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<br />Mr. Zelenka raised the issue of the new federal rules related to the use of publicly funded bus charter <br />services and asked the manager to provide the council with more information. He suggested there was an <br />“odd flaw” in the regulations. Mayor Piercy indicated it was her understanding that the issue had been <br />worked out. <br /> <br /> <br />B. WORK SESSION: Regional Transportation Planning <br /> <br />Rob Inerfeld of the Public Works Department provided a PowerPoint presentation entitled Regional <br />Transportation Planning. Public Works Director Kurt Corey and City Engineer Mark Schoening were also <br />present for the item. Mr. Inerfeld highlighted the various transportation and land use plans the City was <br />required to have, provided an overview of key issues related to regional transportation planning, reviewed <br />the draft work plan associated with the City’s obligations around regional planning, and reviewed the next <br />steps in the planning process. <br /> <br />Mayor Piercy said that the Metropolitan Policy Committee (MPC) was considering all of the expenditures <br />through the lens of the State Legislature’s requirement that the cities reduce carbon emissions by 20 percent. <br />There was also an effort to integrate land use and transportation to a degree not envisioned when the original <br />TransPlan was developed. <br /> <br />Mayor Piercy called for council comments and questions. <br /> <br />Mr. Zelenka said the greenhouse gas analysis that would occur was important. He believed that the link <br />between land use and transportation planning was key and very critical to how the community grew. He <br />suggested that the work coming to the council was important because the council was working with two <br />plans, TransPlan and the Regional Transportation Plan (RTP), which did essentially the same thing. He <br />suggested the plans could be combined to produce a smaller document and perhaps more efficiencies. He <br />said that Portland Metro, which included 24 governments, had only one plan, and he thought the community <br />should attempt to accomplish that as well. He was not “afraid to lead” to make that happen. <br /> <br />Mr. Zelenka spoke to the issue of public involvement. He said the expenditures the community made on <br />transportation were enormous, yet there was also most no public involvement or public testimony when <br />hearings occurred. Generally, only three or four people testified and they were always the same people. For <br />that reason, he did not think that the MPC was doing the proper outreach to the community. He said that to <br />help overcome the lack of public involvement, the MPC had tasked its citizen advisory committee to work on <br />how to increase participation and had agreed to broadcast MPC meetings. <br /> <br />Ms. Ortiz said it was often difficult to describe to people the places the money came from and she <br />appreciated the information. She said the information before the council did not appear to address potholes <br />as much as new capacity. Mr. Inerfeld said that it did not speak to the basic issue of pavement preservation. <br />There was a Eugene-specific policy that called on the City to manage and improve its existing system before <br />adding new capacity. Ms. Ortiz said that it did not seem like the City did that with those dollars. She asked <br />if any Federal money was spent on preservation. Mr. Inerfeld said the Federal dollars were largely <br />designated as modernization money and there was little the MPC could do about that. Ms. Ortiz reiterated <br />her appreciation for the information. <br /> <br />Ms. Bettman said the community spent hundreds of millions of dollars planning and creating plans and the <br />council had established policies calling for prioritization of the existing systems, and “it doesn’t get done for <br />multiple reasons” and she doubted that it would until “we run out of money or run out of gas.” <br /> <br /> <br />MINUTES—Eugene City Council April 21, 2008 Page 3 <br /> Work Session <br /> <br />