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January 13, 2009 <br />Joint Elected Officials Meeting <br />City of Springfield <br />City of Eugene <br />Lane County <br />Page 4 of 10 <br /> <br />an Ad Hoc committee made up today of members in this meeting. That discussion could include taking a <br />look at what the Metro Plan was supposed to do, what it was doing, and determining whether or not we <br />could resuscitate the plan or develop something else. <br /> <br />Councilor Ralston said he felt that dealing with two of the five issues was a good idea, and issues #2 and <br />#4 were the easiest to work through first. Describing the services should be fairly easy. He agreed with <br />Commissioner Fleenor that the Metro Plan may not be applicable anymore, especially regarding <br />jurisdictional autonomy, but the solution of modifying the current bylaws made a lot of sense. His opinion <br />was that Springfield would like some autonomy. <br /> <br />Councilor Poling said he was willing to have the discussion of the viability of the Metro Plan, but he <br />would first like to see the pros and cons of the Plan and a lot more information. If the group proceeded in <br />going into this format, he was interested in resolving issue #4 regarding autonomy. Under the current <br />policy, there had been projects that had been put before the group that were stopped due to objection of <br />one of the jurisdictions for one reason or another, when the project could have been beneficial for all. He <br />spoke regarding public safety and a lawsuit that was filed in the 1970’s regarding police patrols in <br />unincorporated areas. The judge in that case ruled that the requirement in the ORS to ‘maintain peace and <br />order and arrest those that violated that’ was fulfilled in the sheriff’s drive from the office to the <br />courthouse. He was not sure he agreed with that, but felt there was a way to address Councilor Zelenka’s <br />concerns about a public safety district. He discussed a tax levy for those that benefited from extra patrols. <br />He explained. He was willing to discuss the Metro Plan. <br /> <br />Councilor Leezer said she agreed with Councilor Ralston and Commissioner Fleenor to look at the Metro <br />Plan to see if it was still serving everyone. <br /> <br />Commissioner Stewart said the LCBC did believe that the Metro Plan was not working, but he had been <br />told we could not get rid of it. The only way to make it work was to fix it. The LCBC had listed five items <br />they had concerns about. He noted issue #1, and said the County had constituents that lived in the UGB, <br />but were not represented by the cities, such as Santa Clara/River Road citizens. That caused problems that <br />needed to be addressed. In regard to Issue #2, LCBC did try to form a public safety district to fund <br />County public safety, without taking away authority from either of the cities. That was one way they tried <br />to improve that situation. He said he was interested in looking at whether or not a public safety district <br />was feasible in the future to fund services for everyone. He spoke regarding rural reserves, and the <br />concern that the agricultural and forest land was being taken by development. He addressed jurisdictional <br />autonomy and the issue of those residents outside the UGB and inside the Metro area that had no <br />representation. He spoke regarding the dispute resolution currently in place. The current system did not <br />work and a solution needed to be found. He said he didn’t believe they could do away with the Metro <br />Plan, so they needed to amend it to make it a useful tool. <br /> <br />Councilor Taylor asked for clarification of the coterminous boundary and if it meant shrinking the Metro <br />Plan area. She remembered talking about the Metro Plan and that many of the elected officials wanted to <br />get rid of the Plan, but it couldn’t be done. There was also a suggestion to get rid of County government <br />at that meeting. She said she was here to listen to the County. <br /> <br />Councilor Clark said he had watched the LCBC meeting on January 7. Last night at the Eugene City <br />Council meeting, they discussed the LCBC meeting and Commissioner Fleenor’s question about looking <br />at whether or not to proceed with the Metro Plan amendments. He has asked staff to prepare information <br /> <br />