CC Minutes - 09/22/99 WS - Laserfiche WebLink

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Mr. Rayor asked who was responsible for downtown parking. He said that the Budget Committee was interested in making the City's parking effort a true enterprise zone. He questioned why there were private parking garages in Portland but not in Eugene. Mr. Green said that the board understood the City was in discussions with the GSA and asked that the County be included in those discussions given that the project was going to impact the entire community. Mr. Torrey indicated that was the reason he had contacted Mr. Green earlier. Acting City Manager Warren Wong indicated that he had asked Lew Bowers of the Planning and Development Department to take the lead on the issue. Mr. Bowers said that there is no required parking in the area. In parking-exempt zones, the City has historically constructed structured parking to help provide the supply. That had not occurred in the 5th Street area because it was outside the urban renewal district. He noted that the City had provided information to the federal government about its analysis. Regarding the proposed design of the federal courthouse, Mr. Bowers said that GSA held a design competition for an unspecified site. He distributed a copy of a design from the selected architect, the Morphosis Group. Mr. Kelly said he would like to have a discussion to better understand what is going on with different sites and the financial implications of the final site selection. He said that parking was an issue but he believed it was easily solvable. His concern was with the character of the 5th Street area and the planning the City had done for the area. He believed it might be possible to retain the character of the area if the courthouse was built, but in the absence of any dialogue with the GSA he did not see how that would happen. He said that the City Hall site seemed the superior site, but that raised questions about how much money could be available from the federal government regarding reimbursement for improvements. Mr. Kelly also had concerns about the potential costs to the public of the move of City Hall. He wondered if the public was so opposed to the 5th Street site that it would support a bond measure to move services. Ms. Nathanson referred to the cost issue raised by Mr. Kelly and said she was very concerned, particularly since the voters just approved a parks and open space bond measure and a library measure. However, when she considered the costs of retrofitting City Hall, she did not think the money would be well-spent because it would not result in service efficiencies or service improvements. If the building was working well, she would feel differently. The building did not work well and was not a good place for the police station and fire station because of the seismic inadequacies of the structure. Ms. Nathanson did not think a building on the scale of the proposed courthouse was appropriate for the location selected. She believed that a consolidated city hall would serve the citizens best. A civic center could be created around the new library given that the Atrium already housed City offices. She believed that would realize both efficiencies and cost savings. Ms. Nathanson hoped there would be a way for the federal government to reconsider its decision. She believed that the council could make something good from the decision. MINUTES--Eugene City Council September 22, 1999 Page 3 5:30 p.m.