Item 2A: Approval of City Council Minutes

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good working relationship without letting such side issues get in the way. He did not think the council should allow itself to be distracted from reaching its goals. Ms. Taylor thought the City was moving in the wrong direction. She believed the council should have been given all the comments made by the public directly rather than be referred to a book in the City Manager’s Office. She referred to some of the negative comments made by the public, which included recommendations the City terminate the district immediately and then evaluate the use of the funds in a transparent manner. Another critic contended that the district had become a self-perpetuating bureaucracy, and she agreed. Ms. Taylor pointed out that urban renewal was intended to cure blight and eventually terminate, but she had counted 38 properties that were identified as blighted after 42 years of urban renewal. She further pointed out that the current proposal did nothing to address the blighted areas. Ms. Taylor was happy to hear from the Board of County Commissioners and believed that it was the board’s obligation to speak up. She said the money involved was not free. It was tax money and it cost someone something. She was opposed to any extension of time, any increase in the debt limit, and any boundary expansion. Ms. Taylor suggested the council ask the public to vote on the proposal and said she would go along with it if the public agreed. Mayor Piercy believed the council had an honest difference of opinion that was part of the policy-making process. She expressed appreciation for all points of view. She noted that many of the public comments spoke to the blighted conditions people perceived downtown. Many people suggested that downtown was not worth working on until the City had solved other problems downtown. However, Mayor Piercy believed the City would be remiss not to do its utmost to move forward to address downtown conditions, including the downtown “pits” and downtown public safety issues addressed, and said those were the purview of the City to solve. She agreed with Ms. Taylor that the money was not free but had been carefully accumulated in the district for such purposes. Mr. Brown spoke to ORS 457.170, which described a URA’s powers, and suggested the City would violate the provision by paying off the debt for the parking garages and then using the money freed-up to hire more police officers downtown. There was nothing in the statute that suggested that tax increment funds could be converted to general fund dollars. He described the purposes of a URA as contained in the statute and said the statute did not address the subject of paying debt on a pre-existing urban renewal project. Mr. Brown maintained that the statute was clear as to what was allowed and what was not allowed. He said the City had other ways to increase public safety without employing the district. He said that $800,000 could be used to hire police officers and rent jail beds with money left over if the Downtown District stopped collecting tax increment to address homelessness and hunger. Mr. Zelenka recalled that the council received public comment that was overwhelmingly in support of the proposed plan. He said the proposal included four great projects that could produce jobs downtown and that could be accomplished without the need to raise taxes or harm the schools. He said the tax increment financing mechanism was the cheapest of those the council looked at. The next least expensive option, the existing resources option, would require the council to cut $500,000 from the General Fund. He considered that a bad choice that did not make sense. He questioned why the council should spend more money and increase taxes because some people did not like the funding mechanism. Mr. Zelenka thought the council needed to be clear that it did not have unlimited “do-overs” for downtown. MINUTES—City Council May 10, 2010 Page 6 Work Session