Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutEconomic Advisory Board - Minutes - 08/17/2022 ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR August 17, 2022 4:00 – 6:00 pm Via Zoom 0 8 /17 /22 – MINUTES Page 1 1. CALL TO ORDER 4:07 pm 2. ROLL CALL • List of Board Members Present o Renee Walkup o Blake Naughton o Mistene Nugent o Thierry Dossou o Denny Coleman o Jeff Havens • List of Board Members Absent – Excused or Unexcused, if no contact with Chair has been made. o Brauilo Rajoas o Aric Light o John Parks • List of Staff Members Present o Jillian Fresa, Staff Liaison, Economic Sustainability o Josh Birks, Deputy Director, Sustainability Services o SeonAh Kendall, Sr Manager, Economic Sustainability 3. AGENDA REVIEW • No changes 4. CITIZEN PARTICIPATION • N/A 5. APPROVAL OF MINUTES • No changes-minutes approved ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 2 6. UNFISNISHED BUSINESS • Reflection on Economic Equity Forum − SeonAh gave update from the Economic Equity Forum that was held a month ago. There was a panel and table discussions. The panel included representation from Larimer County, small businesses, Tamara Wesley from Intel, and Edgar Ramos from SeonAh’s office who runs the Multicultural Business and Entrepreneur Center. They heard, “this is great information, but what else are you doing in terms of this space.” They also heard “we want to see more business representation, what does that look like, what are the City’s goals in that space.” They also realize they have had some lessons learned and shared what they are doing with that information as they move forward. SeonAh will share the notes from the forum with the Board. − Renee shared that she thought it was interesting and a valuable use of time. Mistene thought it was informational and heard comments about, “this is great information but what more is being done.” − Q (Renee) How was the Turnout compared to the expectations? − A (SeonAh) Housing and Police Services had about 180 people show up. I think we had 80. It was one topic and the day before it even the rsvp list was at 45. It was interesting to look at the signup sheet and see who actually showed up. Folks who didn’t sign up, showed up and folks who signed up, didn’t show up. To have 80 was great. − Comment (Renee) I didn’t know there were that many, but I did think there were quite a few people there that were engaged. − Comment (Denny) I am sorry I missed it. I think it is an important topic. I had a conflict, but I am looking forward to reading the minutes. − Comment (SeonAh) I am happy to share that. We wrote a memo at the end of June to Council about the Multicultural Business and Entrepreneur Center and how many folks they have served. We are also happy to forward that to this group so you can see what patterns we are seeing and what the need is. An example is when we serve that customer twice, they are tending to start their own business right after that. The first time is more of an inquiry, what’s this about, and I have these ideas. If they come back a second time, we are seeing a higher likelihood of them starting their own business. − Q (Denny) What do we have in terms of small business finance that can help small startups? − A (SeonAh) We were at a meeting this week. If you recall at the ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 3 beginning of the pandemic, we repurposed our revolving loan fund we had and worked with the Bohemian Foundation, Chamber, and the regional groups as well. Josh was heavily involved in that. It was a $5 million fund. − A (Josh) That was a fund put together with several partners and we specifically did that to be able to respond to COVID needs. Before that we had been using those dollars for a revolving loan fund that would target historically underrepresented as well as sort of the unbanked kind of small business entrepreneur. Folks that don’t have enough credit history to get a loan or folks who were just getting started. The other thing that is available in the community for start ups is particularly those that are move of a tech basis. Innosphere has started some of its own C capital funding. We also have CSU ventures, but those are seed investments for university-based startups. There are some right here locally in our community and then broader availability for some of that more start up or investment kind of capitol for start up businesses across the Front Range as well. − Q (Denny) What are the minimums for those type of investments? − A (Josh) For Innosphere, I don’t know off the top of my head. I think the largest one is around $1 million. I think they have a $12-$15 million fund and they are raising their second fund because they had placed all their dollars from the first fund. For the loan fund we did during COVID, the max loan was $50,000 and the minimum was $5,000. It had modified underwriting conditions because they needed to get the dollars out the door to help businesses. − Comment (SeonAh) We did get an update and they distributed almost all the money. I think $70,000 is what is left of the $5 million dollar fund. The average loan was $25,000, however when we started to look at the data. Women owned businesses were getting about $20,000-$22,000. We were asking where is that distribution and what is off setting it. We met a week ago to really understand. It was not meant to be a revolving loan fund, so once these are paid back, what do we want to do with the fund. There are discussions around if we need to convert to a revolving loan fund specifically for startups and entrepreneurs. We have committed to all meeting again to discuss that. General funds are easier to use vs if someone contributed cares funding or federal dollars. That is one thing we ware looking to unpack and understand how we might repurpose this a little differently or ask for support in thos aspects that typically would be funded though a community fund. ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 4 − Q (Denny) Is there history to judge the success/failure rate of this fund? − A (SeonAh) Not in Fort Collins, however the Colorado Enterprise Fund (CEF) have done this for over 15 years, and I think the first community was Boulder. They have that historical data so they will be able to give us that information. Only two of the loans have faulted, which they said is very rare. That is a piece of information that is not the standard for the revolving loan as they usually see higher default rates. − Q (Denny) These are loans and not investments, right? − A (SeonAh) These are loans but at 3%. Our revolving loan was character based for those who were struggling with getting funding from other traditional banks. A lot of the banks contributed to the $5 million fund and actually would recommend the fund to businesses they felt would be served well with these vs they could not serve them. CEF is seeing more recommendations from the traditional banks. Instead of saying no we can’t fund you, they would recommend taking a look at this fund. They were very picky in who they were recommending the $5 million fund to. Adams County also has a revolving loan fund and that is also a $5 million fund. They have only given out $2 million of the $5 million. For us to have given out almost all of it was a huge success in itself. • Staffing Changes − Josh got promoted to Deputy Sustainability Direct and as a result he will not longer be the staff liaison for EAB. Jillian Fresa will be their new staff liaison. They will be sharing soon on who will be taking over other responsibilities and title for Josh’s previous role. 7. NEW BUSINESS • Minimum Wage Update − Presentation from Josh Birks, Deputy Director of Sustainability Services. − Raising the minimum wage in Fort Collins was a priority set by City Council April of last year. Since then, they have selected a consultant, conducted engagement and survey, and had a Council work session. There is another work session on September 6th and a Council regular meeting on November 6th. If a local minimum wage is adopted it would be implemented Jan 1, 2023. HB19-1210 allows local governments to establish minimum wage laws, however there are certain requirements to do so including only 10% of Colorado municipalities can, it can only increase a certain amount each year ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 5 until they reach their enacted amount, and they must engage with certain group sin the community and state. − Feedback included overall support from employees. It was evenly split between raising minimum wage would hurt and minimum wage would help. Some of that was due to certain social services falling away if your income increases. Most who opposed a local minimum wage stated that minimum wage is not intended to be a living wage and artificially raising it would negatively impact first-time and unskilled workers and businesses. There was a strong need in open comments to address housing costs. − Feedback from employers included comments about higher wages means less opportunities for high school and college students, increased pricing for consumer products and that local government should not be making decision on minimum wage. It was also commented that the housing costs was the issue instead of wages and this was not the time to make this kind of change as businesses are still recovering from COVID. − Denver is the only municipality in Colorado that has already implemented a local minimum at 15.87. The program started in 2020 and they reached their minimum wage of 15.87 in 2022. Several communities across the country have adopted a local minimum wage and most are tied to the consumer price index (CPI) going forward. − Existing research indicates that a higher local minimum wage generally does not lead to job losses or higher prices, but it does increase worker earnings and employee retention. Approximately one quarter of the Fort Collins workforce would benefit from a $15/ hr minimum wage. These jobs are primarily concentrated in the service sector like food service, retail, accommodations, and persona care. − Today our minimum wage is $12.56/hr and $9.54/hr for tipped employees. − Existing research on local minimum wage findings: − Employment - Evidence points to increases of local minimum wage having a minimal impact on employment levels. - Some negative effect on the rate of hiring for low-wage workers seeing first job. − Earnings - Overall increases have a minor yet positive effect on worker earnings. ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 6 - A higher minimum wage can be offset by reduction in hours. - This is more likely to happen to less experienced workers. - More experienced workers see great increases in earnings. − Prices - Research indicates that increases to minimum wage do not drive higher prices in most sectors including grocery, gas, retail chains and drug stores. - Evidence points to higher prices in restaurants, although the offset is small. − Employee retention - Research generally finds that a higher local minimum wage reduces employee turnover and increases employee retention. - Leads to improvements in job quality and worker attachment. − Business closure/exit rates - Research suggests that higher local minimum wage led to more business closures but the effect is minor. − In Larimer County 10% of earners make less than $13.83 and 25% make less than $14.80. The mean is around $22.66. Industries where the median is below $15/hr is concentrated in food prep, personal care, health care support, sales, and office support. According to the preliminary National Business Survey information, most wage levels have been moved higher than $15 due to labor shortages. − Q (Jeff) Is there something specific you want us to do? − A (Josh) I would say provide any feedback on what you think about adopting a local minimum wage and if you have any thoughts about how council should be thinking about what benchmark they should use to determine what the right minimum level is. Otherwise just let others know we are still collecting information though the questionnaire. − Q (Thierry) Do we know or have any data on small businesses and how the minimum wage impacts them? − A (Josh) That is some of the information that is still being analyzed and will be ready for the September 6th work session. What they have done is analyze the academic research on where the local minimum wage has already been adopted in other communities. Some of them have been in place for many years. We have asked them to identify, if ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 7 they can, some analysis of that locally. We were hoping to get out of the National Business Survey was some good data on how many businesses are currently paying at or below the minimum wage because then we would have some sense of what the impact would be to the community. The sources we had were not as specific as we would like, to know what small businesses are paying now in the community. Survey data is the best way to get that. − Q (Thierry) Since Denver has already done it is there a way for us to learn from what they have already done and what the impact they are seeing to help guide the City? − A (Josh) Yes, the primary leads, Jenny and DeAngelo have had several conversations and will continue to have a number of conversations with Denver about impacts. The challenge is they adopted this in 2019 and then we all know what happened in 2020, so sorting out impacts of minimum wage vs the impacts of the pandemic have been difficult in terms of trying to figure out how it impacted small businesses. The other think we have talked a lot with Denver is enforcement and other issues. − Comment (SeonAh) When I talked with Jenny, she had asked Jillian and I to reach out to our home health care providers because Denver had said restaurants are already paying most folks over that. I have already talked to a couple restaurants here and they are already offering over $15 and some up to $20 for food runners, and they are still not showing up. She said to keep an eye out on home health care because that is where they saw the biggest impact in Denver. We are reaching out to our workforce group specifically to see what the impact could look like. I think the other piece is they have been talking about this benefits threshold piece and what would happen to folks who chose not to work because it would push them off the benefits threshold and they would no longer receive federal benefits. The big lesson learned with Denver from what Jenny said is impacted is home health care and not restaurants like we had been anticipating. − Q (Jeff) How? - A (SeonAh) Because they were paying at a lower rate for the home health care provider. The same people are working longer hours instead of adding more people. She wanted us to check to see if they would end up hiring less because of it. − Q (Renee) Did they talk to preschool teachers, nannies, or people like that? ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 8 − A (SeonAh) No − Q (Jeff) I am always going to think that raising the minimum wage is good. The negatives that businesses always seem to complain about never seem to pan out in the data. They say they are not going to hire more people, or their prices will go up but that is not true and what we have found isn’t different from what everyone else found. I am all aboard. I think it is great. I think if you have a business that is dependent on paying people below a livable amount of money, your business is fundamentally unsound. Is there anyway to spin that evolving fund you were talking about earlier as a staff gap for business owners that will have to pay more in wages. Could there be an evolving fund they could tap into to figure it out over the next 6 months. Would something like that help? − A (SeonAh) In our small business grants we have a category specifically for workforce and eligibility could be for staff retention and staff upskilling. We are in our first round now. We don’t have the numbers yet for how much of a need there is. We did have some caps in place but we know labor costs have gone up, so we are trying to offset that this year. I believer we have 50 participants. The problem is we have limited resources. Our staff is reviewing those to get a sense of what is happening in our industries and what those challenges are. − Jeff asked about the caps and totals. − A (SeonAh) We are allowing three categories: workforce, technical assistance, and stabilization. We are saying you can apply for all three, but we are going to cap you at $10,000. We have put in a budget offer for next year for funding for grants, but it will most likely not get funded. We can talk with Larimer County Workforce to see how we can partner to help in terms of some opportunities and trainings, that doesn’t offset the hiring costs though. − Q (Jeff) Do you know the average number of employees a small business has? − A (Jillian) It varies by industry. − Comment (Josh) What I can say about the revolving loan fund is they are traditionally more for inventory, capital, otherwise physical asset expansion or startup costs. They are typically not used for line of credit to manage cashflow, which would be one way about thinking how you could help about a debt product as a business sees a sudden increase in labor costs. − Comment (Jeff) From a marketing and messaging you are already offering ways to persuade any frustration on the hardship of the ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 9 business owners. You are making effort to help them in another way. − Comment (Josh) I think the question and concern I am staring to hear from the businesses is what number do they set. Living wage is dependent on the makeup of your household. If you want to use living wage as a way to think about minimum wage, the question is what kind of household are you trying to create a living wage for. The living wage for a single adult is close at $15. For a dual income with 2 children or a single parent with one child the median wage is already significantly deficient from a living wage perspective. I think this is one of those things that we are trying to provide guidance to and say where does the minimum wage then fit into the whole situation. It is a meant to be a floor but then the question is for whom and what kind of household. Dual income with no children is $12.41 and the current minimum wage covers that for folks in our community in terms of a living wage. I think that is a question on Council’s mind; where do we set this. − Comment (Denny) I am not ignoring the backbone issues here of inflation, the thread of a recession, but looking at the City Manager’s report on the sales tax increase year after year that predominately comes from retail establishments, is through the roof. From that standpoint I would say there is probably no better time to implement something like this. Usually after they are implemented business objections fade and you don’t hear s much about business failures just because you are paying someone a few more bucks. − Comment (Jeff) We just watched it happen with the pandemic whether there was a law or now. − Q (Blake) I am curious how this will affect the annexation of East Mulberry as there are a lot of service businesses out there. Is it anticipated to get a lot of resistance to the annexation, or would it impact the attraction? What if someone goes just outside the city limits to avoid this? − A (Josh) That is a good question and any answer is speculative. I think the Mulberry annexation is facing some resistance for a verity of reasons. Would this further add to folks’ resistance to being annexed? For some, I think it will. I think there are also businesses out there that are probably already paying over the $15/hr. you have a lot of trade sector employers out there. I think the median wages within industries are above this particular minimum wage. As far as site selection the kind of businesses we would be hoping to attract to our community are probably at the median wage or higher. If they are a larger employer or employer we call primary jobs, they create a product that gets exported from this community, elsewhere and therefore brings money in. I don’t know that the wage level will be as big of an issue. If you ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 10 look at the manufacturing industry the wage level there are higher than the minimum wage, at least the $15 minimum wage being talked about. I do think that in many cases its much to do about nothing and so I don’t know if there will be a lot of negative impacts, but that is me speculating. I don’t think the academic research has looked at those types of questions. − Comment (Blake) I would be curious because the levels and examples were from much larger cities and this is a city with a smaller footprint. Places like Charcoal Broiler were on the outskirts of town when it was a dry town. Economic conditions have changed. What are the effects; just something to think about. − Comment (Josh) I think it is important to think about what the target should be of the minimum wage. We also talked to consultants about CPI or a max of some percentage that wage would raise and if that max means that it doesn’t keep pace with CPI, you could carry it over and make it up in future years. The thing is you would be smoothing out the increases instead of having a 9% increase like Denver is going to have tis year. You might have a 5% and if CPI next year is 4% you would just stay at 5% and stay at the higher number until you got back on track as a way of decreasing the incline of the wage increase. There would not be these big jerks up. It would be more complicated. − Comment (Jeff) It seems like it never stops and 10 years down the road our minimum wage will be $43. − Comment (Blake) I like what you said about the smoothing where the business owner wouldn’t have to plan for a 9% increase that was unexpected. They would be able to look at that more predictability. − Comment (Josh) For me, I keep going back to what is the role of minimum wage in