A proclamation supporting the reauthorization of the Colorado Lottery Division by the General Assembly in 2018.
Okay, great. Let's go on to presentations. Madam Secretary, do we have any presentations? None, Mr. President. All right. How about communications? None. Mr. President. All right. We have one proclamation this evening. Councilwoman Black, will you please read this proclamation? Yes, Mr. President. Thank you. Proclamation number 17, Dash 1404, supporting reauthorization of the Colorado Lottery Division by the General Assembly in 2018. Whereas Colorado voters provided for a statewide lottery and in a subsequent election, adopted the great outdoor Colorado Amendment to the state constitution, which directs that lottery profits be used for parks, open space, wildlife and outdoor recreation purposes. And. Whereas, following the voters approval of a lottery, the General Assembly created a lottery division in the State Department of Revenue to administer the lottery. And. Whereas, as provided in the go COA amendment, lottery profits are allocated to the great outdoors Colorado Trust Fund, the Conservation Trust Fund and to the Colorado Division of Parks and Wildlife. And. Whereas, since 1992, the Coast Trust Fund has distributed approximately $1 billion in grants for projects to improve communities. In all of Colorado's 64 counties, funds have helped connect families to the outdoors, improved local trails and parks, built out outdoor recreation facilities, preserved ranch lands, water resources and view corridors, improved river access and quality and conserved wildlife habitat. And. Whereas, the Go Go Trust Fund has distributed over 22.5 million directly to the city and county of Denver for these purposes. And. WHEREAS, since 1983, the Conservation Trust Fund has distributed approximately $1 billion in grants to counties, municipalities and special districts for acquisition, development and maintenance of new conservation sites, capital improvements and maintenance for recreational purposes on public sites. And. Whereas, the Conservation Trust Fund has distributed over 152.5 million directly to the city and county of Denver for these purposes. And. Whereas. Since 1992, the Cocoa Trust Fund has distributed approximately 215 million of lottery proceeds in support of Colorado's 42 state parks funding park, land acquisition, park development and Operations, Trail construction and Maintenance, environmental education. Youth and volunteer programs and stewardship and natural resource management. And. Whereas, the Colorado Lottery Division is critical to the administration of the entire Gboko program, and the division is set to expire unless extended by the General Assembly, which, during its 2018 session will consider legislation to extend the division to 2039. Now. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed by the Council of the City and County of Denver, Section one, that this Denver City Council strongly urges the General Assembly to approve legislation during its 2018 session to reauthorize the Colorado Lottery Division until 2039. All right. Thank you, Councilwoman Black. Your motion to adopt. Thank you, Mr. President. I move that proclamation. 1404 be adopted. All right. It has been moved and seconded. Comments by members of council. Can someone black? Why, thank you. Senator Williams, I'm glad you're here. I hope you will support this. So the great outdoors, Colorado, if you were listening to that long, boring proclamation, has done amazing things in our state, funding over $1,000,000,000 for parks and open spaces all across our state. The city and county of Denver has benefited quite a lot. I have a few projects in my own district that I was involved with. They've increased the number of parks in our city and all around the state and improved trails for all of our citizens to enjoy. It was under the leadership of Roy Romer, who was our governor, and Ken Salazar who worked for him. And you will recall that Ken Salazar later became our senator and secretary of the interior. And it really showed the kind of thinking that he was involved with and how important he thought open space was and why he was such a good secretary of the interior. And anyway, the the voters of Colorado in 1992 made it an amendment to our Constitution. But what we didn't do was create sort of the management agency that operates it. And this proclamation is just in support of our state legislature reauthorizing that department so that they can continue to run the great outdoors Colorado and fund open space in our entire state. So I hope that everyone will support it. Thank you. And that was a nice shout out to our senator over there. Okay, Councilman Clark. Thank you, Mr. President. I just wanted to thank Councilwoman Black for bringing this word. Go CO is an amazing organization and we are all in the debt of the work that's been done. I said in committee, you can't throw a rock in any direction in Denver and not hit a park that Gogo has helped with in some way, and maybe nowhere more so than along the 10.3 miles of the South Platte River, including the birthplace of Denver, as it flows through our city. And if you haven't been down to the river lately, go down there. There's millions and millions of dollars of improvements to a river that in the seventies was completely dead. There are no parks, no trails, nothing living in the river and go down and experience that today. And none of that is possible without Gold Coast. So I think this is critical for our parks, critical for our city. Thank you, Councilwoman