[0:01] >> good morning everybody let's get

[0:02] started with introductions around the

[0:09] room please jeff baker commissioner

[0:13] john christopherson county attorneys

[0:14] office michelle hallstead county

[0:15] attorney's office rhonda fields

[0:16] commissioner leslie summey commissioner

[0:17] carrie warren gully commissioner kendra

[0:18] davis commissioner's office sorry

[0:19] jessica campbell commissioner district

[0:24] 2. Wonderful wonderful and we have

[0:25] kathy smith on the line as well. Please

[0:30] introduce yourself maam. Good morning

[0:31] everyone kathy smith community

[0:32] resources. Thank you very very much.

[0:36] I'm glad you flagged for that for me

[0:37] michelle that's too small for me to

[0:38] see. I thought that was you. We are

[0:44] here today for a study session on the

[0:45] county economic development program.

[0:48] I'm going to turn it over to kendra

[0:50] davis. Thank you so much commissioner.

[0:52] we are here today to give you a little

[0:54] bit of context about the existing

[1:00] county development program how we've

[1:01] chosen to structure that from the

[1:04] county. We will also do an

[1:05] environmental scan how the county

[1:08] structures that and will talk about

[1:09] what opportunities might be ahead and

[1:11] what the preference of the board is. We

[1:14] will also have finance folks joining in

[1:17] just a minute. We will go ahead and

[1:20] start. This is a general sense of what

[1:26] we will be doing to give you a little

[1:27] background that background will include

[1:28] information you've heard in march of

[1:30] this year when you did the economic

[1:33] development 101, some of our partners

[1:34] will talk about what the account

[1:36] currently does partnerships we

[1:40] leverage environmental scan of

[1:41] neighboring counties opportunities and

[1:42] we will go through next steps based on

[1:46] the feelings [indiscernible] just a set

[1:49] of background, what you talked about

[1:53] back in march. Denver south and aurora

[1:55] economic development council two of our

[1:56] partners presented about some economic

[2:01] development foundations. One of the

[2:02] things they talked about, divisions and

[2:08] objectives gave you a snapshot of what

[2:09] arapahoe county looks like from an

[2:12] economic perspective. They track our

[2:16] employment numbers, some leading

[2:17] industries employers this is all

[2:20] information kathy's team ad works also

[2:23] tracks and they do that in partnership

[2:24] with economic development partners. To

[2:35] take us even farther back I want to

[2:36] highlight objectives of the economic

[2:37] development the board identified in

[2:38] 2021 and 2022. There was a deeper

[2:39] conversation about how the board wanted

[2:46] to structure current economic

[2:47] development functions because there

[2:48] isn't a four-man function within the

[2:50] county structure. These are some of the

[2:52] objectives identified by the board as

[2:53] part of that conversation. You will see

[2:56] the second enhanced tax base post covid

[3:04] is in a position to be involved post

[3:05] covid is a relative term. I wanted to

[3:13] remind the board that this is a

[3:14] conversation the board has had from a

[3:16] county perspective. These are some of

[3:17] the things that were identified. The

[3:21] actions and activities that happens is

[3:22] that conversation and 21 and 22 are

[3:24] based on these foundational items. We

[3:32] can talk about what that approach is.

[3:37] first and foremost we leverage the

[3:38] excellent work of arapahoe douglas

[3:41] works. They have extensive resources

[3:42] for businesses and job seekers, these

[3:49] are two of the high-level things they

[3:50] do that kathy could give you an entire

[3:51] study session on that. They are an

[3:54] incredible resource for the county and

[3:57] for economic development. They also

[4:00] help identify talent pipeline concerns,

[4:04] specific key target areas for the

[4:08] county, areas we have significant

[4:09] business or gaps they might see, they

[4:11] work with our partners to leverage

[4:16] those talents and work with

[4:19] universities and colleges to address

[4:23] those concerns. The county also

[4:24] provides personal property tax

[4:26] incentive program on a case-by-case

[4:29] basis. I believe you talked about that

[4:33] recently. We will also be coming back

[4:36] in september with a deeper conversation

[4:37] of what that might look like from a

[4:40] policy perspective. We will have a

[4:42] little bit of information about what

[4:43] that currently looks like later in the

[4:47] slide. . We also partner with economic

[4:50] development organizations across

[4:53] multiple focus areas. These areas I

[4:54] want to highlight them. These are areas

[5:00] that were identified as important

[5:01] during the conversation in 2022. The

[5:04] board determined these specific

[5:09] sections were where they wanted to

[5:15] focus their resources. We have economic

[5:18] development corporations including

[5:19] denver south over economic development

[5:21] council. They support job creation

[5:23] recruitment, they help identify

[5:29] commercial prospects and work with ad

[5:30] works for the county pipeline needs.

[5:33] we support small business

[5:39] development centers. Aurora has a

[5:42] denver metro edc. And the eastern

[5:46] colorado edc. They help support

[5:47] entrepreneurial efforts and small

[5:50] business trainings. If you remember

[5:51] from last year's presentation, they

[5:54] talked about an area of business

[5:58] evolution, businesses where folks were

[5:59] retiring or transitioning out and

[6:06] helping to find a soft landing for that

[6:07] business to have to continue

[6:08] operations. We support chambers of

[6:11] commerce, those folks do a lot of

[6:13] community building. , they support

[6:16] existing businesses they create

[6:18] opportunities to partner and to build

[6:23] that foundational network of businesses

[6:26] in our community. We support advocacy

[6:27] and interest groups, those include

[6:35] our i70 reap, a specific group not

[6:38] quite a chamber of commerce but has

[6:39] specific project areas and is nimble in

[6:40] terms of the desires and priorities of

[6:47] that agenda.

[6:48] >> commissioner warren gully

[6:50] >> thank you. This is the sba stuff.

[7:01] like the folks that come and present to

[7:02] us that do trainings and those types of

[7:05] things. Thank you I just wanted to

[7:15] highlight within the current strategic

[7:16] plan we talked about using this data to

[7:17] build out what this looks like. These

[7:20] are some of the areas it slots into. It

[7:28] we cover [indiscernible] as well as

[7:35] prosperity some elements of supporting

[7:36] local business building out opportunity

[7:37] areas and creating opportunities for

[7:39] education those sorts of things those

[7:40] are the areas we are trying to leverage

[7:41] the partnerships with these different

[7:45] areas. Within that, the county has

[7:50] specific tools and resources. We talked

[7:54] about a couple of them but I want to

[7:55] dive deeper on them. See if there are

[7:59] questions about what the town currently

[8:00] does and highlight ways the county is

[8:02] trying to make inroads. Obviously the

[8:06] first is arapaho douglas works. If you

[8:11] have any questions I will make kathy

[8:15] answer them. This is generally a high

[8:16] level of what ad works does. You are

[8:18] familiar with their operational

[8:21] categories and what resource they are

[8:25] but they really do a lot in data and

[8:31] providing that data to our business

[8:32] owners to the economic development

[8:34] partners. They talk about economic

[8:37] trends and employment. Those trends and

[8:39] that data help inform those projects

[8:42] and programs they move forward in

[8:45] partnership with. There's also the

[8:50] south metro enterprise zone. This may

[8:58] sound familiar we talked about it a

[8:59] little bit there was an opportunity to

[9:00] expand the existing zone last year.

[9:01] this year last year. The previous zone

[9:08] was pretty small. Englewood was the

[9:09] manager of that zone. Our long-range

[9:14] planning folks saw opportunity in the

[9:15] eastern bloc to expand the zone. After

[9:22] that there was an opportunity to 10,

[9:23] the expansion every 10 years you can

[9:24] bring in the existing zone, we pulled

[9:29] in all of our partners and cities

[9:31] additional counties douglas county as

[9:32] part of the enterprise zone as well and

[9:36] had some substantive conversations

[9:37] about how folks can leverage the zone,

[9:40] who was interested in doing that and

[9:41] what that looked like. Based on that

[9:45] the zone blew up. So it includes parts

[9:52] of, sorry, good clarification, not a

[9:58] technical term. The enterprise zone

[10:00] still exists. Douglas county is part of

[10:03] it. We work with parker eastern block,

[10:10] our long-range planning partners public

[10:11] works did an excellent job of

[10:13] identifying areas that were slated back

[10:14] for projected growth and existing

[10:17] growth they thought were beneficial to

[10:18] have a commercial area included in

[10:21] that. It's a subset of zone that

[10:23] includes sheridan greenwood village

[10:29] sections of the county that did not

[10:30] participate previously for a variety of

[10:32] reasons. It is currently administered

[10:33] by the aurora chamber of commerce. They

[10:34] have transition from inglewood, they

[10:39] are working with the state to identify

[10:40] support enterprise zone 1 requests

[10:46] these are mostly tax credits folks can

[10:47] get as businesses in the enterprise

[10:50] zone. There's also an opportunity for

[10:51] what are called contribution projects

[10:55] which allows big capital projects to

[10:57] receive tax credits contributions from

[11:03] residents [indiscernible] which is a

[11:08] cool opportunity and brought in that

[11:09] zone across our county and douglas

[11:10] county. There's a lot of opportunity

[11:17] here that is new and we are working on

[11:18] trying to leverage that with the aurora

[11:20] chamber of commerce. The county has a

[11:23] tax incentive program. This allows the

[11:26] county to offer economic incentives for

[11:27] new and expanding businesses. You can

[11:32] refund business property tax business

[11:34] facility or expansion, the board talked

[11:35] about this as a program a couple or two

[11:38] years ago I believe. I believe it was

[11:45] two years ago. The idea when folks come

[11:52] for a potential incentive, they

[11:53] bring the benefits to the board. They

[11:56] talk about how many jobs they create

[11:57] what is the median income, what's the

[12:04] capital investment they will be making

[12:05] what do they think the impacts of this

[12:06] will be in the county. Sometimes that

[12:07] can be kind of to borrow another

[12:10] official term squishy math, but it is a

[12:14] conversation with the board and

[12:19] expectation of return on investment.

[12:23] currently the county has 10 incentive

[12:27] agreements, you can have them for

[12:31] specific addresses. There are

[12:34] businesses that have [indiscernible]

[12:35] has an average return of

[12:38] $550,000 .

[12:40] that's an average over eight

[12:41] years or so if the board remembers we

[12:42] went back when we came to you two years

[12:43] ago this program has evolved a lot over

[12:44] the last 10 or 15 years. Over the

[12:52] years. It used to be as low as a couple

[13:01] thousand dollars. And over the course

[13:02] of time has increased to what it

[13:04] currently is, which is 550,000.

[13:10] >> commissioner fields

[13:11] >> can you highlight what six

[13:15] businesses there are? I'm unfamiliar

[13:16] with the six businesses

[13:17] >> come on up.

[13:22] >> thank you lisa. The board currently

[13:29] has agreements with thorough

[13:32] electronics, public national

[13:35] distributing company. Q ts aurora,

[13:38] gemini medical, j.p. Morgan, and

[13:44] charter communications.

[13:49] >> and, qps, is that the data center?

[13:51] the types of businesses. Is it

[13:58] aerospace, a range? I know the data

[14:00] center is, and I know what the banking

[14:02] one, the other topics? If you look at

[14:08] aero that is technical manufacturing,

[14:14] gemini is a large manufacturer of

[14:17] medical products. Typically the

[14:20] business personal property tax

[14:21] investment works when you have a

[14:29] significant lift in the facility

[14:30] fixtures furniture and equipment. A lot

[14:31] of these companies whether it be qt as

[14:32] j.p. Morgan gemini arrow all have made

[14:39] a big capital investment inside the

[14:40] building which is why they are looking

[14:41] for a rebate that's generally right now.

[14:44] where most of the current it's a little

[14:48] bit more focused on advanced

[14:53] manufacturing. Is what I would say.

[14:55] >> I remember when charter

[14:56] communications came to us, we actually

[15:00] extended it because they were adding

[15:01] more people if I remember correctly.

[15:03] they were adding several hundred new

[15:09] people. That is a communications

[15:12] company. It's kind of a spattering. I

[15:15] guess I thought it was mostly finance.

[15:18] if I may jump in kendra, the take away

[15:22] for us as we work really closely. You

[15:25] can see this is not like everyone gets

[15:29] a card. It's not a [indiscernible]

[15:32] environment. [indiscernible]but I would

[15:37] say our economic development partners

[15:42] both aurora and denver south do a good

[15:45] job of vetting these requests on our

[15:46] behalf. So when they come to you they

[15:49] are doing the background work and

[15:53] making their professional

[15:54] recommendation on the level of

[15:56] investment and what it will bring to

[15:57] the county as kendra said a couple

[16:00] years ago because of our uncertainty

[16:06] and our financial situation prior to

[16:07] the passage of 1a, you put a pause on

[16:12] these things globally. So we are

[16:13] starting to see more come through as

[16:17] obviously the investments continue to

[16:20] grow.

[16:23] >> I would like to see I'm not sure

[16:24] kathy has this because it says on one

[16:26] of the slides we are keeping track of

[16:29] trends. I would like to understand the

[16:34] demographics of those agreements in

[16:35] reference to who they are hiring, and

[16:38] where they are coming from. Because

[16:42] when I think about district 5 and that

[16:43] population, many of the areas are

[16:50] boarded up. And there's no really

[16:51] pathway at this point for companies

[16:54] that come into that area because they

[16:57] don't have the richness of the dirt you

[17:01] refine in the unincorporated parts of

[17:04] aurora. So when we are thinking about

[17:07] incentive I'm hoping at some point we

[17:12] look at and I don't know this is a

[17:13] partnership with aurora city, but

[17:17] everything is being developed out

[17:20] south. So transportation becomes an

[17:23] issue, in reference if we want to see

[17:24] the folks get jobs, how will they get

[17:32] their lower rtd or light rail is not a

[17:33] viable option for many of these

[17:37] agreements or businesses

[17:38] >> I don't know if we have that data,

[17:40] kathy maybe you do? It's not random.

[17:45] kathy you can't put your hand up.

