Part six, the district rationale in the service plan. I'm not going to read it because I always run out of time. But basically it's a statement that says We need to form this structure. It's necessary for the public improvements. First of all, it's just pro forma language. It's a recitation that they need. Where's the proof? There's no proof in the service plan or in any documents that I've seen. First of all, this didn't even come to anybody's attention until July 30th. All the outreach that was done on the plan had nothing to do with the district, the service plan. It had to do with the area plan. So I'd like you to read that and say and require that the people here representing the developer get up and give you that proof today that no, no other way exist for this to be done. Third, I ask you to ask if will be sorry, but. Your time is up. I can't be. Up. Yep. Sorry. Thank you very much. Next up, Sochi Gaytan. Hi. My name is Sachin Gaitan. I'm president of Hip Co. The Harvey Park Community Organization Hippo voted to oppose the Loreto Heights area plan and the Metro District Service Plan. We informed City Planning and Councilman Flynn of ZIP Codes five Concerns of the area plan one It must be a landmark historic district designation. Two We need strong language around indicating that Dartmouth Avenue will not go through traffic taking traffic into the elementary school. Three Mitigation of traffic must be stronger language for other streets and avenues heading in the southwest direction for maintenance of the pond. Waterways and wildlife in the southwest region have been nearly ignored. Five Limiting building heights to five storeys and not going higher because we lose adequate view planes of the admin clocktower building. We all know that the higher the building, the higher the penthouse, the higher the penthouse, the higher the prices, hence causing gentrification and unaffordability. We oppose the Metro District Service Plan due to the important components in state law, Title 32 that have been ignored in the last decades. One boundary City Council should require that the developer tell you what those improvements should be, and there needs to be a notice to new property owners telling them what will be spent outside of the boundaries. Two purpose You should have a clear understanding of why this special district is created. It's simply for the bottom line of the developer. Three Who and how is this being paid for? Feature residents will pay double the property taxes of those outside of the district. Over 50% of the financing debt from the entire metro district will go to renovate the theater, the garage and the admin building. And it should only be for infrastructure, not for private properties. Four There should be a detailed ballot initiative that should be attached to this. It will help you determine whether you oppose, approve or disapprove this service plan itself. Special districts are required to comply with TABOR. However, in this case, the developer is going to eliminate TABOR for the residents of the district through the election. So why not? Then, instead of placing metro districts in our communities in order to avoid Tabor, he put more effort into reforming TABOR. The scam is that the developer issues bonds with interest, that these future residents will end up paying $4.9 billion with no oversight. This plan is a poster child to these abuses. You are giving power and latitude to the developer, forcing the gentrification sweep. Developers have had this playbook since the eighties. Bond investors, developers, special district management companies run these special districts. They benefit and push us out. Black, brown, indigenous peoples and working class whites out of the sky. But your time is up. No, thank you. Next up, Jesse Pierce. Jesse Paris, represented for Denver, home of Salau Blackstar, some movement for self defense and positive action committed for social change. And I was on top of the ballot for city council at large, almost 15,000 votes this past May 2019 election. We are against this for the reasons that were already previously stated. It seems Denver is up for grabs to the highest developer. You give developers full rein to do whatever they want to do in this town and nobody is holding them accountable for what they do. We don't need any more unintended consequences. We already have enough it out with Stapleton. Stapleton is a metropolitan district, which is the exact same thing that you're trying to do, Loretta Heights. Now, I went to school for like six months at Loretta Heights back in college. I had to take some Romanians for math. So I'm kind of familiar with this campus. And I was there this past campaign season for one of Flynn's events. Kevin Flynn, councilman for the District. So I'm kind of familiar with this area. So, yeah, I wanted to know, are you going to do a traffic study for the reasons data is Dartmouth's going to be redirected to go all the way through to the school. What's going on with the campus itself? Is this still going to be an educational institution? Are you going to try to turn it into a health campus? Are you going to try to mix it all up? What's going on with that and then what's going on with the housing? Ah what kind of housing are you going to be providing here and what am I levels that are going to be because there's nothing I'm going to tell you that's going to make you not approve this tonight because it's just going to be business as usual. You have made it apparently clear that developers have bought and sold you. Thank you. Next up, Bonnie Gilbert. Hi. I'm Bonnie Gilbert. I live have lived in Harvey Park for the last 30 years, fairly close to Loreto Heights. I have many concerns about the Service Metro District plan, which includes the lack of community input. When the plan was being developed. The how much. Affordable housing will there be and the likely, likely gentrification in the surrounding areas. I am disappointed that the community was not made aware of and included in the process of the Metro plan. When asking and asking questions about the development, the community have been told over and over that certain topics would not be addressed because it was too soon in the process. Then we found out by accident that a metropolitan plan, which included answers to many of our questions, had been released. One week. After the end of the area. Plan process would have helped our understanding of the project if the Service Metro Plan had been discussed previously and in-depth with the community. The plan being voted on tonight will increase property taxes dramatically for those who move onto the former campus compared to those currently living in similar home in the neighboring communities. There's no indication under this plan how much desperately needed affordable housing there will be on the former campus. With taxes so high with the new development, it will likely make much of the housing unaffordable. Another consideration is gentrification in the surrounding areas because of the apparent lack of affordable housing, residents who have lived in the area for decades may be forced to leave the no longer affordable area. The service district plan should have been made public much sooner so that the plan could be studied. Specific questions could be answered about the districts and the community could give more input once the plan was made public. We in the community. Should have been. Notified of the plan because there was not enough time to thoroughly study the plan and get more public input. I have serious concerns about the taxation of residents, lack of affordable housing and gentrification. I request that you do not pass this service metro plan in its current form. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, Gregorio Alcala. It. Thank you, members of the council. I am sixth. Generation Denver, right. My family came. Here over a hundred years ago, lived in the area, was one of the 400 families displaced. The 200 businesses displaced my life and many lives were formed by master plans policies. However. I come here tonight in hopes that we can learn from past, from debt, from urban renewal, mistakes, and some of the successes we've had in historic preservation in the city, in the. State and in the country. What we have here is a gateway to Denver's past. And architectural past, an incredible site that does not exist anywhere left in our city boundaries. The highest point of open space that evolve through a whole different process of systems coming here and developing it. But we do not have. And we have not had. Plant designers and experts involved. In this so-called community process. We have had professional engineers, landscape architects, historians. Ecologists, theologians, geographers that have been excluded to share free of charge. What alternatives we can do through a design. Process. With respect to the planners in our city, we have here a different language. We don't have. Designers representing the people. They use different languages, programs, tools. We are also talking about a democratic. Process that is at risk here. We have professionals in our community, in our. State that can demonstrate alternatives, that will benefit developers. But also think about we talked about sustainability 50 years from now. Cultural landscapes. Environmental integrity that has not been addressed, that has not been part of a base map that we've been asking from the very beginning to have a cultural, historical, environmental base map created an inventory and an analysis to present to the people of Denver, to the community. Through the working class, through indigenous people, people of past, present. And future cultural perspectives, to understand how great this site is and what it could be. It's not about prohibiting profit. It's it's about not imposing limitations for how great this site could be. And we will provide examples, concrete examples, using technology of historic sites in Denver, Colorado, the state, and across the country and the world of how this could be a great site if we. Give an extension. It's way too fast. We have ignored basic protocol, basic processes. I'm