Remarkable opportunities: A conversation with Mayor Andrea Davis

Andrea Davis was elected as the 52nd Mayor of the City of Missoula in Nov. 2023 and in her first few months of office she has been addressing the hot topics of housing, homelessness, public meetings and other issues. 

This week the Missoula County Commissioners caught up with Mayor Davis to discuss what has surprised her since taking office, how the city and county governments collaborate for their constituents and so much more. 

Thank you to Missoula's Community Media Resource for podcast recording support!

Transcript

Juanita Vero: [00:00:10] Welcome back to the agenda with your Missoula County Commissioners. I'm Juanita Vero and I'm here with fellow commissioners Dave Strohmaier and Josh Slotnick. And today our guest is none other than Mayor Andrea Davis, the 52nd mayor of the city of Missoula. So welcome.

Andrea Davis: [00:00:24] Thank you. It's wonderful to be here with all three of you. Yes.

Josh Slotnick: [00:00:27] It's great to have you here.

Andrea Davis: [00:00:28] Thank you.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:00:28] Welcome Andrea,

Andrea Davis: [00:00:29] Great to be here.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:00:30] So I'm dying to hear. How has this time been for you as mayor so far? Has it lived up to its expectations? Any surprises that you've discovered?

Andrea Davis: [00:00:40] Well, most definitely. I mean, I would say that I knew it was going to be intense, the amount of issues that would be working on, you know, just knowing from the community and campaigning all of the things that our constituents are passionate about. You just don't know until you're in it how much the city government, as I'm sure you can relate to, is involved in and with whether you want to be or not. Right? I mean, there are things that are germane, that are core business, and then there are things that constituents bring to you that they want your help solving, whether they're in your jurisdiction or decision making space or not. We are the people that are closest elected officials that are closest to the folks in our community and communities. Also, because I'm the most recently elected mayor after our long standing Mayor Engen, there has been a very great interest and desire by community members, business leaders, other elected officials, constituents, just everyday folks that want a chance to sit down and talk, talk about their concerns, talk about their ideas. And so the intensity of the schedule is something that you can try to prepare yourself mentally, but nothing you really can until you're in it.

Josh Slotnick: [00:01:47] So no truth to the rumor that every time someone says it's like drinking from a fire hose that Dale Bickle has to drink, he has not been able to leave his office.

Andrea Davis: [00:01:56] That's exactly right. Yeah, yeah, that's exactly right. The other thing that I think it's a welcome surprise, I think that folks expected some change with this with my election. And so as we've been working on a few things and I know this is maybe something we'll talk about a little bit later, but I've had the opportunity to be working with new leadership in council and city council, have been interested in doing some things differently to help improve the participation and the way that city council meetings and just the support that we can give as the administration to City Council and as they, as a legislative body, can help continue to make policy decisions on the ever increasing issues that come before them. And so that's been really welcome. And to a large degree, I think it's because people were were ready for some things like that.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:02:41] So fill us in a little bit. Maybe I'll learn something that I was doing wrong a decade ago when I was on city council. So, you.

Andrea Davis: [00:02:48] Know, I mean, one of the things that I think helped coming from the private sector, quite frankly, and I was with homeward as an executive director for 15 years and having run board of directors meetings and having been participating on so many different board of directors meetings, I was always evaluating how things could run. Do we need to make changes for the way things are run? And, you know, I've been participating in city council for the 22 years I've been in the affordable housing industry. And then I been, of course, paying more keen attention as I was a candidate and now presiding over those meetings. And I was really seeing sort of over the arc of time how there had been the way that the meeting agenda, the City Council agenda was set up, that it was difficult for the council to get to the core business of that city council meeting. And truly, that's what the City Council meeting is. It's the city council business. It's not... 

Dave Strohmaier: [00:03:39] Because the meeting opens with public comment on non agenda items.

Andrea Davis: [00:03:42] Non agenda nonscheduled items, and the public and our constituents are, I think, hungry for that opportunity to engage, to engage. But it also then alienates others that wish to come and be part of the city council. The business discussion, the things that are scheduled on the agenda. And so there had been a couple of things added to the agenda because of the pandemic, and then just never shook it off. So it was clunky and you could tell that it's been impacting even some media coming to City council, because they did not know when they would be able to cover agenda items that were scheduled and noticed on the agenda. And because it's in the evening, they were not actually coming to cover local government, which is very concerning. So we generated a bunch of ideas that, you know, staff have been participating, but city council leadership as well, and worked on basically a reordering of city council. We reached out to other cities around Montana to see what they were doing and brought those ideas forward. And so the first part of the City Council agenda is all about the sort of the administrative items, minutes and those kinds of things. Then we have special presentations. So that might be our neighborhood councils or proclamations or this evening, we have partners in the community that are helping install Narcan machines around the community. So we have that resource available that's at the head of the meeting. And so that, again, for folks that are depending on knowing when they're going to be part of a scheduled agenda item, then we roll right into so that's part of the city council business, and we roll right into public hearings, which again, core part of. Business. I'm needing to make sure we take care of those, especially because those are we have a certain statutory obligation to make sure we see those through in a certain time period, then the consent agenda and the regular business, and then we move on to and public comment is all throughout that whole process. So public comment starts with the public hearing...

