>> good morning everybody let's get
started with introductions around the
room please jeff baker commissioner
john christopherson county attorneys
office michelle hallstead county
attorney's office rhonda fields
commissioner leslie summey commissioner
carrie warren gully commissioner kendra
davis commissioner's office sorry
jessica campbell commissioner district
2. Wonderful wonderful and we have
kathy smith on the line as well. Please
introduce yourself maam. Good morning
everyone kathy smith community
resources. Thank you very very much.
I'm glad you flagged for that for me
michelle that's too small for me to
see. I thought that was you. We are
here today for a study session on the
county economic development program.
I'm going to turn it over to kendra
davis. Thank you so much commissioner.
we are here today to give you a little
bit of context about the existing
county development program how we've
chosen to structure that from the
county. We will also do an
environmental scan how the county
structures that and will talk about
what opportunities might be ahead and
what the preference of the board is. We
will also have finance folks joining in
just a minute. We will go ahead and
start. This is a general sense of what
we will be doing to give you a little
background that background will include
information you've heard in march of
this year when you did the economic
development 101, some of our partners
will talk about what the account
currently does partnerships we
leverage environmental scan of
neighboring counties opportunities and
we will go through next steps based on
the feelings [indiscernible] just a set
of background, what you talked about
back in march. Denver south and aurora
economic development council two of our
partners presented about some economic
development foundations. One of the
things they talked about, divisions and
objectives gave you a snapshot of what
arapahoe county looks like from an
economic perspective. They track our
employment numbers, some leading
industries employers this is all
information kathy's team ad works also
tracks and they do that in partnership
with economic development partners. To
take us even farther back I want to
highlight objectives of the economic
development the board identified in
2021 and 2022. There was a deeper
conversation about how the board wanted
to structure current economic
development functions because there
isn't a four-man function within the
county structure. These are some of the
objectives identified by the board as
part of that conversation. You will see
the second enhanced tax base post covid
is in a position to be involved post
covid is a relative term. I wanted to
remind the board that this is a
conversation the board has had from a
county perspective. These are some of
the things that were identified. The
actions and activities that happens is
that conversation and 21 and 22 are
based on these foundational items. We
can talk about what that approach is.
first and foremost we leverage the
excellent work of arapahoe douglas
works. They have extensive resources
for businesses and job seekers, these
are two of the high-level things they
do that kathy could give you an entire
study session on that. They are an
incredible resource for the county and
for economic development. They also
help identify talent pipeline concerns,
specific key target areas for the
county, areas we have significant
business or gaps they might see, they
work with our partners to leverage
those talents and work with
universities and colleges to address
those concerns. The county also
provides personal property tax
incentive program on a case-by-case
basis. I believe you talked about that
recently. We will also be coming back
in september with a deeper conversation
of what that might look like from a
policy perspective. We will have a
little bit of information about what
that currently looks like later in the
slide. . We also partner with economic
development organizations across
multiple focus areas. These areas I
want to highlight them. These are areas
that were identified as important
during the conversation in 2022. The
board determined these specific
sections were where they wanted to
focus their resources. We have economic
development corporations including
denver south over economic development
council. They support job creation
recruitment, they help identify
commercial prospects and work with ad
works for the county pipeline needs.
we support small business
development centers. Aurora has a
denver metro edc. And the eastern
colorado edc. They help support
entrepreneurial efforts and small
business trainings. If you remember
from last year's presentation, they
talked about an area of business
evolution, businesses where folks were
retiring or transitioning out and
helping to find a soft landing for that
business to have to continue
operations. We support chambers of
commerce, those folks do a lot of
community building. , they support
existing businesses they create
opportunities to partner and to build
that foundational network of businesses
in our community. We support advocacy
and interest groups, those include
our i70 reap, a specific group not
quite a chamber of commerce but has
specific project areas and is nimble in
terms of the desires and priorities of
that agenda.
>> commissioner warren gully
>> thank you. This is the sba stuff.
like the folks that come and present to
us that do trainings and those types of
things. Thank you I just wanted to
highlight within the current strategic
plan we talked about using this data to
build out what this looks like. These
are some of the areas it slots into. It
we cover [indiscernible] as well as
prosperity some elements of supporting
local business building out opportunity
areas and creating opportunities for
education those sorts of things those
are the areas we are trying to leverage
the partnerships with these different
areas. Within that, the county has
specific tools and resources. We talked
about a couple of them but I want to
dive deeper on them. See if there are
questions about what the town currently
does and highlight ways the county is
trying to make inroads. Obviously the
first is arapaho douglas works. If you
have any questions I will make kathy
answer them. This is generally a high
level of what ad works does. You are
familiar with their operational
categories and what resource they are
but they really do a lot in data and
providing that data to our business
owners to the economic development
partners. They talk about economic
trends and employment. Those trends and
that data help inform those projects
and programs they move forward in
partnership with. There's also the
south metro enterprise zone. This may
sound familiar we talked about it a
little bit there was an opportunity to
expand the existing zone last year.
this year last year. The previous zone
was pretty small. Englewood was the
manager of that zone. Our long-range
planning folks saw opportunity in the
eastern bloc to expand the zone. After
that there was an opportunity to 10,
the expansion every 10 years you can
bring in the existing zone, we pulled
in all of our partners and cities
additional counties douglas county as
part of the enterprise zone as well and
had some substantive conversations
about how folks can leverage the zone,
who was interested in doing that and
what that looked like. Based on that
the zone blew up. So it includes parts
of, sorry, good clarification, not a
technical term. The enterprise zone
still exists. Douglas county is part of
it. We work with parker eastern block,
our long-range planning partners public
works did an excellent job of
identifying areas that were slated back
for projected growth and existing
growth they thought were beneficial to
have a commercial area included in
that. It's a subset of zone that
includes sheridan greenwood village
sections of the county that did not
participate previously for a variety of
reasons. It is currently administered
by the aurora chamber of commerce. They
have transition from inglewood, they
are working with the state to identify
support enterprise zone 1 requests
these are mostly tax credits folks can
get as businesses in the enterprise
zone. There's also an opportunity for
what are called contribution projects
which allows big capital projects to
receive tax credits contributions from
residents [indiscernible] which is a
cool opportunity and brought in that
zone across our county and douglas
county. There's a lot of opportunity
here that is new and we are working on
trying to leverage that with the aurora
chamber of commerce. The county has a
tax incentive program. This allows the
county to offer economic incentives for
new and expanding businesses. You can
refund business property tax business
facility or expansion, the board talked
about this as a program a couple or two
years ago I believe. I believe it was
two years ago. The idea when folks come
for a potential incentive, they
bring the benefits to the board. They
talk about how many jobs they create
what is the median income, what's the
capital investment they will be making
what do they think the impacts of this
will be in the county. Sometimes that
can be kind of to borrow another
official term squishy math, but it is a
conversation with the board and
expectation of return on investment.
currently the county has 10 incentive
agreements, you can have them for
specific addresses. There are
businesses that have [indiscernible]
has an average return of
$550,000 .
that's an average over eight
years or so if the board remembers we
went back when we came to you two years
ago this program has evolved a lot over
the last 10 or 15 years. Over the
years. It used to be as low as a couple
thousand dollars. And over the course
of time has increased to what it
currently is, which is 550,000.
>> commissioner fields
>> can you highlight what six
businesses there are? I'm unfamiliar
with the six businesses
>> come on up.
>> thank you lisa. The board currently
has agreements with thorough
electronics, public national
distributing company. Q ts aurora,
gemini medical, j.p. Morgan, and
charter communications.
>> and, qps, is that the data center?
the types of businesses. Is it
aerospace, a range? I know the data
center is, and I know what the banking
one, the other topics? If you look at
aero that is technical manufacturing,
gemini is a large manufacturer of
medical products. Typically the
business personal property tax
investment works when you have a
significant lift in the facility
fixtures furniture and equipment. A lot
of these companies whether it be qt as
j.p. Morgan gemini arrow all have made
a big capital investment inside the
building which is why they are looking
for a rebate that's generally right now.
where most of the current it's a little
bit more focused on advanced
manufacturing. Is what I would say.
>> I remember when charter
communications came to us, we actually
extended it because they were adding
more people if I remember correctly.
they were adding several hundred new
people. That is a communications
company. It's kind of a spattering. I
guess I thought it was mostly finance.
if I may jump in kendra, the take away
for us as we work really closely. You
can see this is not like everyone gets
a card. It's not a [indiscernible]
environment. [indiscernible]but I would
say our economic development partners
both aurora and denver south do a good
job of vetting these requests on our
behalf. So when they come to you they
are doing the background work and
making their professional
recommendation on the level of
investment and what it will bring to
the county as kendra said a couple
years ago because of our uncertainty
and our financial situation prior to
the passage of 1a, you put a pause on
these things globally. So we are
starting to see more come through as
obviously the investments continue to
grow.
