Thread by @shayshinecastle

Howdy, ya'll. I was here for the Raucous Caucus, the first candidate forum of the season, and now I'm here for the Chamber forum. I'll be live-tweeting what I can.

Speer answers in Spanish.

She then translates: Latino companies know best what the Latino community needs. They're already addressing this issue; supporting their work can help.

Q: Protected bike lanes are a current council priority. Do you support them?

Brncic: "Boulder is a biking town, and we def want to do everything we can to keep ppl out of their cars. I'm strongly in support, especially in the key commute corridors. .... The other important thing is the multi-use paths, keeping them clean" and crafting rules around e-bikes

Atkins: Yes, I fully support protected bike lanes. Separating modes of travel and using a road diet makes all traffic safer — including car travel. It reduces car crashes, too, by reducing speed.

Tweedlie: "I think the city's done a great job on the bike lanes. A lot of ppl drive less." Dares to bring up the Folsom right-sizing ... biz were pissed off, he says. We have to make sure there are no more snafus like that.

Brockett: We have prioritized the Core Arterial Network... breaking news, the city just got $4M for protected bike lanes on a couple key stretches, and we recently got $$ for bikeway to Longmont.

Gives a shoutout to both Speer and Friend for their work on those respective things.

Q: What role do you see public-private partnerships playing in meeting our community's needs?

Yates: "I love asking for money. I'm a really good fundraiser. .... Matches work. If the city says we'll give $1M" if the community/nonprofit does, that really works.

Speer: "I would love to see us get to a future where people's basic needs do not depend on philanthropy." Let's pursue partnerships to figure out how to redesign our systems so they work for everybody, especially around housing and childcare.

Schuchard runs out of time while rambling. Mentions suicide and car accidents as the leading causes of death...?

Marquis: "Our nonprofits connect us."

Sorry, those answers were both hard to track.

Q: What are the challenges and opportunities you see on Uni Hill to connect to downtown?

Winer: The opportunity of Uni Hill to succeed, this is our opportunity of a lifetime. Right now, it's not doing that great. One of my goals is to have a great Uni Hill commercial district. The hotel will help.

We can help by making it safer on Uni Hill, Winer says, as well as cleaner. How they get the $$ is the big q. Connectivity from the Hill to the hotel(s) to downtown is our opp of a lifetime.

Lewis: I live on Uni Hill. Go there and support the businesses. "It's been a problem for years; it's emblematic of the difficult relationship with CU and Boulder." Mentions the litter, trash, potholes, noise, parties, etc.

The hotel will help, Lewis says, but "all the neighbors" are "disappointed in the design; it's blocking our views."

Brockett: "We've got to get this right." We need to make sure the guests there have an easy way to get downtown. There's not currently a safe connection... it's not pleasant. We're working on a study; CU's two new bridges are great. I hope we can get one of those built.

Tweedlie: "We've got to get rid of the crime and drugs. ... You can build what you like, they will not come." Listing biz that have closed in recent years. Says we need solutions, but doesn't offer any.

Q: What steps would you take to streamline and improve the city's planning and permit process?

Yates: "In my 8 years on council, I've received over 100K emails." I hear about this a lot. The city is struggling with staffing, particularly in planning. "I can't fix the staffing problem" but we can "keep our fingers off" projects Planning Board has already OK'd.

Brockett: It's something we're making process on, with more staffing. We asked staff to report any bottlenecks to us, and council will address them. They'll be bringing those to us in January.

Neyer: Make things easier for more simple projects, and "use technology better" to automate processes we don't need humans for.

Decalo: "Focus on small biz. Streamline what can be streamlined."

Q: What are your concerns about the current labor shortage? How can we address it?

Adams: "Wages and working conditions." These two areas continue to be deplorable for many. We saw an exodus during the pandemic. We have families with multiple jobs still not being able to afford to live.

Robins: Overall, ppl want to work for co that have a good work/life balance, that pay $$ and have a positive culture. That has to do with small biz. We need to try to open more small biz in this town.

Tweedlie: You've got to reward competency, but that's not always possible. If we can't throw $$ at the problem and hire or retain the best guys ... pat them on the back and tell them they're doing a great job.

Speer: My concern is this problem will worsen without active intervention ... We have an aging population. Let's support immigrants in our community, help them move here, live here, get the documentation they need to stay here.

Q: What initiatives do you have in mind to reduce barriers for Latino entrepreneurs?

Adams: I am a small biz owner. I have benefited from the equity amplification program. I would love to see that kind of program expanded.

Brncic: "Promoting diversity and equity in our community is so critical. We do a pretty good job, but we could always do better." We need to make extra sure that everything is offered bilingually, and raise awareness of what is already available.