Juanita Vero: [00:05:24] On-aenda items.

Andrea Davis: [00:05:25] On agenda items. And then we roll into public comment on non-agenda items. And then the mayor comments and city council comments are right after that. So that informational section really is all actually lumped together. And in some ways it then allows us as elected officials to help to respond to potentially to some comments that were made, because that was the other disconnect I was seeing is that people would make comments at the very beginning of the meeting, and then they would walk out and I was like, oh, but if they only knew what we were doing to help alleviate their concern or that their idea was heard. So I'm really hoping that this actually creates a better demonstration of the responsiveness of local government.

Josh Slotnick: [00:06:01] So you spent the last 15, actually 15 plus chunk of your life working on housing, really becoming super fluent and a statewide expert, a regional expert, really well known across the area for your expertise and leadership on housing. So you're talking about housing all the time now. On any given day, you may talk about six or 7 or 8 radically different subjects from could be public health to public works. And then the next thing you're doing, you're talking about homeless encampments and then planning and zoning all the same three hour span. Have you noticed a change in yourself? Have you have you begun to kind of change because of the job?

Andrea Davis: [00:06:36] Yeah, I think so. I mean, I think that is a natural tendency of anyone, an elected official. And I would say especially, you know, yourselves included, because, again, of the myriad of issues that we handle. And it's not like maybe some of our national cohorts where you have like a whole nother level of staff on a specific issue, right, that you you are jumping from topic to topic without the ability to really prepare for that. I depend on staff to bring me up to speed on things because I can't spend the time personally, as much as I'd like to, to be able to prepare for those meetings from meeting to meeting. So what that has required me to do, and something that I learned in mayor school, as I call it, when I went to the Harvard Local Government Academy with the Bloomberg Philanthropies, provided that scholarship, and I went out there. A lot of it is is strategic scheduling and making sure that we are finding time, like 45 minute meetings, if at all possible. It's hard to do because most people think they meet on the hour, but it gives that 15 minutes of buffer time. It gives that time to have a personal break. It gives that personal time to check your email quickly or really quick if you have to get something done, which you do. I am definitely having to be, you know, incredibly intentional about personal health and and mental health, and that's an ongoing work in progress. I'm just making sure that we're finding a little bit of time to take a walk if you can or breathe, but that is definitely something that I would say is, yeah, I'm adapting to all that. And I'm learning like, that's a very big professional growth. You bet, you bet.

Juanita Vero: [00:08:00] But back to the housing piece. Anything that's. Yeah. Ha. Have your thoughts changed on housing? I mean they haven't changed.

Andrea Davis: [00:08:08] I think what makes me feel almost more anxious is that local government and the city. Right. And the city or the county, we aren't able to just turn the dial back on housing prices. And I think that there could be some conceptions out there that I may be able to control more than I can because of the distinct background that I have and the expertise I have in that realm. The work that we're doing to update our different host of codes, so we have a unified development code, will be something that's foundational for the city, because not only will it be, I mean, all of our codes will basically work together. And so we'll be able to streamline process. It'll be more helpful for our staff and certainly be more helpful for the public, including the development community. And that in and of itself will be, you know, obviously, it'll be monumental for Missoula. It's interesting once you're in the position to recognize all of the public process that is involved in something like that and the amount of work that's required. And from the outside, you just want things to happen faster. And so that's something for me in the housing realm, realizing, like, I want things to happen faster than they can. The other part of, you know, like we have an affordable housing trust fund at the city. And, you know, I'm eager to see the sale of some of the properties that we have on the market to fund that.

Andrea Davis: [00:09:20] So when I hear from constituents and hear their ideas, which it's like, yeah, we yeah, we're with you on this, we're 100% with you on this, and we just don't have the resources to make that happen yet. But we are doing some things that are really pretty remarkable right now. The legislature expanded the definition of eligible uses for tax increment financing. And they allow workforce housing. And so the Missoula Redevelopment Agency has created a policy. Tomorrow, they'll be hearing on a project that will be, if approved, the second project funded literally in the last several months, but under at my time as, as the mayor. And it's very meaningful for me because to see legislation crack a resource loose like that, and it's a local resource, which we don't have many of, to actually see that in bricks and mortar and creating homes that are affordable into perpetuity is super exciting. Yeah. I mean, I just I certainly felt the pressure and felt that at home where as the executive director. And then I guess seeing it across the board and seeing like, man, how can we just, you know, move some more of these toggles so we can, you know, affect affordability up and down the whole income spectrum? Just feeling the pressure of it is a little bit more.