[17:49] [indiscernible] go ahead

[17:50] >> thank you commissioner. I wanted to

[17:54] say we definitely can get data related

[18:00] to districts rates demographics those

[18:01] kinds of things. Unfortunately I can't

[18:06] speak to every business and the

[18:10] demographics of who they are hiring him

[18:14] from what district. With that said, if

[18:15] we have a specific ask we can work with

[18:16] businesses in certain areas to see what

[18:23] information we could get statistically.

[18:24] but yes we definitely can get you some

[18:27] dead demographic information related to

[18:28] your district, related to employment

[18:31] rates education levels demographics

[18:32] that way. But I don't know if that's

[18:36] what you're looking for?

[18:41] >> that would be helpful the reason I

[18:42] bring it up is because I know how much

[18:43] time when I think we want to house

[18:53] people we want to eventually get them a

[18:57] job to get them in a situation they can

[19:01] be self-sufficient. We are trying some

[19:02] of these initiatives to getting some

[19:08] people not just off the street into a

[19:09] house temporary housing, but how can we

[19:12] align these initiatives when we are

[19:13] really giving them a job, eventually

[19:15] giving them housing. We are not just

[19:18] housing homeless people.

[19:26] >> commissioner, that's probably a

[19:27] separate conversation for economic

[19:33] development items. That is the goal of

[19:34] our housing stability services creating

[19:35] housing stability plan, getting people

[19:36] referred to arapahoe douglas works.

[19:40] that is our goal with the services we

[19:43] implemented with our housing stability

[19:47] services. Making sure people have the

[19:48] economic stability and mobility, not

[19:51] just getting them into anything

[20:01] temporary. We agree completely

[20:02] >> I think to the comment you made

[20:03] about how this relates to incentives or

[20:04] what date of these companies are

[20:05] reporting back on, that would go to the

[20:06] incentive policy conversation, what

[20:12] would you do about wage ranges hiring

[20:15] groups, some of the demographic data we

[20:16] can ask them to provide. That's a great

[20:21] flag and we will make a note of that

[20:22] when we bring back the incentives as

[20:26] well. Commissioner warren gully

[20:27] >> thank you I'm glad you brought that

[20:28] up commissioner fields. This is kind of

[20:29] our current state, right? What you are

[20:34] talking about is something I think many

[20:37] people, many of us have an interest in,

[20:39] what other types of incentives. I'm

[20:46] thinking about I can't remember the

[20:47] name of the gosh darn grocery store

[20:48] group that came in. Remember one of the

[20:52] things we actually put in place was you

[20:57] had to put one of your stores in a

[21:00] designated food desert that our staff

[21:02] came up with. So I think those are all

[21:06] really important conversations about

[21:11] forward thinking, do we have other

[21:15] types of things that we ask of our

[21:20] businesses when they come into our

[21:25] community.

[21:26] >> it would be great to have a list so

[21:27] I can kind of see. Make sure we are

[21:29] asking and putting in place the right

[21:33] [indiscernible]. One of the things

[21:34] moving forward would be childcare. If

[21:37] we are building some of these big

[21:39] companies, they could have child care.

[21:44] I don't know what the list is but if we

[21:45] have an opportunity to influence

[21:47] incentives to make sure it helps people

[21:48] keep their jobs.

[21:52] >> yes, I think of even union

[21:58] representation in some of these large

[22:15] scale projects. There's a whole host of

[22:16] things we could somewhat explored that

[22:17] I think other organizations do have as

[22:18] part of this conversation it's probably

[22:19] a lot bigger than this conversation

[22:20] >> right. And I understand this is

[22:25] passed but looking ahead

[22:31] [indiscernible]. It's really hard and

[22:32] the middle class is shrinking. We have

[22:36] to be mindful of that as we create

[22:39] these opportunities across arapahoe

[22:43] county. Feeding that pipeline and

[22:44] bringing people up.

[22:49] >> I do want to say that, skipping to

[22:52] the end of the slide, I do want to say

[23:00] those are the conversations we are

[23:01] hoping to spark through this

[23:05] presentation, what are we looking to

[23:06] get to and how can we bring new

[23:07] information that would be helpful, in a

[23:08] structure that would be beneficial. I

[23:17] wanted to mention revitalization areas

[23:18] because the county has designated

[23:24] revitalization areas. This is not

[23:25] something we control but something that

[23:26] is helpful to folks for homeownership

[23:27] opportunities. There is a calculation

[23:31] that hud creates that designates these

[23:35] areas, areas where there are additional

[23:36] opportunity for folks in homeownership.

[23:40] wanted to flag that those exist in the

[23:41] following areas in arapahoe county. We

[23:48] can certainly [indiscernible] of these

[23:49] spaces and navigating how to support

[23:50] folks in that. That's what the county

[23:55] does. Currently that's what the county

[23:56] program looks like, that's how we

[24:01] operate. The list of cities is

[24:06] interesting.

[24:07] >> hud has a list..... [indiscernible]

[24:11] hud has a list, there may be specific

[24:14] areas within those cities, it's not

[24:18] necessarily the whole city itself.

[24:25] >> now we are going to transition

[24:27] [laughter] I love my district. I love

[24:38] district 2.

[24:39] >> that's how the county structures at

[24:40] a high level economic development

[24:41] program. We wanted to talk about how

[24:42] other countries do that. We did not

[24:47] talk about cities because cities are a

[24:48] different animal they have different

[24:53] opportunities to help support and

[24:54] regulate economic development element

[24:55] than counties do. Counties are very

[25:02] regulated in that area [indiscernible]

[25:03] and we will go through that. This is a

[25:12] list of things we looked at with other

[25:13] counties so we can identify that for

[25:17] you. Adams county has a robust economic

[25:19] development department, it's mostly

[25:25] internal, combined with their community

[25:26] development community and economic

[25:31] development department. As you can see

[25:32] the budget is [indiscernible] but it

[25:33] includes all those different areas.

[25:35] like grants and different things

[25:37] flowing through? Permits. It has a lot

[25:41] of different elements, they combine

[25:43] them into one office. Six of the staff

[25:47] are dedicated to economic development.

[25:50] they have a team of six people specific

[25:51] to economic development. What that

[25:59] means to them is different than what

[26:00] the county does but generally that is

[26:01] doing the work we leverage with our

[26:03] partners. They have about $6 million

[26:04] specific to economic development. 1

[26:05] million is membership. The way we

[26:13] leverage our partners [indiscernible]

[26:14] they have a different resource for

[26:16] that. That is about $1 million in

[26:21] memberships. They also provide

[26:22] incentives and have a formal incentive

[26:26] policy. They created a county

[26:27] revitalization authority something the

[26:28] state recently approved that counties

[26:32] can do, a ura for cities. It allows you

[26:35] to leverage certain areas. I believe

[26:41] counties can do that specifically for

[26:42] all unincorporated areas. And you can

[26:44] narrow down what that looks like.

[26:46] that's what adams county has done, they

[26:53] created an authority in that

[26:54] revitalization authority is there board

[26:55] of directors or commissioners.

[26:58] >> the board of revitalization

[26:59] authority are the five county

[27:03] commissioners? Correct that

[27:04] responsibility can also be delegated.

[27:09] they also leverage the adams county

[27:11] regional partnership, as well as

[27:17] [indiscernible]. We are starting with a

[27:18] very robust broad program.

[27:22] >> a quick question michelle this is

[27:26] for you. $1 million in memberships. Is

[27:35] that, what membership would require

[27:36] that accumulation of funds? Do you have

[27:40] a sense? How much goes to the a-list

[27:44] sponsorship? They sponsor accelerate,

[27:54] they do the a-list [indiscernible] I

[27:55] had tickets to [indiscernible]. I think

[28:02] similar at a smaller scale we support a

[28:03] lot of different chambers. I think they

[28:08] augment that. I have not dove into

[28:12] specifically what they give to aurora

[28:14] edc or to acrup. We don't see that. I

[28:24] can tell you just because I talk to the

[28:27] edcs, whether it's denver south or

[28:37] aurora, other people make more

[28:38] significant investments than we have

[28:39] historically done we've been very flat

[28:40] because of our budget situation. As you

[28:41] look at this and it gives you food for

[28:46] thought, as we transition over the next

[28:47] couple years there's opportunity to

[28:50] have conversations about what do you

[28:51] get for the level of investment. I'm

[28:54] proud of the board a couple years ago

[28:55] in 20 and 21 made that shift to look at

[29:01] what are we getting for $50,000

[29:02] investment at the aurora chamber and

[29:03] how do we track that. We haven't done

[29:06] that in the past. I can't speak, they

[29:12] put a lot more into those third-party

[29:13] groups and we do. I don't know what the

[29:18] return on investment is that we could

[29:19] look into that down the road. As we go

[29:21] through these examples you will see a

[29:22] lot of diversity, other counties put

[29:27] not dissimilar amount of money into one

[29:32] organization.

[29:33] >> what I like about the investments we

[29:36] are making, I haven't had a chance to

[29:37] look at the organizations we support. A

[29:40] lot of them are not big-box

[29:45] organizations. [indiscernible] we do

[29:53] invest in I would say neighborhood type

[29:54] organizations really doing a lot of the

[29:55] work in the community as well as

[30:02] supporting aurora chamber and others I

[30:03] was pleased when I saw the list. I saw

[30:10] some names I did not think would make

[30:11] it

[30:12] >> [indiscernible] that's a good one. I

[30:13] want to say from the administrative

[30:17] perspective, the way we talk about

[30:18] economic development partnerships, we

[30:21] talk about it in terms of memberships

[30:24] with organizations. The list attached

[30:25] to your report includes memberships. We

[30:29] also maintain a list of sponsorships

[30:30] for specific events and other

[30:34] investments but we have not

[30:35] historically bundled as development.

[30:43] but that may be something wrong we say

[30:44] memberships to adams county maybe that

[30:45] means sponsorship elements as well.

[30:51] [indiscernible] boulder county we will

[30:52] swing to the other side of the

[30:57] pendulum. Boulder county is not

[30:58] dissimilar from her office. They do not

[31:01] have dedicated staff within the

[31:07] organization. The county

[31:08] administrator's office supports efforts

[31:09] and coordinates with the external

[31:10] partners. They submit about 180,000,

[31:13] that may be different those 24

[31:16] numbers, to fund eight or nine

[31:20] organizations. They leverage boulder

[31:21] economic council to provide external

[31:26] support. They do not do any tax

[31:27] incentives or business retention

[31:28] support as an organization. Any of that

[31:30] work happens external to them. They

[31:34] also do not have a lot of

[31:37] unincorporated areas, most of their

[31:38] unincorporated areas are

[31:40] [indiscernible], not an option to

[31:48] leverage. That's interesting

[31:49] >> commissioner baker

[31:50] >> university of colorado that's all I

[31:51] want to say. That has an impact on

[31:56] boulder. Huge. Very different

[31:59] structure. Very different priorities.

[32:05] douglas county has very limited

[32:09] dedicated staff, they have leverage the

[32:10] internal staff historically, not

[32:13] dedicated but similar to how we could

[32:23] do it. Recently they have chosen to use

[32:24] external support from the douglas

[32:25] county economic development

[32:30] corporation. In 2025 they committed

[32:31] almost $1 million to the edc for that

[32:33] work. That includes all of their

[32:38] incentive programs, all of the work we

[32:39] leverage our partners to do. They also

[32:44] have a community development department

[32:45] that provides that business support,

[32:46] and they have a dedicated business

[32:55] coordinator. That person works with

[32:56] businesses to go through the licenses

[32:57] and permits that sort of thing and

[32:58] helps the staff with that. They

[33:03] launched a childcare tax incentive

[33:04] program in 2026 as well as a county

[33:07] revitalization authority. They

[33:08] delegated that responsibility to the dc

[33:16] edc, another option for consideration

[33:17] and they also launched in 2025 a

[33:18] red tape reduction task force. Just a

[33:24] group across the county dedicated to

[33:25] reducing regulatory burden on

[33:26] commercial and industrial development.

[33:29] douglas county [indiscernible]. They

[33:37] have some tools they have implemented

[33:38] in douglas county that may be

[33:39] interesting to the board. Jefferson

[33:43] county has limited internal staff, they

[33:47] leverage the economic development

[33:50] corporation. They created an economic

[33:51] development planner position in their

[33:56] own structure, that supports contracts

[34:01] with cities metro and special districts

[34:02] and coordinates with the edc. They

[34:10] commit about 260,000 in 2026 to

[34:11] economic development efforts. They have

[34:14] an emphasis on supporting ura

[34:19] development. And all the incentives go

[34:20] through the jc edc. Larimer county has

[34:26] a different structure, all internal

[34:31] support. It is braided with a lot of

[34:37] money but it is primarily

[34:41] [indiscernible]. They have six staff

[34:42] focused primarily on workforce. The

[34:48] economic development functions are from

[34:49] my understanding not the primary

[34:50] function of the office, they are

[34:57] secondary to workforce I should not say

[34:58] secondary I should say braided with

[34:59] workforce in a way we don't do. They

[35:05] have a contract with weld county for

[35:06] broader economic development. They also

[35:09] use consultants for incentives that

[35:10] come before them. Commissioner warren

[35:13] gully

[35:14] >> thank you madam chair. Kendra, to be

[35:18] clear, the 8.1, are they putting 8.1

[35:23] million in their? Or are they utilizing

[35:30] some of their workforce funds to do

[35:31] economic development stuff? My guess is

[35:42] the latter. I don't have a breakdown of

[35:43] how much of that is specific coming

[35:44] from the general fund. My guess is not

[35:48] very much. I was not aware they could

[35:52] spend.... Workforce dollars that way

[35:53] but maybe they don't, maybe they are

[35:58] just saying workforce creates economic

[36:02] opportunity? I don't know how they

[36:03] structure these funds. I just know they

[36:12] are combined. Okay thank you I

[36:13] appreciate that

[36:14] >> those are the counties we looked at.

