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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCC Minutes - 10/25/06 Work Session M I N U T E S Eugene City Council Work Session McNutt Room—Eugene City Hall October 25, 2006 Noon COUNCILORS PRESENT: Jennifer Solomon, Andrea Ortiz, David Kelly, Betty Taylor, Gary Papé, Bonny Bettman, George Poling, Chris Pryor. Her Honor Mayor Kitty Piercy called the meeting of the Eugene City Council to order. A. WORK SESSION: DOWNTOWN OPEN SPACE UPDATE City Manager Dennis Taylor introduced staff present for the item: Planner Nan Laurence and consultant Doug Macy. Parks Planner Carolyn Weiss and Community Development Manager Mike Sullivan were also present. Ms. Laurence and Mr. Macy provided a PowerPoint presentation on the topic, copies of which were provided to the council. The presentation highlighted current open and green spaces in downtown and identified additional opportunities to create new green spaces, enhance existing spaces, and connect to nearby green spaces. The presentation also provided an overview of the Great Streets concept using slides from other communities. Ms. Laurence anticipated that key next steps would include continued work on green place and open space opportunities and the development of the open space concept design. Mayor Piercy called on the council for comments and questions. th Ms. Taylor determined from Ms. Laurence that the northwest opportunity area was around the 5 Avenue and Charnelton area, and further confirmed that the Lord Leebrick Theater was in the area. Ms. Laurence said that staff anticipated redevelopment would occur in that area and staff would work with a developer to provide publicly accessible open space in the development. Responding to a follow-up question from Ms. Taylor, Ms. Laurence confirmed only the front lawn of Shelton-McMurphy-Johnson House was identified for acquisition through the proposed parks and open space bond. Ms. Taylor asked about other park opportunities in downtown. Ms. Laurence indicated none were identified and staff focused on opportunities to connect to other nearby parks and green spaces. She noted that staff found more lawns downtown than it anticipated. Ms. Taylor said she had occasion to use the lawn at the Hilton Hotel when staying downtown with her dog, but had been concerned about the lack of garbage cans in the vicinity. th Ms. Taylor asked about the treatment proposed for 8 Avenue. Ms. Laurence anticipated a green, inviting path bordered by activity on either side that would travel to the river, as opposed to purchasing additional property that would displace development and result in less activity. MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 25, 2006 Page 1 Work Session th Ms. Taylor asked if staff examined 16 Street in Denver, which traveled through the heart of downtown and which included moveable furniture and trees in the center so that one hardly knew it was a street. The streets were closed to automobile traffic but open to street cars, and it seemed like a park. Mr. Pryor termed the presentation exciting and said many exciting possibilities existed. He liked the idea of offering residents more recreational activities in downtown and the idea of more park space downtown tied to other developments. He noted the council’s discussion of possibly locating a new city hall at the half- block at the Parks Blocks, and said if that did not occur, the half-block could be linked to the Parks Block to create a significant downtown space; one that could accommodate the Farmer’s Market. It would be directly across from the Hult Center, a major cultural space, creating a critical mass in a key area of downtown. He asked that staff consider how to integrate that area into a major parks and recreation open space, consider the balance between hardscapes and softscapes, and how events and activities could be coordinated. Mayor Piercy liked Mr. Pryor’s idea because the other great streets all went east -west, and the concept he described could create a break or center. Mr. Papé endorsed the need for additional garbage cans in the downtown. Mr. Papé asked Mr. Macy to comment on the idea of installing angled parking on one side of the street versus parallel parking on both sides of the street. Mr. Macy thought angled parking a very effective th approach in some circumstances. For example, the City might decide to install a wider sidewalk on 8 Avenue as a Great Street, and that could be done while maintaining a good inventory of parking using diagonal parking on one side of the street. He described how Portland retained parking near the Park Blocks in Portland using diagonal parking while keeping the area visually clean and safer by reducing the sense of isolation created by automobile parking. Another idea was to get rid of the existing couplet system and install two-way streets, which created more parking opportunities and a safer pedestrian environment. Mr. Papé asked what made a great plaza. Mr. Macy said that in the United States, such plazas must be programmed. He said he was a member of the board of directors for Pioneer Courthouse Square. The organization had a $2 million budget for programming and hosted an unbelievable amount of activity using corporation sponsorships. Millions of people use the space because it is programmed and managed. He believed that if the City moved forward with the Parks Blocks, for example, it needed to program that space. The more families the City could attract to downtown, the healthier the mix of users would be, and the more attractive and healthy the area would become. He said ensuring ground floor retail and encouraging residents