A bill for an ordinance amending the Denver Zoning Code. Approves a Denver Zoning Code text amendment to implement the recommendations of the Expanding Housing Affordability project to encourage provision of additional affordable housing beyond mandatory requirements, transition multiple existing incentive systems in various overlays, encourage on-site compliance with affordable housing requirements through other incentives, and correct minor errors and omissions from other recently adopted zoning code text amendments. The Committee approved filing this item at its meeting on 4-26-22.
11 eyes council bill 22, Dash 412 has passed. We're going to move on to our second hearing of the evening. Thank you, Libby, for the staff report and those community members who testified on the previous hearing. Council member state of. Please go ahead with your comments. Thank you, Madam President. It's my intent to offer two amendments tonight. One of them will be an amendment to Council Bill 22 for 25 to remove that 38th and Blake Station area incentive overlay rezoning IMX eight to IMX five and not change any of the other zoning classifications. The other one will be an amendment to Council Bill 22 for 26, which aims to treat edu builders as we're treating those adding on to their homes. The current draft of this bill exempts 80 use from paying the linkage fee, but charges anyone building more than 400 square feet. The linkage fee. Many adus being built are larger than many of the homes in neighborhoods like sponsor and are selling as a part of million dollar homes, exponentially increasing the value of these homes. We need to recognize it's much more expensive to build an avenue than it is to build on to a small home. And so we don't want to unnecessarily privilege adu builders while penalizing those who are trying to make more living space on small homes. This is about equity and treating both builders the same. And so just want to make everyone aware of these amendments so that during tonight's hearing council as well as the public may speak to them on record. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember CdeBaca. Would you please put Council Bill 22 dash for two four on the floor for final passage? Yes, I move that council bill 22 dash for 24 be placed upon final consideration and do pass. All right. Thank you. We have it moved and seconded the combined public hearing for council bills. 20 2-4, two for 22, dash four, two, five and 22. Dash 426 is open. Speakers may offer comments on any one or all three items, as well as the two intended amendments after the conclusion of the public hearing. Council will vote separately on each item, but first I would please have the staff report. Are we going to have a staff report this evening? All right. I look the wrong way. Very good. Good evening. My name is Laura Aldridge, the executive director of Community Planning and development. To our council. Members. Thank you for having me here tonight. And to those of you who have signed up to speak, who are watching here in chambers or from home. Thank you for being with us and being engaged in your government. I'm extremely honored and excited to be here tonight as we conclude more than a year of public discussion and consideration for Denver's proposed expanding housing affordability ordinance. We could not have done it without a strong partner in our housing stability department and strong partners in Councilwoman. Robin. Kimmich and Amanda Sandoval, both of whom have helped shape this ordinance every step of the way. As members of the advisory committee, I strongly believe that the ordinance up for consideration. Tonight is extremely well researched, well defined and will benefit Denver residents for years to come. Our city. Planners. Will discuss three items this evening, which together make up the expanding housing affordability policy. One, an amendment to the Denver Revised Municipal Code, which, if approved, will establish the parameters for including greater affordability in new residential developments. Two An amendment to the Denver zoning code which, if approved, will establish zoning incentives to help offset the costs of providing more housing and more affordability in Denver overall. And three. A rezoning of the area around 38th and Blake RTD Station, which. Will bring the pilot approach. Currently in effect. Here into the new citywide system. These three items have been designed to. Work. Cohesively with each other. To implement the adopted plans. Better meet Denver's housing needs and ultimately ensure that new housing, new homes are built, more affordable homes are built, too. I look forward to the progress we will make on housing with new policies like this here tonight. Thank you for your time. And I now turn it over to Britta. Fischer with the Department of Housing Stability. Good evening. Again. Council members and to our public, I am Brenda Fisher, the chief housing officer for the city and county of Denver and the executive director of the Department of Housing Stability. And I, too, am excited and honored to be here this evening, to be at this point in the process where we can bring you a proposal for expanding housing affordability that has been. Heavily informed by the. Community, by best practice research. And our housing needs are pressing housing needs. And that is such a critical component to supporting and complementing our existing affordable strategies, as this is one of many tools that we are deploying to meet the wide range of housing needs in the city of Denver. We've set aside the first few minutes of our presentation today to talk about Denver's broader housing approach and where the Expanding Housing Affordability Project fits in to complement existing programs and meet housing needs. This policy was designed to work with and not replace our existing services, programs and investments into affordable housing and anti displacement and other new ones yet to come. Like our affordable housing prioritization policy. Expanding housing affordability is a critical piece of the puzzle, helping create more affordability for people of many income levels. And I think it recognizes affordable housing as vital community infrastructure. The expanding housing affordability policy will help us serve a broad range of incomes, as you'll see in our presentation. This policy focuses on providing affordable housing for those making 60% of the area median income or less, which is about $56,000 annually for a two person household in Denver, while serving a broader range of incomes to better meet our growing housing needs. So thank you for your support in moving this important policy forward as we work to build a healthy house and connected Denver. I will now turn the presentation over to Brad Wanek Hosts, Director of Catalytic Partnerships, and on Elise Hoke, Principal City Planner with the Community Planning and development for CBD. That Brad. Good evening, city council. Thank you, Laura and Britta, for making these remarks. I'm gonna do my best to pull up the presentation here. Everyone. Up anyway. Good evening again. My name is Brad Whiting. Staff with housing stability. I'm joined with my colleague from CPD, Annaliese Hogue, here to talk about the expanding housing affordability efforts. As Bridget, this alluded to and as you guys all well know, addressing housing needs in this city requires multiple tools and approaches. And this is really fits squarely into our kind of housing opportunity, corner of our of our long range music plan around creating more options of affordability throughout the city. It's been also mentioned, and I won't reiterate line by line, but this is designed to be very much complementary to the existing tools and programs that my department in the city has to address. The wide range of growing housing needs, ranging from homelessness all the way up to homebuyer support and everything in between. A few examples on here of some of the things that we are currently working on or launching include our goal to preserve 50 affordable homes, the privatization policy, a special revenue fund with other departments to mitigate displacement from from large city investments and infrastructure. A huge pipeline of affordable housing already underway, and also a locally funded voucher program, which we're very excited about. As Laura mentioned, the whole idea of this new policy proposal is that as new housing is built around the city, new affordable housing is created to and new development contributes of all types towards towards the solutions that we have. This can be done in a combination of two really primary policy tools. We'll be discussing a mandatory housing program, along with an update to our linkage fee policy already in place. These spending housing affordability policies again complement our existing programs and are really designed to serve a broad range of incomes. What's what's kind of unique and different and new? What we're excited about with these particular policies is the ability for us to increase the supply of of housing overall throughout the city and especially affordable housing without the use of of limited subsidy dollars, creating more and better mixed income housing opportunities throughout the city. And as far as the linkage fee goes, making sure that we maintain at current levels a critical local funding source that we use across the spectrum of need to make housing investments. Here's a simplified version of the range of incomes, individuals and households and families that are served through these programs. You'll see in kind of the dark blue lines, the linkage fee and the mandatory housing fee in lieu the dollars that are prioritized in our strategic plan for investment in the households we seek to support. You'll see a note there that our funding priority is very much at the low end of the economic spectrum, really those serving 50% and below and with a concentration or of a commitment, a prioritization for those even below 30% of BMI, our mandatory housing production tools does drive more of where we think the market can help support creation of housing, which is then that kind of 51 to 80% AMI range. But it's important to note that even those units often do and can and will reach further down the income spectrum of need when combined with tools like housing choice vouchers, including the local vouchers that my department is working to create. You already heard the overview from from more about what we're what's in front of you tonight, the three different items. So we won't belabor these points. I think it's important to remind you and I think Laura said one year in reality, it's well over two years that a version of this has been going on under way under the leadership of Aronowitz. And CPD started out as an affordable housing incentive zoning incentive research project back in 2020. And then February of last year, when we learned that the state legislature was considering a bill to enable a tool like a mandatory or inclusionary housing ordinance to be in place. We shifted tact and really kind of created the program that it is today. And kind of the three major phases that we've gone through was really spending a lot of the early time identifying and documenting and satisfying our housing needs. Taking a look at the lessons we've learned through our prior programs and researching heavily other cities around the country who have similar programs. We released that report back in February of 2021, spent the summer of last year really diving deeply into financial feasibility analysis and starting to shape the policies based on what we felt like the market could support in terms of an affordable housing requirement and or increased linkage fees. Published that policy proposal back in October and then over the winter really started to dove into the actual policymaking itself, releasing a public review of the changes to the DNC and the zoning code in February of 2020 this year, and then made one last round of revisions based on that feedback in March. And what you have in front of you today is the result and the culmination of this kind of two plus years of effort and analysis. Importantly, throughout this process, we've. We've. Made a sincere effort to ensure that there was bailout on this whole process, that we talked to a variety of organizations, individuals, constituent groups, and made sure that we were clear about what we were trying to accomplish and really did our best to listen and interpret and incorporate all of the feedback that we were able to receive from a variety of groups. We don't need to go line by line, but suffice to say that over the course of the process, we met with over 267 different organizations as well as a variety of individuals throughout this process and are very proud of, of, of that element of this process. We feel like we've we've done as good a job as we can have, really making sure that anybody that has a voice was able to share it so quickly into the proposal overview at a high level, right, that the kind of guiding principles for this project are really to balance a variety of different inputs, current and future housing needs. Again, analysis of other pure city programs, both from our state as well as throughout the country. We have a variety of other programs and incentive tools that we as a city have implemented, and we have a lot of lessons learned from those programs that we believe we've incorporated well into this process. Again, financial feasibility has been a huge component of this. We know that if we if we push too far, if we ask for too much, the market won't be able to deliver it and we won't get the outcomes that we really need to really fester among our housing spectrum. And then again, stakeholder feedback. All of this again made possible in alignment with the requirements of the State Bill that did enable this, which also requires cities to have a variety of other tools and and resources available to support the creation of housing in order to be able to pass such a policy. And so we feel like we're in great shape there. So quickly, at a high level, all new development, with a few exceptions, will contribute to creating more affordable housing on the left and the right of the slide, you'll see small residential developments of 1 to 9 units, as well as nonresidential developments. We'll continue to pay the linkage fee on a per square foot basis, albeit at a stepped up and increased rate over the next four years, which we'll get into. And then multifamily developments of ten units or more moving forward instead of paying a linkage fee, will now be expected and required to include a percentage of its units as income in rent or for sale price restricted. And also enabling some alternative compliances there in again, another requirement of the state bill and incorporating some zoning and financial incentives in there as well, because that is the outcome that we're most seeking to create as part of these policy processes. So I'll cover the linkage fee quickly and I'm going to turn it over to on a lease to cover the mandatory affordable housing program. Again, the linkage fee for those who are new is a is a fee assessed on all new developments based on the induced job demand and therefore housing demand of the uses therein and legally justified via a study that we undertook back in 2016 as a city. And we were simply through this process updating it to today's financial feasibility analysis, ensuring that the fees were charging are kind of part and parcel and appropriate for the for the ongoing need the city sees. So again, this applies to all residents developments of 1 to 9 units as well as all nonresidential uses. However, it does not apply to renovations or finishes of existing developments to small additions of four and a square feet or more to existing single and two unit homes does not apply to accessory dwelling units. It doesn't apply to areas with pre existing housing agreements such as the Green Valley Ranch, and it does not apply to restricted affordable housing developments which which we know continue to be a critical part of our strategy. And it doesn't make sense to charge fees to the very developments who are seeking to solve the issues we are seeking to solve. And finally, it does not apply to educational uses. So quickly, here's a snapshot of the proposed linkage fees based on the variety of different unit types. We don't go line by line, but I think it's important to note that these don't switch overnight should you take action in favor of supporting these policies? The first increase will be effective in July of this year, and then it'll increase in an incremental step over the next three years on a schedule until July 1 to 2025, at which point we reach kind of the what we agreed upon and analyzed to be kind of the appropriately feasible fees associated for these different developments and thereafter will increase based on inflation starting in 2026, just as it does today. So with that, I will invite on a lease up to speak for mandatory affordable housing. Thank you, members of council and also the principal city planner with community planning and development. Mandatory Affordable Housing is a new program that, as Brad said, has been enabled to us by state law. And it allows us to really ensure that as we're creating new housing in the city of Denver, new affordable housing is being built by creating mixed income housing, not just in some segments of the city, but across the city citywide, as well as a secondary priority of increasing funding citywide through the fee in lieu contributions. As a reminder, this applies to new developments creating ten or more units, and it does have exceptions of if I have an existing apartment building and I'm just putting in new countertops, it doesn't apply in those instances. State law does not allow it affordable housing projects. It does not require them to mandate, but it allows them to benefit from the incentives being provided as we're as well as areas with preexisting housing agreements or affordable housing projects. The state bill requires that we provide them one or more compliance options to building affordable units on site. The program in the policy is really designed to target housing needs where we know it's the greatest, which is at 60% AMI on the rental side and slightly higher on the ownership side. Therefore, the policy has been designed to encourage applicants to build affordable units on site more. Walk through what each of those look like. We also have the payment of value and while that fee and lose an option, it is not a desirable option from a financial perspective as it is a considerably high fee and that is calibrated by development type and market area to ensure that it is appropriately kind of leveraged on occasion. Those fee and lieu dollars will go back into the preservation and creation of affordable housing with the focus at lower incomes. We also do have ability to enter into negotiated alternatives in ways in which we can accommodate creative solutions at better and further. Our affordable housing needs in certain neighborhoods may be family friendly housing. Dedication of land for an affordable housing or supportive service. We want to allow for those creative solutions to occur, as well as in instances of large developments of either ten acres or more, or those leveraging city financial programs such as TIFF or metro districts . Those processes require a community engagement process and to kind of show how the affordable housing plan is being proven out in response to community needs. So we're going to focus a little bit, though, on the build on site requirements as this is really kind of the front of the policy and what we're aiming to achieve through it . The the program is set up in which it gives applicants two different compliance options. It also targets rentals and ownerships at slightly different income levels based off of housing needs and in our higher cost areas of the city, which include downtown and Cherry Creek. It also requires a higher contribution of affordable units in total. An important piece of this program is incentives, and incentives are really designed to promote the creation of affordable housing while increasing the overall supply of housing, overall and affordable housing. Therefore, the incentives have been structured into two different segments, the first of which are the baseline incentives, all of which are buy right. Therefore, for projects that are building the affordable units on site, which is really the outcome that we've designed and want to achieve. They have access to three incentives. The first is a permit fee reduction for affordable unit up to 50% of the commercial construction permit fee. They also, if they're doing a mixed income or excuse me, a mixed use building and they have a commercial ground floor use, they are exempt from paying the linkage for use as a financial incentive, as well as an alternative parking ratio, which reduces their standard parking requirement down by 0.5. As you'll note, applicants who select or elect to pay the fee in lieu do not have access to any of those incentives. However, affordable housing projects are not required to comply but can access those incentives as well. We also have this secondary bucket of enhanced incentives and these to our buy right. There are some additional caveats, the most important piece being that they are providing a higher level of affordability, meaning more affordable units on site over the entirety of the building. That includes height incentives, parking exemptions and particular areas which I'll speak to on the next slide, as well as in certain instances, the affordable housing review team, which is predominantly been focused towards fully affordable housing projects, but giving staffing and capacity in the future. We anticipate that these projects can also benefit from a more streamlined concierge review. As made mentioned on the prior slide. I'm not going to go through these are really for reference but to access those enhanced incentives. As you can see, it's a higher percentage of affordable units overall that are required to be met to access those incentives . The parking reductions and exemptions have been certainly something of topic through the planning board and the various liberty meetings. So I did just want to clarify those. In our existing zoning code, as it exists today, we have an alternative parking ratio of point one parking spaces for affordable units that are income restricted up to 60% area median income. What we are proposing here is to bring forth a new reduction which is in that baseline incentive. So any project that is building affordable units on site, regardless of where they are located in the city, can take advantage of a slightly lower parking ratio for all of the units that are being part of that mixed income development. The new exemption is only available in that enhanced incentive bucket, so that means they have to be providing a greater level of affordability. What is available is in that red color here on the map today. So today, if this were to pass projects that are within a quarter mile of a fixed rail transit station and are also a mixed use or a commercial zone district can take advantage of that parking exemption. Once again, this is a minimum. They can always park above it in future iterations. And the amendment that passed out of those corridors that are grayed out or high and medium capacity transit corridors identified through Denver moves. These corridors will not come online as an area to access parking exemptions until the city makes those capital investments. You know, Colfax will be the first one, but that's still quite a few years out. So what we're really trying to do is align our regulations with the reality of the infrastructure that can support multimodal transportation and greater affordability. I'm going to now just give a quick overview as it pertains to the 30 and Blake area, as we are kind of hitting on all three regulatory pieces in this combined public hearing. 