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HomeMy WebLinkAbout10/21/1991 Meeting - . M I NUT E S Eugene City Council McNutt Room--Eugene City Hall October 21, 1991 5:30 p.m. COUNCILORS PRESENT: Shawn Boles, Ruth Bascom, Debra Ehrman, Bobby Green, Randy MacDonald, Paul Nicholson, and Kaye Robinette. COUNCILORS ABSENT: Roger Rutan. The October 21, 1991, Eugene City Council dinner meeting was called to order by His Honor Mayor Jeff Miller. Councilor Bascom asked for the council's consensus to have BRING Recycling submit a funding request application. The council concurred. 1. DISCUSSION REGARDING EMERGENCY HOUSING SERVICE STRATEGIES e Ms. Ehrman requested that the council review and comment on the proposed use of $500,000 in additional funding received by Lane County through the State Emergency Housing Program. State law requires that the funding be considered as supplemental; it cannot be used to replace existing funds. Steve Manela, Lane County Health and Human Services Department, said the budget for allo- cating emergency housing money within the county has been balanced at $543,916. Ms. Ehrman requested input from the council regarding the housing program. She said the Basic Needs Subcommittee will meet during the week to finalize the proposal described in the report. Mr. Robinette said he was impressed with the program's goal to break the cycle of homelessness. Ms. Ehrman questioned whether the State money could be used for capital expenditures. Mr. MacDonald said that while there has been concern that homeless shelter capacity will not be increased by the program, the additional services proposed for homeless people would move them more quickly through the system and away from dependency. Ms. Bascom asked whether the $75,000 earmarked under Self-Sufficiency Services for enriched housing services could be used as matching funds for another grant. Mr. Manela stated that all of the State money could be used to match Federal funds and possibly for the homeless program. Ms. Ehrman said that amount had been reduced from $125,000. Mr. Nicholson cited his concern about putting aside an inordinate amount of reserve and questioned whether the State would approve of the plan. Mr. Manela explained that the plan is based on decisions made locally and the e October 21, 1991 MINUTES--Eugene City Council Page 1 . only State constraint is that the money be spent within this biennium. He said the $75,000 was based on a housing authority prediction. Mr. Nicholson added that he would like to see an attempt to evaluate the results of the proposed program. Mr. MacDonald wondered how the reserve money would be used within the bienni- um to avoid returning it to the State. Mr. Manela answered that the reserve is intended to be used for housing projects that will be in operation within a year. Mr. Green asked how the funds would be disbursed. Mr. Manela said the funds would go to nonprofit service organizations through a letter of intent pro- cess, and in the case of competition a bidding process would be followed. He added that the success of the program would depend on agency collaboration. Mr. MacDonald encouraged a prevention approach to homelessness. In response to a question from Ms Bascom, Mr. Manela said there is now a full-time child development staff person at the Family Shelter as well as a van to take chil- dren out into the community. Ms. Ehrman said she heard no major opposition to the proposed housing program and will report back to the council after the housing subcommittee meets. Mr. Robinette said he did not favor enhancing regular homeless programs, and supported the program's intent to break the cycle of homelessness. City Manager Mike Gleason thanked the council for helping to pass the legislation which led to the State housing grant. e II. EUGENE DECISIONS: DIRECTION ON SECOND ROUND OF PUBLIC INVOLVEMENT Barb Bellamy, Eugene Decisions Project Team, presented a four-part plan for involving citizens in making community funding decisions. She asked the council to review and approve the citizen involvement activities planned for the second round of public involvement. The following is an outline of pro- posed activities and dates of action. A. Public Involvement 1. Tabloid Mailer--November 6 2. Mail Surveys--November 6 a. random sample of voters b. statistically valid c. long and short tabloid versions 3. Public Workshops--November 18-22 a. five regional workshops b. neighborhood groups at random e October 21, 1991 Page 2 MINUTES--Eugene City Council e 4. Workshop Kits--November 6 through December 20 a. self-administered b. one-hour and two-hour versions c. video, background information, worksheet B. Background Reports 1. Workshop resource manual a. detailed service impact analysis and financial information b. long-term issues paper: consolidation, privatization, efficiency, volunteers 2. Review of administration 3. Review of compensation report Ms. Bellamy said the time line was adjusted to receive an adequate amount of public input. She said there will be a process checkpoint in December and the end date of the process will be June 1992. Tony Mounts, Financial Management Services Division, then presented sample budget strategies that will be included in Eugene Decisions workshops. Strategies focused on spending reduction ideas, budget maintenance ideas, and e budget enhancement ideas. Mr. Mounts stated there were some changes from the draft budget ideas presented at an earlier meeting. Responding to council- ors' requests for clarification, Mr. Mounts stated that the Transient Room Tax is treated as General Fund dollars, not program revenue or dedicated revenue. Mr. Gleason said that in determining strategy, overhead costs for the City could be stated as 10.4 percent and the City's managerial costs could be figured at 5 percent of the employment base. Budget reduction strategy 2 would eliminate $1 