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HomeMy WebLinkAboutNatural Resources Advisory Board - Minutes - 12/17/2014NATURAL RESOURCES ADVISORY BOARD REGULAR MEETING WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2014 DATE: Wednesday, December 17, 2014 LOCATION: 215 N. Mason Conference Room 1-A TIME: 6:00–8:30pm For Reference: Joe Piesman, Chair 970-691-6697 Bob Overbeck, Council Liaison 970-988-9337 Susie Gordon, Staff Liaison 970-221-6265 Present: Joseph Piesman, Chair Harry Edwards Robert Mann Joe Halseth John Bartholow Liz Pruessner Alexa Barratt Absent: Rob Cagen Staff Present: Susie Gordon, Staff Liaison Dianne Tjalkens, Admin/Board Support Josh Birks, Economic Health Director Daylan Figgs, Sr. Environmental Planner John Stokes, Natural Areas Director Guests: David Tweedale, citizen Chris Ray, citizen/Troop 96 Gayle Volk, citizen Call meeting to order: Joe Piesman called the meeting to order at 6:02pm. Agenda Review: Add Climate Action Plan update to end of meeting. Public Comments: None. Member Comments: None. Review and Approval of November 19, 2014 minutes Harry moved and Bob seconded a motion to approve the November 19, 2014 NRAB minutes as presented. Motion passed unanimously, 7-0-0. • John Bartholow said he had an email correspondence with Stormwater’s Susan Strong and she asked to clarify that their department is always trying to set the bar higher. AGENDA ITEM 1— Economic Health Department Strategic Plan Josh Birks, Economic Health Director, described an internal strategic plan to guide staff programs and projects, which will be reviewed by City Council in January. The Economic Health Office is focused on long term vitality, residents finding employment, living in community and having businesses remain and expand within the city, as well as attractive and sustainable infrastructure. The strategic plan is being revisited in order to include triple bottom line thinking, and to ensure alignment with community values and City Plan. Economic conditions that have become more important are changes in the workforce, the pace of innovation, climate change and community build-out. The plan is oriented around five themes: Community Prosperity, Grow Our Own, Place Matters, the Climate Economy and Think Regionally. Community Prosperity is about employment opportunities across income and education/skill spectrums. The Economic Health department has focused on primary employers, those who bring wealth into the community, and those will continue to be supported while including other types as well. There is a mismatch between employee skills and employer needs. The labor force study has identified gaps and the next step is to determine how to fill them, with input from the private sector. Grow Our Own is to encourage the development of new and creative industry. A large challenge is adding capital access. Rocky Mountain Innosphere is working on this. Place Matters is about having a quality, balanced built and natural environment. The purpose is to maintain unique elements that make Fort Collins a desirable place to live while going through changes. This theme area includes balancing land use, targeted infill and redevelopment, growing up rather than out, maintaining access to nature, etc. The Climate Economy is a two-pronged approach: helping current business adapt in place to climate change, and developing opportunities in innovation. Think Regionally is to create resiliency by working with regional partners, enhancing relationships, developing a unified story, and preserving regional character. There has been a series of public engagement opportunities, and Josh will be visiting more boards and holding a “super board” meeting. The final draft will be presented to Council in January or February. Discussion/Q & A: • Harry asked if the department is interacting with trade unions. Josh said one staff is on the Larimer County Workforce Investment Board, which includes trade union representatives. • Bob asked if “regional” relates to northern Colorado. Josh agreed, but added that this needs to be more defined. • Harry asked if Josh has been in communication with Lucinda regarding the Climate Action Plan. Josh said he sits on the internal technical team and he is addressing the financial implications. Harry said there will be profound economic implications. Josh agreed. He will work to translate opportunities into economic development. The focus of conversations has been on who pays and who saves, and making it equitable. • John asked about metrics, and if the Economic Health department is going to take responsibility for them. Josh said the department has been tracking many of these metrics as part of BFO offers, but departments are also selecting additional metrics and will track them. Citizens can view metrics at fcgov.com\dashboard. • John asked about the cluster of industries Economic Health would like to attract. Does it also make sense to discourage certain types of businesses from coming in due to their carbon impact? Josh said yes, including data centers. These facilities want a lot of land and need a lot of power, and are not consistent with Fort Collins’ values. It is a delicate issue to draw the line. There is also natural 2 selection. There is a value set here, and costs associated with that. We try to be as transparent as possible about expectations. • John asked if, when the plan is approved, another Anheuser Busch came to town, would the plan transparently discourage them? Josh said we would talk about the cost of water in a very different way, which might naturally lead them to select a different location. We have a strong craft beer industry and are seeing smaller operations open. Adding a lot of small, however, can add up to a large. The conversation would