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HomeMy WebLinkAbout07/22/1991 Meeting e M I NUT E S Eugene City Council McNutt Room July 22, 1991 5:30 p.m. COUNCILORS PRESENT: Kaye Robinette, Paul Nicholson, Ruth Bascom, Shawn Boles, Roger Rutan, Bobby Green, Debra Ehrman. COUNCILORS ABSENT: Randy MacDonald. The regular meeting of the Eugene City Council was called to order by his Honor Mayor Jeff Miller. I. INTRODUCTORY COMMENTS Mr. Gleason explained that the council had requested a meeting between itself and the executive managers to further discuss leadership issues which have arisen as a result of the Eugene Decisions process. e II. SUMMARY OF JULY 8 MEETING John O'Connor, Human Resources and Risk Services (HRRS), acted as facilitator for the meeting. He reviewed leadership issues discussed by the council at its July 8 meeting including: 1) the City should be an enabler for private nonprofit agencies; 2) limited physical, fiscal, and personnel resources; 3) the City's carrying capacity; 4) actual costs versus subsidies; 5) effective communication with the public; 6) cynicism in the community about government; and 7) the need for the City's boards and commissions to help communicate information to the public. III. CONCERNS OF THE EXECUTIVE MANAGERS Mr. Gleason said there was consensus at the senior executive level that the leadership partnership between executives and the council is working well. He said the leadership of the council has been steadfast. Mr. Gleason said the City is not seeking short-term solutions to its finan- cial problems. However, he said the council will probably get no plaudits from the public for its attempts to find long-term solutions. He said the difficulties of this situation could exacerbate differences of opinion be- tween the councilors. He said the council needs to lead the community into a conversation about how to deal with the City's problems. e MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 22, 1991 Page 1 '-- e Mr. Gleason said the community might believe that the City does not really have financial problems and is only saying that it does for political rea- sons. In reality, he said, even small budgetary cuts would lead to drastic measures; i.e., a one percent cut in Fire Services would mean the closing of Station 7. Mr. Gleason said that due to ten years of cutbacks, the City is less capable of responding to change. He said there are only 25-30 people within the organization capable of leading organizational changes, and they are busy with the council's work plan. He said these people have difficulty denying any request by the council, but were finding that they had to do this on an increasing basis. He said there would be a diminishing ability to respond to the council at the executive level as Eugene Decisions progressed. Mr. Gleason said it was possible the City would run out of time and resources at the same time. He pointed out that the City is part of a process which is happening at the State and Federal levels as well, and which will last for a long time. Mr. Gleason said Eugene Decisions makes sense because it uses the activist portion of the community to elicit a response from the remainder of the com- munity. He said this was an experimental process and that the executives were committed to following through with it. Mr. Gleason said he hoped the City could avoid a situation where departments e fought among themselves for funds and resources. He said executives did not have a sense of hopelessness, but a realistic sense of commitment and opti- mism. IV. COUNCIL RESPONSE TO EXECUTIVE CONCERNS Mr. Boles said Mr. Gleason's comments were thoughtful and helpful. He ex- pressed concern that if the council's work plan was not realistic in view of the Eugene Decisions process, the council and executives should begin immedi- ately to work together to correct this situation. He expressed extreme re- gret that the City had lost Pat Decker of the Planning and Development De- partment (POD) to a job in another state. In response to a question from Ms. Bascom, Mr. Gleason said there was a major difference between taking one item such as the need for a new Library and making that issue stand on its own, as opposed to creating a complete strate- gy around the issue. In reference to an earlier comment by Mr. Gleason, Mr. Rutan said he was not being pressured by his constituents now, but expected to be later when the decision-making process began. He said he was concerned about the uncertain- ty of the Eugene Decisions process and that he looked forward to the initia- tion of workshops the following week. e MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 22, 1991 Page 2 e Mr. Rutan said the council had worked hard in the past to become a close knit group, but was not as cohesive now because there were three new councilors. Mr. Robinette said that although each of the councilors had their own vision for the results of the Eugene Decisions process, the council should be con- scientious about listening to the concerns of the public. He said the coun- cil had progressed a great deal in its ability to work as a team. He said he thought he would be able to accept results of the Eugene Decision process with which he did not agree. Mr. Nicholson said the council needed to