sorry, but your time is up. Thank you. Next up, Jim Gibson. Good evening. I'm Jim Gibson. I live at 2787 South Stuart and I'm representing the Loreto Heights Community Initiative. First and foremost, developers should pay their own way. A service metropolitan district plan is simply not necessary for improvements. Like every other owner, the developer should get his own private financing to pay for his own improvements. Why should the developer, which is the same thing right now as a metro district, get a taxpayer handout more than doubling of property taxes on the future residents of the district. This service plan is not ready for prime time. It's a blank check and should be rejected by council this evening. If council still believes that the taxpayer should subsidize this developer, at the very least, he should say no tonight and demand a version that holds the developer more accountable and protects future homebuyers. Similar to other service plans around the state, the master developer keeps a small parcel of land, which will be the operating district. That way, he'll be able to control the five. Taxing districts indefinitely, keeping residents in debt. And their property taxes high. Please see page B one of the service plan. The second version of the service plan should not include this small parcel of land and should include a limit on the total of an amount of debt that can be incurred to pay back this debt. Future owners and renters will pay in property taxes up to an additional 90 mills. More than double what other Denver homeowners have to pay is shared by the city administration in the Finance and Governance Committee meeting on July 30th. Tonight's request represents the highest additional property tax millage increase for a metropolitan district in Denver ever. The doubling of property taxes on homes within the district will make the availability of additional affordable housing very difficult, if not impossible. This huge increase in property taxes will inevitably result in higher priced homes than the surrounding neighborhoods to. The north and east of the. Site. The result will be the gentrification of those communities and many displaced working class and senior residents to protect residents. Service Plan 2.0 should include the language of the measures that will be on the November 2019 ballot, when the district would be created. Similar service plans around the state suggest that, among others, this list of ballot measures are most likely to include the election of district board members, all of which will be the developer's people, because no one owns property there right now. An exemption from TABOR requirements, including eliminating the future residents right to vote on bond debt and taxes. Those decisions will be left up to the developer control district, board members and a waiver of term limits for district board members to further ensure long term developer control of the site. Please say no to this service plan. Thank you. Thank you. That concludes our speakers. Are there questions for members of Council on this issue? Councilman Flynn. Thank you, Mr. President. Andrew, could you come on up? Good evening. Hi. Do you know how many metropolitan districts there are in the city at the moment? City and county. Denver's been has a lot of metropolitan districts. I think we're well over 80 metropolitan districts right now. Okay. And when I downloaded the data from our map data website actually counted about 120 or 130. Is that because some of them like here, also include districts that come under a management district like being proposed here? Yeah, correct. And so you're right, there's probably about 120, but not all of them are active. And so is a statutory thing where they called inactive status, where maybe they were approved, but there's no purpose for them and they are under like a management construct. So for instance, like in this case with Loreto Heights, you'll have the management district. No, that's number one. Our district, district number one and district's number two through five may actually be inactive until such time that there's actually development on the site. Okay. So a number of them have the 50 mil maximum for debt, correct? That is true. Okay. Because I think someone had said that 50 mills was was hired by was higher than but a good number according to the list we were provided that have that for debt. Right. And there are a couple of metro districts out in northeast Denver that are higher than 90 mills at the moment. Is that correct? There are some metropolitan districts that were created many years ago, probably even earlier than 1990. And when those service plans were put together, those service plans did not even contain military caps, which the service plan does. And as such, they have the opportunity to have rather high mle levies if they're listed as unlimited. Yeah, and they are unlimited. Okay. And the table that we were provided showed that some of them have had or two of them have district levies that total over 100 mils. Correct. Okay. And that some of those districts have management district structure with several taxing districts coming under them, correct? That is true. Do you recall the last time? And if you don't just say so, when was the last time that the city came in and constructed streets, water, sewer, drainage and other improvements for private development? And I I've been with the city for about 12 years or so, and I do not recall any instance where I've seen that. Okay, in those 12 years, how many metro districts have gone forward? Um, I don't know, but quite a lot. Fernald and Green Valley Ranch, I think, is one of the oldest. The Ebert District in 1973, I think was the date on it. Correct. Okay. And a couple of the new ones would be what? The Navajo Market in in my district, we have Granite Ranch. We have Union Station and a couple of other. Yeah. Just last fall, we did a series of districts. We had a one called Hurley Place. It was in the Reno neighborhood. Yeah, we had one called the River Mile, which is a similar structure. And so those are some of the other examples. Okay. To be clear now, the mill levee that we're being discussed that we're discussing here applies only to the real estate and improvements that are on the property now owned by West Side and not to any property outside the campus boundaries, including the number of public schools, DST, school on the campus, but is completely encircled by West Side properties and the Catholic Charities Mount Loretto Apartments off to the side. That's correct. That is correct. The it's called the service area and inclusion area and the DPS and I I'm not sure about the second building, but I don't believe that second building is in the inclusion area. No, that's okay. Thank you, Mark. We have each. What does the metro district provide for in terms of the cemetery? We heard Sister Mary now talk about the future of the cemetery. What are the provisions in the service plan for dealing with the cemetery, understanding that it may be excluded at some point and that's still being talked about? Sure. That is being talked about whether the district would perform any work on the cemetery. But if it were to perform work on the cemetery, it would be performed landscaping and open space type work. Okay. Now, one of the speakers mentioned or several mentioned open space in the service plan. There appears to be more open space than was recommended by the community in the area plan process that will be seeing her next month. What are the plans for open space that are funded by the Metro District? Parks, plazas, trails? What exactly does it consist of? All the above, sir. Okay. And there's. These are subject to change, of course. But I think the area plan will recommend the standard 10% seven acres. The diagram in the service plan shows significantly more. But you don't really have a a fixed number on that yet. I don't have a fixed number on that, Councilman Flynn, but I can tell you that the objective is to well exceed the city standards. Is to want. To exceed the city standards. Okay. What measures does the metro district intend to use for to ensure transparency for purchasers? Sure. That's a great question. I'll answer part of it, but I'm going to also ask my legal counsel to come up and answer sectorial the rest of it. By statute, there is disclosures that you have to be included. There are opportunities that are recorded against the property. And I if it's okay with you, I like Megan to explain that a little bit further. Thank you. Thanks. Thank you. To answer that question, Councilmember Flynn, the transparency comes on all different levels. Statutorily, this is a local government, so the district must comply with all of the same disclosure requirements public records, public meetings, audit audit laws, budget laws, election laws, construction, bidding laws. Anything that relates to a requirement of a local government within the state, the district must comply with specifically relative to disclosure to purchasers. Statutorily, there are several notices that are required. There is a notice that is required to be recorded against the property within the boundaries of the district. In addition to that, the order and decree creating the district will be recorded against the property. So there's disclosure at that level. There are annual transparency notices that must be submitted to essentially a public repository, which may include a district website and or the Special District Association website. So that is available. There is an annual reporting requirement directly to the city, so the district will be selling information annually to the city, which is obviously also available to the public. So on several levels. All right. Thank you, Mark. The $96.9 million in identified public improvements in the metro district plan. Of course, not all of that can be funded by the mill levy. And you're pursuing other avenues, like through borough, through grants, through like tack five funding and tax credits, historic tax credits and things like that. Is that correct? That is 100% correct, sir. Okay. Of that, 96.9 million. My math. And it's always dangerous to do math on the fly there. 