to live near the public space helped to provide eyes on the plaza on a 24-hour basis. Mr. Papé asked who owned the property in front of the Shelton-McMurphey-Johnson House. Ms. Weiss said the property was owned by Ya-Po-Ah Terrace and its acquisition was included in the proposed bond measure. She said that preliminary discussions with Ya-Po-Ah Terrace management had occurred but she did not know if the owner was amenable to selling the property. Responding to a follow-up question from Mr. Papé regarding public access to the area from downtown, Ms. Weiss said that a better connection between Willamette Street and Skinner Butte Park was envisioned in the City’s open space plans, and that would require going over or under the railroad tracks. MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 25, 2006 Page 2 Work Session Mr. Papé asked if the City was working with PeaceHealth regarding its plans for the Willamette campus property. City Manager Taylor reported that he and the mayor recently met with representatives of PeaceHealth, who were discussing a timeline of 2009 for disposal of the property. Mr. Kelly thanked Mr. Macy for his remarks about the need to program public plazas and recalled that had been a recommendation of the Parks Block Placemaking Committee. He thought an employee to manage the space would be appropriate. Mr. Kelly said he did not see his motion, passed by the council in April 2006, reflected in Ms. Laurence’s presentation. His focus had been on green space and much of what was being presented focused on hardscape. He had discussed a festival lawn concept in April and nothing in the presentation approached that. He had also requested rough costs and timelines and staff was now proposing to return with the cost and time line for developing a plan to develop the space. Ms. Laurence said that when considering new green spaces, staff had nothing to judge in regard to what was the right size and space, and so it turned to the inventory approach. Staff looked at what was happening in the downtown to create a bigger framework. She pointed out that the Cit had many visionary policies but no design plan to guide staff at the design level. A timeline and budget had to be the next phase. Mr. Kelly did not see that next phase in the suggested staff motion. Ms. Laurence said staff was building toward that, but Public Works staff as well as other staff pointed out the need for a design level plan after the Agenda Item Summary (AIS) was drafted. Mr. Kelly wanted to see key next step #2 added to the motion. Mr. Kelly agreed that criteria were needed and had hoped that with professional involvement, the council would see ideas for those criteria during the presentation. He saw nothing concrete in the presentation to comment on. He wanted a more specific timeline and the cost of creating a connection to the river. He agreed with Mr. Pryor that something in the center of downtown would be useful. Mayor Piercy endorsed having more garbage containers in downtown. She believed when installed, they were used, and they changed the look of an area. Mayor Piercy encouraged Mr. Kelly to bring up the managed Parks Block concept with the Mayor’s Cultural Policy Review Committee. Ms. Bettman agreed with Mr. Kelly that it would be nice for the council to be able to focus on something do-able and concrete. The City had many high-level planning documents that the City could not afford to implement, and by the time it got through those high-level planning efforts, it had missed opportunities. She thought all the concepts discussed were good and liked the idea of connectivity and using street space as public space. She said that downtown street design was very important to her, as well as corridors with consistent themes and connecting places. Speaking to Mr. Papé’s comments, Ms. Bettman did not like diagonal parking because it made the street look like a parking lot and she thought parallel parking preferable because it protected pedestrians from the traffic lane. Ms. Bettman called for a better connection on Willamette between the Hult Center and the Hilton Hotel. She did not think the space was very navigable space for anybody and thought it should be opened up and better connected. She had hoped to have street car running through the area but acknowledged that idea had failed to gain traction. She thought the area at a minimum should be made a more inviting public space for pedestrians. MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 25, 2006 Page 3 Work Session Ms. Bettman also wanted to maximize any opportunities at the EWEB site given its riverfront location, and not merely preserve a little strip. th Ms. Solomon spoke to the staff recommendation that the City install an at-grade stop light at 8 Avenue and Mill Street, and said that it continued to make no sense to her. She thought it represented a huge danger to drivers and pedestrians alike. She hoped the City could do better than that. Responding to a question from Ms. Solomon regarding the context of the council’s upcoming tour of the EWEB property, City Manager Taylor said that he and Mayor Piercy had been meeting frequently with EWEB leadership and thought more frequent meetings would be useful. The tour would inform the council about the utility’s intentions. Deb Brewer of EWEB confirmed City Manager Taylor’s remarks. Mr. Papé called for a meeting between the council and the EWEB commissioners Ms. Solomon, seconded by Ms. Ortiz, moved to direct staff to develop a downtown open space concept design, including refining the project scope and developing a citizen involve- ment process, and 2) to continue work on green space and open space