[36:15] structure is all a little different,

[36:19] definitely identifying opportunities

[36:20] the board could look up further. This

[36:25] is a list of some of those

[36:26] opportunities the board may want to

[36:29] look into. This is certainly not a

[36:31] recommendation or any sort of staff is

[36:37] just identifying things other counties

[36:44] do. We want to make sure you are aware

[36:45] of additional tools in the toolbox if

[36:46] you want to look into those. Our idea

[36:49] would be if you identify some of these

[36:50] areas of interest, we could come back

[36:53] to you with what that might look like

[36:54] in our county, what kind of effort it

[37:00] might need additional resources the

[37:01] county might need to launch something

[37:10] like that. And the board could have a

[37:11] conversation about what that looks

[37:12] like

[37:13] >> I would just say I think we've heard

[37:14] throughout the last year the incentive

[37:15] payment agreement structure is

[37:16] paramount of importance. We are moving

[37:19] forward. We will be bringing that back

[37:20] to you after recess. I think the other

[37:22] ones are certainly things, there's no

[37:29] timeline on any of these and some of

[37:30] these things you have talked about in

[37:33] other spaces. I think this is just an

[37:34] awareness of what people do that you

[37:36] could have us explore further with a

[37:40] shared group of people across the

[37:45] county. Commissioner warren gully

[37:46] >> thank you madam chair. I can't

[37:51] remember, what is the benefit of a

[37:52] county revitalization authority? It's a

[37:55] 65 page bill.

[37:59] >> it's a good read. I don't want to

[38:05] get out of my space, I will let

[38:07] michelle chime in I'm certainly not an

[38:15] expert. I think it allows the county to

[38:16] create goals and opportunities for

[38:20] incentives within a specific geographic

[38:23] area to help leverage the business in

[38:27] that area. It is not dissimilar from

[38:28] the urban renewal. Think about tax

[38:37] increment financing, leveraging

[38:38] property taxes to build infrastructure

[38:39] for a specific area. Jason is nodding

[38:45] his head, I'm glad I remember the 65

[38:47] page summary. It is a newer tool in the

[38:51] toolbox. Understanding how you would

[38:52] use it where you would use it, what

[38:57] makes sense, is something that could be

[38:58] explored down the road. It's a newer

[39:01] tool for counties akin to the urban

[39:04] renewal. For counties version of urban

[39:10] renewal. We identify an area for

[39:11] example commissioner fields

[39:14] conversation, if there is an area we

[39:15] want to tag? I don't remember the bill,

[39:18] do you remember the bill?

[39:33] [indiscernible] I know jason has looked

[39:34] at it this at the 30,000 foot level

[39:35] >> very broad strokes because it has

[39:36] been quite a while since I've looked at

[39:37] the details. There's two components to

[39:38] a county revitalization authority. The

[39:40] first step is for the county to

[39:45] establish it, take action to say there

[39:46] is a county revitalization authority

[39:48] and is applicable in these areas of the

[39:51] county. Adams county has taken that

[39:57] step. They adopted resolution saying we

[39:58] have a county revitalization authority,

[40:01] and it may have been anywhere in

[40:02] unincorporated adams county. The second

[40:11] step is a more detailed process to

[40:12] focus on a specific area and develop a

[40:13] plan for that area. My understanding is

[40:19] that adams county is currently doing

[40:20] that for an unincorporated area near

[40:29] commerce city. As ms. Hallstead

[40:30] mentioned the tax increment financing

[40:31] is one of the tools committees can

[40:33] bring to the county revitalization

[40:43] authority.

[40:44] >> thank you jason

[40:45] >> commissioner campbell

[40:46] >> I can hit some of the things it

[40:58] touches on. Area that upon

[40:59] implementation of the county

[41:00] revitalization plan substantially

[41:01] promote sound growth of the county

[41:02] economic social conditions and furthers

[41:03] health safety well-being of the public

[41:04] by the actualization of one of the

[41:05] following opportunity factors. It

[41:08] creates opportunities for investing in

[41:09] infrastructure water sanitary sewer,

[41:18] improvement of mobility increased

[41:19] access to transportation development of

[41:20] affordable housing economic opportunity

[41:21] job creation growth expansion to

[41:22] healthy food system community medical

[41:29] system public parks enhancement of

[41:30] safe reliable transportation

[41:31] remediation contamination of water,

[41:40] clearance abatement rehab of

[41:41] structurally unsound former landfills

[41:42] urban level development in

[41:49] unincorporated areas. Thank you.

[41:50] >> I would be remiss I'm glad jason is

[42:00] here, I'd be remiss in not highlighting

[42:01] kathy and jason have both been key

[42:02] partners in this conversation because

[42:03] the county has a economic development

[42:05] function. Both of them do excellent

[42:06] work trying to gather the tools at

[42:11] their disposal. Jason's team look up

[42:12] the eastern plains and how we can

[42:13] support those areas in economic

[42:22] development. Commissioner fields

[42:23] >> you mentioned there may be some

[42:24] challenges when dealing with the city.

[42:32] I can tell you what I've seen is great

[42:33] partnership with community resources

[42:34] that suit relates to the housing

[42:35] authority and city of auroras

[42:42] opportunity. I'd like to suggest we

[42:43] continue to use that lens to reach that

[42:49] communities where there's been no

[42:50] investment in some communities which

[42:51] happens to be in urban areas for

[42:58] decades. So, if there is an opportunity

[42:59] to take a look through partnership to

[43:01] address that, it would be good.

[43:07] >> commissioner baker

[43:10] >> sorry, it may be for jason. We have

[43:22] done the economic zone that we took,

[43:23] did not take but worked with inglewood

[43:24] and got aurora chamber to take that on.

[43:30] does an economic zone preclude a

[43:36] revitalization authority? Or can they

[43:39] be overlapped? Okay. I wanted to make

[43:54] sure

[43:55] >> I do want to say it would be helpful

[43:56] if the board had specific tools here

[43:57] they want to identify they are

[43:58] interested in getting information. We'd

[43:59] love to think about how that comes back

[44:00] to you.

[44:02] >> commissioner. Thank you madam chair.

[44:06] okay, so, ya, I'm having a hard time

[44:14] consolidating all of my thoughts.

[44:19] looking at this list, obviously we

[44:25] talked about incentive payment

[44:29] agreement structure. One thing I think

[44:30] would be helpful also is understanding,

[44:31] getting a broader lens, like scope of

[44:35] how much land we have available to be

[44:38] developed in unincorporated areas.

[44:41] where they are because when we think

[44:50] about commodities, which land is, the

[44:53] scarcity and limitation, are we running

[44:59] out of land where is the land how is it

[45:00] zoned how do we think about that? Where

[45:04] does that fit within our own their

[45:07] comprehensive plans? So we know how

[45:08] strict we can be. If we are starting to

[45:13] run out of land especially in dove

[45:14] valley and other areas, we can be much

[45:17] more strict about what we have. Whereas

[45:21] maybe in district 3 it's at this but I

[45:34] also think developable areas in urban

[45:35] areas or suburban whatever the

[45:36] centennial that bridge between all the

[45:39] things, sustainability goals and how

[45:40] strict we want to be around those, as

[45:42] wells to what commissioner fields was

[45:46] saying, it would be great to know what

[45:47] we can require. So, childcare, so that

[45:55] incentive agreement is important to me.

[45:58] also and I will say as a broader tool,

[46:02] I think it would be informative when

[46:03] looking at that, is being very

[46:07] strategic in our local economy, and

[46:13] diversifying the industries that are

[46:15] here. While aerospace is great, we've

[46:23] got a really strong connection between

[46:24] primary employers and the satellite

[46:25] companies that go around to supply

[46:40] that. I don't want us to get to have

[46:41] [indiscernible] making

[46:42] sure we have a diverse portfolio with

[46:43] an accounting of industries and saying

[46:44] does that support also in getting with

[46:45] our community colleges or schools. Do

[46:49] we have that talent pipeline and

[46:50] creating that relationship. I'm seeing

[46:52] a whole [indiscernible] of it. I think

[46:59] affordable housing policies and

[47:00] incentives we've been working on that.

[47:02] what more can we do. Childcare property

[47:07] tax incentive program could be

[47:12] interesting. I'm open to the county

[47:18] revitalization authority but I think we

[47:19] need to sort of feel that a little bit.

[47:23] internal staffing, I think that is a

[47:24] conversation we need to have. We've

[47:26] been having it but it feels a lot like

[47:31] the economic community development

[47:36] perspective that adams has taken is

[47:42] all-in-one. Economic development

[47:43] programs yes we need to talk about that

[47:44] permitting review process I did write

[47:46] down, I remember in our conversation

[47:47] with denver south, talking about what

[47:52] is helpful to developers and people

[47:58] coming in. It's clarity and consistency

[47:59] on land development, development

[48:00] processes. Thinking about that from

[48:05] that development process of kind of

[48:11] fostering and I know we've been talking

[48:12] about some of that but just the clarity

[48:14] around it timelines and how we

[48:22] communicate that. One of the things I

[48:23] like about adams county website that

[48:24] has all the portions on there. So maybe

[48:29] even part of what we do because of the

[48:30] economic development opportunities are

[48:38] distributed, may be part of what we do

[48:39] is pull it together on a website and

[48:40] just go look for the information and

[48:41] find these things and it's all located,

[48:42] we have a hub for access. And we kind

[48:45] of start thereby organizing the

[48:47] information. One thing I find whole

[49:03] areas is like that douglas county and

[49:04] ma I said remove requirements for small

[49:05] locally owned businesses. Douglas

[49:09] county took the commercial industrial

[49:16] route. But your margin of error with a

[49:17] small business is [indiscernible] I

[49:18] think it was the mandani example was

[49:24] restaurants had to get a supple permit

[49:25] to serve ice cream or something. If

[49:33] there is stuff in public health or

[49:34] building and things we are doing that

[49:35] either we need to communicate with

[49:36] people ahead of time. I know public

[49:37] health does a lot of education. What

[49:41] are we doing that is more that needs to

[49:45] be done. I know the county has always

[49:46] resisted over regulating because to

[49:48] what commissioners said the nancy

[49:54] approach or I think you talked about

[49:55] that commissioner warren gully. If you

[49:57] do a thing are you going to enforce it.

[50:06] we've always been reticent to

[50:07] [indiscernible] so maybe we don't have

[50:08] extra stuff like that but maybe things

[50:09] get through that don't make sense

[50:10] anymore. I also, the objectives on page

[50:16] four, really interesting conversation

[50:17] for us to have, either strategic

[50:21] retreat or some other time study

[50:32] session, when we look at creating a

[50:33] sustainable economy. Is not just

[50:34] primary employer it's also bottom-up

[50:37] that's not really reflected explicitly

[50:38] in the objectives, in our approach it

[50:47] is but I think going bottom-up and

[50:48] having that whole pipeline that is

[50:52] encouraging small locally owned

[50:56] independent businesses, for every

[50:57] hundred dollars spent at a local loan

[51:02] business, somewhere between 48 and $75

[51:03] stays in the local economy. If you shop

[51:05] at your target it's 15 bucks. Those

[51:09] kind of things and pulling a bunch of

[51:15] pieces together. I also wrote down

[51:16] focus only using locally owned

[51:17] businesses as county lenders. There are

[51:21] different things for procurement

[51:32] [indiscernible]. How you spaced that up

[51:33] unbundling larger contracts. Anyway I

[51:35] have a lot of different ideas. I think

[51:46] for me it's about going where do we get

[51:47] bang for our buck and what's the

[51:52] easiest gets first and timing our work

[51:53] out as we flush out the system. If meet

[52:07] internal need internal staff,

[52:08] [indiscernible] the thing I get nervous

[52:09] about with the tax incentive program is

[52:10] like edc and denver south are doing

[52:11] their job to bring people in and how I

[52:24] guess we really need to define it if

[52:25] we're not going to be proactive

[52:26] ourselves and I don't think we need to

[52:27] on that but we need a clear definition

[52:28] of moving forward and all of that. I

[52:29] have a lot of thoughts.

[52:38] [indiscernible]

[52:39] >> commissioner warren gully

[52:40] >> thank you madam chair. I think it is

[52:47] hard to have this conversation because

[52:48] of what commissioner campbell just laid

[52:54] out. We all touch into these worlds

[52:55] because of the work we do on different

[52:58] boards and chambers and economic

[53:05] development folks. I know commissioner

[53:06] baker is out there are in his community

[53:07] trying to advocate for the rural side.

[53:09] when I think about this, what I need

[53:12] your help with kendra is, is there a way

[53:16] we could say for the next five years we

[53:26] really want to incentivize childcare

[53:29] opportunities and affordable housing.

[53:31] that's really our goal. How do we

[53:37] structure our incentives around asking

[53:40] partners and businesses coming into our

[53:46] community. How are you going to do this

[53:48] or do we want to look at, I know at one

[53:53] time jason and his team did go through

[53:54] online and figure out where are areas

[53:58] in unincorporated arapahoe county

[54:00] mostly within cities. Like commissioner

[54:07] summey, and my little pockets of these

[54:08] funky little areas. Are there areas we

[54:12] really want to specifically say this is

[54:16] an area we want affordable housing or

[54:19] senior housing or non-apartment

[54:24] housing. Those kinds of things. Then

[54:31] that kind of gives us the opportunity

[54:35] to say, this is the kind of development

[54:36] we are looking for, versus just whoever

[54:40] belongs to that area. I don't know if

[54:44] that's really possible, or whether we

[54:47] can utilize these tools to do that. I

[54:51] look at the childcare property tax

[54:56] incentive program that I've chatted

[54:57] about with our early childhood folks,

[55:02] that's probably not going to

[55:03] incentivize the small mom-and-pop

[55:06] groups, which is the majority of people

[55:07] in our area. It's these large-scale

[55:12] childcare centers. They are important,

[55:22] too, but would I rather have some kind

[55:23] of incentive that supports the

[55:24] employees that work there? It's so

[55:29] broad that I wonder if it's more

[55:30] beneficial to start thinking about in

[55:34] the next 3 to 5 years what do we want

[55:35] to focus on. The following 3 to 5 years

[55:38] to commissioner campbell point, we want

[55:44] to diversify the types of businesses we

[55:45] are going to incentivize. That's kind

[55:48] of where my brain has been trying to

[55:51] hone it in a little bit. That may not

[55:56] just be how this world works and I get

[56:03] that . I think there's an opportunity

[56:04] bring up a great plan and that's why

[56:05] the plan program structure is on there.