38 Then Blake area does have a variety of existing zoning, as you can see, kind of outlined in white here. The area under consideration tonight. The existing zoning consists of urban center mixed use and industrial mixed use. Some districts with heights ranging from three stories to 12 stories as well as currently has an incentive overlay which is proposed to be removed and replaced by a citywide system. The D of seven, which is a design overlay which is proposed to be retained. So computers going on its own. And then there are also some existing overlays of billboard and adult use. Those are not being touched through this part of the proposed rezoning right now. So today I'm the 38th and Blake incentive overlay allows for additional height in exchange for affordable housing fees, affordable housing or community uses. The maximum heights range in this area from 5 to 16 storeys, but we kind of see that 12 storeys being most common. What we've seen to date is that many projects do not provide affordable units because it's an incentive, it is not a requirement, and they're able to build within the base height, meaning there's no real incentive to build at higher heights and leverage that affordability. The projects that are taking advantage of the current pilot program are providing about 2 to 5%, depending upon what their development project type is, and they're serving a higher army level of 80% than what is being proposed in the future. The proposal here before you that combines a map tax syndromes amendment would allow for all projects in the 38 the Blake area, regardless of whether they're building within their base or height zone district to provide affordable housing units on site. When we've done the analysis of modeling, what we can see is that this will create 2 to 4 times more affordable units in the area, and it will also be reaching substantially lower income levels than what we currently have today, as well as it is a way of ensuring consistency of citywide regulations as it pertains to affordable housing. And we're not just keeping this older pilot program on the books. So to achieve this, how we're kind of doing it, it's a little bit nuanced, but we are removing the current incentive overlay. We are making revisions to the base height in some locations. As you can see, it's a change in the areas that kind of have that hatched green area. The red, there's no change to the base heights being proposed and the maximum heights are remaining the same. So there's no increase in overall development being proposed through this. So just a question that we commonly get. Why are we adjusting base heights in the current incentive overlay? Some of those base and incentive heights are at greater deltas than what's being proposed through the citywide. And so to ensure that we maintain the overall development capacity that is called for in our citywide and area specific adaptive plans , we are making adjustments to those base heights so we can be consistent and implemented. So now we get into the. Normal aspects of our texts, amendment and rezoning criteria. I first start with just an overview of the public process. Broad earlier spoke to the overall process of this project, but the public kind of legal process is outlined here with the required noticing and information, starting with the initial application, informational mailing, planning board, luti, so on and so forth. Getting us here to today. Additionally to that legislative process, just want to give a quick overview. These items were unanimous, immensely recommended for approval by Denver Planning Board in April. They also did make a secondary motion encouraging City Council to evaluate further expansion of the parking exemption, which did move through Ludy. Also Ludy heard all three pieces, all of which did have recommendations of approval to be moved here today, as well as two successful amendments, one of which was to expand the enhanced incentive parking exemption to a quarter mile of BRT corridors in the future that are going to have capital city investments as well as in the past amendment to maintain the CPI increase for those projects that are grandfathered in today. So as we get into the review criteria for combining them for the text, in the moment we have consistency with the plans, uniformity of restrictions, something about furthering the public health, safety and welfare for purposes of consistency with adopted plans. In your view. Denver Comprehensive Plan and Blueprint Denver as well as all the various plans specific to the 30th and Lexington area. As many of these were thoroughly detailed in the staff report, I'm going to go over them pretty quickly as I know we have a lot of speakers signed up, but we can always go back and refer to those as needed. So the first one being the Comprehensive Plan 2014. While there are a variety of various plan recommendations outlined in the staff report, I think the first kind of most important one here is under that equitable, affordable and inclusive goal to create a greater mix of housing options in every neighborhood for all individuals and families. We are also speaking to using land use regulations, meaning our zoning code, mainly to enable and encourage for private development or the market of affordable, missing middle and mixed income housing, especially where close to transit. Many of these incentives are focused there, and since it wants me to move along and just keep it going. Blueprint Denver is our land use and transportation plan, which also provides more goals and recommendations that are implemented through this than what is up here on the screen in further detail. But a couple strategy that I just really want to hit on is incentivizing affordable housing through zoning and especially in our regional centers. 38 and Blake is a regional center, are community centers, community corridors. And those areas adjacent to transit gives examples of what those look like, much of which is articulated here, as well as implementing additional parking reductions and projects that are providing income restricted affordable units. Another easy checkmark that we are implementing through this map and text amendment as well as other incentives for affordable housing that go beyond zoning, that get into permit fee reductions, process and other aspects. And it's important that we continue to acknowledge there are further barriers to affordable housing and we continue to advance those. Blueprint In Denver, the majority of this area is the urban center context. And what this rezoning or is it will continue to implement the urban center context as well as acknowledge that this is a regional community center. These are areas that are really directed through our adopted plans to accommodate more than 50% of housing and jobs growth in the area by maintaining these maximum building heights and development capacity and continuing to maintain and implement our area's adopted plans, as well as the acknowledgment of the station corridors, some of the specific plan recommendations that are specific to 38 and Blake. Further details are found in the appendix and in the staff report most recently was 38 and Blake stationary a plan amendment which really came out of an acknowledgment that this area could accommodate more growth, more housing. In exchange for that, we needed to create things that benefited the community, namely affordable housing. So it spoke to promoting taller building heights in these to the area that provides community benefits. This is now substantially increasing from from what was put on the books in 2017, the affordable housing contribution. Lastly, this texture map amendment furthers uniformity of district regulations by maintaining standards within the Denver Zoning Code and further implements public health, safety and welfare. With that, staff recommends approval of the Math and text amendment as well as approval of the DMCA amendments. With that, my presentation completes. You and Brad and Britta and Laura for the presentation this evening. We have 55 individuals signed up to speak and I'm going to go to the first few speakers that are participating virtually , and we'll alternate virtually for and against and then we'll return in person and alternate for and against in chambers here, and then we'll go back to virtual. And so I wanted to let folks know that and we're going to go ahead and start online with our first speaker, Ian Frosh. Hello. My name is Ian Fresh. I live in the posh Park West neighborhood. I have some concerns about this policy in its current form. I'm kind of worried it's going to backfire. I'm worried that it's going to reduce the housing supply overall, leading to higher costs overall because it's making it more expensive for developers to build housing . And the market rate units basically subsidize the lower income units. But that so so those market rate units might need to be higher than market rate, but that might not be feasible. So developers might just not build and we might just get nothing. I do like the parking requirement reduction by a half space per unit, but I'm not convinced there are enough incentives to not discourage developers from building housing in Denver. And really, I think these incentives should already be legal in all developments to encourage more abundant and cheaper housing like the higher heights and parking reductions. The parking requirement exemption near a quarter mile from. From train stations. It wasn't clear to me. I think that needs to be expanded to apply to high frequency clients that exist right now rather than in the future. So I think it sounded like it was only in the future. Bus Rapid Transit Lines and I live near Broadway station and I take the bus a lot more than the light rail because it's more convenient for us. It actually goes to more of the places it needs to go, and the light rail is basically kind of useless for getting around the city because it's mainly along the highway and through industrial areas. So I'd really prefer that exemption to apply to bus lines as well. And I also would really like the city to just legalize with more housing citywide, legalize more density mixed, use higher heights and completely get rid of parking requirements so that we're not prioritizing housing for cars over housing for people. The limits that we have right now are what got into this got us into this housing crisis. The limits cause this and fixing these artificial limits would help reduce the market rate, also making it so fewer subsidies are needed to produce low income affordable housing when the market rate is lower. So I really would like city wide zoning reform and I am concerned that this policy would just discourage developers from developing and we get less housing. Thank you. Think, thinking, thinking. Our next speaker is Lucia Brown. Hello. My name is Lucia Brown and I live in the Baker neighborhood, and my support for expanding housing affordability is tepid at best. The main reason I support it is because the reduction of parking minimums around the transit corridors, although this could go much farther as the previous speaker just mentioned. What I'd like to see is all parking minimums and maximums eliminated for all kinds of developments, not just affordable. But I'll settle for this as a start. And also the burden of helping to pay for affordable housing should be spread across the city, not just on new developments. But again, this is a first step. And ultimately I would like to see Denver legalize. All kinds of housing everywhere. And that means getting rid of single unit zoning throughout the city. And hopefully the new council will have the political will to get this done. Thanks so much. Think thinking. Julien Camara. Yes. Good evening. Members of the City Council. My name is Julian Camera. I'm a Denver resident. It's no secret that Denver has one of the largest gaps in the country between medium income and income needed to live affordability. So to live comfortably, the people of Denver have been calling for affordable housing because we're in a housing crisis and there's no end in sight. But I'm here to talk about the affordability requirement that was placed at 50% AMI. And it sounds like it's actually at 60%. Am I? But. That's missing the whole purpose of expanding affordability. The people who will benefit from this initiative are mostly those in low salary positions getting paid. 36,000. 42,000, $50,000 and more. And these are folks typically with stable employment, and that includes health insurance, a retirement plan, PTO, all the benefits that come with the salary. So these are the folks that are considered to. Be in need of affordable housing. Where does that leave them? Individuals and families who make half that while receiving less benefits and resources. I met a 20 year old the other day who's living in their car and they wouldn't qualify for an affordable unit unit under this initiative. So this bill could be an opportunity to start Denver on a new power pathway. Housing affordability is the true intention. Specifically for those who need it the most, but it needs to actually do that. And we cannot need to continue to allow the poorest people be disregarded as if they don't matter because the number of people being disregarded is growing and our city cannot sustain itself on development and profit interests. We have to take care of our people. Everyone from all different walks of life in Denver agree that housing is a crisis and they're not happy with what's going on. And we're really counting on our elected officials to make it right. So I ask that you lower the designation. Of 50% of AMI or 60%. And adopt the recommendations of local community advocates. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Ethan Hemming. Good evening. It's wonderful to be here with you remotely. I appreciate the chance to express our support for oh 4 to 4. I'm the CEO of Warren Village and a proud resident of Denver. Warren Village has been around for 50 years. We provide affordable housing for single parents and their children. We do transformative, supportive services for these families. We provide early learning in two locations. In a word, we create opportunity. And that's why I'm here to testify in support of oh 4 to 4, because what we believe it will do for our latest development, our work that we're bringing forward in southwest Denver at the corner of Alameda and Pecos, hopefully in two years, we believe this initiative would allow us to take advantage of a height bonus and to go up one more story and one of our buildings on our affordable housing campus. And what that means, truly the foundation for what we do is affordable housing. And what that would do is take this development that is currently slated to be 74 units, much, much needed, 74 units. But if we could take advantage of this, we would have 89. So that's 15 families, that's 15 children, 15 moms, 15 lives that we think we could have a greater impact on. So I cannot express it any greater way than to talk about those 15 families tonight. And I just appreciate the chance to support this. Denver needs that. We are excited to be here to support it. And we truly, truly hope that it will pass. Thank you. Thank you. We're going to go ahead and transition back in chambers. I'm going to call the five individuals that we have in chambers. Victoria Barriga will be our first speaker, followed by POZ Athena, Mary Coddington, Kenny Owens and Samuel Valeriano. And so, Victoria, we'll start with you. Sorry. It's okay. Okay. My name is Victoria Barriga. I live in affordable housing on Lowry, which is that 80%. Amma, am I sorry? What I'm here to talk about is. Is. Is this proposal on the we. And the linkage fees and the affordable rents. The problem with this bill is that it only affects people from 60% to 80% to 100%, which I don't understand why 100% is even in it. It it's like I said, I'm in affordable housing at 80% and and I don't make that much money. But people who are making less than 30%, less than 50%, they can't get housing. We have our ourselves we have a family member who has to live in our house with us. We it's an affordable I mean, it's ADA. Compliant for me because I need my walker to get around everywhere in the house and having that third. Person in the house makes it a lot harder. But he's unable to keep the apartment he had because of the rent increases. And he works full time, 40 hours plus a month, and he still cannot pay the rents that people are being charged here in Denver. And it's just absolutely insane. When I was renting apartments back in the seventies, eighties, nineties, you could find reasonably priced. Apartments. That made sense for the amount of income that a person made. I am on my income right now. I could not afford any of these rents. If I had to go rent somewhere, I'd be in. I've been a big piece of trouble. So it's good that that that the council is. Looking at trying to provide affordable housing. But I think. It's been said before that paying linkage fees does not address the very big problem that is happening right now in our city businesses and people are all upset about people being on the street. A way to get people off the street is to provide them with housing that they can afford so they can get into housing. And we we need to be really supporting people who are making 30% or less of that. Am I because those are the people that we're seeing that businesses are getting upset about, that residents are getting upset about, and it's not their fault. It's like it's not their fault. We have had cuts in in in the in the housing from federal since the same times. I mean, it's been going less and less and less and less. And I'm sorry, but these developers are saying that it's too expensive to develop. I'm sure there are other developers out there who would be totally willing to build something that they weren't making quite as much money on. And I'm sorry. I don't see my time. So that's the time allotted. Thank you. Okay. You're welcome. We're going to go ahead and go to our next speaker. So I. Guess. I was. Actually. Speaker before. 2011, my village, which is the. Single parents housing program, and that's at 30% AMI. And I can't even really afford to save up for myself going to school full time. I suppose that I could. Stop going out to eat, sometimes buying houseplants and maybe some self-care items. But for example, if somebody like Ian Frisch, I couldn't just have that kind of lifestyle of self care like he probably does in that sense that developers will develop because that's their goal, to make money, to develop spaces and gentrify. And so just because there's affordable housing asked. Doesn't mean they're not going to develop. Perhaps the greedy ones won't develop as much, but there will definitely be developers regardless. And the fact that it's 50. To 60%. AMI seriously, I'm at 30%. AMI As a full time student at Metro, I got my eighth communication with honors last two semesters ago, and now I'm working on my B.A. and my own business as well, and I'm supporting this little person and trying to get a car. And it's really difficult. I can ask you to try. And switch lives with me to maybe just see what it's like if he's even still there. But all of those developers I know we live in a plutocracy and I would like to perhaps even have conversations between the poor and them and see what comes of that. But the thing is, the plutocracy has the privilege to say no and to not talk to us and to stick their nose up at us and to all of you guys. And then unless they want to pay you so they can get their way. But not all of you guys are sold out, thankfully. But there's a lot of politicians and police officers who are sad. Because this is a plutocracy. But I really would appreciate it if there would be 30 to 40% and not just. 50 to. 60, because like that one. Guy said who said he helped develop this plan, he said it encompasses from. Homelessness all the way to home buyers. No, it doesn't. Homelessness is 30 to 40% am-I. He lied to us. He's he's trying to truly develop that. That was like a whole PR scheme or marketing scheme to cover up the truth. And that's just sad. But many of these people are just used. To covering up the truth because they're getting paid. And that's the truth. Thank you. Our next speaker, we're going to ask Mary. We're going to try to have a speaker go before you. Thank you for your consideration. Mr. Gary Jackson. Mary Coddington, who will be here in person, and then Kenny Owens and Samuel Valero. Uh huh. Uh huh. Uh huh. Uh huh. Uh huh. Ladies and gentlemen, Counsel, please look up at these screens. I like to see the people whom I like to see the people who killed me. The ones who should never see my five grandkids grow up. In a South sweep a month and a half ago. You blew my heart as bad as this old man out there. Now I'm scared that I'll die. Maybe right here. And you deserve it. Each and every one of you deserves that. You just can't look at me. You just seem so. Hartmann. It's all put there. I'm drowning. In terror. Strongest man I ever knew and ever. I've almost died three times this week. He blew me up in the house and came screaming. You have four tents in my camp. Spotless. It was in a stolen cookie. We caused no problems. You put a trash man in charge of armed first responders. Those cops knew me. They would have never done that. They respect me as a force for good in that community. You're trash, man. It orders the cops around. Did this to me. I'm going to die today. Right now. Tomorrow, next week. Affordable housing. What's affordable? Listen to his brain sound. I went into the streets. I took care of the schizophrenics and the fair, the children that you're going to use. I gave them. Everything I had. I didn't steal a cookie in Newtown, not one cookie. I'm going to preach to these people whose obligations and love side, Mr. Councilman, the homeless need leaders they need who is still in the need to quit. Everything we will. And show the citizens respect. But after World War Two at Nuremberg, you put those Nazi leaders on trial. And they said. You told them. You said you're guilty of crimes against humanity. We've been following Moody's. You said that's not good enough. Your obligation was. To humanity when you took them out. Hung. Our obligations each other. I'm a good man. You wanted me and you Streets. You killed me. You don't even know what's going on out there. Whose last name? Any of you ladies? With the homeless housing camps. We saw what was being done in your name with your approval. Who's this time you really thought about these issues or you said screens we. Have allotted for each speaker, we've got 3 minutes for everybody. And so we want to make sure we can hear from everybody. Thank you for being here. And we're going. To put everything on. The speaker. Her name is Mary Coddington. And so we thank you for being here. We've got a lot of folks. God bless each of you people. Please make better decisions, your soul. Rest on it. Thank you. Our next speaker is Mary Coddington. Good evening, Council. It's nice to be here with you in person tonight. My name is Mary Coddington. I'm a resident of District nine. But tonight I'm speaking to you on behalf of the Neighborhood Development Collaborative, a coalition of 20 affordable housing providers across the. Denver metro area. Serving everyone from. Folks exiting homelessness, affordable rental housing and affordable. Homeownership. On behalf of in D.C., I am here to ask each of you to vote to approve expanding housing affordability through those for 24 and for 26. Firstly, we would like to thank CPD and host for the extensive stakeholder project stakeholder participation that they held throughout this process. We met with them several times and really felt that our thoughts. And feedback were considered and are represented to you in the final draft proposal tonight. And I want to spend a lot of time tonight talking about the need for affordable housing. I know that all of you are acutely aware of that. And we have a lot of representatives in the audience tonight that can speak firsthand. But one point that I want to call out is that. Affordable housing developers. Build and manage approximately 7% of the housing stock within the city. And yet 33% of Denver households are housing costs burden, and up to. 50% of renters are housing cost burden. So the affordable housing sector alone can't necessarily manage all of that need that's out there. And the pace of affordable housing development will never keep up with the pace of market rate development. Therefore, it's imperative that the private sector serve a portion of the growing needs. You'll probably hear tonight that it's unfair to put the burden of affordable housing onto one sector, but that's really not the case. As Britta and Brad mentioned earlier, this is one of a series of tools that's used to address the housing need in our community. And by focusing, you know, incorporating the this income range into market rate development, it frees up other resources in the city to address the lower aims that I know a lot of folks are concerned about tonight. This program is designed to build mixed income communities, which is essential for access for folks to be able to have amenities such as high quality schools and parks and grocery stores. But it's. Also important to remember that this is only a first step towards economic integration, and it should be followed by loosening the land use restrictions that limited owners ability to build. Different housing forms on their property. Once again, the affordable housing development community that's represented by in D.C. request that you approve this proposal and provide an additional tool to achieve housing stability in Denver. Thank you so much for your time and consideration. Thank you. Our next speaker is Kenny Owens. Hi. I'm Kenny Owens. I'm an advocate for those experiencing homelessness. Uh. I don't know what zip code I'm in most of the time. I. I'm a rough sleeper. And as I see it, these you're your host. I don't know how effective they are because those outside two inclement weather days. And. They didn't. They didn't. What do they call it when they, uh, they. They didn't declare inclement weather, so nobody got vouchers. Uh huh. But their numbers seem to be supported by everybody who's spoken. And what they were saying is that lesser the EMI that would be supported. I mean, this would be 36,000. Now they're looking at 41,000. So my question to your would be four years within maybe not this term, but next term you're up for reelection and people were paying a 400, $400 rent increase every year. Are y'all going to be able to get the votes for anything lower than 30% being looked after? Okay. Y'all are looking at 60%. And in Seattle, they did that. In L.A., they did. We're trying to overcome some of the challenges of homelessness while we're doing this. And I don't think that it measures that will increase homelessness by double will. Be effective, I. If, uh, if you can tell somebody who is making $57,470, uh oh, that's hard. So twice the, uh, fitting end to 50% and mine in four years because of the effect they will take place with, uh, with building these developments that don't have to pay linkage fees so that there is affordable housing. What's it going to do to the rest? And rent is my question. Everybody else is. Thanks for your time. I agree. Thank you. Our next speaker in chambers is Samuel Valentino. And then we're going to go ahead and transition to virtually sounds. Go ahead, Samuel. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Sam Valeriano and I'm the health policy manager for the BE Well Health and Wellness Initiative of the Foundation for Sustainable Urban Communities. I live in Council District six and the organization I work for primarily serves the diverse communities in Council districts eight and 11. The Bible Health and Wellness Initiative has a mission to effect programs, policies and practices to support health equity and create a culture in which all people genuinely have the opportunity to achieve the health status that they desire regardless of their race, income, gender, education, or any other social barrier. As we will hear from probably some of the supporters of this bill, the quality and affordability, quality, affordability and stability of a home are foundational to human health and wellness. Over the last decade, more than 100,000 people have moved into our city. This coincided with a massive increase in housing costs. In 2012, the median home price in Denver was around $200,000 and the median rent was about 1100 dollars a month. Today, the median home price is more than 550,000, and the median rent is almost 1800 dollars a month. Statewide, the number of available housing units that are considered affordable for people making less than $45,000 a year has been cut in half since 2010. Today, more than 100,000 Denver households spend at least 30% of their monthly income on rent or mortgage payments, and nearly 50,000 households spend more than half of their monthly income on housing costs , leaving precious little room for other basic necessities like food, transportation and health care. And we all know about the continuous plight of our own house population whose ranks continue to grow at a seemingly exponential rate. Now, while we understand and recognize the fact that there are issues like mental health and addiction that contribute to homelessness, we understand that the root cause is a lack of affordable places to live. According to one estimate reported in Denver earlier this year, the city and county of Denver needs at least 50,000 new units of housing just to keep up with demand. So we support these zoning amendments because they make very necessary, if long overdue reforms to the zoning code that will enhance our city's ability to increase the housing supply, ultimately stabilize costs, and eventually bring some level of relief to a majority of Denver residents. Thank you very much for your time this evening. Thank you. We're going to transition back virtually. And our next speaker is Brandi mangers. And it's not looking like we have Brandi with us and so we're going to go ahead and move on. Charles Allison Godfrey. Go ahead. Councilmember. Hi. My name is Charles Allison Godfrey. I'm a resident of Denver District six. I'm also an employee of Elevation Community Land Trust, an organization that creates affordable homeownership opportunities for Denver at and below 80% of the area median income. I'm testifying on behalf of elevation today. We support Denver's expanding housing affordability plan because it will increase our city's affordable housing stock. Homeownership is transformative at both family and community levels. Families. Homeownership built into generational wealth benefits, educational outcomes, and improves physical and mental health for the community. Increased homeownership rates, raise community wealth and increase the amount of cash that families have to spend in the local economy. Investing in homeownership is also important because it is one of the main drivers of the racial wealth gap. The typical white family has five times the wealth of the typical Hispanic family and eight times that of typical black family. This corresponds with the fact that 68% of white households own their own home, while 52% of Hispanic and 37% of black households put in their homes. These statistics show the importance of investing in affordable homeownership for our cities residents of color who are disproportionately overrepresented at lower income levels. The Expanding Housing Affordability Ordinance will not cure all of Denver housing problems, but adding affordable homeownership opportunities to the city's housing stock is a crucial step in the right direction that will not overly impact developers profits nor their incentive to develop. However, when the city considered discretionary agreements under the alternative compliance options of these ordinances, Elevation urges the city government to maximize community benefits in these agreements. Instead of allowing these alternative compliance options to be a backdoor for housing developers to escape their responsibilities under the plan, Elevation Community Land Trust expresses deep gratitude to the city employees and advocates who are involved in drafting the plan and ask you to vote yes to adopt it. Thank you for your time. Think, think, think. Speaker is Tyler Carlson. Hello, counsel, good to see you tonight here on behalf of Nathan ICC. And I am a Denver resident and I want to first of all thank Brad and Annalise and the rest of their team for all the outreach that they provided over the last many months. While we don't always agree on everything. I think we do agree that we're all working hard to create a better city here in Denver, and we're really appreciative for all of the time and effort they spent listening to the real estate industry and trying to incorporate our feedback into the program. I do want to, as a commercial real representative, I we are concerned that we're creating a housing affordability problem for a small business affordability problem, because most small businesses rent their commercial space and the increased linkage fees that are being voted on tonight, which in some cases increase up to 400%, are going to trickle down to increased rents for our tenants because it's increasing the cost of commercial structures. So I think that should be something that the council weighs tonight in its decision and do want to encourage staff and council to be pretty mindful of the 14 month, I believe, threshold for obtaining approvals because as has recently been in the press, the Denver process has gotten longer and much more protracted than in the past, and we are very much concerned that projects are moving forward in good faith, will be caught in the gaps on delays in processing and will be subject to fees that they currently are not planning on because the runway is frankly too short on the timeframe for getting their piece approved. I think again, 14 months as I recall. As a private citizen, I support this program from a mixed income neighborhoods perspective. You know, I live in Parkville. I have lived in the Central Park neighborhood for a decade, and I see the value for my personal life and my family's life and living in a mixed income, integrated neighborhoods. And I think this proposal will do that. But I cannot support this as a housing affordability program because it will not decrease the cost of housing overall. There will be a select few who are fortunate enough to get subsidized rents, but those rents are subsidized by their neighbors. You know, I've got two kids who go to East High School, and if there's five boys, you want to go buy a $10 pizza. They each throw in two bucks, they buy a $10 pizza. If the government decides that only one boy has to pay a dollar, then guess what? The other four boys got to pay an extra $0.25 or they don't get a pizza. And I think that's the reality of this program is it does not decrease the cost of housing for its construction. All it does is limit the income potential from a certain segment of the renter pool. And either two things happen. Those lost the rents for the subsidized units got to have to be paid for by the other residents. The 80% or the project doesn't happen. And that's the mathematical economic reality of this program that was actually mentioned. David Pardo is the next speaker. David Pardo I live in the River North neighborhood and I actually wanted to speak specifically to that. I don't just live specifically in Liver River North, I also work in the neighborhood and both my work and my home are in the over. What was the overlay district around the train station? And so out of my window you can see a whole bunch of cranes. There are three that are visible right now and I like that. I like seeing this city grow. I like the fact that we're turning this neighborhood into a more vibrant place where there are more things to do, there are more people around. And so I would be speaking to a specific amendment that was presented tonight, would like to see that amendment not be adopted. I think that this neighborhood can accommodate the vertical growth. There aren't very many low lying housing type buildings left. Almost everything that's low lying is a warehouse space. Many of them are vacant. I walk past them on a daily basis. And so I have mixed feelings about the the entire program, because as the last speaker just said, if you lower the rents for a few people, some people have to pay more. That being said, I live in a building that's like that. We have limited income folks that live in the building that pay a little less rent. I pay a little more rent because of it. I don't mind. I don't think it's a bad deal. But I am concerned if what it does is it causes projects to not pencil. If a developer comes in and they say, I need to make I want to do this with this piece of land. And they realize that by having affordable units, they can't make the project work in a way that the bank will approve. Then we just don't get those units. They don't build the building. That's how development works. I know this because I work in the industry, and so to me, it's important to not say, Oh, let's not do this, but to make sure that over the coming years we look at the effects of this program on the amount of housing that gets built. Do we end up with more housing because of this? Because we get height incentives? Do we get less housing because developers are scared of building and having to build affordable units? I can't say one way or the other what's going to happen, but I think it's important to watch and see what happens. So that we can figure out, is this working perfectly? Does it need to be changed? What do we need to do with it so that our city gets what it needs? The last thing I wanted to speak to is I'm excited to see less parking. I don't think we need that much of it in a city that has as many things as it has. We have at this point, half a dozen ways to get to the mountains on public transit. So I don't think providing parking is the most important thing that we can do. I think it's providing housing for people. So and with that, I think that's good. All right. All right. Thank you. Our last speaker that we had online was Luke Leary. And it doesn't look like we have Luke with us. And so we're going to go ahead and transition then back into chambers here. Our first speaker is Joel Noble. Good evening, counsel. My name is Joel Noble. I live in Curtis Park. Although I serve on several boards and commissions, including the Denver Planning Board, I'm speaking here tonight only on my own behalf. First, I'd like to encourage council to vote in favor of each of the items on the agenda relating to expanding housing affordability. There's a lot to like in this package serving the range of incomes, either directly with included affordable units or indirectly by the linkage fee, providing funds that the city can use to help those who need even deeper levels of affordability. Thank you to the Council sponsors of this effort, to the staff and to the Community Advisory Committee that worked for so long on this, and we're ready to act. When the state gave the latitude to pursue this approach. In specific tonight, I want to speak to the 38th and Blake portion of the proposal. I served as Curtis Park Neighbors representative in 2016 to 2017 to the Community Steering Committee for the height amendments and the incentive overlay to the 38th and Blake Station area. As you know, the existing affordability incentive here was put in place as the city's pilot of what could be done to incentivize, including affordable housing, which at the time could not be required by offering additional height. That was that was as much as the city could do legally through that process. We had a consensus reached on building heights that were higher than they were previously allowed. And the map is block by block negotiated with all the neighborhoods surrounding that area. Tonight's proposal thoughtfully brings forward the maximum heights that we're in that agreement, and then the current zoning incentive overlay. That was the consensus from 2017. But now the affordability is going to be required and expected, which we couldn't do before. Previously is unless Hoke spoke to those who chose to do the incentive. Height would provide between two and 5% of the units affordable to get that height. Now, they'll just provide between eight and 10% affordability because of what I hope you'll pass tonight and consistent with the community vision. We do want to have the ability to stretch to do more. So if they do more affordability than that and have the incentive levels, then and only then can they hit the maximum heights that were agreed to in 2017. This brings forward an incredibly thoughtful way. The intention of the community to allow additional heights only when affordability is required and to have an incentive. And for that reason, and for so many more in this very comprehensive package, I encourage you to support this as it addresses one of our most critical issues. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Dominique Mack. And then the next speakers are Gerald Horner, Teresa Howard and and the Christian Coalition. Go ahead, please. I like to the council, first off. For allow me to come up here and basically let you all know how I feel. I just want to say I don't know what happened last time I was here, but the hearing about the walkout broke my heart because as a young lady that grew up having, you know, a lot of hope in our justice system that her because as a person to be homeless and a mother, I raised my children. So I believe that our system works. You punish those who do wrong. You reward those who do wrong. And you hear those who cry for help. And, you know, they're just kind of let down on me. So I just I hope everybody's past that now. So first and foremost, I'd like to say this much. I really can't say much. I'm not, quote, no stance, because all these faces here, you have our our mailmen, our doctors, our lawyers, our homeless, you have everybody here and letting you know how this bill is affecting us. This COVID has really made us see that homelessness and this whole situation is it's prejudice. It can affect all of us. And I really want you to take the time to consider this bill, because this might be your grandmother. And as you see, we had a grandmother standing here to speak on behalf of this situation to where? They income is not able to support this and to be out there in a tent helping somebody in these situations every day, watching the people that you go to sleep next to wake up and they in that hypothermia or heat exhaustion from being out here because they can't afford adequate housing. Are we asking you all to do is just revise this? Yes. This is the first step to change, but at least revise this because it's not flexibility. It's not flexibility for us. This out here, we are people's moms. We are people's grandmothers. We are people's fathers. We are your family. And we just want you all to know that we're here and just take the time to consider that. And I just want to say thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Gerald Horner. Thank you. My name is Gerald Horner. I live in the Five Points neighborhood of District nine, and I'm here tonight to express my support for the recommendations that have come out of the Expanding Housing Affordability Project. I have to acknowledge, though, that this does. Not address the most vulnerable in our community those. In the zero, the 30%, and I those that are on the street today. Nonetheless, this these proposals, this proposal does address the need we have for workforce housing. We are we certainly have a crisis. Across all income spectrums. But to have housing geared toward teachers. Nurses, firefighters and the like is. Certainly critical to the city's. Livability. It's also important to note that this engagement that the city has had with the with the neighborhoods and the community over the last couple of years is also what we saw back when the original 38th and Blake overlay were created. There was tremendous community engagement and number of us that live in the area participated in those meetings. And we know that it was important at that time that this affordable. Housing was something that was critical. To improve the livability of our city. I am an advocate for supporting aspects of Livable City that include smart growth. Smart density. One of. The biggest concerns we have as. Residents is the very is the fact that as the city grows and we increase in our density, we're seeing a decrease in quality of life for our pedestrians, for cyclists, for families trying to cross the streets in our inner, inner city neighborhoods. And we're asking that. The city look at the neighborhood plans that have been developed over many years across the city that address issues such as traffic calming measures, ball about different converting streets from one way to two way that would help reduce the speeds in our neighborhoods and so on. So while this is part of the this is a tremendous step forward in helping with housing affordability. I would also ask that our incoming mayor and city council look closely at the existing neighborhood plans that call for increasing safety measures to make our inner city neighborhoods more livable, more livable. Thank you again for voting in support of these programs put out by expanding housing affordability. And thank you for your time. Thank you. Our next speaker is Tyrese Howard. Hello. Truce Howard with House Keys Action Network, Denver. So the stable which enabled this city bill opened the doors for much needed city. Action to restrict prices and newly. Developed housing. We are in agreement with those supporting this bill that the city should mandate developers build housing. At restricted prices. However, we do not support this bill because it sets in stone a standard for acceptable affordability that will never create housing for our community. Poor and houseless people are left out entirely of this plan. We have been told by counsel people that, quote, no one ever said this plan was intended to meet the. Housing needs of people. Under 50 or 30%. And I. We're expected to be okay with this. To be grateful that maybe, just maybe, someday, funds will trickle down to build housing for poor and houseless people. We are told we have shelters and expected to accept that this is the inevitable way of life and that things for for for in houses, people . Well, housing is built for people above 60%. And I know. Thank you. We do not accept this. It was said today that the most need is at 60% AMI. This is not. True. And as city reports themselves, state people at 30% and I are 60, 64% of people at 30%. Army are severely cost burden. And compare that to 2% of people at 100% ami are severely cost burden. The report for this plan states that the city wants to meet the greatest needs yet. This bill includes housing created at. 100% AMI. And not for people at 30%. If Denver really believes that it is, then it should be meeting the greatest needs that the development should be required to build below 50%. In addition, looking at the linkage fee, it's great that there was an increase in that linkage fee. However, that does not cover the cost of building another unit. And so, again, we're expected to wait for that money to trickle down to people who are actually low income. You say it's not financially feasible. Yes, I understand that the financing of housing for poor people who can't afford the. Insane rents. Must depend much more on developers or on. Our government. Or others. But is this really not feasible? If it's feasible for developers to have high priced rents in apartments and keep many of them empty? Is it not feasible for those to be left reserved for people under 30%? Am I? If it's feasible for the city to pay millions of dollars for new sports stadiums and millions of dollars on policing and jails, is it not feasible to mandate that housing be put at 30% AMI. For each speaker? All right. Thank you very much. Thank you. Our next speakers, Andy, question. Hello. My name is Andy Christian. I live in West Colfax, currently represented by District one, soon to be District three. I'm just so pleased to be here tonight and I'm really, really pleased at the work that city council has done. I don't represent any organization. I am not part of any developer, and I've being paid by anybody to be here. I just am really encouraged by, honestly, the forward thinking, the strong thinking and the clever thinking, community focused thinking that has gone into this proposal. It started in a place without certain state laws that it now has the power to take advantage of. We now take advantage of existing laws and communities across Colorado. Large cities, small towns can all take advantage of the state laws that it sounds like due to our advocacy as a city. Instead of entertaining this, conversations with state lawmakers are now possible. I also think something else that we're missing out on or instead of not recognizing here, is the political courage it takes actually to implement something. Like this. In one of our biggest housing markets, city in county of Denver right here. You have folks like Lakewood, folks like Boulder. You folks like other cities nearby, you know, good cities, nice people there. But they have a problem with affordability, too. And I think to be able to take on sort of this type of policy, which is not an experiment, it's been tried in many other cities and states across the country. And to take on this policy in our biggest housing market in Denver is an act of political courage. I just have some little questions. Not that I looked at the answer tonight, but I want to entertain perhaps down the road. So this policy has a number of kind of knock ons that I find really fascinating, and I'm interested to kind of keep track of these. For instance, the West Area plan kind of implements height restrictions along the south side of the gulch, which is where the W line runs. And we'll further area plans like potentially the West Area plan looks to be doing what they implement strict height limits, which is perhaps a backdoor to limiting incentivize building height under deeper affordability. Will developers themselves look for it? Look to rezone parcels to slightly higher floor so that they're incentivized to leapfrog the limit of earlier incentive sites? They could have taken on, you know, from IMX 5x7 and they can suddenly go really high up and will rezonings drop? As developers find it's actually just very easy to instead of going through the rezoning process to just take on their buy. Right. Deeper affordability. I'm interested too, I think in something that a previous speaker said that the commercial real estate market in Denver, one of the small changes that have been suggested by community stakeholders was the commercial ground floor like linkage fee dropping that for new mixed use development. I wonder if down the road that means that we have a resurgence of weird retail back in Denver because we can afford to have a space that didn't have to pay a linkage fee that is ubiquitous in every new development around town. Again, I just want to thank you for your courage to do this work. There's so much more to be done. So much more to be done, as many of the other speakers have said tonight. But I think this is a very important first step and especially gives other political leaders in Colorado encouraged, too. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker are going to be a group of speakers virtually. And so we're moving back to Zoom. Nolan McGowan is first. Hi. Good evening. My name is No. Let me go. I'm part of the Global Response Coalition Organizing for Health and Housing Justice. And I guess I'm assuming that this will pass City Council tonight and therefore asking the city council and city staff very closely monitor this because I do believe there's a lot of potential unintended consequences that could come out of this. I was part of the committee for this and feel like the power in that committee was weighted towards the developer's stated bottom line instead of the needs of the people in this city. Well, I fully understand this is a market based solution. I don't think that it's creative enough to encourage partnerships either with affordable housing developers or the surrounding community of with private developments. I also don't see this proposal as bold enough or equitable enough to support. We know that there are areas that are vulnerable to displacement, and we need to address the biggest gaps in affordable housing, which is below 60%. And there are some major red flags when it comes to equity that we would hope that you are paying close attention to. Having across the board requirement across the city takes up for that very small amount of high cost area could actually encourage development in these neighborhoods, especially areas like us that are receiving high amounts of investment. For this reason, we proposed an equity pilot for the next neighborhoods that are currently receiving the highest amounts of public investment investment. That amendment was not approved at committee, and we really need you all to pay particular attention to this and track. If there's becoming concentrated development in these neighborhoods where the land cost less, if part of the purpose is to have affordable housing throughout Denver in areas that do not have affordable housing. Now, there's a lot of reasons why this isn't going to reach that outcome, including exclusive zoning in these neighborhoods and other impacts, ongoing impacts of redlining . Unfortunately, there are not enough accompanying policies to prevent ongoing patterns of displacement and destructive development in this proposal, and this could exacerbate patterns of displacement instead of stopping them. While we have this new Impact Investment Fund, we still don't know what it's being used for. We still don't know if that will be connected to affordable housing. We have the equity rezoning again. We don't know what's going to come out of that, and we are very concerned that this would be used for reasons to replace an actual conversation in agreement with community for changing neighborhoods like us that are very overwhelmed with new residential development. That's replacing an industrial uses. We really need more tools to be able to encourage equitable development. In order to get the lower arms we're going to we need a greater affordability. We also can't count on any developer going any lower at. Thank you. Keynote speaker joining us virtually is Keith Pryor. Hey. Keith Pryor into the queue. Hey, can you hear me? Yes, yes. Yeah. Great. Thanks. Keith Pryor live in the Five Points area and definitely in support of all three of these motions before you tonight. Definitely want to address the 38th and Blake Street Station and I do oppose the amendments that are being brought forward. There was extensive community outreach in that plan that allowed for the right incentives for the additional affordability. And now that we're mandating the affordability and not if that were to not pass, then you would be taking those developable spaces away from that which was already granted. And so it is critical that those two pieces move together because you are mandating the affordability. And we did agree for those additional height incentives in that area for that additional affordability. So that is a critical piece. I do think that that this is definitely something that is needed in the city. I do believe that DHS is a great partner that is working on the 0 to 30% and is an amazing partner in that. And we are meeting those needs, but obviously we need to meet them more. But this is not the program for that. I do have concerns and I'm hoping that down the road that the council will revisit one of I think one of the glaring missed pieces of this, and that is single family development. I don't believe that the linkage fees are sufficient enough. I think that this really does punish those that are trying to build density and help solve our problem while yet giving a free pass to those that continue to support sprawl, continue to support a car dependent city. And there is a need to basically say enough is enough on sprawl and that we have Master Masterplan communities in Green Valley Ranch, Montebello, Lowry, Central Park. There is no affordability. All of those houses will all be 400, 600, $800,000 because they're one house. And you're not basically capturing that market and you are supporting sprawl drive till you qualify by not having sufficient linkage fees and really discouraging single family development when we need more multifamily. And so I hope down the road that we will revisit this topic and really note the unsustainability single family development, because it really does promote more car dependency and it really does not support a sustainable community and a sustainable city. And you guys are giving them a free pass with this particular proposal that's in front of you. Added we're going to go ahead and transition back into chambers. Tyler Isreal is our next speaker, followed by Kinsey Hastert, Jerry Burton, Naomi Amaya and Kerry Washington. Hey, it's Tyler again. I just wanted. To say that all of these previous speakers have all been bringing up some very. Good points. And the general. Gist, which is basically what I have planned out. Is that this bill, this proposal. I would be in support of it if it was more inclusive. On the. Income level, I'm hearing less than 50%. Am I? The system once again, is just kind of going to forget about us. I know I don't make over 50%, am I? So there be the huge air quotes on the word affordable. Let's be real. The one. Thing that would work is if. Landlords and rental companies were restricted from charging more than one third. Whatever minimum wages. After taxes. With a 40 hour workweek. They want you to make three times the rent. And so that would be beneficial for everyone. Right now, the majority of the working class is convinced that this entire system is meant to keep us down. And not not protect us, but. Rather protect people's assets. But we are the people with no assets to begin with. Those who don't have assets and want them. Are pushed and forced back down to square one and live their whole life at square. One, if you will. Isn't the whole concept of renting from someone who does have their own property? Help to meant you are meant to help you save until you can get your own property. Renting is collectively more expensive. Than buying property like over the. Course of your entire life, but that requires. A lot of investment at once, and it's really hard to save for that if the majority of someone's income is being put towards housing to begin with. This isn't rocket science, y'all. If the jobs paid enough in. Housing was affordable, we wouldn't see those tents. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Kinsey Hastert. Thank you, councilmembers. My name is Kinsey Halstead. I'm a resident of District ten. But this evening I'm here in my role as state and local policy director for Enterprise Community. Partners. Enterprise works nationally and in Denver to increase the supply of affordable housing, advance racial equity, and build resilience and upward mobility. I'm here to voice Enterprise's support for the expanding housing affordability proposal. I'd like to start by briefly thanking council members and Sandoval and their staff Annaliese Hoke, Brad Wine and in the teams at CPD and host and all the members of the advisory committee who have worked to put this policy before you today. Enterprise is proud to have served on the advisory committee and believes the proposal is a needed tool to create more affordable units through mixed income development and generate new funds for the city to invest in more and more deeply affordable homes. In particular, we appreciate tying the creation of new market rate housing to onsite affordable units, which will help advance more equitable access to community benefits and economic opportunity. Prioritizing units that are affordable to renters and homebuyers with incomes at 60 and 80% of area median income, while also providing flexibility for developers to include units affordable to individuals and families living on less. Ensuring the fee in lieu is high enough to meaningfully disincentivize developers from choosing this alternative to providing affordable homes in mixed income development. Prioritizing neighborhoods where residents are particularly vulnerable to involuntary displacement for the city's investment of fees in lieu collected from such communities and significantly increasing existing linkage fees projected to generate millions of dollars each year in much needed funding for affordable production and preservation. We further understand and appreciate the units created through this policy should ease investment demand for this income bracket, allowing the city to dedicate a greater share of its affordable housing resources, including those generated through increased linkage fees and fees in lieu to providing homes for those with incomes below 60% AMI. And we look forward to working with the city to help ensure these outcomes. We do recognize the. Benefits to affordable housing necessarily operate within the constraints of a market driven solution, and that while a critical step forward, this is but one piece of a much bigger puzzle of Denver's affordable housing solution. To that end, we appreciate the concerns of many of those here tonight and of partners representing neighborhoods experiencing particularly deep affordability needs and significant involuntary displacement. We hope to continue to engage with. These partners to advance. Equity in implementation and future policies and investments led by and serving these communities. Enterprise urges your support of the proposed. Package and looks forward to our shared. Work ahead to ensure everyone Brite has an affordable, safe and healthy place to call home. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Jerry Burton, followed by Naomi Amaya and then Kerry Washington. Hello, my name is Burton. And with hand, I'm a veteran as well. Well, most of the thing that we're going to say have been said. And so I'm not going to duplicate it. What I'm saying is this bill does not do anything for us. A cellphone has already been done, was already going on in this city. The legal fee is too low because if they do not build for affordable, you only get back at the minimum $30,000 per unit. And that is not right. $30,000 per unit is nightmare enough to even begin to build a house of affordability. If you're going to put a little fee, we're losing our house by paying $30,000 or so to lose it to a market rate. Why not make them buy another unit at 200 to $250000 with a legacy CFP? And that way you will continue to have the housing that affordability, because at this rate that you are beginning to get this link to see that mean that we are losing at least one house every time that charge $30,000 depending on what that industry would be at the time a solution you charge them $250,000 or more, so that way you would not lose none. Now you got the. Money to build. The house. Affordability. Another thing I want to say, I'm a make this very short because I've been talking all day and I'm kind of tired and New York is tired as well. And I know anything that I can say. You know, I already heard. You already know. But why would why pass a bill that on what you already are doing in the beginning and what that would do? With that being said, I'm going to say leader unhoused people alone and find a way to give them a home and start to continue to do the sweeps and all that. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you. Our next speaker is Naomi Amaya. Thank you, Madam President, and members of the City Council. I'm happy to speak in support of the expanding housing affordability policy. My name is Naomi Almon. I'm the director of policy and government. Affairs for the. Denver Foundation. But our foundation is the Community Foundation here in the metro region that has been funding non-profits, working to expand the affordable housing supply here in the region, but also provide systemic supports to respond to a history of exclusionary housing policies. And we've heard a lot from Kim. Yeah, sure, sure. I. I can happily do that. Thank you. I need a reminder some time. So we've heard a lot about the city of Denver and the housing crisis that we're in. We don't have enough units. They're not affordable. And we really are at a point where policy interventions are needed. We've heard a lot tonight about the expanding housing affordability proposal. It's a tool that will help in providing increased number of units as a new development is happening and increase the much needed increase in the linkage fees, but also providing for that family with the hope of putting more funding into our affordable housing fund. From a public welfare perspective, we really need to grow and maintain the existing affordable housing supply here in the metro region. Data and a lot of the community feedback has really shared that housing security is not evenly distributed across the population and it really disproportionately impacts those individuals from various racial and ethnic backgrounds, older individuals, and those living with the lowest incomes. That said, we recognize, again, this is one of many tools that's needed to address the affordable housing supply. We're really excited about the city's work on housing prioritization and really will look forward to working with the city and other community partners in their work in furthering policy efforts and funding to address the much needed need for housing here in Denver. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Kerry Washington, followed by Adam. Hi, Councilor. Thank you for your time today. I am coming before you about this bill and I'm one of the ones that are under 30%. And I tried to qualify for some. Affordable housing and it had to be three times my income. So if it. Wasn't for the vouchers that I received, I wasn't able. To give into any of the affordable housing. So it kind of made it difficult for me to even try to proceed. So the affordable housing was not implemented because of the three times the rent for the and I end up finding something and then it went down to two times the rent. So by me being on the 30% less, I was still unable to qualify. But I fought the system and then I tried to make sure that everything went through. So yes, I got affordable housing, but it was a fight. I look out for my colleagues that are out here still trying to. Apply and trying to get approved for affordable housing. And it's very hard out here, especially in Denver. Denver County, it's not easy at all. Also, they push you to the outskirts of Denver County and try to get you to go to the other counties around Denver selections so that you can be able to afford the affordable housing , which is not fair. I don't consider that fair. Then not only the other counties. That are still. Out there unable to get housing. Is the. Hard. For them. I just wish that this act would not pass because I really think. They need to work more on. The affordable housing. So that everybody can qualify or at least be able to get affordable housing within their minimal rates of under the 30%, which is still quite high for people who are. On fixed incomes or or disabled or. Just unable to get within a minimum wages of. Working. Or being able to get affordable housing for individuals. I mean, just individuals under the age of 50. On down, they're still not able to get affordable housing. So that's where we're at right now. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker in chambers is Adam Astrof. Thank you so much for having me tonight. City Council. My name's Adam Astrup. I live in the Baker neighborhood and am a candidate for the Denver City Council District seven seat. I'm here today to support the expanding housing affordability policy. Once again, our staff have gone out of their way to produce something that is technically very efficient. It's very effective. It will not harm market rate development in our city. It has some process improvements that will help get affordable housing on the road, on our streets. Faster in our. Neighborhoods. And that's something that we all support. But unfortunately, this policy, just as it won't hurt market rate development, is also not going to go far enough to dig us out of our hole. I think that you've heard tonight that Denver voters, you know, from many different Army brackets, neighborhoods and political affiliations might big action on the housing crisis. And this, unfortunately, I think, really was the easy path instead of the right one. It once again keeps affordable housing. Constrained. Near the most polluted portions of our city. It doesn't. Serve. All of the Americans that we need, and it can't produce the number of housing units that we need. So for those of you who will be here after the next election, I hope we can work on more. But I do think Denver voters are tired of a politics that feels like a feud between old high school classmates . And I think that they're looking for something more and real solutions that can actually work. So I think this was a good one. It's a good step. And I hope next year that we can all work together to tackle these problems at every single AM event, because that's the last thing I just want to add here. There's been a lot of talk about competition between providing housing for 0 to 30 Army versus 60 to 80%. Those two services, we need them all. We're short every single army band. They're not in competition with each other. They're both in deficit. 60% Army is two parents working full time at Wal-Mart with two kids. They deserve housing people who are in crisis. We're coming out of an issue or they need help with addiction. They deserve housing, too. We can do more. So again, thanks so much for this first step and look forward to talking to you more. Thank you. Our next speaker in person is paradise. William Wilson. Excuse me. Paradise Wilson. Paradise, Wilson. Okay. We'll go ahead and transition back on to Zoom. And so our first speaker is Brandi Majors. Well. Can it be heard? It's about time I got back in your house the first time. I don't know what happened. All right, so I got 3 minutes almost. In my personal opinion. This bill. My personal opinion is a major. Why? Well, first of all, this is not for the people. It is for as usual. WIP is creative for Spirit four. That's what it is. Let's look at it for what it is. Does not help the people. The only positive thing I've heard out of any of this presentation, and it's probably just. From the men they spoke with about War Village. That was the only thing that sounded positive. To me at all. Everything else. Garbage, trash, trash, trash. And if not, this is your problem. This is what you did. You have to fix it. So you think it all sounds good. It then lays it out all nice and neat. But it's not for the people. Where the people. The people have been consistently telling you what they need. You be consistently. Ignoring the people. So the two people on this council. To deserve their position. They've really, really. Stepped it up, really worked out, shot. Up the bucket. But catch me. Oh, without you. Too. I mean, where would we be now? As poor as everybody else. Political musical chairs season update your resume me pray they don't call me because I tell you. You're not worthy of a job. The other thing is this British bishop. In ten people before, ten people behind. Underneath, they should be fired and everything else with that. These service providers have not been helping the people they have. You already know they have it. It's always a service provider. Linking you to this. Really? Could you do that? Where would you do that? Where is the success in this? We don't want to hear that. People don't want to hear from the people running these programs. The people come. Here and ask for money from you. We don't want to hear it because it lives more white. But they matter to you. They fill your pockets. The baddest man on the block. Had a point. You're killing everybody. You're murderous. You should know that, too. The single mother became the mother. The young mother wasted or came down huge to make a point. That's a group of people that you. Need to help. Wayne Petersen again, another. Person you need to. Help. Stop ignoring. It's not going away. Systemic racism has to end. Greed has to end. Your fraudulent misappropriation of funds has to end. Period. New administration. We're going to do better. Once we reduce it, work together. The mayor needs to work with you. You need to work harder. Do for. The people which we hired. You to do. Work for the people. Not your pockets. You're all greedy. You misappropriate. Funds. You're lying. Your money. Fraudulent. All fraudulent. You know what we know? We're telling you, bitch. You do better. We know this group right here, minus the other two, cannot do this. If I have to place, I would shut this down. It's a no. Personally, no. I brought me. Go ahead, Kate. Thank you, Madam President, and members of the city council. I'm Kate Barton, a Denver resident and executive vice president of the Downtown Denver Partnership. We are here today in support of the expanding housing affordability policy. Over the last six months, we came together with members of Denver's local business, residential and Commercial Development Community to work with city staff and provide comments, insights and technical expertize on how this policy could help achieve the goal of producing affordable housing options in Denver, which is largely contingent on development and the actual supply of housing in our city. This policy strikes a good balance to achieve this goal. We, like our partners, are committed to building diverse housing options that