Juanita Vero: [00:10:23] So you can spill some dirt on the Scott Street Ravara project. How do you pronounce that? Am I pronouncing it correctly?

Andrea Davis: [00:10:28] Ravara.

Juanita Vero: [00:10:29] Ravara. Yeah.

Andrea Davis: [00:10:30] So that has already been funded. So that's super exciting. I mean, in my career, that project, which was the old white pine sash site in Missoula, there were multiple attempts and that North Side neighborhood had worked for decades to get that piece of property cleaned up. But it was held in private ownership, and there was all sorts of environmental regulatory realities that were not making that possible. And if but not for local government, but not for the city of Missoula, that property would still be sitting there as an abandoned piece of industrial wasteland.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:10:59] Well, and I can remember back in the day, while I was on city council, actually, where there were those voices, not from the community so much as from industry that was not real wild about cleaning it up to residential standards. And I think this is a great case in point where going the extra mile to do both the right thing and also the environmentally safe thing is yielding results, and that we were able to turn this site that had been used for industrial purposes for a very long time into something that's actually safe for people to live on the.

Juanita Vero: [00:11:36] Benefits of doing the right thing.

Josh Slotnick: [00:11:38] Yeah.

Andrea Davis: [00:11:38] Yeah.

Juanita Vero: [00:11:39] Smurfit-Stone! 

Andrea Davis: [00:11:40] I want to be clear for listeners that the project, the old white pine sash site that has been cleaned up to residential standards and it wouldn't have happened. But for the neighbors being so incredibly persistent with the state, actually, we all partnered, right? We all partnered and said, yeah, we want to make this happen because that is a big piece of property right in the middle of the North side that has the opportunity to be a thriving part of the neighborhood, which it will. We have now turned dirt, and the Missoula Redevelopment Agency has done a few things. First, it used tax increment financing to buy the property. That's, of course, a long standing eligible use of tax increment financing funds. Now we are putting in the necessary infrastructure to actually build the vertical structures, the homes and the and the retail that might be available on that site. But because this workforce housing initiative has been made possible through recent legislation, and the MRA, the Missoula Redevelopment Agency has passed a local policy here, we are actually able to take tax increment financing and invest it in workforce housing and our workforce. Housing policy is one that wishes to keep those homes affordable into perpetuity.

Andrea Davis: [00:12:42] We don't want to just see the first generation of folks benefit, because we just don't have enough resources to to do that. And so how we're able to achieve that on this site is the building of a community land trust. So the first phase of development on the Rivera site, the Rivera development on the Scott Street site, Rivera partners is the private development partner, is we're building the largest community land trust in the state of Montana. Half of those homes will be market rate, and half of those will be income restricted. For people that are earning a range of incomes from 80% of the area median income to 120% of the area median income. So that's a really wide range of incomes for people that are earning their wages in Missoula and differs per bedroom size. A community land trust is where the the land is held in trust, and then the home buyer only purchases the improvement or the home. And that's what really helps it be affordable. But it also helps it be affordable for the next home buyer. 

Josh Slotnick: [00:13:35] Are there appreciation caps?

Andrea Davis: [00:13:36] There are. And that is how you can ensure affordability into perpetuity. Missing middle housing. That's why we need to make sure that there are the next home ownership option for folks that are moving from a community land trust into the next affordable market option. That project is underway, and then there will be another 230 apartments that are built, conventional market rate apartments and a city park and sidewalks and bike lanes and all sorts of things. Those 230 apartments will not be funded by Missoula Redevelopment Agency workforce housing, because that is conventional market rate project. The project that comes in front of MRA tomorrow will be another private developer bringing forward a project. They are looking for this workforce housing subsidy. We could call it tax increment financing, but the quid pro quo for us as taxpayers and residents is that there will be deed restricted home ownership options for folks to actually get into.

Josh Slotnick: [00:14:26] What are you going to set the AMI at?

Andrea Davis: [00:14:28] Well, the workforce housing policy is 80% to 120%. So it's really what the developer brings in my understanding is they're looking at and I might have misspoke there. There may be actually rental projects as part of this as well. So 85% of the area median income, the market can't touch that right now.

Josh Slotnick: [00:14:43] No. So the rules when the legislature said now you can use TIF to do workforce housing, they put in that 180 to 120%.

Andrea Davis: [00:14:50] They actually allow 60 to 140%.

Josh Slotnick: [00:14:54] Oh that's fantastic.

Andrea Davis: [00:14:55] Why is that? Because every market is different in Montana. And actually local cities and constituents know what they need best.

Josh Slotnick: [00:15:01] Uncharacteristically wise of them.

Andrea Davis: [00:15:02] Yes, yes.

Josh Slotnick: [00:15:04] Yes, I would say go to go to 200% given well, what the market. It is right now, and I feel like we're just in a in a whole new territory right now.

Andrea Davis: [00:15:12] Yeah, exactly. We really are. We really are.

