SPEAKER_01 0:00

BEHC, the Frequency. Happy Friday, and welcome to the Frequency, a weekly local podcast covering the news, events, and voices shaping the Boulder Valley. Today's show is ostensibly about two housing developments coming to Louisville. Council Gadfly Mark Cathcart joins us to walk through the details. But my conversation with Mark was really about more than just these two projects. It's about the sustainability of cities themselves. Mark called urban centers a pyramid scheme. We also talked a lot about why it's so important to be involved in local decision making, even when it's seemingly boring or asinine. As Mark so eloquently puts it, the very future and survival of our towns might depend on us, shaping them more equitably and environmentally minded. That's really what this show is all about: trying to convince you to pay attention to local leaders and local issues. I promise you, the things they decide on a weekly basis have more bearing on your daily life than whatever goes on in Washington. And you have a much, much better chance of actually shaping policy here in Boulder County. One last note before I get off my soapbox. Mark was concerned about not being understood due to his British accent. I personally find his voice delightful and very clear, but just in case you don't quite have the ear for accents, we've posted the full transcript in today's show notes. That's it for your Friday announcements. I hope you have a lovely weekend and enjoy this conversation.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

Hello, my name's Mark Cathcart. I'm a 10-year resident of Louisville. And prior to that, I lived in Austin, Texas. And I learned while I was in Austin that one of the most important things you can do is keep up with what the city are doing because it can affect you in ways that you don't understand. So when I moved here, I jumped straight in, and I still like to occasionally attend city council meetings, especially on things that you know I think are important. So that I guess is what we're going to talk about today. Two recent concept plans for some innovative residential developments.

SPEAKER_01 2:47

And just for clarity's sake, concept plans, I assume, are the same in Lewisville as in Boulder. They're not a decision point yet. It's just more like, hey, here's what we'd like to do. And then the bodies that are reviewing them can make suggested changes before they actually come back for decision making. Is that accurate?

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Yeah, that's right. They have no statutory status. It's just an opportunity for the developers to say, here, you know, this is what we're thinking of doing, and then get feedback from the council, which they can either take on board for you know their actual plans that would have to go to the Planning Commission and then to the city, or they can, at their peril, ignore the feedback that they get. Sometimes the developers just want to get something approved. This site is a fine example. There have been three prior approved development plans for one of these sites that we're going to talk about. It's never, it hasn't changed one bit since I moved here, or in fact, first since we first came here in 2014.

SPEAKER_01 3:58

Perfect transition into what are these proposals we're talking about? Where are they located? And what do people want to build there? What's so innovative about them?

SPEAKER_00 4:09

There's two of them almost, but the opposite corners of Louisville. The first is being done by Boulder Creek neighborhoods. It's more northeast of Louisville, right on the border with Lafayette. It's actually the site that runs up 95th Street or CO42, north of South Boulder Road. There's the Kestrel Boulder County development, the affordable development there. And then there is currently a storage location, a pet place, and an I doctor's. And then just beyond that, there's a big piece of undeveloped land. So the interesting thing about this is it is an active senior targeted neighborhood with potentially between 174 and 205 units on the six-acre site. There'll be a mix, everything from patio homes, which will be developed next to the existing patio homes in Steel Ranch. And then as it goes east to 95th Street or CO42, there there'll be three or four-storey developments. What I think is somewhat concerning for me is that even though we're gonna have stacked homes on the east with the taller buildings, is that all the prior plans for this site were for mixed use. So some form of commercial with residential on top and then residential property surrounding it. And it's being built, or at least the current developer is the same one. So it is Boulder Creek Neighborhoods. The developer didn't seem to feel it was a problem developing a mixed-use neighborhood in Lafayette, but Louisville has almost zero success getting mixed-use development built. It's approved of few, but typically the developer bails before pulling the permits to build. So this is another in that vein. The developer here is just saying we can't do mixed use. And the feedback from the council was typically, yeah, that's okay because there's the Louisville Plaza just down the street with King Supers, plus there's some commercial on South Boulder Road. If Louisville were a poker player, everyone knows they fold on the first hand. I just don't understand how they think they're ever gonna do this. And it actually has some serious consequences long term because you know you cannot fund a city out of just property taxes. Sales tax remain, you know, is a big part of that. I'm concerned about that, but I'm also concerned that we seem to require in Louisville everyone to drive everywhere all the time for everything. So that's this first one. It's a concept plan only. So we haven't seen the final layout, we don't know the heights of the buildings, we don't know how much community benefit in the way of parks and things that are going to get added into it, but it will include an extension to the road that's there currently called Calix Drive. So you will be able to drive in and up through the neighborhood and out on two roads.

