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HomeMy WebLinkAboutminutes.council.20220322 1 REGULAR MEETING ASPEN CITY COUNCIL MARCH 22, 2022 At 5:00 p.m. Mayor Torre called the regular meeting to order with Councilors Doyle, Hauenstein, Richards, and Mesirow present. Mayor Torre noted a couple of agenda amendments. Under Action Items, there is Resolution #042 that should have been under the Consent Calendar and Resolution #043 should be under Public Hearings. Also, the special event permit application for Rio Grande is being pulled from the agenda this evening. CITIZEN COMMENTS: None. COUNCILMEMBER COMMENTS: Councilor Hauenstein wished everyone a happy Spring. The days are getting longer, so enjoy your last month of skiing and get your bicycle out and support Ukraine. Councilor Richards said she will not be at any meetings next week. Councilor Mesirow will cover APCHA, and she will be kind of out of touch. Councilor Doyle read an excerpt from Democracy Now about earths temperatures being higher than normal. It’s pretty alarming. Mayor Torre said there is a program tonight at 7:00 p.m. about starting a ranch from the ground up over at ACES. It’s an interesting topic for our area. He referred to an article in the paper today. On the front page of the Aspen Times, there is a headline about the housing crisis cutting into this summer’s philharmonic program. This is just one of the direct impacts from what is happening in town right now and will affect 80 to 100 students. This is exactly the impact we are trying to take a look at during the moratorium. CITY MANAGER COMMENTS: City Manager, Sara Ott, said she wants to embarrass one of our staff members and asked Tessa Schreiner to come forward and said she is our new Climate Action Manager. We felt really confident to find excellent talent to help this mission critical work. Mayor Torre congratulated her and said she’s been doing a great job. You do have big shoes to fill, but we’re sure you’re up to the task. We were going to review the arts and culture grants this evening, and we did go ahead and email you the information and the citizens will be presenting the work of their committees. The resident survey is nearing completion. We’ve had a phenomenal response; over 300 a week ago. Some of you have been contacted by some members of our federal legislative delegation regarding federal spending requests, and we are working on that and prioritizing what is the appropriate ask. She asked if that should come to council or staff move forward with what it thinks. Councilor Richards asked when the deadline is, and Ms. Ott said April 18th and they would need direction by the 5th. Councilor Richards said she won’t be here, but if other council members want to see that, she is supportive. Mayor Torre said he doesn’t need a meeting, and Councilor Hauenstein said just an update is fine for him. Councilor Richards said she is comfortable with staff taking the lead. The last item is that at least two of you are attending the CML conference in June and it begins on Tuesday evening same as regular meeting, so she’s concerned about quorum. She needs direction on if 2 REGULAR MEETING ASPEN CITY COUNCIL MARCH 22, 2022 we will retain this date or move it to another date to instruct applicants appropriately. Mayor Torre said his preference is to maintain the regular schedule and will be heading over on Wednesday morning. Councilor Hauenstein and Richards said they are fine with going on Wednesday morning. BOARD REPORTS: Councilor Hauenstein said he had a CORE meeting. It was a powder day but both he and Councilor Doyle were in attendance. They reviewed some of the committees getting established, marketing, development, and governance committees. They celebrated three people who had huge dedications of time to CORE. Ashley Perl, Cindy Houben and Mona Newton who have dedicated a good portion of time to this cause. He had CCLC and Mackenzie Sexton gave an ACRA update and spoke about the formula retail ordinance, as well as the 4th of July discussion regarding CCLC’s involvement in the parade. Councilor Doyle said they spoke about plowing Castle Creek Road with the Nordic Council. They recently received another anonymous donation for $5000. He mentioned Steve Aitken retiring and said his replacement will need to understand the summer and winter uses. Councilor Mesirow gave an update on the trail systems and said the Rio Grande will go on for a while, but we will slowly move into bike season as the temperature’s rise. Councilor Richards said we haven’t taken on any new issues at APCHA. They’ve been preparing a survey to go out to people in position to right size and will be finalizing this next week with Councilor Mesirow in attendance. She is driving this evening to Club 20 in Grand Junction because they have an executive meeting and awards. Mayor Torre had the Wheeler board and RFTA. Later in the agenda, we have the Wheeler COVID protocols and changes asked for by the board. They are doing house keeping with building maintenance. The Wheeler RETT and grants are going on there and keeping