CC Minutes - 09/27/06 Work Session

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Mayor Piercy said she had been hearing at almost every meeting in the community a growing concern that one day Eugene would be a city for wealthy people and poor people and nothing in between. She said the challenge was to ensure in an intentional way that there was a place for young families to move into the community. She said a city without children was not a community and just letting the market prevail would not ensure that working families and young families had an entry; those families were critical to the well- being of the community and the school system. Ms. Bettman stated that just because something was heard everywhere did not mean it was substantiated by research and data; it just meant it was the prevailing opinion. She thought that a responsible representative government made sure that they substantiated the policies they made with research and data. She said that Eugene had a higher rental rate than most communities of a comparable size and the issue was not rental or nonrental; it had to do with stable, healthy neighborhoods. She said the distribution of rentals in the City was another issue. She thought that people would grab whatever piece of information or opinion suited their purpose and she preferred a much more informed discussion about where the City needed to go. She said that poorly designed and unregulated infill and density would have a counterproductive effect and people would flee to the outlying areas in order to protect their investments. Ms. Bettman stated that there were items on the work plan she did not think should be priorities and if they were removed there would be resources available for issues such as the tree ordinance or the alternate path. She noted that one of the tasks under opportunity siting was to develop criteria for identifying additional opportunity sites. She thought it was the general sense of the council to work on demonstration sites for opportunity siting and not necessarily look beyond that to the next steps. She said the task might be more appropriate for the next year. Ms. Bettman stated that the buildable lands analysis was a Planning Commission initiative and not a high priority for the council; it could be replaced with another task. She asked the commission to take Ballot Measure 37 into account on all of its work plan initiatives. She was not certain what sort of clarification the commission wanted on Item 11, the Jefferson-Westside neighborhood City-initiated Metro Plan amendment. Mr. Nystrom said the council’s motion on September 11 made the Jefferson-Westside issue a high priority and the question was how that fit in with the other high priorities currently on the list. Ms. Bettman thought that Item 11 should replace some of the Planning Commission initiatives. Mr. Belcher said that the Census Bureau website indicated that Eugene’s percentage of rentals was 63 percent and the national average was about 50 percent. Mr. Kelly indicated he shared Mayor Piercy’s concern about the potential bifurcation of the City’s population, as did 4J School District Superintendent George Russell. He suggested that the City might want to lobby for elimination or modification of the statewide ban on inclusionary zoning as a tool that could help with equity. He had no concerns with the placement of Item 11 in the work plan. Mr. Papé asked for a work session on a residential buildable lands inventory. Mr. Pryor expressed his appreciation for the Planning Commission’s work. He recognized that the council was referring some very difficult issues to the commission and felt confident that those issues would be thoroughly and thoughtfully studied. He felt the work plan attempted to create a balance between a variety of interests, the order of work was fair and he would support it. MINUTES—City Council September 27, 2006 Page 7 Work Session