Item 3A: Approval of City Council Minutes

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Ms. Bettman proposed a friendly amendment to add the following language: This motion in no way endorses the concepts of the proposal. Mr. Poling and Ms. Solomon accepted the amendment. Ms. Bettman pointed out that the proposal indicated it was the developers’ expectation that the City would acquire all of the listed parcels and sell those parcels to the development team at no cost. She asked what was meant by “all of the listed parcels.” Mr. Sullivan said the development team was involved in discus- sions with all of the private property owners and had not provided a list of individual properties yet. He assumed that the statement meant those properties that the developers were unable to acquire. Ms. Bettman asked if amending the urban renewal district to increase indebtedness meant that the development proposal would consume all of the available funds. Mr. Sullivan replied there was very little room in the existing debt cap for the downtown urban renewal district. City Attorney Glenn Klein explained that what was called “maximum indebtedness” in the urban renewal plan was really a spending cap and the library used most of the spending cap. He said it was the spending cap that would need to be increased. Ms. Bettman said that in terms of using eminent domain to achieve a public benefit, she questioned whether consolidating a huge chunk of downtown in the hands of one property owner was a public benefit. She said a diversity of ownership was a good thing. Mr. Papé agreed with the need for public input and said that if the council entered into a development agreement, it certainly had the right to define the type and extent of public input that would be part of the process. He said when the agreement came back to the council it should describe in detail the type of public process in general as well as the specific process for each phase of the project. He asked about the history of the Atrium Building’s ownership and whether it had seismic problems. Mr. Sullivan said the City purchased the Atrium Building in 1998 at a good price and had significant equity in the building, which represented a substantial amount of cash as a liquidated asset. Mr. Papé stated that he would not be in favor of subsidizing the project with a decreased sales price as had been done for other downtown developments. He said the City should receive market price for that asset if it was sold. Mr. Poling asked if the proposal language about the City acquiring listed parcels and selling them to the development team at cost meant the purchase price plus any legal fees if eminent domain was necessary. Mr. Sullivan said that staff assumed that “at cost” was a fully loaded cost that would include the costs of any acquisition process. Mr. Kelly remarked that he was also interested in a fair recovery for the Atrium Building and any discussion of its sale should take into account the fiscal impact of relocating staff to rented space. The motion as amended passed, 7:0; Ms. Bettman voting in opposition. C. EXECUTIVE SESSION Mayor Piercy called the Eugene City Council into executive session to discuss real estate negotiations pursuant to Oregon Revised Statutes 192.660(2)(e). The council returned to work session at 7:20 p.m. and the meeting was adjourned. MINUTES—Eugene City Council January 9, 2006 Page 8 Work Session