Josh Slotnick: [00:15:15] You've convened a group to talk about encampments for people who are living outside, and I think it's fantastic. Brought all these people together. How's it going? What are you learning? Where do you see these conversations going?

Andrea Davis: [00:15:26] I'm glad you asked about this, because it was something I was hoping to have the opportunity to do once I took office, because I had heard from people not only current city council members, but also people in the community that felt like they just wanted a voice at the table to talk about this incredibly complex issue and topic. And we convened a working group of city council, which doesn't typically happen. You know, city council has their committee meetings on Wednesday, but to step outside as a full body and have a working group is is not very typical. So we have a professional facilitator that is leading the charge on this Jenny tribe. And she said, you cannot have any more than 25 people. Well, with 12 city council, the mayor and a municipal court judge, that leaves 11 community members. And so we were very thoughtful. We took ideas from all of city council, but then also folks in the community that we work with across the board, from business representatives, all the way to service providers. And so we have folks that represent the business community. We have folks that represent the Unhoused Tenants Union. So folks that are actually currently living unsheltered and houseless, that's great.

Josh Slotnick: [00:16:30] Those two next to each other, that's fantastic.

Andrea Davis: [00:16:32] Yeah, I mean, that is something that's really not been done before. And also, you know, service providers and neighborhood representatives and the idea and the reason that I really wanted to see this happen was because there is just so much misunderstanding across the board, or maybe not really truly understanding different perspectives on this. And the city is, is is kind of stuck in the middle. Right. And, you know, we are expected to be responsive in a very difficult situation that, as you know, the ninth District Court of Appeal rulings have basically. Yeah. And Boise and Grants Pass have basically made the city the provider of last resort in some ways. Right. But without the resources to do it, it's really created a lot of misunderstanding about what we can and can't do and what we should do. And I think a lot of why I wanted to see this move forward is just that. We had more ideas at the table. There was a greater understanding of the opportunities, the limitations and where we might go from this. The whole point being is that the City Council has a current ordinance. It's been in the for 20, 30, 40 years. There's no camping in the city of Missoula. That's our current ordinance. We want to update that to be more in line with the ninth District Court of Appeals rulings. There is guidance to help do that. At the same time, we've heard from many community members, including those that are unhoused and represent those that are unhoused, to say, well, what can we do to help folks if they can't access the shelter that has been provided through the Johnson Street Facility, Emergency Shelter and Poverello Center and other folks that are providing services for folks that are and housing for folks that are living houseless.

Andrea Davis: [00:18:02] This is really a conversation to say, how does the city respond in a regulatory way with a I see a combination here of a regulatory response in a way that also brings about programs and practices that may be city led and involved, but also our private partners and our service partners in the community, including our faith based community, who are very interested in figuring out how they can provide meaningful solutions here. I'm very hopeful that there will be both will come forward, that we'll have a make sense regulatory response that provides public health and safety for all Missoulians, and that we also have the ability to help those that are most vulnerable, figure out a safe place to sleep and also connect with services and hopefully eventually, you know, housing. So we're starting out with 3 to 5 meetings. We're on our third this Wednesday, the 27th of March. We have city staff there as resources. There are public of course are invited to come. They observe and then provide comment at the end. And I mean, I think at the end of the day, this is one of the it's a way to shed light on the topic, understanding the complexity of it. And I'm hoping come up with a host of solutions that are more community led. I was.

Josh Slotnick: [00:19:10] Just going to ask that what's the is the objective to update the ordinance you mentioned or more than that, more.

Andrea Davis: [00:19:16] Than that? The objective is to produce actionable recommendations to city council. Right. And that likely will, you know, what does that look like? That's probably a regulatory response to some degree, because we have to update our camping ordinance. But also that might mean that if, for example, one of the programmatic or what should I say, maybe like a program or a practice that comes out alongside of that by our private partners, like the faith based community, some folks in that faith based community have indicated they want to open up their parking lots to a small number of people living in cars and RVs. This is something that's been practiced all over the country, and this is where the public and private sector comes together, because there still is a regulatory way in which we make that a workable solution. And that's through permitting, because obviously it might create more concern if there is not a limit to the number of folks that. You camp in parking lots. And so that's a best practice around the country. So if we have a group of folks that say, okay, we're willing to do this, but what's the city's involvement or the city's involvement would be in permitting. And that's part of our regulatory response to something that is also a private solution. So I'm hoping that we're going to come up with a number of different kinds of solutions that would really help. You know, obviously we want to reduce what we call functional zero homelessness, which means that as people are entering homelessness, somebody else is exiting homelessness. This is a situation that we are going to be living with for a long time. As we know, a national issue.

