CCMinutes - 11/22/04 WS - Laserfiche WebLink

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Ms. Taylor said that given the desperate need for road maintenance funds it was ridiculous not to use the funds for that purpose. She said if the council waited and demonstrated the need for a new police station the voters would support it. She asked if there was an estimate of the cost of a seismic retrofit to City Hall. Mr. Carlson said that seismic analyses had indicated the cost of a retrofit was at least as much as new construction and would still not address the inefficient space and layout of the building. Ms. Taylor asked to see the specific figures and stated she would not support the motion. Mr. Kelly said he would support the motion but not the addition of Option 5. He agreed it was important to move the process forward by looking at the overall facilities needs. He liked aspects of Option 5 that addressed public input and co-location with partner agencies but was reluctant to appropriate $750,000 on the basis of a single paragraph summary. He asked if the City Manager required an amendment to the motion in order to elaborate on the scope of work associated with Option 5 and bring that back to the council in January 2005. City Manager Taylor said his recommendation was to pass the motion currently before the council and make a separate motion for Option 5, then postpone action on it until the first work session in January 2005 in order to maintain momentum and allow staff the opportunity to develop a more detailed scope of work for action by the new council. Mr. Kelly said he would move to direct the City Manager to bring back to the council an expanded scope of work on master planning for development of a new City Hall and Community Safety Building. Ms. Nathanson said the discussion reminded her of why she was impatient to move the process along; the council had been talking about City Hall, civic needs, a police station, and downtown fire station for many years. She said that people in the community appreciated the fact that City government set money aside and determined how to spend it wisely instead of asking voters for money on every project. She said the funds had been set aside for a police building and all of the questions discussed at length. She would support the motion and another motion that would initiate the planning process to keep the work going. Ms. Bettman said that a study provided as part of the Hazard Mitigation Plan estimated the cost to retrofit for minimum seismic standards at $9 per square foot. She said that seismic standards were not the only type of update City Hall needed and retrofitting was not a viable financial option. She supported the motion and would support Mr. Kelly's suggested motion to bring back an expanded scope of work for master planning without specifying an amount of money. She pointed out that Option 5 addressed co-location not of City Hall and police service but of County buildings. She said that a recent study indicated that co-location of county and city services in larger cities was not an efficient use; that only worked with very small communi- ties. Mr. Pap~ agreed with Ms. Nathanson's comments that the council needed to move forward and he hoped the council would be able to convince voters of the urgency of the need. He asked what type of public relations would be done to convince voters of the need for a new City Hill and police building like they were convinced of the need for repairing and upgrading streets. City Manager Taylor noted that the ballot measure had an undervote of 16,000-17,000 and it was clear that the City needed to do a better job of communicating with the public on large facility improvements. The motion passed, 7:1; Ms. Taylor voting in opposition. Mr. Kelly moved, seconded by Mr. Pap~, to extend the discussion by five minutes. The motion passed unanimously. MINUTES--Eugene City Council November 22, 2004 Page 5 Work Session