Item 2A: Approval of City Council Minutes

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also provided support to the concepts of redevelopment and conversion. Mr. Pryor emphasized the importance of identifying the acres in question soon. Mr. Farr recalled that the CRG had considerable discussion of the subject of the needed acreage and members had been “all over the board.” He believed the actual math justified the 400 acre number. City Manager Ruiz concurred. Mr. Farr did not think it was an exact number, and he anticipated that much of the land needed would be added in a “just-in-time” fashion. He emphasized the importance of larger parcels. Ms. O’Donnell continued the PowerPoint presentation. She discussed the strategies associated with the pillar Provide affordable housing for all income levels and noted their connection to the housing mix and housing mix ranges. She anticipated the Technical Resource Group, a subcommittee of the CRG, would continue to work on the issue. Ms. O’Donnell shared the housing mix ranges under discussion and noted the benefits of the ranges identified by community members. Councilors and commissioners asked questions clarifying the information presented. Strategy 1: Plan for a higher proportion of new housing stock to be multi-family than the 39 percent of multi-family that currently exists. Increasing the proportion of multi-family housing increases the amount of housing accessible to all income levels. Mr. Clark said that as a result of past planning, Eugene had experienced slower growth in the number of families with children and decreased demand for single-family detached housing. He suggested that if the community planned for more of the same it would get it, and that meant more young families moving to outlying communities so they could live in single-family homes. That meant declining school enrollment and difficulty funding the schools. He did not want to continue that pattern. Mr. Clark asked if the City wanted to force leapfrog sprawl and increase the number of people who worked in Eugene but lived elsewhere. He preferred to keep those families in Eugene and suggested that the City needed to “get very real” about what the market place really wanted. He asked if the City really knew that young families wanted to live in multi-family housing. His experience suggested that they did not. He recommended that the City consider census data from the entire region when considering the mix. Mr. Farr suggested that the facts mentioned by Mr. Clark could also be attributed to a lack of affordable single-family housing in Eugene. Those with median incomes could not afford Eugene’s median house prices. He asked how much thought staff had given to the question of people who did not have the option of single-family detached housing, although such housing was their preference. Mr. Pryor believed the question of housing mix represented a pivotal point in conversation. He said it was also challenging because the City was attempting to predict future demographic and economic shifts. Mr. Pryor suggested the housing mix was also affected by the suppliers. Homebuilders did not want to build low-income housing because they made more money building more costly housing. He maintained that the trends in Eugene were not driven by the market but by the suppliers. Mr. Pryor believed that buyers, builders, and planners needed to recognize that and shift their thinking. He encouraged people to put aside traditional thinking and gather all the information possible. In response to Mr. Clark’s comments, Mr. Zelenka averred that school districts were “declining everywhere.” He also maintained that young families did not drive the housing market; the housing market was driven by the “boomers.” Mr. Zelenka asserted that the “boomers” were downsizing and wanted to live downtown. Multi-family developments were being built for “downsizing boomers.” He suspected that the trend was toward multi-family housing and suggested the council review the data MINUTES—Eugene City Council/ February 28, 2010 Page 4 Eugene Planning Commission Joint Work Session