million in capital projects. Mr. Robinette said this strategy was inconsistent with the others. Mayor Miller said the strategy was also inconsistent with City policy. Mr. Boles said the council should not encourage strategies that would reduce funding for capital projects. Mr. Nicholson said that since this strategy takes $2.2 million from cultural services, it would require renovation of cultural ser- vices facilities to be considered as a general capital project reduction. Ms. Bascom preferred including capital projects in the reduction strategy. Mr. Robinette believed the council should not discuss refinement of strate- gies at this point. Mayor Miller wondered about the City's current level of funding for maintenance. Mr. Nicholson said the strategy could be presented in its current form, but the public should know specifically what will be reduced by general capital project reductions. Mr. MacDonald said that the strategy should be tied to e Page 3 MINUTES--Eugene City Council October 21, 1991 - e service reduction and said that the optimum maintenance level should be de- termined. Mr. Boles stated the strategy explanation should identify how the strategy will save money and what would be sold. Mr. Gleason questioned whether the inclusion of capital projects in the reduction strategy would convey a sustainable strategy. Mayor Miller called for a vote to determine whether capital projects should be included in reduction strategy 2. The vote was 3 to 4 in favor of eliminating the category. Ms. Bascom said another reduction category should then be added to strategy 2. Mr. Nicholson suggested the capital projects category in the reduction strategy be annotated to state which municipal bUildings would be closed. Ms. Bascom said the City is asking the community where to cut, therefore choices have to be presented. She also suggested major spending cuts in Public Safety and said the council should see where the community wants to make cuts. Mayor Miller called for a vote to determine if capital projects should be included in reduction strategy 2 but annotated to state what build- ings would be targeted for closure. The majority of the council voted in favor. In referring to the enhancement strategies, Mr. MacDonald asked whether a fire tax could legally be implemented. Mr. Gleason said all citizens would be taxed but at different rates. Mr. Boles indicated that such a tax would e conflict with Ballot Measure 5. C. Surveys Ms. Bellamy introduced Bill Simonsen and Ed Weeks of the University of Oregon who presented plans for surveys that will be distributed throughout the com- munity through the mail and the Eugene Decisions newspaper tabloid. Councilors discussed the importance of encouraging citizens to complete the survey. Mayor Miller asked that staff bring ideas for incentives to the next Eugene Decisions Committee meeting. D. Tabloid Mailer Rosie Pryor, Public Information Coordinator, presented a draft tabloid mailer and asked the council for comments. City Manager Mike Gleason asked Ms. Pryor to use public safety as an example under the consolidation example so it would be easily understood. Mr. MacDonald suggested that any editing remarks be given to Ms. Pryor by the next day. Mr. Nicholson said he hoped the tabloid would encourage citizens to look at the City organization ini- tially. Mr. Gleason suggested including a statement that the council would appreciate any suggestions. Ms. Pryor, answering Mr. Green's question, stat- ed that the cost of the tabloid was $12,000 for 76,000 copies. e MINUTES--Eugene City Council October 21, 1991 Page 4 .~ e Councilors suggested changes to the draft tabloid and Ms. Pryor asked for any refinements to be brought to her within two days. Ms. Bascom asked about adding a category stating which local services have been expanded. Mr. Gleason said such services are usually user fee-supported and that any gaps were due to increased demand for these services. He added that this explana- tion should be added to the tabloid. Mr. Boles asked why the tabloid's headline had been changed. Ms. Pryor an- swered that the former heading was in the third person and was less effec- tive. The council generally agreed that the modified heading should be used. E. Public Workshop Ms. Bellamy presented examples of workshop exercises. Mr. Green asked wheth- er the results of certain choices selected by participants would be avail- able, i.e., costs and impacts. Ms. Bellamy said the tabloid and a resource notebook will accomplish this. Jenny Carmichael, Eugene Decisions Project Team, presented the work sheets to be used in the workshop. Mr. Nicholson was concerned that people may only choose enhancement choices that will not affect them. Mayor Miller believed respondents would be more community-minded and that people could be asked whether their choice was based on personal impact. He added that the council should add a phrase to the work sheets defining the council's objective in implementing the Eugene Decisions process. The council agreed to remove the term "leisure services" from the worksheet. e In response to council's questions, Ms. Carmichael explained that the listing of City services will be broken down for better understanding of current services. She said participants could write in any services they would want to include. Strategies would be compared among participating groups. Ms. Bascom said people may feel they are being steered in a certain direc- tion, but also may feel free to redesign the survey activities. For instance they could replace the dedicated room tax with a non-dedicated room tax. Mr. Boles said that after the public's initial response to the public input ac- tivities, it will be necessary to conduct more in-depth testing of community response. The meeting adjourned at 8:35 p.m. (Recorded by Tracey Ludvik) mncc 102191 . MINUTES--Eugene City Council October 21, 1991 Page 5