BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS SUMMIT COUNTY 970.453.3414ph I 970.453.3535 f 208 East Lincoln Ave. I PO Box 68 COLORADO summitcountyco.gov Breckenridge, CO 80424 TO: Board of County Commissioners David Rossi Jeff Huntley FROM: Millicent Marter RE: Work Session Meeting of May 6, 2025 DATE: Tuesday, May 6, 2025 Attendees: Elected Officials: Eric Mamula, Nina Waters, and Tamara Pogue- County Commissioners Staff: David Rossi, County Manager; Jeff Huntley, County Attorney; Steve Greer, Assistant County Manager; Andy Atencio, Assistant County Manager; David Reynolds, Finance Director; Cameron Turpin Valentine, Assistant County Attorney; Toby Weiner; Assistant County Attorney; Andrew Armstrong, Assistant County Attorney; Adrienne Isaac, Communications Director; Allison Hiltz, Director of Community Partnerships; Caitlin Johnson, Executive Administrative Manager; Lina Lesmes, Interim Co- Housing Director; Brandon Howes, Interim Co-Housing Director; Kyle Snyder, Assistant Finance Director; Eric Monk, Contract Administrator, Shannon Brown, Grant Program Administrator, Michael Berry, 911 Communications Director; Alice Gustafson, Road & Bridge Project Engineer; Kim Weiers, Facilities Administrative Assistant; Jessica Forsyth, Open Space & Trails' Senior Resource Specialist; Katie Austill, Planning Technician; Suzanne Pugsley, Senior Planner; Jen Uhler, Planner I; Millicent Marter, Deputy Clerk. Guests (in person or via Zoom): Abigail Tietjen, Becky Bowers, Jim Benkelman, Joanne Cook, Kelly Owens, Kim Atencio, Blair McGary, Matt Loutherback, Peyton Rogers, Phil Lindeman, Shannon Hayes, Tom Fisher, Jim Baird, John Crone, Julia Puester, Scott Reid, Jeanine Svoboda, Annette Parsons, Ben Brown, Virginia Hammock, Scott Reid, Becky Bowers, Shannon Hayes, Karen Esposito, Kim Atencio, and others who did not sign in. I. Citizen Budget Advisory Committee Update David Reynolds, Matt Svoboda, and members of the Citizen Budget Advisory Committee and others discussed topics including but not limited to: Mr. Reynolds began by introducing the members present from the Citizen Budget Advisory Committee before providing some background and data that has been collected for today's presentation. It was noted that the 2024budget numbers were audited by Eide Bailly and Mr. Reynolds recommended that the public review the materials provided in the packet for today's Work Session. Mr. Reynolds presented data involving the County's General Fund starting from 2017 and ending in the present. From this data, the General Fund was separated into revenues, salaries, operating, expenses, and net. Revenues, salaries, and expenses all appeared to increase over the years but, when removing the elected offices' budgets from the General Fund, it was noted that the Summit County Board of County Commissioners' Work Session Meeting Minutes of May 6, 2025 Page 1 of3 increase was not as extreme. Commissioner Pogue asked a clarifying question to confirm that the salary and operating funds were a part of the expenses. The presentation showed positons/expenses within the Sheriff's Office's was much higher than the other Elected Officials (Electeds)Ofices. Mr. Reynolds then presented on the individual departments within the Sheriff's Office, which included Sheriff Admin, Jail, SMART, Animal Control, Emergency Management, STARR, Search & Rescue, and Water Rescue, on how each department contributed to the Office's total expenses. From this, staff presented how the Sheriff's Office percentage affected the County's General Fund over the years with the Office utilizing approximately 36.2% of the Fund. Mr. Reynolds then presented on neighboring counties to help contextualize all of this data, which included Eagle, Pitkin, and Grand County. From this comparison, it showed that while our neighboring counties are larger in size (and population for just Eagle County), Summit County's Sheriff's Office has a higher percentage of salaries, expenses, impacting the General Fund and more full-time employees employed by the Sheriff's Office. To finish his presentation, Mr. Reynolds read off his key findings from Eide Bailly's research which included that the growth of the Sheriff's Office budget as a share of the General Fund is