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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCC Minutes - 11/21/07 Work Session M I N U T E S Eugene City Council Work Session McNutt Room—Eugene City Hall—777 Pearl Street Eugene, Oregon November 21, 2007 Noon COUNCILORS PRESENT: Andrea Ortiz, Chris Pryor, Betty Taylor, Bonny Bettman, Jennifer Solomon, George Poling, Mike Clark, Alan Zelenka. Her Honor Mayor Kitty Piercy called the meeting of the Eugene City Council to order. A. WORK SESSION: Planning Process for Eugene Water & Electric Board Riverfront Property City Manager pro tem Angel Jones recognized the Eugene Water & Electric Board (EWEB) commissioners who were in attendance. She introduced Associate Planner Nan Laurence to provide an overview of recent activities. Ms. Laurence said that City and EWEB staff had been working to develop a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to outline the process for master planning of the EWEB site. She said binding aspects of the MOU pertained to the process of master planning, such as appointment of an advisory team and participation of the community at large. She said other aspects of the MOU were description and nonbinding on the council or any other regulatory body reviewing the master plan; those would include the description of open space or mix of uses. She said the EWEB commissioners had reviewed and unanimously approved the MOU. She said the master planning process was structured to provide as much council involvement as possible while maintaining protocol around the issue of quasi-judicial decisions, namely that the council could not participate in the development of a plan that they would later be involved in evaluating. Ms. Bettman felt there were inconsistencies between the EWEB process and the process undertaken with respect to the hospital. She said the council had passed a motion asking for the provisions of the MOU to be brought back for discussion, not approval. She said there was no reason, because of its quasi-judicial role, that the council would have to endorse or approve the MOU. She saw the definitions of mixed use and open space as a land use issue and the council directing staff to utilize those definitions via the MOU was a land use decision. She said the council could adopt those definitions in a parallel process. She commented that the MOU was intended to define the role of staff, but it did not; it did discuss timelines and if the council agreed to those timelines it would violate its quasi-judicial role. She said the agreement was between staff and EWEB; the council could approve the tenets as they applied to the citizen advisory committee and appointment process but should not approve the MOU. City Attorney Glenn Klein said the only reason for the council’s approval of the MOU was because the MOU committed the council to certain actions. He would be willing to craft a different motion that would address Ms. Bettman’s concerns. MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 21, 2007 Page 1 Work Session Mayor Piercy asked if there was a quasi-judicial conflict with the council’s endorsement of the MOU. Mr. Klein said in his opinion there was no problem; approving the definitions of open space and mixed use were not binding commitments that the City, in its regulatory capacity, would apply. He said the MOU could also be clarified to indicate that it was an agreement between EWEB and City staff; throughout the process staff had made it clear to EWEB that nothing in the MOU could bind the City in its regulatory capacity. He said the motion could be revised to indicate the council was only approving specific items and the City Manager was agreeing to the rest of the MOU. In response to a question from Mr. Zelenka, Ms. Laurence said the council would agree to select four members of the advisory committee and staff would develop criteria for selecting committee members and a recruitment process. Mr. Zelenka recognized that the definition of mixed use in the MOU was not binding on the council, but he felt the intent of the mixed use definition could be more clearly articulated. He would support a revised motion to approve only specific items and not the entire MOU and urged the City Manager to closely review the agreement before signing it. He also did not think the City staff's role was as clearly defined as it could be. Mr. Pryor said his intent was to acknowledge the collaborative nature of the endeavor and reach an understanding on how to proceed. He said the MOU was not a contract and not binding on the council; signing it would be a demonstration of good faith, which EWEB had already shown with unanimous adoption. Mr. Clark thanked EWEB and City staff for their efforts and the EWEB commissioners for their demonstra- tion of a desire to work cooperatively to determine the future of the riverfront property. He would support the MOU as written or as revised. Ms. Taylor said she would support a revised motion, but wished the council could be more involved with the planning process. She saw no point in approving the entire MOU. Mr. Klein pointed out that if the MOU was changed, it might need to go back to the EWEB commissioners; simply revising the motion consistent with his suggestion would allow the City Manager to sign the same MOU that was approved by EWEB. Ms. Bettman, seconded by Ms. Taylor, moved to endorse the portion of the Memo- randum of Understanding between the City Manager and the Eugene Water & Elec- tric Board that committed the City Council to reviewing and approving selection criteria for the citizen advisory committee and to selecting four members of that committee. Ms. Ortiz was pleased at the prospect of working with EWEB to use the property in a wise manner that would benefit the community. Mr. Pryor said he could support the motion if it maintained the spirit of cooperation. Ms. Bettman questioned why the MOU should be entered into if it was nonbinding on the council. She expressed frustration with the restrictions imposed on the council regarding a hospital but the permissiveness MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 21, 2007 Page 2 Work Session of the EWEB riverfront property process. She felt that the rules should be applied consistently to both situations. The motion passed unanimously, 8:0. In response to a question from Mayor Piercy, Ms. Laurence said the Downtown Plan