[56:11] . There's an opportunity to scope out

[56:12] where you would like to make

[56:13] investments certainly economic

[56:14] development tools, you don't always see

[56:15] the results immediately. You kind of

[56:16] have to build it in. I think it could

[56:20] be something we talked to our partners

[56:24] with. They are the ones recruiting

[56:25] these people they understand how that

[56:26] works. If that's not a function, it's

[56:31] not a way the world works, they will

[56:33] tell us I'm sure. There is an

[56:37] opportunity if you would like to

[56:49] identify priorities, we can build out

[56:50] the program or structure that says if

[56:51] you want to focus on x, y, and z in the

[56:52] next 3 to 5 years this is what you

[56:53] should do this is how we could

[56:54] potentially build it in. If you want to

[56:55] transition you could swap it out for

[56:57] something else. Maybe we could build

[56:58] out an idea of what kind of resources

[56:59] would be required to do that. Certainly

[57:00] we don't want to give you a plan that

[57:02] you can't do. What does it look like to

[57:07] make investments and what does the

[57:08] county need to do that.

[57:12] >> I guess I'm thinking like shape

[57:16] properties, I think it was just that

[57:17] redesign and office space. We all know

[57:21] how extremely expensive that is to do.

[57:29] I have heard from our colleagues

[57:30] there's a lot of empty office space. I

[57:36] like your idea of maybe talking in that

[57:37] manner with some of our development

[57:38] folks or our partners to see what do

[57:42] they see out there. What are business

[57:50] employers saying, we are not coming to

[57:51] arapahoe county because of x. I guess I

[57:56] would just want to say that some of the

[57:57] things our partners do relative to

[57:59] incentives attraction retention are

[58:01] really specific and unique. Some of the

[58:05] things you have talked about broadening

[58:12] the ecosystem are also things that are

[58:13] conversations with directors and

[58:14] strategic planning and strategic work

[58:21] plan. What are those tangible things we

[58:22] are going to make investments in to

[58:23] achieve an outcome. It may not be an

[58:24] economic development thing. But it

[58:29] definitely supports the ecosystem. I

[58:32] think there is some of these things are

[58:37] super like permitting and review his

[58:40] super strategic that absolutely helps

[58:41] our business community all the way

[58:45] around. What level of investment would

[58:46] you want to put on that effort relative

[58:49] to some other things that might not

[58:50] rise to the top. I think there is some

[58:58] prioritization and strategy within the

[58:59] board and county about what are things

[59:00] you can move forward. I know we are

[59:01] doing a lot on housing. But I do think

[59:05] you have to have intentionality as

[59:07] well, where do you want to see that

[59:10] vision. And which tools what levers,

[59:16] they are not all economic development

[59:17] but there is some policy decisions and

[59:18] investments he can make that can and

[59:20] sent those kinds of things to happen. I

[59:27] want to pull it back just a because

[59:28] it's all good stuff.

[59:36] >> arapahoe county is a county that is

[59:37] rich for many opportunities for

[59:40] economic development. We see that

[59:41] people want to do business in arapahoe

[59:42] county. Some of it is going to require

[59:47] us to make sure these companies that

[59:52] come in, if there's a value that

[59:53] relates to responsibility to the

[59:55] community, it can't just be about their

[1:00:00] profit line without there has to be

[1:00:02] some payback. I don't know what it

[1:00:05] looks like. But you can't just have dia

[1:00:06] as a cash cow, and then you don't

[1:00:11] invest in the community that built dia

[1:00:17] or whatever. There has to be some kind

[1:00:18] of integration some kind of involvement

[1:00:19] in all the cities and people. You can't

[1:00:22] just take from the county and not

[1:00:23] invest in the county. What values can

[1:00:25] we make sure when we are pitching or

[1:00:28] they are pitching us, there has to be

[1:00:34] some investment back into sponsorships,

[1:00:39] maybe I don't know basketball team or

[1:00:43] whatever. There's got to be a link back

[1:00:44] to the community, not gouging the

[1:00:48] community. I agree.

[1:00:55] >> good work. We will bring back

[1:01:00] incentives as the primary thing, and

[1:01:05] circle back with kathy and jason and

[1:01:06] see whatever we can do. Great. Thank

[1:01:09] you very very much.

[1:01:15] >> I think you are good until one, no,

[1:02:59] never mind.

[1:03:00] >> we've got one more thing.

[1:03:01] >>

[1:03:02] >>

[1:03:03] good morning everyone. . Rhonda fields

[1:03:18] commissioner, [indiscernible] leslie

[1:03:20] summey commissioner, carrie warren

[1:03:23] gully commissioner, jessica campbell

[1:03:24] commissioner district 2,

[1:03:25] [indiscernible] open spaces, jason

[1:03:29] reynolds public works and development.

[1:03:32] thank you very much we are here for a

[1:03:34] dropping grant opportunity with the

[1:03:37] state historical fund grant. I will

[1:03:42] start with director pingenot. Thank you

[1:03:48] madam chair. I'm going to quickly pass

[1:03:49] it on to sandy and dan. Quick drop in

[1:03:58] session. We are knowing that 17 mile

[1:03:59] house needs a little tlc. That is what

[1:04:02] we are here to talk about. This is on

[1:04:05] our cip list. Just kinda make that

[1:04:15] connection. Sandy take it away

[1:04:16] >> I will talk about the grant and

[1:04:19] leave it to dan to talk about the scope

[1:04:20] itself and work we are doing. We'd like

[1:04:23] to apply for a grant from the state

[1:04:27] historical fund up to 250,000 we are

[1:04:28] working on the budget numbers. We have

[1:04:30] to supply 20 percent match.

[1:04:36] [indiscernible] what else should I say.

[1:04:45] we receive state historical fund

[1:04:46] grants in the past most recently in

[1:04:47] 2017 or 2018 for work on the barn.

[1:04:48] [indiscernible] at the time. What

[1:04:51] should I say? We have applications due

[1:04:56] october 1 so we have a lot of work to

[1:04:57] do before that. Ideally we would do the

[1:05:01] work beginning next summer. That might

[1:05:05] be all from the grant side of things.

[1:05:08] the only thing I would add madam chair,

[1:05:10] this is very competitive grant. We are

[1:05:15] not necessarily holding our breath, we

[1:05:20] are thinking about a plan b if that is

[1:05:25] the case. But we have given overtures

[1:05:26] by folks in the state historical realm

[1:05:28] that they feel like our project is

[1:05:35] competitive. So, that is promising.

[1:05:37] it's about 40 percent of grant

[1:05:42] applications are actually approved. So,

[1:05:47] but we will persevere nonetheless. It's

[1:05:51] important to at least make the ask. It

[1:05:57] seems like you typically get around

[1:06:03] [indiscernible] it depends on the cycle

[1:06:04] they have two cycles per year and they

[1:06:05] get three times the amount of requests

[1:06:07] available. With fingers crossed. Do you

[1:06:11] want to talk about the scope of work?

[1:06:15] the scope of work is set to address the

[1:06:16] windows, the doors, the certain

[1:06:20] shingles on the roof. As the main focus

[1:06:24] is the house as well as the siding.

[1:06:33] obviously, we are going to be doing the

[1:06:34] gutters and wood facia as well. Ideally

[1:06:36] we would do it all at once considering

[1:06:40] they are all intermingled. There is an

[1:06:45] element that we would, you could

[1:06:50] potentially improve the windows

[1:06:51] specifically on the barn as well since

[1:06:53] those were not addressed, not needed at

[1:06:57] the last grant application. So, that

[1:07:04] right there is the scope we are looking

[1:07:05] to focus on as far as what this

[1:07:08] application will be received or not.

[1:07:11] commissioner baker

[1:07:12] >> thank you. The windows, some of

[1:07:18] those windowpanes are original. And you

[1:07:24] can tell because they are thin at the

[1:07:25] top and thicker at the bottom. If there

[1:07:29] is replacements being planned, would we

[1:07:33] keep some of the original available to

[1:07:41] be on display or something like that?

[1:07:44] we would reuse all items that are

[1:07:45] possible to be reused. We still have

[1:07:49] because of the easement, we still have

[1:07:56] to get everything as far as specific

[1:07:57] details on the scope of work approved

[1:08:00] by the colorado historical

[1:08:06] [indiscernible], the foundation. So,

[1:08:12] our goal is to reuse, even with the

[1:08:16] doors reuse as much of the doors as we

[1:08:21] can. We would take this opportunity and

[1:08:22] we have been working with

[1:08:26] [indiscernible] to get her blessing

[1:08:27] more or less to update the doors from

[1:08:31] the security aspect as well. So, we met

[1:08:35] with her last week, she has given her

[1:08:41] blessing, she is willing to write a

[1:08:42] support letter as well. I think for

[1:08:44] some of the artifacts, we would look to

[1:08:49] potentially use them in some capacity,

[1:08:51] so they are not wasted. Thank you

[1:08:59] >> so to add to all these other

[1:09:03] comments, this is another partnership

[1:09:04] we have with [indiscernible]. Their

[1:09:05] team did a great job earlier this

[1:09:08] summer with some painting and other

[1:09:11] things that needed to be done. We are

[1:09:20] mindful of capacity at ffm. We've been

[1:09:26] thinking about how can we work with

[1:09:28] some of the construction folks in this

[1:09:37] space that are strong in historical

[1:09:44] preservation. We do have experience in

[1:09:45] the past and some come to mind, we are

[1:09:47] thinking about leaning more on those

[1:09:50] folks in a way to be mindful of our

[1:09:54] partnership with different departments.

[1:09:56] just adding that to the mix.

[1:10:01] >> commissioner warren gully

[1:10:04] >> I missed the cue. Any other

[1:10:09] discussion? Do we have thumbs up for

[1:10:10] the grant application? Thank you for

[1:10:16] finding it. Thank you very much.

[1:11:17] >>good afternoon everybody. Hi. Since

[1:11:25] everybody and their mother is in the

[1:11:28] room right now, let's get started with

[1:11:29] introductions. Jeff baker commissioner.

[1:11:34] patrick hernandez hr michelle hallstead

[1:11:35] commissioner's office rhonda fields

[1:11:37] commissioner [indiscernible] leslie

[1:11:39] summey commissioner carrie warren gully

[1:11:42] commissioner jessica campbell

[1:11:44] commissioner district 2 dusty sash hr

[1:11:49] [indiscernible]wonderful. Thank you all

[1:12:30] very very much. We are here for the

[1:12:37] 2027 total compensation. Dusty sash?

[1:12:38] >> thank you for having me. We will

[1:12:46] review total compensation and then dive

[1:12:49] into benefits, look at what the market

[1:12:54] is, what our plan looks like and changes. As

[1:12:58] a reminder we do make decisions on

[1:13:02] benefit requests today so we can get

[1:13:06] open enrollment on. , side of

[1:13:13] [indiscernible]. We will go through

[1:13:14] compensation and look at total cost at

[1:13:16] the request and the timeline. There's a

[1:13:22] lot of slides in the appendix I may

[1:13:23] refer to them from time to time, in

[1:13:27] case you one additional background and

[1:13:28] data on the requests we will be making.

[1:13:30] also I know the board knows this, I

[1:13:33] don't mind interruptions so feel free.

[1:13:41] >> you just opened the beast

[1:13:42] >> I'd rather address it when we have

[1:13:51] it. Total compensation philosophy has

[1:13:52] not changed in several years we strive

[1:14:05] to competitively pay our employees to

[1:14:06] our defined wage and salary market and

[1:14:07] adjusts to attract new talent and award

[1:14:08] performance our salary is the midpoint

[1:14:14] which means half of our peers pay less

[1:14:15] than us have to pay more than us and in

[1:14:16] our market area is 26 entities within

[1:14:17] the denver boulder area. The five

[1:14:20] components of compensation it is not

[1:14:23] just cash, it is included compensation

[1:14:28] the dollars we pay employees in

[1:14:29] exchange for the value they provide us.

[1:14:32] it also provides benefits which limit

[1:14:35] exposure. To financial risk. Work life

[1:14:42] success benefits. And policies like

[1:14:47] flex time, vacation, sick those kind of

[1:14:49] things that allow employees to be

[1:14:50] successful at work and at home. They

[1:14:55] bring their whole self to work at work

[1:14:56] so we want to make sure they are

[1:14:57] successful in both places. Performance

[1:15:01] recognition to tie their goals and

[1:15:02] efforts to the county. And, our

[1:15:09] successes within that. And development

[1:15:16] and career opportunities, learning

[1:15:17] exercises that enhance skill and

[1:15:18] competency so they can grow. I

[1:15:23] understand not today but sometime you

[1:15:28] may hear recommendation to change this

[1:15:37] compensation philosophy

[1:15:38] [indiscernible]. That is the

[1:15:39] overarching premise of which we will

[1:15:40] put the rest of this against. Benefits

[1:15:42] and well-being. We will look at the

[1:15:45] market. Not a lot has changed since we

[1:15:49] met on this. Over all our living and

[1:15:50] benefits are leading the market, we

[1:15:55] provide comprehensive holistic suite of

[1:15:56] benefits to support employee well-being

[1:16:00] and they can personalize it for what

[1:16:01] matters most to each of them and their

[1:16:04] families. We lead the market and

[1:16:06] medical, dental, paid time off plans,

[1:16:09] inhibit your money line caregiver

[1:16:15] support benefits to provide support for

[1:16:16] those caring for others, infants at

[1:16:17] work and medical gap. The market vision

[1:16:26] flexible spending accounts eap life and

[1:16:27] a d&d insurance and disability

[1:16:31] insurance. Tuition reimbursement policy

[1:16:32] and paid caregiver leave. Retirement

[1:16:40] contribution, I understand the

[1:16:41] retirement board has asked the board of

[1:16:45] county commissioners to increase the

[1:16:46] county portion from 10 percent to 10.25

[1:16:50] percent, that is $635,000. We would

[1:16:57] need a decision on that today so we can

[1:16:58] get the system quoted for first of the

[1:17:05] year. We have a note that empower has

[1:17:06] put in a bid to acquire milliman.

