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Ms. Taylor supported the amendment as she thought it made the MUPTE less onerous. Ms. Nathanson said the area in question was a neighborhood in distress and the properties it contained were in decline. She noted the council's many goals for the neighborhood and its recent adoption of a report forwarded by the University of Oregon-City of Eugene Joint Task Force on the West University Neighbor- hood. She asked about the condition of housing stock in the area proposed to be removed from the MUPTE boundaries. Mr. Weinman said the area in question contained a considerable amount of substandard housing. There was also the potential of condominium ownership with the MUPTE. Ms. Nathanson noted the 2002 riots took place in the area in question. For that reason, she would probably not support the motion. Mr. Pap6 said that during graduate school, his daughter lived in the area in substandard housing. He said the MUPTE was a tool to help the City improve the area, and emphasized the council could reject an application if it did not believe the public would benefit. Mr. Meisner was inclined to support the amendment. He said that there were several multi-unit develop- ments constructed in the area without a subsidy, citing specifically the development at 14th Avenue and Hilyard Street. Mr. Weinman said that development was constructed with the use of the MUPTE. The alley project near 18th Avenue and Hilyard Street was not built with the assistance of the MUPTE, but he would not characterize it as high-quality development. Mr. Kelly acknowledged there was substandard housing in the neighborhood but did not think the council would be helping the neighborhood if it defeated the motion. He noted that the West University Neighbor- hood Association indicated its support for the MUPTE was based on the inclusion of the standards. The joint task force had recommended the MUPTE as a tool, but as a tool to diversify the housing stock. Without standards, the final decision on applications was ~up to the whim" of the council. Ms. Bettman supported the boundary reduction. She thought expanding the boundary would defeat the purpose of having the MUPTE downtown. Removal of the standards gave the council no leverage over housing quality. She feared that existing housing would be tom down to accommodate higher density housing in an already dense area. Ms. Bettman said the council should adopt housing standards if it was concerned about substandard housing. Ms. Nathanson pointed out that the standards were not deleted but merely placed in another part of the application. The applications would be evaluated by the council on a project-by-project basis to ensure the public benefit outweighed the temporary loss of tax revenue. The standards continued to exist; if a project did not meet the standards, the council did not have to grant the exemption. Ms. Nathanson asked staff if they had ever discouraged an application from coming to the council because it did not meet the standards. Mr. Weinman said no. Mr. Pap~ concurred with Ms. Nathanson's remarks. He wanted to see redevelopment of substandard housing in the West University Neighborhood and thought one of the ways to encourage that was through use of the MUPTE. MINUTES--Eugene City Council April 21, 2004 Page 6 Work Session