Matters Memo

City of Boulder City Council Agenda Item Meeting Date: February 5, 2026 Agenda Title Council Retreat Follow-up Discussion

Staff Contact • • • • •

Nuria Rivera-Vandermyde, City Manager, City Manager’s Office Chris Meschuk, Deputy City Manager, City Manager’s Office Pam Davis, Assistant City Manager, City Manager’s Office Mark Woulf, Assistant City Manager, City Manager’s Office Matt Chasansky, Citywide Strategic Plan, City Manager’s Office

Executive Summary The purpose of this item is to provide City Council a recap of its retreat on January 12 and 13, 2026. The retreat included the selection of City Council Priorities and discussion of process-related items to address in the upcoming term. At the conclusion of the prioritization process, council members reached consensus on the following five Priorities: 1. Bicycle Security and Theft Reduction 2. Cost-benefit List of Measures to Become a Fire-adapted Community / Wildfire Home Hardening Implementation Hub 3. Exploring Our New Authority to Modify the Tip Credit 4. Power Resiliency Including Timing and Barriers 5. Sister City Language Updates

Two additional projects remain on the staff workplan this year, carrying over from the 2024-2025 City Council Priorities: 6. Long-term Financial Strategy 7. Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan This memorandum outlines the scope, timing, and outcomes for each of the five priorities and provides an opportunity for council to confirm the approach to each priority prior to moving forward. To develop the scope, staff reviewed council retreat materials, including notes and recordings, and conducted additional discussions to establish draft project milestones. The purpose of council priority setting is to help guide organizational and policy efforts towards a limited number of workplan items for the given term. Typically, the term lasts two years. However, due to the changes approved by voters in November 2024 which adjust the election of City Council members to even years, the current council’s term will be one year (and thus, a time horizon for City Council Priorities of one year).

Questions for Council Does council have any clarifying questions or comments on the scope for any of the 2026 City Council Priorities?

Alignment with City Plans and City Council History Sustainability, Equity and Resilience (SER) Framework and Citywide Strategic Plan Alignment SER Framework Goal Area The City Council Retreat and Priorities support the SER Framework goal of “Responsibly Governed: local government that provides an excellent customer experience, responsibly manages the city’s assets, and makes data-driven decisions informed by community engagement inclusive of those who have been historically excluded from government programs and services. The city organization exemplifies an employer of choice with policies and programs to support employee inclusion and wellbeing.” Each individual City Council Priority will have further impacts on goals in the SER Framework.

Citywide Strategic Plan Although the five Priorities are not currently captured in the Citywide Strategic Plan, the process to update that document for a new term (2027 – 2030) that is planned for the coming year will include consideration of future City Council Priorities.

City Council History In preparation for the retreat, staff consulted with the Council Retreat Committee on issues of timing, format, and accountability. Based on these consultations, the full City Council held discussions about retreat preparation at two regular meetings. The memos for these items are available at the following links: • •

October 16, 2025 – Council Retreat Planning Discussion (Matters from the Mayor and City Council) December 4, 2025 – City Council 2026 Retreat Touchpoint (Matters from the City Manager)

Staff also discussed the Council Retreat and prioritization process with the new member of council during council onboarding and orientation in the fall of 2025. Boards and commissions were invited to provide input on the Retreat through their annual letters to City Council. These are available at the following link: •

Winter 2025 Board and Commission Letters to City Council

Analysis Prior to the Retreat on January 12 and 13, 2026, City Council members submitted 30 proposals for consideration, which included duplicate submissions that were consolidated into individual priority items. Pre-retreat polling among council members via a forced-ranking survey was conducted to narrow that group. During the Retreat, the top-ranking proposals were discussed, individuals advocated for those that did not rank highly, and other ideas not initially proposed were discussed in detail. City staff answered questions throughout the process. At the conclusion of the prioritization process, council members reached consensus on the following five Priorities: 1. Bicycle Security and Theft Reduction 2. Cost-benefit List of Measures to Become a Fire-adapted Community / Wildfire Home Hardening Implementation Hub 3. Exploring Our New Authority to Modify the Tip Credit

