Item 2A: Approval of City Council Minutes

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Ms. Ortiz thanked her for the information. She felt that not supporting the motion was akin to denying there was a problem. She wanted to see the process move forward as there was a definite transportation problem in the western area of the City. Ms. Solomon was supportive of the motion but she did not recall the second part of the motion, which was to authorize the City Manager to make staff available to the WEC. Ms. Proudfoot responded that one of the gaps in staffing had been in land use. She said the land use/transportation relationship was of great interest to the WEC and they felt they could use help with that element of the discussion. Ms. Solomon reiterated her support. She did not want the City of Eugene to provide the full staffing for the WEC as there were multiple organizations involved in it. Ms. Taylor said she was concerned as she did not feel the council had enough information on the WEC. Ms. Taylor, seconded by Ms. Bettman, moved to postpone the motion. Ms. Bettman believed the 35 members of the WEC was “heavily weighted” with staff of different agencies who were not officially present as staff from those agencies. She asserted that out of those 35 she had counted only six who could be “loosely defined” as progressive. She did not believe the WEC was a “balanced body.” Ms. Proudfoot pointed out that the Lane Transit District (LTD) had contributed $5,000. Ms. Bettman asserted that the WEC was transitioning from “a self-selected group meeting on their own time as kind of a private club” into a “mantle of credibility.” Mr. Clark commented that balance lay in the eye of the beholder. He related that he had viewed the list and perceived it to consist of five or six business interests with the remainder made up of government agency interests and activists. He thought it had been a little off balance in that regard. He said he was likely to support the motion but he would want to have more frequent reports to the council than had been suggested. Mayor Piercy recalled that when the council majority had decided to not support going forward with the West Eugene Parkway the council had said it would support a collaborative to come up with alternative solutions. She believed the WEC was in keeping with the City Council direction. She underscored that Mr. Pryor had been reporting to the council regarding the meetings on a regular basis so that the council would be informed from the beginning. She averred that the WEC was a broad-based group that came out of an effort to find a different way of bringing people together to work toward a community solution. The motion to postpone failed, 6:2; Ms. Bettman and Ms. Taylor voting in favor. Mr. Zelenka said he appreciated Ms. Bettman’s concern. He felt it was late to weigh in on the issue at this “stage of the game” as the WEC had been going on “for quite a long time.” He had been impressed by the work of the WEC as related to the council in Mr. Pryor’s reports. He stressed the importance of working on West Eugene’s transportation issue. Ms. Bettman reiterated that she would oppose the motion. She had been troubled by the assertion that the WEC had brought “everyone to the table” given that there was no rail advocate participating on the group. She said a rail advocate had not been invited and this meant such an advocate had been “excluded.” She felt the council had not been presented with an adequate amount of information on the WEC and approval of the motion was tantamount to “rushing it through.” MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 8, 2007 Page 4 Work Session