CC Minutes - 01/29/03 WS - Laserfiche WebLink

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Ms. Bettman was very interested in finding tools that attracted reinvestment and investment to downtown. Her interest was in focusing those tools for the greatest benefit and return. She requested information on which tool had the least impact on the delivery of other City services, and wanted to know the impact of each tool on the delivery of City services. Regarding the MUPTE, Ms. Bettman expressed concern that broadening the boundaries blunted the tool, and wanted to know if the City could apply it to specific sites where it wished to see vertical redevelopment and multi-storey mixed use. She confirmed with Mr. Kupper that parts of the district could be connected by streets. Ms. Bettman felt that the meeting materials in the packet missed the question of what the City's ultimate objectives were for downtown. She said that the Downtown Vision was deliberately general, and if the City was looking for ways to raise revenues, she wanted to know what those dollars would be spent on. She wanted to know if any of the funds were proposed to be used for the 6th Avenue road project. Ms. Bettman suggested it would be helpful to see the historical project list broken down so the council could see what percentage was funded with renewal dollars. Ms. Solomon said that the City did not have an exact listing of how all dollars would be used before it formed new urban renewal districts in the past; instead, projects had "percolated up" over time. She did not want to the limit the City's opportunities by predetermining exactly what projects would be funded by urban renewal. Mr. Kelly agreed with Ms. Solomon and indicated that rather that creating a specific project list, he was interested in creating parameters about expenditures before the district was formed, rather than leaving it open to anything. Mr. Kelly said that he believed the council had given clear direction that was reflected in a motion adopted on April 9, 2001, that added a sentence to the implementation work plan for the vision implementation tools stating the information provided to the council would also include proposals to balance downtown incentives with increased cost recovery elsewhere in the city. However, "there was not a single word in this packet" regarding the topic. He expressed frustration that the council's direction was not followed, and said he would be unwilling to support any of the proposals until the information was provided. Mr. Sullivan indicated that the information requested was coming to the council on February 12, 2003. The focus of today's presentation was on improving the quality of the opportunities that existed in downtown, which did not happen by inhibiting development opportunities on the periphery. He reminded the council that Mr. Kupper, in his presentation, had indicated that cities that had sought to protect their downtowns with regulation outside the core had found it did not create an incentive for downtown development as much as it impeded development overall. Mr. Kelly said the motion did not discuss reducing incentives but rather increased cost recovery for development outside downtown so that some of the tools could be made more revenue-neutral. He expected a response on that. Ms. Taylor thought any new district formation proposal should be referred to the voters. She tended to oppose renewal districts because they diverted money from the General Fund. She thought the MUPTE should stay in a limited area. If the MUPTE boundaries were extended, the City would be encouraging development, not encouraging the downtown. She noted the City's MINUTES--Eugene City Council January 29, 2003 Page 3 Work Session