serve all income levels to meet the overwhelming demand and need for housing in our city. We share a common goal the creation and use of sound market based tools that address all housing needs in all Denver neighborhoods. First and foremost, I'd like to thank the teams at CPD and host for the extensive stakeholder process. Listening to our feedback and responding to many of the comments about this policy as it's evolved. This is a large and complicated issue that requires many tools to achieve the goal of affordability. This policy is not a silver bullet, but is a step in. The is a good step that helps to address one of our city's most significant needs. We appreciate the phased approach, the linkage fee to linkage fee increases that is included in the final policy before you fee increases will be passed on to the end user no matter the asset class increase in commercial rents to businesses large and small. Thus, a phased approach helps to allow for the market to absorb and adapt to these significant changes. We also recognize the work to strengthen and offset incentive programs to support the ultimate outcomes of these policies and mitigate some of the burden and burden placed on the development community, including building fee waivers and the exemption of linkage fees for all grounds where square footage and mixed use developments were on site. Affordable housing is included. A central issue in our discussion with city staff has been the development review process in ensuring that regulations do not hinder housing supply. An important element of any policy is the ability to know whether it's working. We appreciate how the city team has created transparency in this policy implementation. We also appreciate the commitment to efficiency of development, review the public facing dashboard and continue conversations to ensure that develop the development review process is supportive of projects moving forward. To that end, the provision that enables CPD to come in front of the City Council with an opportunity to extend the grace period for projects to be grandfathered under existing requirements. Should the city fall behind? The review of SGV is a critically important component of ensuring that this policy works. While we support this policy, we have ongoing concerns with an inclusion housing policies and their overall impact on the cost of housing. We want to acknowledge this, not the silver bullet, and we urge City Council to look towards policies to help address the missing middle housing across the city through increased housing supply tools. In the end, we come to you collaboratively in this important endeavor to achieve the important goal of affordability in our city. And the downtown Denver Partnership continues to be supportive of many components of this policy. The creation of this policy has appropriately included feedback from stakeholders, and we thank you for your hard work and consideration. I think it's just really I was watching a baby and on a. I am in speaking and listen to this proposal as it does not represent my community and the linkage fee needs to be put towards making more affordable housing. The AMA needs to be lowered its common sense. I am here representing my community here. Young house community. I'm here because when I had to flee a violent domestic situation, I had nowhere to go. And they took me in. And for all of you who say yes to this proposal, you're saying to them they don't deserve housing. Now, I want to ask you, why do certain citizens in your city deserve housing more than others? Why do people who are suffering from dependency, from miscarriages, from their support systems failing them? Why can't they have housing? Why do they go to shelters where there's addiction and violence? We talked to people on the streets. We know what they go through a. These are citizens of Denver. And you playing Monopoly with them, making negotiations with multi-million dollar developers, whatever. Just like these are human beings, these percentage figures, no matter how you slice of the pie. Like when you vote yes and go to sleep tonight. That piece that you forgot. Who are most in need? You're saying just wait. We'll get to you in a linkage fees or trickle down and you know, enjoy the sheltered. But I just want to say like I hope you never have to have the misfortune of living on the streets. Of having to have all of no privacy, all of your weaknesses, all the things you need. Just out on display for everyone to see. For cops to come when you're just trying to survive. And to take your tent away. To take your blanket away. To suffer frostbite, to suffer severed limbs, weak hearts. Nobody wants to die in the street. You don't want to. Nobody wants to. Families don't want to. This is passed down. Generations. Jenner. Jenner. Relationally. Poverty, racism, violence, dependency is pattern. You're not only doing these people, you're doing their families. And I just don't understand how to watch most of your walk out when people from my community are trying to tell you their experiences . You expect them to respect you and respect this house of law when they're just trying to strive for their basic rights, their basic human rights to survive. And that was shameful. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is online. Shay shadi. Well, thank you. Thank you. So I guess that means I'm shady. I am not only a. Member of the human race, but I am here with House Keys, Action Network, Denver. And I like a lot what Riley said about being taken in by House Keys. Because when they found. Me, it was during their outreach team, which I now have the. Absolute. Pleasure of being a part of. And what I mean is. Why was it so hard? For someone like that to find me, I just reach you. I cannot tell you how much of a difference. This has made not only and obviously financially is not the most serious aspect as it's hard for them to. Almost. Solely provide for me in this manner. What I mean is the hope it has given me and I tend to quote scripture a lot. My faith is absolutely everything to me. And faith is the substance of things unseen of things that you only hope for. Because if a man already has what he hopes for, what does he have? And this hunger I have is the most wonderfully devastating thing. This time. Two years ago, I was much like you. My ex-husband took everything from me in the divorce. But that's okay, because now I have a peace that surpasses understanding and I am ready to rebuild. And as a registered Republican, I believe in small government. And perhaps this is God teaching me something I didn't understand before. I was very concerned about how do we pay for things like this? Well, the truth of the matter is, I don't mind when I reenter into society because I would never stop trying. I'm going to respond from the concrete as many times as it takes to fix this. I am so emotional. I hate to lose track, but what I mean is. I'm just overcome right now. What I mean is it takes opportunity to get out of this situation and some people don't want to get out of this situation, and I've seen it. That's their right to do so, isn't it? This is America. And what the one of the first speakers said about. Dominique. She said that. Well. We believe in the system here. I believe in this House of law study law. I've absolutely got to get up off the street, get back into school so that I can afford to pay a little bit more. I wouldn't mind paying a little bit more taxes or whatever it takes to make this happen because. We are the future and if we build each other up, we're just going to do better. I absolutely oppose this of 50% and why it'll make something that's nearly impossible. Q Absolutely. Thank you so much. We'll go online to Aaron Clark. Thank you very much, the council members. It's good to see you this evening. My name is Aaron Clark. I'm a Denver native and I'm here to speak in favor of all of the combined packages or ordinances that you're looking at this evening with respect to the expanding housing affordability. I'm speaking tonight as a member of the. Expanding Housing Affordability Committee. I was a part of that committee. As a then current, now former member of the Denver Planning Board and also as a local affordable housing developer. Very much in support of this because. We need an all of the above approach to affordable housing in our city and in our region. I very much take to heart all that we have heard from many members of the local community looking for deeper affordability, really helping to house the unhoused. This is. What we're looking at this evening is one tool in a broader toolbox related to providing housing across the income spectrum, across the continuum of housing needs. And it is a meaningful way to bring market rate developers surely more meaningfully into the mix of how we how we really increase affordable housing supply. I focus on the word expanding versus affordable. Here it is. It is to increase the overall amount of affordable housing. It is to expand those who are part of that process. There are thousands of us across the state of Colorado who work to develop, produce, find land for affordable housing. Every day. And what we're hearing from our community, the cries of for the need for deep affordability really speaks to how far behind the behind the eight ball we are, how much. The need for housing. Is outpacing our ability to produce it. And for that reason, we need everyone possible to be providing to be part of the solution. And the market right now is does not have to be part of that solution. We do, at the end of the day, live in a private property system and a market based system. And so this is specific to those middle incomes that we also need to help help in the affordability so that we can focus our energies on the deeper affordability that many of us are working on on a daily basis. And that is not really where the market developers would be. This is because of the affordable housing state legislation, and Denver is really the only city that's moving forward with that. And you should be commended for doing so. So please support. Thank you. Our next speaker is Monica martinez. Hi there, Monica martinez. I'm a resident of Council District five. I'm also the executive director of the Facts Partnership, a nonprofit based on the East Coast Export War. I am a member of Mom Mothers Advocating for affordable housing that was founded by President Dana Crawford. I'm on the city's stimulus task force that is helping to inform the cities way to expend the ARPA dollars, the $305 million in ARPA dollars. Oh, I hope I didn't state the wrong amount. I think it's 305. Lastly, I was also the policy analyst for Hickenlooper, Mayor Hickenlooper's affordable housing plan way back in 2006. But guess what? Never got adopted. So I really want to commend you all for getting across the finish line or almost there. I know how hard it is to create citywide policy and satisfying multiple stakeholders. Community members that are in desperate need for housing is really a hard task. So I commend host team and CPD team for coming up with a policy that that will address the massive problem that we have of affordable housing. I know from our stimulus task force, we've heard from Denver residents the serious concern around the need for more affordable housing. Obviously, all policies could be improved upon, but I would commend and encourage you to pass this. I really like how you guys are using market based solutions. I think leveraging the market through providing height incentives, honoring housing over parking and then really those permit reductions really will help result in more predictable development processes for developers. We know that any time there's increased unpredictability to process results and increased cost, which in turn then impact the amount of housing we can build. So I would definitely encourage us. The other thing I would say I support is the the ability to create more mixed income communities. Really apologize. My my clock is going off. Lastly, I would offer. A question for you all to consider. I'm excited about the possibility of a concierge review, but I would encourage you all to revisit this and see what its effectiveness is. I worry. I do know that from the implementation and follow up. After the fact. Properties slipped through the cracks. And so I would really encourage a council to consider kind of a review of that implementation of the concierge. Lastly, I'll just applaud you for your work, and I just want to say I really support the passion of some of the speakers here tonight. But I think using language like murders has must. Be. Rejected in this era. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is in Chambers V Reeves. Hello. Thank you for allowing me to speak today. My name is Vee and I'm here to speak against this bill. And this is something that you've heard from a number of people today, from all different points of view. But overwhelmingly, this bill. We have to recognize the fact that it was created in favor of developers. We even heard today from someone supporting this bill. And they were from. The Denver business district. So to have a group, a business improvement district in support of this bill, which is called mandatory affordable housing, is a kind of expanding. Affordable housing is a kind of irony. Thank you for that for look, Sandoval. Appreciate that. But that's an important point that you made in the fact that literally when I said. That, because we also. Heard someone say they want to emphasize the idea of expanding. Over the idea of. Affordable. And that is really what's happening. So I think if we're going to have. A title. That's supposedly addressing this issue, supposedly suggesting that this is a way to create affordable housing, we just it's a lie. And it's inconsistent with the reality of it. We also heard from another stakeholder who was part of the process of creating this bill, who they themselves said felt it favored the developers. We're making a job for them a lot easier by allowing them to come into our city and to continue to develop and to continue to profit off of the people in a way that. Is still unbridled in comparison with other. Cities. And so for us to be introducing a concept. Like this with linkage. Fees and also with percentage armies of affordability, we really do need to consider the reality of what is happening there. We should also consider that. You know, you've heard from people saying that there is support for. 30% AMI. And that is not the case. We don't have new development of structures that are specifically for 30% or less. AMI And because of that, it is going to perpetuate this issue of house business that we're experiencing, one that's affecting everybody. One that is most. Importantly affecting the people who are in. The throes of it and experiencing it on the daily. So I just would like to reemphasize those points, reemphasize the fact that. So much of the support for this bill does come. From businesses, developers who are going to come in from out of state and really have a huge impact on our population here. And I hope that, you know, by seeing and hearing. The voices and the stories of the people who do believe in. You and who do believe that you have the power to consider what is happening. And act in a just. Manner. I hope that you will see it that way, too. Thank you. Thank you. We're going to go back on the virtual platform. We've got Kate Stig Bergh. Thank you, President Gilmore, and members of council for giving me the opportunity to speak with you tonight. My name is Kate Steinberg, and I'm the senior director of activism at Healthier Colorado. We're a statewide nonprofit organization that aims to ensure every Coloradan has a fair shot at living a healthy life. One of the focus areas in which we engage is social determinants of health, which is why in the past we've supported policies in Denver, such as raising the minimum wage, ensuring the passage of our rental licensure program, and fighting against the repeal of the Group Living Ordinance and why we prioritized House Bill 1117 that was referenced earlier this evening on behalf of the nearly 13,000 members in Denver. We urge you to vote yes on the Expanding Housing Affordability Ordinance, also known as the in your home is the foundation for your Health. And it's no secret that Denver's severe lack of affordable housing has forced economic hardship on many families, especially for people with low incomes , older adults and communities of color. In fact, Denver is now ranked the fifth least affordable housing market in the country. This rise in housing costs has been devastating to the cultural diversity and vitality of our neighborhoods. Too many families have been pushed out of the communities they've called home for decades or are unable to live where they work. These housing pressures create family insecurity, exacerbate economic anxiety and cause displacement. It's long past due that Denver requires affordable housing as part of new market rate developments and brings developers to the table as partners to help keep people in their communities. And with a roof over their heads and a December 2020 poll, 75% of Denver's Denver voters supported inclusionary zoning policies like the one the Denver City Council is considering tonight. We recognize the proposal is one critical piece in a much bigger puzzle and that while a critical step forward, it cannot solve Denver's affordable housing crisis alone. This market driven policy will not address all the city's housing challenges, including disproportionate lack of access to homeownership for Bipoc Denver, its record high market rate rents and mortgages and restrictive zoning policies that exclude affordable housing from a large portion of Denver neighborhoods and beneficial community resources. But what it will do is set a solid foundation for the creation of affordable housing for many Denver residents in perpetuity. Simply put, we need actual, tangible homes and we need them to be affordable. All new development in Denver moving forward will now have standard and basic requirements to contribute to increasing housing affordable options should this pass . I understand and respect the varying viewpoints of this proposal. Healthier Colorado supports us because at the end of the day, we know that housing instability is a significant contributor to poor health outcomes for loved ones and neighbors. Please support this policy and you for your time. Thank you. Thank you. Move back into chambers. Robert Bailey. You know, this expanded policy is not business driven. It is city planning driven. So a lot of willingness on the whole thing. Thank you very. Much for having me. Appreciate it very much, Brad. You say that this bill does not apply to educational facilities. Why is this? Well, she said we want more educational facilities. So do I. We agree on that. On the other hand, I also want more places to sleep at night. Brad I guess that is where we differ. The so-called affordable housing program is a policy that, in effect, works to tear down the people who build things up. And at the same time, you are not receiving receiving even half of the rent reduction proclaimed. A lot of shell game going on. Let's talk about the differences between policy and development. Pouring concrete and building the place where we sleep at night. This is development. Everything else is policy. Our so-called affordable housing policies are not working. Voting yes today means to expand on that voting no. All that does is hits the pause button. Let's wait another year or two. Let's think about this. Let's search for some sun, some hope, some signs of success. Let's see if we can find some. Pouring concrete is going very well. I like to go stand next to those large construction sites. I just stand there in such an enormous project that is being executed so well, so precisely. And I just look at that and I say, now, this is human achievement, and you want to blame that achievement and you want to control that achievement. You are in the beginning steps of losing this achievement. You will never be able to plan out the place where we sleep at night better than the millions of people who work in the field. We should focus our efforts. On helping more people back into the market, not trying to become the market bit by bit. How do we do this? Money, money, money. We need more vouchers at the federal, state and local level, and we need to make it illegal to discriminate against these vouchers. We could do that next week if you wanted to. It would be easy and we could do that. And then the owners can. Complain about tenants, toilets and vouchers. That's fine. I have no problem with that. But you call. Expanding the housing affordability. I call nationalizing the building industry. One more step. You're trying to take one more step in that direction. I would recommend not doing that. One of the very best books I've ever read on organizational. And this is it. I don't know if you. Can read that is. Just don't do it. Just don't do it. One of the very best organizational books I ever read. It makes a great case for saying no today. A great case. Organizations have a tendency to just do something, do something, do something. A lot of times the best thing to do is just don't do it. Thank you very much. I appreciate that very much. Thank you. Our next speaker is online, Darryl Watson. Council. President Gilmore and members of Council. Thank you for your service to city and county of Denver. My name is Darrell Watts, and I'm a 30 year resident of Denver's District nine. I speak tonight as the chair of the Housing Stability Strategic Advisors Board, the HSA, the board providing advice to the Department of Housing and Stability. Members of the HSA board engaged in almost two in this almost two year process, specific engagement through the official one and a half year community engagement process. We agree that more needs to be done at all levels. Brad winding from host and a lead talk from community planning and development provided presentations today to say board the board by consensus supported Denver City Council's adopting bill 2204 two for are the enhancing affordable housing initiative as an appropriate response to House Bill 1117 as it mandates the development of new affordable housing units. HSA rationale is as follows Each will work complementary with the spectrum of programs developed by host to confront the current housing crisis, specifically the housing opportunity, pillar and host five year plan. It does not remove the requirement for four host and service providers to find solutions for deeply affordable units. 