>> I would like to see I'm not sure
kathy has this because it says on one
of the slides we are keeping track of
trends. I would like to understand the
demographics of those agreements in
reference to who they are hiring, and
where they are coming from. Because
when I think about district 5 and that
population, many of the areas are
boarded up. And there's no really
pathway at this point for companies
that come into that area because they
don't have the richness of the dirt you
refine in the unincorporated parts of
aurora. So when we are thinking about
incentive I'm hoping at some point we
look at and I don't know this is a
partnership with aurora city, but
everything is being developed out
south. So transportation becomes an
issue, in reference if we want to see
the folks get jobs, how will they get
their lower rtd or light rail is not a
viable option for many of these
agreements or businesses
>> I don't know if we have that data,
kathy maybe you do? It's not random.
kathy you can't put your hand up.
[indiscernible] go ahead
>> thank you commissioner. I wanted to
say we definitely can get data related
to districts rates demographics those
kinds of things. Unfortunately I can't
speak to every business and the
demographics of who they are hiring him
from what district. With that said, if
we have a specific ask we can work with
businesses in certain areas to see what
information we could get statistically.
but yes we definitely can get you some
dead demographic information related to
your district, related to employment
rates education levels demographics
that way. But I don't know if that's
what you're looking for?
>> that would be helpful the reason I
bring it up is because I know how much
time when I think we want to house
people we want to eventually get them a
job to get them in a situation they can
be self-sufficient. We are trying some
of these initiatives to getting some
people not just off the street into a
house temporary housing, but how can we
align these initiatives when we are
really giving them a job, eventually
giving them housing. We are not just
housing homeless people.
>> commissioner, that's probably a
separate conversation for economic
development items. That is the goal of
our housing stability services creating
housing stability plan, getting people
referred to arapahoe douglas works.
that is our goal with the services we
implemented with our housing stability
services. Making sure people have the
economic stability and mobility, not
just getting them into anything
temporary. We agree completely
>> I think to the comment you made
about how this relates to incentives or
what date of these companies are
reporting back on, that would go to the
incentive policy conversation, what
would you do about wage ranges hiring
groups, some of the demographic data we
can ask them to provide. That's a great
flag and we will make a note of that
when we bring back the incentives as
well. Commissioner warren gully
>> thank you I'm glad you brought that
up commissioner fields. This is kind of
our current state, right? What you are
talking about is something I think many
people, many of us have an interest in,
what other types of incentives. I'm
thinking about I can't remember the
name of the gosh darn grocery store
group that came in. Remember one of the
things we actually put in place was you
had to put one of your stores in a
designated food desert that our staff
came up with. So I think those are all
really important conversations about
forward thinking, do we have other
types of things that we ask of our
businesses when they come into our
community.
>> it would be great to have a list so
I can kind of see. Make sure we are
asking and putting in place the right
[indiscernible]. One of the things
moving forward would be childcare. If
we are building some of these big
companies, they could have child care.
I don't know what the list is but if we
have an opportunity to influence
incentives to make sure it helps people
keep their jobs.
>> yes, I think of even union
representation in some of these large
scale projects. There's a whole host of
things we could somewhat explored that
I think other organizations do have as
part of this conversation it's probably
a lot bigger than this conversation
>> right. And I understand this is
passed but looking ahead
[indiscernible]. It's really hard and
the middle class is shrinking. We have
to be mindful of that as we create
these opportunities across arapahoe
county. Feeding that pipeline and
bringing people up.
>> I do want to say that, skipping to
the end of the slide, I do want to say
those are the conversations we are
hoping to spark through this
presentation, what are we looking to
get to and how can we bring new
information that would be helpful, in a
structure that would be beneficial. I
wanted to mention revitalization areas
because the county has designated
revitalization areas. This is not
something we control but something that
is helpful to folks for homeownership
opportunities. There is a calculation
that hud creates that designates these
areas, areas where there are additional
opportunity for folks in homeownership.
wanted to flag that those exist in the
following areas in arapahoe county. We
can certainly [indiscernible] of these
spaces and navigating how to support
folks in that. That's what the county
does. Currently that's what the county
program looks like, that's how we
operate. The list of cities is
interesting.
>> hud has a list..... [indiscernible]
hud has a list, there may be specific
areas within those cities, it's not
necessarily the whole city itself.
>> now we are going to transition
[laughter] I love my district. I love
district 2.
>> that's how the county structures at
a high level economic development
program. We wanted to talk about how
other countries do that. We did not
talk about cities because cities are a
different animal they have different
opportunities to help support and
regulate economic development element
than counties do. Counties are very
regulated in that area [indiscernible]
and we will go through that. This is a
list of things we looked at with other
counties so we can identify that for
you. Adams county has a robust economic
development department, it's mostly
internal, combined with their community
development community and economic
development department. As you can see
the budget is [indiscernible] but it
includes all those different areas.
like grants and different things
flowing through? Permits. It has a lot
of different elements, they combine
them into one office. Six of the staff
are dedicated to economic development.
they have a team of six people specific
to economic development. What that
means to them is different than what
the county does but generally that is
doing the work we leverage with our
partners. They have about $6 million
specific to economic development. 1
million is membership. The way we
leverage our partners [indiscernible]
they have a different resource for
that. That is about $1 million in
memberships. They also provide
incentives and have a formal incentive
policy. They created a county
revitalization authority something the
state recently approved that counties
can do, a ura for cities. It allows you
to leverage certain areas. I believe
counties can do that specifically for
all unincorporated areas. And you can
narrow down what that looks like.
that's what adams county has done, they
created an authority in that
revitalization authority is there board
of directors or commissioners.
>> the board of revitalization
authority are the five county
commissioners? Correct that
responsibility can also be delegated.
they also leverage the adams county
regional partnership, as well as
[indiscernible]. We are starting with a
very robust broad program.
>> a quick question michelle this is
for you. $1 million in memberships. Is
that, what membership would require
that accumulation of funds? Do you have
a sense? How much goes to the a-list
sponsorship? They sponsor accelerate,
they do the a-list [indiscernible] I
had tickets to [indiscernible]. I think
similar at a smaller scale we support a
lot of different chambers. I think they
augment that. I have not dove into
specifically what they give to aurora
edc or to acrup. We don't see that. I
can tell you just because I talk to the
edcs, whether it's denver south or
aurora, other people make more
significant investments than we have
historically done we've been very flat
because of our budget situation. As you
look at this and it gives you food for
thought, as we transition over the next
couple years there's opportunity to
have conversations about what do you
get for the level of investment. I'm
proud of the board a couple years ago
in 20 and 21 made that shift to look at
what are we getting for $50,000
investment at the aurora chamber and
how do we track that. We haven't done
that in the past. I can't speak, they
put a lot more into those third-party
groups and we do. I don't know what the
return on investment is that we could
look into that down the road. As we go
through these examples you will see a
lot of diversity, other counties put
not dissimilar amount of money into one
organization.
>> what I like about the investments we
are making, I haven't had a chance to
look at the organizations we support. A
lot of them are not big-box
organizations. [indiscernible] we do
invest in I would say neighborhood type
organizations really doing a lot of the
work in the community as well as
supporting aurora chamber and others I
was pleased when I saw the list. I saw
some names I did not think would make
it
>> [indiscernible] that's a good one. I
want to say from the administrative
perspective, the way we talk about
economic development partnerships, we
talk about it in terms of memberships
with organizations. The list attached
to your report includes memberships. We
also maintain a list of sponsorships
for specific events and other
investments but we have not
historically bundled as development.
but that may be something wrong we say
memberships to adams county maybe that
means sponsorship elements as well.
[indiscernible] boulder county we will
swing to the other side of the
pendulum. Boulder county is not
dissimilar from her office. They do not
have dedicated staff within the
organization. The county
administrator's office supports efforts
and coordinates with the external
partners. They submit about 180,000,
that may be different those 24
numbers, to fund eight or nine
organizations. They leverage boulder
economic council to provide external
support. They do not do any tax
incentives or business retention
support as an organization. Any of that
work happens external to them. They
also do not have a lot of
unincorporated areas, most of their
unincorporated areas are
[indiscernible], not an option to
leverage. That's interesting
>> commissioner baker
>> university of colorado that's all I
want to say. That has an impact on
boulder. Huge. Very different
structure. Very different priorities.
douglas county has very limited
dedicated staff, they have leverage the
internal staff historically, not
dedicated but similar to how we could
do it. Recently they have chosen to use
external support from the douglas
county economic development
corporation. In 2025 they committed
almost $1 million to the edc for that
work. That includes all of their
incentive programs, all of the work we
leverage our partners to do. They also
have a community development department
that provides that business support,
and they have a dedicated business
coordinator. That person works with
businesses to go through the licenses
and permits that sort of thing and
helps the staff with that. They
launched a childcare tax incentive
program in 2026 as well as a county
revitalization authority. They
delegated that responsibility to the dc
edc, another option for consideration
and they also launched in 2025 a
red tape reduction task force. Just a
group across the county dedicated to
reducing regulatory burden on
commercial and industrial development.