That means promoting procurement and grant opportunities to the Latino community, Brncic concludes.

Tweedlie: I would encourage ppl in the city organization to learn Spanish. (which he then demonstrates with a few words)

Speer: My response here is similar to my previous one. Let's strengthen partnerships and supports with the folks already doing this work in the Latino Chamber. Can we provide funding or resources like navigators?

Q: Do you support reducing or eliminating parking requirements?

Decalo: I would not eliminate off-street parking bc there are plenty of existing vehicles, but I would look at increasing access to multi-modal transportation and ensuring ppl who choose to live without cars can get around. We could make some exceptions for parking.

The q was specific to new development, btw.

Decalo: We could do affordable housing with no parking.

Lewis (who is car free): The avg. parking spot adds cost of $30K to any development, and we wonder why we can't get affordable housing or the missing middle.

Yates: This comes up when somebody is building an apt building. The city has an archaic rule ... of certain # of parking spaces per bedroom. "We always give a waiver" when developers ask. "This is one of the silliest laws the city has."

"We need to reduce parking requirements significantly in this town, so we can build more housing." Yates concludes

Brockett: We do give out a lot of waivers for parking reductions, bc our requirements are too high. I'd like to see parking maximums like we have in Boulder Junction, and pair those with things like bike share, car share, scooter access, etc.

Candidates being offered 2Qs and can answer either one: What is your understanding of the most pressing needs in our community? OR How do you pivot in moments of crisis?

Yates going with the second one: We pivot by coming together as a community, listening and figuring it out. ... coming together with our creativity. "I don't think this community has ever found a problem it couldn't solve."

Radically different from his answers at the PLAN forum the other day....

Speer: For me, I lean on the relationships I have in the community, with staff. It's critical to build relationships in times of non-crisis... you can't just go in times of crisis and expect them to be there.

Marquis: I was the BVSD school board president during COVID. Our pivot was all about supporting our staff. I was amazed at what they were able to do to provide food to community members, create internet services, mental health resources for teachers, Chromebook distribution, etc.

"Our job wasn't to question everything, but to offer our leadership," Marquis finishes.

Atkins: "We shouldn't need to pivot. We need to build resilience on all fronts: housing resilience, climate resilience, mental health" ... all the things we struggle with now. Pivot is the wrong approach; "that's reactive, we need to be more proactive."

Our nonprofits cannot meet the needs in the community, Atkins says, so we need to work on fixing the systems that led to these conditions.

Q: How did you or would you have voted on the recent minimum wage issue? boulderbeat.news/2023/08/26/bou…

Yates: "First of all, we do need to raise our minimum wage. There's no question about that. The question is when."

He voted to stick with the original timeline of 2025, which council affirmed in May. He's going over that now.

"Consistency is important in gov't. When we promise something to you, we need to follow through on it," Yates says.

Tweedlie: "Minimum wage. I don't know a lot about it."

He does not appear to know much about any of these issues, tbh.

But his answer is essentially: Raising the minimum wage destroys jobs.

Speer, who voted to do a quicker increase to the wage in Boulder: That's because "the landscape had changed since May ... (with) record level of needs. The longer we wait to help the ppl struggling the most, the worse our economic crisis is going to get."

Brockett: In May, I wanted to do 2024. I still wanted to do 2024 last week when we voted. People are suffering. I'm still glad we are working with the consortium and raise the wage in 2025.

Winer: I missed the May meeting, when council decided 2025. So to come back 3 months later, I decided to keep a promise the city gave and not change our minds at the last minute. "I'm sorry to everyone I disappointed."

Schuchard: "This was tough, this was agonizing. The decision has been made, we are moving forward. ... We need to continue to coordinate and move this forward . .. with the greatest speed."

"More broadly, we need to think about what's putting us in this scarcity," he concludes. We need a wage at least as high as Denver's ($17.29 this year, $18.29 next year)

Robins: I do agree with a higher minimum wage. I do think we need to keep our regional collaboration intact.

Neyer: "A healthy system involves both consistency and change. Should council be consistent? Yes. Should council sometimes change their mind when the situation calls for it? Yes." In this case, would have voted for an increase in 2024

Marquis: "I don't envy the city council for having to make that decision." Regional consortium is important for more problems than just wages, such as homelessness. "Can we build on this collaborative effort?"

Lewis: This is a tough one, and as it should. City council should only tackle tough things that can't be tackled elsewhere.

"I probably would have supported increasing the minimum wage. It's too low."

That said, we need to support biz, Lewis says, doing some of his trademark name-dropping of local folks.

Decalo: We need to increase wages. Minimum wages have not kept up with inflation. We need to focus on the small biz that would feel the impact. Taking the proper time is v critical. ... We also need to focus on housing.