[1:17:09] milliman houses are retirement plan,

[1:17:13] pension plan. Mpower houses the 457

[1:17:17] deferred compensation and for a1a

[1:17:20] defined contribution plans. At some

[1:17:21] point assuming this goes, we will do an

[1:17:25] implementation of move the pension over

[1:17:29] to mpower or the retirement board can

[1:17:31] choose to do an rfp to select a new

[1:17:36] provider. That is expected to close on

[1:17:39] september 1. More to come. We will talk

[1:17:43] about the net value, how to say our

[1:17:48] medical plan is leading the market.

[1:17:53] this is a reminder compares plan

[1:17:56] design, that is deductible co-pay

[1:17:57] coinsurance and out-of-pocket maximums,

[1:18:02] the cost within the design plus

[1:18:03] premiums to get a value. It compares

[1:18:07] our plan against similar plans in the

[1:18:10] market. On the core plan, when you

[1:18:13] factor in the hra, are deductible is

[1:18:18] less than the average of peers. Our

[1:18:21] co-pay is the same. Our specialty

[1:18:24] co-pay is a little more. Our

[1:18:27] out-of-pocket maximum is less and

[1:18:31] coinsurance is less. Premiums are also

[1:18:35] less. You add all that together

[1:18:36] compared to the average of the peers,

[1:18:39] that makes our plan 12.3 percent more

[1:18:41] valuable, we are leading the market.

[1:18:45] does not mean somebody can't have a

[1:18:47] lower premium. That might be in there

[1:18:48] because it's an average but it also

[1:18:52] means that others have higher premiums.

[1:18:58] on average the employee only is $35.05

[1:19:06] more per month, and the family is $162

[1:19:07] more each month than our plan. And we

[1:19:08] have the choice plan, the design seems

[1:19:12] to be about the same but premiums are

[1:19:18] more. That results in our choice plan

[1:19:19] valued at 15 percent lower than the

[1:19:20] market average for the ppo. Medical

[1:19:30] renewal, you will recall that last year

[1:19:31] we had a 19.3, we negotiated to have a

[1:19:37] smoothing effect, we took a .5 and have

[1:19:38] three percent for three years. We have

[1:19:45] negotiated that and we have the three

[1:19:47] percent smoothing for the next three

[1:19:48] years forgiven that is gone. The first

[1:19:51] offer for renewal is 13.2,

[1:19:54] [indiscernible] has negotiated that to

[1:20:01] 9.5. From a starting expectation of

[1:20:02] 16.2 our renewal will be 9.5. That

[1:20:09] makes our five year average 3.2

[1:20:10] significantly better than the market.

[1:20:17] which tells me since plans are 90

[1:20:18] percent of cost employees are using a

[1:20:22] plant [indiscernible]. We are talking

[1:20:23] huge numbers but employees are using

[1:20:27] the plan the cost of the 9.5 is just

[1:20:28] under 3 million total cost. Primary

[1:20:34] drivers we've had some high costs

[1:20:35] [indiscernible] with bone and kidney

[1:20:40] cancer copd congestive heart failure

[1:20:41] and autoimmune disease that affects the

[1:20:42] skin, I can't say it. Scleroderma. And

[1:20:49] we've had additional high-cost claims,

[1:20:51] more than the benchmark. We've had

[1:20:56] high-cost claimants over 50,000. We've

[1:21:03] had a higher cooling point this year

[1:21:04] which means we take on more risk. Our

[1:21:07] premium for that goes down, a portion

[1:21:13] of the premium goes down but we are

[1:21:14] also taking on more risk of claims.

[1:21:17] kaiser has also changed their

[1:21:21] underwriting methodology to be 24

[1:21:22] months instead of 12. The idea would be

[1:21:31] that hopefully that smooths things out

[1:21:32] when you have a bad year you have 24

[1:21:33] months to calculate that in.

[1:21:36] unfortunately for us it includes the

[1:21:37] 19.3 now that we got last year. It was

[1:21:44] an advantage for us this year but

[1:21:45] overall given our five-year average it

[1:21:46] should help in the future. They applied

[1:21:49] a trend of 6.89 compared the cost this

[1:21:56] year. At 6.89 that beats the national

[1:22:01] trend average of 9.5 and colorado trend

[1:22:02] average of 11 percent. That comes in a

[1:22:07] lot lower than the average. Because of

[1:22:16] this, it's a rare occasion but we are

[1:22:17] able to maintain county employee will

[1:22:22] total cost share 7525 by applying 9.5

[1:22:23] percent to the county portion and

[1:22:24] employee portion. Both plans all tears.

[1:22:28] it's rare that happens because they pay

[1:22:29] so much less than the county does. The

[1:22:32] percentage dollar amount usually ends

[1:22:39] up being bigger. In this case we can

[1:22:40] maintain 75/25 by applying 9.5

[1:22:41] across-the-board. It will probably

[1:22:48] never happen again. That puts the

[1:22:49] county cost to the general fund at just

[1:22:51] over 1.2 million. Any questions? We

[1:22:59] will maintain the same premium cost

[1:23:03] share. The hmo employee only the county

[1:23:06] pays 82 percent with employees paying

[1:23:09] 18 percent. Dependent coverage county

[1:23:12] pays 72 percent with employees sharing

[1:23:15] 28 percent. Choice ppo a buyout plan

[1:23:26] that's more expensive the county

[1:23:27] contributes less in addition the county

[1:23:28] covers 64 percent with employee paying

[1:23:29] 36. Dependent coverage county pays 54

[1:23:32] percent with the employee paying 46

[1:23:33] percent of the premium. That increases

[1:23:39] total cost of the plan 26 million for

[1:23:42] the county side and just under 9

[1:23:43] million for the employees to share. The

[1:23:48] cost goes up in the percentages the

[1:23:51] same 75/25, because it is a

[1:23:53] [indiscernible] call so as you read

[1:23:54] more people total cost goes up. This is

[1:23:57] what it does to the rates. Today's

[1:24:01] rates are in the second column, 2027

[1:24:05] rates are in the third column, the

[1:24:12] change from 26 to 27 biweekly in the

[1:24:19] fourth column. From $6.29 employee only

[1:24:23] to 51 70 on the family for the ppo. We

[1:24:38] can talk about how that impacts the

[1:24:39] employees the employees often hear if

[1:24:41] my rate is going to go up 9.5 percent

[1:24:42] and I only get three percent merit

[1:24:43] increase, it's costing me to stay. We

[1:24:52] wanted to show the impact of a larger

[1:24:53] percentage on a smaller dollar amount

[1:24:54] compared to a smaller percentage on a

[1:24:59] larger dollar amount. He these include

[1:25:05] medical on a dh amount dental basic

[1:25:06] live short-term disability 401(k) and

[1:25:07] tax rate of 20 percent. The first

[1:25:11] example is employee a, a 29-year-old

[1:25:18] single individual making $42,226, our

[1:25:21] lowest paid employee at the county

[1:25:27] currently. Currently that ends up being

[1:25:28] gross 1626 per pay period. The employee

[1:25:33] has $218 in deductions while the county

[1:25:36] provides $497 of benefits in addition

[1:25:39] to the base comp. That results in his

[1:25:44] taxes because you will take the gross

[1:25:47] minus the deductions, to get a taxable

[1:25:49] income. You are being taxed on a

[1:25:54] smaller amount. While it's 20 percent

[1:25:55] tax rate it is 17 percent of gross.

[1:25:59] those pretax benefits lower your tax

[1:26:04] bill. This individual currently takes

[1:26:05] home 69 percent of gross for 11 26.

[1:26:20] assuming spoiler alert 4.6 percent

[1:26:21] salary increase for the following year

[1:26:22] his income will go to 1700 per

[1:26:23] paycheck. With the increase to medical,

[1:26:27] his increase will go to 229 for

[1:26:29] reductions, still remains 13 percent.

[1:26:32] his taxes go up to 294, remaining at 17

[1:26:37] percent. For a take home of 1177. He

[1:26:41] will still take home $51 more per

[1:26:47] paycheck, even with the larger increase

[1:26:48] to medical and 4.6 percent increase to

[1:26:53] salary. Second example is a 49 year-old

[1:26:54] with a family making 90,059, our

[1:26:57] average pay across the county. If you

[1:27:00] remove this it's 84,000. 90,000 ends up

[1:27:11] being 3464 today. You can see all the

[1:27:20] same numbers. 18 percent for

[1:27:21] deductions taxes 16 percent take-home

[1:27:22] pay 66 percent. Interestingly enough,

[1:27:30] you read the family coverage in in your

[1:27:31] take-home pay even though you make a

[1:27:32] lot more ends up being less on a

[1:27:33] percentage basis. Assuming 4.6 percent

[1:27:38] this individual would take him an

[1:27:39] additional 103 13 each paycheck.

[1:27:42] essentially it ends up being being

[1:27:51] enrolled in these plans saves the

[1:27:52] individual $131 in taxes each paycheck.

[1:27:54] reduces their tax bill. Just a little

[1:28:03] bit of an impact on how this helps

[1:28:06] employees. If we apply all that and it

[1:28:10] gets approved, this is the same chart

[1:28:11] to look at the value but instead of the

[1:28:15] 2026 versus 2026 where we are today, is

[1:28:21] the peers 2026 against our 2027. That

[1:28:25] drops a little bit because they haven't

[1:28:26] changed their premiums yet. Our plan

[1:28:30] would still be valued at 7.5 percent

[1:28:34] higher than their current plan even

[1:28:35] without them changing agreements. It

[1:28:37] sits in a good place. Our target is plus or

[1:28:41] minus five percent of the average. We tend to

[1:28:50] lead a little more than that five

[1:28:51] percent we do expect this will go up

[1:28:52] once our peers make changes. We have

[1:28:59] found out our ten county [indiscernible]

[1:29:04] was scheduled for 9-14 so we will have

[1:29:05] more information on that from that

[1:29:06] meeting and on comp. Before you have to

[1:29:09] make a decision on comp that after this

[1:29:14] meeting. A little note on medical

[1:29:17] renewal for 2028, we are in the process

[1:29:18] of doing the medical survey, which goes

[1:29:21] a cup closed a couple of fridays ago.

[1:29:29] we will put that all together but

[1:29:30] depending on what that circumstance

[1:29:31] looks like and what we decide to do

[1:29:32] kaiser has offered if we don't go

[1:29:39] early, if we stay with our normal

[1:29:40] schedule they will offer a negotiated

[1:29:44] option. It came to us with no more than

[1:29:46] 9.5 not to exceed 9.5 percent. We asked

[1:29:48] them to sweeten the pot, they came back

[1:29:53] with two options. Option one no greater

[1:29:56] than nine percent. If we get a two

[1:29:57] percent renewal we get to present. If

[1:29:59] we get 15 percent we get nine percent.

[1:30:03] or option two, eight fixed eight

[1:30:07] percent. I don't think that's

[1:30:10] reasonable because it would get that

[1:30:11] history shows we beat the markets more

[1:30:14] years than not. We end up paying eight

[1:30:17] regardless. We don't have to take it if

[1:30:20] we go early. If that's the decision

[1:30:24] this is off the table but it is there

[1:30:26] in case we are sticking with the normal

[1:30:27] timeline in the first place.

[1:30:32] commissioner campbell

[1:30:33] >> I know that we have been putting

[1:30:38] together a team to look at our medical

[1:30:39] and all of that. And that there is a

[1:30:42] little bit of urgency around it, we

[1:30:44] been talking about it for a while, I

[1:30:49] also know there's a lot of information

[1:30:50] that goes into this. Is there a benefit

[1:30:52] in sticking with the current, deadlines

[1:31:03] or actions? We laugh sometimes like

[1:31:04] government seems like were the problem.

[1:31:09] but also to be thoughtful and

[1:31:10] procedural and get feedback and buy-in,

[1:31:14] that takes time. So if we go with this,

[1:31:16] does it have this benefit also the side

[1:31:21] benefit of giving us a thoughtful

[1:31:25] process so we are not rushing that

[1:31:26] feedback process as well. Basically you

[1:31:27] would have a year to talk about and

[1:31:33] figure it out and then we go out in 28

[1:31:35] for 29. Which is our normal schedule. I

[1:31:40] will say bill and I have been meeting

[1:31:41] with all of the [indiscernible] the

[1:31:45] anthem blue cross, united healthcare,

[1:31:50] all of them one-on-one informally.

[1:31:55] we've also met with brian over at

[1:32:04] aurora. They added in healthcare

[1:32:05] standard next to kaiser last year so we

[1:32:06] could get some lessons learned. What we

[1:32:10] don't want to do to your point is rush

[1:32:11] so we get the same result we got two

[1:32:12] years ago. All of them said we can't do

[1:32:15] that, we can't meet those expectations.

[1:32:20] so we only had one proposal that did

[1:32:21] not meet the rfp requirements. What we

[1:32:26] want to do is be thoughtful and

[1:32:27] intentional so no matter how much time

[1:32:39] it takes to make sure we're

[1:32:40] [indiscernible] so ideally every single

[1:32:41] one of them respond and we have a

[1:32:42] choice

[1:32:43] >> are we doing internal committee

[1:32:46] process as well? We are halfway through

[1:32:47] it now we just met from 12 to 1 today,

[1:32:50] going over next steps in the next two

[1:33:01] meetings. We will provide you

[1:33:02] information [indiscernible]

[1:33:03] >> okay great meetings the last meeting

[1:33:04] is september 29. We have open

[1:33:05] enrollment between now and then. We

[1:33:08] will hopefully have a committee member

[1:33:09] present results to you in early

[1:33:13] november. Okay great. Okay. And we can

[1:33:17] take that feedback and inform the work

[1:33:18] next year as well. But this also, by

[1:33:26] staying the course, this gives us more

[1:33:30] surety. Okay. More clarity. Once we get

[1:33:33] the feedback from those two groups

[1:33:35] because we did a survey and also

[1:33:38] did.... Clarity by staying on time and

[1:33:40] not going out in 27. I know some people

[1:33:43] were eager for us to do. But by not

[1:33:52] doing that we also get this witch in a

[1:33:53] land of everything costs more and more

[1:33:55] it feels like. Maybe it's disappointing

[1:33:58] that some people not go out earlier but

[1:34:01] it also [indiscernible]. You don't have

[1:34:02] to make this decision until november.