douglas county [indiscernible]. They
have some tools they have implemented
in douglas county that may be
interesting to the board. Jefferson
county has limited internal staff, they
leverage the economic development
corporation. They created an economic
development planner position in their
own structure, that supports contracts
with cities metro and special districts
and coordinates with the edc. They
commit about 260,000 in 2026 to
economic development efforts. They have
an emphasis on supporting ura
development. And all the incentives go
through the jc edc. Larimer county has
a different structure, all internal
support. It is braided with a lot of
money but it is primarily
[indiscernible]. They have six staff
focused primarily on workforce. The
economic development functions are from
my understanding not the primary
function of the office, they are
secondary to workforce I should not say
secondary I should say braided with
workforce in a way we don't do. They
have a contract with weld county for
broader economic development. They also
use consultants for incentives that
come before them. Commissioner warren
gully
>> thank you madam chair. Kendra, to be
clear, the 8.1, are they putting 8.1
million in their? Or are they utilizing
some of their workforce funds to do
economic development stuff? My guess is
the latter. I don't have a breakdown of
how much of that is specific coming
from the general fund. My guess is not
very much. I was not aware they could
spend.... Workforce dollars that way
but maybe they don't, maybe they are
just saying workforce creates economic
opportunity? I don't know how they
structure these funds. I just know they
are combined. Okay thank you I
appreciate that
>> those are the counties we looked at.
structure is all a little different,
definitely identifying opportunities
the board could look up further. This
is a list of some of those
opportunities the board may want to
look into. This is certainly not a
recommendation or any sort of staff is
just identifying things other counties
do. We want to make sure you are aware
of additional tools in the toolbox if
you want to look into those. Our idea
would be if you identify some of these
areas of interest, we could come back
to you with what that might look like
in our county, what kind of effort it
might need additional resources the
county might need to launch something
like that. And the board could have a
conversation about what that looks
like
>> I would just say I think we've heard
throughout the last year the incentive
payment agreement structure is
paramount of importance. We are moving
forward. We will be bringing that back
to you after recess. I think the other
ones are certainly things, there's no
timeline on any of these and some of
these things you have talked about in
other spaces. I think this is just an
awareness of what people do that you
could have us explore further with a
shared group of people across the
county. Commissioner warren gully
>> thank you madam chair. I can't
remember, what is the benefit of a
county revitalization authority? It's a
65 page bill.
>> it's a good read. I don't want to
get out of my space, I will let
michelle chime in I'm certainly not an
expert. I think it allows the county to
create goals and opportunities for
incentives within a specific geographic
area to help leverage the business in
that area. It is not dissimilar from
the urban renewal. Think about tax
increment financing, leveraging
property taxes to build infrastructure
for a specific area. Jason is nodding
his head, I'm glad I remember the 65
page summary. It is a newer tool in the
toolbox. Understanding how you would
use it where you would use it, what
makes sense, is something that could be
explored down the road. It's a newer
tool for counties akin to the urban
renewal. For counties version of urban
renewal. We identify an area for
example commissioner fields
conversation, if there is an area we
want to tag? I don't remember the bill,
do you remember the bill?
[indiscernible] I know jason has looked
at it this at the 30,000 foot level
>> very broad strokes because it has
been quite a while since I've looked at
the details. There's two components to
a county revitalization authority. The
first step is for the county to
establish it, take action to say there
is a county revitalization authority
and is applicable in these areas of the
county. Adams county has taken that
step. They adopted resolution saying we
have a county revitalization authority,
and it may have been anywhere in
unincorporated adams county. The second
step is a more detailed process to
focus on a specific area and develop a
plan for that area. My understanding is
that adams county is currently doing
that for an unincorporated area near
commerce city. As ms. Hallstead
mentioned the tax increment financing
is one of the tools committees can
bring to the county revitalization
authority.
>> thank you jason
>> commissioner campbell
>> I can hit some of the things it
touches on. Area that upon
implementation of the county
revitalization plan substantially
promote sound growth of the county
economic social conditions and furthers
health safety well-being of the public
by the actualization of one of the
following opportunity factors. It
creates opportunities for investing in
infrastructure water sanitary sewer,
improvement of mobility increased
access to transportation development of
affordable housing economic opportunity
job creation growth expansion to
healthy food system community medical
system public parks enhancement of
safe reliable transportation
remediation contamination of water,
clearance abatement rehab of
structurally unsound former landfills
urban level development in
unincorporated areas. Thank you.
>> I would be remiss I'm glad jason is
here, I'd be remiss in not highlighting
kathy and jason have both been key
partners in this conversation because
the county has a economic development
function. Both of them do excellent
work trying to gather the tools at
their disposal. Jason's team look up
the eastern plains and how we can
support those areas in economic
development. Commissioner fields
>> you mentioned there may be some
challenges when dealing with the city.
I can tell you what I've seen is great
partnership with community resources
that suit relates to the housing
authority and city of auroras
opportunity. I'd like to suggest we
continue to use that lens to reach that
communities where there's been no
investment in some communities which
happens to be in urban areas for
decades. So, if there is an opportunity
to take a look through partnership to
address that, it would be good.
>> commissioner baker
>> sorry, it may be for jason. We have
done the economic zone that we took,
did not take but worked with inglewood
and got aurora chamber to take that on.
does an economic zone preclude a
revitalization authority? Or can they
be overlapped? Okay. I wanted to make
sure
>> I do want to say it would be helpful
if the board had specific tools here
they want to identify they are
interested in getting information. We'd
love to think about how that comes back
to you.
>> commissioner. Thank you madam chair.
okay, so, ya, I'm having a hard time
consolidating all of my thoughts.
looking at this list, obviously we
talked about incentive payment
agreement structure. One thing I think
would be helpful also is understanding,
getting a broader lens, like scope of
how much land we have available to be
developed in unincorporated areas.
where they are because when we think
about commodities, which land is, the
scarcity and limitation, are we running
out of land where is the land how is it
zoned how do we think about that? Where
does that fit within our own their
comprehensive plans? So we know how
strict we can be. If we are starting to
run out of land especially in dove
valley and other areas, we can be much
more strict about what we have. Whereas
maybe in district 3 it's at this but I
also think developable areas in urban
areas or suburban whatever the
centennial that bridge between all the
things, sustainability goals and how
strict we want to be around those, as
wells to what commissioner fields was
saying, it would be great to know what
we can require. So, childcare, so that
incentive agreement is important to me.
also and I will say as a broader tool,
I think it would be informative when
looking at that, is being very
strategic in our local economy, and
diversifying the industries that are
here. While aerospace is great, we've
got a really strong connection between
primary employers and the satellite
companies that go around to supply
that. I don't want us to get to have
[indiscernible] making
sure we have a diverse portfolio with
an accounting of industries and saying
does that support also in getting with
our community colleges or schools. Do
we have that talent pipeline and
creating that relationship. I'm seeing
a whole [indiscernible] of it. I think
affordable housing policies and
incentives we've been working on that.
what more can we do. Childcare property
tax incentive program could be
interesting. I'm open to the county
revitalization authority but I think we
need to sort of feel that a little bit.
internal staffing, I think that is a
conversation we need to have. We've
been having it but it feels a lot like
the economic community development
perspective that adams has taken is
all-in-one. Economic development
programs yes we need to talk about that
permitting review process I did write
down, I remember in our conversation
with denver south, talking about what
is helpful to developers and people
coming in. It's clarity and consistency
on land development, development
processes. Thinking about that from
that development process of kind of
fostering and I know we've been talking
about some of that but just the clarity
around it timelines and how we
communicate that. One of the things I
like about adams county website that
has all the portions on there. So maybe
even part of what we do because of the
economic development opportunities are
distributed, may be part of what we do
is pull it together on a website and
just go look for the information and
find these things and it's all located,
we have a hub for access. And we kind
of start thereby organizing the
information. One thing I find whole
areas is like that douglas county and
ma I said remove requirements for small
locally owned businesses. Douglas
county took the commercial industrial
route. But your margin of error with a
small business is [indiscernible] I
think it was the mandani example was
restaurants had to get a supple permit
to serve ice cream or something. If
there is stuff in public health or
building and things we are doing that
either we need to communicate with
people ahead of time. I know public
health does a lot of education. What
are we doing that is more that needs to
be done. I know the county has always
resisted over regulating because to
what commissioners said the nancy
approach or I think you talked about
that commissioner warren gully. If you
do a thing are you going to enforce it.
we've always been reticent to
[indiscernible] so maybe we don't have
extra stuff like that but maybe things
get through that don't make sense
anymore. I also, the objectives on page
four, really interesting conversation
for us to have, either strategic
retreat or some other time study
session, when we look at creating a
sustainable economy. Is not just
primary employer it's also bottom-up
that's not really reflected explicitly
in the objectives, in our approach it
is but I think going bottom-up and
having that whole pipeline that is
encouraging small locally owned
independent businesses, for every
hundred dollars spent at a local loan
business, somewhere between 48 and $75
stays in the local economy. If you shop
at your target it's 15 bucks. Those
kind of things and pulling a bunch of
pieces together. I also wrote down
focus only using locally owned
businesses as county lenders. There are
different things for procurement
[indiscernible]. How you spaced that up
unbundling larger contracts. Anyway I
have a lot of different ideas. I think
for me it's about going where do we get
bang for our buck and what's the
easiest gets first and timing our work
out as we flush out the system. If meet
internal need internal staff,
[indiscernible] the thing I get nervous
about with the tax incentive program is
like edc and denver south are doing
their job to bring people in and how I
guess we really need to define it if
we're not going to be proactive
ourselves and I don't think we need to
on that but we need a clear definition
of moving forward and all of that. I
have a lot of thoughts.