Josh Slotnick: [00:20:41] Every population center, every population center in the country, if not in the world, is dealing with people who do not have a place to live. And it's kind of an unusual quirk of politics and of our time that we who who work on the local level, are dealing with the consequences of whatever kind of cultural and policy machinery it is that creates people who have nowhere to live. And I'm hoping at some point, our federal government begins to craft a larger plan and get some aid out to local governments to help to deal with this, because I bet you guys will come up with something fantastic. I'm fully serious. I bet you'll come up with something really cool having those folks, all those people together. Hopefully we'll be able to be involved in something like that. And yet next year and the year after, there will be more people living outside.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:21:29] So I guess on that point, because we don't live on islands that are completely separate from one another or in silos or whatever metaphor you want to use here. What's what sort of conversations do you have with mayors and other municipalities in Montana or or beyond? Because clearly, if if a jurisdiction in the state of Montana makes the conscious choice, and here I'm thinking counties or municipalities makes the conscious choice that we're not going to invest in, in resources to address houselessness or homelessness. What that means is that the problems do not go away, but folks are going to seek out service rich environments, whether they have roots there or not. So any what are you seeing across the state with, with your counterparts if anything?

Andrea Davis: [00:22:21] Yeah, I would say also, my previous work as an executive director of homeward, I was seeing this issue crop up in every urban center in Montana. And so whether you have the service rich environment or not, people are living houseless in all sorts of communities. Billings and Missoula have, I think, a higher number because we are the two largest cities in the state and we do have more services, including just hospitals, you know, things that are your basic services, let alone services for folks specifically for, you know, like mental behavioral health care or substance use disorder treatment, for example. I mean, I can tell you that I was right as I left homeward, we just completed the financing package to create 25 permanent supportive housing homes in Great Falls. I have only had one meeting with counterparts of the what we call the Big seven, and we were only scheduled every three months, unfortunately, so I'm waiting for the next. But I can tell you that this conversation I'm on two different mayor groups across the country. One was a group of colleagues that I met as part of the Harvard Local Government program, and the other is a group of women mayors. Actually, so many communities of every scale are dealing with such significant issues in this space. I think it's a reality that when you live in a city like Missoula or Billings, where you do have greater number of services, you will see people coming from smaller areas in Montana to be able to connect with those. But it is something that I have asked for our local Montana League of Cities and Towns and to really start working this up the chain to the National League of Cities and Towns in terms of a greater amount of federal and state response to help localities manage the situation, because it's really pretty. So pretty difficult.

Josh Slotnick: [00:24:05] Yeah. A couple winters ago, if I remember right, there was a point in time count for people who were living outside in Kalispell and in Missoula and in Kalispell, they came up like seven fewer than Missoula, which means per capita they had more. And it's not a service rich environment at all. So when we talk about services, I would like, for the purposes of conversation, just to expand our definition, there are formal and informal services, obviously formal services we could fill those in. Informal services are what happen at any population center in the United States. There is a lawn to sit on where you will not be bothered. At the courthouse. There is no such thing in big Sandy. There is a bathroom at the transfer center and in the courthouse. There is no such thing in big Sandy. We have a gazillion and not quite a gazillion a few less restaurants in Missoula that have dumpsters behind them. We have a park system. We have a river running through this place. We have a...

Juanita Vero: [00:24:56] Costco and hospitals!

Josh Slotnick: [00:24:57] All of these things create a wake behind them. Society creates a giant wake, and if you have nothing, you can live off what you find in that wake. These are. Informal services that are attached to every population center, regardless of the formal services you have. Case in point, Kalispell, where they wrote their now famous letter that said if you build it, they will come. So we're not building squat and then nobody will be here. There are people there because of those informal services that are associated with a population center. I just wanted to say that.

Andrea Davis: [00:25:29] That's well said. 

Dave Strohmaier: [00:25:30] And I think That that hits on a point that you raised, Andre, in terms of if you look at another community in the state of Montana, our largest city, Billings, it is not as if that community is bereft of folks without homes or without houses. And I do wonder if, in the spirit of myth busting, there's more that can be done to to drive home that point, because you would get the impression from some folks that by virtue of the fact of us being a politically bright blue dot in the state of Montana, that somehow that is the reason why they witness homelessness in our community. Well, the reality is that makes no difference. In fact, the largest city in the state of Montana that can hardly be characterized as the bastion of liberalism, uh, it too struggles with this very issue.

Josh Slotnick: [00:26:25] I would say Tuesday night, downtown Billings, you would see more people who obviously are living outdoors than you would in downtown Missoula.

Andrea Davis: [00:26:34] Absolutely. Yep. Absolutely. Yeah. That's where their main their their missions are and their, their. Yeah. And their while their housing market has gotten tight as everywhere in the state has comparatively to places like Bozeman and like Missoula, the median home sale value is is quite different actually. So it's it's interesting the myriad of different issues that relate to somebody entering into homelessness and then the ability to get out of it.