30% or lower. The current linkage fee and center protocols do not provide a necessary affordable housing needed, specifically between 60 to 80% AMI. That would increase access to housing to community teachers and firefighters, to name a few. This process included almost two and a half years of discussions with members of the community throughout Denver, with the Expanding Housing Affordability Advisory Committee and with the SSA board and with members of the development community that would build this necessary housing. If adopted, will impact the lives of community members at work in our city but cannot afford to live in our city. Our current housing crisis requires action and requires deliberate action now. We need more housing. This plan takes immediate steps to create some of that necessary housing. It is only one new tool. There is more work to be done. Thank you, council members, for voting yes on this plan. Same thing. Our next speaker is in person, Joe Davis. Three 2466 Being the 56 years I've been watching this struggle for a long time with my mom and my sisters. My grandma didn't get too involved because she was more independent upon herself. But the point being is this as we sit here and do this struggle, everybody's forgetting. The one most important thing is we are all equals. We all want. And the ones that think they're not got something to say to what won't be any of this. Once we all step up and see that we have one way to go, and that's only because we're all in this battle. It don't matter which way we go. And and as we get any and all this other stuff, as the relevant part does that the struggle is once is beating us, is beating us for the money to try and make money that you guys are asking for. And see, though, as we out here, I mean, 30 to 50 an hour a moment is $50 an hour. I can barely even make what you're asking. I can imagine something to do when they are struggling. And I'm ready. MAN 16 And you only getting $100 a day and you got to eat it. Then you just broke your ankle. I mean, you can. All this stuff adds up a lot faster than walking down the street, getting beat down, and the struggle is the heartbeat. And I didn't have something of the season in my life from heart attacks and stress and trying to accommodate what a lot of people up here are asking for. And the last of the living, 169 people. Joe Day was right here and quite a few of my family members suffered. Quite a few of my friends are still suffering, getting beat down for the little change that we got added to the $3.20 we don't get since the gunmen have shot me back that somebody owed me. Now I tell you like this. You talk to everybody. Everybody understand that you talk to everybody and everybody that thinks that they're a little higher. You know, you got to sit down in the conference room or the principal's office and. I hope that we come to a solution here real soon because of the facts that. If we don't put another foot down the US because we are all one. We are all in this struggle. If you ever had to step down that little bitty wage, then we need to understand what we are out here in the rain, snow, sleet, wind and humans that think they want what we got. And what do we have? Same thing. You know. Better land and you know, some materialistic stuff. And the money we struggle for. We break our backs trying to get it and then take 3000 hours to catch. The time we have allotted for each speaker. Thank you. We're going to go back virtually to Caitlyn Quander. Good evening. My name is Caitlin Quander. I live and work in Denver and I'm speaking this evening on behalf of Knapp, Colorado. Colorado represents a diverse network of over 600 developers, owners, investors and various real estate professionals. First, I want to thank CPD and host staff for their intensive and nuanced work on the issue over the last year. Also, the advisory committee made up of voices across the city. They proactively engage with all points of view in the community during the process. Working to solve affordable housing is complex, and we hope that the city has struck the right balance to promote more affordable housing, but also not curtail development of the city, which would impact the many jobs in construction and also further exacerbate the lack of housing. One of these examples is the phasing in of the linkage fee. We appreciate this incorporation to allow the market time to adjust as the free fee increases annually. This doesn't mean that Colorado is in complete agreement with the approach and we do have continuing concerns about the impacts. But that's what compromise is about and we support the proposal before you this evening. Some will suggest that the ordinance doesn't go far enough. The goal of it was to establish a market based program, meaning without any public funding. This program complements other city programs that do address homelessness, homelessness and 0 to 30% AMI. It also provides more funding for the Affordable Housing Fund to build housing for that population. I want to reiterate that while development is active in Denver, it's at the top of the market. New projects are already becoming more difficult given the supply chain issues and construction costs. We remain concerned that increased linkage fees and increased requirements will be passed along to the other business and residential tenants in these projects. The proposal will likely make the scene metal housing and the ability for small business to lease space. A new retail development more expensive in Denver. We hope staff and City Council will seriously consider an amendment come spring 2023 that allows projects in the pipeline making pragmatic progress be allowed to continue until the rules that existed at the time they submitted the application. We have substantial concerns. ACP CPD staff is already working hard and busy and it will be difficult to keep up. We hope the city will continue to partner on innovative ideas, including further changes at the state level to incentivize even more affordable housing. Thank you. Q Our next speaker is Anna DeWitt for. I spent a lot of winter and District ten. I understand that many of you have. Spent several years developing this plan. I appreciate your work, your time, your tears and your sweat on this. But before I can comment. On E.J., I want to tell you a story. Recently, I was teaching my five year old how to bake an apple pie. I don't know about you, but I love apple pies. But like most five year olds, my daughter wanted to add much more sugar than needed. And that's understandable. Sugar makes apple pie the sweetest. So we tend to focus on it. When I explained to her that sugar, while important, is only one part of baking a delicious apple pie. And this is how I view. With this, we're addressing an important part of expanding housing affordability. But we need other ingredients to truly make a difference in affordability. I'll give you an analogy. When we look at the prices of. New and used cars, we've seen a huge spike in prices. We know that this is because car manufacturers are struggling to make enough cars due to the shortage of electronic parts. But what if what if we as a city decided to make. Those greedy, unwilling car manufacturers who were out to hurt us? What if we made them sell. Each 10th car for half the price of their own while other nine cars would sell for a. Sorry. Hey, guys, I'm on a council meeting now. Sorry, I have several roommates anyway, so we won't see a spike in those other nine cars. In this case, a better solution would be to address the root cause of the castle prices. Not create a scapegoat. For me, this is similar to what we're deciding tonight. I do agree we need forced, affordable measures. But my concern with E.J. is that this forced measure will affect people purchasing new homes, meaning young people. We're not addressing the root cause, namely the fact that most of our city is owned by single family homeowners. The very people that have exasperated exhaust. Excuse me exacerbated the housing crisis have little to no. Responsibility in this plan. And that's my biggest concern. My hope. Is that when we pass the age, we also create a higher affordable housing tax for Denver residents. Who reside in large single. Family homes. It's not just up to young people buying small. Condos or townhomes. It is all of Denver's responsibility. My other hope is that when we pass, you change your bitter city of outdated zoning laws. If this council really wants to move the meter in regards to how high housing prices, we will work. Together to end restrictive. Exclusionary, single family zoning. I and this was saying I support DHEA, but I support DHEA. If this council will be. Bold enough to add the other ingredients. To make a delicious pie. Thank you. Think thinking. Our next speaker is Alfonso Espino. Hello. Good evening, everybody. It's now my pleasure to be here for what seems like an annual meeting of a celebration of what is essentially a kicking of the proverbial can down the road. Non solutions advocated as solutions. Language co-opted to vein for housing justice. It's not my pleasure to be here. So I'm not here to address council, which has become predictable in its capacity to vote for which way. But I am here to address some of the people that were speaking and some of the people that are watching, hopefully, and those that I know that are not because we are in direct contact with them in our communities organizing as we speak. To the housing developers and any developers that are opposed to it. Spare me or crocodile tears to those that are in favor. It shows me exactly why we should oppose it. To the so-called housing advocates who only co-opted the housing justice movement in favor of political power backed by institutions like BlackRock and the largest developers in the country, and some of the ones that are creating those portfolios that this new housing stock is going towards, right where this is all just retirement funds for the people that have been playing with us our whole lives. Most are here to address the people, the masses, the working class, to remind them and to remind myself for the public record and for those that will be studying history 30, 5000 years from now, who do not lay down and allow them to convince us that they brought forward solutions now . I'm here to remind them, to remind ourselves that our power lies nowhere near this chamber. It lies outside in the streets with our neighbors and our communities organizing among ourselves to take that power which will not be given to us to enact that change which will not take place here. It's more of the same. Not surprised. But I only came for the public record. Oh, and I'd like to offer one more correction to a gentleman that spoke about an hour ago before me stating that he somehow lived in a nonexistent rhino neighborhood, which, to my knowledge, does not exist. It's a special tax district. Please. Five points will still call. Thank you. That was near Miracle. And we have Erin with us. And so we're going to go ahead and go to our next speaker. Yolanda. Okay. All right. Doesn't look like Yolanda's with us. Thank you. Jonathan Piera is online virtually. Good evening, Counsel Johnson Pier, District three resident. I want to start by thanking CPD Counsel and partners for seeking solutions to Denver's affordability crisis. Both redirect subsidies for affordable home and shelter providers, as well as continue examination of policy solutions. As the capital city of a state short 175,000 homes today and projected to be short half a million homes by 2030. We have a long way to go to reach our goal of safe and stable housing for all. Regarding the rule, tonight's Inclusionary Housing Ordinance will play in reaching that goal. We should consider that for decades, cities have been debating whether inclusionary zoning can close their severe housing gaps. As you've heard in this room tonight, experience tells us that there are things these ordinances do well, such as creating mixed income residences and things they do poorly, such as increasing metropolitan sprawl. They're politically popular, of course, because they're seen as an easy win. The ordinance doesn't inconvenience homeowners by asking them to contribute more to the problem, instead placing that cost only on new development, often renters. And because mixed income homes can only be built in a small fraction of city. We don't even ask those homeowners to change what their neighborhood looks like. One thing is clear, though. From Portland, Oregon to Portland, Maine, inclusionary zoning is not nearly enough to solve the problem, whether implemented in small cities or large. Many residents in all of these places still find stable homes out of the reach. These cities still have residents living on the streets. These cities still have residents moving away because they can't afford to live in their home town any longer. Clearly, to whatever extent these programs may help some residents, they are not providing everything we need. So I'd like to focus on the future. Once this ordinance passes tonight, you'll have finished the politically easy part. Next, we need you to show courage by doing what is politically hard in cities around the world. You, too, are doing a much better job of housing their residents. They are pushing policy that is far more effective but hard. These include eliminating costly parking mandates citywide, improving tenant protections, lowering barriers to neighborhood scale housing forms, subsidizing mixed income housing, simplifying rules, and speeding up permitting processes. Another important path is easing restrictions on how homes are used. One which you began to walk last year as you expanded access to living. There are even small building code changes that help, like preventing single start buildings. Weird things. Small things. I ask that you don't wait to see results before pursuing additional proven tools needed to house rights of all stripes. Please do not consider this mission accomplished. Let's move past this political hurdle and get back to working on real long term solutions quickly to produce more affordable homes. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Bill Zeigler. It doesn't. It doesn't. Bill with us. So, Tim Kraft. Good evening, Madam President, and members of council. My name is Tim Kraft, a long time Denver resident, and I'm here tonight speaking on behalf of the Home Builders Association of Metro Denver, where I serve as the chair of our Government Affairs Committee. Our association and member submitted a letter to City and Denver excuse me, in December of 2021, and we greatly appreciate staff keeping us involved along the way. Ever since, our input has largely been focused on the underlying issue driving the need for this affordable housing measure. The fact that creation of housing has not kept up with the creation of households. While the steps proposed in the affordable measure before you now are great in that they help to improve equity. It does not do enough to help the underlying, if you will, that we don't have enough rooftops. The families that currently want to. This can only be solved by making it easier to build more homes. While great and meaningful incentives have been provided for traditional multifamily projects with house incentives, incentives attached and for sale product has to some degree been left by the wayside. Additional measures can be achieved to help the addition of housing through the creation or the allowance of smaller lot sizes, fee reductions and expedited review time. We also encourage the city to reinstitute the residential infill task force with the drive to increase supply by expediting approvals and increasing the use by rate approval process. We also want to remind the city that the state's construction defect litigation still makes it difficult and extremely risky to build vertical for sale multi-family housing. Moving forward, we ask the city to honor commitments made to the applicants who have projects in the pipeline submitted as IDPs before the applicable deadline of June 30th, and to honor the 14 month timeline previously discussed by several of the speakers. We hope the city is able to honor those projects. The construction industry and the city's goals are aligned in that we both want to deliver more homes to help alleviate the cost burdens currently burdening residents of debt and incentives to help achieve that we greatly support. Thank you for the opportunity to provide input and we appreciate all the hard work by city staff. Thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you. Our next speaker is Rich McClintock. And it doesn't look like we have Rich with us. And so we'll go ahead and move to Renee Martinez Stone. Good evening, counsel. My name is Rene Marsh. Penistone, and I am a Denver resident and employee of the Denver Housing Authority. I'm speaking tonight in support of expanding housing affordability. And I want to thank CPD and House for their innovative leadership on this effort. It's an impressive start to what I believe will help to bring many more bold and equitable housing solutions. In West Denver, 83% of households are currently vulnerable to gentrification and thousands of families. Almost 9000 have been displaced since 2015. One in two households have an additional person or family living with them. They're keeping residents from being homeless. They're doubled up and in need of more housing. I've been tonight I'd like to speak specifically to a proposed amendment tonight and describe why we need to keep it use it. It is accessory blowing units exempt from the future linkage to historically. We have seen use be built by developers and investors. Mostly. Because the complex the technical expertize they need and the financial flexibility needed to absorb the added costs and requirements that come with a use currently. The pilot program created at the Denver Housing Authority with Habitat and the city is changing. Who builds radios? We help residents navigate the process of building a road in their backyard. And this is an affordably restricted, though. In 2021. When 82 permits were down significantly citywide. 10% of those permits were for homeowners in our program, not affluent homeowners, not traditional developers, 100% of them below one 20%. And like 50% of them, below 80% am I. And even some below 60% in my 83%. Of those. Building ratings were persons of color. 25% were female. Heads of. Household, and 100% want to stay in place and providing affordable housing or changing the neighborhood. These are homeowners who want to help, and they're willing to invest their own financial resources in affordable housing. And they need to. Expand their living space. But they cannot be. A part of the solution without our support. I hope Council will approve this work tonight and will not approve the current amendment amendment to remove the linkage fee exemption. This is working backwards in terms of. Equitable. Opportunity for all and. Would create. An additional obstacle for homeowners adding affordable homes. In single. Families own neighborhoods, something we've heard many times tonight. Thank you for your time. Let's move to. Portland. Our next speaker is Lauren Hanson. So my name is learning and I am a resident of District ten and a resident of North Cap Hill. I would just like to keep my remarks brief and speak in favor of the three ordinances that we have in front of us right now. I also do want to actually touch on one of the comments some of the earlier speakers made. And personally, I think that we need to go a little bit further when it comes to reducing parking, particularly in places like where I live in northern Capitol Hill, where my apartment is situated on the crest of a large parking lot crater that is underutilized about about 70% of the time. My biggest thing in regards to that is we did have a speaker earlier that also spoke to the issue and useful source of concrete. I think one of the most useless pieces of concrete in the city is an underutilized parking space that can also be used to build more affordable and more housing overall. Thank you all for letting me speak and have read it. Thank you. Our next speaker is Ryan Keeney. Greetings, Council members. My name is Ryan Keeney and I live in Council District ten. I'm board president of Yimby Denver and also serve on the board of Capitol Hill United Neighborhoods. I was a member of the city's Expanding Housing Affordability Advisory Committee, which helped craft the package before you today. I am in support of the proposal as written before this Council meeting. It will create more attainable housing for people who are currently rent burdened or unable to buy a home in Denver. It will accomplish this through a variety of methods that leverage private development to build up affordable units without being so burdensome that homebuilders are unable to build anything at all. However, in the big picture, this proposal plays a game of financial musical chairs. Despite the development incentives, this proposal will likely on average increase the price of new market rate housing in order to fund a relatively small number of new homes at below market rate. It is unlikely to significantly increase the total amount of housing construction and the number of new affordable units will be grossly insufficient to meet our severe deficit. We need to empower the market to build as many homes as possible in order to maximize the effectiveness of city tools such as single unit detached houses. On large lots are still the only types of homes allowed on most of the city's layered land, which is now incredibly expensive, even in the form of a vacant lot. This means that it is effectively illegal to add to our housing supply in most of the city, and most of the city's geographic area will not directly contribute a single affordable units under this proposal. We must legalize housing abundance in the form of 80 youth and multi-unit buildings in every neighborhood in order to truly meet the challenge of the affordability crisis we are facing today. Only an abundance of housing can solve a housing crisis. The expanding housing affordability package takes small strides towards this vision, but is held short by the limitations of its approach. I urge Council to pass this bill today and to follow the lead of progressive localities like Portland, Oregon and Minneapolis, Minnesota, to pass a residential infill residential infill ordinance tomorrow. Thank you. You are net speakers John Duff and Bob. Focus on the community. I'm John Davenport, project director for Rhino Art District Rhino Districts. Thanks to teams of CPD and host for the comprehensive consultation process and commends. The city for taking. This step towards a more affordable future. This policy won't solve all the issues Denver is experiencing. But in a year when the city's been the fifth least affordable real estate market in the country ahead of New York City, this is a step forward. The 30th and Blake incentive overlay, which many constituents were involved in the creation of, was a pilot program, and a number of lessons were learned from that. These included the need for deeper affordability and for more consistent and predictable program. We're excited to see these lessons included in the city wide VHA policy. We also appreciate the way in which the 38 completed zoning heights have been considered and integrated within the policy before the change in state law. Height incentives were one of few ways to encourage affordable housing when the incentive overlay was created. Therefore, the difference between the base and incentive height was maximized to increase the likelihood of affordable housing outcomes. Now, with the ability to require affordable housing, a low base height is no longer necessary to create affordable units. Indeed, keeping the base height low would severely restrict the city's ability to focus growth near transit services and amenities and to maintain consistency with the to small area and city wide plans. However, the most notable way is that it would stifle the ability of the 38 complaint area to create more affordable units through linkage fees. We welcome the policy and the city's approach to integrate the 38 complaints overlay within the policy to deliver a city wide consistency and to maximize affordable housing outcomes. This was thoroughly consulted on and the city's community engagement process and we look forward to the 38 and Blake area contributing to the creation of Denver's future affordable housing needs. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker, the next to Heather Lafferty and then James Warren. Then it. They were supposed to join us virtually. And it doesn't look like we have them on with us. And so that concludes our speakers this evening. I'd like to thank all of our speakers, and we're going to then move into questions from members of Council on Bills 22 Dashboard two, four, four, two, five and 426. And we'll start out with Councilman Leach. Thank you as well to all of the speakers. It's a long, late night and we really appreciate you being here. A lot of important questions were raised by our speakers and there are some answers. And so I'm going to ask some questions. One of the things about this bill is it's not one bill or strategy. There's like four or five different pieces of it. So I'm going to ask some questions about the lowest income folks that relate to each of those pieces. So the first question I wanted to ask is, Britta, if you could please come up. So one of the things this bill does is it generates revenue for something called our Affordable Housing Fund. We've talked about the linkage fee, but the linkage fee goes into something called the Affordable Housing Fund. Can you describe how that fund particularly impacts or assists those either below 30% of your immediate income or exiting homelessness? Thanks for that question. Council on a. Couple of key things about the. Affordable housing fund and homelessness. It helps us provide a deep subsidy, which is really needed in order to reach the rent. Levels for a person exiting homelessness. And so that is really helpful. Grant dollars, low interest loan dollars that. Help us do that. The second component that is an eligible use from this fund is services dollars. So services that help go alongside housing to support someone exiting homelessness as well. In since its inception between 2017 and 2021. Approximately 12% of the. Affordable Housing Fund, or about $15.7 million directly supported programs. In housing developments that serve people experiencing homelessness. During that same time period, another 18% of the Affordable Housing. Fund, or about 23.6 million. Has supported the AA delivers. For Denver or D3. Agreement, which will produce more than 2500 units in partnership with the Denver Housing Authority and other developers, including around half of those units that will including around half that serve people experiencing homelessness or earning below 30% AMI. So just to be clear, this bill will generate funding that will build housing below 30% of area median income. Yes. Thank you. Second part of this bill, the part that I think a lot of the speakers were talking about, is the residential development requirements on a lease. I have a question for you if you want to start heading up. So so requiring developers to include some some affordable homes. Did did you all did the studies look at doing 30% of area median income housing as part of those requirements? And what did they find? Yes, we absolutely did look at an entire range of incomes acknowledging that that the spectrum of need is great. When we evaluated what a market based program could support a 30% am-I, it was around 2 to 3% and so really less than 5%. And so we had to have a trade offs conversation of do we want to be getting on up to 120% and we could have produced more units or do we go down to 30? And that's really by having a community conversation and doing the feasibility. We came to a balanced need of acknowledging where this program could be successful but also still target incomes where there was a significantly greater need. So to summarize your quick response, we did look at 30% AMI 40%, 50%. They were just at substantially lower numbers. That being said, the negotiated alternatives allows for hosts to bring dollars to those programs and we can buy down affordability. So it's not off the table. It's just not something that that is spelled out explicitly. Great. I'll get there in just a second. But first, Brenda, and if you just want to stay closed, sorry, I'm bouncing back and forth between you. But so Britta, we had a really powerful speaker earlier today. I just want to be sure I say her name right. Kerry Washington shared a really powerful story about her voucher experience. And I wanted to ask you, who are we use who who's using vouchers in Denver? And what is the biggest challenge that they face from what you all are hearing? Yeah. I was grateful for that testimony, as well as some others who mentioned vouchers and vouchers. We are. Fortunate that this council did pass already legislation that makes source of income protected here in the city and county of Denver, which means that someone who has a landlord cannot discriminate against a. Tenant because the source of. How they're paying their rent is about. And that is really important. But it doesn't solve some of our other issues. And utilizing a voucher, there are. Two key ones that I'll focus on. There's several, but one is the availability of housing stock. There is just really not many apartments to be found to take those vouchers that are at the right price point because you still have to deal with the fair market rent. And right now, that restricts the pool, right? If you can only go up to. 100% of the fair. Market rent, then all those units above it aren't accessible to be used with that voucher because the voucher covers. The distance between what a person can afford to pay with 30% of their income and. That market rent. So it means that when the HUD calculates that there's league and all of that and it means that there are many people that cannot find in that further restricted pool of housing stock and in Denver, a place to use it. That is one of the beauties of this policy, is that by creating more affordable units, even if they are restricted at an 80% or less level or 60% or less level, someone could use their individual tenant based voucher as well to help make up that distance and. Be in an affordable home. It increases. The pool of. Stock that we have. For people utilizing vouchers. So let me just make sure I get it right. Every single unit created at 60, 70 or 80% of am-I would be available and within the rents for a voucher holder, meaning they could pay as much as, you know, a third of their income no matter what that is. If they earned 10% of my 20%, if they were leaving homelessness. Is that right? That is correct. Okay. So the next question, Brad, you're on deck. So we talked about the developer requirements, which are a formula, but the formula doesn't apply to every single project. There are some projects that are large, more than five acres. Maybe they're getting subsidies from the city. They don't go under the formula. So can you talk to me a little bit about how those projects are treated under this policy? Yes. Thank you for the question, Councilwoman. So those are, under this policy considered what we've defined as high impact developments, meaning the definition that you talked about, either the scale of it, just raw acreage or the utilization of tax increment financing or metro district financing. And those projects have to go through kind of an added community engagement process to ensure that what they are proposing, what they're negotiating with our department and the city is is responsive to the needs identified as part of that process. And so that typically will end up being is more responsive and a little bit less reflective of the citywide policy because of the need, because of the impact that those developments have. And so there are examples of in recent history, like the Navajo Market or like the red lights or River Mile, where we had large negotiated agreements with large developments that included a variety of affordable housing options, including several rental units below 30% ami restricted for sale options as well, and a mix in between. And the idea is that those typical developments are those atypical developments of that scale are more demanding of a of a more localized, more nuanced and more kind of context sensitive approach. So just to say back what I heard from you, which is that this policy provides for negotiated agreements in large developments, and those developments have included 30% of my housing in recent history. Just to answer your. Last strategy that we didn't talk a lot about during the testimony, but this policy includes incentives. Actually, one speaker talked about it it. And so we have affordable developers building housing for those exiting homelessness. We have those building supportive housing. And so what specifically is this policy providing that will increase housing for those exiting homelessness are 30% of AMI in some areas of the city. Sure. Thank you again for the question. So similar to Ethan for more and village just spoke to this exactly where the incentives are available to those developments. You are agreeing to provide units on site and especially the enhanced level of affordability yet to avail themselves of incentives like additional height which allows for additional units by right. Not having to go through a rezoning process to get there, the elimination or address the reduction in the parking required, which one eliminates a tremendous cost to that development to build that parking, especially even if it's in a structure, but also the square foot is it's not being utilized for parking can be utilized to provide more housing . Right. And so I think that the example that the gentleman from Warren Village mentioned was that the project they're working on at 30% AMI and below was targeted for 73 units because that's where they could fit in the box if they were allowed the new box that the spaces would allow them to build 89 units. That's a pretty substantial increase, and it's one example of what we hope will be consistent across the board, particularly for the providers of of housing, for almost all of them. All right. Thank you, council president. Those are my questions. All right. Thank you, Councilmember Kenny. Next up, we've got Councilmember Ortega. Thank you, Madam President. Brad, I have a few questions for you as well, starting first with you and then I have one for Annaliese. So when you mentioned the 400 square feet, you mentioned above 400 square feet. Is that accurate for those that are exempt or was it below 400 square feet for someone adding onto an existing property? Yes, that's specific to additions to existing homes and additions under 400 square feet are exempt from paying them. Because when you spoke, you said above and I just wanted to. Oh, if I do, I am mistaken and I apologize. Thank you. For calling. Let's see. I have another one for you. So you just talked about the high impact developments. What is the policy around those projects requiring the affordable units to be built on site as opposed to allowing them to go build off site? Shouldn't there be different expectations where there are public subsidy dollars in a project to require more integrated communities with mixed incomes, as opposed to allowing people to do the buy out or go build their units off site? So I think it's important first to start with again, the House bill that enabled us to have this policy in the first place, which legally requires us to provide options, alternatives to providing units on site. That said, yes, if we are putting dollars into developments as a city, the expectation ought to be that the outcomes within that development are better or at least more responsive to the community needs than, say, city wide standard policy. And so our expectation of apartment will be to push forward as much as we can affordable housing on site, but there are options available to them to negotiate. If they have a parcel of land that they want to contribute. That would be a ideal for the creation of a deeply affordable, permanent, supportive housing development in a location that's near services or in a community that needs it greatly. We are open to that kind of alternative. But the but the threshold is high. And we expect, again, first and foremost, that it's responsive to the feedback that these developers receive from communities. So I think part of what's critical to this conversation is making sure that we don't create communities like what we saw happen with Lowry and with Stapleton, where the affordable housing that's on site were. Only because we created specific provisions that allowed that housing to exist in. And so I think, you know, ensuring that we do have blended communities is part of what has always made Denver a great city in terms of mixes of various incomes across this city. And we're, you know, at a point where we have priced many, many people out of our city. So I just wanted to say that. Let me go on to my question for in always the lower parking ratio. Can you tell me if any of the conversation around that involve conversations with lenders and do any of the provisions call for no parking in any of the developments? So to your first question, did it include conversations with lenders? Yes, they are an important piece of the conversation. And I think what we see is lenders tend to look back in time and so they tend to be more conservative. They say. What did the last four developments provide? Oh, they were at a 0.75. That's what we should provide, even though they didn't acknowledge that. Scooters and e-bikes and all the various transit investments have changed the mobility option. So I think that lenders will continue to be conservative, but we are seeing systems change and and I think that will vary. And whether it's affordable housing lenders like Charter or more informal lenders to market rates. In terms of your question around the parking exemption, this bill does introduce a new parking exemption that does not currently exist in the code. As a reminder, currently in the code, all of our downtown core, this area that we're here does not have a parking minimum. I think we've noticed that every new development that has gone up has multiple podiums of parking. So parking minimum enables for the opportunity for developers to choose units over parking spaces. But what that does is it restricts the parking exemption into particular zoned districts. So multi-unit and mixed use districts, as well as those that are also located within a quarter mile of a fixed transit station. And in the future, our high and medium capacity transit corridors like Colfax and Federal as BRT comes online, those projects that are providing an enhanced level of affordability, meaning more affordable units on site, can take advantage of not providing vehicle parking. So speaking to parking minimums, the 38th Street and 42nd and in Fox area, I see this in a very similar light. You've got the 38th Avenue underpass as a major entry point for this area. And I'm wondering if any of the conversations that looked at increasing the density in that area talked at all about the infrastructure and the fact that that is very similar to the 38 by 25 Fox in Park Avenue interchange, where that is the only entry point into the site right now until a developer may build a new bridge over the railroad tracks, which then increases the opportunity to increase the parking minimums for the area. So can you just speak to whether or not that was part of the bigger conversation? Simply put, yes. Blueprint Denver is a land use and transportation plan, meaning that we do not singularly look at land use decisions of where we should be directing jobs and housing growth separate from the infrastructure needed to safely and sustainably be able to support that. We've had continued conversations with our partners and dotted around the 41st and Fox station, which is why there are rules and regs that govern the area and the development. Acknowledging that the further connections of mobility of various modes need to occur to accommodate that development capacity. And similarly to we've continued conversations on the 38th complaint area. Just because you have zoning entitlement for something does not mean that carte blanche you can develop it. We have a very thorough development review process that includes over 38 various agencies to ensure that the public health, safety and welfare is executed with every development. And so it's really just important to note that that we look at it at a holistic scale, and this plan is implementing that holistic scale, but also it's looking at the site specific scale at the time of settlement plan. So in the review that is done at CPD, has any of that looked at an infrastructure improvement district that asks all the developers to participate in offsetting the costs that. Otherwise the taxpayers would be asked to offset. So, for example, if the 38th Avenue underpass is not part of that bigger conversation that they're all being asked to participate in, it should not be left to one particular project to bear that cost. Is that something at least being talked about or thought of in the process? And if you can answer that, maybe maybe Laura can address that. I know at the 41st and Fox station area, that was something that was under consideration. I don't believe a formal proposal has advanced or gone through. I'm not aware of one specific 238 and Blake, that would be an improvement district. But if any of the staff do have answer, I've not heard of that being proposed, but I really think it would be for our partners and Dottie that something like that would be brought forth. Yeah, I think with some of these areas where we know we're going to be seeing lots of development, being able to look at the infrastructure. And I know we've talked about this along the Federal Boulevard corridor as well, Laura, but in this area, that 38th and that 38th Avenue underpass that is right at that Blake Street Station is it's a bottleneck today. So as we add more traffic, that has to be addressed as part of how we look at the area more holistically. So can you tell me just looking at an infrastructure improvement district that all developers might participate in is something that you all have explored. Thank you for the question, Councilwoman. We are in conversation with Dottie to begin. Looking at what that might look like. I think we're too early in the process to be able to definitively say that we've got an answer or a concept that we're moving forward with. But if I guess. I guess I'm looking at the concept not necessarily solely at this area, but sort of more broad in in areas where we know a lot of development is being proposed. Sure. Fair question. I think we are looking at the applicability specific to Fox Park because it's very apparent just the constrained infrastructure. I think it's a great opportunity to expand. Once we've got an understanding of how how it might work at Fox Park, then how to take that much more broadly. Certainly to your point, and as you pointed out to us numerous. Times, are in a number of places. Around the city that could benefit from from a. Concept like that. So we're. Looking into. It with Dottie. So since you're up there, I'm going to bring up the other issue. We always talk about life, safety and welfare when we're doing development projects. And I notice with the 38th and Blake area, some of the sites abut the railroad tracks. And I just want to know if any of the conversation that looked at that area address some of the things we've been talking about related to the railroad safety work that is going on now that will ask developers to address the life safety issues as part of their development. Yeah, thank you for the question. It is my. Understanding that conversation and the research that was completed by community planning and development was prior to my position being here as executive director. My understanding is that. My as CPD worked to identify how. That might be, how we might engage with the development community, and what kind of regulations we have in place today, which are very limited in terms of requiring a developer to address that safety concern. I believe what we did is through our site development plan process is ensure that every developer was made aware of the safety concern and the potential for them to encouragement for them to think about that as a part of their development. I understand with this consultant. Who is now currently underway, we will be looking at how do we enact regulation that will bring that safety much more into. Yeah, so it's. Really more focused on identifying our vulnerable areas along the rail corridors where development may occur that would ensure that we are in fact addressing the life safety issues and we'll provide some guidance on how we address that. So I appreciate the conversation and the fact that we're we're not there yet on all of that. But collectively as a city, it is an issue that we have not been addressing. Because we made this a voluntary process. And so the work that we're doing will, in fact ensure that we have the ability to ask the developers to address the life safety issues by the sheer fact that we're giving them the permit to go build their project as they're proposing. And this is just asking them to look at it in a little bit different way. It's not to stop development, but to do it in a different way that in fact addresses those life safety issues. So thank you. I think I've got one last question. And this is around whether or not the process and the conversation around bringing that forward made any distinction on housing type. So for example, there are a number of affordable housing manufacturers around our state as governor just, you know, announced he's going to fund one up in Grand Junction. There's one in one vista, there's one down in Pueblo. There's discussions about doing one somewhere, you know, in the front range. And the hope is that that type of housing can be done faster, cheaper. And if that can bring online housing in Denver quicker and more affordable, then is there are there any restrictions? And I get that they have to go through the whole building department assessment, making sure that there and you actually meet the building code, fire code, all of our, you know, UBC. But are there was that part of the conversation and are there any restrictions on that? Thank you for the question. So, of course, part of the conversation is how do we deliver homes faster? Which is why many of the incentives we're looking at, the opportunity, modular home or prefabricated home is certainly something that we're seeing as a growing trend to better address some of the supply issues. From a zoning perspective, we do not treat those types of homes any differently. I will note that that sometimes those homes don't always fit our building envelopes. And so what we sometimes see is someone said, Oh, I have a modular home, I want to build it in Denver. And they don't do the homework to understand that our zoning might require, you know, a book plane or a setback or whatever else. So just like any building might need modification, that is a challenge that we continue to work through and find solutions with so we can advance on affordable housing. And then as it pertains to the building code, our building code is constantly evolving and changing. We're currently undergoing an update. So, so long as those are meeting the building code, there's no limits on those opportunities. More quickly, deliver affordable housing. And I've got one last question and this is for you, Brad. So as we look to the development community, which is, in my opinion, different from our nonprofit housing developers to now contribute and participate in providing affordable units in our city. Is it anticipated that when we're asking them to do affordable units, that they're encouraged to apply for low income tax credits, to maybe get that subsidy deeper or expand the number of units are able to provide on their development. Thank you for the question. So the short answer is no. This is designed around what a market development can feasibly achieve on site without the need for subsidy, which is critically important. That said, I think our department and the city ought to and are willing to invest additional resources if it's important to say, increase the number of units available or buy down the affordability of issues that are created. We're not opposed to doing that, but across the board, we want to make sure that these options available are ones that can be replicable and included without the need for for the city to putting additional dollars. And so. Thank you. Thank you, Madam President. All right. Thank you. Councilmember Ortega, Councilmember Hines. Thank you. Council President. I have a question about linkage fee and the the thought process that went from that first iteration that we and council saw. And the current iteration, I guess, on a lease, I don't know, I'm you guys are looking at each other. So I guess between the two I bet you have the answer. And so as one example, this proposal shows four steps in the linkage fee increase as opposed to I think the first one that I saw only had three steps. Could you could you talk a little bit, I guess, to help guide that I don't want to lead you too much, but to help guide the the thought process. I think that the first iteration was probably not hard, not strong enough. And and so I think the first proposal then we had a second proposal, but that that had higher linkage fees. And then the third proposal or third iteration, we actually had a fourth step. So I can can you help me? Maybe I'm just making all this up. So that's why you're here to set the record straight. Well, thank you, Councilman, and good memory. This process has been evolutionary and responsive to community and stakeholder feedback. The first proposal was released in the fall of last year, and that included just a one time jump up to fees that were lower. And we certainly acknowledge that COVID is continuing to impact many facets of our lives, development being one of those. And then in the next iteration, we then said, let's phase us in over three years. But then we said, Well, we're on phasing it in over three years, but we're also keeping the fees on kind of a more modest side. At that point, we did increase the the linkage fee up to increase it by a dollar. So for larger single unit homes and that was a direct concern that we heard from community of our scrapes and rebuilds, of the loss of naturally occurring affordable housing and the replacement of of highly unattainable housing. Then kind of in that next iteration, we we acknowledge that