Refers to the ballot at the November 3, 2015 coordinated election a question concerning the approval of an Amendatory Intergovernmental Agreement with Adams County governing the development and use of certain property at Denver International Airport. (BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT) Refers to the ballot at the November 3, 2015 coordinated election a question concerning the approval of an Amendatory Intergovernmental Agreement with Adams County governing the development and use of certain property at Denver International Airport. The last regularly scheduled Council meeting within the 30-day review period is on    .  The Committee approved filing this bill at its meeting 6-9-15.
I don't want to recount all the virtues of this historic move forward together with our brothers and sisters in in Adams County. But I do want to recognize and acknowledge and thank for being in the room. Two commissioners from Adams County, the esteemed chairs, Tedesco and Steve O'Driscoll, waved to the watching public all for people who are watching Channel eight this evening. So appreciate you guys being here and thanks for all your hard work on this. Thank you, Councilman Levitt. Councilwoman Shepherd. Thank you. I do have a few questions for the airport team. My first question is a part of this agreement involves a $10 million payment to Adams County. And I'm trying to clarify, what benefit does Denver receive in return for the $10 million? Mr. President, members of council, my name is Evan Dreier. I am Mayor Hancock's deputy chief of staff. Councilwoman Sheppard, your question is, what benefit does the city and the airport benefit from for the $10 million? There's there's a couple. I think the the first one is the opportunity to develop a broader array of commercial development at the airport. We're talking about an amendment to the intergovernmental agreement that was first entered into in 1988. This would be the first major development, first major amendment. And there is a price to that. And that price we negotiated with our friends in Adams County at $10 million. Secondly, the pace of development and the revenue that will be derived from that that we will be sharing will be slow in order to provide some compensation to Adams County. Initially, we agreed on an initial upfront payment of $10 million. Those would be the two primary benefits. Okay. So but as I understand, revenues are to be shared 50, 50 equally. So we're paying 10 million upfront in order to agree to split revenues. 5050. Correct. At what I'm understanding. Okay. I also want to clarify what the talking about the clear the clear zone language, if I understand correctly, we have the ability Denver does to lease land in the clear zones. But then I was reading a few paragraphs down where it sounds like there will be some mitigation payments made back to Adams County. It sounds like there's some other financial consideration that we might either pay or forego that I wasn't clear on in the development agreement. I'm going to ask David Broadwell to respond to that question. Thank you. David Broadwell, Assistant city attorney. The the provisions in the agreement regarding the clear zones basically would again relieve land use restrictions on that property, which is in Adams County. It's owned by Denver and by DIA, but it's in Adams County and currently subject to a fairly severe set of land use restrictions dating from 1988. One of the things the mandatory agreement will allow us to do is, and on a limited basis, identify development parcels in that area for future development going forward. Now the original agreement had the concept that since Denver was buying up a lot of this acreage, which was going to remain fallow in public ownership in Adams County in 1988, we were taking it off their tax rolls and as a consequence of taking it off their tax rolls, a part of the original deal was that there would be something like a payment in lieu of taxes, which they use the term mitigation payment to describe that in the original deal. And frankly, even though it's hundreds of acres, it's basically open range land that generates only like 70 or $80,000 a year in mitigation payments. The last time we checked last year. So a very small sum of money flows to Adams County from that. To the extent a small amount of commercial development will probably evolve and occur over the years under the New Deal, that some of that will actually be subject to what's called now possession of interest taxation, where the Adams County jurisdictions will actually see more of a tax flow off of that property if it develops more in the future. But the mitigation payment idea dates from 1888. There are a lot of terms and conditions in the original deal that are simply being left intact and aren't being changed by the New Deal. I'll be happy to answer more specific questions about where that concept came from and what it means. How many acres are we talking about? And I'm sorry, what was that second term? The possessor, interest, taxation. How many acres are we talking about? Out of the 1500. Well, the reference the reference to 1500 acres in the agreement, his land that we're going to have freed up in Denver County on the airport property itself, the 1500 acres has nothing to do with the clear zones. The New Deal will allow the Clear Zone acreage to be kind of open in terms of whether or not any of that property is made available by Denver and DIA in the future for commercial development. Again, if, when and if we do, it'll be leased. It'll be in Adams County and potentially within the boundaries of Aurora or Commerce City as well. And