Josh Slotnick: [00:26:59] So one other housing question I just can't help myself because we have an expert here in our midst. I've said, oh, we have national demand and we're attempting to meet that with local supply. We'll never build our way out of this, though. We should try. It'll never happen. Recently we were looking at statistics. This morning. The rental market has softened so much. It's now in the quote, healthy range of over 5% vacancy a couple of years ago 0.5%. Wow. Did we build ourselves a version of a solution? Or are these all rentals that people can't afford? I don't know the answer, but just driving around town, you see for rent signs or even bonus rent here signs that are over a couple of years ago we wouldn't have seen. Do you think this points in a direction on for home ownership? Could could we gain more ground than maybe we had thought just through construction?

Andrea Davis: [00:27:44] Yes and no. I mean, I live in the central Missoula, I live in the Franklin neighborhood, and that's been, you know, more of what's been deemed a working class neighborhood. It's it's it's something that where there were more affordable home options, more affordable rentals for a long time. And it's shocking what just went on the market for over $600,000. And so I see that and I get a little depressed. I mean, that's what makes me think like, has anything changed since I've become mayor? And my thought around housing, I see that and I go, what are we going to do? That's that pressure. I feel like I feel, you know, like I'm responsible for that. But I think that you raise a really good question, Josh, because the housing market is never static and we are a growing community. And so we have built a lot of rentals. And there are for all the people that applaud that and welcome it. There are as many people that, of course, are frustrated with change that they see in Missoula, whether those homes are affordable to the people that are renting them is a question mark. I will say that, you know, in a state that's a non-disclosure state for home and mortgage transactions, but really, as far as sort of lacking a lot of data around this, you know, Missoula, actually in Missoula, organization of Realtors, in my opinion, has some of the best data collecting in anywhere in the state.

Andrea Davis: [00:28:51] You know, having done development all over the state, I would say this is we're in a better case in Missoula, but landlords aren't required to report their rent. And so we don't really know the question to that. I would say though, if there, you know, if we're in that healthy 5% vacancy that we have and the city has a committed to evaluating data as best as it can with what's reported and what we might see out there as far as number of apartment homes built, rental homes built, and current rents to evaluate. Are we meeting our goals, our our absorption? That's always a moving target because population shifts and change and economics change for homeownership. I think we can get there with different market forces. I also think we have to be really intentional about creating opportunities for the kind of homes for purchase that we call that missing middle, because the jump to the $600,000 bungalow that I just saw in my neighborhood that I would never be able to afford in my professional career right now, I think to myself, like, how did this happen? And of course, you know, this is the case with most desirable places to live is, you know, on the urban in the urban core where you've got walkable neighborhoods and you're closer to services.

Andrea Davis: [00:30:07] And. Tivities that that's where people want to be. So that's where the demand is. And I think that if we are more intentional about ensuring that both through the market, being able to deliver on that, which code reform is part of that, but then all of the other strategies that we have in our affordable housing policy that actually ensures some level of affordability. So there's a step up in this missing middle. I think we're still going to have to be very intentional about that, because I think homeownership in particular is challenging because of just where the current market still stands. But I'm hopeful that we can get there. We have to be intentional about it. Yeah. And the city and the county are not like we're not responsible for that. And I think it's something that we need to make sure that we're always really clear about with the public is that we are an important partner in that, but we are operating within the market environment. That is a capitalist system in the United States. So we're doing our best through incentives and regulation and working alongside the private sector to try to make all these things happen.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:31:00] Well, a great Example of that. This morning we were briefed. The commission was briefed on a few things that will be coming before us for action in the next few days related to extensions of phasing plans for subdivisions, major sub lots.

Josh Slotnick: [00:31:16] Yeah, yeah.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:31:17] So so first off, there are a lot of entitled lots out there from subdivisions that we have approved in years past. So there's not a huge shortage of available lots. But what we oftentimes are not infrequently hear from folks is that we in local government, city, county, are getting wrapped around the axle of regulation and and impeding folks from creating housing and slowing down the final plat approval of subdivisions. Well, what we've seen as recently as this morning is that the reason why many developers are coming before us requesting extensions on implementation of their their subdivisions and final plat approval and phasing of their subdivisions has everything to do with market forces, personal, the personal lives of developers that have kind of gotten in the way of them implementing their projects, and way less to do with us creating roadblocks. So I think that's an important narrative that needs to be told.

Josh Slotnick: [00:32:17] I'm glad you brought that up. And and I really like what you said to these decisions. And this whole world lives in a in a specific context. And they just said it really well. We can set the table, but whether someone wants to sit down and eat or not is kind of up to them. I'm talking about in development interest rates being super high right now, maybe it's not the right time to borrow many, many millions of dollars and take a big, massive risk.