opportunities in coor- dination with related downtown projects, including City Hall Master Planning, Park Blocks Master Plan, improvements to the Farmers Market, work with public and private redevel- opment opportunities, and other implementation efforts for the Downtown Plan. Mr. Kelly called for the inclusion of specific projects in the concept design plan to help focus the council’s future discussions. Speaking to the issue of Great Streets, he said they were not green spaces but they could th be connectors. He thought Ms. Taylor’s suggestion that staff examine Denver’s 16 Avenue was excellent. He also liked the slide showing a European street and said that while it did not contain much green space, he liked the scale and wanted to see associated design concepts fleshed out. Mr. Kelly said that a center planting strip was not a green space. Ms. Bettman said the motion did not mention either EWEB or streetscapes and asked if that meant if they were “in” or “out.” Ms. Laurence said that those elements were a fundamental part of staff’s thinking as well as a part of the Downtown Plan. She did not think that staff would focus on them more if included in the motion. Ms. Bettman asked that Ms. Solomon accept the inclusion of those elements as a friendly amendment. Ms. Solomon agreed. th Ms. Taylor thought an overpass at 8 Avenue and Mill Street much safer than an underpass. Ms. Taylor recalled the placemaking exercise mentioned by Mr. Kelly and regretted that the City never followed up on the resulting recommendations. Ms. Taylor said the Making Cities Livable Conference would be in Portland next year and it would emphasize families. She hoped councilors attended the conference. The motion passed unanimously, 8:0. B. WORK SESSION: PROPOSED MODIFICATION TO THE PARKS SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT CHARGE METHODOLOGY AND RATES MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 25, 2006 Page 4 Work Session City Manager Taylor introduced Engineering Data Services Manager Fred McVey of Public Works. Nancy Burns of Public Works and City Engineer Mark Schoening were also present. Mr. McVey was present to overview the recommendation of the Public Works Rates Advisory Committee (RAC). He acknowledged the complexity of developing an systems development charge (SDC) methodology and recognized the members of the advisory committee: Michael Roberts of the Eugene Area Chamber of Commerce, Paul Nicholson of the Friends of Eugene, Merle Bottge of the League of Women Voters, Paul Harrison of the Citizens for Public Accountability, Barbara Roberts representing professional engineers, Doug Weber of the Lane County Home Builders Association, David Hinkley of the Neighborhood Leaders Council, Scott Clark of the Voter Pool, and John Prior of the Neighborhood Pool. He thanked the RAC members on behalf of the Public Works Department for their commitment and involvement. He also acknowledged staff contributing to the effort and thanked consultant Debbie Galardi, who was present, for her assistance. Mr. McVey said the two issues before the council were the applicability of parks SDCs to non-residential development and the growth allocation method to be used for neighborhood parks. Regarding the first issue, Mr. McVey reminded the council that the examination of the applicability of the parks SDC to nonresiden- tial development was pursued at its direction. He reported that the staff team worked with the RAC and developed what it believed was the basis for a rational and defensible nonresidential charge; but the RAC disagreed, believing the staff recommendation was both difficult to explain, administer, and defend. The RAC instead recommended a hotel/motel charge as an aspect of the residential charge. However, staff prepared an ordinance consistent with the council’s earlier direction to forward to a public hearing. Mr. McVey addressed the second issue, that of methodological choice as it applied to the allocation of capacity to growth attributable to neighborhood parks. He reminded the council that the Lane County Home Builders Association raised issues earlier in the review process related to the use of the system-wide capacity analysis used in the methodology, which lead to further work by the RAC, resulting in the development of a service-based allocation method to be applied uniformly to all development regardless of geographic location. Mr. McVey said staff also provided a summary of the key elements of the parks SDC in Attachment C to the AIS. Table 1 of the AIS provides the relative effect of the various options before the council; the numbers were based on figures that were two years old, and he recommended the application of an inflation factor. Mr. McVey said that throughout their development of the proposed SDC, staff and the RAC considered the issues of legislative compliance, public acceptance, administrative feasibility, revenue adequacy, equity, and technical defensibility. He believed the proposal met those criteria, and hoped to have a final methodology available to the public by mid-November, prior to the public hearing schedule for January 16, 2007. Mayor Piercy called on the council for questions and comments. Ms. Bettman averred that the RAC was heavily weighted in favor of the development sector. As the SDC methodology was a technical matter and the City had engineers that could develop the methodology, Ms. Bettman questioned whether the City needed such an industry-weighted committee to work with staff to bring policy to the council. She did not think it was fair; staff should bring the council a recommendation, which should then be open for public discussion and possible