there have been there's been an evolution in the law since 1988 that says when a public entity like Denver leases land for commercial development, then the value of that leasehold is subject to property taxation under a possessor interest theory. The value of that possession interest and all of our concessionaires and lessees at DIA now are subject to this kind of taxation that that whole concept evolves since 1988. And we make reference to it in the mandatory agreement that any leasing out there in the clear zones in Adams County will be subject to that kind of taxation and they'll keep that tax revenue. The taxing entities in Adams County will benefit from that. One final point is that development on the on that acreage, although it's in Adams County, it's physically on property we owned. Therefore, the DIA enterprise, the aviation enterprise will benefit from the ground lease revenue. Even Dreier indicated earlier that the back to the $10 Million question that in paying that we project substantial economic benefit to Denver both in terms of the 50% of the tax revenue will be retaining, but also in terms of the ground lease revenue the DIA will enjoy 100% will be kept by the aviation enterprise and will not be shared. So the $10 million payment needs to be viewed in relation to both. Some taxes which will flow to Denver, 100% of the lease revenue will flow to Denver. Okay. And then I have some other questions that are more on the planning side. So I know there's been a lot of conceptual planning happening about what this will look like as it moves forward. Is that information going to become public before the November ballot vote? Is that going to come to council? Like to lend news to our land use committee or neighborhood and planning committee. Might be helpful if Kim Dae or comes to the podium. I mean, yes, we have been doing a lot of looking at what potential could be developed on the property. The truth is this agreement that is in front of you hits a little reset for us because all of the planning we were doing did not include the clear zones. So we're going to be going back over the next few months, relooking at it, because we now have a different landmass to look at. And we want to look at all of our planning efforts based on this concept of 1500 acres. So, no, you probably will not see a plan prior to November 11. Okay. So towards the end of the agreement, Article 11, it talks about Denver and the HCC forming a new regional entity to promote and market development opportunities on or around the new airport and assist in coordinating land use and infrastructure planning. It gives a date of 1231 2016 for that to be completed. My big question is this is we're talking about greenfield development, and that's a tremendous amount of new infrastructure in terms of both utilities as well as new roads. My big question is, who will pay for that infrastructure not only to build it, but also how it will be maintained? Because this is not. Right for an airport development. The airport enterprise will be responsible for paying for infrastructure. Off airport development, I think, is still something that we are hoping to have conversations with the Adams County and Adams County jurisdictions about this regional entity that you mentioned. Councilwoman Shepherd could be a vehicle to getting to regionally cooperative infrastructure, both the development of the planning for and the payment of. But it may not be there may be other options out there as well, but that entity could be a vehicle. Okay. And then my other. So one of our upcoming agenda items is about I-70. And certainly all of the growth in northeast Denver in the metro area has caused tremendous impact to I-70, which we're going to be discussing here pretty soon. Will part of this planning include a traffic impact study for I-70? For Pena Boulevard? Yes. I'm not sure about I-70. Okay. Those are my questions. Council President and I would like to pull it out for a vote. Sure. All right. Well, let's do that first. Councilwoman Ortega, when you make the motions for us tonight. I will. Will you please have four or two ordered published? Mr. President, I move that council bill 402 series of 2015 be ordered published. Has been moved in saying Councilman Shepard. Okay we go to the other council member station. And then if you could come. Back. Absolutely, we will do that. Councilman five zero. Thank you, Madam President. Mr. President, I know. That. You have been gone so long that in. Now that we have this up for a vote, I would perhaps like to even make an additional comment. The more than one I was going to to say I'm going to be supporting this agreement, I think it really is a fine agreement. I'm delighted to see the Adams County officials here. Thank you for coming. I remember back in the 1988 time period when even for your predecessors, this was a tough swallow. And it was really an excellent example of cooperation, very tightly drawn agreement that needed changes if the vision that we were all flying today were to come about . So this agreement, I believe, is essential. Now, Councilwoman Sheppard, the $10 million made me flinch at first to $10 million has that habit. But when I think about what Adams County is doing to come to the table now, I am willing to go that extra step because I know it's difficult to get these kind of agreements going . And I also remember the history. And given the history and since we have acknowledged individually the Adams County Commissioners, I want to acknowledge former Representative Pat Grant, who I also think had something to do historically with the original agreement. Thank you, Pat. Thank