the broader wage levels. What you are doing is setting a mandatory floor to wages which in my opinion not a bad thing to have. The question is what is the right floor. I agree that Fort Collins is a smaller community. Originally the State Legislator was thinking there would be several mountain towns where it would make sense for there to be a premium over state minimum wage because of their unique circumstances. I don’t think anyone was preparing for the statewide changes that were going to happen in terms of housing pricing and other things. That might be something too that is impacting it. I will say the City is anticipating that it will have to pay higher wages whether or not Council acts. The current budget includes some funding set aside to increase all our wages to a minimum of $15/hr as ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 11 well as deal with the compression it creates. For example, you could have a parks crew who was making $15.05 and their line person was making $11.50. When they get bumped to $15/hr it doesn’t make sense for the parks crew to still be at $15.05. You must give them an increase as well. The primary place it will impact is the Parks and Rec folks because that is where most of our staff is that currently makes less than $15/hr in the organization. The city is preparing for it and trying to lead by example whether the policy is adopted and effective in 2023 or not. We are getting ready to move to a $15 minimum in 2023. − Q (Renee) Are the consultants doing any risk assessment to look at businesses that may leave the City of Fort Collins and go to other areas in Northern Colorado? Is that a factor they are considering as well? − A (Josh) I think the reality is it is very difficult to analyze that because what businesses say and do don’t end up playing out the same. The best place for us is to make an appraisal for that risk and look at the academic work that has had the opportunity to do the multiple year analysis of minimum wage adjustments in other communities. In Seattle they found it does lead to slightly higher rates of closure and exits but it is minor in terms of the overall economy. Is there a risk, yes; does it create a significant loss in terms of economic activity in the community, that hasn’t been found in those academic studies. − Comment (Mistene) I have mixed feelings with this. I don’t disagree with anything in terms of impact on business. I think those studies you have brought forth are probably correct. I do wonder though if this is something we want to tackle at the local level. Your comment about where this was really intended for mountain towns where there are extenuating circumstances; I think as a state everyone is struggling with the housing issues and affordability. I think one of my concerns is its another item to add to the list of whether Fort Collins is business friendly and are we going to end up where businesses chose not to locate here because it is more difficult and expensive to deal with in relative comparison. Thought COVID we have seen from a commercial real estate standpoint that there are some businesses that are choosing to leave the area because it is easier to do business in Greeley or Weld County. My concern is this would be another thing to add to that list. − Q (Jeff) What are their reasons for saying that? − A (Mistene) It is a handful of things. Some of it is politics and that is a person preference but often time it is taxes and length of time it takes to get projects approved. Weld County and Greeley can be easier and ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 12 quicker to deal with. There are a lot of things that play into it. It is another thing to worry about how business friendly Fort Collins is. I think in terms of competitive wage, so many places are already paying above $15, I acknowledge that and don’t disagree, but free market factors have worked to really raise wages. We are in a competitive environment. Like we have said, what are we trying to achieve here, minimum wage vs living wage. We need to be careful with that in terms of where our actual wages are currently and not trying to benchmark against that. − Q (Denny) Where is City Council looking ahead on this. Are they generally in favor of it or opposed? − A (Josh) Staff had originally approached the priority as consider raising the local minimum wage and Council was very clear back in May that they wrote the priority as raise the local minimum wage. Generally, there is strong support for doing something locally. I think there are differing opinions on what that local minimum wage should be and how it should be set. In general, there is support for doing something but the question is how much support for $15 vs $16. Council needs to sort and see what they think is that target number. We as staff are trying to give them guidance on how to think about that. − Comment (Renee) As a Board we have an opportunity to write to City Council for our recommendations on this topic. − Q (Jeff) It sounds like Misty brough up a handful of potential concerns. Most of the concerns are not related directly to this minimum wage; they are related to Fort Collins being a burdensome place to do business or attract business, which is legitimate and certainly something worth considering. Mistene, do you think the minimum wage issue even matters relative to the other ones you mentioned? − A (Mistene) I think it is death by 1,000 cuts. When do you stop adding things to the pile? I am not sure my viewpoint would