53.9 million of that is in the community benefits portion, the theater restoration, the academy building, etc., as opposed to the traditional infrastructure of the streets, the sewers, the water, the drainage, the traffic control, etc.. So more than half in the community benefits. All of those items were requested and put in the area plan by the community, were they not? Yeah. That is a true statement, sir. I'm. The just pull out the street improvements. 20.4 million was the tentative price tag on street improvements. If the metro district model were not being used here, how much would those street improvements cost? There would be no change in the cost, sir. Okay. So the way that we finance it doesn't affect the capital cost. It affects the repayment cost. That's a true statement. Okay. So I won't go through all of them one by one. But but all of these recommendations are consistent with what the community process came up with over the past year, correct? Yes. Okay. Did you explore the alternatives that were mentioned, for instance, private obtaining, private financing? And what was the analysis? What did you decide would be the effect on affordability if you were to obtain private bank financing, to build the streets, etc., to do the theater instead of doing metro district bonds? Sure. That's a great question. Can I tell you that I specifically explored private financing for the roads and streets on this particular project? The answer is no, but in historical respects I can tell you the answer to that question from other projects. The one of the luxuries of using public financing, such as a metro district to do capital improvements for public improvements is you're able to get much better economic rates, as an example, from a bonding capacity than you would if you privately financed it. And to be honest with you, I'm not sure this is even privately financeable, but if you were able to find financing dollars for it, it would be very expensive money. Similarly, if you were if we were to go out hypothetically and go out and privately finance this, there's still a cost to doing that. The cost still has to be capitalized and it has to be repaid. Rather than having bonds issued, which could be paid over a long period of time, that cost would have to be recouped immediately upfront. So what would be the end result of that? The end result of that would be literally the house would cost more money. Those that are leasing either apartment spaces or office spaces, the lease rates would be higher. And because of all that, everything that would happen on the campus would cost more. For an example, that hot dog or that cup of coffee. But further, we haven't actually answered all the questions. And you didn't specifically ask this question, but I'm going to explore it for you. If we go in and we put in infrastructure and we privately finance finance it, what happens from the maintenance? Operation standpoint, there still is grass that needs to be cut, snow that needs to be plowed, and there's plants, flowers that need to be planted in order to achieve the vision that the community is asking. That would be that would be on the order of, say, a nature way that would have fees that would do something like that. Yes, sir. In the alternative. So just to summarize, what you're saying is that the bond financing, which probably likely is obtainable at a lower interest rate, would result in lower lower costs for housing rentals , commercial than borrowing upfront at bank rates and having to recoup that cost right away. Yeah, because the cost that you would have to pay for is not only the bank rate because you would never, ever get 100% financing on this. You would have to go out and raise private equity to build the other half of it, which would be very expensive capital. Final question, Mr. President. Thank you. You sat in on all the area plan meetings with the community. Is the density that is being recommended in the plan sufficient to leverage private financing for this? I'm not following your question 100%. Can you rephrase it? The density that is being recommended, the low density on the Irving Street side, the the medium, the low medium, and then the high medium up on the south end and up along the north end. Is that density sufficient to produce leverage that would leverage private financing as opposed to the metro district? I think what you're asking the question is if we had high density, all high density on this, could we do this without metro district financing? Maybe. I don't know the answer to the question. And I honestly didn't even explore it because it's not what the community is asking for. All right. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilman Flynn. Councilman Black. Thank you, Mr. President. Mr. Henderson, I had a clarifying from you. I feel like I read an email from you and I can't find it in my email, but you live in solitary or something like that, is that correct? Correct. There was an article in the newspaper. I wrote a commentary. It wasn't an email, but it told told the story. Okay. And where is that located? That's in Lakewood. If you know where Dinosaur Ridge is, it's directly across the a470 from Dinosaur Ridge. Okay. So I just I'm trying to get from Meg in to address your concern about the elections not happening. So. How does that work? She was nodding her head when you were talking about that. So if you wouldn't mind, Megan, can you address that and how that would be different here? And then while you're at it, Ms.. Gaitonde had some additional legal concerns about boundaries, TABOR and oversight. So I think all those things are probably related. If you want to discuss that, I'll stand up here for a little bit. Okay. Thank you. Relative to the question on elections. So as I mentioned previously, elections are is ah, it's late. I apologize. One of the requirements of districts is local governments. So we follow the same election cycles, the same election requirements as all other local governments in the state. So relative to director elections, currently those director elections are held in May of every even year. So next elections will be 2020 in May. There is a statutory provision that indicates when there are not more candidates than seats available, the election may be canceled. That's the instance when an election may be canceled in the theory they're statutorily legislatively. The history is if you have two seats open and you have two candidates need not go through the entire expense and cost of an election when you have two people for two seats. And so I can only presume that perhaps that was the circumstance that occurred with Mr. Henderson. That is what is statutorily authorized. To the extent there is more candidates and seats available, the election must be held. One of the questions that was raised, I think by several individuals was who's entitled and qualified to be an elector and therefore take and have one of the seats on the districts. It is any individual that is over 18 and registered to vote in the state of Colorado, who is a resident of the district for more than 30 days, or who owns property they and their spouse within the boundaries of the district or has an interest in real property via a contract whereby they're obligated to pay taxes. And so any of those individuals at the time of election, in accordance with the election requirements, would be considered an elector able to sit on the boards. Okay. And one of the concerns was about oversight. Sure. So oversight in each district, these districts will each have a board of directors. That is the governance board. Again, in all of the requirements relative to open records, procedures, open meetings, just like the city council here is run by a board of directors. The board of directors must be registered electors of the district in the same manner that I just described and compliant with all of those statutory requirements. And that also relates to the transparency with all the, you know, requirements relative to the recorded disclosures, the annual budgeting auditing requirements that that are associated with that. So the directors would oversee sort of high level financing decisions, as well as hiring someone to play as the board. To that end, yes. So decisions are made by the board. Just just like the city council makes a decision, a majority vote. The district would retain consultants to assist with compliance of all of these matters. So there are managers, legal accountants or rather legal advisers, accountants, engineers, construction advisers, project managers, just like, you know, the city. It takes a village. The same is true with the district, and the district and board can approve entering into engagements with all of the appropriate and requisite professionals necessary to ensure compliance with all of the statutory, regulatory and all other requirements the district must comply with. Then all of that information is public. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you, Councilwoman. Councilman CdeBaca. I'd like to bring back up socially Guyton and Mr. Henderson. Mr. Henderson first. You didn't get a lot of time to explain the 57 million on the 7 million. Can you explain how that financing and paying back the debt works? Of course. Of course. And it's it's it's not everywhere. This is not unique. And it'll happen here, too. What the developer is saying to you all in the service plan is he's going to loan the cost of the infrastructure to the future residents. I've talked to many developers. I've represented them as well as citizens and engineers. And they have uniformly said. The most expensive way to build and finance infrastructure is through these special districts. Because here's what's happened. They take the actual cost. They had a profit. Pick a number. There is no accountability. And that's why you all are so important, because you all are the only check and balance in this process until we get all the residents in the community. You are it. And the statute gives you the power to require more information to call them in on the carpet. And if they're not doing what they supposed to do, you can dissolve the district. So we start with the actual cost. You add profit. Pick a number. There's no accountability. Then because it's a loan, you take that cost and the profit and you add interest. The interest in our case, $21 million. So that's $7 million worth of pipe in the ground. That's the first one. The second loan is because the residents can't pay all of that. Says the developer. The developer is running the boards. This first election that they're going to have here in a couple of weeks. The TABOR election is going to take away the power of the voters to vote on bond that and give it to the boards which are going to be exclusively, exclusively the developer for at least ten, in some cases 20 years. And that board is going to then say, okay, we're going to. Issue bond debt to pay off the loan. So now you have the interest on the loan, $21 million. And then you have the interest on the bonds. Another 37.6 million. Add those two up, we're paying $57 million in interest for $7 million worth of pipe in the private. This is a way to generate another profit center for the developers. I've talked to the special district attorney. They say it's just the name of the game. Go along to get along. Can you can you talk about those documents that you were saying should be coming first? You got cut off? Yes. There's there you have the service plan. There are defects in the service plan. Even our service plan tells us how much we're paying. It says you cannot pay more than X number of million dollars in principal. This service plan leaves open, it says will close to 96. No, you all need to set limits. If there's no limit, there's no control. It's a blank check. So the first document is to tighten up the service plan. The second document. This is the most important one. The ballot issues. You never you've never seen them. No city or county in the front range has ever seen them. The ballot issue, the eight, in our case, the eight employees of the developer are voting. To eliminate the right of future residents to vote on bond se and they give it to the developer boards. You all should have that in front of you. You should know that when you're voting on this, you're voting to eliminate the right of future residents to vote on the bond. But. The the the other piece of information in that ballot issue that you need to be aware of is they don't put it in the service plan or in the ballot issue. They're going to establish a maximum amount of financing. They said it would cost $27 million to build our infrastructure. You all are talking about 96. The financing for that, in our case, just one. $27 million of infrastructure. $4.9 billion. And that becomes important when they issue the bonds because the bonds have a limit. They say, okay, they can only pay 50 mils. But the debt is higher. They can't pay it off. So the interest keeps rolling. And what happens is you don't pay off that bond. You don't pay off that debt until you hit $4.9 billion. That number is important. You need to know what that number is and you aren't going to see it unless you get the ballot issues. You should have that in front of you before you vote on this. The third set of documents that are important are the internal agreements. They reference them in their in the service plan. Why do you have all these separate districts? And then there's one management district. Think back to Western civilization course, right? Feudalism. You have a small parcel that no residents are going to live in. In our case, it was ten square feet. In this case, it's 1/10 of an acre. Because no residents live there. The developer controls it. And that's the management district. That's the one that makes all the spending and taxing decisions. These other myriad districts. They just provide the money. They want to keep control over the taxing and spending, and they do it by living in this district. So these two agreements are important. The third area of agreements, the first agreement is all those other districts, the three or four or five, seven, how many, however many there are in our case? Or three? They all agree. It's a tax themselves and pay all the money to the First District blusher. The second agreement is the first District flusher agrees to pay all the advances of the developer. I guarantee you it'll happen here. It's happened in every special district I've looked at. It happened in hours. Let me clarify. So you're saying that the coordinating district could basically decide to impose the mills on the other districts and not itself? Excellent point. It import imposes the the mill rate the tax. But because it's so small. And nobody lives there. They don't pay. Anything. Got it. The developer doesn't pay anything. They're totally fine. And the important thing. The signatures on all those agreements, it's all the same person. Got it. It's the developer saying I'm going to pay myself. And. The developer of the first District, then paying the developer. So it's a wonderful it's a wonderful operation. I've talked to developers in other parts of the country and they said, Oh my God, that's fantastic. We wouldn't have we don't have spent any money. I have gone through the details in our in our area and talked to other developers about it. And this is the most expensive way to do it. There are alternative ways and all I'm suggesting and as I peddle this this around the state. Number one disclosures. Tell the residents when they walk in to buy that house. Here's how much interest you're going to be paying over the life of your special district loan. Here's the total amount of money that you will be paying in principal. And by the way, as soon as you sign that contract, you have a right to vote and serve on the board. And if anybody tells you different like they did in our community for over 11 years. You just do it. And. But the residents here in our state know more about financing the purchase of a used car than they do financing a house in a special district. And that's wrong. And you all are in the best position to require those disclosures. Thank you so much, Mr. Henderson. So, Chief, can you talk to us? I heard some concerns about outreach and how there were there was outreach, but not necessarily regarding the financing structure. Can you tell me a little bit more about some of the challenges there? Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for asking, Councilwoman. So the baca. My apologies to. I'm very tired. I usually go to bed early, so I got a little boy I take to school really early in the morning. But yeah, the I'm a Spanish speaking indigenous Latina and city planning nor Councilman Flynn's office nor the developer ever reached out to me as a Spanish speaking leader in our community to bring folks into this Spanish speaking community wide meeting. And only ten or 12 Spanish speaking folks showed up to that meeting. And that's it. 10 to 12 people representing our Latino community to me is very inauthentic and not true community outreach and engagement for this process. And that was for the area plan process. And those folks were also not informed of the Metro District plan. So they didn't have that information when they were making the decisions. And was the financing structure something that was explained to you in the English version of community engagement? No, as a matter of fact, it was might have been mentioned once. I don't know if it was by the developer or by Councilman Flynn. It was mentioned once as a possible tool for financing and it was mentioned once early on and never brought up again at all. So it was never defined during the area plan process. And Jeb Gibson, who is was our representative for Hip Cove, our primary representative, could share more with you about that question about historic district status. So I've heard it come up from multiple people, the the desire to protect the historic nature of this process, of this property. Did anyone pursue historic designation? If not, why not? You know, that's a little more difficult for me to answer. I can bring Jim Gibson up or our representative that can share more with you. But for us, it's for hip. It was it's uber important that that happens on that campus. There's a lot of historical buildings that we want to be protected and especially the view planes of those buildings. So we're very, very concerned about the view planes. Would you like me to bring Jim Gibson up if he's still here? Jim, is he still here? Gentlemen, I just want to check in there. You're going after this question from on the metro district, not from the neighborhood plan perspective, because we will be taken out of next week, September and Louie coming up. So you're doing a. Story district. Historic district through the lens of this bill, not the next one that's coming. Yeah, because it feels like I mean, this entire thing feels like putting the cart before the horse. And so I think this would have been the first step or conversation to have. And so I'm curious about even how these pieces got out of order to begin with. But your question, counsel. Was his. I heard a lot about historic status, historic preservation of the area. Why was this not pursued? Was this a part early part of community conversations? Yes, that's a great question. And it it speaks right to the way the area plan process was conducted, because essentially when I when I first entered this process, I assumed that, you know, issues would be put on the table. We would wrestle with them, we would work through them and then come to some sort of rough consensus. That's not the way it worked at all. What happened was you we planning would put up some slides on the board and they would say, okay, what do you think of this? What do you think of this? What do you think of this? We'd have maybe 5 minutes of discussion. They'd go back and interpret what they thought the consensus was. And their version of the consensus was much different than my version of the consensus, as well as other steering committee members. And we were told only towards the end of the process that we were merely advisors, just advisors. So that meant they could pick and choose the advice they wanted to take from the community. So to say that it