CC Minutes - 02/09/05 WS - Laserfiche WebLink

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willing to buy the bonds. Mr. Kelly hoped the community had another alternative. He did not like the comer the City Council had been painted into by bond counsel. He determined from Mr. Ruffler that the MWMC included three elected officials representing the local jurisdictions and four lay representatives. Eugene had two lay representa- tives. Mr. Kelly recalled that the council received an e-mail from Roxie Cuellar of the Lane County Homebuilders Association, who maintained that setting a higher SDC rate to cover the bond payment would be decided by a non-elected board. He asked if that was correct. Mr. Ruffler said the commission recommends rates and SDCs to the elected governing bodies, which then adopted them. Mr. Kelly asked what happened if a community rejected the MWMC's recommendation. Mr. Ruffler said to the extent the rates or charges were necessary to repay bonds, the MWMC could move forward without that approval. Any additional component of the rates that went above that minimum requirement could be refused by the parties to the IGA. City Manager Taylor said the fundamental issue was how to assure the bond holders while still maintaining flexibility for the governing bodies. In the parties to the IGA could not reach an agreement, at a minimum the parties must meet their commitment to the bond holders. Mr. Kelly disliked the fact there was no majority of elected accountable officials on the MWMC if the parties could not reach agreement. The lay members of the MWMC could not be voted out of office. He did not know the solution. Ms. Bettman did not think it was a good idea to include Coburg in the review of the IGA. The council should focus on the parties to the IGA as no decision had been reached that Coburg's participation in the MWMC was in the best interest of other governments. She was concerned that the gesture to review the IGA could be misread by Coburg. She hoped any analysis about including Coburg in the IGA had a rigorous financial component because she wanted to avoid any situation where Eugene ratepayers subsidized capacity for Coburg. Mr. Papd said he was suggesting the review as a mere courtesy. Mr. Papd determined from Mr. Ruffler that Springfield provided financial services for the MWMC, so any analysis of whether bond requirements were met would be done by that city. Mr. Papd asked what happened if the estimates were high and the MWMC had more money than it intended to apply to the repayment of bonds. Mr. Duey said that staff would review the numbers annually and make recommendations for the rate component for the debt service through the MWMC for the cities to consider. The community could also choose to either lower the rate based on the debt service, or raise it based on the debt service. Mr. Kelly was concerned that the IGA eliminated the Metropolitan Policy Committee (MPC) as a dispute resolution body and called for the formation of a new dispute resolution body. Mr. Lidz responded that one reason was that the two councils might want to appoint their MWMC representative to a dispute resolution committee. Mr. Ruffler pointed out that the MPC included representatives from other bodies without an interest in the wastewater program. Mr. Kelly appreciated both answers but neither satisfied him. He thought it could be resolved by modifying the bylaws of the MPC to accommodate the dispute resolution role, and suggested that a community's MWMC representatives could be involved in the discussion. Mr. Poling agreed that the MPC should be the dispute resolution body. He thought the MWMC representa- tives could be a useful source of information as opposed to being part of the dispute resolution body. MINUTES--Eugene City Council February 9, 2005 Page 7 Work Session