be, this doesn’t matter. I think it is another aspect for concern form a business standpoint. You are not going to lose businesses that are already paying above $15 but maybe some of those service businesses. Their leases expire, they look around and go all of this has happened over the last five years, it’s getting too expensive to do business here or they are moving or building a new location they look at the process they are going to have to go through in one place vs another. It is something that is going to fee into that decision making process. I ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 13 don’t think you can say it doesn’t matter but I do think at some point you have to take a 40,000 ft view and say what are we doing here incrementally over time. − Q (Jeff) if we were to make a recommendation, can it incorporate things that are more outside of the scope? Can we say, we are supportive, but you should consider everything Mistene has mentioned, even if it is more of an isolated issue? − A (Josh) Your role is to provide advice and perspective to Councils as they take up these policies. I think what you are describing is how to frame up your advice. There is not any limitation that you say we support/don’t support, or we don’t take an opinion. You can enter in some more context and information to them. Most of the memos the Board has transmitted includes a couple paragraphs of explanation, things to consider or issues an item has raised that needs to be considered. − Comment (Thierry) Personally I am in favor of it but Josh even said earlier that City Council is seeking guidance on the intent and how much we should raise the minimum wage. In my perspective we need a little more data to decide. Mistene raised concern about businesses, but we don’t know if minimum wage is related to that or not. Maybe we do some research in that area. Looking at the data Josh showed earlier about 54% of folks strongly agree, how many of them are business owner’s vs individuals because of course individuals will be in favor of it. I think we need more data to decide. − Comment (Renee) There is a work session September 6th. If we are going to submit a memo to Council, we need to do it in the next week and a half. I agree with you Thierry, but I don’t think we will have those answers in two weeks. − Comment (Josh) On the 6th Council is going to be leaning in on the amount. Moving forward, the official adoption won’t be until the 15th of November. The question is how you want to influence the conversation. You don’t have to wait and just sent one communique on it. You could send one that states this seems like a generally good idea and have you thought about how this stakes up with other condensations. Then we could ask this group to come back in you September meeting to share the same data they shared with Council at the work session on the 6th and you could send another that says yes, we agree with the amount or no we don’t. You don’t have to think of this as a single opportunity to provide you perspectives. Maybe the question isn’t should or shouldn’t we share but what kind of ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 14 information or thoughts could we give council before the September 6th work session that would be useful and then reserve your right to support or not support or provide further guidance ahead of the November session. − Jeff moved to writing a memo to Council and Denny seconded. Renee and Josh explained the process and dates they will need the memo. Jeff will write the first draft − − . The Board agreed it would include a general support based on the analyses that have been done but there is some concern attaching it to CPI and what Mistene mentioned earlier. − Q (Renee) Do we have data on what Jenny said about the health care workers? I see it as a really important point. We all see medical professions and some of us have elderly parents that need help. - Comment (Jeff) That is an issue of an exploited class. Those people should be making a lot more including daycare workers and preschool teachers. - Comment (Renee) No argument there. Let’s see if we can get some more data to support that. It always helps if we have numbers or something concrete. It helps reinforce the idea that we are not just talking about restaurant workers. It is optional for me to go to a restaurant, its not optional to get healthcare. - Comment (Jeff) I don’t know if I agree with putting it in the draft. You are basically saying there is a negative that people who are paying this kind of position and they might not hire more and just make them work longer hours. If I understood correctly, if we raise minimum wage the affect is going to be that the people who employ healthcare workers are going to employ fewer of them and ask the ones, they currently employ to work longer hours. I think that it might be good to mention that is something that happens, so Council could prevent that from happening. I don’t think it makes sense as an argument against raising the minimum wage. - Comment (Renee) Not against, for. - A (SeonAh) Jenny said she reached out to the Denver folks and had an important discussion with home health care providers who were reimbursed by Medicaid at a federally state ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 15 set rate and can’t easily absorb the wage change. She said they were very helpful stakeholders, and they will continue to work with HCPF at the state to address this issue each year in the state budget as well. Restaurants