policies cited on page 171 of the agenda packet were adopted into the land use code and were binding. B. WORK SESSION: Update on Street and Lighting Fee Development Public Works Director Kurt Corey provided an overview of recommendations from the council Subcommit- tee on Transportation Funding Solutions, which consisted of a package of five potential new revenue sources to begin to address the shortfall in transportation system funding. He said the recommendations before the council for consideration were a street and bike path lighting fee and a street utility fee based upon parking. Mr. Corey reviewed the list of assumptions for the street utility fee and said the annual revenue target, subject to council direction, was $6.5 million. He said single-family residential units would be assessed $4.50 per month; nonresidential assessments would be calculated on the basis of $4.75 per month per 1,000 square feet of established parking area. He reviewed the list of assumptions for the street and bike path fee and estimated an $850,000 annual revenue target. He said examples of residential rates were $.80 per month for arterials and collectors and $.70 for local areas and multi-family residential assessment would be the same, multiplied by the number of distinct addresses per property; nonresidential rates could be a flat fee or per unit assessment. Mr. Clark was concerned with moving forward with either fee so soon after the voters had defeated the gas tax. He wanted to see the City reach a solution to the entire problem and suggested not discussing the fees until after discussing a bond measure, as that could assure failure of that measure at the polls. He recommended that the entire package of solutions be sent back to the subcommittee for reformulation. He did not want to see the council move forward with a piecemeal approach. Mr. Pryor stated that the subcommittee considered many different options before arriving at its package of recommendations. He did not think it would be useful to reconvene the subcommittee. He agreed that a piecemeal approach could be a problem, but the recommendations had been separated into components because of timing issues. He was willing to discuss presenting an entire package of solutions. He felt the street utility fee would be difficult to sell to the public as a fair and equitable option. He suggested considering assessment of nonresidential properties on a graduated scale based on the fact that only a portion of most parking lots was actively used. Ms. Taylor stated she would not support a street utility fee. She thought it would be fairer to charge by the car and homeowners without a car should not have to pay. She objected to charging special fees for City services and said the council should find ways to raise more General Fund revenue, as street maintenance was the City's responsibility. She said a bond or levy could be presented to the voters. She urged the council to consider a business tax to increase the General Fund and using reserves to pay for streets. Ms. Bettman felt that work on different funding options should move forward in parallel. She was willing to support the fees generally, in concept, but had some concerns with the specifics of the methodology. She supported parking as the nexus for the assessment. She was generally comfortable with the staff recommen- MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 21, 2007 Page 3 Work Session dations, but had an issue with excluding private parking lots and calculating the assessment on the minimum required parking in the code. She said that adjustments for credits and reductions were often used only by certain people and everyone else would make up the difference. She asked how many cars could typically be parked on 1,000 square feet. Mr. Corey replied that it depended on the size and configuration of the lot and could range from five to eight spaces. Mr. Zelenka remarked that the City was facing a backlog because transportation system funding had not been forthcoming from either the State or federal levels. He urged the council to eliminate the sunset provision on the $.02 gas tax. He was unwilling to use the General Fund to pay for fixing potholes at the expense of police, fire, and children's programs. He was willing to consider implementing the street utility after the levy was placed on the ballot in May 2008. He asked how shared parking would be charged proportionately to customers. Mr. Corey said the assessment could assign the number of spaces per commercial square foot, lineal foot of street frontage or floor area, for example. Mr. Poling asked if there had been any attempts to join with other cities to talk to the County about the potential for a countywide vehicle registration fee. Mr. Corey replied that a work group composed of employees in positions similar to his in other jurisdictions had been convening for several months to discuss possible regional solutions. He felt that work group could convince the cities to approach the Lane Board of County Commissioners with unified support for regional funding options such as a registration fee or countywide gas tax. Mr. Poling suggested that the cities could adopt the same resolution requesting a countywide solution for presentation to the County. He had concerns with the fees that were being discussed, but would support moving forward at this point. He was interested in the possibility of a business tax and urged the council to discuss that option. He asked how many businesses there were in the City of Eugene. Fred McVey, Public Works, estimated there were approximately 6,000 nonresidential customers. Ms. Solomon stated that she was committed to supporting the subcommittee's package of recommendations. She agreed that the timing of options could be reconsidered. She was not in favor of assessing nonresiden- tial properties on the basis of the amount of asphalt; the assessment should be based only on parking spaces. She did not think that people could opt out of paying the fee if they did not own a car as everyone still benefited from a good road system regardless of whether they drove a car. Mr. Clark said he was concerned with how moving the fees forward would appear in the media and be perceived by the public. He thought the level of trust that would be violated would not be worth the ground gained in moving forward with the fees. He advocated for rebuilding