be open and transparent. Today we would need to recover the full cost of the water. Anheuser Busch got a deal on the water, and that would not occur again. • John asked how much of an enclosure this makes, that Council can’t go around. Josh said ultimately Council decides, but this is a guiding document. The plan will be approved by resolution. • Joe Piesman asked how the Economic Health Office envisions the town changing visually over the next 25 years. We have growth management areas (GMA). Is there something on the table in the near future about annexation, or are we staying where we are? • Josh said there are areas in the GMA that are not annexed, including much of east Mulberry. The City has contemplated annexing that within city boundaries, but no one is discussing growing outside of the GMA. Mulberry could present a better front door for our community and have opportunities for employment. The other underdeveloped area is Mountain Vista. Outside of those, we are rapidly approaching or have already hit the GMA. There are a lot of natural areas that create a buffer. College is anticipated to intensify and those other areas are expected to build out. • Joe Piesman noted that there is a discrepancy between what people think of with affordable housing and housing affordability. The City needs to be on message with this. Josh said the Housing Affordability Policy Study has recently been completed by Social Sustainability. It found that the primary distressed demographic is renters who make 30% AMI or less. We’ve seen a lack of supply, and there is next to no vacancy, so prices have gone up. Some of that will get corrected with more supply, but that lowest income group is in need of assistance. At $25,000 annual income, or less, the housing cannot be built to be affordable to them, so subsidies need to happen. We have an obligation to provide decent and safe shelter to everyone in the community, but we don’t need to give everyone their preference. Who is caught in the middle is the renter who wants to enter the market as a first- time homebuyer; that market is really compressed. We need to provide different types of housing as part of the solution. Higher density housing can bring the price point down for first-time buyers. • Harry asked if the Economic Health department has taken a position on the stadium proposal. Josh said the office will not take a position unless instructed by Council. Joe Piesman added that topic has been added to the NRAB work plan. Josh said that the City needs to understand the impacts of the stadium and have input on how they are managed. • Alexa said there has been innovation in agriculture and natural resources, and the next thing that needs to happen is resource sharing. Is the City aware of, or is it considering options to get these industries together? Josh said the department has funding to support clusters and sectors. The City put $30,000 into the Local Food cluster this year, which is looking at the food shed. Alexa said she is talking about crop production and bio-energy. 5,000 patents were filed along the Front Range in this area. Josh mentioned the Innovators Conference, and that he is planning on attending. He would like to understand the opportunities, and the City would be open to understanding how to help. Alexa said CSU is a great resource for that. Josh added that the plan looks at drawing more connections with CSU. • Liz commented that a red flag she found in the plan was regarding business friendly land use codes. She is concerned about the inventory of existing office and business space and whether more needs 3 to be built. She sees every shopping center has empty space, but we build on green space. She would like to see infill and redevelopment. Once green space is gone, it is gone forever. Josh said one challenge is that some of those currently available spaces are outmoded. We might need to help transition the inventory by changing its use or redeveloping. The costs of redevelopment versus greenfield development sometimes encourage green field development. This is where TIF and other tools can be used. • Liz said looking at the triple bottom line, there is also an intangible cost of losing green space. Josh said staff is looking at a two-tiered capital expansion fee system to encourage private investment toward infill. There may be regulatory things that can be done. There has not been an appetite for a two-tiered fee structure yet, but we are looking at how to maximize use of space. • Liz said Community Prosperity needs to include the idea of figuring out how to build the prosperity of the community without pushing people out. Market forces come to bear, people get priced out. That is not sustainable. We have to figure out another way to not leave these people behind. Josh said the approach staff takes is that the Social Sustainability department addresses challenges that people with lower incomes face such as child care, transportation, etc. Economic Health is looking at career development to allow individuals to grow in the system and developing jobs that allow people to stay in Fort Collins. For example, the City assisted Avago, which helped add a number of operator jobs that did not need a lot of prior education and had a living wage. • Bob said Bruce Hendee is leaving in March, and asked what is happening with the search. Josh and others are meeting with the recruiter, and the City anticipates having the new person in place by March 1. There will be an opportunity for internal candidates to apply, and a national search will happen as well. Bob said when a founder leaves an organization, it is a vulnerable time. Josh added that Bruce leaves behind several disciples who are passionate and committed. • Joe Piesman said the board