[1:34:07] >> okay. Okay gotcha. We get feedback

[1:34:12] from the survey and group and if this

[1:34:17] makes sense cool. If your instruction

[1:34:19] is december 9, I need drop dead, I will

[1:34:25] take every single minute you can give

[1:34:26] me on top of that but that is my

[1:34:29] drop-dead. There's no way I can go early

[1:34:30] if I don't know by september 9.

[1:34:32] >> okay thank you. That's medical. Here

[1:34:41] goes dental. We had a renewal for

[1:34:44] dental this year. Claims went up .3

[1:34:49] percent. Which is $5200. Asoc because

[1:34:53] it's self-insured we pay an

[1:34:54] administrative fee to delta dental went

[1:35:00] up 2.9 percent an additional $3000

[1:35:01] total increase of 8200. That being the

[1:35:07] case we also have the dental reserve at

[1:35:12] 671 300. A previous board gave us

[1:35:13] instructions to keep that around

[1:35:15] 300,000. We have not been able to

[1:35:22] supplement the rates effectively

[1:35:27] enough, impasse strategy to make a dent

[1:35:28] in that it keeps going up. I'm

[1:35:31] deviating a little in my request this

[1:35:37] year. To take out the 8200 increase

[1:35:41] from the reserve, but also to reduce

[1:35:42] the employee share of the rates for 27

[1:35:44] and reduce the dental rates. And we pay

[1:35:47] it out of the reserve. That will reduce

[1:35:53] the reserve by 322 which puts us around

[1:36:01] 350. That ends up being anywhere from

[1:36:10] two dollars to 10.50 a paycheck

[1:36:11] depending on your tier. A smaller cost

[1:36:19] but still a positive message to say

[1:36:20] medical rates are going up but dental

[1:36:24] is going down.

[1:36:25] >> commissioner warren gully

[1:36:28] >> thank you. If we do that which is a

[1:36:34] great idea, I'm just thinking of when

[1:36:35] we have to get the rates back up to

[1:36:36] what they normally would be and how

[1:36:38] that would feel also. What do we

[1:36:43] typically add to this fund every year?

[1:36:52] we did not add as much last year some

[1:36:53] of it depends on claims but generally

[1:36:54] it's been growing by 200,000 a year. I

[1:36:55] think we will be okay. We do the normal

[1:37:02] split going forward assuming this does

[1:37:03] not [indiscernible] where if it's a two

[1:37:04] percent increase how does that play out

[1:37:08] into the rates. We allocate the

[1:37:09] increase again but from the lower

[1:37:12] number. We start building from the

[1:37:13] lower number back up again. So we

[1:37:19] wouldn't have to next year

[1:37:20] [indiscernible]

[1:37:21] >> I don't anticipate that, no. Can't

[1:37:26] guarantee on the aso but I don't

[1:37:27] anticipate that on the claims. We have

[1:37:28] not seen that yet. I have a question do

[1:37:34] you want us to wait until you finish

[1:37:37] everything or give you direction? This

[1:37:44] seems like it could be [indiscernible]

[1:37:45] if you are ready and you don't need to

[1:37:47] see the whole picture to make decision

[1:37:48] then tell me and I will write it down.

[1:37:50] do we have thoughts on the dental? Five

[1:37:52] thumbs up on the dental.

[1:37:57] >> do you want to go back to medical?

[1:38:03] >> this one seemed a really simple.

[1:38:08] this one is informative so you don't

[1:38:13] have to vote. Life a d&d disability and

[1:38:17] medical gap rfp was conducted this year

[1:38:18] it is our third largest. We went to

[1:38:21] market to match or enhance the current

[1:38:23] plans. We had seven responses, the

[1:38:34] standard was the incumbent

[1:38:35] [indiscernible] the evaluation team

[1:38:36] dusty bill dominique and jay, the

[1:38:43] standard received the highest rating

[1:38:44] and will remain the provider with

[1:38:45] reduced premium costs to save the

[1:38:46] county 370,000 a year. And some

[1:38:56] significant enhancements. For

[1:38:57] guaranteed issue meaning you don't have

[1:38:58] to fill out signature form will

[1:38:59] increase for employee live from 200,000

[1:39:00] to 250. Spouse live from 30,000 to

[1:39:04] 50,000. The accelerated benefit which

[1:39:05] is not something lovely to speak about,

[1:39:10] accelerated benefit is when you

[1:39:11] received a terminal diagnosis within

[1:39:12] the next 12 months, you can take a

[1:39:13] portion of life insurance out. That

[1:39:17] increases to 80 percent up to 600,000.

[1:39:19] so you can get your affairs together.

[1:39:21] some enhancements on that. Well-being

[1:39:34] plan, we continue to have double-digit

[1:39:35] growth in the portal access for

[1:39:47] participation of programs. We offer

[1:39:48] more than 16 programs with a reminder

[1:39:49] successful well-being generally needs

[1:39:50] to have 10 programs per year to keep

[1:39:52] engagement. And six asked specs to be

[1:39:54] holistic. Our plan does have six, it

[1:40:00] has career community emotional

[1:40:01] financial physical and social

[1:40:03] components. So we can address the whole

[1:40:07] person. We continue to see double digit

[1:40:11] growth each year since we redesigned

[1:40:15] the program. Wellness council

[1:40:19] unfortunately has dropped. Right now we

[1:40:20] have a few reports struggling in, 32

[1:40:24] percent completion of the kp numbers,

[1:40:26] 25 percent of everyone. Last year we

[1:40:30] had 48 percent. It dropped

[1:40:34] significantly. We can look into reasons

[1:40:36] why, it could just be fatigue, it could

[1:40:43] be we did not get the communication out

[1:40:44] as effectively as we used to, we will

[1:40:45] have to look into it. It did drop

[1:40:50] significantly. With the easier process.

[1:40:54] total health continues to grow every

[1:41:01] year, total brain continues to grow we

[1:41:02] had 1570 since we initiated it in 2024.

[1:41:05] your money line has 32 percent

[1:41:09] engagement rate, that is more than

[1:41:10] double the standard for the business

[1:41:15] engagement. Employees are using the

[1:41:16] benefits the county provides for them

[1:41:17] for their well-being. Tuition

[1:41:21] reimbursement, we had 13 participants a

[1:41:22] little low in 2025, we had 18 in 2026.

[1:41:30] mental health first aid we had 398

[1:41:33] participants since 2019, most of the

[1:41:34] board will be at the november meeting,

[1:41:35] we just had them last week, we got a

[1:41:41] lot of positive feedback again from

[1:41:45] that class. Our pivot tobacco

[1:41:47] cessation, we currently have 15

[1:41:51] participants, if every single

[1:41:52] participant were to quit, that would

[1:41:55] save the medical plan 135,000 a year.

[1:42:02] tobacco user cost twice what a

[1:42:05] nontobacco user costs, on average

[1:42:08] $9000. We have 189 employees who have

[1:42:12] tested to using tobacco chronically.

[1:42:18] we've had 150 participants in the

[1:42:25] program since 2021. For 2026 we did add

[1:42:26] an improved spouse's and adult children

[1:42:27] to the program, per the request of

[1:42:31] employees. Home thrive our caregiver

[1:42:34] support, we've had 247 participants

[1:42:41] since 2022, 152 unique active users in

[1:42:42] the first half of 2026. They signed up

[1:42:47] once but they continually go back and

[1:42:52] get additional support. This more than

[1:42:53] doubles their [indiscernible] while

[1:42:54] that seems low to me, they are thrilled

[1:42:57] with the engagement our staff has with

[1:43:03] it. I will need a vote on this one.

[1:43:12] vacation carryover. Our current carrier

[1:43:13] policy all benefit eligible employees

[1:43:17] may carry over 144 hours of vacation

[1:43:18] regardless of tenure or accrual rate.

[1:43:21] we made this choice intentionally

[1:43:28] because we do recognize the positive

[1:43:29] impact of taking vacation on the

[1:43:32] employee well-being. And selfishly

[1:43:33] their productivity when they come back.

[1:43:37] however, we often hear, I often hear

[1:43:45] that it just isn't feasible to take all

[1:43:46] that time off because we need on the

[1:43:50] accrual that we lag on the carryover.

[1:43:55] so we give more time but is not always

[1:43:56] possible for them to take all that time

[1:43:59] off. They end up feeling anxiety and

[1:44:02] stress about not doing their job taking

[1:44:03] their time and losing it. We did look

[1:44:07] at it for a couple years to get to the

[1:44:13] right timing. We are going to propose

[1:44:18] we drop the accrual down so everyone

[1:44:19] under 10 years of service will accrue

[1:44:23] at 144. Currently we have under five

[1:44:27] years at 120. They can carryover one

[1:44:28] year worth of accrual. It's still not

[1:44:34] like what our peers do but it's a

[1:44:38] smaller step. But we carryover the same

[1:44:41] as they accrual. If you accrue 144 you

[1:44:42] can carry over 144. If you accrue 168

[1:44:47] you can carry over 168. If you accrue

[1:44:52] 192 you can carry over 192. The

[1:44:57] potential liability, if they are taking

[1:44:58] time off while employed, it's part of

[1:45:03] their salary. But if they leave with a

[1:45:07] balance, that payout is a potential

[1:45:18] liability. That cost will be about

[1:45:19] 216,000 which represents 2.5 percent of

[1:45:20] total vacation liability in 2027.

[1:45:23] additionally the carryover, the

[1:45:24] difference between 144 and 168 hours,

[1:45:29] is an additional $68,500. We asking to

[1:45:43] make this change on behalf of employees

[1:45:44] who have been begging for this.

[1:45:48] commissioner fields

[1:45:49] >> my question is, I know you are

[1:45:52] responding to feedback from employees.

[1:46:03] do you have consensus what kind of

[1:46:04] reaction might you get because of the

[1:46:05] [indiscernible]

[1:46:06] >> it is positive. We did get feedback.

[1:46:14] we have the five and under at 120 which

[1:46:15] means they would only accrue 120 was to

[1:46:27] move all of those accruing 120 up so

[1:46:28] they get 24 hours more to 144. There's

[1:46:30] no take away it is all positive. We

[1:46:36] also have feedback that this is not

[1:46:43] enough but again with that standard

[1:46:44] principal of its good for their

[1:46:46] well-being, it's good for employees to

[1:46:49] take time off. I don't want to go so

[1:46:50] far over with it, they are getting

[1:46:53] burnout because they don't take time

[1:46:57] off. Commissioner baker

[1:46:58] >>dusty, has this particular all of it

[1:47:03] hasn't gone before the e team? And you

[1:47:06] got feedback from them as well? Yes. We

[1:47:13] have thumbs, five thumbs up.

[1:47:19] >> thank you. No change on the

[1:47:26] holidays. Because christmas falls on a

[1:47:29] saturday, we will back christmas up to

[1:47:33] friday for weekend rules which means

[1:47:34] christmas eve gets backed up to the

[1:47:39] 23rd. It will be thursday and friday

[1:47:40] off but now we are on the right days.

[1:47:45] other than that, those are the days.

[1:47:52] the court holidays no christmas eve or

[1:47:53] day after thanksgiving unless the court

[1:47:56] closes. Therefore they received five

[1:48:01] floating holidays. They are supposed to

[1:48:02] be saving two of those in case the

[1:48:05] courts close. If they don't choose to

[1:48:06] do that and use them ahead of time,

[1:48:10] they have to either take vacation or

[1:48:11] take it unpaid if the courts close.

[1:48:23] other benefits, late guarantee accept

[1:48:24] prepaid legal will go from 762 to 992

[1:48:26] 832 percent increase. It has not

[1:48:27] increased in 12 years. It's a huge

[1:48:35] increase, it increase two years ago and

[1:48:36] I pushed back and they let it ride for

[1:48:38] a couple years. It has not really

[1:48:39] changed in 12 years. While 30 percent

[1:48:44] seems huge, divided by 12 it's not that

[1:48:48] bad. That is benefits. Compensation,

[1:48:56] update on the labor market. Our

[1:49:03] employees are focusing more on costs

[1:49:06] than retention as a primary decision

[1:49:07] driver for comp and benefits. This does

[1:49:10] not mean they don't think retention is

[1:49:17] important. Is just that in the last year

[1:49:22] the cost is no longer sustainable for

[1:49:23] organizations so that becomes a primary

[1:49:24] driver trying to find what their

[1:49:26] decision-making is. There still remains

[1:49:33] economic uncertainty. As an example 1

[1:49:34] of the reasons we may have economic

[1:49:36] uncertainty is ai, restructuring jobs

[1:49:40] in some fields. Ai has helped

[1:49:43] organizations target reskilling for data

[1:49:48] entry clerks. Which means organizations

[1:49:55] even if they don't get rid of the role

[1:49:56] as a human being they lowered the

[1:49:57] salaries or they use ai and don't

[1:49:58] rehire so that creates uncertainty. We

[1:50:05] also see some boomerang effect with

[1:50:06] that organizations that laid off these

[1:50:07] roles are thinking ai could do it have

[1:50:09] said this is not working and brought

[1:50:14] back the staff. That creates boomerang

[1:50:16] creates instability. And some

[1:50:21] uncertainty. Merit budgets have settled

[1:50:28] back to the approximate 3.5 percent

[1:50:29] each year that were at pre-pandemic

[1:50:30] levels but turnover and job openings

[1:50:31] remain at the 22/23 level.

[1:50:40] organizations are looking at

[1:50:41] performance-based bonuses or short-term

[1:50:42] incentives which we don't get here

[1:50:43] because you have to have stock options.

