CC Minutes - 01/13/09 Joint Elected Officials

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January 13, 2009 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 5 of 10 on what it would mean to the City of Eugene if they disengaged from the Metro Plan, and some of that had been provided this morning. Some of the information included costs shared by the jurisdictions with joint planning. He was interested to see what kind of money would be required if we did separate and what financial burdens each jurisdiction would bear. It was also mentioned in the report that new agreements would need to be entered into in place of the Metro Plan as required by the State. He would like to learn more about those requirements. He spoke regarding the issue of disenfranchisement. Since he began serving the City residents, he has felt that no one should be forced to annex into the City of Eugene. He regularly met with County residents in that area to hear their issues and concerns. He discussed agreements Eugene had made with the County that indirectly forced people to annex into the City in order to gain certain services. He would be in favor of making new agreements that weren’t so hard on those residents. Making sure those County residents had adequate services as well as adequate voices was important. Councilor Wylie said she supported a lot of what Commissioner Stewart said. If the Metro Plan was outdated, they needed to work on making it relevant with thoughtful amendments and looking at the future needs of our community. Regarding Public Safety Districts, she said each jurisdiction had individual interest in special districts. Through remaking the Metro Plan, each jurisdiction may gain more respect and cooperation for each other’s projects. Each was working hard to make things better for their citizens. Commissioner Handy said Commissioner Stewart gave a good review of the issues from the County. He also thought Councilor Fleenor addressed the Board’s concerns regarding the current Metro Plan. He discussed the Martin Luther King Jr. event at the County earlier in the morning, and the poignancy of the statement “now is the time” and the “urgency of now”. It was incumbent upon the elected officials to keep in mind the needs and desires of the people. He asked Eugene staff for an update on the process of updating the Refinement Plan for the City of Eugene, particularly the River Road and Santa Clara areas. Eugene Planner Muir said in the work plan for the City of Eugene was a neighborhood based plan update process for the Refinement Plan. The goal, consistent with the Neighborhood Empowerment Initiative work they had been doing, was to come up with a more current way of reflecting local plans and priorities either in a Refinement Plan or District Plan. They had not yet gotten to prioritization other than to develop a system that allowed those areas that were most ready to move forward. They were working closely with the neighborhood associations and City staff developing a framework to do that. Councilor Woodrow said he was also hoping to hear what the LCBC was looking for during the meeting. He had no issues with the proposed solutions regarding the Metro Plan descriptions, as long as the solution was the same for all three entities. He discussed a past attempt by Springfield to form a special district that was stopped by another jurisdiction. He empathized with the citizens that lived in the County and didn’t have County or City representation. Some resolution should come out to those citizens and he would like that resolved. Councilor Solomon thanked the Board for bringing this to the City’s attention. She agreed with Councilor Wylie that if all three jurisdictions had to follow the Metro Plan, all should benefit. There needed to be a way for all three to use the Plan fairly and she believed they could get to that point. Councilor Pishioneri referred to the comments from Commissioner Fleenor and Commission Stewart, and noted that the Springfield’s Planning Commission would likely have their opinions about the Metro Plan.