was totally community driven is just a misrepresentation. Thank you. I can't remember your name, sir. The developer, Westfield. Mark, can you come up real quick? You mentioned something about if this doesn't go through or if you didn't get the financing, we'd have to deal with the current zoning. What exactly would the current zoning allow? The current zoning doesn't allow the community vision. It allows for its campus zoning currently today. It allows for educational uses. And you could put residential on there as well. So the current zoning allows the landmarks to stay in place. The zoning doesn't speak to landmarks, the zoning just speaks to uses, and the uses would be educational, campus or residential. And the greenspace would be preserved. The zoning doesn't speak to green spaces. It speaks to those uses, which, again, is educational or residential. Thank you. Yeah. You're done. Council. Councilman Hines. Thank you, Mr. President. Mr. Markovich, may I also ask some questions of you? Does anyone live on this property today? No, sir. There are actually no occupants on the property today. So does the campus have a use today? No. It is currently vacant and we have security monitoring the property from any more destruction that's been happening out there. Sorry. Any more destruction? Sure. We've had lots of vandalism since we've on the property and where we're forced to put 20, 24 seven security on it to prevent any more damage from happening. Okay. When was the last time this location was activated? I believe the last classes were in 2017, if I remember. Right. Okay. Um, if no one buys a home, does that mean no one services these bonds? No, that's not true. Okay. Bonds can be serviced by any of the uses that will ultimately put on. Their bonds are repaid through the property taxes. Okay. If no one purchases property in this special district, then you would be holding the bonds and no one would be paying you that. Well, we wouldn't be holding those bonds. Those bonds would be sold on the market. And then we, as the owners of the property, would would ultimately be responsible for paying back the debt, for sure. Yeah, I guess the nature I guess part of my question is if you price yourself out of the market, you're the one who's screwed. I mean, I'm sorry. You're affected. Negatively affected. Is that. Fair? I mean, I suppose that could be a true statement. Okay. Do. So I'm. I'm new here. Do service plans change the zoning or. Or do you plan? No. Service plans don't do anything. In fact, only just because a service plan is approved. I can't put a shovel in the ground. I can't go out and sell bonds because I won't have infrastructure to build because I won't have a site plan that's approved. But word. Well I'm not on luti but council as a body is going to be discussing that tomorrow in committee. Is that correct. Tomorrow in your land use committee. Those that are on it will be discussing the area plan. No, not a site plan. Just the area plan. Okay. Can you tell me about the rehabilitation that's necessary? Is there? I think I recall there being asbestos in the in the buildings. I mean, is there I want to also say that I recall a like a number of $63 million or I don't know, maybe I just pulled that out of thin air. It is late, after all, but there's a significant investment required for anyone to take this property or this campus. Is that correct? Yeah, absolutely. Actually, you may or may not remember, but Metro State did look at actually acquiring the property when it was closing down, before it was being considered a sold to a developer. One of the reasons why Metro State decided not to purchase it was because of the cost of putting in the necessary infrastructure and updating the buildings to a standard that they thought that they needed. Was that they were offered to buy it for dollars or something. Right. There's a I. Can't speak as a matter of factly on that. There might be others in the room that could speak to that. But I do believe it was economic. And maybe I can someone else can clarify. Okay. I'm curious about voting rights for residents. It's been mentioned a couple of times about how the voting rights are given to a management district in them and that no one, no residents get to be to participate in that management district. Can you tell me about. If I were to buy a home or where to purchase property in the district, what would I somehow be precluded from voting? That's a great question. And just because it's a very technical question, if that's okay with you, I'd like Megan to answer it. Sure. So relative to the district structure and the coordinating or managing district in taxing district structure, the and stepping back a little bit the reason for so many districts in this circumstance and relative to developments like this, we do have a unique circumstance where this is going to be a multi use development. We're going to have commercial users, retail users, residential users in order to recognize that and the potential for differing needs and interests in the future. That's why we have so many different taxing districts proposed, because it's likely that commercial owners will be interested in other things than single family residential owners. And we want the opportunity to recognize that in the future the relationship between the districts will be recognized, obviously not only in the service plan, but contractually through intergovernmental arrangements. And those intergovernmental arrangements between those districts say essentially in the beginning we need some efficiency because some of the infrastructure that's going to be installed obviously is going to be community wide infrastructure. So the coordinating district is going to assist with that as the property builds out and the uses are finally determined through the zoning and ultimate site development plan approval processes, property will be included in the appropriate and requisite district. Agreements will be entered into whereby in each district there will be a board of directors that can be represented, will be represented by constituents of that district. So each of those districts will have their own board that can be filled with constituents of that requisite district. The agreements that are entered into these days have provisions and recognize that interests change over time. So they're determinable and ultimately if one does, if a district. So we have all of these districts are a party and one residential district determines that they want more control over their own destiny, not as a part of the larger group , but they say we can do this more efficiently ourselves and we'd like a little bit more control rather than being part of the larger group. The agreements and their position in them are terminal so they can control their operations. Now, to the extent there is existing debt outstanding that they've agreed to pay, that obviously can't go away. But to the extent they want to make future decisions and have a hard time in doing that, the agreements do allow for that. So it's really a structure to recognize the need to have the development be developed in an efficient, coordinated manner. But it also recognizes that things change over time. Okay. So I haven't run a metropolitan district or six. I have in addition to being on city council, I have the lovely opportunity to be on the board of my HRA. And if we want to change that and I do that for free, I'm crazy. If we want to change something in our governing documents or declarations or bylaws, we have to get 75% of all homeowners to agree to that, which is we can't find 20% to get quorum. So getting 75% is effective. I mean, it's it's it's a it's a percentage, but it is effectively impossible is I want to I don't know how you can really as an attorney say it's effectively impossible. But I want to ask this question anyway, because it seems like the that's the nature of what I've heard a couple of people say tonight is that it would be effectively impossible for someone in this property to to do it, you know, do it, do their own thing. There would be. Effectively required by the developers into perpetuity to do whatever the developers want. Do you have any thoughts or comments on that? Well, what I can say is those requirements and provisions relative to highways don't apply to districts. So again, we're purely in the local government statutes. So the requirements relative to constituents or electors getting positions on the board, not until your 75% built out or frankly, I don't even know what the requirements are because it is factual and statutorily required that once you are an elector, once you have those interests we've discussed before, you're eligible to be a board member irrespective of what's happening in the development. If you live within the boundaries of the district, you're a resident of what I said. So those provisions don't apply to these districts. Okay. So what is there? I'm having trouble reading my own writing. Will there be an H away as well? Potentially. Or is that like, oh, I see what I was. Well, these properties have fees. So in addition to servicing will there the the bond and property taxes, will they also have fees? You know, at the end of the day, that that actual answer isn't known for 100% certain, but the thought process was we wouldn't need one because the infrastructure would be in. And then the district, through the maintenance and operations mills, would be able to take care of what the FHA would normally take care of. Oh, there was a comment earlier about putting the cart before the horse. Do you have any comment on are we putting the cart before the horse? And if so, why? I think in a perfect world, Councilman Hines, we would have the area plan and a lot of things, you know, done already. Unfortunately, the way the statutes written, it requires, you know, elections. And as you know, at the state level, there's only certain times of the year when that's allowable. So if we were to and we worked on the area plan as quickly as we could, understanding that when we started and we bought the property, we immediately, you know, started working with the city on how to do a rezoning. And if we would have just gone forward with a straight rezoning without doing a small area plan and we could have potentially of gotten community, community consensus, you know, through just a rezoning, normal process rather than doing an area plan. You know, we could have had an area plan approved already by now, hypothetically, you know, and then we could be sitting in front of you today with this metro district. You know, getting this approved in the car wouldn't be in front of the horse. What we tried to do is the right thing on this project and completely hit the pause button for over a year. I mean, we bought the property in July of 2018 and we've been working, you know, as closely as possible with the community. So in a perfect world, would it be nice, you know? But at the same token, I think we have community consensus. This service plan, as has been said on more than one occasion tonight, doesn't approve any zoning. All it does is put the tool, so to speak, in the toolbox so we can deliver what the community is asking for. Okay. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilman. Councilwoman Ortega. Thank you, Mr. President. Let me start with you first, Mark, if you don't mind coming back up. No problem. Do you all plan to be a master developer or do you plan to own many of the structures that. Both. Existing structures, but any of the new ones that will be built on the site as well? Yeah, that's a great question. And we've been asked that question a lot of times. I can tell you what we do, what we do well, and I know what we don't do. We are not a residential home builder. So as it relates to the street residential, we wouldn't be doing that. But when we start talking about the mixed use commercial aspects of the property, there is a high likelihood that we will be developing those ourselves. And we continue to own. This structure is possible for sure. Okay. Tell me a little bit about the open space. And I don't remember. What's the total number of acres on this site? 70, 70 acres. So how much of that will be open space? You know, at this point in time, I can tell you that the city requirement is 10%. I can tell you that with site planning that we are considering for the the project it's in, it's in far excess of the 10% at the end of the day. And I'm going to stand here and promise you that it's 20%. I'm not going to do that. But I am going to tell you it's going to be well north of 10%. So within the Metro District Service plan, does that include maintenance of the open space? Sure does. Okay. And is that sort of built into the project over the term of the debt being collected? Two different topics. The debt being collected and repaid is for the initial bonds that are issued. That's the 50 mills. Right. The operation and maintenance is up to and again, that's up to the 50 mills. The operation and maintenance is up to the 15 mills. And until we have a final plan, as far as what it is that we're going to be completing out there, it's hard to say exactly what that what the mills are going to be as far as the operation and maintenance. And it also depends on what kind of open spaces there are, you know, fallow grass, you know, has a different cost, you know, versus, you know, hardscape, you know, plazas as an example. So has there been discussion with the City Parks Department about that open space eventually being turned over to the city to be a city park? Or is that intended to be under the control and ownership of the entire development? Sure. Great question. In there having conversations that we've had with the Parks Department, we are also going through the LDR process just starting as well. Initial conversations with the Parks Department are the they don't have the capacity or the financial wherewithal to manage and operate the parks. So they think the best hands for the parks operations would be within the district. For you to continue to control it. The district to control it. Okay. I guess that's what I mean when I say you all as opposed to the city or the department. Okay. So housing is a big part of the discussion and affordable housing has been part of that commitment. Has there been any discussion about the phasing of that? Absolutely. And I'm proud about this, actually. One of the things that I can tell you is that we heard loud and clear from the community that affordable housing was important. We've heard from Denver that affordable housing is important. We also heard that, as some people have mentioned tonight, that some of the historic preservation is very important. There's a particular building on campus. PANCRAS The Hall, which was built in 1929, which was a dormitory. When you talk to the building, it actually wants to continue to be residential. Clearly, if you are saving a building, you're not going to move the building. And if we're talking about, you know, doing affordable housing as an important element, community benefit, we saw no reason why we shouldn't just tell everybody that pancreas a hall is going to be an affordable housing project. In fact, we are very proud of what we're what's transpiring there. It will be 68 units, I believe, of the 30 to 80% AMI. There are three bedrooms there. I believe there's 17, three bedrooms that are going to be inside of that project as well. And is that the only affordable housing or will there be more than that? I think you know. I think you know the answer to that question. But I will answer it for, you know. Okay. Let me move on to my next couple of questions and I wanted to ask. Let me ask you this question and I'll call someone else up. So the expectation is that we're talking about 97 mils total on on the entire project. Right. 90. 90. Okay. I don't know where I got 97. Maybe I was looking at the 96.9 on the cost. And that's an up to number. Sorry to interrupt. I guess what I'm trying to get at is. The long term existence of the metro districts. I know. Not long ago there were some changes at the state legislature that pretty much allows them to exist in perpetuity. And I. I don't know if the expectation is that they will exist beyond the time frame of paying back the debt. So how how is that how are you looking at structuring this in terms of the the long term existence of the metro districts? There's two questions there, actually. There's one question as it relates to the debt. Right. And then there's the other question that relates to the operations and maintenance. And then actually a third question as it relates to the programing of that 90 mills that you're referring to, 20 of those mills are being held aside for the opportunity to use them for programing, whereas 15 mills are being used potentially for the opportunity for maintenance and operations, and then the 50 mills would be used for up to 50 mills be used for the debt services. Once the bonds are retired, it would be up to the board to make a decision on whether or not they would want to issue new debt. Maybe there might be a a rec center or something that they would want to build as a public amenity. And that could be an opportunity. So because these operate like a independent unit of government within the city and county of Denver, they can continue to issue debt after that. I mean, I believe that that is a true statement. And I look at my attorney to nod yes. Yup. And she nodded. Yes. Okay. So. If we set limits at 50 mills, what would what would be compromised in the in the project. If we set it at 50 mils. Oh, meaning that 50 total for debt service operation and maintenance and for programing. Yeah. Well, I mean, it just, you know, whittles away tools in the toolbox, you know, as it relates to, you know, bringing forward to southwest Denver, a place I don't know if it's sustainable or not. I can't really I haven't explored that model. We were looking for the optimistic side that we would be able to move forward, you know, with a tool in our toolbox that can be fully utilized. So the hope and expectation is that if you get the total 90 miles. If I'm hearing you correctly, that's what allows you to be able to meet the community benefits and the commitments that were made to the community through the planning process. No, that's actually not what I said. Of the 90 mills, only 50 mills, up to 50 mills that can be utilized for debt services, for infrastructure installation. The other 40 mills, which goes to 15 for operations and 20 for programing and five to the regional mills, you know, could be determined otherwise. Okay. Let me just look to see if I have one last question here. I guess I just want to ask her attorney. So what's what's the incentive for any of the districts to expire after the debt is paid? Or is there? So. Kirsten Crawford, legislative counsel and I'm here with Dianne Feinstein, who's really more of the special districts expert. But I just want to make a couple comments because there's been a lot. Of. We've we've jumped around a lot tonight in I think so many things probably needs and deserve more explanation. And the first thing I want to just confirm is that both with when it comes to the Urban Renewal Authority and to the special districts under Title 32, these are crazy governmental entities. They have certain powers. They're separate and different. From. A home rule municipality. And their powers are very limited. So special districts have enumerated in their statutes certain powers. There is absolutely credibility to the debate that has been ongoing for for many years, not just here tonight at council about the virtues and the pros and cons of special districts. But I want council to understand that that is a debate that has to occur at the state level. And the only reason this comes to council tonight is for approval of a service plan. And it's a pretty narrow opportunity to council for council to approve or not approve the service plan with respect to incentive to retire the debt. I don't know, Joann, if you feel like you can answer that from a legal perspective. But the one thing that I want to just say with respect to Councilwoman Ortega's question is that any additional debt that would be sought after. Have would have to. Go out for an additional vote. But would that have to come