and union were probably their most vocal stakeholders. - Comment (Renee) Yeah, well if you have some data, I think it could be useful. - Comment (Jeff) If you raise minimum wage the people who can’t get more money for their workers, have to figure out how to pay them more. - Comment (Renee) You can’t raise the cost each year. - Comment (Jeff) I mean you could but probably don’t want to as healthcare is expensive for everyone, but it is a consideration. • Brief Economic Health Strategic Plan Update Preview − Information shared by SeonAh Kendall. − They issued their request for proposal (RFP) for a consultant in June but not happy with the consultants and failed that search. They reissued another RFP in July. When they reissued, they refined the request on how they braid economic, social, and environmental and honoring the sustainability triple bottom line. They also called out circular economy and what a road map would look like. There was a council priority of does the City really have a circular economy. They ended up selecting Hickey Global and Barry Matherly and Ioana were selected as the consultants for the project. SeonAh, Jillian, and Shannon Hein met with them yesterday. Their proposal did a good job of braiding all three and their work around data will be good. For circular economy they said they work with site selectors all the time and ask businesses in the industry if they see a need for it. They also work internationally and can ask their European colleagues for best practices and big potholes. The Economics team has asked the consultants to validate the cluster studies they already did. They are also looking at how to balance the focus on the traded sector and primary employees with the small businesses. The target is to go to Council for a work session at the end of January to talk about the strategic plan and circular economy. − Q (Denny) Have you worked with Ioana before? She is incredibly smart and will be a gem to work with. − A (SeonAh) We have not but we liked her small business background. She has worked specifically with our underrepresented businesses ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 16 and one of the conversations we had is in our equity indicator conversation, we said business representation is important; What are we doing besides what the Multicultural Business and Entrepreneur center is to help in stabilizing our underrepresented businesses. We were talking about not only in terms of race, but abilities, sexual orientation, and more. Being able to leverage those skillsets with Hickey Global was one we were really excited to be able to leverage. − Q (Renee) Where are they based? − A (SeonAh) Barry is in Detroit. One of the questions we had for him is with Jillian’s new position, we don’t provide workforce development, however we know that there are workforce sector policies that can be put into place, what examples have you seen? We had only seen two or three. He had created those in Detroit and how to do the match making for businesses with workforce whether it is at the universities, K-12 or private industries He has a wealth of knowledge in that space so it could fill a gap for us. One of the big pieces for Josh and I was how do we braid the economic, social, and environmental piece to think about people centered approach to resilience. − Q (Denny) Would it ever be okay for me to sit in on a meeting with them? − A (SeonAh) I think we would be coming back to you all before we go to the work session. We asked for a detailed schedule, and they will be engaging with EAB as well. It is in their work scope about engagement with this Board specifically, but we have a plan to meet with them every week until the project is done. It would be Jan 24th for the work session and have an adoption in late February. − Q (Jeff) Before the pandemic the focus was on bigger companies and then during the pandemic it flipped to smaller businesses. Is balancing it out as simple as figuring out what percentage there is of each company and spilt money and resources that way? − A (SeonAh) It is more complicated because when you think about our small businesses, they create community. What we have heard from our larger businesses is they can attract talent, but they can’t keep it because there is no sense of community. How do we bridge that will be an important piece. At the start of the office, it was just Josh and I and we had to tackle what we could. Five years ago, was the first time we hired someone specifically for small businesses. In 2018 we started work with our Latin X businesses and it is about building trust and relationships. I don’t think it will be here is the data, this is how we split it. It is about how you balance it in terms of focus areas. Jillian’s ECONOMIC ADVISORY BOARD TYPE OF MEETING – REGULAR 0 8 /1 /22 – MINUTES Page 17 role is a good one, workforce touches everything. It is not just going to be primary employment. She will be working with small businesses and helping to make sure they interact well in that space, instead of having the advance of who you know connect the resources. 8. UNFINISHED BUSINESS • None 9. BOARD MEMBER AND STAFF REPORTS • Renee mentioned that September 26th-30th is Fort Collins Startup Week. They are looking for speakers, volunteers, and sponsors. You can find more information at foundedinfoco.com. • Denny asked about conditions of parking lots and where to report that. Josh mentioned the best place is Access Fort Collins. 10. OTHER BUSINESS 11. ADJOURN - 6:00 pm