you to all of the Adams County officials, former and present for supporting this. And I hope council will also. Thank you, Councilwoman Fox, Councilwoman Ortega. I just want to ask David Broadwell a couple clarifying questions. I didn't hear the answer to Councilwoman Sheppard's question about the number of acres in the clear zone. And then I also want to clarify whether or not those the land in the clear zone is within the LDA noise contour and whether any residential can be built on that. So when you say land in the clear zone, you mean total number of clear zone acres or developer developable number of clears on acres? Probably developable is more important and accurate. Well, I'm going to defer Dan Paramus in the room and he may have some more precise acreage language, but it's a good it's a good time to pause and clarify that the clear zone areas are heavily regulated still under federal regulations that define what can and can't be there in terms of instruction. They're called clear zones for a reason. Right. So so we've identified very surgically some potential. And I'll I'll turn it over to Dan right now to talk about kind of in gross numbers, how much acreage that might be. Just to start answering your series of questions. Thanks, David. Council President and Council Members Dan Paramo with Dear Dan Real Estate in total Councilwoman. There's about 8000, a little over 8000 total acres in the clear zones. When we look at the actual developable acreage, we've focused just as we have on the airport land, on what's kind of immediately developable. And that generally looks to be about 500 to 800 acres. But over the long term, as we develop infrastructure. Additional acreage will become. Developable out of that 8000. Then will you just clarify from the maps that you all provided in the documents that we received, it looks like all of the clear zoned land is on the outside edges of the airport. You just clear? Correct. I believe on your packet, the clear zone was all in green on the perimeter of. Of the airport. Okay. Thank you, ma'am. I have no further questions. Thank you. Councilwoman Ortega. Councilwoman Shephard, come back to you. Yeah. Thank you, Mr. President. I am calling it out for a vote. There is a lot to like in the plan. Obviously, the economic development potential of this is huge, not just for Denver, but the whole region. And I mean, the revenue sharing between the counties is absolutely historic and precedent setting, setting. And, you know, it has so many wonderful implications in so many ways. I have not been privy to any of the negotiations. I also do not serve on the airport committee. I have tried to do my best due diligence on this and have been briefed a couple of times by the consultants on the plans. But. And I mean, this is huge. What we're talking about has huge implications for the city, for the region, for what development looks like for the whole northeast area. I have a lot of questions about, you know, where will the workers that are going to be working at this be housed? And I have huge questions about the impacts to our transportation infrastructure, not just to the things that are going to be built on airport property as a result of this. But for the surrounding transportation infrastructure, I have a lot of questions about, you know, what type of public transportation will be here, how it will be augmenting all of this. And I feel for my and this is my comments are in no way meant to disparage all of the hard work of everyone that's been involved in this Adams County team. You know, the airport folks, the consultant team, everyone else. I want to feel more comfortable about what I'm actually referring because because the implications go far, far, far beyond just the financial agreement between the two counties. I want to understand the long term land use and transportation issues surrounding this. I just can't I don't feel comfortable voting to refer it to the ballot tonight, so I will be abstaining. Thank you, Councilwoman Sheppard. Councilman Brown. Thank you, Mr. President. This indeed has been a long time coming. And I really wonder if our guest in the chamber this evening, the two county commissioners from Adams County, ever thought they would be sitting in this chamber and listening to this debate? And by the way, I think our benches are probably harder than yours. I am pleased to support this tonight, and I want to thank the two teams. On both sides that were involved in the give and take to make this possible. And I hope my colleagues would join me in supporting this this evening. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilman Brown. Councilwoman, can each. Thank you, Mr. President. I wanted to wait to chime in because I wanted to kind of understand and hear my colleague, Councilwoman Shepherd's, concerns a little better before deciding whether I needed to to speak. I will be supporting the agreement tonight. And it's not because I don't share some of the same questions that Councilwoman Sheppard does. I do think that a few things help me feel a little more comfortable, though, and not to change her mind because I respect her, her differing opinion. But we have a train that is going to the airport with two major stops. One is already planned and that one has the potential for significant residential. And so whether we do or don't approve this particular agreement, development is already headed into that corridor. So the question really isn't, is development going to continue to grow in the far northeast corridor toward the airport? The question is whether the airport land is in play for that or not. And, you