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they should move on to the next agenda item. <br /> <br />Councilor Zelenka offered a friendly amendment to accept the recommendations and to refer <br />the seven recommendations to the three jurisdictions for further discussion and action. <br />Councilor Ortiz accepted the friendly amendment. <br /> <br />Councilor Ralston underscored that the task force had spent four hours a month working on the report and <br />recommendations. He likened this to having the Planning Commission do the leg work on a planning issue <br />so that the council would not have to delve into it. He believed that the recommendations were stated <br />vaguely enough that it would tie no one’s hands. He supported moving the recommendations forward to the <br />next step; the JEO should accomplish something. <br /> <br />Mayor Piercy called for a vote of the Eugene City Council. The council voted unanimous- <br />ly, 8:0, to approve the motion. <br /> <br />Mayor Leiken called for a vote of the Springfield City Council. The council voted unanim- <br />ously, 5:0, to approve the motion. <br /> <br />Mr. Holmes called for a vote of the Lane Rural Fire/Rescue District. The district board <br />voted 3:1 to pass the motion, with Mr. Brown dissenting. <br /> <br />2. PROPOSED MERGER OF FIRE DEPARTMENTS <br /> <br />Chief Murphy stated that the departments were before the JEO to recommend a functional consolidation of <br />the Springfield and Eugene fire and rescue departments. He explained that the employees of the two cities <br />would still be employed in the same way and a system that crossed geo-political boundaries had already <br />been in place since 2007 and had operated daily without incident. He cited training and the fire marshal’s <br />office as examples of areas in which consolidation could mean cost reductions. He related that they had <br />engaged a consultant, brought this before the Eugene Chamber, Springfield Chamber and the City Club, and <br />had convened public forums to gain input on the potential consolidation. They had heard a lot of support for <br />beginning the process in order to determine whether a merger was something they should pursue. He stated <br />that because of the vacancies that already exist and anticipated vacancies, some major functions would be <br />done under the direction of Eugene and some under the direction of Springfield; they were seeking joint <br />leadership on the merger. He noted that the suggested timeline was something the elected officials could <br />modify at will. <br /> <br />Chief Murphy pointed out that maintaining the current vacancies would save $600,000 in FY10/FY11 and <br />$850,000 in the following fiscal year. He said if they failed to deliver the savings, this would be evidence <br />that the merger was not working well. He stressed that they were only recommending that they initiate the <br />process, with phase one serving only to analyze and develop the proposal. If there was a phase two, which <br />was a plan to implement the merger, it would be at the direction of the elected officials. <br /> <br />Councilor Zelenka felt a need to discuss the proposal in a City of Eugene council work session as they had <br />not engaged in this conversation yet. He was not prepared at the present meeting to say yes or no. <br /> <br />Councilor Clark agreed that it would take future study at the City Council level, but he believed the merger <br />was a good idea from what he had learned so far through the task force work. He thought making people <br />safe with the money at hand would be an efficient use of resources. He averred that the 3-Battalion System <br /> <br /> <br />MINUTES—Joint Elected Officials—Lane County, Springfield, December 7, 2009 Page 7 <br /> & Eugene <br /> <br />