trust with the voters and building support for a solution, particularly a countywide solution. He was willing to be part of the subcommittee reconvened to develop a new package of solutions that could gain common support. Ms. Bettman hoped to see the options refined to the point they were usable tools and hoped staff would be directed to bring those refinements back to a work session. She said that could include emergent ideas such as a business license fee. She said one problem with using the facility reserve was that only certain departments had contributed to that reserve. She said the City should conduct a study to determine if it would be cost effective to do billing internally instead of contracting it out. Regarding residential and nonresidential methodology for the street utility fee, she said she could never support allocating 2.1 parking spaces per 1,000 square feet. MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 21, 2007 Page 4 Work Session Mr. Pryor indicated he was open to new ideas and agreed with Mr. Poling's suggestion that all the cities in Lane County advocate for a countywide solution. He was interested in the possibility of using facility reserve funds for streets and wanted to discuss that during the upcoming budget process. Mr. Zelenka remarked that the subcommittee had recommended asking the County to consider a vehicle registration fee and other options, as only the County had that legal authority. He was generally supportive of the street utility fee with parking as a proxy and the assessment of nonresidential properties was scaled appropriately. He liked the two-tier approach for the street lighting fee, but was not certain how an "opt out" provision would function. Mr. Corey said if the council wished to pursue an "opt out" provision, staff would develop a methodology for neighborhoods on local streets. Mr. Zelenka said that some neighborhoods were considering different types of lighting. He would support researching the feasibility of an internal billing system and was opposed to reconvening the subcommittee, although he welcomed any new ideas that Mr. Clark might want to offer. Ms. Taylor said she preferred to discuss funding options as a full council instead of at the committee level. She felt that pursuing a countywide solution was the best approach as most cities shared concerns with transportation system funding. She was not in favor of a lighting fee, which would be questioned by people who lived in areas without street lights. Mayor Piercy said further discussion of the backlog was important to building trust and it was necessary to begin the education process well in advance of putting a measure on the ballot. Ms. Bettman said the responsible approach was to continue to refine the fee options, which had broad-based support. She was in favor of placing a measure before the voters in May 2008 and the City had already done much work to educate the community about the problem. She said an important factor in the success of a ballot measure was the level of support from the council. She said that residential rates should be tiered and nonresidential rates should be based on the square footage of available parking, whether pervious or impervious, and the likely actual amount of parking spaces per that square footage, instead of a random diminished or reduced number, to avoid placing an unfair burden on residential customers. Mr. Clark did not think the gas tax failed because people did not like the tax; it failed, at least in part, because of the perception it was not fair. He said a new package was needed to achieve the council's goal. He was willing to consider refinements at another work session, but would not favor forwarding either fee to a public hearing until after the May 2008 election on the bond measure. Mr. Poling favored a flat rate for residential parking and was willing for staff to continue to refine the fee concepts. Regarding Ms. Taylor's comments regarding questions about a lighting fee from people who lived on dark streets, Ms. Solomon said that was exactly what she was hearing from constituents who paid taxes but lived on streets that were deteriorating. She remarked that taxes were originally intended to fund essential services like police, fire and roads and over time many other things had been added to the City's budget; however, people still expected that their taxes would pay for roads. She would be interested, for that reason, in pursuing a General Fund option for streets. MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 21, 2007 Page 5 Work Session Ms. Ortiz, seconded by Ms. Bettman, moved to direct the City Manager to bring back to a council work session in early 2008 a refined proposal for a street utility fee and street and bicycle path lighting fee for discussion. Ms. Ortiz said much work had been done and she was unwilling to start over, but agreed it was not wise to discuss implementing a new tax so soon after the voters had defeated the gas tax. She was willing to have further discussions on options, although she did not want to see General Fund resources used for streets. Mr. Zelenka hoped it was implicit in the motion that the council would not take any action on the fees until after the levy vote. He said the council would continue to work through the package of subcommittee recommendations. He supported working with other jurisdictions toward a countywide gas tax. He said that any new taxes should be simple and straightforward. He understood the "opt out" provision would apply to areas without street lighting. Mr. Clark said he would support the motion. He suggested polling the public during the City's next survey to determine what percentage of the General Fund budget people perceived was used for street maintenance. He felt that many people thought the General Fund was already used for streets and he supported looking at that option. Ms. Bettman asked for a list of the departments that contributed to the facility reserve, along with an estimate of the percentage contributed by each department. Ms. Taylor stated she would vote for the motion, but did not support either fee. The motion passed unanimously, 8:0. The meeting adjourned at 1:36 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Angel Jones City Manager pro tem (Recorded by Lynn Taylor) MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 21, 2007 Page 6 Work Session