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him to deny more applications, Recommendation 55 was probably not a significant issue. Ms. Taylor suggested that the question was one purpose of the division: Was it to process applications quickly or to consider what kind of community was wanted? Ms. Taylor noted that she had not favored funding the audit. She said the audit had been presented to the council in the context of a sample performance audit. She had expected to see something about efficiency and whether planners were being used in the best possible way. Speaking to the latter issue, she suggested that depended on what one considered what planners should be for: Were they to plan for a good community or to satisfy the needs of developers as quickly as possible? She asked Mr. Zucker if he perceived the audit as an overall look at efficiency or as a look at a service to a particular group of people. Mr. Zucker said that he viewed his work as focusing on the customers. The question was, who were the customers? He said that applicants were one group of customers. Neighbors were customers, as was the City Council. In many ways, staff was a customer. He attempted to place his recommendations in that broader context. In terms of efficiency, he believed that everything came back to the customer. Mr. Zucker said in the permitting process, it was dangerous to say the customer was the developer because many customers were residents and homeowners who wanted to carry on with their lives. He believed that an applicant that came to a city for a permit should be able to get a clear understanding of what was needed, what it would cost, how long it would take, and what requirements existed. Mr. Zucker said he did not think the City had to revise its entire code. He said that both applicants and other citizens say that they wanted clarity in the code, or exactly what was being asked of us. Citizens will call for proscriptive codes. However, when there was actually a development proposal, everyone wanted flexibility to solve their own problems. He said that the reasonable way to approach the problem was to provide flexibility in the process to ensure a better product at that end. Ms. Taylor asked if Mr. Zucker considered his work similar to what a performance auditor did. Mr. Zucker said yes. He followed the federal yellow book approach to auditing. He said that the audit approach was partially dictated by the budget. In the time his firm was in Eugene, he thought it did a credible job. He believed that for the amount of time allotted, the firm did a pretty good staffing analysis. Mayor Torrey asked if staff could provide the council with information on focus group in which participants were citizens seeking to remodel their homes. He said that there was a perception on the part of some councilors that developers were somehow bad and other people were not. Mr. Coyle indicated he would provide that data to the council. Mayor Torrey commended the report as excellent. He said that he met monthly with a group of small business owners, who wanted to know what they had to do, asked for help if needed, and for the process to occur in a timely fashion. People complained that the process was short- circuited by different City departments involved in the plan review process. Mayor Torrey said that he was told by a City employee that he had been unable to make it through the permitting process because it was so complex. Mayor Torrey solicited a second round of council comments. Speaking to Mr. Coyle's earlier remarks, Mr. Kelly did not think the council wanted the department to deny more applications. The council wanted the department to implement the code, and if an MINUTES - Eugene City Council June 25, 2003 Page 9 Work Session