back to this body? They would just go. Would it have to come back to this body to be approved, to be put on the ballot to go out to a vote? It depends. Okay. Clarify that. Debt is. Well, I think you you asked and said a couple of things. What I was going to address initially you were talking about the termination of a metro district that they are they do have a perpetual existence, just like any municipal entity. And it is to some extent, it's up to the board of directors at that time to say, do we want to continue or do we want to, you know, do we want to try and terminate the. It's not a good word, but and the special district, number one, they would need to be debt free to be able to shut down essentially or make other arrangements to retire the debt. But the debt is not the only reason for the special districts, in my view. As Megan Becker was saying that in and as Mark said, they will have lots of maintenance responsibilities and that is an ongoing function. And is Kirsten was saying that. I mean, this ties into another question that came up earlier. I think that if the district is really going to change dramatically, it is considered a major modification in any metropolitan district within the city and county of Denver would have to come back to city council to. Really change your alter the service plan in terms of what they can do and the service plans that that we have approved recently talk about a maximum mill levy and the election would cover the maximum amount of debt. So whether they could issue debt later depends on two factors. One, the length of time and I'm not the bond financing expert, but the authorization will expire at some point in time. So that's one issue. And the other one would be the amount has the maximum been issued. And if that was the case, then the district would have to go to an election of its. Eligible electors if they want to try and issue additional debt. So join in your experience, at what point in time does the city in these districts begin to assume responsibility for city services? Trash pickup. Street sweeping, snow removal, that kind of stuff. Well. My understanding is that the metro districts typically provide a higher level of service in certain areas than city services. I don't think it's necessarily a replacement for city services and perhaps I don't know Megan or Mark, you. Mark, you want to help out with this one? I might be able to help out a little bit on this one. You know, as you think about like city services, there's the service services aspect. And then there's also one of the responsibilities of the district is to provide that infrastructure, like the roads and the sewers and the waterlines. And each of those have a warranty period based on each jurisdiction. And each of those responsibilities sometimes is 2 to 3 years. And then when they get after the warranty period, it's gone by and they've built it to the standards of each of those jurisdictions. They get then transferred over to like, say, the city for the roads or Denver water for the water pipes. And at that point, then those infrastructure pieces become a part of that organization's maintenance. But, I mean, we look at the OEM pieces of the of the metropolitan district. What we're looking at is like common area maintenance is like parks, open spaces, not necessarily the roads anymore. As like all the other public entities that manage the roads or the water lines take on that responsibility. So the 15 mills of our operations and maintenance would really be part of the what I'll call common area maintenance and even sometimes replace as a highway style activities. So just to be clear, though. Once the roads are are constructed. Is it assumed then that those are city streets and the city is responsible for snow removal? Street sweeping, you know, trash pickup, all those all those services that are provided to every other neighborhood across the city. Sure. The the answer is, of course, it depends. The what if the city like streets, for instance, if the streets are built to the city standards, then yes, they would be after a warranty period, they would be handed over to the city and we would be doing all the snow removal and replacement of any potholes or patching of potholes or problems with the roads. But if they were not built to those city standards, like sometimes they're just a little narrower than what we would normally accept as a city street. They were staying there. The it's the streets that do not meet the city's standards would be retained by the metropolitan district and it would be a metropolitan district responsibility for operations. So in our review and approval of these districts, as are brought forward to us, are we not dictating certain standards that we expect? I mean, if the streets are too narrow in any of these developments, you want to make sure your, you know, emergency vehicles can get through there. Sure. I that you do want to have safety for everyone and the standards are important. But the metropolitan district itself is a financing tool, and the standards for the streets and whatnot are not dictated in the metropolitan district. Where is that done? Go ahead. Is it? Yeah. So let me explain further. The the roads and the standards that the roads are built to are approved in the site plan of the project. They're I think what Andrew was trying to explain is that there could be some roads, especially at Loreto, where we're trying to create some of these public places that may be unique and unique. What is an example of that? Like, for an example, there could be a street that doesn't have a curb. Why would you want to have a street without a curb? So you could close the street down and you can make it more of a festival street. The city may not want to have that particular street that wouldn't impact, you know, the flow of traffic on the site. But it might be a special place, you know, on the property. What Andrew was explaining is if that case were to exist, it would still have to meet standards as it relates to emergency type things. But the district could own them. Okay. All right. That was a helpful explanation. Thank you. Thank you. I have no further questions. Thank you, counsel. All right. A few people up for a few follow ups. Councilman Flynn. Thanks for has just had a few follow ups for me. Let me start with Megan. When Mr. Henderson was talking about the experience, etc., and then his other research, you were nodding your head this way quite a bit and I wanted to find out why was that? What were you taking issue with? I think what I want to make sure that everyone understands and it's, you know, based upon some of the comments of your attorneys, these districts are quasi governmental entities. So there is transparency, there is accountability. We have to follow the statutes. We have to follow the Constitution. We have to follow the election laws. Everything is publicly available. And can I say that there haven't been circumstances in the state of Colorado that have not followed all those rules? There have been. But it's absolutely true that these districts must follow all of those open records, open meetings, transparency. So there is accountability. There is transparency. And it's our intent and our goal to ensure that that does happen, not only in accordance with statute, but in accordance with what the community desires. So. Okay. Andrew, just to follow up on that, real briefly, have any of the metro districts in Denver had those issues? Lack of transparency, fraud, abuse. I imagine I'd like to say no, but I'm sure at that point that you don't know they would come up with one, but I'm not aware of one. All right, Mark, during the area planning process, the use of metropolitan district was always on the table from the very first draft, was it not? Yeah. If you look at the first draft of the area plan that came out in June, one of the tools that was noted, I don't remember what page, but there's a page in there that talk specifically about metro top metropolitan districts as a financing tool. It was in the first draft and in the second draft. Okay. And then the planning board draft is absolute third draft. And it's you had your staff at every meeting. And the the area plan steering committee is not a site planning committee. That is correct. It is absolutely the site plan. So when the service plan comes out for the metro district and it implements pretty closely the guidance you were hearing from the community, what you know, what would you say about that? I think my team did a good job listening. Okay. Can you are there any areas where you where you might have deviated from the guidance? I didn't see any myself. And probably unfair to ask you, but. No. I mean, I think the area plan the area plan is a document that sets up the visioning statement for what the property wants to be. But it's not a site. Plan, not a site plan, you know, inside of the service plan. We are required to put as attachments, illustrations to what, what, what, what, what the project is going to be. And that's simply what's in there are illustrations. Thank you. Dr. Aguilar, could I ask you a couple of questions? As the head of the Neighborhood Equity and Stabilization Team, I've heard it said that metro districts are absolutely the worst way to do a project like this, with the exception of all the other ways of doing it, because they all cost money and they all have their impacts. And from the southwest, Denver is pretty high on our inequity index or pretty low on the equity index would be the proper way to say what concerns do you have about the financing here and the potential impacts that the mill levy might have on affordability and on one on the development of the site, if any ? I actually am more concerned if we don't pass this. I think it was alluded to here this year because. Six 0 million six. $0 million right. Take Tokyo was going to donate. Yes. The property to and. They could not afford the money to make it usable because of the asbestos and the lack of wiring in it. And I in the interest of full disclosure, my property is across the road from the right of heights. And when Jeff Romaine was selected economists, he would