Item 3A: Approval of City Council Minutes

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Mr. Zelenka wanted staff to clarify the text related to industrial lands to highlight that no decision had been made about the needed acreage. He did not think people understood the draft nature of the document and feared that such “bold statements” would take on a life of their own. Ms. Gardner requested that the council initiate a code amendment process to address infill compatibility standards with an initial focus on multi-family development standards, to establish a flexible review process to facilitate opportunity siting, and to remove barriers to mixed-use development that exist in the current code. She reminded the council that the code amendments represented a long-standing list of proposals supported by the Infill Compatibility Standards and Opportunity Siting task teams and the neighborhood associations. Mr. Brown wanted to see a more specific list of proposed code changes. He supported moving forward with the code amendments related to opportunity siting and the infill compatibility standards but requested more information about the barriers to mixed-use development and flexible review process mentioned by Ms. Gardner. Ms. Gardner envisioned a flexible adjustment process that included neighborhood input and provided for a way to allow good, sustainable projects that might not precisely fit the parameters of the code. Speaking to Mr. Brown’s question regarding barriers to mixed use, Ms. Gardner acknowledged the City’s past work in removing barriers to mixed use in downtown and said there were other areas of the code where such barriers continued to exist. Ms. Harding cited removal of the requirement for ground floor commercial development in C-2 zones as an example. Mr. Pryor indicated support for the staff request as a way to “get the ball rolling.” Ms. Taylor agreed that the requirement for commercial development on ground floors in the C-2 zone was problematic. She agreed with Mr. Zelenka’s remarks about people’s understanding of the nature of the document and emphasized she was not prepared to vote on its contents at this time. She supported moving forward immediately with the code amendments related to infill compatibility. Ms. Ortiz indicated support for the proposed revisions to the Seven Pillars of Envision Eugene. Speaking to the projected need for industrial land, Ms. Ortiz said her ward needed jobs and it would require a large industrial employer to provide them. The industry did not need to be heavy industrial and she suggested it could be green industry. She also supported the initiation of the code amendments, saying they were a long time coming. Mr. Poling also supported the revisions to the Seven Pillars. He suggested the last bullet under the pillar “Provide for adaptable, flexible, and collaborative implementation” could be revised to read “Revise language to include phased development approach to making urban growth boundary expansions areas available for housing development, if needed.” Speaking in regard to the proposed recommendation to add industrial acreage, Mr. Poling recalled testimony suggesting that more than 400 acres were needed and recommended that the number be left out entirely to avoid being too limiting or over-reaching. Ms. Weiss moved on to the subject of the housing mix. She reported that the City anticipated a demand for 15,000 homes in Eugene over the next 20 years, and the question facing the community was how many would be provided in the form of single-family homes and how many would be provided through multi-family development. The TRG had examined the housing need and mix. The TRG did not plan to forward a recommendation on the needed acreage because it believed the decision was ultimately a policy MINUTES—Eugene City Council May 25, 2011 Page 4 Work Session