[indiscernible]
>> commissioner warren gully
>> thank you madam chair. I think it is
hard to have this conversation because
of what commissioner campbell just laid
out. We all touch into these worlds
because of the work we do on different
boards and chambers and economic
development folks. I know commissioner
baker is out there are in his community
trying to advocate for the rural side.
when I think about this, what I need
your help with kendra is, is there a way
we could say for the next five years we
really want to incentivize childcare
opportunities and affordable housing.
that's really our goal. How do we
structure our incentives around asking
partners and businesses coming into our
community. How are you going to do this
or do we want to look at, I know at one
time jason and his team did go through
online and figure out where are areas
in unincorporated arapahoe county
mostly within cities. Like commissioner
summey, and my little pockets of these
funky little areas. Are there areas we
really want to specifically say this is
an area we want affordable housing or
senior housing or non-apartment
housing. Those kinds of things. Then
that kind of gives us the opportunity
to say, this is the kind of development
we are looking for, versus just whoever
belongs to that area. I don't know if
that's really possible, or whether we
can utilize these tools to do that. I
look at the childcare property tax
incentive program that I've chatted
about with our early childhood folks,
that's probably not going to
incentivize the small mom-and-pop
groups, which is the majority of people
in our area. It's these large-scale
childcare centers. They are important,
too, but would I rather have some kind
of incentive that supports the
employees that work there? It's so
broad that I wonder if it's more
beneficial to start thinking about in
the next 3 to 5 years what do we want
to focus on. The following 3 to 5 years
to commissioner campbell point, we want
to diversify the types of businesses we
are going to incentivize. That's kind
of where my brain has been trying to
hone it in a little bit. That may not
just be how this world works and I get
that . I think there's an opportunity
bring up a great plan and that's why
the plan program structure is on there.
. There's an opportunity to scope out
where you would like to make
investments certainly economic
development tools, you don't always see
the results immediately. You kind of
have to build it in. I think it could
be something we talked to our partners
with. They are the ones recruiting
these people they understand how that
works. If that's not a function, it's
not a way the world works, they will
tell us I'm sure. There is an
opportunity if you would like to
identify priorities, we can build out
the program or structure that says if
you want to focus on x, y, and z in the
next 3 to 5 years this is what you
should do this is how we could
potentially build it in. If you want to
transition you could swap it out for
something else. Maybe we could build
out an idea of what kind of resources
would be required to do that. Certainly
we don't want to give you a plan that
you can't do. What does it look like to
make investments and what does the
county need to do that.
>> I guess I'm thinking like shape
properties, I think it was just that
redesign and office space. We all know
how extremely expensive that is to do.
I have heard from our colleagues
there's a lot of empty office space. I
like your idea of maybe talking in that
manner with some of our development
folks or our partners to see what do
they see out there. What are business
employers saying, we are not coming to
arapahoe county because of x. I guess I
would just want to say that some of the
things our partners do relative to
incentives attraction retention are
really specific and unique. Some of the
things you have talked about broadening
the ecosystem are also things that are
conversations with directors and
strategic planning and strategic work
plan. What are those tangible things we
are going to make investments in to
achieve an outcome. It may not be an
economic development thing. But it
definitely supports the ecosystem. I
think there is some of these things are
super like permitting and review his
super strategic that absolutely helps
our business community all the way
around. What level of investment would
you want to put on that effort relative
to some other things that might not
rise to the top. I think there is some
prioritization and strategy within the
board and county about what are things
you can move forward. I know we are
doing a lot on housing. But I do think
you have to have intentionality as
well, where do you want to see that
vision. And which tools what levers,
they are not all economic development
but there is some policy decisions and
investments he can make that can and
sent those kinds of things to happen. I
want to pull it back just a because
it's all good stuff.
>> arapahoe county is a county that is
rich for many opportunities for
economic development. We see that
people want to do business in arapahoe
county. Some of it is going to require
us to make sure these companies that
come in, if there's a value that
relates to responsibility to the
community, it can't just be about their
profit line without there has to be
some payback. I don't know what it
looks like. But you can't just have dia
as a cash cow, and then you don't
invest in the community that built dia
or whatever. There has to be some kind
of integration some kind of involvement
in all the cities and people. You can't
just take from the county and not
invest in the county. What values can
we make sure when we are pitching or
they are pitching us, there has to be
some investment back into sponsorships,
maybe I don't know basketball team or
whatever. There's got to be a link back
to the community, not gouging the
community. I agree.
>> good work. We will bring back
incentives as the primary thing, and
circle back with kathy and jason and
see whatever we can do. Great. Thank
you very very much.
>> I think you are good until one, no,
never mind.
>> we've got one more thing.
>>
good morning everyone. . Rhonda fields
commissioner, [indiscernible] leslie
summey commissioner, carrie warren
gully commissioner, jessica campbell
commissioner district 2,
[indiscernible] open spaces, jason
reynolds public works and development.
thank you very much we are here for a
dropping grant opportunity with the
state historical fund grant. I will
start with director pingenot. Thank you
madam chair. I'm going to quickly pass
it on to sandy and dan. Quick drop in
session. We are knowing that 17 mile
house needs a little tlc. That is what
we are here to talk about. This is on
our cip list. Just kinda make that
connection. Sandy take it away
>> I will talk about the grant and
leave it to dan to talk about the scope
itself and work we are doing. We'd like
to apply for a grant from the state
historical fund up to 250,000 we are
working on the budget numbers. We have
to supply 20 percent match.
[indiscernible] what else should I say.
we receive state historical fund
grants in the past most recently in
2017 or 2018 for work on the barn.
[indiscernible] at the time. What
should I say? We have applications due
october 1 so we have a lot of work to
do before that. Ideally we would do the
work beginning next summer. That might
be all from the grant side of things.
the only thing I would add madam chair,
this is very competitive grant. We are
not necessarily holding our breath, we
are thinking about a plan b if that is
the case. But we have given overtures
by folks in the state historical realm
that they feel like our project is
competitive. So, that is promising.
it's about 40 percent of grant
applications are actually approved. So,
but we will persevere nonetheless. It's
important to at least make the ask. It
seems like you typically get around
[indiscernible] it depends on the cycle
they have two cycles per year and they
get three times the amount of requests
available. With fingers crossed. Do you
want to talk about the scope of work?
the scope of work is set to address the
windows, the doors, the certain
shingles on the roof. As the main focus
is the house as well as the siding.
obviously, we are going to be doing the
gutters and wood facia as well. Ideally
we would do it all at once considering
they are all intermingled. There is an
element that we would, you could
potentially improve the windows
specifically on the barn as well since
those were not addressed, not needed at
the last grant application. So, that
right there is the scope we are looking
to focus on as far as what this
application will be received or not.
commissioner baker
>> thank you. The windows, some of
those windowpanes are original. And you
can tell because they are thin at the
top and thicker at the bottom. If there
is replacements being planned, would we
keep some of the original available to
be on display or something like that?
we would reuse all items that are
possible to be reused. We still have
because of the easement, we still have
to get everything as far as specific
details on the scope of work approved
by the colorado historical
[indiscernible], the foundation. So,
our goal is to reuse, even with the
doors reuse as much of the doors as we
can. We would take this opportunity and
we have been working with
[indiscernible] to get her blessing
more or less to update the doors from
the security aspect as well. So, we met
with her last week, she has given her
blessing, she is willing to write a
support letter as well. I think for
some of the artifacts, we would look to
potentially use them in some capacity,
so they are not wasted. Thank you
>> so to add to all these other
comments, this is another partnership
we have with [indiscernible]. Their
team did a great job earlier this
summer with some painting and other
things that needed to be done. We are
mindful of capacity at ffm. We've been
thinking about how can we work with
some of the construction folks in this
space that are strong in historical
preservation. We do have experience in
the past and some come to mind, we are
thinking about leaning more on those
folks in a way to be mindful of our
partnership with different departments.
just adding that to the mix.
>> commissioner warren gully
>> I missed the cue. Any other
discussion? Do we have thumbs up for
the grant application? Thank you for
finding it. Thank you very much.
>>good afternoon everybody. Hi. Since
everybody and their mother is in the
room right now, let's get started with
introductions. Jeff baker commissioner.
patrick hernandez hr michelle hallstead
commissioner's office rhonda fields
commissioner [indiscernible] leslie
summey commissioner carrie warren gully
commissioner jessica campbell
commissioner district 2 dusty sash hr
[indiscernible]wonderful. Thank you all
very very much. We are here for the
2027 total compensation. Dusty sash?
>> thank you for having me. We will
review total compensation and then dive
into benefits, look at what the market
is, what our plan looks like and changes. As
a reminder we do make decisions on
benefit requests today so we can get
open enrollment on. , side of
[indiscernible]. We will go through
compensation and look at total cost at
the request and the timeline. There's a
lot of slides in the appendix I may
refer to them from time to time, in
case you one additional background and
data on the requests we will be making.
also I know the board knows this, I
don't mind interruptions so feel free.
