The Boulder Human Relations Commission used most of its Dec. 1 retreat to translate broad goals into a tentative work plan that commissioners said should focus on "building bridges," public awareness and targeted support for marginalized residents.

After swearing in two commissioners, the group conducted an icebreaker about community leadership. Commissioners described leadership as bridge-building, modeling participation and creating belonging, setting the tone for the retreat's priorities.

Staff presented a work-plan template in which commissioners were asked to identify an objective, desired outcomes, a lead commissioner, timeline and staff resource needs. Staff emphasized that items should align with the HRC mission and be feasible given available staff support.

From a wide-ranging brainstorm, commissioners converged on three main objectives: (1) building bridges among community groups, including using tools like "Difficult Dialogues" hosted by university partners; (2) increasing awareness of the HRC and how residents can access its services (tabling events, outreach and publicity were suggested); and (3) supporting marginalized populations, specifically noting concerns raised about unhoused residents in local planning processes.

Commissioners discussed practical measures of success. Proposed metrics included the number of community engagements or tabling events actually executed, baseline and follow-up community surveys to measure belonging and connectedness, and qualitative "sense-making" during meetings to surface perspectives from commissioners' community networks. Staff offered the city's community survey as a baseline and agreed to share available data.

On intergovernmental coordination, staff reminded the commission that city departments or council may request HRC review on projects (the transcript cited Boulder Junction Phase 2 as an example). Commissioners discussed avoiding duplication with other advisory bodies and coordinating when a topic is already within another board's remit.

The group debated process issues (meeting structure, how to capture community input between meetings without violating open-meeting rules, and decision-making when commissioners disagree). Staff advised that two commissioners can draft items between meetings but that final action must be taken by the full commission to comply with open-meetings laws.

Commissioners agreed to draft a short letter inviting City Council to collaborate on the building-bridges priority and to finalize any formal submission at a regular meeting after adapting retreat outcomes into the work-plan template. A motion to adjourn was made as the transcript concludes; no vote is recorded in the supplied text.

Ending: The HRC left the retreat with a draft structure for a 2026 work plan, several volunteers to synthesize notes and a staff commitment to provide templates and survey data for further refinement at upcoming meetings.