there was still room for our linkage fee numbers to grow. However, kind of as a compromise. What we did is we increased that growth rate over four years, providing predictability, but in the long term, increasing those fees to a higher amount. So once we kind of go to that CPI, you adjustment will be at a really kind of healthy pace when we look at. Comparison appears as well as what we know the market can be able to bear, helping to ensure that we're maintaining a critical source of funding that's complementary to other things, such as the marijuana sales tax and the property tax all homeowners are paying and contributing to as well. He thinks. So that was that was what I was looking for. So I seem to recall that when there were three steps, we we looked at pier cities and the linkage fee amount was still below. Um, what we saw was the right amount or the, you know, the amount of linkage fees that people were charging just as we looked at peer cities. Is that right? Um, so generally speaking, peer cities range the whole gamut. So peer cities linkages range from 250, a square foot all the way up to 1750. However, there's a lot of important nuanced differences. Some of those districts with 1750, it only applies to the incentive, not to the entirety of the building. Some of them only apply to their central business districts and not the remainder of the city. Others, like Boston, Massachusetts, have had linkage fees on the books for decades, and so it's allowed for them to gradually increase over time, allowing for the market to absorb it. So when we do compare our proposed numbers, which also are a range based off of use and where it's located within the city, it is much more of that middle range of where we look at our peers, where previously we are well below every single peer in the country. Okay. I want to thank you for I know that you and I, when we had one of the briefings, I did express concern about how we should get a little higher with linkage fees. So I want to thank you for for I'm sure I wasn't the only one. So but I can pretend like I feel like you listened to me specifically. So thank you for that. Um, the, the other thing, the only other thing that I wanted to touch on was about parking ratios. Um, I want to thank you and Director Aldridge and, and my peers here on council for eliminating parking minimums, you mentioned . There are no parking minimums downtown as of July 19th of last year. There are no parking minimums in Golden Triangle either. So the question for you is, while this microphone works, um, does the eliminating. This is a leading question. Does the elimination of parking minimums mean that we will have no parking spaces in any new Golden Triangle development? We have not seen that trend to occur as of yet. But if you travel only to. Fair enough and I think where I'm going with this is the there were the questions a few minutes ago in comments and in in the many tests, the people testifying about how we could eliminate parking minimums. But banks still have parking minimums, as you were saying. They look back and they say, you know, this development had parking. And so they followed the trail us and and and how we want to move forward with land use in our city that a fair statement. Yeah. I think lenders are looking at lending risk and the marketability of those units. And we as a city have to look at this from a policy perspective of implementing our adopted plans, which call for a multimodal, sustainable, interconnected transit network that reduces single occupancy vehicle and individual ownership needs. So we might not see these policies play out in the sense that we might not see significant reductions in vehicle parking for the next couple of years. And that's okay because we are still at least eliminating a barrier and providing the opportunity for those affordable projects to take advantage of lower parking ratios and like the Warren Village example, provide a lower parking ratio, provide a fourth floor, and provide more housing for individuals and families exiting homelessness. Yeah, and I'll just repeat and this the last, my last comment, I would just repeat something that I mentioned in committee. I would be in favor of installing parking maximums if I felt that the the banks would support it. But I don't want to go down the path of installing parking maximums and then destroy any development in our city because because we couldn't get funding for them. Thank you. Thank you. Councilman Hines, Councilmember Sawyer. Thanks. Just wanted to follow up on one thing we haven't kind of touched on yet, though. We heard a number of people comment on in public comment, and that is the idea of that of the fact that housing affordability is is lessening in our city because of the number of scrapes that are happening. Right. So one of the ways that CPD had discussed potentially alleviating that problem or addressing and incentivizing adaptive reuse was the what's the name of the project? I can't remember it now where we have one house and it gets split into three or four different units, but the house stays the same. I don't know if there is a fancy name for it, but I think you keep the existing building form, but you allow greater density. There was a whole project name for it that. I can't remember because I'm on like our 17. Of my day at this. Point and I'm afraid. You guys, if you remember it, let me know, please. Thank you. So we have abandoned that project and or set it aside for now in favor of some other priorities. So wanted to know how this proposal will address the problem of scrapes and and incentivize adaptive reuse. Yeah. And were you thinking of residential infill? Yes. Thank you. The residential. Development. Policy went to that level of specificity because I think we acknowledge that we needed to look at whether it was adaptive reuse or allowing. As part of the East Area plan. That was part of the proposal. Initially, also in the discussions. Yes, I totally get that day. And so I think that this this project and specifically the linkage fee is where we kind of broke the current use category, which said we're going to charge a new 800 square foot home, which very few people are building. But that's what we've historically seen in them. We're going to charge them the same exact linkage fee on a per square foot basis as a $4,000 mansion. And that's where we had the opportunity to say, we know that the city needs to be doing more, but this is a first step in which we can charge higher linkage fees on those larger units that are more than 1600 square feet. You can very easily fit a family friendly three plus bedroom home and 1600 square feet. So we want to still ensure that we're allowing for family friendly housing, which is much needed, but for those developments that are providing those kind of larger scrapes that are well over two or 3000 and selling at 1.2 plus million, that they're at least contributing in a more meaningful way to affordable housing if they do choose to move forward of those groups. Got it. Really appreciate that. I just felt like we hadn't quite clarified. There are so many different things that this proposal is doing. And so I wanted to just make sure that I understood exactly how it was addressing that challenge, which is something that I hear from my residents a lot. So. Thanks. No more questions. All right. Thank you. Councilmember Sawyer. Councilmember Flynn. Thank you, Madam President. Unleash. Maybe you could help clear the air on the issue of the parking and the exemption, because a lot of us were treated to a flood of emails over the weekend, the last couple of days, because of the feeling that agreement or a consensus that came out of the advisory committees before I went to the planning board and then planning boards suggested then and the council committee amended and put in the park total parking exemption. Back into the audience and we're being asked to vote no on it because of the impact that that will have. So explain to us how one would qualify for a complete exemption, because it doesn't apply to just the way I'm reading it. It doesn't apply to simply any development of ten or more units within a quarter mile of a by an enhanced transit corridor. So how does it work? Yeah. Similar to my response of Councilman Hines to the parking reductions and exemptions have been a continuous evolution throughout the duration. Yeah. So in the fall we had a much broader applicability of the parking exemptions and we kind of peeled it back and took it and got some feedback from advisory committee saying, Oh, you guys peel the back too far, but I get it. Let's keep moving this piece forward. Planning Board also made a recommendation and then we had the passage of at Luti further expanding that. I think the really important piece to note is, I think what you just articulated, it's not every project within a quarter mile radius, it's projects that are building affordable units onsite at a higher level of affordability. And it's those corridors that have had city capital investment. So Colfax, as it exists today, while there is incredible transit service and I certainly get to benefit from that, does not qualify for the parking exemption. They can certainly provide reduced parking as our code allows for parking reductions. But it's not until about four or five years out from now when the city has made that capital investment and we have fixed BRT stations in place, that that parking exemption can be leveraged once again by projects that are providing a higher level of affordability on site. Not only just factored in represent. Could you explain on, for instance, on BRT, actually on on the transit on the rail transit, the measurement is from the center line of the platform of the station and not just within a quarter mile anywhere along a track. Because of course, for instance, on the line, if I live at on Clayton Street, I can easily walk to a station. From there, I could walk all the way over to 40 in Colorado or down to 38 in Blake. So on the BRT, does it apply also to within a quarter mile of a BRT stop or the corridor itself, the entire cadre? Great question. As drafted, it applies to the entirety of the corridor. And the reason being is, one, it's much more interconnected and in all of the plans for BRT that have been executed thus far. Stops are always about a quarter mile or less apart, oftentimes far less. So we could create all these little bubbles run along the corridor that would be quarter mile radius. But in all the instances, at least with the Colfax corridor, they overlap. So for simplicity's sake, it's applied to the entirety of the corridor. Okay. And I also I had difficulty finding a Chapter 27, Article ten, so that I could understand what are what are the enhanced affordable housing projects, what makes it an enhanced project over and above the mandatory? What are the triggers for that? Yeah, certainly. So it should be kind of towards the end of the bill I can pull up the page, but if the screen will show right what I needed to do, the enhanced affordability requirements on page 20 of the slide deck. And so it's an increase of 2 to 3% dependent upon choice and market area. But it's important to note that that overall percentage increase applies to the entirety of the building. And so what we actually see is that in many instances this can more than double the affordable housing contribution by leveraging a higher percentage of affordable units on site. Mm hmm. And you mentioned to Councilman Hines that we certainly don't expect that. Many builders would put up a new 120 unit, a 180 unit building and provide no parking. A bank probably wouldn't finance that. But I haven't seen any proposals of that scale come in. I think where we really see some of these projects being able to take advantage of lower parking ratios are some of our smaller, more affordable housing projects that are, you know, two or three stories. Typically less than 50 units are able to go to a very low parking alternative. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Madam President. All right. Thank you, Councilmember Flynn. And thank you to the city staff answering those questions. The public hearing is closed. Comments by members of Council on Council Bill 22, Dash 424. Councilmember Ortega. Thank you, Madam President. I first want to thank the entire team of people that were involved in bringing this forward. I think they were very thoughtful in trying to come up with some great recommendations in this these three bills. This is not intended to solve the entirety of the problem of our affordable housing needs and issues. I think it's one more tool in the toolbox. I know we used to have an inclusionary housing ordinance when we created the housing fund. I had argued that we should keep the IATO in place because that at least allowed us to still get affordable for sale housing. But that that was then. This is now. And I think the the measures that our city staff and community partners that came together to come up with recommendations on how we could address various price points in our area. Immediate income scale can happen with with this legislation that is before us tonight. I want to thank my two colleagues, Councilwoman Canete and Councilwoman Sandoval, for their participation on behalf of this body and for keeping council informed as this was moving through the process. This doesn't solve everything for everybody. And I know that we have spent a lot of money on addressing homelessness. Not all of it has been done to the satisfaction of everyone, but. We have spent unprecedented dollars during this time frame, and in large part because we benefited from receiving some federal dollars that allowed us to meet the needs of so many people that have been struggling. And as you heard earlier tonight, we have many people staying in hotels until, you know, we can continue to work towards getting them into housing. But it's a supply issue, and we need to continue to work towards looking at how we create that and also not being expected to be the city that solves this problem for the whole metro area. Neighboring counties have been building housing at rapid paces as well, and a lot of that is market rate housing, too, and it's creating the same effect in their communities. And when we see people having to move away because the price point as far as Henderson and and creating some strain on some of our rural communities that don't have transportation. So we've got more people driving in their cars. This kind of legislation I think is a huge step in the right direction and allows us to ensure that we are continuing to move the needle in meeting our needs. And, you know, like any legislation, we can always come back and revisit it, make changes to it, and look at how we can continue to make those tweaks that need to be made. It doesn't mean that tonight's bill is, you know, cast in stone, but it will be important to have in place as we move forward and try to meet the needs of our missing middle, which is a huge segment of our population that can't afford to stay here. It allows us to create more on the lower admi scale, but that is a large part of what we have been doing this whole time and in large part with our nonprofit housing developers that are building housing across the city. So I will be supporting this tonight. And again, thank everyone from CPD, from a host that worked with our community partners to bring this forward. Thank you. Thank you, Councilwoman Ortega. Councilman Kenney. Thank you. Council President. I just chimed in briefly to provide a little orientation to those who might be following along, as Councilman Sandoval and I were clarifying where we're at procedurally. So there are three bills in this package, one of which is going to be having some amendment discussion. So I usually we do amendments first before we discuss the package so we can kind of comment on the whole package and what however it turns out, this bill does not have any amendments on it. But so I think what's best is I'm going to urge my colleagues to vote yes on this, and I'm going to reserve my comments for after we have the bigger discussion. So I'll be commenting on the entire package as a whole when we get to that bill. So it's a little different than I'm used to. All good. But I just wanted to, you know, urge folks to vote yes and then I'll have some longer comments on a next version of the package. Thank you. Council President. All right. Very good. Thank you, Councilman Canete. Councilmember Hines. Thank you. Council President My battery is saying that it's my laptop saying he's about to shut down, so hopefully I can get this through. So I want to bring up a comment that someone else had said, we have many other cities in the metro area and they also have housing affordability issues. And as Councilmember Ortega said, you know, it's not up to Denver for us to do everything on behalf of the entire metro area and frankly, on behalf of the entire state or region. So but we are doing what we can and we're trying to do our part. And in many ways, we're doing more than our part as as best we can. We also have fewer limitations that some of the other cities have. Like, for example, there's a city to our west that limited the development to 1% growth there, intentionally slowing development when and their, you know, their housing affordability is going up even more . And I think one of the comments on in testimony was about other cities like Boulder. And they are, you know, even more unaffordable than we are where the average home value is over $1,000,000. As as other commenters have already said. You know, we've been advocating our state counterparts to create these regulations. And and because of our success at the state level and encouraging our state counterparts to pass these laws, we now have expanding housing affordability. Like we also have additional control over the minimum wage. So Denver continues to work from the making housing more affordable perspective. We're also continuing to work from empowering people to get closer to a living wage. You know, we got the chance to increase the minimum wage above the state average and we jumped on it. Now we're more than $3.30 above the state minimum wage. That helps more than one in nine Denver rates in our city. This also will have a material impact for for people in our city. So we're doing what we can in many different angles. You know, this this is typically I mean, this is one of the many issues that our city, you know, struggles with and and policy struggles with because people want immediate results, but government cannot provide that. We've got to be prudent with the people's money, and we should consider the public when we consider how to spend the people's money. In 2008, the economy imploded, all housing projects stopped, and the Denver developers found other hobbies in other industries. Same with the construction workers in Denver. And then in 2013, Denver started to recover. And then shortly after that, Denver's housing market turned white high. We've had 130,000 people move to our lovely city since then, and Blueprint says we're expecting an additional 200,000 people to move to the city by the just the city of Denver by 2040. Housing development hasn't kept up, and we're doing our best to move quickly. That's part of the reason why prices continue to go up. But again, we've got that conflict where people want resolution. Now, that's not what government does. We want to make sure that we are methodical and measured with our our decisions. We're using the people's money. So I recognize that that we've got a lot of frustrated speakers who are just struggling to survive. We are doing what we can. And and and so I. Anyway, that's that. Thank you. I clearly am. I thought art is as solid as I could be if if it were earlier in the evening. Thank you, Council President. No worries. Councilman Haines, council member said. Thank you. I'm going to do my comments on the whole package. Since this next half, I'll be introducing in explaining the amendments. I want to contextualize my comments with with two titles that we've sadly been given. We were named the second top gentrifying city in the country recently and the top city displacing Latinos in the country. Supporters of this bill have touted that this will provide a steady and modest supply of affordable housing. After fighting for a decade for an opportunity to make it mandatory that developers build what Democrats need. Modest is hardly the approach we should be taking. The whole is just getting bigger and bigger and army is increasing as our population shifts to higher income earners. Therefore, affordable is slipping farther and farther out of reach for more Denver sites. The grace period we're giving for this to even kick in means that steady and modest impact will not even kick in fully for years. We've defined high costs markets in a way that ignores areas most vulnerable to displacement. We're ignoring the high social costs of displacement identified by our own gentrification study, and we've ignored the pleas from community to apply a higher cost to areas where we have driven change on purpose and development disproportionately is affecting black and brown families. This is a market based tool. We've established that relying on the market so far hasn't served us very well, has it? We've been relying on the market to self-correct and it has not corrected. We developers have not prioritized lower cost housing, despite that being the highest in demand. We fought for the ability to make mandates so that we didn't have to rely on developer generosity that was not manifesting at the needed levels. Yet here we are essentially codifying the status quo. We've written a policy to uplift developer power while ignoring the city's greatest needs. None of this was written from the perspective of people who are houseless or rent overburdened. People are going to say that this is a good start, but that's not true. If the linkage fees are low, you can't even change this for years and it doesn't actually solve the crisis we're facing. It's just virtues, virtue, signal policy, which we're getting really comfortable with these days. Community has been involved and many have pushed back only to be marginalized and overruled by the developers in the process. We heard that tonight. Best practices have been considered and a whole study was completed to tell us what would be a maximum justifiable fee . And we ignored our own study of best practices and that maximum justifiable fee. Why did we pay for the study? The entire proposal is nothing more than a repeat of the abysmally low linkage fee passed in 2016 that has locked us into our current situation. Incentives for developers linkage fees far below what data says we can justify this developer's sales pitch coming from our own planning department is real smooth. Sounds good. Took a long time and yet does very little for the people worried about a roof over their heads. It lets us off the hook because now we can say we did something and wait another decade before doing anything else. It's sad and it's infuriating. This body doesn't need my vote to pass this bill tonight. Your minds are made up. They always are. Well before the people speak. I too am still just a minority on this body. But the people out there, they need my vote tonight. They need it because they need to know that I see them. Someone sees them and understands this is smoke and mirrors and we all deserve more than developer crumbs. I will not support these bills tonight because they are a slap in the face to a city expecting us to treat this housing crisis as a real crisis. If a modest approach to putting out a blazing fire is the best we can do, everyone in this city should be outraged rather than placated by tonight's vote. I'd like CPD to go back to the drawing board and put the most impacted people in the city first for a change. But that's unlikely to happen. So I'm not supporting this tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember CdeBaca. Seeing no other members in the Q Council Bill 22, Dash 424 is on the floor for final passage. Madam Secretary, roll call on Council Bill 22, dash 424. Black eye. CdeBaca. No. When I. Turned. In my. Hands. I can each. Ortega. I. Sandoval. I swear i. Torres. I. Madam President. I. Madam Secretary, please close the voting and announce the results. One night and eyes. Ten eyes council bill 22, Dash 424 has passed. Council members say to Barca, will you please put Council Bill 22, dash 426 on the floor for final passage.