>> you just opened the beast
>> I'd rather address it when we have
it. Total compensation philosophy has
not changed in several years we strive
to competitively pay our employees to
our defined wage and salary market and
adjusts to attract new talent and award
performance our salary is the midpoint
which means half of our peers pay less
than us have to pay more than us and in
our market area is 26 entities within
the denver boulder area. The five
components of compensation it is not
just cash, it is included compensation
the dollars we pay employees in
exchange for the value they provide us.
it also provides benefits which limit
exposure. To financial risk. Work life
success benefits. And policies like
flex time, vacation, sick those kind of
things that allow employees to be
successful at work and at home. They
bring their whole self to work at work
so we want to make sure they are
successful in both places. Performance
recognition to tie their goals and
efforts to the county. And, our
successes within that. And development
and career opportunities, learning
exercises that enhance skill and
competency so they can grow. I
understand not today but sometime you
may hear recommendation to change this
compensation philosophy
[indiscernible]. That is the
overarching premise of which we will
put the rest of this against. Benefits
and well-being. We will look at the
market. Not a lot has changed since we
met on this. Over all our living and
benefits are leading the market, we
provide comprehensive holistic suite of
benefits to support employee well-being
and they can personalize it for what
matters most to each of them and their
families. We lead the market and
medical, dental, paid time off plans,
inhibit your money line caregiver
support benefits to provide support for
those caring for others, infants at
work and medical gap. The market vision
flexible spending accounts eap life and
a d&d insurance and disability
insurance. Tuition reimbursement policy
and paid caregiver leave. Retirement
contribution, I understand the
retirement board has asked the board of
county commissioners to increase the
county portion from 10 percent to 10.25
percent, that is $635,000. We would
need a decision on that today so we can
get the system quoted for first of the
year. We have a note that empower has
put in a bid to acquire milliman.
milliman houses are retirement plan,
pension plan. Mpower houses the 457
deferred compensation and for a1a
defined contribution plans. At some
point assuming this goes, we will do an
implementation of move the pension over
to mpower or the retirement board can
choose to do an rfp to select a new
provider. That is expected to close on
september 1. More to come. We will talk
about the net value, how to say our
medical plan is leading the market.
this is a reminder compares plan
design, that is deductible co-pay
coinsurance and out-of-pocket maximums,
the cost within the design plus
premiums to get a value. It compares
our plan against similar plans in the
market. On the core plan, when you
factor in the hra, are deductible is
less than the average of peers. Our
co-pay is the same. Our specialty
co-pay is a little more. Our
out-of-pocket maximum is less and
coinsurance is less. Premiums are also
less. You add all that together
compared to the average of the peers,
that makes our plan 12.3 percent more
valuable, we are leading the market.
does not mean somebody can't have a
lower premium. That might be in there
because it's an average but it also
means that others have higher premiums.
on average the employee only is $35.05
more per month, and the family is $162
more each month than our plan. And we
have the choice plan, the design seems
to be about the same but premiums are
more. That results in our choice plan
valued at 15 percent lower than the
market average for the ppo. Medical
renewal, you will recall that last year
we had a 19.3, we negotiated to have a
smoothing effect, we took a .5 and have
three percent for three years. We have
negotiated that and we have the three
percent smoothing for the next three
years forgiven that is gone. The first
offer for renewal is 13.2,
[indiscernible] has negotiated that to
9.5. From a starting expectation of
16.2 our renewal will be 9.5. That
makes our five year average 3.2
significantly better than the market.
which tells me since plans are 90
percent of cost employees are using a
plant [indiscernible]. We are talking
huge numbers but employees are using
the plan the cost of the 9.5 is just
under 3 million total cost. Primary
drivers we've had some high costs
[indiscernible] with bone and kidney
cancer copd congestive heart failure
and autoimmune disease that affects the
skin, I can't say it. Scleroderma. And
we've had additional high-cost claims,
more than the benchmark. We've had
high-cost claimants over 50,000. We've
had a higher cooling point this year
which means we take on more risk. Our
premium for that goes down, a portion
of the premium goes down but we are
also taking on more risk of claims.
kaiser has also changed their
underwriting methodology to be 24
months instead of 12. The idea would be
that hopefully that smooths things out
when you have a bad year you have 24
months to calculate that in.
unfortunately for us it includes the
19.3 now that we got last year. It was
an advantage for us this year but
overall given our five-year average it
should help in the future. They applied
a trend of 6.89 compared the cost this
year. At 6.89 that beats the national
trend average of 9.5 and colorado trend
average of 11 percent. That comes in a
lot lower than the average. Because of
this, it's a rare occasion but we are
able to maintain county employee will
total cost share 7525 by applying 9.5
percent to the county portion and
employee portion. Both plans all tears.
it's rare that happens because they pay
so much less than the county does. The
percentage dollar amount usually ends
up being bigger. In this case we can
maintain 75/25 by applying 9.5
across-the-board. It will probably
never happen again. That puts the
county cost to the general fund at just
over 1.2 million. Any questions? We
will maintain the same premium cost
share. The hmo employee only the county
pays 82 percent with employees paying
18 percent. Dependent coverage county
pays 72 percent with employees sharing
28 percent. Choice ppo a buyout plan
that's more expensive the county
contributes less in addition the county
covers 64 percent with employee paying
36. Dependent coverage county pays 54
percent with the employee paying 46
percent of the premium. That increases
total cost of the plan 26 million for
the county side and just under 9
million for the employees to share. The
cost goes up in the percentages the
same 75/25, because it is a
[indiscernible] call so as you read
more people total cost goes up. This is
what it does to the rates. Today's
rates are in the second column, 2027
rates are in the third column, the
change from 26 to 27 biweekly in the
fourth column. From $6.29 employee only
to 51 70 on the family for the ppo. We
can talk about how that impacts the
employees the employees often hear if
my rate is going to go up 9.5 percent
and I only get three percent merit
increase, it's costing me to stay. We
wanted to show the impact of a larger
percentage on a smaller dollar amount
compared to a smaller percentage on a
larger dollar amount. He these include
medical on a dh amount dental basic
live short-term disability 401(k) and
tax rate of 20 percent. The first
example is employee a, a 29-year-old
single individual making $42,226, our
lowest paid employee at the county
currently. Currently that ends up being
gross 1626 per pay period. The employee
has $218 in deductions while the county
provides $497 of benefits in addition
to the base comp. That results in his
taxes because you will take the gross
minus the deductions, to get a taxable
income. You are being taxed on a
smaller amount. While it's 20 percent
tax rate it is 17 percent of gross.
those pretax benefits lower your tax
bill. This individual currently takes
home 69 percent of gross for 11 26.
assuming spoiler alert 4.6 percent
salary increase for the following year
his income will go to 1700 per
paycheck. With the increase to medical,
his increase will go to 229 for
reductions, still remains 13 percent.
his taxes go up to 294, remaining at 17
percent. For a take home of 1177. He
will still take home $51 more per
paycheck, even with the larger increase
to medical and 4.6 percent increase to
salary. Second example is a 49 year-old
with a family making 90,059, our
average pay across the county. If you
remove this it's 84,000. 90,000 ends up
being 3464 today. You can see all the
same numbers. 18 percent for
deductions taxes 16 percent take-home
pay 66 percent. Interestingly enough,
you read the family coverage in in your
take-home pay even though you make a
lot more ends up being less on a
percentage basis. Assuming 4.6 percent
this individual would take him an
additional 103 13 each paycheck.
essentially it ends up being being
enrolled in these plans saves the
individual $131 in taxes each paycheck.
reduces their tax bill. Just a little
bit of an impact on how this helps
employees. If we apply all that and it
gets approved, this is the same chart
to look at the value but instead of the
2026 versus 2026 where we are today, is
the peers 2026 against our 2027. That
drops a little bit because they haven't
changed their premiums yet. Our plan
would still be valued at 7.5 percent
higher than their current plan even
without them changing agreements. It
sits in a good place. Our target is plus or
minus five percent of the average. We tend to
lead a little more than that five
percent we do expect this will go up
once our peers make changes. We have
found out our ten county [indiscernible]
was scheduled for 9-14 so we will have
more information on that from that
meeting and on comp. Before you have to
make a decision on comp that after this
meeting. A little note on medical
renewal for 2028, we are in the process
of doing the medical survey, which goes
a cup closed a couple of fridays ago.
we will put that all together but
depending on what that circumstance
looks like and what we decide to do
kaiser has offered if we don't go
early, if we stay with our normal
schedule they will offer a negotiated
option. It came to us with no more than
9.5 not to exceed 9.5 percent. We asked
them to sweeten the pot, they came back
with two options. Option one no greater
than nine percent. If we get a two
percent renewal we get to present. If
we get 15 percent we get nine percent.
or option two, eight fixed eight
percent. I don't think that's
reasonable because it would get that
history shows we beat the markets more
years than not. We end up paying eight
regardless. We don't have to take it if
we go early. If that's the decision
this is off the table but it is there
in case we are sticking with the normal
timeline in the first place.
commissioner campbell
>> I know that we have been putting
together a team to look at our medical
and all of that. And that there is a
little bit of urgency around it, we
been talking about it for a while, I
also know there's a lot of information
that goes into this. Is there a benefit
in sticking with the current, deadlines
or actions? We laugh sometimes like
government seems like were the problem.
but also to be thoughtful and
procedural and get feedback and buy-in,
that takes time. So if we go with this,
does it have this benefit also the side
benefit of giving us a thoughtful
process so we are not rushing that
feedback process as well. Basically you
would have a year to talk about and
figure it out and then we go out in 28
for 29. Which is our normal schedule. I
will say bill and I have been meeting
with all of the [indiscernible] the
anthem blue cross, united healthcare,
all of them one-on-one informally.
we've also met with brian over at
aurora. They added in healthcare
standard next to kaiser last year so we
could get some lessons learned. What we
don't want to do to your point is rush
so we get the same result we got two
years ago. All of them said we can't do
that, we can't meet those expectations.
so we only had one proposal that did
not meet the rfp requirements. What we
want to do is be thoughtful and
intentional so no matter how much time
it takes to make sure we're
[indiscernible] so ideally every single
one of them respond and we have a
choice
>> are we doing internal committee
process as well? We are halfway through
it now we just met from 12 to 1 today,
going over next steps in the next two
meetings. We will provide you
information [indiscernible]
>> okay great meetings the last meeting
is september 29. We have open
enrollment between now and then. We
will hopefully have a committee member
present results to you in early
november. Okay great. Okay. And we can
take that feedback and inform the work
next year as well. But this also, by
staying the course, this gives us more
surety. Okay. More clarity. Once we get
the feedback from those two groups
because we did a survey and also
did.... Clarity by staying on time and
not going out in 27. I know some people
were eager for us to do. But by not
doing that we also get this witch in a
land of everything costs more and more
it feels like. Maybe it's disappointing
that some people not go out earlier but
it also [indiscernible]. You don't have
to make this decision until november.
