CC Minutes - 01/26/09 Regular Meeting

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M I N U T E S Eugene City Council Regular Meeting Council Chamber—Eugene City Hall 777 Pearl Street—Eugene, Oregon January 26, 2009 7:30 p.m. COUNCILORS PRESENT: Chris Pryor, George Brown, Andrea Ortiz, George Poling, Jennifer Solomon, Mike Clark, Alan Zelenka, Betty Taylor. Her Honor Mayor Kitty Piercy called the meeting of the Eugene City Council to order. She noted that the information regarding applications to serve on the Civilian Review Board was available on the City’s website. 1. PUBLIC FORUM Mayor Piercy reviewed the rules of the Public Forum. John Brown , 101 East Broadway, indicated that he was commenting on behalf of himself. He thanked the councilors and mayor for their service to the community. He stated that The Register-Guard had printed an article regarding an illegal homeless camp located in Councilor Zelenka’s ward. He explained that a 20-acre property on Moon Mountain Drive owned by an 80-year-old woman who did not live in the area had become inhabited. He related that she had tried for approximately a year to get a response to the illegal camping and it had finally been addressed. He said a very aggressive group of people had lived at the camp; one had stolen a wheelchair from someone in the neighborhood, there had been a lot of drug activity, and a warrant had been issued for one person for sex offenses. He stressed that even City staff would not go to such a camp without police escorts. He explained that the situation had been addressed on the previous Monday, and on Tuesday, the owner of the property had been given a Notice to Abate, requiring her to clean up the mess within 10 days. He reiterated that she had tried for one year to get the City to respond. He said the City had revisited the site earlier in the day and found nine more camps and issued three more citations. He related that staff estimated there to be over 40 cubic yards of debris. He stated that if the owner did not remove the debris, the City’s practice was to have the debris removed and then put a lien on the property for payment. He had identified a number of illegal camps on City and County property. He felt that if citizens only had ten days to clean up such camps then the City should abide by those same requirements. He stressed that if the intent of the law was to protect the environment, it should not discriminate between publicly- and privately-owned land. He hoped the council would give consideration to a potential double-standard, and if the private sector had to clean up this type of mess in ten days, the City should do so also. He provided pictures of the camps located on public lands. Zachary Vishanoff , Ward 3, stated that he had given $1 to Councilor Taylor to purchase Civic Stadium from School District 4J. He related that university students had purchased a house on Moss Street and made it into a center of sustainability and had installed photo-voltaic (PV) panels. He said there were approximately 74 more vacant houses in that area. He urged the City to streamline the permitting process for the Moss Street house and to launch an inquiry into the rest of the houses. He suggested that the university could allow a forum where other student groups would be allowed to do adaptive reuse in a way that would be a complement to the Fairmount Neighborhood. He had also noticed that the university was proposing the construction of an indoor track. He was concerned that the university would want to build it on the Mac Court site. He felt the university was getting “reckless” and “a little ahead of themselves.” Lauren Doxsee , 2136 McMillan Street, stated that Civic Stadium was one of her family’s favorite places to go. She thought having Ems baseball games at the University of Oregon would make it too quiet in their neighborhood. She felt that everyone loved Civic Stadium and urged everyone to bond together to keep Civic Stadium. MINUTES—Eugene City Council January 26, 2009 Page 1 Regular Meeting