communicate to the public in a mean- ingful way that it needed the counsel of citizens. He said the council would get widely varying opinions upon which to base its decisions. He said the councilors would have to compromise with each other and with public prefer- ence. Mayor Miller said this was an exciting time because the future of the commu- nity was being shaped. He said the councilors would have more power than ever before. He cautioned councilors and staff that the public was listening closely to what they were saying. Mayor Miller asked if the council was in agreement that the figures prepared by staff were accurate and that the City was facing a serious threat finan- cially. He said that as he spoke to various groups in the community they expressed disbelief that the situation was as bad as they were being told. He warned that the public's bias against government could focus on the coun- e cil and staff. Mr. Boles asked the council to think about whether it was seeking the pub- lic's advice or direction. He said he was seeking advice. He said that if the council sought direction, this could ultimately lead to making decisions adverse to its own principles. He said that if the council sought advice only, it would be allowed to adhere to its principles. Mr. Boles said deci- sions rested with the council, not the community. Mr. Nicholson said that according to Mr. Boles' definitions, the council could turn down advice, but not direction. He said the council should be careful to ask the right questions of the public and to take its answers seriously, or Eugene Decisions would not be a meaningful process. Mr. Boles said the council had advisory loops to the community, but closures were the responsibility of the council itself. Mr. Robinette said the distinction between advice and direction was not great in view of the fact that the public had to approve funding measures. Ms. Bascom referred to a recent public hearing on the Comprehensive Housing Affordability Strategy (CHAS). She said the purpose of the hearing had been to discuss funding for permanent low-income family housing, but the group wanted to discuss housing for such groups as the homeless, disabled, mentally e MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 22, 1991 Page 3 e ill, etc. She said this kind of confusion about purpose could occur during meetings on Eugene Decisions. Mr. Green said it was his assumption that the council was seeking the advice of the public, but that it must make the final decisions. He said the coun- cil would need to exercise discipline in order to "stay the coursen with Eugene Decisions. He said it would be best if the council could reach con- sensus on its decisions. Mayor Miller said the council would use the advice of the public to provide direction for its decisions. He said any budgetary cuts would require coun- cil consensus. He said the Mayor's Task Force on Human Rights had reached an impasse in its decision-making process at which point the majority asked the minority what concessions were required to reach consensus. He suggested the council might need to use a similar process with Eugene Decisions. He said council consensus would help create leadership. Ms. Ehrman said information disseminated to the public prior to Eugene Deci- sions was essential in helping the public understand what was at stake and what the City needed from citizens. Mr. Nicholson said that when Eugene Decisions was over, the public should feel that it had been part of a sincere consultation. Mr. Robinette said he was glad that the workshops were about to begin. He said the Eugene Decisions process would make better sense to everyone after e the City had collected results from the citizenry. He said citizen surveys would show whether the public understood the overall process. Mr. Green said public education was important and noted that there would be many different levels of understanding. Ms. Bascom said it might be neces- sary to alter the process if the first methods did not seem to be working. She pointed out that alterations to the original process might be perceived by the public as manipulation. Mr. Nicholson pointed out that the public consensus might be onerous to the council. Mr. Gleason said the most likely outcome was that the public would say that it wanted to keep all City services, but did not want to pay for them. He said staff would collect workshop data and other information, and create strategies from this material by the end of September. Mr. Gleason said it could be anticipated that public interest in the Eugene Decisions process would become intense when strategies were released. Mr. Robinette said the biggest problem for the council and the City was to educate the public about the reality of the City's finances. He said that if this education were successful, the Eugene Decisions process had a chance of being successful. He noted that staff would create strategies and the coun- cil would refine these strategies. e MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 22, 1991 Page 4 Mr. Boles said that while it would be difficult for the council to deal with e the community's concerns, it would be even more difficult to organize the results of various surveys in an orderly fashion. He said it was fairly certain that