Andrea Davis: [00:32:41] When we've had so much inflationary changes on materials and of course, labor and labor. Yeah. The things that we continue to to try to, you know, we try to provide those carrots. Right. And that's you know, what we with the limited resources that we have as local governments to continue to try to get creative around some of those things. In 2019, the city passed an ordinance that incentivizes contractors that bid on city projects to have an apprenticeship program. Yeah. And we just recently approved a project that is a sidewalk project. And what it does is it basically gives credit because, you know, obviously as public entities, we have to take low bidder. And we had a bid for a sidewalk project. And there is it's allowable under Montana law, under municipal code to allow for a credit to be given when this contractor has an apprenticeship program that basically reduces their bid and in this case made them then the lowest bidder. So that means they were awarded this project. That means that folks that are learning the skills necessary through a formal apprenticeship program will get the city job. And those are the kinds of things that we can do coupling hopefully with the private sector. Again, you know, unions are very on board for making sure that they are training the next generation of laborers and then the private sector when it comes to general contractors and such. But also, you know, the work that we do with nontraditional folks like we know that we have done through the Great Cities Good Jobs program, where, yeah, work with.

Juanita Vero: [00:34:06] Mountain Home.

Andrea Davis: [00:34:07] Mountain Home. Yeah. Getting folks that may not traditionally be involved in the trades and through our local institutions like Missoula College. So we can make sure that we are helping people see that doing this work is meaningful. Yeah, it is valuable. And it is good paying living. Yeah. But that is a change in our society. Demographic shift and a cultural shift. Yeah. That impacts all of this.

Josh Slotnick: [00:34:33] Yeah.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:34:33] So it's great having you, Mayor Davis, in our palatial, opulent 1960s era law office here on Pine Street and and looking across the street, there's the city council chambers. And there was a day it's been, thankfully, many years ago when West Pine Street resembled more of a chasm or a moat in which, yeah, yeah, you picked the analogy where maybe city county relations were not as close as they are today. And as as my colleagues are probably sick of hearing me say this. The city of Missoula actually is in Missoula County, and there are portions of Missoula County that are in the city of Missoula. There are portions of Missoula County that are outside of the city of Missoula. How is this in your first few months in office? How has city county interaction struck you and what opportunities, I guess, do you see for moving forward collaboration between our two jurisdictions? I mean.

Andrea Davis: [00:35:35] First of all, having worked alongside government in all the years that I did and having some professional experience before taking office with this newfound relationship has resulted in very tangible things. This community has benefited from you as a body, having taken the chance that you did to make a big move, which was to donate five acres of land to help the Trinity Apartments project actually happen. And out of those total on two different sites, that one of which was not donated by you, but out of those 202 apartments, 30 permanent supportive homes were built. And when we were talking about the homelessness crisis earlier, and we're talking about the real challenge that that is those are homes that folks that have been chronically homeless, that have no other housing solutions. Right? These are folks that have basically burnt every bridge when it comes to getting a section eight voucher or, you know, rental reference or credit. So this is the kind of housing made for them, because we know that when people get a roof over their head and the support needed, that's when they can start to get their life back on track. And that means that they're visiting the emergency room less. That means that they are engaging with law enforcement less, and they are making relationships again, which ultimately means that they're happier, healthier people. And I think that's what our goal here is. Right. So you did that. And I can say that as somebody from the private sector working in this space, what an amazing thing that was.

Andrea Davis: [00:36:45] So I knew taking office that this was going to be a fantastic opportunity because you are like, how do we get to yes. How do we make these things happen? So I've known that going in, and I will have to say that I have had city staff members say this is this has been such a remarkable opportunity for us, people that have been with the city for a long time because they've said this is a real change in how we work together as two local governments, right? We work in partnership together, you know, knowing that we may have distinct responsibilities and that we do right, obviously, to our constituents and our particular areas drawn on a map. But we partner in so many different ways because, like you said, I mean, our worlds intersect completely. And as a growing community, we have to be paying attention to how the city and the county, you know, literally have shared boundaries together. And even though there may be an actual city boundary, obviously residents don't necessarily see that. They don't feel that. And so it's like, how do we have a kind of a seamless way that we're providing our constituents what they need for a good, healthy environment? And I think a lot of that is the willingness of the people in the seats that we're in to say that we're going to figure this out, that we respect and want to work together, and that we have common goals. That's my perspective.

Josh Slotnick: [00:37:55] That's great. No, that's super great. So before we close, we're going to ask you this question. We get to ask everybody. It's one of my favorite ones. If you wouldn't mind sharing with us some nugget of wisdom you've come across in the recent past. Me from a book, a podcast, anything you like. What do you got?

Andrea Davis: [00:38:10] Oh my gosh. Okay, okay, well, let me tell you what what podcast I'm listening to right now, Dolly Parton's America, and I highly recommend it. Okay. All right. It's on Radiolab. I mean, it's just it's wonderful for so many reasons. It's a fantastic podcast. Anyway, I love it, but this one is an eight part series.

Josh Slotnick: [00:38:26] I did hear this one.

Andrea Davis: [00:38:26] Jad... Jad Abumrad 

Josh Slotnick: [00:38:29] I can never say his name.

Andrea Davis: [00:38:29] I think I might have just. Didn't say it right

Josh Slotnick: [00:38:31] But it's a couple years old.

Andrea Davis: [00:38:32] It might be.

Josh Slotnick: [00:38:33] It's really good. It is a.