4. Power Resiliency Including Timing and Barriers 5. Sister City Language Updates The complete summary of these new City Council Priorities can be found below. Please find in Attachment A comprehensive notes taken by the facilitators at Peak Facilitation. Two additional projects remain on the staff workplan this year, carrying over from the 2024-2025 City Council Priorities: 6. Long-term Financial Strategy 7. Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan Council also discussed the following process improvements during the Retreat: a. Board Packets Timing – Council requested that, when packets are long and complex (and as a result, provided to council members a week early), community members also receive those packets early. For now, staff will send them over Hotline unless/until a better platform or solution is identified. b. CAC Request Criteria and Tracking – Staff are working on a form that council members can fill out when submitting a CAC request that collects uniform information about each request. Additionally, staff will begin to include information about CAC requests and the outcome of those requests in each weekly CAC agenda. This work is in progress. c. Historic Designation Decisions – Council discussed whether to explore options for reducing council time spent on historic designation decisions. Staff recalled that this topic was explored in more detail during the 2024-2025 term, and do not have the capacity to bring forward these changes for council consideration in 2026. d. Council Debate Opportunities – Council decided to not pursue this item or make changes related to debate rules. e. Study Session/Matters Item Topic Selection – Council indicated interest in staff exploring a mechanism for council members to provide ongoing input on study session topic selection when there are openings on the agenda. f. Shorter Council Meetings – Council requested that CAC make a concerted effort to not schedule meetings past 10:00 pm except in rare circumstances.

Anticipated Fiscal and Workplan Impacts The City Council priorities will be added to the workplans for pertinent city departments. Below is a detailed description of each priority, with information about the lead department, partnering departments, other team members in the community and

workplan impacts, including any projects or programs that must be de-prioritized to accommodate. Note that staff are currently discussing the racial equity and climate impacts for each of these projects. Details will be provided as the projects return to City Council for updates and action. Listed within each Priority description is the SER goal that pertains to the outcomes of that project. For more about each goal, please refer to the SER Framework: bouldercolorado.gov/sustainability-equity-and-resilience-framework.

Priority: Description:

Lead: Engagement:

SER Goal: Staff Notes:

Bicycle Security and Theft Reduction Create a coordinated, data-driven program to reduce bicycle theft and increase public confidence in bike parking and storage, focusing on measurable results. In 2026, the program would implement manageable actions while establishing a framework for future expansion. Key strategies include problem-solving policing with targeted bike theft operations, as well as public education on bike registration and secure locking. The effort will include coordinating with community partners such as CU, RTD, local businesses, and residents to promote a unified bike security culture for the City of Boulder. Police Department Community engagement will include education on various social media platforms, customizing a web page on the city’s site and an emphasis to provide on-site information sharing at local events centered around bicycling. These enhanced community engagement efforts will be shared during a city council session in Q3 of 2026. Safe Personnel assigned to bait bike operations will need to be reassigned from other tasks, which could include investigations into drug overdose deaths, motor vehicle thefts, and pattern crimes, for example targeted take-over robberies of jewelry stores. Depending on circumstance, scheduled bait bike operations could be canceled to address other public safety obligations. The ability to acquire additional bait bikes and trackers is currently unfunded; the outcome of these operations will be impacted by the ability to put out “appealing” bait bikes and then effectively track them when they are taken. The scope of this priority does not anticipate new investment in capital infrastructure. Formalization of a voluntary bike rack encouragement program and other capital enhancements or

upgrades for long-term bike parking would require pausing or discontinuing longstanding active transportation programs for the community including Winter Bike to Work Day and Walk and Bike Month, Walks with Older Adults, Safe Routes to School coordination with BVSD, e-bike/e-moto safety education, Share the Path safety, and the courtesy education campaign, and repurposing those budget allocations and responsible staff. Additionally, there are no resources for ongoing maintenance of new capital infrastructure; funding and staff resources would need to be repurposed from street sweeping, multiuse path, greenway, and median maintenance for example, or contracted out at a higher cost to the city.