might consider asking Bruce to attend a meeting to discuss his vision. AGENDA ITEM 2—Soapstone Natural Area Management Plan Daylan Figgs, Sr. Environmental Planner, provided an overview of ecological planning for the Soapstone Prairie that includes reintroduction of black-footed ferrets and consideration of bison herds. Daylan discussed four projects: Instream Flows, Energy by Design, Black-footed Ferrets, and the Bison Plan. Soapstone is owned by Natural Areas and Utilities owns Meadow Springs They partner to manage the ecological resources. Instream Flows Fish surveys identified streams that still had native species, and two streams that had no fish. Fish were stocked, but the department recognized that the stream flows were not protected. They began filing instream flow applications in 2012. The flows were quantified, and now applications are moving forward. There are not many other water rights/diversions. They will start the water court process, and will continue fish reintroduction. Energy by Design Soapstone and Meadow Springs are split estates, meaning that the City does not own the mineral rights. Interests in mineral increased over the years; there has been a lot of interest in oil and gas in the area. We are concerned about protecting natural and cultural resources. We looked well by well, but there was not a comprehensive plan that would include all the other activities such as roads and pipelines. The department 4 started the Nature Conservancy process, which is called Energy by Design. They have worked with the state land board on land conservation and they were open to helping in a planning process around minerals. They put together a team that included many conservation organizations, and developed a science-based tool. There is a mitigation hierarchy component that focuses on minimizing impact. The goal is no net loss of conservation value. This has been used to look at biological values and we are one of the first to add cultural resource sites to the process. The tool includes a map which identifies areas where wells can go, such as old roads and other previously developed areas that would not have as much species impact. Other areas are designated to not have drilling. They have not yet had to use the plan, but the state is interested in releasing some of the minerals. The tool is built into the lease document, so the state can use it in negotiations. Discussion/Q & A: • Joe Piesman asked where the native species come from to reintroduce. Daylan said fisheries, other streams, etc. • Bob asked about quantifying instream flow. Daylan said it is quantified by CFS and what needs to be protected by CFS. • Joe Piesman asked what areas are most at risk. Daylan said the reports show the east side of Meadow Springs is where the most oil and gas would be located, but it is not a good production site, and has a very low likelihood of profitability. • Joe Piesman asked if lowering prices of natural gas will affect this. Daylan said it is too soon to tell. People are putting a lot of money into holding leases, and brokers are compiling a lot of acres together to sell to big companies in the future. Ferret Reintroduction at Soapstone Daylan showed a map of prairie dog colonies. There have been up to 4,200 acres of active prairie dog colonies, but an outbreak of plague devastated the colonies, bringing them down to 50 acres. Staff realized the need to mitigate disease. With 4,200 acres, colonies were running into problems with locations, and the department started a management plan process. They drew lines for ideal locations for colonies with 4,000– 7,000 core acres. They will not protect from plague outside the boundary, and will work with neighbors if colonies go outside the boundaries. There is interest in paying owners to have prairie dogs if the land owners are willing to have ferrets reintroduced on their properties. They have released 42 ferrets thus far into prairie dog areas, of which they have been able to track 13. Likely there are other ones that are still there but not found, though they also do expect attrition. Next year they will supplement, as well as capture and inoculate wild-born ferrets. The Safe Harbor Agreement provides assurance for neighboring land owners that they are not held responsible for deaths of ferrets on private property. Additionally, the City can opt-out of the program at any time. Broad spectrum pesticide is currently being used to kill fleas, but it also kills all small insects, so the department would like to get out of putting it in burrows. The newly developed vaccine looks promising. The protected colonies are generally dusted and vaccinated, though they have control groups for each. They are vaccinating outside of the study plot as well. Dusting is immediate, but the vaccine will take multiple doses. It takes a couple of years to protect a colony from plague. The United States Geological Service is the only manufacturer of the vaccine. It takes 4-6 weeks to perform dusting, but they could vaccinate in two days. Discussion/Q & A: • Joe Piesman asked if they monitor fleas. Daylan said generally no, but if there is an outbreak of plague then yes. They have done a trial for bait uptake rates of the oral plague vaccine and in the second year put vaccine in, and now, in the third year, they looking at uptake rates with other small animals and looking for negative effects; there are none so far. 5 • Liz asked about the form of the vaccine. Daylan said it is peanut butter flavored bait with the vaccine in the product. • Joe Piesman asked how many ferrets were released. Daylan answered 42 with “absolutes” on 13 still accounted for. Staff surveyed four nights in a row. They only found ferrets in the colonies they were released into and they checked