largely due to salary increases, the growth in the Sheriff's Office staffing was 29% over four years, but the growth in salaries was 90%, and the current forecasts for 2025 indicate that the Sheriff's Office will be $734,000 in the red at the end of 2025. Matt Svoboda then began his presentation for the Citizen Budget Advisory Committee (CBAC) by providing some personal background on Mr. Svoboda's financial knowledge and reiterated Mr. Reynolds' sentiments that he and the rest of the Committee do not wish to defund law enforcement, and expressed his deep respect for what law enforcement does every day for public safety. Mr. Svoboda then stated the CBAC's mission before presenting on the data the Committee collected involving the County's General Fund. This data similarly showed that Public Safety made up a majority of the County's expenditures. In fact, based on the data, public safety spending in Sumit County is the 2nd highest in Colorado as a percent of the General Fund (with Denver being number one) even though Summit County crime rates are low compared to other Colorado counties. The CBAC recommended to the Board that the County needs to reduce Public Safety spending and to better fund other priority areas such as roads and workforce housing. For this, the Committee recommended instituting regular actuals VS. budget reviews to avoid surprises and thus fully utilize available funds, and to develop a 5-year strategic/financial plan to help frame near-term issues by potentially hiring a third party budget analyst. Other members from the CBAC then spoke on the Committees' conversations with the Sheriff's Office and their spoke on their own personal recommendations to the Board and the Sheriff. Commissioner Mamula expressed his gratitude to the Committee for their hard work while hoping they can begin looking to budget allocations in other departments such as youth and family services, housing, and roads. Commissioners Pogue and Waters agreed with their fellow Commissioner on thanking staff and the Committee while stating that they will hold off on asking questions involving the Sheriff's Office for a future separate meeting with Sheriff FitzSimons. II. Land Owner Proposed Code Revision Susan Lee, Simon Corson, and Sally Ward discussed topics including but not limited to: Summit County Board of County Commissioners' Work Session Meeting Minutes of May 6, 2025 Page 2 of3 Ms. Ward began with presenting on the proposed change to the County Boy Mine requested by the applicant to add a tubing hill as an accessory use to the Museum on property in the A-1 zone District and to thus amend chapters 3 and 15 to the Land Owner Code involving Museums and Tube Hills. Ms. Ward stated that Staff rejected the applicant's proposal but, nevertheless, the applicant wished to continue through the process for Board approval. Staff then presented on the potential impacts on A-1 parcels throughout the County should this proposal be approved before recommending to the Board that they do not grant the authority to initiate the proposed code amendment. Commissioner Pogue noted that this request would be more appropriate within the context of the County's Master Comprehensive Plan while Commissioner Waters requested how this proposal would affect future accessory dwelling units within the County. Jeff Huntley requested a brief Executive Session to discuss and receive legal advice pursuant to CRS 24-6-402 Subsection (4) (b)(e) on the topic(s) of budgetary matters and instructing negotiators in regards to the Sheriff's Office. A motion was made by Commissioner Waters and seconded by Commissioner Pogue to go into Executive Session to discuss and receive legal advice on the topic(s) of budgetary matters and instructing negotiators in regards to the Sheriff's Office. The BOCC voted 3 to 0 to go into Executive Session per CRS 24-6-402 Subsection (4) (b)(e). The motion was approved. III. Adjourn Staff will return to the Work Session on May 13, 2025. Commissioners thanked the team for their work. Meeting Adjourned. Respectfully submitted: Approved by: Millicent Marter, Deputy Clerk ELbIhe Eric Mamula, Chair 1861 SOLORADO Summit County Board of County Commissioners' Work Session Meeting Minutes of May 6, 2025 Page 3 of3