A bill for an ordinance authorizing a transfer of cash from the Excise Tax Base Account for an increase in appropriation to the 2017 General Fund Contingency and subsequent supplemental appropriations to the Affordable Housing Property Tax Revenue Fund and the City Attorney. Appropriates $9,451,397 to the 2017 General Fund Contingency due to excess revenue derived from the recent settlement surrounding hotel lodgers tax revenue; appropriates $4,058,171 to the Affordable Housing Property Tax Revenue Fund; and appropriates $5,393,226 to the City Attorney’s Office for legal fees associated with the settlement. The Committee approved filing this bill by consent on 11-21-17.
All right. Thank you, Councilman Nu, if there are no objections for members of council. We'll go ahead with this one hour public hearing on Monday, December 18th. This is for Council Bill 1324 regarding minority and women business enterprises and small business enterprise legislation. So that is done. Thank you, Councilman. New Madam Secretary, can you please put up 1319 and Councilwoman Black, will you please put 1319 on the floor? I move that council bill 1319 be placed upon final consideration and do pass. All right. It has been moved and seconded comments by members of council council and can each. Thank you, Mr. President. Council Bill 1319 is a bill that accepts funds from the Lodgers Tax and allocates a portion to the housing fund. It takes the right source and it dedicates a portion of it to the right overall use, which is affordable housing. The majority of these funds backfill linkage fee dollars, and the majority are going to expenditures that were already planned. However, a portion of these funds are not yet for planned or allocated uses over the course of the past several months. I have done my best to ask very specific questions about some of the ways that we are doing on allocated housing, funding, decisions and processes. And I have been unable to get answers to some of those questions in order to be consistent with the votes of conscience. I have taken the past several times. These things have come before me because these things are still unanswered. I can't vote for these funds tonight. I expect that the bill will probably pass anyway and I highly respect my colleagues. I don't take issue with your decision, but for me, when questions go unanswered, I can't then vote for the bill to move forward. So with that, I'll be voting no tonight. Thank you, Mr. President. All right. Thank you. Councilwoman, can each councilman take. Thank you, Mr. President. As you all know, we are waiting for a housing plan to come before us. And that plan is supposed to be a guide for how we spend our housing funds in this city. Not just the $15 million fund that was created a year and a half ago, but all of our housing funds. And I attended a housing advisory committee meeting last week where there was discussion about various aspects of the plan. And I became very concerned about the appearance that we are making decisions before the Housing Advisory Committee has even had an opportunity to adopt the plan to ensure that their voice, their input is very much a part of what that plan needs to contain to ensure that we are targeting those dollars where our greatest need exists. And you all probably read the article about a an expectation that there would be city dollars allocated to a community land trust. I commend our foundation community for wanting to do that and for stepping up to the plate. We have a community, the Globeville, Luria, Swansea community that's been working on a community land trust. And this presentation last week sort of presumed that the community efforts would be negated by a citywide effort. And in my experience, you know, over the last 30 plus years, I've been on council and have seen development opportunities happen, not just here in our city, but in other cities across the country. It's when you have community buy in and you've got a bottom up, as well as a top down commitment to funding to make things happen. And in this case, it didn't appear as though there was any commitment whatsoever to the community component of this land trust. And so I am sharing some of the same concerns that Councilwoman Kenney is sharing. She and I have been tracking and following what's happening with our housing programs. And I know when I had asked some questions early on about the $15 million that we had for 2017 and learned that it had all been allocated to various projects. Decisions are being made and, you know, the need exists. I don't question that we shouldn't be looking at where those needs are, but I don't know that any of that is taking into account the recommendations that are coming out of the draft plan for the housing fund, for the housing plan that ensures that we're prioritizing where those dollars need to be spent the greatest. So I'm not sure if I'm going to vote for this bill tonight, but I am expressing my concerns about how decisions are being made before we have clear guidance on where we're prioritizing those dollars. So I think it's critically important that we follow the lead of. For roots in our community. You have been doing housing in this city for years and years that have been sitting on this housing advisory committee and giving guidance and recommendation to the city. And so I'm just sharing the same frustration and concerns. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. Councilman Ortega. Councilman Espinosa. Yeah. Thank you, Councilwoman Kennedy, for calling this out for a separate vote, sort of people who can see the the why do you see me scrambling here and highlighting things? This was the bill that sort of got me going, not sitting in. Think of any more. I don't scrutinize these things in real time the way I was accustomed to. And so this one called out I mean, raised some alarm bells for me. So I'm glad you guys bought Councilwoman Commission. Ortega put some additional light on it. Because of that, I will be abstaining from this vote because I'm not comfortable on either side. It's not lost on me that on night where we're going to be approving, and rightly so, 1349, which puts $2.6 million into building 180 affordable units out in Stapleton, this is $4 million without without that specificity and specificity specifically to, you know, with no specificity in the plans to address some glaring affordable housing and gentrification pressures that we are putting by pumping hundreds of millions of dollars into Globeville or Swansea. I have been consistent in my message to the administration, to Eric at the the Director of Office of Hope that without specificity for that community, where we are making this much investment in everything but the people that are there and have to endure the pressures that come with this level of investment would be a failure of that plan. So with that, I won't vote no, but I will be abstaining from this vote. Thank you. All right. Thank you. As well as Councilman Flynn. Thank you, Mr. President. I have a great deal of sympathy with the arguments that council members can each and Ortega put forward, but I would still urge my colleagues to approve this appropriation. It is the money. The funds are unexpected funds that came from a settlement with the online booking agencies that were not collecting the full lodgers taxes on the on their on their online bookings. And so we have this sudden influx of money. And what this ordinance does essentially is it appropriates it into the housing fund and it doesn't speak to how eventually it might be spent. But I think it's still prudent to park the money there for the time being. My heart is with is with the arguments that the two council members on my on either side made. But I would still ask us to approve the appropriation pending other decisions as to how it's spent. Thank you. Councilman Espinosa Yeah, I just want to say I agree wholeheartedly with that investment in affordable housing and putting that money towards this. But just because this money would go to the you know, otherwise, my understanding is this would go to the general fund, which we can appropriate at a later date. You know, once we have that plan in place with the specificity and actions that the community has been calling out for, this is sort of a just a a straightforward push back as far as I'm concerned with the the the the lack of specificity and solutions. And for me, in in the in the plan thus far. So with that, I think at some point, just like we can say no to correct errors, I think we need to learn to say no to specific requests without clear direction on how that's going to be utilized things. Okay. Thanks. You know, I'll be supporting this. You know, obviously we're no longer in an affordable housing need. We're in a desperate crisis, and we need to get funds any way that we can. However, Councilwoman Kenny Rogers has brought up some points, obviously, that need to be addressed. And I would just look to the administration to hear the concerns that are going on in city council to begin to meet with some of these council members to help us figure out how we can agree on some of the specificity needs to be happening around the use of these funds or else every bill that comes before us, this is what's going to happen. So I'll be supporting this, Madam Secretary. It's been moved. The second roll call can each. Lopez I. Knew. ORTEGA No. Sussman I black. Eye. Clark All right, Espinosa. Flynn. I. Gilmore i Herndon. I Cashman. Reluctantly, I Mr. President. I closed voting results tonight. Two nays. One abstention. Tonight, as soon as one abstention, 319 passes. All right. I believe these are all the items that need to be called out. All of the bills for introduction to Order publish. We're not ready for the block votes. A resolution that bills for final consideration. Council members remember that this is a consent or block vote and you will need to vote. Otherwise, this is your last chance to call on an item. On a separate vote, though, tonight, Councilwoman Black is making the motions. I'm going to ask Haslam and Gilmore to offer the block vote so that computer technology experts can continue to access the computer issues she is experiencing. Is that all right, Councilwoman Gilmore? Yes. President Brooks. Okay. And Councilman, we did just please put the resolution for adoption in the bills for final consideration, for final passage on the floor. Well, do I move that resolutions be adopted in bills and final consideration be placed upon final consideration and do pass in a block for the following items. 1355 1327 1336 1137 1329 1337 1338 1342 1354, 1184, 1278, 1330 1331, 1332, 1343, 1344, 1345, 1346, 1347, 1349, 1422, 1353, 1296, 1297, 1301, 13, 15, 13, 16, 13, 17 1318 1309, 13, ten, 13, 11, 13, 12. 1196 1211 1264. All right. I think she got it. Madam Secretary, do you concur? Yes. All right. It's been moved and seconded. Madam Secretary. Roco. Black eye. Clark Espinosa, Flynn, I. Gilmore, I. Herndon, I. Cashman can eat Lopez. All right, new Ortega I. Assessment I. Mr. President. I. Please salsa following announced results. 13 Eyes. 13 Eyes. The resolutions have been adopted and the bills have in place a full and final consideration and do pass. Tonight, there will be a required public hearing when Council Bill 1076 Changes on reclassification classification of 1400 1404 1408 West 37th Avenue and Highlands and require a public hearing on Constable 1143.