torment me by saying they're never going to be able to afford to fix that and they'll be living across in a by a blighted, vandalize piece of property. Really. And and so I'm hoping you will prove him wrong. But but it is beautiful. And there's a lot of open space. And I'm very excited about the vision of preserving the quadrangle. I think it's ambitious to try and preserve that theater, although like the whole community, I would love it. I, I think we're in a little bit of a catch 22 because the plan as is being developed really limits heights and limits density. And without that, I don't know how you pay for it. So I'm a little concerned about that. But I think that what's being proposed is the the best we can expect for this level. Mark has asked sometimes me and Melissa has had from housing about what kind of housing will expect from him for affordability. And we've warned him more than he'd like to give us. And but I think that he listens very well to the people there who really wanted a parkway facing the grand entrance. He really wanted Dartmouth not to go all the way through. Who really wanted the quadrangle preserved? He's working with his district in hopes of preserving the theater. I have my concerns about whether that's still going to be possible, even though, of course, I would love to. Have you toured the theater with Kimberly Desmond as well. I. As well there because I saw it as a potential neighborhood equity initiative because we don't have that level of arts in southwest Denver. And there's actually a lot of open space on the lower level. And I thought it could be a great nonprofit space. But the financial evaluation that you had done came back pretty daunting without even considering that it needed a new roof and you needed parking for it. And so so I have in my heart a line in myself to the possibility we won't have that. But I'd love to not have a blighted area there, and I'd love to see that administrative building being used again because it's really gorgeous. Okay, I'll take this opportunity then to remind everybody in case the mayor is still up and watching that. At the last community meeting, Mayor Hancock made the announcement that we will save the theater. So I asked him at my next occasion, okay, how do you plan to do that? So we'll find out. And selfishly, I'd love to see that, but I. I would like to see us invest in more affordable housing there. I mean, we have to pick priorities. We don't have enough money for everything. And it's a beautiful opportunity. And I do want to apologize. So we we were involved in trying to make that Latino town hall happen and the mayor's office fired. We went to Southwest Community Coalition and talked about it. And Alves Rubio, who is our West Denver neighborhood representative, went out and met with his contacts in the area and we still got really poor attendance. And it was really quite a humbling experience to think about what is. There was childcare. There was food. It was held completely in Spanish and we still could not get the community to come out. And so I apologize. We did make an effort to have the Latino community in particular there. Do you recall that successful recall. Senator, that way or. Dr.. What I call what do I call you now? I mean. Do you do you recall also that our DPS representative yeah, we did backpack fliers from college view and. We did we sent local fliers home, we did everything we could. And it was really unfortunate that we just could not get the population to come out for this. Okay. And it was held offsite. It was held. It all started. All Saints Church. Yeah. You went for the Catholic route. It's. That didn't work. All right. Thank you, friend. That's all. Thank you, Councilman Flynn. All right. I'm not seeing anybody in the queue. Still on questions, so I'm going to go ahead and close. This public hearing for Kels was 745 is closed and we're moving to comments by members of council. Councilman Flynn. Thanks, Mr. President. Just to quickly repeat what I said during the questioning earlier, that metro districts are often remarked to be the absolute worst vehicle for doing things like this except for all the others. And it's a hard choice to make. The fact is the city doesn't go in any longer. And build roads for developers. We don't build sewers and water and drainage. We don't do any of that anymore. We used to two decades ago, I think the first special district I became familiar with when I moved to Denver almost 40 years ago was one that was in place for 60 years and and built one of the most well-known public infrastructure projects that was privately owned. And that was the Moffitt Tunnel District. And they taxed the homes and businesses and property of of thousands of residents from what was then Denver at the time, all the way up through Jefferson, Boulder, Grand, all the way, I believe, to Craig to Moffat County. And and that was that's now owned by Union Pacific. So there's a long history of successful use of special districts as a as a vehicle for accomplishing what private financing and what other methods of getting that infrastructure done is simply worse than a worse option than what we're looking at tonight. This is an opportunity to get something done right. Not only in southwest Denver, but in the city. We have an iconic. Site. It is among the highest points in the chart, the highest point in a city. But it's it's darn close to it. And and this is a chance that to build something that in 50 years through the use of this vehicle and others, because this doesn't provide enough capacity to build something that when someone comes here 50 years from now, they will know that this was a campus. This is a different place. This could be southwest Denver's living room or family room. And we want to make sure that it's done right. We want to make sure that the streets, the public works understands that this is going to be a place we want people to come to and not pass through. We don't want it to be porous. We don't want Dartmouth to go through and siphon traffic into the neighborhoods off of off of Federal Boulevard, because this is a campus and we want it to remain a campus. It's a sacred site, if I can even use that word, as Sister Mary Nell said about the cemetery, I would apply that to the entire campus because for almost 130 years, when Sister Pan Croatia first designated that site as the future home of an extension of Saint Mary's Academy, it's it's been a revered site in southwest Denver. Not the oldest fort Logan beats it by a few years. But this is our chance to get it right. And this is. Probably the worst vehicle to do it other than all the others. And so I asked my colleagues to consider that, to consider the track record in Denver of special districts being successful and and vote to approve this tonight. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Flynn. Are there any other comments? All right, I am going to. I'm sorry, sir. You can take a step outside, or you can wait for us to deliver it. So, sir. I'm asking you to please stop or to take your comments outside. We have closed the comment period and now we're deliberating. On campaign funds should recuse themselves from this trade. All right. So, you know, other comments, I will finish this out before we vote and just say, first of all, thank you to Councilman Flynn. You know, this is right at the edge of my district, technically in Councilman Flynn's district, but a place that is very, very near and dear to me. As you heard earlier, my mother is what brought her to Colorado was to go to school here. My parents celebrated 50 years of being married this year in January. And we went driving through what is a very sad campus right now because there is no use, I mean, other than people throwing rocks through windows and breaking things because we have a developer who didn't charge through and say, I'm going to go build, I'm going to go build. But I will take a pause to meet with community and understand what the community wants and develop that. But we took a drive through to, you know, got to hear my dad talk about those are the steps where I fell in love with your mother. And, you know, my mom lived in pancreas a hall. And to hear plans for that building, you know, not the historic of our name, the historic landmarked administration building, but plans to retain that and bring people back to living there. And all my mother's stories about party line phone, only one phone for the whole dorm. And you had to wait in line to call home the history of that area. And, you know, I, I know that we're just talking about the metro districts. I'm not trying not get to astray, but also my constituents on my side. You know, again, college view, literally, a neighborhood is named for its view of the college. And I'm Claire Harris, also a graduate of Loretto, who was probably the most skeptical person in the city when this site was purchased and walked out of this community process. As one of the staunchest advocates to say, okay, hey, we had a voice at the table. Now go find a way to deliver on this dream and vision. And this is a tool, you know, to get us there and to deliver on something that is, you know, not just another development. It is a special place, a sacred place for our city. And so I will also be supporting this site. And I want to say thank you to everyone who put the work in to try and get this right, despite the fact that it has, you know, been hard to watch that site sit and see the things that people do and you don't have any activation on it. But I think we're getting closer to a day where we can all be very proud of of what's here. So with that, Madam Secretary, roll call. Flynn. Hi. Black. I see. Tobacco. No. Gilmore, I. Herndon, I. Hines. I. Cashman by. Kenny Ortega. I. And I just want to say a quick thank you all for your patience and sitting through this long night. Sandoval. Sawyer. I. Torres. I. Mr. President. I. Madam Secretary, please trust voting in those results. One 911 eight. 111 nine Constable 745 has passed and yes, thank you, Councilman Ortega. Thank you all for sticking it out on this late night, seeing no other business before this body. This meeting is adjourned.