Item 2A: Approval of City Council Minutes

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Ms. Solomon indicated she preferred Option A and supported Mr. Clark’s suggestion to expand the western boundary. She noted a letter from Linda Henry regarding problems occurring outside of the library and was pleased the library was included in the ordinance boundary. Ms. Ortiz was willing to discuss the ordinance and conduct a public hearing to receive community feedback. She said in the past the Human Rights Commission (HRC) had been concerned that an exclusionary zone was used punitively. She noted that considerable community policing had been added since the council had last discussed an exclusion ordinance and questioned whether it was still needed. She observed that the ordinance did not include a variance to enter downtown for entertainment purposes such as a performance at McDonald Theater. Mr. Pryor agreed with expansion of the western boundary of the proposed zone. He sought to strike a balance between flexibility and certainty and felt that Option A best achieved that in a thoughtful and transparent way. Ms. Taylor pointed out that if people were excluded from the downtown area they would just go elsewhere in the community. She was willing to listen to community feedback but was opposed to excluding people from any place and hoped the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) was following the issue. She said the downtown should be open to everybody. Mr. Zelenka agreed there were problem behaviors in the downtown area. He was opposed to Option A because it would exclude someone before a conviction. He was willing to discuss Option B, but wanted to see how effective an increased police presence, combined with Downtown Eugene, Inc. (DEI) patrols, would be in controlling problem behaviors. He said that some of the offenses in the ordinance were not criminal violations and the variances needed to be clarified. He was concerned about the impact of the ordinance on Municipal Court’s workload. Ms. Piercy commented that there were many projects underway in the downtown area that would have a beneficial impact and wondered if the ordinance should have a sunset provision that would allow its effectiveness to be evaluated in the near future. She said the City had explored some short-term measures, such as increased policing of downtown, loans to businesses for improving their premises and other strategies for improving the appearance of downtown, which had helped to reduce problems. She was also concerned about the burden an ordinance might place on the Municipal Court. Judge Allen remarked that the proposed exclusion zone was significantly different from the prostitution zone, both in size and number of offenders. He said there had been 45 exclusions in the prostitution zone in eight years and the clientele in that zone was typically ashamed and embarrassed, resulting in few repeat offenders. He said the exclusion was part of probation for those individuals. Regarding the proposed exclusion zones, he said there were 8,600 misdemeanors filed with the court last year and 5,290 of those fit the definition of an offense in the proposed ordinance, although he was not certain how many of those occurred in the downtown area. He said the funding crisis for the public safety system in Lane County meant he did not have the jail space to enforce such as ordinance. He recognized the City’s desire for a vibrant downtown free of problem behaviors, but those behaviors were limited to a small number of individuals. He said the ordinance would have to be enforceable to be effective. Ms. Piercy asked if the list of offenses should be narrowed. Judge Allen said it could be pared down to better focus on what the City hoped to accomplish and grant the court the discretion to determine the length of exclusion. MINUTES—Eugene City Council June 9, 2008 Page 3 Work Session