>> okay. Okay gotcha. We get feedback
from the survey and group and if this
makes sense cool. If your instruction
is december 9, I need drop dead, I will
take every single minute you can give
me on top of that but that is my
drop-dead. There's no way I can go early
if I don't know by september 9.
>> okay thank you. That's medical. Here
goes dental. We had a renewal for
dental this year. Claims went up .3
percent. Which is $5200. Asoc because
it's self-insured we pay an
administrative fee to delta dental went
up 2.9 percent an additional $3000
total increase of 8200. That being the
case we also have the dental reserve at
671 300. A previous board gave us
instructions to keep that around
300,000. We have not been able to
supplement the rates effectively
enough, impasse strategy to make a dent
in that it keeps going up. I'm
deviating a little in my request this
year. To take out the 8200 increase
from the reserve, but also to reduce
the employee share of the rates for 27
and reduce the dental rates. And we pay
it out of the reserve. That will reduce
the reserve by 322 which puts us around
350. That ends up being anywhere from
two dollars to 10.50 a paycheck
depending on your tier. A smaller cost
but still a positive message to say
medical rates are going up but dental
is going down.
>> commissioner warren gully
>> thank you. If we do that which is a
great idea, I'm just thinking of when
we have to get the rates back up to
what they normally would be and how
that would feel also. What do we
typically add to this fund every year?
we did not add as much last year some
of it depends on claims but generally
it's been growing by 200,000 a year. I
think we will be okay. We do the normal
split going forward assuming this does
not [indiscernible] where if it's a two
percent increase how does that play out
into the rates. We allocate the
increase again but from the lower
number. We start building from the
lower number back up again. So we
wouldn't have to next year
[indiscernible]
>> I don't anticipate that, no. Can't
guarantee on the aso but I don't
anticipate that on the claims. We have
not seen that yet. I have a question do
you want us to wait until you finish
everything or give you direction? This
seems like it could be [indiscernible]
if you are ready and you don't need to
see the whole picture to make decision
then tell me and I will write it down.
do we have thoughts on the dental? Five
thumbs up on the dental.
>> do you want to go back to medical?
>> this one seemed a really simple.
this one is informative so you don't
have to vote. Life a d&d disability and
medical gap rfp was conducted this year
it is our third largest. We went to
market to match or enhance the current
plans. We had seven responses, the
standard was the incumbent
[indiscernible] the evaluation team
dusty bill dominique and jay, the
standard received the highest rating
and will remain the provider with
reduced premium costs to save the
county 370,000 a year. And some
significant enhancements. For
guaranteed issue meaning you don't have
to fill out signature form will
increase for employee live from 200,000
to 250. Spouse live from 30,000 to
50,000. The accelerated benefit which
is not something lovely to speak about,
accelerated benefit is when you
received a terminal diagnosis within
the next 12 months, you can take a
portion of life insurance out. That
increases to 80 percent up to 600,000.
so you can get your affairs together.
some enhancements on that. Well-being
plan, we continue to have double-digit
growth in the portal access for
participation of programs. We offer
more than 16 programs with a reminder
successful well-being generally needs
to have 10 programs per year to keep
engagement. And six asked specs to be
holistic. Our plan does have six, it
has career community emotional
financial physical and social
components. So we can address the whole
person. We continue to see double digit
growth each year since we redesigned
the program. Wellness council
unfortunately has dropped. Right now we
have a few reports struggling in, 32
percent completion of the kp numbers,
25 percent of everyone. Last year we
had 48 percent. It dropped
significantly. We can look into reasons
why, it could just be fatigue, it could
be we did not get the communication out
as effectively as we used to, we will
have to look into it. It did drop
significantly. With the easier process.
total health continues to grow every
year, total brain continues to grow we
had 1570 since we initiated it in 2024.
your money line has 32 percent
engagement rate, that is more than
double the standard for the business
engagement. Employees are using the
benefits the county provides for them
for their well-being. Tuition
reimbursement, we had 13 participants a
little low in 2025, we had 18 in 2026.
mental health first aid we had 398
participants since 2019, most of the
board will be at the november meeting,
we just had them last week, we got a
lot of positive feedback again from
that class. Our pivot tobacco
cessation, we currently have 15
participants, if every single
participant were to quit, that would
save the medical plan 135,000 a year.
tobacco user cost twice what a
nontobacco user costs, on average
$9000. We have 189 employees who have
tested to using tobacco chronically.
we've had 150 participants in the
program since 2021. For 2026 we did add
an improved spouse's and adult children
to the program, per the request of
employees. Home thrive our caregiver
support, we've had 247 participants
since 2022, 152 unique active users in
the first half of 2026. They signed up
once but they continually go back and
get additional support. This more than
doubles their [indiscernible] while
that seems low to me, they are thrilled
with the engagement our staff has with
it. I will need a vote on this one.
vacation carryover. Our current carrier
policy all benefit eligible employees
may carry over 144 hours of vacation
regardless of tenure or accrual rate.
we made this choice intentionally
because we do recognize the positive
impact of taking vacation on the
employee well-being. And selfishly
their productivity when they come back.
however, we often hear, I often hear
that it just isn't feasible to take all
that time off because we need on the
accrual that we lag on the carryover.
so we give more time but is not always
possible for them to take all that time
off. They end up feeling anxiety and
stress about not doing their job taking
their time and losing it. We did look
at it for a couple years to get to the
right timing. We are going to propose
we drop the accrual down so everyone
under 10 years of service will accrue
at 144. Currently we have under five
years at 120. They can carryover one
year worth of accrual. It's still not
like what our peers do but it's a
smaller step. But we carryover the same
as they accrual. If you accrue 144 you
can carry over 144. If you accrue 168
you can carry over 168. If you accrue
192 you can carry over 192. The
potential liability, if they are taking
time off while employed, it's part of
their salary. But if they leave with a
balance, that payout is a potential
liability. That cost will be about
216,000 which represents 2.5 percent of
total vacation liability in 2027.
additionally the carryover, the
difference between 144 and 168 hours,
is an additional $68,500. We asking to
make this change on behalf of employees
who have been begging for this.
commissioner fields
>> my question is, I know you are
responding to feedback from employees.
do you have consensus what kind of
reaction might you get because of the
[indiscernible]
>> it is positive. We did get feedback.
we have the five and under at 120 which
means they would only accrue 120 was to
move all of those accruing 120 up so
they get 24 hours more to 144. There's
no take away it is all positive. We
also have feedback that this is not
enough but again with that standard
principal of its good for their
well-being, it's good for employees to
take time off. I don't want to go so
far over with it, they are getting
burnout because they don't take time
off. Commissioner baker
>>dusty, has this particular all of it
hasn't gone before the e team? And you
got feedback from them as well? Yes. We
have thumbs, five thumbs up.
