CC Minutes - 08/11/08 Meeting - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

Josef Siekiel-Zdzienicki , Taylor Street, Eugene, 3RT member, stated there was growing community thth preference for routing EmX to West Eugene along 6 and 7 avenues from the downtown station. He said th many respondents to a 3RT survey agreed the disadvantages of an EmX line on West 13 Avenue thth outweighed the advantages and preferred 6 and 7. He did not feel that LTD had adequately involved business in its planning and design activities. He pointed out the problems caused by the Eugene Code requirement that structures be built out to the curb, which created a conflict with LTD plans, and asked for a moratorium on the requirement. Azra Khalidi , Donald Street, Eugene, asked if the City had a plan for use of the Hynix building now that the company was leaving. She said the site comprised 20 to 30 acres and said the taxes paid by Hynix between 2000 and 2008 could not be compared to the capital gains and profit during that period. She noted that Councilor Taylor was the only one to oppose the location of a Hynix facility in Eugene. She suggested that the University of Oregon and Lane Community College use the Hynix building. th Deb Frisch , West 11 Avenue, Eugene, cited the history of the council’s action on vacation of an alley to accommodate the new University of Oregon basketball arena and described it as worrisome. She noted that EC 9.2160 was not on the list of minor code amendments. She did not think that the Police Auditor and Civilian Review Board (CRB) had changed anything in the Eugene Police Department. Carol Berg-Caldwell , Augusta Street, Eugene, spoke to the withholding of a citizen complaint from the Police Auditor, contrary to the voter-mandated ordinance. She said Police Chief Robert Lehner’s decision to withhold the file was upheld by City Manager Jon Ruiz. She said if the ordinance needed to be revised to address certain circumstances that should be done through the appropriate process and not the decision of one person. She urged the Police Chief and City Manager to listen to the community and be accountable for their mistake. th Melissa Mona , East 14 Alley, Eugene, said the proposed exclusion zone was not a new idea and had been used elsewhere to discriminate against certain people. She said the proposal was unconscionable and similar laws in jurisdictions had been struck down as unconstitutional. She did not think the issue was drugs; it was a complex problem related to people who were mentally ill and homeless. She said the City had failed to properly address mental illness or homelessness and the solution was not to sweep them out of sight. She said there was a civic duty to help those individuals. John Brown , Eugene, welcomed Mr. Ruiz to the community and commended his willingness to consider a number of points of view. He said the National Association of Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement (NACOLE) was an excellent resource for recruiting a new Police Auditor. He said that clean water was his passion and he was concerned about the City’s practice of blowing trash from the park blocks and downtown sidewalks into storm drains. He said that maintenance staff for the City parks had indicated the practice was due to a lack of financial resources. He preferred that no cleanup activities occur if they resulted in putting trash into the river. Chico Schwall , North Grand Street, Eugene, said he worked at the Shedd Institute and served on the WOW Hall board of directors. He said there were serious public safety problems in the downtown area, but the exclusion zone was not the solution and would not be considered if the people about to be subject to it were in any position to object. He said problems would not be solved by moving them, and suggested that the use of police resources should be examined. He asserted that he and the WOW Hall would be willing to work with the City to find a just and sustainable solution to the problem. MINUTES—Eugene City Council August 11, 2008 Page 2 Regular Meeting