INC PARC Meeting Notes Feb 21 2017

PARC NOTES Feb. 21, 2017

INC’s Park and Recreation Committee (PARC) met February 21 at Brookdale. Present were co-chairs Cindy Johnstone and Maggie Price, Katie and Steve Fisher, George Mayl, Marlene Johnson, Eric Richardson, Helene Orr, Joanne Weiss, and Will Dupree. (Late notice had been sent that scheduled guest speaker, Auditor Tim O’Brien, was ill and unable to attend.)

As a follow-up from PARC’s January meeting, Cindy and Maggie presented and distributed copies of Tom Morris’s proposed Amendment to the zoning ordinance regarding Park use and responsibility. Tom has reached out to all council members and has met with most except Paul Lopez, Robin Kneich and Stacey Gilmore who did not accept his invitation to talk. His amendment assigns the responsibility to create park OS-A subdistricts and park zoning maps to the Department of Parks and Recreation. The Amendment applies the requirements of typical zoning changes to the use of our parks, requiring posting, notifications, public hearings, and requires approval of City Council to adopt proposed changes, giving citizens the ear of elected officials on votes. In short it asks City Council to take back powers that it relinquished to the Manager of Parks and Recreation during the zoning changes of 2010. As of Feb 21 these were the amendments discussed but more fine tuning will occur.

PROPOSED AMENDMENT TO DENVER ZONING ORDINANCE

2/20/2017

REPLACE: 9.3.3.1 A as follows:

In the OS-A zone district, the City Council, by majority vote, shall have final approval authority over the form of all buildings and the use of all park lands

REPLACE: 9.3.4-1 as follows:

The OS-A district is intended to protect and preserve public parks owned, operated or leased by the City and managed by the City’s Department of Parks and Recreation (“DPR”) for park purposes as approved by City Council.

ADD: ???? as follows:

Until such time as zoning subdistricts and maps are approved by City Council, projects proposed for park lands which have not been so designated by City Council will require Council approval.

REPLACE: 9.4.3-1

USES AND REQUIRED MINIMUM PARKING

Permitted uses, number of uses and applicable use limitations, in the OS-A zone district, shall be determined by City Council.

PARC had some preliminary discussion, with further consideration at its March 21 meeting.

There was brief, continued discussion of the MacFarland lawsuit re the proposal to redesign the City Park Golf Course to accommodate a major city draining project. PARC also talked about the role of Arts & Venues in DPR matters. Both groups answer to the Mayor.

Longer consideration was given to a proposed 5-year plan to hold a major 3-day Music Festival at Overland Golf Course, said to bring 30,000 people per day. Will is from Platt Park and is Production Mgr. of the annual Underground Music Showcase (UMS) held on S. Broadway, and knows that parking, noise, and safety are major problems to solve, with particular knowledge of music festivals. Neighbors of Overland are concerned with this proposal. It is unclear where it stands at the moment.

Marlene spoke about a meeting she had with Tom Morris and Councilperson Kendra Black about Tom’s proposed Amendment. Citizen help for parks brought up questions of how the dog-bag system of neighbors providing newspaper sacks for dispenser boxes already in parks. (This was one of INC’s contributions to save DPR money and prevent commercial advertising from being placed in parks.)

Katie reported that PRAB (Parks & Recreation Advisory Board) discussed park use, how many events, and in which venues, and heard about the Game Plan part of Denveright. Katie gave them a copy of updates on Denveright’s four areas. DPR is to make a Master Plan for City Park. PRAB January2017_minutes

DENVERIGHT DOWNLOAD

GAMEPLAN DOWNLOAD

DENVERIGHT

https://www.denverinc.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/denveright.pdf

GAMEPLAN

https://www.denverinc.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/gameplan.pdf

There was discussion of the types of audits PARC is interested in hearing about such as City Golf Courses, and Arts & Venues.

The next PARC meeting will be Tues., March 21, 6:00-8:00 p.m., at Brookdale, 2020 So. Monroe Street. – Diana Helper, PARC member

Additional Report Received From Brad Cameron After PARC Meeting

I attended the Park & Rec planning meeting last night (2/22/17) regarding Heron Pond, which also includes Northside Park, Heller Open Space, and an area owned by Denver Wastewater.

Attached is a map of the area displaced last night. Alas, it is sideways, but still legible. The dark blue area is that burdened by the “Heller Open Space Covenants” (the 1.9 MB document attached), the dark green area is that burdened by the “Heron Pond Conservation Easement” (the 939 KB document attached), the light green area is the former wastewater treatment plant now known as Northside Park, and the two shaded orange parcels are “owned” by Denver Wastewater.

(More information should be available on line at heronpondplan@denvergov.org.)

As some will recall, Heron Pond, Heller Open Space, and Northside Park were all considered for “designation” back in 2014, but were pulled when redevelopment of the National Western Complex heated up. Scott Gilmore forwarded the two attached recorded documents at that time.

PDFS

Heron Pond DR Recorded

Heron Pond CE03 Recorded

It should be noted that none of these 3 preserved areas would exist without the foresight of Mayor Wellington Webb. They were put in place thanks to his vision. While public use of Northside Park remains minimal, that will someday change.

The vision of GOCO is also much appreciated, without which neither the Heller Open Space Covenants nor the Heron Pond Conservation Easement would exist. Those two land restrictions significantly tie the hands of Denver regarding what can be done on the 2 parcels. Extension of 53rd Avenue is explicitly prohibited, as is virtually anything else other than “passive recreation” and use as a natural area.

Northside Park is not so protected, however, and therefore the National Western plan contemplates extension of 51st Avenue across its southern arm and then across the South Platte River.

As for the Wastewater parcel, the proposal is for “development opportunity sites” to be created in it on either side of 51st Avenue. The remaining portion to the north would be a combination of storm water detention and park land. Currently that parcel is a vacant lot occupied by weeds and not much more. It reportedly was purchased with $$$ from the “Wastewater Enterprise Fund.” I was told that some way would need to be found to pay back that Fund if “designation” as park land were to occur.

I inquired of Assistant Park Planner Mark Tabor regarding whether the master plan would call for designation of those areas left to remain as park land, and his response was ambiguous.

Needless to say, I intend to continue to monitor development of the Heron Pond master plan with an eye toward designating whatever emerges from it as “park land.”

Please let me know if there are any questions or comments.

Inter-Neighborhood Cooperation

Neighborhoods work better when they work together

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