>> thank you. No change on the
holidays. Because christmas falls on a
saturday, we will back christmas up to
friday for weekend rules which means
christmas eve gets backed up to the
23rd. It will be thursday and friday
off but now we are on the right days.
other than that, those are the days.
the court holidays no christmas eve or
day after thanksgiving unless the court
closes. Therefore they received five
floating holidays. They are supposed to
be saving two of those in case the
courts close. If they don't choose to
do that and use them ahead of time,
they have to either take vacation or
take it unpaid if the courts close.
other benefits, late guarantee accept
prepaid legal will go from 762 to 992
832 percent increase. It has not
increased in 12 years. It's a huge
increase, it increase two years ago and
I pushed back and they let it ride for
a couple years. It has not really
changed in 12 years. While 30 percent
seems huge, divided by 12 it's not that
bad. That is benefits. Compensation,
update on the labor market. Our
employees are focusing more on costs
than retention as a primary decision
driver for comp and benefits. This does
not mean they don't think retention is
important. Is just that in the last year
the cost is no longer sustainable for
organizations so that becomes a primary
driver trying to find what their
decision-making is. There still remains
economic uncertainty. As an example 1
of the reasons we may have economic
uncertainty is ai, restructuring jobs
in some fields. Ai has helped
organizations target reskilling for data
entry clerks. Which means organizations
even if they don't get rid of the role
as a human being they lowered the
salaries or they use ai and don't
rehire so that creates uncertainty. We
also see some boomerang effect with
that organizations that laid off these
roles are thinking ai could do it have
said this is not working and brought
back the staff. That creates boomerang
creates instability. And some
uncertainty. Merit budgets have settled
back to the approximate 3.5 percent
each year that were at pre-pandemic
levels but turnover and job openings
remain at the 22/23 level.
organizations are looking at
performance-based bonuses or short-term
incentives which we don't get here
because you have to have stock options.
to continue to gain momentum over base
salary increases. We will see how that
plays out. Generally government lags
three years from private. So we should
be able to see some of those outcomes
from these changes before we have to
look at any of those things as an
option. There has been because of the
economic uncertainty a structural slow
down. Organizations are becoming slower
to hire, they slow down higher rates,
also employees while the turnover rates
are same as 22, they are starting to
slow down because of economic
uncertainty employees are holding fast
and slowing their willingness to leave.
slow down on both sides. Salaries and
advanced sectors like ai have continued
to experience growth. They are using
what they call skill sets to determine
compensation rather than experience. We
have a new technology you may not have
a lot of people with skill sets. That
would not work for mature organizations
like us across-the-board.
[indiscernible]
>> the first box iteration of merit
sits at 3.5 with top performance
receiving between 5.6 and six percent.
in the labor market. Denver cost of
labor is around 18 percent higher than
national average. Thus from the bureau
of labor statistics. Cost of living is
12.9 percent of the national average.
cost of labor is higher than
cost-of-living. Still higher than the
national average. We talked about the
percentages on dollar amounts. And how
that impacts it. The denver cpi
increase five percent versus national
average of 4.2. Arapahoe county
unemployment is 3.6 percent. We have
talked in the past about when
unemployment rate is below four, it can
make it very hard for us to hire or
recruit. So, we start looking for some
creative and flexible ways to
incentivize employees and candidates to
come when we are in hard to fill
positions. We have our eyes out for
that [indiscernible] on that. 94.8
percent of employees are in positions
that match the market, 87 percent of
jobs are matched to the market. That's
a very stable number and we love that.
it tells us we do have the data to say
we are where we are at in a competitive
market. From three years ago when we
had no data to this, it makes our jobs
a lot easier. Our comp ratio is .98, it
shows our structure not the employee
pay, our structure is lagging the
market by two percent. Not a surprise.
we did not fund 2.67 percent we
requested last year due to financial
constraints. The fact that the
structure is behind is not surprising.
our average pay and this is a new
statistic, our average pay is lagging
peers by 3.9 percent. The structure two
percent below where it needs to be,
will move almost 2 percent . But our
pay is in the lower percentile , there
are more demographics on that our
average pay how many people are below
midpoint on page 45. So roger on the
structure. But our average pay lag
appears by 3.9 percent but yet two
boxes over we see that 94.8 percent of
employees are in positions that match
the market 87 percent of jobs match the
market if average pay lag our peers by
3.9 percent that feels counter posed.
these are the positions that have a
benchmark so we have a number to
compare against. The structure is two
percent. But managers are making hiring
decisions and pay decisions in the
lower half. So our pay is almost 4
percent lower than peers average pay.
so the comp ratio, yes. I guess 3.6
percent unemployment will take care of
that. Maybe. I mentioned that the total
comp which we usually have in july
won't be until september 14. At this
point I only have 36 percent of peers
recording and their number. Cpec are
foundational markets data came back
with merit moving 3.7 percent into
2027, structure moving 1.93, which
represents that two percent. Pay scale
came in at 2.1 and 2.1 even across.
world of work came in at 3.5 and 2.5,
pay scale and world at work all
industries and all public-private and
not-for-profit. Government fears the 36
that have provided feedback come in
with a merit asks, they have not asked
yet, 2.43 percent on average, structure
movement of 1.19. If you add the 1.19
and 2.43, you get to a very similar
number two what you see on the next
request. Which is market. We will be
moving the structure 1.93 percent, that
will be applied to the minimum and
maximum. When we move the structure it
also lowers the comp ratio. We move the
structure without the pay that lowers
the comp ratio. We recommend you
approve funding, not today, as part of
your normal budgeting package,
recommend funding that movement at 1.5
percent. Not the whole thing but the
majority of it. That is we are trying
to get a total budget number and allow
for pay-for-performance where it
applies in our merit. If the decision
is not to fund the market structure at
1.5, there is still a cost to bring the
minimum. We have 33 jobs not including
union representative jobs that will be
reclassified to higher grades and seven
will be reclassified into lower grades.
nobody gets re-class to a lower grade
has money taken away they have a lower
range but there are some that will need
to get some money to move up in their
grade. That cost is about 92,000
between the two. It's one or the other,
not additive. Merit, for those not
representative or unsworn, we are
asking for 3.1 percent. Going back to
my spoil alert, a total budget of 4.6.
that does not mean everyone gets 3.1
percent. It depends on their
performance rating, some people get
2.1, some people get four. Each
department gets to make the decision
when they are using it for
pay-for-performance. This can adjust
the base rate if they have the room in
the range. It can be a lump-sum if they
are at max or a combination of both. If
you are at max you get a combination
because it's 1.93 for structure to your
base and the remaining lump-sum. This
would cost approximately 4.6 million to
the general fund 2.5 million and with
the benefit load 3 million.
[indiscernible]I would like to ask that
we revisit the one-time award, current
policy is the directors and elected
officials can award one-time awards
between $50 and 5000 for project-based
awards. They are required to keep the
documentation on that. I keep a list of
how many to make sure for the board
direction nobody is abusing it no one
has. We've had the average award of
$1130. We've had an average of 70
awards given in the year. As those
numbers increase, as salaries increase,
the one-time award capped at 5000 does
not always reflect the level of impact
some of these projects make. So I am
requesting we increase it to 7500 the
gross up award and the cost would be
56,000 a year. Commissioner campbell
>> two questions. Please remind me this
comes from each department or office
budget. So they have to find the money
for this. Do we have data since you are
tracking, are these awards normally
given to higher classified employees or
lower classified? Usually lower. They
are project-based so it depends on the
project. Covid for an example 5 years
ago, we had tiers of people who worked
on it so we had tier 1 and who was
working on it based on hours and
impact. We had a variety in that.
usually it is the lower paid employees
that are asked to take on an additional
project that receive these
>> okay. So when we say the cost,
that's based on average. But we do
baseline budgeting so it's not like a
fixed asked from the general fund? It's
not.
>> it is estimating based on averages
and number of awards. They still have
to find the money. Okay great cool
thank you
>> the next ask is for the das office.
they would like to address their new
higher rates and do compression
adjustments to go with that. The
average salary of dda is 98,000 and the
average salary for the dda one is
117,000. What they are experiencing is
sometimes it's hard to get dda to move
from organizations that have this
average to a new hiring lower than
that. Our new hire rate for the dda is
92,000, for dda one it is 102,000. The
other thing they are experiencing other
than being able to attract at lower
numbers than average is that they are
having trouble motivating the county dda
to take on extra work load and impact
of the dda one going from investigator
felonies if there's not a big enough
differential between the salaries.
there is a feeling for them the
internal promotions are not motivating
and they are unable to attract from her
peers for their vacancies. They did
work with us we are recommending a
higher promotional rate for dda to 95 and
the dda 1 to 114,000 plus providing
compression for everybody that is in
their roles. That cost is about
$90,200. One of the things we have
additionally requested and are working
with them on, they have more levels
than the market does. One of the ways
we could create that deferential is by
taking out the dda one level and going
from county dda to dda two. When we say
the average dda one is 117, that's a
blend of one and two because the
market, the peers don't have that.
there is some more work to be done
after we get these hiring rates
started. That is a request for comp. I
will go over a summary of compensation
agreements with the unions which have a
lot of pending language. Still pending.
we have the fop sworn structure, this
is the original counteroffer of the fop
asked for five percent we countered
with the 63rd which is where they are
today, 3.01. The normal step
progression moving from one sub 1 to 7
two is just over 600,000. The market
increased to remain at the 63rd will be
1.7 million. Sworn management structure
is larger than you see in the past.
part of that is based on where the
sergeant ends up so that will change.
also the lieutenant market moved almost
12 percent. It moves significantly.
that has an impact on the number. The
cost on this proposal pending
negotiations, about 2.6 million with
benefit load to the general fund. The
emergency communication, those very,
it's an average of 2.95 percent
increase. Step progression 40,000 going
from step one to step two, 63rd
percentile 150,000. And total cost 233
with benefit load. Pending
negotiations. Those represented in
human services, depending on county
merit decisions. Depending on what you
decide for the merit budget, if that
was approved, this is based on that.
the annual increase across-the-board
for those represented would be 3.6,
represents a combination of 1.5 and
2.1, the meets expectations general
starting point for pay-for-performance.
out of the 3.1 percent budget if you
meet expectations he get about 2.1
percent. That's what that represents.
