Item 3A - Minutes Approval - Laserfiche WebLink

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ordinance and give direction to staff to come back with an amendment that accomplished the council's purpose. He said the issue typically arose when the council was giving direction to staff. He said an alternative approach was to have the discussion about what the council wanted to accomplish, table the issue and move on to the next item while staff developed proposed language. He indicated these approaches applied to substantive, not minor, changes to an ordinance. He encouraged direction to staff that provided guidance and required consultation when appropriate, instead of attempting to wordsmith extremely detailed and specific language. He characterized the issue as one of trusting staff to follow the council's direction and suggested that staff could consult with the councilor or councilors who were identified as leading a particular issue. City Manager Taylor encouraged councilors to provide more general direction and identify a member with whom the staff could consult to determine if the council's intent was being met by the proposed language. Responding to Mr. Klein's remarks, Mr. Kelly noted that there was language currently in the operating agreements about avoiding amending ordinances "on the fly." He said that the option to table an item until later in the meeting while staff crafted language was acceptable unless there were time constraints. He expressed concern with the issue of trust and said his experience over the past two years was that broad direction from the council had often resulted in a response that was not reflective of the council's intent, thereby prompting the council to be more specific in its direction. He said that when a response was not received for two or three months and it was not what the council wanted, that further delayed action. Ms. Bettman agreed with Mr. Kelly's remarks that staff responses were not timely and did not articulate council direction. She asked if Mr. Klein's suggestions referred to instances when only one or two councilors requested an amendment or instances when the entire council was in agreement and there was a motion to change the language. Mr. Klein said his remarks anticipated that a majority of the council wanted language brought back. He suggested if one or two councilors were interested in amending an ordinance, the council should determine if a majority supported the concept before postponing the issue to another meeting and directing staff to develop language. Ms. Bettman said the problem with Mr. Klein's suggestion was that any amendment would need to be debated ahead of time to get the council's support of the intent before a councilor could request that language be developed. Mr. Klein said he was not suggesting that the current procedures should not continue, only encouraging alternative approaches to crafting %n the fly" when there had been no opportunity to discuss amendment language with staff and other council members prior to a meeting. He said that a motion to direct staff to return with language that achieved a specific result and work with a designated councilor to ensure the language was responsive was intended to better meet the council's needs. Mr. Kelly stated his opposition to specifying a councilor to consult with staff as he did not think that should be codified. He encouraged staff to communicate freely with members of the council. Ms. Nathanson said unfortunately staff was likely to have reservations about freely contacting councilors because of concerns that their conduct would be challenged or considered inappropriate. Mr. Meisner cautioned that solutions to a problem should not eliminate opportunities to be creative. Mr. Klein reiterated that the purpose of the discussion item was not to change the existing process but to offer options to crafting motions %n the fly" that could make it more efficient or productive. He said staff MINUTES--Eugene City Council September 8, 2004 Page 7 Process Session