CC Minutes - 02/23/05 WS - Laserfiche WebLink

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council's desired approach to the City Hall facility. He stressed that land assemblage was the most difficult part of downtown development. Before the City divided property that it currently owned, he recommended the council have a clear idea on how it should proceed. Ms. Solomon acknowledged City Manager Taylor's comments, but wanted to consider this opportunity to partner with private development. She did not want to pursue master planning if it precluded the exploration of the sub-projects. She reiterated her wish to see what a quarter-block land swap would look like and also what a quarter-block police station would look like. Mr. Pryor remarked that the conversation should ;;be packaged and saved" for the point in the discussion when it was appropriate. He recalled that the item on the agenda was a discussion on what kind of meeting to have to talk about what kind of meeting to have. He underscored that the master planning process had not yet begun and all of the great input about that process should be saved for that discussion. He commented that he had never been involved in a process where a decision on the degree of public involvement was needed to determine how much public participation there should be in the master planning process. He thought it an interesting dilemma. In looking at the options, Mr. Pryor thought Option 1, which left it to the City Manager to determine the public process, was not adequate. He thought Option 2, wherein $15,000 was spent on designing a public process subject to council approval might be %kay." He thought Option 3, which engaged some public input, might also work. What he was trying to determine, however, was what motion the council should vote on and what kind of process the City wanted to pay for to decide what the public process should be. He did not feel the need to spend ;;a lot of money" to decide how much public participation there should be in a public participation deciding process. He stressed that he did not dispute the need for public participation when the council arrived at the ;;big meeting process." Mr. Kelly wished to address Ms. Solomon's comments. He thought both sub-projects presented opportuni- ties. He said in a perfect world, such projects should wait for a master planning process, but given the time- sensitive nature of the projects he felt the council should have a discussion as soon as possible. He asked if he needed to petition for a work session. City Manager Taylor thought this discussion could happen and would likely be best conducted in an executive session. He said the larger question at hand was what the council wished to do with regard to the City Hall facility. Mr. Kelly called it all relevant and intertwined and indicated he would request a work session. He thought the discussion might lead the council to consciously decide to limit its options regarding the City Hall complex. Regarding options, Mr. Kelly expressed a preference for Option 2, but said he was not interested in the option if it did not include some public involvement. He also agreed with Ms. Bettman regarding the necessity of the council making the fact-based decisions such as whether to build or renovate. Ms. Bettman asked Council Coordinator Lynda Rose to provide to the council copies of an e-mail she sent out after the January meeting that laid out the fact-based decisions she thought the council should make. She favored Option 2, stating that the City had the expertise to focus the discussion on the discrete issues of whether or not to build and what the minimum threshold for services that should be included in the building. MINUTES--Eugene City Council February 23, 2005 Page 6 Work Session