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Mayor Torrey thanked the students from the University of Oregon who took on the challenge of bringing the issue before the council. He cautioned them that their work was not over. Mayor Torrey agreed with Mr. Meisner's remarks about staffing, saying it was easy to upsize but not to downsize. He thought Ms. Taylor's points about temporary staffing were well-taken. Ms. Taylor did not support an ordinance sunset, saying a sunset was different from a council evaluation. She supported the current phasing plan and pointed out it would take more time to identify single-family rental housing stock. She hoped the University of Oregon students who raised the need for the ordinance found another worthy cause. Mr. Pap6 joined in the appreciation expressed to the students and staff. He thought a sunset provision would trigger a sufficient level of staff review. Mr. Pap6 opposed the $10 per unit fee proposal, preferring to have a lower fee initially. He concurred with the remarks of other councilors, saying that two FTE were far more than would be needed when the program was established. He suggested that the City outsource the service as it could be done by an outside firm. He wanted to look at that approach before the City hired new staff. Ms. Nathanson suggested that the City also pursue changes in the State Landlord-Tenant Law. She asked the City Manager to inform the council of the process for prioritizing the issue for lobbying in the next State legislative session. Ms. Nathanson asked Ms. Miller to discuss a staff statement in the Agenda Item Summary that many qualified families overpaying for housing would not benefit from an exemption to the ordinance. Ms. Miller said that the issue was raised at the HPB meeting. Members expressed concern that there were people eligible to be in low-income housing who overpaid for housing now because of a lack of affordable low- income housing units. If those units were exempted, that did not benefit those families. Ms. Nathanson clarified that the statement was less about the exemption than about the housing stock. Ms. Miller concurred. Mr. Kelly noted the Coalition for Eugene Housing Standards included other organizations than the University students, such as Centro LatinoAmericano. He thanked all those organizations. Mr. Kelly discussed the problems created by the illegal conversion of housing, such as single-family houses converted to multi-unit housing. The housing in question may be poorly built, and its systems not designed to handle multiple units. He asked if there was a way to identify such housing. Noting that staff had discussed the issue with University students, Ms. Miller said one of the results of having such a program was that it was likely the City would be called on to investigate situations where a unit was found to be not only substandard but illegal as well. She thought the City would encounter many such units, particularly in the University area. Mr. Taylor suggested that collection of that data would inform future council decisions regarding the scale and pricing of the service. Mr. Meisner said the City was exempting owner-occupied homes from the ordinance, but many marginally legal or illegally converted units involved owner-occupied homes. He cited room rentals as an example. He said staff would need to be very careful in its approach. He said the new State law requiring proof of permits on sale of a property may help in the long-term. MINUTES--Eugene City Council August 11, 2004 Page 5 Work Session