Since we're talking about small biz so much... 90% of Boulder's 8,400 biz are under 20 employees; 97% under 50

Brncic: I 100% support increasing minimum wage. Had we been talking about the 2024 timeline back in May, that would have been fine. But we weren't. Asking orgs to pivot with 4 months left in the year is unfair and not in keeping with the commitments we made.

Atkins: I've heard several ppl say ppl are suffering. I am those ppl. I've used the city's rent assistance program, and I can't use it again to December. My wage is about minimum wage (he's a BVSD paraeducator). "This is something we need to do yesterday."

"When we have $$ to spend on things other than basic needs, guess where we can go? Your small biz," Atkins concludes.

Adams: "The fight for $15 started in 2012. How long do we have to wait for progress? I know there are more solutions than what is currently being discussed." ... There are federal, state and local investments we have not taken advantage of.

Bc there was an uneven distribution of questions, Neyer, Robins, Winer and Schuchard(?) are each getting to answer one more q of their choosing, or add comments.

Neyer, choosing to answer q about off-street parking: It does need to change. I'm glad the city is already doing waivers. The amount of parking we currently mandate... we have all this asphalt, it's a massive heat sink, it takes up space we could use for housing.

We can't take it all away, but it's important to take steps toward a less car-dependent society, Neyer says.

Robins: Public safety is a real issue for ppl in Boulder right now. In general, we can look at public safety from the direction of fires and floods. But I think it's a little dif for ppl right now, making sure your biz is safe, that you're safe walking.

We need to get community and county courts working together, hold ppl accountable for their actions, treat mental health and substance abuse. Enforce camping ban and support our police, Robins concludes.

Schuchard on bike lanes: We have to protect and defend the Core Arterial Network on the next council. We've got to double, triple and quadruple transit transit in and out of the city.

Winer also takes a q on bikes: Happy to be part of the council that prioritized the CAN. For me, protected bike lanes are the way to go.

A bit of applause for council members not using acronyms that the audience doesn't know. That's unusual and appreciated.

We're gonna do wrap-ups, and I'll tweet those since I didn't do intros.

Very thin crowd here at the end... lots of ppl have left already. This is the lowest-energy election year I've personally seen, which does not bode well. Participation is important!

Yates: Leadership matters. 4 years ago, I was running for re-election. Thanks for these last 4 years. Ask yourself if I've been a good leader? Have I listened to you? Have I made wise decisions? boulderbeat.news/2019/09/27/bob…

Tweedlie: I'm a software engineer; we're practical guys. I'm a gardener. I think you can tell a lot about a man by how he tends his garden. Invites ppl to his house on 4th street.

Speer: My vision for the future of Boulder is vibrant and inclusive. We won't get there overnight, but I know we will get there.

Brockett: We are fortunate to live in one of the v best places in the world. We have big problems that we have to make progress on: housing, public safety, homelessness, climate, mental health. I know we can and will became the just, equitable and inclusive city it deserves to be

Winer: City council can't solve all our problems. I'm happy that we've solved some, and made some people's lives better.

Once again giving our her number and inviting ppl to call her.

Schuchard: "Affordability, safety, inclusion ... that's what I want to work on to make Boulder stronger." To close, thanks the biz community.

Robins: Hold ppl accountable, support youth and family, subsidize recovery not encourage addiction .... I'm a fantastic listener.

Neyer: How blessed are we all? We have amazing candidates, a council that really cares. I have the knowledge and passion for sustainability, ecology, community connection and technology.

Marquis: I've been volunteering throughout the community since I've lived here. I'm impressed with how much ppl care, even if we have different ideas. I think we can use that joint caring to solve our most critical problems.

Lewis: "I was born here and I had the gift of safe streets. We don't have that right now. ... I'm excited with the deep roots I have in this community to work in coalition" to solve problems.

Decalo: I love our open space, Pearl Street, that we have so many family biz. I was born and raised here. I bring perspective as a young person in politics.

Brncic: We are at a critical inflection point, and the leaders over the next few years are going to decide the direction the community heads. I am concerned about the path Boulder is on, and I think we need a change in leadership.

Atkins: "We need our basic needs met. We need to have the safety that comes with that as well, and I mean safety for everybody. Health for everybody, transportation for everybody, wages for everybody, arts and culture for everybody."

Adams: A vote for me is a vote for a just and joyous community that is climate and culturally resilient. I'm courageous, that's gonna be essential in moving us forward. I'm not afraid to ask qs, try new things, demand what we already agreed upon.

I think that's it for this one. Now to write 14 profiles, 5 ballot measure stories, 2 explainers on slates and ranked choice voting, and of course editing BBOP's opinionated voter guide.

Look for it all in early October!

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