the advisory board in the loop with what council wants with funding. RFTA is still waiting for travel restrictions to lessen. There is nothing huge to report, they are just gearing up for summer. The Board of Health was a return to normalcy and going back to quarterly meetings. There are still new variants emerging, but as of this time, the BOH doesn’t see the need to meet on a monthly basis. Councilor Richards added that she continues to wear her mask because she works in a grocery store and it’s still dangerous. Mayor Torre said COVID testing is still available and free testing, which is located at the armory. Next Tuesday he has ACRA. Ms. Ott said she had the Airport Advisory board regarding the airport layout plan which needs to be updated. The first step in receiving assistance from the Federal Aviation Administration to realign the runway. Work is advancing and will take a couple of years regarding the impacts of air quality etc. May 2nd – 15th, the airport is closed for pavement maintenance. There are a high number of flights coming in every day and this summer it will go down some. Be ready for another busy summer. CONSENT CALENDAR: Councilor Hauenstein pulled the childcare item; Resolution #037. Mayor Torre pulled Resolution #044 and wanted to mention the board appointments. 3 REGULAR MEETING ASPEN CITY COUNCIL MARCH 22, 2022 Resolution #037, Series of 2022 – Burlingame Childcare Center Design Contract – Jen Phelan, Asset Department and Andrea Korber, Principal Architect Councilor Hauenstein asked about the two columns in the memo of scope. Ms. Phelan said we have worked with the architect to develop two tracks: one with affordable housing in addition to daycare on site and one solely with daycare. The decision point will be at conceptual schematic. If we don’t move with housing, there is less design involved. Councilor Hauenstein asked about HOA approvals from Burlingame. Ms. Phelan said it depends on the site plan and are currently looking at different options. Mayor Torre said he supports this but still has outstanding questions and they need more information moving forward. Councilor Doyle said he appreciates the people working on this project as they are well-versed in designing this space. Resolution #044, Series of 2022 – Approving Sister Cities Relationships Mayor Torre pointed out that the reason for this tonight is to reaffirm these relationships as these were not all done in the same fashion, so this makes it easy to put into one resolution to make sure these relationships are moving forward. Board & Commission Appointments Mayor Torre said he is so thankful to those who participate in this. We still have openings though, so please go to the city website and apply if you’re interested. Councilor Doyle motioned to approve the consent calendar; Councilor Richards seconded. Councilor Richards thanked the parks department to find ways to reduce their water consumption. Mr. True clarified all items in the consent calendar that are being approved. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. FIRST READING OF ORDINANCES Ordinance #2, Series of 2022 – Aspen Mini-Storage Annexation, Ben Anderson, City Planner Councilor Richards motioned to read Ordinance #02, Series of 2022; Councilor Doyle seconded. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. City Clerk, Nicole Henning, read the ordinance. Mr. Anderson said he is going to talk about Ordinance #02 and #03 since they are a package deal. This process is replicating the process done 10 years ago to bring the Lumberyard BMC West property into the city and establish the initial zoning. The documents presented are nearly identical. Ordinance #02 would approve the annexation and, Ordinance #03 will establish the initial zoning. This is relatively small in the world of annexations. He made note of one minor correction and said there are two maps with the two ordinances, and one of the maps was repeated. They were duplicated and we will correct that. Councilor Hauenstein said for the public and clarification, this is needed to move forward with the lumberyard project. 4 REGULAR MEETING ASPEN CITY COUNCIL MARCH 22, 2022 City Attorney, James R. True, asked to clarify the maps in the packet. Mr. Anderson said the annexation map (exhibit c) should be associated with Ordinance #02. MR. True suggested that the correction be made with the motion. Mayor Torre motioned to approve Ordinance #02, Series of 2022; Councilor Doyle seconded. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. Council Richards motioned to read Ordinance #03, Series of 2022; Councilor Doyle seconded. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. Ms. Henning read the ordinance. Councilor Mesirow motioned to approve Ordinance #03, Series of 2022; Councilor Doyle seconded. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. Councilor Richards left the meeting momentarily. Ordinance #05, Series of 2022 – Building IQ – Tessa Schreiner, Climate and Sustainability Officer and John Dougherty of CORE Councilor Doyle motioned to read Ordinance #05, Series of 2022; Councilor Mesirow seconded. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Torre, yes. 4-0, motion carried. Ms. Henning read the ordinance. Councilor Richards reentered the meeting. Ms. Schreiner said they are here to talk about Building IQ. On February 22nd, they brought policy Resolution #021 to council for direction on Building IQ, which was approved. She said Ordinance #05 has two components: the energy and water benchmarking phase, and the building performance standard phase. She said the reason they are doing this is because council set a carbon goal, council set new science- based targets, and require taking a look at the GHG emissions inventory and climate action plan. She explained the stakeholder engagement and the work session held with council in 2021. This program has been given the thumbs up by many national experts. She explained building IQ’s impact should it be passed. Mr. Dougherty said this is a partnership that builds on the skillset that CORE has delivered, and how to work with buildings to understand their carbon impact on the community. Assessments, rebates, and incentives programs. This is a coordinated effort with the COA and what that looks like in terms of process. They are looking at what can be handled online with dedicated staff to support web-based hub. We’re eager and excited to be a part of this. She said they don’t have additional staffing needs to implement this program, and no additional financing is needed either. Councilor Hauenstein asked about a person to monitor the site and she said they will spend their grant funds on this process. Councilor Hauenstein said in supporting CORE, we are supporting energy beyond Aspen. Councilor Doyle said CORE made advancements in the past week for development staff to begin to look at their commitment to ongoing funding. 5 REGULAR MEETING ASPEN CITY COUNCIL MARCH 22, 2022 Mayor Torre said they’re putting together a great package of how to move this forward. They are hopeful for the benchmarking process itself. The benefits are environmental and economic, and they are on a great path. He appreciates the hard work that has gone into this for years. Councilor Doyle motioned to approve Ordinance #05, Series of 2022; Councilor Richards seconded. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. PUBLIC HEARINGS Resolution #043, Series of 2022 – Moratorium Policy Resolution – Ben Anderson, City Planner and Phillip Supino, Community Development Director Mr. Anderson shared the moratorium conceptual project timeline as well as the constraints. The request tonight is to authorize code amendments, focus work on key solutions, and He defined the code amendments and the amendment topic areas.: growth management, affordable housing, and review procedures. He went over review criteria and explained next steps. He said staff will return to council on March 28 to discuss regarding, community engagement, residential development, and demolition. He also discussed what this will look like post moratorium. Councilor Richards motioned to approve Resolution #043, Series of 2022. Mayor Torre reminded her it’s a public hearing, and she withdrew her motion. Mayor Torre opened public comment. Mayor Torre closed public comment. Councilor Richards motioned to approve Resolution #043, Series of 2022; Councilor Mesirow seconded. Councilor Hauenstein said a lot of work has gone into this and we all feel how important this is to save some of the fabric of Aspen. We are very appreciative and looking forward to specifics over the next seven weeks. Councilor Mesirow said he’s very supportive of this. What you are seeing here is the scaffolding. This is years of work being condensed into a number of weeks. Councilor Doyle said he is really happy this work is continuing. He thanked Com Dev and reminded the public they can still add their input. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. Resolution #041, Series of 2022 – Amending COVID Protocols at the Wheeler Opera House – Sara Ott, City Manager Ms. Ott said the recommendation from staff and the Wheeler Advisory Board is to lift the mask requirement and make it optional and provide proof of vaccination. This is the only facility within city ownership that has any restrictions left. These restrictions are set to expire April 15th. We are looking for council support to remove the mask requirement. Councilor Hauenstein said he feels it can be removed as recommended. 6 REGULAR MEETING ASPEN CITY COUNCIL MARCH 22, 2022 Councilor Doyle said at this point, it’s difficult to ask someone to put a mask on. Councilor Richards said she agrees with the recommendation, but she still wants to emphasize vaccinations. Councilor Mesirow said he is supportive of this as well. It’s time. Councilor Mesirow motioned to approve Resolution #041; Councilor Doyle seconded. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. Councilor Hauenstein motioned to adjourn; Councilor Doyle seconded. Roll call vote: Doyle, yes; Hauenstein, yes; Mesirow, yes; Richards, yes; Torre, yes. 5-0, motion carried. _____________________________ Nicole Henning, City Clerk