Salida City Council Work Session, Part Two
The Salida City Council (SCC) work session on April 15 began with a visit to the Scout Wave water feature on the Arkansas River. The SCC then returned to Council Chambers at the Touber Building to address two other topics: what to do about Salida’s urban deer population, and updating the city’s Inclusionary Housing (IH) policy.
Managing Salida’s City Deer Population: Options
The SCC is returning to the question of deer population control in response to citizen complaints and concerns regarding human/deer interactions, and the perception that the deer population is not only growing, but growing more and more habituated to humans, with resultant tales of aggressive deer behavior.
A deer partakes of some Halloween decorations. Photo by Carly Winchell
“Over the years, we have had a variety of different strategies for dealing with wildlife,” said Parks and Recreation Director Diesel Post.
He cited as an example the 2013 passage of a leash law for dogs within city limits (with the concomitant effect, observed by this reporter, that Salida’s deer population seemed suddenly much more comfortable hanging around town, particularly in peoples’ yards and vegetable gardens).
That same year, a “Deer Task Force” study of the city’s urban deer situation presented some options for living with, and/or controlling the population of, urban deer: “Public Education and Awareness”; supporting the Colorado Department of Parks and Wildlife (CPW) recommended population control techniques, (essentially, euthanizing); or some form of birth control for does.
Post, reporting on these findings, stated that according to CPW, the birth control option was impractical, as was the “trap and transfer” option. “Culling” (apparently the term of art for “trap and kill”), is currently the only CPW-recommended method for actually reducing the deer population. One benefit of that method, Post noted, was the availability of the processed venison being made available to food banks.
The fourth option that the Deer Task Force had proposed – “Do nothing” – was where Post introduced the idea of Salida’s “social caring capacity”. In other words, how many urban deer do the citizens feel like supporting? Currently, the statistics suggest that there is one deer for every 29 human residents, which is considered overpopulation by CPW standards.
“The deer are the property of CPW,” Post said: “We can work collaboratively with CPW to manage the herds.”
“Are we sure about the numbers of deer?” asked Mayor Dan Shore. “We will know more by the end of the week [when a new study concludes],” Post replied: “We do know that they are out-fawning the mortality rate.”
Urban Deer in Helena, MT
Post also outlined the Helena, MT Urban Deer program, which features an in-town trap/cull season between Nov 15 – March 31. “I’m just presenting the information,” he concluded. “[Helena officials] will come down if you are interested – more research is definitely in order.”
According to Post, the next steps, come down to two options: Status Quo (“Do Nothing”), or “You direct us to do more research and work with CPW and we can have a conversation later.”
“As far as [deer] being CPW’s property, what can we do if we use a [population control] method they don’t like?” asked Mayor Pro-Tem Justin Critelli.
“We would be back to Square One and without their support,” said Post. “We are not the only town facing this problem, but we would be the first town to go to CPW [for assistance] if you decided to go for it tonight – our discussion goal tonight is, do we have a problem that we want to deal with, or are we OK with where we are at now?”
Council discussion ranged from deer survey methodology to the possibility, raised in previous times, of a bow-hunting cull program within the city limits, a possibility that Post quickly vetoed: “We don’t have areas in town any more where people can go bow-hunting. Besides, bow-hunting programs have been a disaster.”
“We’re not supposed to decide the extermination method,” City Administrator Christy Doon pointed out: “We’re just supposed to figure out whether or not we should work with CPW.”
Council member Alisa Pappenfort seemed strongly in support of that idea. “There is a problem, and people should be able to grow food in their gardens without deer eating it.” She also raised the issue of fencing, to keep deer out of yards and other private property, as “an equity issue”, saying that not everyone could afford to put deer fencing around their properties.
“CPW will provide fencing for people who have deer eating all their produce,” said Council member Aaron Stephens.
“Whatever we decide is going to cause an uproar,” said Shore. “That’s OK – but what I would love is to get more research. Should we continue to collect data and continue this conversation?” The SCC agreed with that option.
Staff seeks guidance on Inclusionary Housing criteria
Photo courtesy of Shutterstock.
City Attorney Nina Williams led the IH policy presentation, saying she was working with the Chaffee Housing Authority (CHA) as well as Community Development Director Bill Almquist on refining the IH policies and details of deed restrictions, but “the elected body needs to give us guidance.”
The discussion centered around the central IH priority of making affordable housing available for the local workforce, and the role that deed restrictions play in that process.
“In order to qualify for IH, you need to have deed restrictions,” said Williams. “It would be difficult to enforce IH policy if you don’t have deed restriction approved by the city attorney. A deed restriction is an enforceable contract – any future owners are put on notice that the [affordability] deed restriction is tied to the land.”
Williams also discussed how the concept of Area Median Income, or AMI, factored into deed restrictions. “AMI is important for two reasons. It establishes income ranges for families of one to four, and it also establishes ‘what is affordable’ for housing.”
She outlined some of the city’s current IH policies. The first; “Defining who is a ‘qualified occupant’ – if they are renters they are required to comply with deed restrictions by the Housing Authority.” Second, “A lottery [placement] system for local workforce.
Two other policies are in place: Deed restrictions prohibit the property from being a Short-Term Rental (STR). Deed restrictions prohibit any ownership of other residential property in Colorado, and the city and housing authority have a [first refusal] lien on any foreclosures of deed-restricted properties, to keep them affordable housing.”
“Just to summarize,” said Almquist, “The deed restriction is the tool – the hammer, if you will – to implement IH. The Housing Authority is the laborer wielding the hammer.”
“These are things that need policy clarification,” said Williams. “We are asking for you to confirm that your goals for IH are still the same.”
Possible future clarifications
Council debated the matter, and defined “workforce” more specifically as local workforce, not working remotely for companies or businesses outside Chaffee County. Staff and Council also discussed:
- How many hours per week the workforce should actually be working in order to qualify
- Income qualifications, including net worth
- What qualified persons aged 60 or older as “workforce”
- Potentially disqualifying factors such as a hypothetical someone with a “rich boyfriend” who might skate into IH and take up a space at the expense of someone with fewer resources to hand.
“Addressing the ‘fictional rich boyfriend’ scenario,” said Almquist, “the size of house depends on the size of the family, also their net worth. You could apply as a single person, but you would only qualify for a studio or a one-bedroom apartment.”
After a discussion of policy changes, Williams said that now the Salida IH policies would “go to the Housing Authority.”
Featured image: Mule deer bucks, down from higher elevations, wandered throughout Chalk Creek Canyon following a snow storm. Salida’s urban deer look nowhere near as healthy as they scavenge local gardens for food. Jan Wondra photo
Recent Comments