Black. And I'm very excited to support this tonight. Thank you, Mr. President. Yeah, thank you, Councilman Clark. Councilman Lopez. Thank you, Mr. President. I just also wanted to chime in. Thank you, Councilwoman Black, for bringing this proclamation forward. Hopefully this is reauthorized. I don't know if there would if there is any trouble in doing it, but I think it's awesome that that to us as a council, you know, when when session is underway, they get to see that the city and county of Denver, at least the council, is supportive of the reauthorization. I could tell you one story and that sits on Alameda and Osceola over in the struggling Westwood and Barnum, and that's quite an event. Those four Winds Park and Quadra event. This park is Westwood's first park in 30 years. And that park was an empty, empty trailer, former trailer homes. And they're just old bar chop shop. It's really it's a blighted parcel of land in a recession. In a recession, the Great Recession, we were able to build this park partly with with the trust for public land, some money in the 28 bond that it was able to move around. I'm good at that and move that money around into the park and then also go. And if it wasn't for Google, we wouldn't have that park. And I you know, we have a lot of parks in Denver and I'm bragging because this is my district and this is my whole where I was born and raised in four crews over the quarter and those take your kids on a and it's best in the summer because the little water fountains going on. But this park is pound for pound, I think the coolest park in Denver. And it was designed by the people in the community, designed by the folks in middle and elementary school over a nap. They when they were in kindergarten or kindergarten or first grade, if we wanted a park, we want to help design it. Now, I visited him as a fifth graders just last week, and they love that park. And that was because of go call. And that's exactly what that money does is, you know, I'm. I'm horrible at the lottery. I think I'm one of those people that don't play because I think it's just people who play the lottery don't go. I'm not I'm not trying to offend anybody, but I think it's just attacks for those of us who are bad at math. Right. And so but the lottery is awesome. And it's awesome because even if you don't win, the community wins. Right. And even all those little scratch tickets that I didn't win anything up, at least we have a park in the West Side and we got something out of it, so I can tell you that. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilwoman Black, for bringing that proclamation to. Thank you. Councilman Lopez, I think. Okay, Councilman Gilmore. Thank you, President Brooks. Thank you, Councilwoman Black, for bringing forth this proclamation. My I started out working for the Colorado Department of Natural Resources when Governor Romer was in office and Ken Salazar was the director of the Department of Natural Resources. And so great outdoors. Colorado has not only addressed statewide issues, but community wide issues as well. And so not in my council district, but in Councilman Herndon's council district in the Monticello community. Great outdoors. Colorado helped purchase five and a half acres of raw, undeveloped land at the front side of Mont Bello off of Albrecht Drive in Peoria. And that land will be maintained. Four and a half acres as an open space outdoor area for the community to come and learn and environmental, education, science and technology, careers. And the final acre will be a holistic wraparound service education center right in the Montebello community. So, you know, projects in Grand Junction Brush, Colorado all over the state, but right close to home in the Mount Velo community, great outdoors. Colorado is also making an impact. And so thank you, Councilwoman Black. And I hope we can continue and get the support to make sure that go continues on its important work. Thank you, President Brooks. All right. Thank you, Councilwoman Gilmore. All right. It has been moved. The second see no other comments, Madam Secretary, roll call. Black. Clark II. Espinosa. Flynn. I. Gilmore. I. Herndon. Cashman. Can each i. Lopez. I knew Ortega. Susman, i. Mr. President. I. Please announce the results. 13 Eyes. 13 Eyes Proclamation 1404 has been adopted. It's unanimous, Senator. Unanimous. Okay, Councilman Black, is there anyone you want to bring up? Yes. I would like to ask Chris Castilian, who is the director of Great Outdoors Colorado, to say a few words. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilwoman Black. I really don't know what to say after all that. I show up and I get to hand out money for all these great projects that you all bring forward to to go CO and our other partners with the Conservation Trust Fund and State Parks. We're very lucky in Colorado to have an organization like Gboko, as you all have articulated. We've had a tremendous impact throughout the city and as a Denver native, I've seen the impact myself and the communities that I've grown up in around Denver, and I'm grateful for it. And I'm just the last guy in line here to hopefully carry on a longer term vision for this state and appreciate your support for the reauthorization of the lottery division so that we can continue doing great things in all of your districts and working with great partners throughout the state of Colorado. Thank you. Congratulations, Mr. President. Thank you. Right. All right. Thank you, Councilman Black, for bringing that forward. Madam Secretary, please read the resolutions.