[1:50:46] to continue to gain momentum over base

[1:50:51] salary increases. We will see how that

[1:50:55] plays out. Generally government lags

[1:50:56] three years from private. So we should

[1:51:03] be able to see some of those outcomes

[1:51:04] from these changes before we have to

[1:51:05] look at any of those things as an

[1:51:09] option. There has been because of the

[1:51:13] economic uncertainty a structural slow

[1:51:16] down. Organizations are becoming slower

[1:51:19] to hire, they slow down higher rates,

[1:51:24] also employees while the turnover rates

[1:51:25] are same as 22, they are starting to

[1:51:30] slow down because of economic

[1:51:31] uncertainty employees are holding fast

[1:51:34] and slowing their willingness to leave.

[1:51:37] slow down on both sides. Salaries and

[1:51:41] advanced sectors like ai have continued

[1:51:48] to experience growth. They are using

[1:51:51] what they call skill sets to determine

[1:51:52] compensation rather than experience. We

[1:51:56] have a new technology you may not have

[1:51:57] a lot of people with skill sets. That

[1:52:02] would not work for mature organizations

[1:52:21] like us across-the-board.

[1:52:22] [indiscernible]

[1:52:23] >> the first box iteration of merit

[1:52:24] sits at 3.5 with top performance

[1:52:25] receiving between 5.6 and six percent.

[1:52:26] in the labor market. Denver cost of

[1:52:30] labor is around 18 percent higher than

[1:52:33] national average. Thus from the bureau

[1:52:37] of labor statistics. Cost of living is

[1:52:38] 12.9 percent of the national average.

[1:52:41] cost of labor is higher than

[1:52:44] cost-of-living. Still higher than the

[1:52:48] national average. We talked about the

[1:52:49] percentages on dollar amounts. And how

[1:52:54] that impacts it. The denver cpi

[1:52:56] increase five percent versus national

[1:53:00] average of 4.2. Arapahoe county

[1:53:01] unemployment is 3.6 percent. We have

[1:53:05] talked in the past about when

[1:53:06] unemployment rate is below four, it can

[1:53:09] make it very hard for us to hire or

[1:53:22] recruit. So, we start looking for some

[1:53:23] creative and flexible ways to

[1:53:24] incentivize employees and candidates to

[1:53:25] come when we are in hard to fill

[1:53:30] positions. We have our eyes out for

[1:53:31] that [indiscernible] on that. 94.8

[1:53:37] percent of employees are in positions

[1:53:38] that match the market, 87 percent of

[1:53:40] jobs are matched to the market. That's

[1:53:43] a very stable number and we love that.

[1:53:49] it tells us we do have the data to say

[1:53:50] we are where we are at in a competitive

[1:53:54] market. From three years ago when we

[1:53:55] had no data to this, it makes our jobs

[1:54:00] a lot easier. Our comp ratio is .98, it

[1:54:04] shows our structure not the employee

[1:54:08] pay, our structure is lagging the

[1:54:09] market by two percent. Not a surprise.

[1:54:18] we did not fund 2.67 percent we

[1:54:19] requested last year due to financial

[1:54:21] constraints. The fact that the

[1:54:22] structure is behind is not surprising.

[1:54:25] our average pay and this is a new

[1:54:30] statistic, our average pay is lagging

[1:54:31] peers by 3.9 percent. The structure two

[1:54:35] percent below where it needs to be,

[1:54:37] will move almost 2 percent . But our

[1:54:40] pay is in the lower percentile , there

[1:54:49] are more demographics on that our

[1:54:50] average pay how many people are below

[1:54:51] midpoint on page 45. So roger on the

[1:55:01] structure. But our average pay lag

[1:55:02] appears by 3.9 percent but yet two

[1:55:08] boxes over we see that 94.8 percent of

[1:55:17] employees are in positions that match

[1:55:18] the market 87 percent of jobs match the

[1:55:19] market if average pay lag our peers by

[1:55:21] 3.9 percent that feels counter posed.

[1:55:28] these are the positions that have a

[1:55:29] benchmark so we have a number to

[1:55:31] compare against. The structure is two

[1:55:35] percent. But managers are making hiring

[1:55:37] decisions and pay decisions in the

[1:55:43] lower half. So our pay is almost 4

[1:55:44] percent lower than peers average pay.

[1:55:47] so the comp ratio, yes. I guess 3.6

[1:55:53] percent unemployment will take care of

[1:55:58] that. Maybe. I mentioned that the total

[1:56:08] comp which we usually have in july

[1:56:09] won't be until september 14. At this

[1:56:11] point I only have 36 percent of peers

[1:56:14] recording and their number. Cpec are

[1:56:23] foundational markets data came back

[1:56:25] with merit moving 3.7 percent into

[1:56:28] 2027, structure moving 1.93, which

[1:56:30] represents that two percent. Pay scale

[1:56:35] came in at 2.1 and 2.1 even across.

[1:56:39] world of work came in at 3.5 and 2.5,

[1:56:52] pay scale and world at work all

[1:56:53] industries and all public-private and

[1:56:54] not-for-profit. Government fears the 36

[1:56:55] that have provided feedback come in

[1:56:56] with a merit asks, they have not asked

[1:56:59] yet, 2.43 percent on average, structure

[1:57:07] movement of 1.19. If you add the 1.19

[1:57:11] and 2.43, you get to a very similar

[1:57:13] number two what you see on the next

[1:57:20] request. Which is market. We will be

[1:57:25] moving the structure 1.93 percent, that

[1:57:29] will be applied to the minimum and

[1:57:34] maximum. When we move the structure it

[1:57:35] also lowers the comp ratio. We move the

[1:57:39] structure without the pay that lowers

[1:57:42] the comp ratio. We recommend you

[1:57:43] approve funding, not today, as part of

[1:57:46] your normal budgeting package,

[1:57:51] recommend funding that movement at 1.5

[1:57:54] percent. Not the whole thing but the

[1:58:00] majority of it. That is we are trying

[1:58:01] to get a total budget number and allow

[1:58:03] for pay-for-performance where it

[1:58:04] applies in our merit. If the decision

[1:58:06] is not to fund the market structure at

[1:58:13] 1.5, there is still a cost to bring the

[1:58:16] minimum. We have 33 jobs not including

[1:58:25] union representative jobs that will be

[1:58:26] reclassified to higher grades and seven

[1:58:27] will be reclassified into lower grades.

[1:58:32] nobody gets re-class to a lower grade

[1:58:33] has money taken away they have a lower

[1:58:35] range but there are some that will need

[1:58:37] to get some money to move up in their

[1:58:43] grade. That cost is about 92,000

[1:58:45] between the two. It's one or the other,

[1:58:57] not additive. Merit, for those not

[1:59:00] representative or unsworn, we are

[1:59:01] asking for 3.1 percent. Going back to

[1:59:06] my spoil alert, a total budget of 4.6.

[1:59:10] that does not mean everyone gets 3.1

[1:59:12] percent. It depends on their

[1:59:14] performance rating, some people get

[1:59:16] 2.1, some people get four. Each

[1:59:24] department gets to make the decision

[1:59:25] when they are using it for

[1:59:27] pay-for-performance. This can adjust

[1:59:28] the base rate if they have the room in

[1:59:31] the range. It can be a lump-sum if they

[1:59:33] are at max or a combination of both. If

[1:59:40] you are at max you get a combination

[1:59:41] because it's 1.93 for structure to your

[1:59:42] base and the remaining lump-sum. This

[1:59:55] would cost approximately 4.6 million to

[1:59:56] the general fund 2.5 million and with

[1:59:57] the benefit load 3 million.

[2:00:08] [indiscernible]I would like to ask that

[2:00:19] we revisit the one-time award, current

[2:00:31] policy is the directors and elected

[2:00:32] officials can award one-time awards

[2:00:33] between $50 and 5000 for project-based

[2:00:35] awards. They are required to keep the

[2:00:40] documentation on that. I keep a list of

[2:00:41] how many to make sure for the board

[2:00:42] direction nobody is abusing it no one

[2:00:47] has. We've had the average award of

[2:00:51] $1130. We've had an average of 70

[2:00:52] awards given in the year. As those

[2:00:57] numbers increase, as salaries increase,

[2:01:08] the one-time award capped at 5000 does

[2:01:09] not always reflect the level of impact

[2:01:10] some of these projects make. So I am

[2:01:18] requesting we increase it to 7500 the

[2:01:19] gross up award and the cost would be

[2:01:21] 56,000 a year. Commissioner campbell

[2:01:23] >> two questions. Please remind me this

[2:01:28] comes from each department or office

[2:01:30] budget. So they have to find the money

[2:01:34] for this. Do we have data since you are

[2:01:36] tracking, are these awards normally

[2:01:43] given to higher classified employees or

[2:01:45] lower classified? Usually lower. They

[2:01:48] are project-based so it depends on the

[2:01:53] project. Covid for an example 5 years

[2:02:01] ago, we had tiers of people who worked

[2:02:02] on it so we had tier 1 and who was

[2:02:03] working on it based on hours and

[2:02:05] impact. We had a variety in that.

[2:02:12] usually it is the lower paid employees

[2:02:13] that are asked to take on an additional

[2:02:16] project that receive these

[2:02:18] >> okay. So when we say the cost,

[2:02:20] that's based on average. But we do

[2:02:28] baseline budgeting so it's not like a

[2:02:29] fixed asked from the general fund? It's

[2:02:35] not.

[2:02:36] >> it is estimating based on averages

[2:02:37] and number of awards. They still have

[2:02:39] to find the money. Okay great cool

[2:02:49] thank you

[2:02:50] >> the next ask is for the das office.

[2:02:57] they would like to address their new

[2:02:58] higher rates and do compression

[2:02:59] adjustments to go with that. The

[2:03:04] average salary of dda is 98,000 and the

[2:03:08] average salary for the dda one is

[2:03:22] 117,000. What they are experiencing is

[2:03:23] sometimes it's hard to get dda to move

[2:03:24] from organizations that have this

[2:03:25] average to a new hiring lower than

[2:03:31] that. Our new hire rate for the dda is

[2:03:32] 92,000, for dda one it is 102,000. The

[2:03:38] other thing they are experiencing other

[2:03:39] than being able to attract at lower

[2:03:44] numbers than average is that they are

[2:03:45] having trouble motivating the county dda

[2:03:47] to take on extra work load and impact

[2:03:51] of the dda one going from investigator

[2:03:55] felonies if there's not a big enough

[2:03:56] differential between the salaries.

[2:03:59] there is a feeling for them the

[2:04:03] internal promotions are not motivating

[2:04:07] and they are unable to attract from her

[2:04:09] peers for their vacancies. They did

[2:04:15] work with us we are recommending a

[2:04:25] higher promotional rate for dda to 95 and

[2:04:26] the dda 1 to 114,000 plus providing

[2:04:27] compression for everybody that is in

[2:04:30] their roles. That cost is about

[2:04:36] $90,200. One of the things we have

[2:04:37] additionally requested and are working

[2:04:40] with them on, they have more levels

[2:04:41] than the market does. One of the ways

[2:04:49] we could create that deferential is by

[2:04:50] taking out the dda one level and going

[2:04:51] from county dda to dda two. When we say

[2:04:54] the average dda one is 117, that's a

[2:04:57] blend of one and two because the

[2:05:00] market, the peers don't have that.

[2:05:07] there is some more work to be done

[2:05:08] after we get these hiring rates

[2:05:10] started. That is a request for comp. I

[2:05:19] will go over a summary of compensation

[2:05:20] agreements with the unions which have a

[2:05:23] lot of pending language. Still pending.

[2:05:31] we have the fop sworn structure, this

[2:05:40] is the original counteroffer of the fop

[2:05:41] asked for five percent we countered

[2:05:42] with the 63rd which is where they are

[2:05:46] today, 3.01. The normal step

[2:05:50] progression moving from one sub 1 to 7

[2:05:51] two is just over 600,000. The market

[2:05:55] increased to remain at the 63rd will be

[2:05:59] 1.7 million. Sworn management structure

[2:06:00] is larger than you see in the past.

[2:06:05] part of that is based on where the

[2:06:06] sergeant ends up so that will change.

[2:06:10] also the lieutenant market moved almost

[2:06:13] 12 percent. It moves significantly.

[2:06:16] that has an impact on the number. The

[2:06:29] cost on this proposal pending

[2:06:30] negotiations, about 2.6 million with

[2:06:31] benefit load to the general fund. The

[2:06:36] emergency communication, those very,

[2:06:40] it's an average of 2.95 percent

[2:06:44] increase. Step progression 40,000 going

[2:06:45] from step one to step two, 63rd

[2:06:53] percentile 150,000. And total cost 233

[2:06:56] with benefit load. Pending

[2:07:01] negotiations. Those represented in

[2:07:06] human services, depending on county

[2:07:10] merit decisions. Depending on what you

[2:07:11] decide for the merit budget, if that

[2:07:15] was approved, this is based on that.

[2:07:21] the annual increase across-the-board

[2:07:22] for those represented would be 3.6,

[2:07:25] represents a combination of 1.5 and

[2:07:28] 2.1, the meets expectations general

[2:07:32] starting point for pay-for-performance.

[2:07:38] out of the 3.1 percent budget if you

[2:07:39] meet expectations he get about 2.1

[2:07:40] percent. That's what that represents.

[2:07:44] it is 1.3 million with benefit load. In

[2:07:48] addition there are nine jobs being

[2:07:49] reclassified to higher grades, those

[2:07:55] cost about 2800. For ffm, the 3.6 which

[2:08:08] represents 156,000, 185,000 with

[2:08:13] benefit load. They don't have anybody

[2:08:14] being [indiscernible] last year there

[2:08:15] were several, custodians went up two

[2:08:21] grades. Nothing getting re-class this

[2:08:22] year and no cost in addition to that.

