Boulder Community Neighborhood Forum

Questions

Information
Number of years residing in Boulder:
Neighborhood:
Number of years in your current neighborhood:

Question #1 - Your neighborhood
What are the most important issues your neighborhood faces?
How have you been involved in addressing these issues?
What actions do you think the City should take to address these issues?

Question #2 - Floor Area Ratio (FAR)
Existing houses are being scraped off and extremely large homes are being built on their foundations throughout the City. This is dramatically changing the character of the neighborhoods and removing existing affordable housing stock. In 2004, the City Council passed a 0.8 restriction on FARs in single-family residential areas. This restriction has turned out to be nearly irrelevant as even most mega-homes fall under this threshold.

Should the City Council lower the maximum FAR?
What else, if anything, should the City do to preserve existing housing stock and the character of our neighborhoods?

Question #3 - Variances
Variances to zoning rules used to be granted only for exceptional situations, e.g., where lot size, slope or configuration prevented any reasonable development. Now variances (e.g., of height limit, set back rules, floodplain restrictions, etc.) are granted as a matter of course, obviating the whole purpose of zoning.

Should the City go through the rezoning process if the desired development requires it, or should the City continue granting wholesale variances to individual properties?

Question #4 - Densification and Annexation
Past city councils have supported more and more growth, including looking at annexing additional lands on the edge of the City, increasing housing density within the City and promoting more job growth. Within the current city limits, there are over 100,000 residents and nearly 100,000 jobs, roughly 50,000 of which are held by in-commuters. Under current City zoning, there is the potential to add 64,000+ more jobs and 13,000 to 15,000 more residents.

Do you support building out the City to these numbers?
Do you support annexing more land for more development?
Should Boulder limit growth to that amount for which we can maintain levels of service (water, transportation, police, fire, etc.) and our quality of life?

Question #5 - Affordable Housing
Boulder's affordable housing program has become dependent on the Inclusionary Zoning (IZ) ordinance that requires 20% of new residential units in a given development to be affordable, or only 10% if the developer pays a relatively small fee, which most do. In addition, because the City Council has made affordable housing such a priority, developers are not made to pay to fully mitigate their impacts on city facilities and services. Prior to the IZ ordinance, the City focused more on using tax revenues to buy down existing units to make them affordable, which was a slower process but did not involve the impacts of so much new development.

Do you support the current approach that depends heavily on new development to provide 1 or 2 affordable units out of every 10 built, with the others usually quite high priced, or would you focus more on the slower approach, which has less impact, of buying down existing units and requiring developers to more fully mitigate their impacts?

Question #6 - Alcohol
Alcohol use is involved in a large portion of the unpleasant behavior that neighborhoods have to deal with. These behaviors include loud parties, late night noise and riots.

Are laws regarding alcohol-related offenses strong enough to deter this behavior that significantly affect neighbors' "peaceful enjoyment of the home"?
If not, how do you propose to strengthen these laws?

Question #7 - Rentals
The number of rental units in neighborhoods is large and increasing; many neighborhoods are made up of nearly 50% rental units, which were formerly affordable single-family houses. Impacts associated with these units often include trash, parties, noise, extra vehicles, and lack of upkeep of the properties, all of which negatively impact nearby residents. Many City ordinances, including the "3 unrelated residents" rule, go un-enforced.

Should the City better enforce the "3 unrelated" rule, or should the focus be on eliminating impacts, or both?

Question #8 - Budget Priorities
The City is budgeting very little money for neighborhoods. The Environmental Zoning Enforcement Office (EZEO) only has five enforcement officers and the Neighborhood Services Office, started in the early 1990s, is no longer funded at full capacity.

Will you increase funding for the EZEO, reinstate the full Neighborhood Services Office budget and support continuing efforts to enhance the livability of exisiting neighborhoods?

Question #9 - Floodplain Development
The recent South Boulder Creek flood study showed that hundreds more homes (for a new total of 1,100+) are now in the 100-year floodplain and that CU South and the Hogan/Pancost properties are also in the 100-year floodplain. New development in floodplains diverts floodwater, which then creates impacts on existing homes.

Do you support further development in the 100-year floodplain under the current City regulations?
If so, under what restrictions?

Question #10 - Mosquitoes
Numerous neighborhoods in South and East Boulder (e.g., Majestic Heights, Keewaydin Meadows, Meadow Glen, Viele Lake) are severely impacted by mosquitoes. This is both a public health issue and has a major impact on the quality of our lives.

Should the City aggressively pursue mosquito control programs within the City limits and on adjacent Open Space lands?
What are the pros and cons of such a program and how would you balance these?

Question #11 - Water Supply
The drought of 2002 indicated that the City is not totally secure in its water supply. The recent imposition of water budgets is ominous in that the City could easily reduce budgets and further restrict use. Given that the City projects 64,000+ more jobs and 13,000 to 15,000 more residents, what strategies below do you support to ensure an adequate water supply for the City, including maintaining our trees and landscapes for which Boulder is famous, in addition to the current City efficiency investments?

  1. Restrict usage
  2. Restrict new development
  3. Purchase further water rights
  4. Increase the price of water for consumers

Question #12 - CU/City Oversight Committee
Two years ago the CU/City Oversight Committee was established to provide neighbors with a comfortable forum for addressing and solving intersecting problems in the community in an organic way.

If you are elected to City Council, would you pay attention to the work of this committee?
Do you support the continuing efforts of the CU/City Oversight Committee to address the alcohol issue in our community and at the University?

Question #13 - US36 Noise
US36 creates significant noise impacts on Martin Acres and Frasier Meadows. Proposals to address this include sound walls and lowering the speed limits.

Do you think this is a significant problem that you will take action on?
Should the City expend funds to address these concerns?

Question #14 - Transit and Densification
Over the last 10 years the City has increased the number of bus routes and has focused on adding density along these transit corridors. This densification can negatively impact the surrounding neighborhoods and is rapidly changing the character of the City. Meanwhile many buses are running nearly empty and we have seen marked increases in car traffic in these areas.

Do you believe this strategy is reducing automobile impacts?
Do you believe densifying the corridors is what the community wants?

Question #15 - Funding for Transportation
The City's Transportation Master Plan (TMP) has as its goal "no increase in vehicle miles traveled (VMT)" but the plan is under funded by hundreds of millions of dollars. Future VMT growth will come mostly from new development and not from current residents driving more.
Do you support charging new development for the cost of preventing the VMT increases that it will create?

Candidate's response