07/31/1991 Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

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-------- . In response to a request from Ms. Bascom, Mr. Van Landingham reported on the results of housing legislation this year. The two most important bills which came out this session were legislation which provided improvements to the low-income housing property tax exemption program and a bill implementing a State Housing Trust Fund. Mr. Vanlandingham noted that the City's ability to provide matching funds for the latter program will be very important. Ms. Bascom commented that matching funds will be important in receive housing moneys at the Federal level too. Mr. MacDonald added that the Federal HOME funds also require a local match, and that the Social Goals Committee recom- mends that this issue be folded into the Eugene Decisions process. Responding to inquiry from Mr. MacDonald, Mr. Weinman said that staff has not conducted an analysis of the possible impacts of the University's enrollment reduction on the availability of low-income housing. Ms. Bascom felt that the council has not made enough progress on the housing issue and asked whether the council might be willing to extend housing as a social goal for another year. She also said that she does not like the term "social goal" and felt that the council should abandon this terminology. The council agreed to raise the issue at the City Council Goals Session in the fa 11 . Mayor Miller commented that if the council decides to change the social goal this year, it does not mean that it will no longer be committed to housing issues. - Mayor Miller adjourned the meeting of the Eugene City Council and convened a meeting of the Urban Renewal Agency. (Councilor Green left at this time.) III. DOWNTOWN SITE DEVELOPMENT GUIDELINES Jan Bohman, Planning and Development Department, gave the staff presentation. She said that the site development gUidelines were written for use with pro- spective developers of projects on sites owned by the Renewal Agency. They have been used by Development Division staff on an interim basis, pending approval by the Renewal Agency. The goal of imposing guidelines was: 1) to reinforce the creation of a true downtown environment; 2) to strengthen the retail and commercial components of downtown; and 3) to maintain and improve downtown as an active pedestrian place with a vibrant, varied street-level environment and promote a variety of uses. Ms. Bohman said that the goals can be accomplished through projects which incorporate a diversity of uses, especially uses which generate a high level of pedestrian activity, encourage density, and include architecture which does the following: e MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 31, 1991 Page 6