Andrea Davis: [00:38:34] Couple years old, but it's really good. So I'm listening to that right now, which is really fun. And then I was thinking about what you just asked, which is like, well, you know, was there some wisdom from a book you just wrote or wrote? I did not, um, but that I just read. I just finished reading Braiding Sweetgrass, which is also a...

Josh Slotnick: [00:38:49] Everybody has loves that one. 

Andrea Davis: [00:38:50] Wow. Beautiful. I think about and I always mispronounce. So I looked it up as I was waiting for our podcast to start. I was like, how? What do you call that again? I'm going to definitely mispronounce this, but the one of the tribes in that area of, you know, like upstate New York and that region in the northeast, I think it's the Haudenosaunee. And they have a Thanksgiving...

Dave Strohmaier: [00:39:12] Haudenosaunee.

Andrea Davis: [00:39:13] Haudenosaunee! 

Juanita Vero: [00:39:14] Way to go, Strohmaier.

Andrea Davis: [00:39:14] Thank you to our local historian. Thank you. Haudenosaunee. Yes. Okay. Well, they've got a Thanksgiving address, " Greetings to the natural world." And it's everything. Like the people, the earth, mother, the waters, the fish, the plants, the food plants, the medicine herbs, the animals, the trees, the birds, the four winds, the thunders, the sun, grandmother moon, the stars, the enlightened teachers, the creator. And then they have closing words. And I won't go through all that with you, but I thought that perspective is one that really helps anchor who we are as humans, and how we can better relate to the world around us, and sometimes realizing that there's teachers all around us. So that's one of the things that I was really an enjoyable read. And the other thing that because we talked about this earlier, I thought I would mention is that I'm reading a book right now called When We Walk By, and it is a I'm like just a little ways into it. It's about homelessness and the way we can look at the issues. But. Really the people differently in ways that not only as local governments and service providers and, you know, governments all the way up the chain. But like everyday people, you know, how are we helping people reconnect? It's something a message that came out of is coming out of this book, and it's something that I've heard from other colleagues in this space, is that social disconnection is is really the underlying issue for so many challenges and really recognizing, you know, that homelessness is this word that we've been using more normally, intersectionality, that it is the intersectionality of multiple systems crashing together and really failing for the person.

Juanita Vero: [00:40:43] And the economist, bryce Ward just talked about that specifically like that, that loss of that social capital.

Andrea Davis: [00:40:48] Yeah. So it's one of the it's a good book to to I think.

Juanita Vero: [00:40:51] I'm sorry. So when we walk by and.

Andrea Davis: [00:40:54] When we walk.

Juanita Vero: [00:40:54] By the author again, yeah, I know I.

Andrea Davis: [00:40:56] I'll have to I'll take a picture and send it to you.

Juanita Vero: [00:40:58] Donald Burns and Kevin Adler.

Andrea Davis: [00:41:00] Yeah. That's it, that's it. And then when I brought in, I just wanted to mention this because this is something I think is really fun to read. And it was given to me by Jeff Badenoch, who used for involved in local civic life for many years. It's called palaces for the people, and it's Eric Klinenberg. It suggests a way forward, believing that the future of our democratic societies rests not simply on shared values, but on shared spaces the libraries, child care centers, churches and parks where crucial connections are formed and goes back to.

Juanita Vero: [00:41:29] That social capital connection.

Andrea Davis: [00:41:30] Yeah, exactly. And this is for that, he said, this is for the mayor's library, but there's no reason we can't check it out for them.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:41:37] So many good books.

Josh Slotnick: [00:41:39] Yeah.

Andrea Davis: [00:41:40] And when we have time to read them!

Dave Strohmaier: [00:41:42] Thanks so much, Andrea. Thank you.

Juanita Vero: [00:41:44] Thank you.

Andrea Davis: [00:41:45] I hope we get to do this again soon.

Josh Slotnick: [00:41:46] Oh, yeah. For sure.

Andrea Davis: [00:41:47] Okay. Thanks so much for everything you do.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:41:49] Thank you.

Juanita Vero: [00:41:49] Likewise. Thanks, everyone.

Josh Slotnick: [00:41:51] Thanks for listening to the agenda. If you enjoy these conversations, it would mean a lot. If you rate and review the show on whichever podcast app you use.

Juanita Vero: [00:41:59] And if you know a friend who would like to keep up with what's happening in local government, be sure to recommend this podcast to them.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:42:05] The agenda with the Missoula County Commissioners is made possible with support from Missoula Community Access Television, better known as mCAT, and our staff in the Missoula County Communications Division.

Josh Slotnick: [00:42:17] If you have a question or a topic you'd like us to discuss on a future episode, email it to communications@missoulacounty.us.

Juanita Vero: [00:42:24] To find Out other ways to stay up to date with what's happening in Missoula County, go to Missoula.co/countyupdates.

Dave Strohmaier: [00:42:32] Thanks for listening.