know, we know that most all of this land is not really for residential. And so for me, the potential here is as a major city that's losing land along the I-70, in the 25 corridors and in some respects along the river as well for industrial and manufacturing purposes. Those areas, generally speaking, are slowly and incrementally being re zoned from industrial manufacturing type uses to residential. So if I, as a major city, want us to have a piece of that potential sector in the future, and I want us to be able to have some balance right the tax base that we need. Residents are more expensive to serve, right? They need libraries and they need all kinds of schools and services. And businesses are an important piece of the tax base to support that kind of residential service space. So if I see the trends happening, which I see happening then and I and I believe in having middle class working jobs in the city and county of Denver and not I mean, I love that our our region is interconnected. And I know many of our residents work in Commerce City and other areas in the region, but I want some of those kinds of jobs in Denver, too. I think it is worth the leap now to say that that's possible. I share your concern about the transportation network to get them there and all those pieces. But the thing that I have is the knowledge that this body, whether I'm on it or not, over the next 30 years that this all unfolds, will have a say over each of those leases. Because when we lease land and I just look at the city attorney, even if it doesn't, we have a $500,000 threshold for contracts. But we we vote on every lease regardless of the dollar value. Is that correct? The city attorney is nodding. For those of you who do not have video, he's nodding yes. But that is the way that I think this body stays very active in ensuring. And this is where. So how do we know that Adams County will continue to participate in a conversation about transportation? Well, they have a vested interest now in that development happening. So if we see a lease coming to this body that has a significant, you know, job base and we don't feel like there's local transit to get folks from the the rail station to there or there's not adequate roads. We can say we want to see a conversation about that infrastructure and Adams County will have a vested interest in participating because they won't see the revenue from that conversation unless they're part of the transportation conversation. So so I realize that what we're doing is we're making planning possible. We're not actually planning. I just want to make really clear, I'm not agreeing to development at the airport. I'm not planning development at the airport. What I'm saying is it's possible. And I think that like Councilman Brown, given the history, I mean, I think that if you go back here, the privilege of this airport was made possible by the voters of Adams County. That's that's a fact. And so to the extent that there is consideration in this agreement of $10 million up front, it is an acknowledgment of of who made this possible in terms of the enormous economic impact from the airport. At that time, they thought that investment would immediately result in significant commercial development, you know, outside the airport land and in their jurisdictions. That didn't happen. It turns out that the trend was that those developers want to be closer to the airport than we thought. So they made some assumptions, but they made some sacrifices. We're making some sacrifices of $10 million and we're making some assumptions. And so I believe that that it's okay to pave the way for that possibility, provided we keep lots of control over each of the steps along the way. And I'm sure that although they won't be ready in the next few months when the planning is progressing, this council does need to be a part of that conversation. It does need to come to us. Even if the zoning is in place, the plan should go through this body and I will, you know, advocate for that to happen. So sorry for the long comments, but I think that just kind of sharing some reasons why this is important that hadn't been mentioned previously. Thank you. Thank you, Councilwoman. All right. Any other comments for or two is on the floor for publication, Councilman Brown. Sorry, Mr. President, but I just want folks to remember that this is not a final vote in terms of this agreement. This is up to the voters to simply refers this issue to the voters. Of course, they're going to be questioned. So we've had some good ones tonight. And guess what? That's why you have a campaign to educate the voters about the advantages or perhaps disadvantages of this agreement. So all we're doing is putting it on the ballot. We hope we have a good campaign. We hope we have enough money to run a good campaign. But this this is the first step of a long journey, which will end on November the third. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilman Brown. All right. No comments on 402. See? None. Madam Secretary. Roll Call. Shepherd. Epstein. Susman. Hi, Brooks Brown. Hi, Fats. I can eat Lemon Lopez, Montero, Nevitt Ortega. I rob I. Mr. President. All right, Madam Secretary, please call the voting. Now the results. 12 eyes, one abstention. One abstention. 402 is over. I'm sorry. Her vote or electronic vote was no. Is that what you wanted or to abstain? Abstain. It's abstain. Changes. It's chosen. No, on my. Oh, no, Annemarie. At 1212 eyes one abstention four two is ordered published. All right, one down, six more to go. If I were to go next. One 379. Councilwoman Monteiro, what would you like for us to do with this?