other colonies. Bison Partnership with CSU The issue around bison is genetics. Bison are hardy animals so they have been bred with cattle to make the cattle herds more resilient. Most bison herds now have cattle genetics. Yellowstone still has a pure bison herd but it is infected with Brucella, which causes cows to abort young. CSU is using assistive reproductive techniques to create Yellowstone bison without bringing Brucella into the herd. The City’s role at Soapstone will be to house the herd as a conservation herd that will help manage the genetics of other herds. CSU has collected embryos from Brucella-infected bison, washed the embryos and implanted them into other non- genetically pure bison, resulting in pure-bred, non-infected young. Ova and semen can be collected from dead animals as well to create embryos, which can then be implanted into healthy surrogate animals. These techniques have worked, though success is not 100%. Discussion/Q & A: • Joe Piesman said CSU has some of the top animal reproductive experts. • Bob asked if the pure bison have to be kept separate from regular bison to keep the genetics pure. Daylan said ideally yes. • Joe Piesman asked about the risks of inbreeding. Daylan said they will continue to work with CSU to bring in new genetic material. • Bob asked about current information on the herd. Daylan said phase 1 will include about six animals animals from CSU that will go to Soapstone. There is an Intergovernmental Agreement that is going through boards and commission and Council. Then fences will be built and the area will likely have bison within a year. • Joe Halseth asked about the fencing. Daylan said they have played with various fencing designs. One concern is continuing to have other wild animals be able to move through it. They have built stretches of bison fence to ensure this is going to work. • Alexa asked if prairie dog and bison areas will overlap and if there will be conflict. Daylan said there will be overlap area, but these animals are compatible. There are cattle in the area now and they get along. • Joe Piesman said having two endangered animals of the west in the same place is very neat and asked whether the City will use this as an educational tool? Daylan said yes. Also, Denver Zoo has a bison herd elsewhere and we can swap with them. People who go to the Denver Zoo live in grasslands of the Front Range. This connection can help us form a nice partnership around species conservation and citizen science initiatives. • Joe Halseth asked about the master plan and how hunting might be integrated into Soapstone. Daylan said staff is working with Colorado Parks and Wildlife in Larimer. They manage a lottery system for pronghorn hunting on Red Mountain, which they would like to continue at Soapstone. It would be late season, after the area is closed. They could have a lottery system or a youth hunt. Staff is looking at options to have an educational component. They are aiming for the 2016 season, but this will require code changes. • Liz said when she started on the board eight years ago, Daylan spoke at the NRAB meeting about the plans for Soapstone, and she noted how far we have come since then -it is great! 6 AGENDA ITEM 3—Impact of Dry-Point Areas on the Poudre River John Stokes, Natural Areas Director, reviewed analyses regarding key stretches of the Poudre River that tend to go dry each year, and the impacts this creates for riverine species. John said a consultant engineering firm that does water engineering work around the state did the study. There are a number of structures that create dry points. Water rights are allowed to divert water. He showed a map of the dry points. It goes to the mouth of the canyon and out to I-25. There are six places. He gave the Greeley Pipeline Dam as an example. It is off of Highway 14. The diversion puts water in the pipeline and takes it to the water treatment plant. The river has been running surprisingly high for winter for the last two years. The reservoirs are full, so they are not diverting water. The natural system is full of water as well. All the springs at Soapstone and Bobcat are running. He showed photos of the headgate and bypass structure, and the south bank of the river. Staff would like to put in a fish bypass at this structure. Based on historic flows, they could put water in the bypass 80–85% of the time without changing water administration. He showed a graph of the percent of days the river flows below a sampling of CFS rates. There are many winter time diversions in the canyon. The Joint Operating Plan with Greeley, Northern Colorado and Fort Collins guarantees a minimum CFS throughout the winter, down to the Greeley diversion. There are protected instream flows in the upper canyon that are pretty good rights created by the state. Staff is looking at all options and ideas to get more water in the river and build bypass structures. These will be discussed with the entities that have structures and it will be made clear that the improvements will not change delivery or water rights, or cost them anything. The City will figure out how to pay for it. Greeley is a large organization and has the resources to have a discussion like this, but a ditch company may not, so the ditches that deliver irrigation water may move more slowly toward progress. However, Daylan was able to negotiate a fish ladder at a diversion structure belonging to North Poudre that needs to be rebuilt. They will also be able to install a measuring device. It is imperative to measure water and protect it as it moves through structures. People are constantly trading water. You might put it in at point A, but it doesn’t show up at point B because it is not protected. We need to make sure no one else is picking