[2:08:31] the cost summary, and again it's a

[2:08:32] chart every year I get to test your

[2:08:36] eyes. One benefit proposal column, to

[2:08:44] comp proposals our recommendation I

[2:08:45] would not put it in the presentation if

[2:08:46] I was not recommending it. In the white

[2:08:51] is total cost, in the gray is the

[2:08:56] general fund. At the bottom with

[2:08:57] benefit load for the recommended

[2:09:01] package. Everything in compensation one

[2:09:08] and all benefits with benefit load to

[2:09:09] general fund 10.18 million. The only

[2:09:14] difference for option two is not

[2:09:16] funding the market, just doing the cost

[2:09:20] for minimum, no da and no one-time

[2:09:24] award. There are your totals. Well

[2:09:40] done. Here are the timelines. Some of

[2:10:02] the timeline is missing. We did not

[2:10:05] like the timeline apparently. We are at

[2:10:15] the third box. The ebc meeting budget

[2:10:16] request is september 8, that's where

[2:10:18] they [indiscernible] your comp. Open

[2:10:24] enrollment is october 28 through

[2:10:28] november 12. Study session for the

[2:10:35] budget october 20, november 10 is when

[2:10:36] compensation will send out performance

[2:10:37] ratings to the directors and elected

[2:10:45] officials. November 21, supervisors

[2:10:46] will need to complete writing their

[2:10:47] performance evaluations. December 1

[2:10:53] through the eighth the directors and

[2:10:54] elected officials conduct calibration

[2:10:55] meetings if needed for review. December

[2:11:00] 9 directors elected officials send

[2:11:01] performance rating budget back to

[2:11:04] compensation. December 8 is the

[2:11:05] adoption of the budget. December 15 is

[2:11:15] when we will open the spreadsheets

[2:11:16] [indiscernible] so change in the

[2:11:19] system. December 29 directors and

[2:11:22] elected officials submit final merit

[2:11:26] within my arapahoe. January 7 the pay

[2:11:27] increase letters will be released in my

[2:11:31] arapahoe. We will be in the system.

[2:11:37] january 15, pay increases and benefit

[2:11:38] changes are reflected on pay checks.

[2:11:43] that's all I've got. Would you like to

[2:11:51] go back to medical. Sure let's go back

[2:12:01] to medical. 9.5 percent increase.

[2:12:18] commissioners?

[2:12:19] >> can you put the slide back up?

[2:12:20] >> [indiscernible] I just think this is

[2:12:34] a thoughtful approach [speaker off mic]

[2:12:35] the county is contributing and the

[2:12:47] out-of-pocket expense for employees

[2:12:48] [indiscernible] I think it's a very

[2:12:49] fair approach

[2:12:50] >> me too

[2:12:51] >> we don't even need to discuss, five

[2:12:52] thumbs up. Are we thumbs up for

[2:13:23] retirement?

[2:13:24] >>I see. Do we have thumbs for the

[2:13:35] retirement contribution changing? Five

[2:13:36] thumbs up for the contribution change.

[2:13:40] commissioner warren gully. Can you

[2:13:47] remind me or [indiscernible]I just

[2:13:54] wondered about I think we have a goal

[2:13:55] we are getting to. If I remember right

[2:13:57] it is 11 percent? Yes. [indiscernible]

[2:14:10] >> okay, that's everything I need from

[2:14:13] benefits thank you, generally there's

[2:14:17] some direction given to the ebc on what

[2:14:18] direction you want to take for comp.

[2:14:25] >> we are on the ebc. Tell me what you

[2:14:31] would like from us on that

[2:14:36] conversation. Generally it looks like

[2:14:37] what could you reevaluate, what would

[2:14:40] not get done if we do this proposal

[2:14:44] first. It looks something like that

[2:14:48] that direction.

[2:14:49] >> I'm looking at todd.

[2:14:54] >> obviously with the budget process we

[2:14:55] have to figure out what we can afford

[2:14:59] based on the other request you receive

[2:15:00] at some point later this fall. I think

[2:15:03] usually what we go into the ebc process

[2:15:08] with is do commissioners feel

[2:15:10] comfortable with the request or

[2:15:11] recommendation put forth today? Is that

[2:15:15] what you want the executive budget

[2:15:16] committee to fit in the budget. If it

[2:15:17] does not fit bring it back to the full

[2:15:21] board. Is there anything about the

[2:15:23] compensation portion of the

[2:15:24] presentation you as a full board would

[2:15:28] like to have the executive budget

[2:15:29] committee look at differently than what

[2:15:31] is proposed? Commissioner warren gully

[2:15:32] >> thank you madam chair. I guess what

[2:15:35] I would want to start off by saying I

[2:15:39] really want to thank our labor partners

[2:15:44] and the whole team here for coming

[2:15:47] together. Last year was a really

[2:15:51] difficult budget year because we had

[2:15:52] not gotten things all the way through

[2:15:55] and this is new for us in arapahoe

[2:16:04] county. I feel like there was a lot of

[2:16:05] thoughtful purposeful work around how

[2:16:06] can we line up a timeline that gives us

[2:16:08] the ability to really receive and put

[2:16:15] from asme and the fop and also to

[2:16:23] figure out how are we going to do this

[2:16:24] and how will that be reflected across

[2:16:25] the rest of the staff. I just wanted to

[2:16:26] say thank you for that. This is a big

[2:16:31] change for the way the organization

[2:16:36] does compensation. I felt it went much

[2:16:38] smoother this time than last year.

[2:16:41] thank you very much for that.

[2:16:50] >> commissioners? What are you

[2:16:53] thinking? I wanted to make sure, I

[2:16:57] don't know if commissioner fields has

[2:17:01] any questions. But, I know what kind of

[2:17:02] work goes into this. It's a team

[2:17:08] effort. It's not only dusty although

[2:17:09] she is the presenter, I know she gets

[2:17:13] input from a lot of different corridors

[2:17:16] in arapahoe county. The amount of work

[2:17:17] that goes into it, medical, man, what a

[2:17:24] system in america we've got. So thank

[2:17:34] you for lifting the veil so to speak

[2:17:35] and making that a little clearer. We

[2:17:39] see behind the veil altogether. We wish

[2:17:47] there were way more options then I

[2:17:51] think we have. It's important for us to

[2:17:54] understand it. And the effort the team

[2:17:57] is going through to get peoples input.

[2:18:03] because we could speculate what people

[2:18:04] will use and what they won't use.

[2:18:06] sometimes we are right and sometimes we

[2:18:09] are off by a little bit. You've done a

[2:18:14] pretty good job. I like retirement as

[2:18:18] someone who is close, two years away. I

[2:18:23] think we are doing a great job in

[2:18:29] meeting our obligations. I do consider

[2:18:32] it an obligation. We said we were going

[2:18:33] to get to 11 percent. Without raising

[2:18:39] the employee contribution. So we'd be

[2:18:40] more in line with what's going around.

[2:18:45] just really kudos, compensation we have

[2:18:46] to wait until the last minute. It seems

[2:18:53] like a lot of times before we have all

[2:18:54] of the information we need to make a

[2:18:55] good decision. Hang in there for the

[2:19:00] rest of the story

[2:19:06] >> commissioner fields? It's already

[2:19:07] been stated, well done come a

[2:19:10] well-thought-out. I like the way you do

[2:19:13] the comparisons. As it relates to

[2:19:16] market value in denver and other

[2:19:17] locations as a benchmark. It appears by

[2:19:19] what you presented that arapahoe county

[2:19:26] is in a strong position as it relates

[2:19:32] to employee retention, benefits. I

[2:19:35] think the future looks bright. Except

[2:19:41] for ai. When you have that slide about

[2:19:49] ai and having to lower salaries because

[2:19:50] of the skill set of jobs or

[2:19:52] responsibilities, ai was taking that

[2:19:56] over. I was trying to picture what that

[2:19:58] conversation is like without employee.

[2:20:03] can you describe what it's like when

[2:20:04] someone may be it is a patrick

[2:20:07] question, when you are looking at

[2:20:08] salary and it has to be reduced. I know

[2:20:11] it had on there we [indiscernible]. It

[2:20:16] wasn't necessarily for us. . Okay that

[2:20:39] would be a tough conversation I'm glad

[2:20:40] to hear we are not doing that at this

[2:20:41] point.

[2:20:42] >> as far as I'm aware, it's a toolset

[2:20:46] for us, a resource it's not doing the

[2:20:51] job for us. [indiscernible]. That

[2:20:56] clarification helps a lot thank you.

[2:21:03] >> on your bsr we have covered all the

[2:21:08] staff recommendations. So what else do

[2:21:09] you want from us? I think it's just

[2:21:14] todd's question, do you have any

[2:21:15] concerns about the comp presentation.

[2:21:20] we have no concerns at least I don't

[2:21:21] does anybody else have concerns? I

[2:21:25] don't think so I think you came in here

[2:21:26] and knocked it out of the park and

[2:21:27] answered all of our questions, we gave

[2:21:30] some thumbs. We expect things to go

[2:21:35] smoothly.

[2:21:36] >>we have no questions. Thank you.

[2:21:45] thank you very very much. [applause].

[2:21:53] >>lovely, let's take a couple of

[2:21:59] minutes to change the room.

[2:22:06] >>

[2:29:43] >>

[2:30:11] >>. Let's get started with

[2:31:01] introductions jeff baker commissioner

[2:31:02] michelle hallstead commissioner's office

[2:31:03] leslie summey commissioner

[2:31:04] [indiscernible] carrie warren gully

[2:31:07] commissioner [indiscernible] director

[2:31:11] for centennial park jessica campbell

[2:31:13] commissioner district 2. Thank you very

[2:31:17] very much. I'm sorry mr. Saraceno for

[2:31:20] cutting in front of you for that

[2:31:26] introduction. We are here for a drop in

[2:31:27] for the airport improvement program

[2:31:28] grant for the public airport authority.

[2:31:32] [indiscernible] what do you have for us

[2:31:33] today sir

[2:31:34] >> thank you commissioner summey. We

[2:31:41] are here for what's called a service

[2:31:42] award initiative vehicle movement area

[2:31:47] transponders. Centennial airport was

[2:31:49] one of the first in the country to have

[2:31:50] a service awareness initiative, that

[2:31:52] allows the tower to see aircraft on the

[2:31:55] ground even if they have a cloud deck,

[2:32:01] bad visibility. We are one of the first

[2:32:02] airports in the country to have that.

[2:32:09] they've expanded that, obviously there

[2:32:10] was a horrible accident between the

[2:32:11] fire truck and aircraft, as a result of

[2:32:13] that the ffa is handing out grants

[2:32:16] making them available to airports to

[2:32:19] expand that system. You have

[2:32:24] transponder on all airport vehicles not

[2:32:25] only will they be able to see the

[2:32:26] aircraft but they will be able to see

[2:32:28] [indiscernible] which is especially

[2:32:29] important during the winter, being able

[2:32:32] to see that because we have low

[2:32:35] visibility, and can't see what's going

[2:32:36] on on the ground. We are coming to you

[2:32:40] to ask for the board to support grant

[2:32:51] [indiscernible] one grant too far. Our

[2:33:05] original recommendation john thank you

[2:33:08] for joining us was to come to you we

[2:33:09] were anticipating getting the grant in

[2:33:14] mid-september. The faa has decided to

[2:33:15] drop it on as early. Now we expect the

[2:33:17] grant to come out very soon, possibly

[2:33:19] in the next week or so. So, we are

[2:33:26] changing our recommendation we are

[2:33:27] asking from the board. We are asking

[2:33:29] today to have the board allow the chair

[2:33:35] to sign the grant and have it ratified

[2:33:36] at the september 8 county board

[2:33:39] meeting. That's what our ask is. The

[2:33:43] total grant amount will be 115,000 and

[2:33:49] the airport will be required to do the

[2:33:50] five percent match and we have that

[2:33:51] budgeted so it's not a problem.

[2:34:00] commissioner campbell

[2:34:01] >> we prefer to give you the authority

[2:34:03] before but we have done this in the

[2:34:04] past where they come up and in this

[2:34:05] case we are a year out on break.

[2:34:08] normally we would have something about

[2:34:12] there. It's not uncommon for us to do

[2:34:13] that and have the ratification, it

[2:34:17] clean set up. To add to that now that

[2:34:18] we know the grant is coming sooner, the

[2:34:21] ffa once it back early september, so we

[2:34:23] have a rush to get it signed. My

[2:34:29] question was about the language in the

[2:34:32] grants we've been discussing over

[2:34:33] several years just verifying. Sometimes

[2:34:36] as we know things with this

[2:34:37] administration are a moving target. I

[2:34:46] have not seen the language but I see it

[2:34:47] before commissioner summey waits for

[2:34:48] asu can sign this now. But I will

[2:34:50] verify the language has not been, the

[2:34:55] language we've been concerned with has

[2:34:56] not been in these grants. We don't

[2:35:02] anticipate any changes but we will look

[2:35:03] at it and you will look at it to make

[2:35:14] sure. Commissioner baker

[2:35:15] >> this is kind of a weird question but

[2:35:16] is it a notice of funding opportunity

[2:35:17] that comes out? Or something else? For

[2:35:21] the faa. I'm wondering if they are like

[2:35:25] what transportation does. Correct they

[2:35:29] made us aware that the funds were

[2:35:30] available for make additions to the

[2:35:31] system and then we applied for the

[2:35:34] grant. And now we have been awarded

[2:35:36] that grant amount. It is nofo

[2:35:45] originated yes. We got it through the

[2:35:46] faa local airport district office. They

[2:35:49] are pretty good about communicating.

[2:35:52] they knew we already had the system,

[2:35:55] the foundation system in place in the

[2:35:59] tower. They knew we would be a good

[2:36:00] airport to roll it out on. So this is

[2:36:03] an enhancement what does it do? The

[2:36:07] current system just sees our aircraft

[2:36:10] on the ground, the new system adds

[2:36:13] transponders to the vehicles so we can

[2:36:15] see the vehicles. How many transponders

[2:36:17] do we get? 34. Cool. We have five

[2:36:26] thumbs up to take their money.

[2:36:33] >> [indiscernible]thank you very much

[2:36:44] we have some exciting stuff coming so.

[2:36:45] more money we have found. You are about

[2:36:52] the only one. Thank you mike.

Board of County Commissioners Study Session on 2026-08-11 11:00 AM

Agenda

Transcript