SPEAKER_01 8:23

Let's divert from fact and maybe ask your expert analysis here. Is that what do you think the chances are of this actually getting developed?

SPEAKER_00 8:32

There have been three prior proposals, and the dirt that they dug out when building Steel Ranch is all piled up, and when you drive up 95th Street, the residents always complain about it. So I remember going to it was a city council meeting where the prior set of plans, the prior plans weren't from Boulder Creek neighborhoods, and obviously Boulder Creek neighborhoods has done already in Louisville a number of developments. So they have you know they have a track record. So I think this one has a bit a better chance of getting approved.

SPEAKER_01 9:15

Housing for older adults is a huge need, and it has been for you know with the aging population here. I I remember writing for the Daily Camera, I think in 2017, an analysis of how many senior housing units were needed, and that was almost 10 years ago now.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

So it definitely has that advantage, right? I mean, the best thing about this is it's rental, so it allows people to make some different financial decisions rather than selling a three, four, five-bedroom house and then having to pay nearly the same for a two-bedroom house. I'm quite pleased to see this, and I'm pleased to see that the developer is gonna put in a park, which these days in Louisville isn't the normal.

SPEAKER_01 10:10

What's the second project that you're looking at?

SPEAKER_00 10:13

So the second project that came up on the same day is again unusual. It's a hundred percent affordable, but it's being proposed to go into basically a GDP area that is commercial. The development is being done by COBOL and company, and they're looking for a hundred units of a hundred percent permanently affordable housing on a two-acre two point eight acre site in Centennial Valley Business Park. So, what they're proposing is a two and a half acre site up there that they need to revise the general development plan for in order to do this affordable housing. The developer wants to apply for some 2026 affordable housing credits. In order to do this, they are partnering with the city of Louisville and they fast-pathed the GDP through the city's processes to get it approved on time for them to submit for 2026 affordable housing funds. They have to be in by August, sometime in August. So it came up as a concept plan on June the 2nd, and this is just the amendment, not the actual design, not the height, not the amenities, but literally just the GDP amendment to allow residential to be put in there. It's gonna be a mix of one bed, one bath, two bed, one bath, three bed, two bath. And what was interesting is that the council made all sorts of positive noises about this being 100% residential, being dropped into an otherwise commercial neighborhood, and how good that'll be. And it it reminded me very much of some of the old school like Victorian developments in the UK, where they decide to build a factory and then they build housing for the workers adjacent to it. What the city council members then described was Nirvana. It's going to be really close to King Supers. It'll be really close to the CU Boulder Annex. It's got access to the Flat Iron Flyer and the whole commute into Denver or Boulder from there. It's right adjacent to the bikeway. There are lots of restaurants and you know food places down there. There is a childcare down there as well. So it is ideally placed. And I think, you know, probably again on balance, it's a good development, a residential development, where people actually can do things without having to have a car. But it's almost coincidental rather than planning, right? We do all these comprehensive plans and we create all these zones and stuff, great expense. We pay consultants and everything. And here we are, 20 plus years later, dropping an affordable residential into a commercial district.

SPEAKER_01 14:03

As these projects come back up for further review and approval, how can people get involved in them? And I guess a bigger question is why? Why would you encourage people to care about these projects and speak about them?

