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1. Intuitive. Staff and the public find the code difficult and confusing, and it is likely more complex than it needs to be to achieve the City's goals. A thoughtful audit of the effectiveness of criteria and standards should be done to measure their value. 2. Adaptable. At this time, the City's code is 'one size fits all.' It could be more flexible and adaptable on a project-by-project basis. Establishing flexible and adaptable tools would allow City staff to better respond to challenges and issues that come up during the development process. 3. Enabling. Entrust staff to carry out policies and objectives by utilizing professional expertise. Empower staff to use creative problem solving to achieve set policies and goals. Provide the framework for bounded delegation. Allow staff to make practical, rational decisions on common sense matters. Common-sense requests by applicants often require exception processes and may be burdensome. 4. Logical. There should be a discernible path from the standards and criteria to the objective the City is trying to achieve. Make it make sense. Every time we propose amendments to the code we should ask ourselves the questions 'what issue are we trying to address, and what problem are we trying to solve?' 5. Strategic. Having a code that is less detail oriented and more form-based with adjustable processes that allow more responsiveness to staff, developers, and neighbors about how to achieve goals and policies can allow staff to be more open to negotiations and hands- on problem solving. 6. Fair. The code must recognize there will be a variety of different stakeholders needs that must be met. Negotiations, compromise, balance, and consensus building must be incorporated into a code revision process and ongoing code applications in order for the code to embody the diverse values of our community. · The City Council and Budget Committee should fund a facilitator to assist businesses with expansion, coordinate multi-agency review of development permits, and assist in developing methods and policies to help streamline the permitting process. · The committee recommends that the City of Eugene establish an Enterprise Zone. Its boundaries should include the previous West Eugene Enterprise Zone properties, plus a relatively small amount of adjacent industrial-zoned properties that were not included in the previous zone. An eligible firm would receive 100% of the Zone's tax benefits if it expanded on existing, redeveloped, brownfield, or infill sites. Eligible firms would receive 67% of the tax benefits if the new investment occurred on a greenfield site (Oregon Administrative Rules preclude reduction of the tax exemption benefit by more than one-third). Those firms building on greenfield sites could receive up to 100% of the tax benefits if they meet additional criteria related to attractive wages, employee benefits, job training and advancement opportunities, job retention, and job programs that assist disadvantaged workers. The recommendations in support of existing tools are: · Infrastructure. An important role of government is to increase economic capacity by improving the quality and efficiency of infrastructure such as roads, bridges, water and sewer systems, airport and cargo facilities, energy systems, and telecommunications. The Committee agreed that infrastructure is one of the most important things that a local government provides, and it is important to acknowledge that the City should continue to support its infrastructure systems. L:\CMO\2004 Council Agendas\M040809\S040809B.doc