CC Minutes - 05/28/03 WS - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

Speaking to Ms. Solomon comments about property owners' level of anxiety, Ms. Taylor said that there was also anxiety on the part of the environmental community that a proposal to protect a property could lead a property owner to destroy its natural resource values. She observed that there appeared to be an internal conflict between what people wanted; they said they wanted to protect their property and wanted to retain it in its current state, but they did not want to be told that they might not be able to build on it someday. She thought part of the answer could be environmental easements, and hoped that the council soon discussed such easements and tax incentives for such properties to help protect the natural resource values they contained. Ms. Taylor asked Mr. Bj0rklund to comment on the safe harbor process and why some people thought it better. Mr. Bj0rklund said that some considered it a shorter process with a clearer outcome. The approach provided some options; it could be applied to certain sites or certain classes of sites, and the standard inventory process could be applied to others. It could be applied to one type of resource and not another. He suggested that the council might want to have a more detailed discussion of those options in the future. Mr. Bj0rklund said that safe harbor approach was not an "all or nothing" approach. Ms. Taylor did not think the council needed to reconsider the approach it took to the inventory given the time changing the process would take. She thought that generally, the safe harbor approach provided for "more loopholes." Mr. Bj0rklund said that rather than stating the approach provided more loopholes, he would characterize the approach as very prescriptive; the process would take about 90 percent of what was currently included in the Goal 5 inventory out of the inventory. The safe harbor approach did not provide for discretion as to which sites were studied further unless mixed with the standard inventory approach. Ms. Taylor asked if the City could protect the sites on the inventory or partially protect them from those who might be interested in degrading the natural resource values of a site to take it out of the inventory. Mr. Bj0rklund said that the Oregon Administrative Rule for Goal 5 allows local jurisdictions to apply interim protection measures for up to 120 days. Mr. Pap8 asked if there would have been any time or cost savings from continuing the joint jurisdictional effort. Mr. Bj0rklund said that at this point, no. If the jurisdictions had agreed at various points in the process, it would have been resource-efficient to process the inventory as a whole. That had been the goal early in the process. Eventually, the jurisdictions "agreed to disagree." Mr. Pap8 asked if the potential for collaboration and the establishment of consistent criteria were beyond hope. Mr. Bj0rklund believed that the process was beyond the need for that. There was now no benefit to agreeing on the same thing. He noted that there were sites on the inventory that must be co-adopted by Lane County, which required coordination with that body. Responding to a question from Mr. PapS, Ms. Childs indicated that the City would have to develop regulations associated with the inventory to address the code amendments related to Goal 5 remanded by the Land Use Board of Appeals. Ms. Nathanson asked Mr. Bj0rklund if he envisioned the staff recommendation could be for a combined approach involving the safe harbor and standard inventory approach. Mr. Bj0rklund said that it was possible. He said that the City had a range of options under Goal 5, and could use both approaches as tools to get the municipality to where the council wanted it to go. MINUTES--Eugene City Council May 28, 2003 Page 4 Work Session