SPEAKER_00 14:19

The city of Louisville has a fairly good, well, actually, it's very good, to be fair. They have a very good process for subscribing to planning, the revitalization commission, city council meeting announcements. But the best way to start is to subscribe to the email notifications or set yourself a calendar notice. The council always meets, not exclusively, but typically always meets on Tuesdays, and the Planning Commission is once a month on Thursdays. Why should people get involved? It's slightly more sensitive. If the only people that get involved in plans are the people who are most impacted by them, we know that that's almost always nimbies, right? It's the people that don't want to see things get done because they like where they live, which is great if everyone likes where they live and can live where they like. But we know here in Boulder County that's just not, that just doesn't happen, right? You live where you can afford, and getting housing in some of the neighborhoods is A, beyond what a lot of people can afford, and B, the housing units just don't come up. So sometimes it's just great to show up at the city council, listen to a developer, listen to a development proposal, and say, this is really good. I'm really enthusiastic about this. The council should do it. You can be sure that the people that already live around it are going to show up, and nine times out of ten, they'll complain. Interestingly, for the first development that we talked about with Boulder Creek neighborhoods, even on a concept plan, a lot of the neighbors showed up to support its development. They had some questions, but they're fed up looking at a weed-infected huge pile of dirt that blocks their view. So you don't have to go to every meeting, but pay attention. The ones that are interesting, like these two, neither of these are adjacent or anywhere near me. I think they're it's good fun. And I like to go along and go to the council about their inability to do mixed use because it's something I really believe in. So if you don't believe in mixed use, come along. Let's have a debate.

SPEAKER_01 17:03

You and I will talk about mixed use at some point because it's so interesting what's happening in Louisville versus in Boulder, where we've moved really largely to mixed use everywhere, and then now we have all of these empty commercial and retail spaces sitting around. So I think they're gonna move again away from mixed use. So I find that because mixed use is ideal, that's what you want, that's for vitality and everything, but I don't think they quite got it right in Boulder, and it sounds like they're not getting it right in Lewis Hill either.

SPEAKER_00 17:32

I'm biased mostly by where I grew up in the UK. My whole city was essentially built by US Marshall Plan funding after the Second World War. So it went from a sleepy little village of 20,000 people to it was kind of like Erie of its time. It was one of seven that they built, the UK government built with Marshall Plan funding, which, if I remember correctly, they didn't pay the US back for until like 2010 or 2012. But it was essentially a whole new development, and every neighborhood in the town had a small commercial square: grocery store, liquor store, dentist, doctor surgery, post office. This whole state project where they were looking at higher density and transit corridors, and they passed all those amendments back in 2024. This whole stretch of South Boulder Road is probably in excess of 2,000 homes. The state can't mandate almost anything is built as mixed use because most of them are covered by HOAs. So what you need to do is to encourage people, right, by showing them that you can build this. And for the ones that are mixed use, I'm still on the fence about allowing them to build residential only. We know it requires different funding, you know. Residential developers don't have the banking context, they don't have the track record, so they typically just don't do it. And the city eventually folds when they show up and say, hey, look, it's affordable or rental. So we'll see. So I wouldn't expect to see any of these back in planning, possibly even this year. It's a big deal because essentially cities are a pyramid scheme, right? I mean, I love Old Town Louisville, I love all the houses, especially a lot of the smaller ones, but it's a pyramid scheme. They can't afford to do all the roads, they can't afford to do city facilities unless they keep developing. They need to bring more either sales tax or property tax in to pay for the building, to pay for construction, to pay for the roads. So ultimately, that's why people should get involved, because in essence, everyone's paying for all those buildings, all the city employees, and it's worth congratulating the developers when they come up with good ideas, and I think both of these are.

SPEAKER_02 20:45

Well, thank you so much for all of your time, and I hope we can do this again sometime.

SPEAKER_00 20:51

I'll let you know if something interesting comes up, and especially when either of these two come back.