the process would evolve because it had been doing so all along. He said the interaction between the council, staff, and the community would depend on the proper organization of this material. Linda Norris, Acting Assistant City Manager, said it had taken the executive managers and City employees time to comprehend the extent of the City's fi- nancial problems and it would therefore probably take the community a couple of months to absorb the information in the Eugene Decisions process. Mr. Nicholson said he was concerned that the entire process would look more like a public relations tactic than a sincere effort. He said most of the public would probably come to only a couple of meetings at which the issues of concern to them were being presented, and then not participate further in the process. Mr. Nicholson said the City might get coherent information from a small group of citizens who are intensely involved in City affairs, but the larger commu- nity might disagree with this information. Mr. Robinette said citizen sur- veys would help test the validity of material. Ms. Bascom said the situation just described by Mr. Nicholson had in fact occurred with the Eugene Agenda. Mr. Gleason said the Eugene Agenda was based on the council's agenda. He said the concept was accepted by a few, e but soundly defeated in a public vote. Mr. Gleason said Eugene Decisions would mobilize community activists to cre- ate a community conversation about strategies. He said some of the strate- gies would gather their own momentum. Mr. Boles said the Eugene Agenda was based on the results of a small number of questionnaires, not a reasonable sample range. Ms. Ehrman pointed out that although the Eugene Agenda was defeated, it led the way for a successful public vote on expansion of the Eugene Airport and began setting the stage for a new Library. Mayor Miller said there was a great deal of pressure on the council to reach consensus, but that it was important to let the councilors disagree with one another because superficial agreement was not helpful. Mr. Nicholson said the council needed to hear from very low-income people who would not normally participate in this kind of process. Mr. Boles agreed that the council should listen to this segment of the community. He said the council's goal was to create a sustainable service system and that some strategies would not lead to this. Mr. Robinette added that the City needed long-term methods for creating sustainable service systems. e MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 22, 1991 Page 5 Mr. Gleason said the council had put in an amazing amount of work on the e Eugene Agenda educating the community. He said this process had shown that having the community's attention was not necessarily a solution to the City's problems. Mr. Nicholson said the City needed to find a humane and sustainable method of providing services. He said the Eugene Agenda had led to the belief on the part of some that only one segment of the community was being heard. He said the council needed to find a politically viable proposal which did not leave one segment of the community bitter. Jim Meeks, City Librarian, said there had been a strong campaign for a new Library and that while people seemed favorable to a previous proposal, they had voted against it. He cautioned against being overly optimistic simply because the public seemed to favor an idea. Cathy Briner, POD, said she had felt better after the forums for the River- front Research Park Master Plan had begun. She said definite themes had emerged from this process and would probably be repeated in the Eugene Deci- sions process. Warren Wong, Director of the Administrative Services Department, pointed out that Eugene's problems are reflected in cities throughout the country. He said the City's cash reserves can be used to "buy time" for the City and council to work with the community to find solutions. e Mr. Wong said the City had not taken the time to build coalitions for the Eugene Agenda. He said decision points related to this process had been reached over the ensuing five years. He said a great deal of Eugene Deci- sions would involve education, and answers would be generated over a five- year period. Ms. Norris said the executives had heard a great deal of pride expressed by City employees about how the council was addressing the issues involved in Eugene Decisions, and employees felt the City was making its best attempt to solve its problems. Sandra Franklin, of the Municipal Court, said the executives were experienc- ing all of the concerns expressed by the council. Dave Whitlow, Director of the Department of Public Safety, said he had spent time with police officers and fire fighters discussing the Eugene Decisions process. He said the concern he heard most often is that the Eugene public still believes that the City government is comparatively well off. He noted that human service organizations believe that the City is wealthy. Mayor Miller asked the councilors to attend scheduled media sessions. The meeting adjourned at 7:15 p.m. e MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 22, 1991 Page 6 e R~~. Micheal Gleason (Recorded by Kris Bloch) mncc 072291-530 e e MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 22, 1991 Page 7