it up. The City is working with an outside non-profit organization that has expertise in water rights and collaboration to help work with diversion owners. Discussion/Q & A: • John asked if there is a different mix of strategies for each structure or ones that work for all. John Stokes said some of each. Each one is a little different, but there is a lot of opportunity. A lot of these structures are getting really old and will need to be rebuilt. However, water related work is contentious and people are cautious about changing. • Joe Piesman asked if the City could use the North Poudre fish ladder agreement as a template to show that these partnerships work. John said yes. • Alexa agreed that working with a third party is a good strategy. John said this group works with water providers and irrigators and has a good track record. • Joe Piesman asked for an update on NISP. John said he expects the Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement in June. There will be a 45-day comment period, but staff will request an extension to 90 days. Recently, he sent a memo to Council describing where they are and the approach taken. He will continue look at a handful of issues important to the City, and pay attention to what the state is doing with respect to mitigation. The state has been required to develop 7 a mitigation plan. There is no official public process with the state mitigation plan. They did one for Windy Gap and Trapfield in Denver, so this is the third. • Joe Piesman asked if any external staff will be hired to help review. John said there is a lobbying firm on retainer and the City has an attorney. Staff will use people from CSU for technical assistance. Utilities will have outside help on water quality issues. Water temperature will be a major issue. The difficult part for staff will be getting the response through Council. There may be a work session in May or June to help new Councilmembers understand the project. AGENDA ITEM 4—Other Business Climate Action Plan Update—Harry Edwards Progress reported at last meeting of the Citizen Advisory Committee (CAC) was very good. A model has been developed that takes inputs, such as switching to all electric cars, and shows the result for carbon emissions. He showed a chart of emission inventory; 50% of emissions are from electricity generation, 24% from transportation, and 19% from heating with natural gas. He showed a chart of Platte River’s energy resource mix; 75% of Platte River’s generation is from burning coal. The CAC was polled to determine opinion on likelihood of success for various elements. Members are somewhat skeptical that Platte River will reduce emissions. The group found it very unlikely that 40% of existing homes and buildings would move to all-electric heating. The group is also skeptical that new construction, electric vehicle adoption, and reduced VMT will meet the goals in the plan. The contractors went back to the drawing board to include the skepticism in the model. If Platte River does not achieve the 80% reduction of emissions, the whole model is in trouble. Harry showed a list of items Platte River is discussing, such as retiring coal-fired units. One potential strategy is removing coal combustion around 2045. Platte River is discussing a combined cycle which involves a gas turbine that runs a steam turbine. He finds this very encouraging. In California, Jerry Brown signed a bill requiring 33% of the state’s electric power be from renewables by 2020. Entrepreneurs are coming on the scene to develop innovative technologies. This is a business opportunity for Platte River, to take the lead in focusing entirely on renewables. • Liz said she is surprised the solar input isn’t more for the long term. She also wondered if it would be distributed or consolidated. Harry said he thinks it would be in Platte River’s best interest to have it consolidated. Review City Council’s 6-Month Planning Calendar/Agenda Planning • January: Agenda items are board elections and CAP update • February: Nature in the City Announcements • Thank you to Liz Pruessner and Joe Piesman, who are leaving the board after having each completed two terms of service. o Joe Piesman thanked the board for their service. o Liz added that she appreciated and enjoyed the experience. The City needs informed intelligent discussions from those willing to serve. • Joe Piesman said the board is short two seats. There will be two new members beginning in January. o Susie said Rob Cagen resigned from NRAB. Joe Piesman added that Rob did not feel the board was a good match for him. 8 o Susie added that Steve Catanach recently resigned from the City and will be working with Spirae. o Bob said John may agree to be chair when elections are discussed next month. • Harry and Susie will complete the 2014 annual report. • Harry will chair the January meeting. • Liz said the West Nile Virus TAC had a meeting last night, and there will be one meeting per month through the middle of next year. She anticipates attending the January meeting, at minimum, and will update the board. Pro-sprayers are very vocal on lowering the vector index. There are discussions about establishing a mosquito district in order to larvacide in the County as a prevention strategy. Joe Halseth is also on the committee. o Joe Piesman added that the pest management specialist position was not funded in the BFO. Susie noted that there is a mid-cycle opportunity to request funds. • Joe Halseth said the Bicycle Master Plan was passed last night. Winter bike to work day was last week. Adjournment: Harry moved to adjourn. Meeting adjourned at 8:38pm. Approved by the Board on January 21, 2015 Signed ____________________________________ 1/27/2015 Dianne Tjalkens, Administrative Clerk II Date 9