it is 1.3 million with benefit load. In
addition there are nine jobs being
reclassified to higher grades, those
cost about 2800. For ffm, the 3.6 which
represents 156,000, 185,000 with
benefit load. They don't have anybody
being [indiscernible] last year there
were several, custodians went up two
grades. Nothing getting re-class this
year and no cost in addition to that.
the cost summary, and again it's a
chart every year I get to test your
eyes. One benefit proposal column, to
comp proposals our recommendation I
would not put it in the presentation if
I was not recommending it. In the white
is total cost, in the gray is the
general fund. At the bottom with
benefit load for the recommended
package. Everything in compensation one
and all benefits with benefit load to
general fund 10.18 million. The only
difference for option two is not
funding the market, just doing the cost
for minimum, no da and no one-time
award. There are your totals. Well
done. Here are the timelines. Some of
the timeline is missing. We did not
like the timeline apparently. We are at
the third box. The ebc meeting budget
request is september 8, that's where
they [indiscernible] your comp. Open
enrollment is october 28 through
november 12. Study session for the
budget october 20, november 10 is when
compensation will send out performance
ratings to the directors and elected
officials. November 21, supervisors
will need to complete writing their
performance evaluations. December 1
through the eighth the directors and
elected officials conduct calibration
meetings if needed for review. December
9 directors elected officials send
performance rating budget back to
compensation. December 8 is the
adoption of the budget. December 15 is
when we will open the spreadsheets
[indiscernible] so change in the
system. December 29 directors and
elected officials submit final merit
within my arapahoe. January 7 the pay
increase letters will be released in my
arapahoe. We will be in the system.
january 15, pay increases and benefit
changes are reflected on pay checks.
that's all I've got. Would you like to
go back to medical. Sure let's go back
to medical. 9.5 percent increase.
commissioners?
>> can you put the slide back up?
>> [indiscernible] I just think this is
a thoughtful approach [speaker off mic]
the county is contributing and the
out-of-pocket expense for employees
[indiscernible] I think it's a very
fair approach
>> me too
>> we don't even need to discuss, five
thumbs up. Are we thumbs up for
retirement?
>>I see. Do we have thumbs for the
retirement contribution changing? Five
thumbs up for the contribution change.
commissioner warren gully. Can you
remind me or [indiscernible]I just
wondered about I think we have a goal
we are getting to. If I remember right
it is 11 percent? Yes. [indiscernible]
>> okay, that's everything I need from
benefits thank you, generally there's
some direction given to the ebc on what
direction you want to take for comp.
>> we are on the ebc. Tell me what you
would like from us on that
conversation. Generally it looks like
what could you reevaluate, what would
not get done if we do this proposal
first. It looks something like that
that direction.
>> I'm looking at todd.
>> obviously with the budget process we
have to figure out what we can afford
based on the other request you receive
at some point later this fall. I think
usually what we go into the ebc process
with is do commissioners feel
comfortable with the request or
recommendation put forth today? Is that
what you want the executive budget
committee to fit in the budget. If it
does not fit bring it back to the full
board. Is there anything about the
compensation portion of the
presentation you as a full board would
like to have the executive budget
committee look at differently than what
is proposed? Commissioner warren gully
>> thank you madam chair. I guess what
I would want to start off by saying I
really want to thank our labor partners
and the whole team here for coming
together. Last year was a really
difficult budget year because we had
not gotten things all the way through
and this is new for us in arapahoe
county. I feel like there was a lot of
thoughtful purposeful work around how
can we line up a timeline that gives us
the ability to really receive and put
from asme and the fop and also to
figure out how are we going to do this
and how will that be reflected across
the rest of the staff. I just wanted to
say thank you for that. This is a big
change for the way the organization
does compensation. I felt it went much
smoother this time than last year.
thank you very much for that.
>> commissioners? What are you
thinking? I wanted to make sure, I
don't know if commissioner fields has
any questions. But, I know what kind of
work goes into this. It's a team
effort. It's not only dusty although
she is the presenter, I know she gets
input from a lot of different corridors
in arapahoe county. The amount of work
that goes into it, medical, man, what a
system in america we've got. So thank
you for lifting the veil so to speak
and making that a little clearer. We
see behind the veil altogether. We wish
there were way more options then I
think we have. It's important for us to
understand it. And the effort the team
is going through to get peoples input.
because we could speculate what people
will use and what they won't use.
sometimes we are right and sometimes we
are off by a little bit. You've done a
pretty good job. I like retirement as
someone who is close, two years away. I
think we are doing a great job in
meeting our obligations. I do consider
it an obligation. We said we were going
to get to 11 percent. Without raising
the employee contribution. So we'd be
more in line with what's going around.
just really kudos, compensation we have
to wait until the last minute. It seems
like a lot of times before we have all
of the information we need to make a
good decision. Hang in there for the
rest of the story
>> commissioner fields? It's already
been stated, well done come a
well-thought-out. I like the way you do
the comparisons. As it relates to
market value in denver and other
locations as a benchmark. It appears by
what you presented that arapahoe county
is in a strong position as it relates
to employee retention, benefits. I
think the future looks bright. Except
for ai. When you have that slide about
ai and having to lower salaries because
of the skill set of jobs or
responsibilities, ai was taking that
over. I was trying to picture what that
conversation is like without employee.
can you describe what it's like when
someone may be it is a patrick
question, when you are looking at
salary and it has to be reduced. I know
it had on there we [indiscernible]. It
wasn't necessarily for us. . Okay that
would be a tough conversation I'm glad
to hear we are not doing that at this
point.
>> as far as I'm aware, it's a toolset
for us, a resource it's not doing the
job for us. [indiscernible]. That
clarification helps a lot thank you.
>> on your bsr we have covered all the
staff recommendations. So what else do
you want from us? I think it's just
todd's question, do you have any
concerns about the comp presentation.
we have no concerns at least I don't
does anybody else have concerns? I
don't think so I think you came in here
and knocked it out of the park and
answered all of our questions, we gave
some thumbs. We expect things to go
smoothly.
>>we have no questions. Thank you.
thank you very very much. [applause].
>>lovely, let's take a couple of
minutes to change the room.
>>
>>. Let's get started with
introductions jeff baker commissioner
michelle hallstead commissioner's office
leslie summey commissioner
[indiscernible] carrie warren gully
commissioner [indiscernible] director
for centennial park jessica campbell
commissioner district 2. Thank you very
very much. I'm sorry mr. Saraceno for
cutting in front of you for that
introduction. We are here for a drop in
for the airport improvement program
grant for the public airport authority.
[indiscernible] what do you have for us
today sir
>> thank you commissioner summey. We
are here for what's called a service
award initiative vehicle movement area
transponders. Centennial airport was
one of the first in the country to have
a service awareness initiative, that
allows the tower to see aircraft on the
ground even if they have a cloud deck,
bad visibility. We are one of the first
airports in the country to have that.
they've expanded that, obviously there
was a horrible accident between the
fire truck and aircraft, as a result of
that the ffa is handing out grants
making them available to airports to
expand that system. You have
transponder on all airport vehicles not
only will they be able to see the
aircraft but they will be able to see
[indiscernible] which is especially
important during the winter, being able
to see that because we have low
visibility, and can't see what's going
on on the ground. We are coming to you
to ask for the board to support grant
[indiscernible] one grant too far. Our
original recommendation john thank you
for joining us was to come to you we
were anticipating getting the grant in
mid-september. The faa has decided to
drop it on as early. Now we expect the
grant to come out very soon, possibly
in the next week or so. So, we are
changing our recommendation we are
asking from the board. We are asking
today to have the board allow the chair
to sign the grant and have it ratified
at the september 8 county board
meeting. That's what our ask is. The
total grant amount will be 115,000 and
the airport will be required to do the
five percent match and we have that
budgeted so it's not a problem.
commissioner campbell
>> we prefer to give you the authority
before but we have done this in the
past where they come up and in this
case we are a year out on break.
normally we would have something about
there. It's not uncommon for us to do
that and have the ratification, it
clean set up. To add to that now that
we know the grant is coming sooner, the
ffa once it back early september, so we
have a rush to get it signed. My
question was about the language in the
grants we've been discussing over
several years just verifying. Sometimes
as we know things with this
administration are a moving target. I
have not seen the language but I see it
before commissioner summey waits for
asu can sign this now. But I will
verify the language has not been, the
language we've been concerned with has
not been in these grants. We don't
anticipate any changes but we will look
at it and you will look at it to make
sure. Commissioner baker
>> this is kind of a weird question but
is it a notice of funding opportunity
that comes out? Or something else? For
the faa. I'm wondering if they are like
what transportation does. Correct they
made us aware that the funds were
available for make additions to the
system and then we applied for the
grant. And now we have been awarded
that grant amount. It is nofo
originated yes. We got it through the
faa local airport district office. They
are pretty good about communicating.
they knew we already had the system,
the foundation system in place in the
tower. They knew we would be a good
airport to roll it out on. So this is
an enhancement what does it do? The
current system just sees our aircraft
on the ground, the new system adds
transponders to the vehicles so we can
see the vehicles. How many transponders
do we get? 34. Cool. We have five
thumbs up to take their money.
>> [indiscernible]thank you very much
we have some exciting stuff coming so.
more money we have found. You are about
the only one. Thank you mike.