Priority:

Description:

Enhancing Boulder’s Wildfire Resiliency through (1) the Development of a Comprehensive Wildfire Home Hardening Implementation Hub and (2) a Comprehensive Assessment and Analysis of Current or Planned City Wildfire-Related Programs, Projects and Actions These two projects advance Boulder’s wildfire resilience through leveraging the City’s 10-department Wildfire Resilience Team and building on the 2024 Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) and its follow-on implementation plan to encourage and strengthen homeowner action and prioritize, accelerate, and measure city-led wildfire mitigation efforts. • Task 1 - This task builds on the City’s existing Wildfire Ready website to include the creation of a new home hardening resource to help homeowners prioritize and implement wildfire hardening recommendations. The Wildfire Ready Hub will provide guidance on materials, contractors, costs, calculations, and available incentives to close the gap between home hardening assessment and action. Hub features and tools are being considered pending an assessment of the complexity and associated costs given the constrained schedule. • Task 2 - This task responds to Council’s direction to define what it means for Boulder to Become a Fire-adapted Community by undertaking a comprehensive assessment and analysis of the menu of mitigation measures the city is or is planning to pursue. Grounded in an evaluation of the City’s five-year CWPP implementation plan, this work will assess 18 action areas and ~130 projects to identify highest priorities, costs and benefits,

barriers to implementation, timelines, project status, performance measures, and gaps. This assessment will help support how future investments, as outlined through work plans, budgets, and policies, will be used to get our community more wildfire ready. Lead: Cross-departmental Wildfire Resilience Team Engagement: Both tasks benefit from recent extensive community engagement. In 2023-2024, there was nearly a year of public engagement during the CWPP update. Managed by consultant SWCA, the community engagement included multiple outreach events, two public webinars, open houses, online surveys with strong community participation, and interactive tools that shaped the plan’s content. On the staff/agency side, the planning process involved close collaboration among the City of Boulder, Colorado State Forest Service, U.S. Forest Service, Boulder County, and the Boulder Office of Disaster Management. For Task 1, the Wildfire Resilience Team conducts routine community engagement via tabling at events throughout the year. This, including other opportunities, will also be a space to gauge the reception of the implementation hub and provided tools. For Task 2, no additional engagement with the community is expected. The robust CWPP engagement foundation supports positioning of task 2 as primarily an “inform” effort, which aligns well with the limited 10month schedule and scope. For City Council engagement in 2026, two touchpoints are proposed: (1) a mid-year Council Study Session and (2) a Q4 update through Matters from the City Manager. SER Goal:

Safe

Staff Notes:

Both project tasks will use existing City programs and interdepartmental coordination through the Wildfire Resilience Team, emphasizing pragmatic, timely progress within current resource constraints. No additional staffing (FTE) is assumed; therefore, work will be absorbed into existing staff workplans with associated limitations and trade-offs. Given the project’s constrained 10-month schedule and limited resources, the scope is intentionally focused and excludes complex or resource-intensive efforts. For example: •

A web-based home hardening project calculator tool may be scoped, but implementation, build, and deployment will be subject to

feasibility and resource constraints. Staff will decide how best to meet the goal of providing homeowners with resources and tools to assist them in implementing home hardening and resiliency projects. • The Assessment and Analysis project will focus on a high-level, comparative first-pass assessment rather than deep-dive “academic” analysis or formal economic analysis of any single topic, project, or program. • Existing plans and policies will serve as guardrails to focus and limit the analysis; for example, retroactive wildfire-related code enforcement will not be studied as this is not currently called for in an existing plan or policy. The goal remains to provide actionable, prioritized recommendations that support effective wildfire resilience efforts, investment, and policy decisions. Priority: Description:

Lead: Engagement:

SER Goal: Staff Notes:

Exploring Our New Authority to Modify the Tip Credit State legislation (HB25-1208) passed in 2025 allows jurisdictions with a higher minimum wage than the State’s to adopt an ordinance that increases the local tip credit, as long as the resulting tipped minimum wage is not less than the State’s tipped minimum wage. In line with the city’s goals to support economic vibrancy, businesses, and a diverse workforce, City Council would like to explore this authority and determine whether to modify the city’s tip credit beginning in 2027. City Manager’s Office Targeted community engagement will be used for this project at the Consult level and will be primarily focused on workers and businesses, using tools such as an online form and up to two community meetings. City Council will be updated midway through the project, prior to the completed evaluation and associated proposed ordinance. Economically Vital Given that this priority’s intent is to consider modifying the tip credit in enough time to be implemented by 2027, staff recommends that ordinance consideration be completed by June 2026 to allow businesses and workers time to plan for any adjustments. Given this timeline, the research and analysis will use readily available data, including relevant information from the 2024 minimum wage evaluation, and align with other economic vitality efforts to evaluate the impact on workers, employers and overall job stability. The engagement description above reflects this condensed timeline as well.

Priority: Description:

Lead: Engagement:

SER Goal: Staff Notes:

Priority: Description:

Lead: Engagement: SER Goal: Staff Notes:

Power Resiliency Including Timing and Barriers Reliable electricity is critical for public safety, economic stability, climate resilience, and community well-being—especially as Boulder experiences increasing climate-driven hazards such as extreme winds, wildfire risk, and heat events. City Council has expressed a desire to better understand Xcel Energy’s current and planned actions to improve grid reliability and resilience and to identify what roles, authorities, and strategies the City of Boulder could pursue to reduce outage risk and community impacts. This project aims to clarify risks, responsibilities, and options so the city can make informed decisions, advocate effectively with Xcel Energy and regulators, and explore local actions that improve resilience for residents, businesses, and critical facilities. Climate Initiatives This project will include engagement with Xcel Energy to document Xcel’s planned multi-year investments in Boulder’s electric infrastructure, evaluate the expected effectiveness of these investments toward improving community resilience and grid reliability, and assess what residual risk remains. Based on these identified risks, community engagement will be conducted to identify and evaluate different strategies that the city could undertake to further mitigate risk and enhance community resilience. Safe None

Sister City Language Updates The purpose of this project is to update the Sister Cities Program Resolution and related processes to clearly define how the program is administered. This includes application submission, internal review and approval workflows, ongoing reporting expectations, and governance requirements. The update will create a consistent, transparent, and repeatable process for managing sister city relationships City Clerk’s Office At this point, we do not anticipate any public engagement. Responsibly Governed The 2026 workplan for the City Clerk’s Office was ambitious prior to the addition of this priority, including the Boards and Commissions

recruitment, weekly Council agenda management, Boards and Commissions OneMeeting transition, and the upcoming election. There is some risk to the project timeline and staff will work to mitigate capacity concerns. Please note this reminder: there are two additional Priorities that will be carried over into this year’s workplan from the last term due to the multi-year nature of the projects: the Boulder Valley Comprehensive Plan and the Long-Term Financial Strategy.

Community Engagement Prior to the City Council Retreat, community engagement was conducted by inviting Boards & Commissions to provide their suggestions for proposals through a letter to council. Staff has already heard valuable feedback related to the timing of these letters and will discuss with the boards and commissions and retreat committees to ensure continuous improvement. Please refer to the details above for engagement considerations for each priority.

Next Steps for City Council Following this February 5 council discussion, staff will finalize project charters for each priority, assign staff, plan for racial equity and climate considerations, complete detailed scoping and begin the work. Staff anticipate developing a Council Priorities tracking dashboard similar to that for the previous term. This will support council members and the community in knowing how each priority is progressing, what stage of analysis or decision-making each priority is at, and when the next key decision points for council are coming. Council will also begin seeing these priorities scheduled for future council meetings throughout 2026.

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Attachments Attachment A: City Council Retreat Meeting Notes