modifications. She also thought the committee process dragged out the timeline for the SDC to be revised. She maintained that, after participating in the development of the SDC rates, the industry members sued the City. She called for the RAC to be sunsetted. MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 25, 2006 Page 5 Work Session Regarding the staff recommendation for the nonresidential parks SDC, Ms. Bettman said the staff recommendation was a justifiable calculation. She thought just charging hotels was arbitrary and not supportable. Regarding the growth allocation attributable to local services for parks versus a system wide approach, Ms. Bettman pointed out that all other City SDCs were based on a system-wide approach. Mr. Papé acknowledged the complexity of the information before the council but questioned why the process had taken so long, given that the council asked that the methodology be revised in April 2003. Mr. McVey attributed the time taken to the adoption timeline required for the Parks, Recreation, and Open Space (PROS) Comprehensive Plan. Mr. Papé suggested that commercial and industrial uses could have been added tentatively. Mr. McVey recalled that the council agreed in 2003 to adjust the rates as opposed to the methodology. Mr. Kelly agreed with Ms. Bettman it was time to sunset the RAC, given it had worked through all four SDC methodologies and because he did not believe it was not needed for every change to the SDC. However, he believed the RAC had served a useful purpose. He had read the minutes of RAC meetings and found them interesting for understanding the tradeoffs had had taken place. He was struck by the fact that RAC members had frequently not taken the political positions he expected. Regarding the nonresidential parks SDC, Mr. Kelly said he could live with either the staff recommendation or the RAC recommendation. Speaking to the issue of the growth allocation attributable to neighborhood parks, Mr. Kelly said he agreed with the input the council received from Roxie Cuellar of the Lane County Home Builders Association. As long as the City had a defensible and equitable plan, it should also have a common sense plan. He said that the City could not argue in the PROS Plan for new neighborhood parks in already developed areas and then attribute that all cost to future growth. He was fine with the revised staff recommendation in the staff- prepared motion. Mr. Pryor indicated he could support either the RAC or staff recommendation as it related to the nonresiden- tial parks SDC. He looked forward to hearing public testimony on the issue. Mr. Pryor thought the RAC had done a good job and members had tried to be balanced. He said it never hurt to have extra eyes on the process. Mr. Pryor agreed with Mr. Kelly’s remarks regarding the growth allocation attributable to neighborhood parks. He said the blanket application of rules tended to fall victim to the blanket application of rules. They do not apply in each situation, and he thought it was good to be as specific as possible, particularly when it came to money. Mr. Pryor endorsed the revised allocation method as being more intuitive and much more responsive to the needs of a particular service area. Speaking to the remarks of Mr. Pryor, Ms. Bettman said that the SDC actually was a blanket rate and the methodology did not change what was charged or where it was charged, it just changed the calculation for capacity. She likened the service area issue to how the City charged for transportation SDCs. The City did not separate its road investments by geographic area and charge only those living in a certain service area. Ms. Bettman said the City should not base its neighborhood parks SDC on a geographic service area MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 25, 2006 Page 6 Work Session because people move and they use parks all over the city. She did not think the service level approach was justifiable, and the system-wide approach was more defensible given its use in the other SDC methodologies. Responding to a question from Mr. Papé, Mr. McVey said he would provide the council with the rate schedule showing what condominiums would pay when that information was available. Mr. Kelly determined from Mr. McVey that legal staff was consulted in the development of the recommen- dations and found them to be legally defensible as methodology choices. Mr. Kelly said that if the recommendation contemplated different SDCs for different areas of the commu- nity, he would not support it. The recommendation instead computed the overall level of need and split that need out by different area and then allocated it uniformly to new development, which he was comfortable with. Responding to a question from Mr. Poling, Mr. McVey again reviewed the names of the RAC members and confirmed that the members from the Voter Pool and Neighborhood Pool were randomly selected. For the benefit of Mr. Poling, Mr. McVey briefly contrasted the system-wide and service area allocation approaches. Mr. Poling thought there might be some approach other than charging all nonresidential uses or charging only hotel/motels. He did not think it made sense to charge all nonresidential uses because he did not think some would impact the park system. He could not support charging all nonresidential uses the parks SDC. Ms. Solomon noted her support for the service-area based growth allocation method. Ms. Solomon, seconded by Ms. Ortiz, moved to direct the City Manager to proceed with proposed modifications to the parks SDC based on inclusion of a charge for all nonresiden- tial development and a service area-based growth allocation method for neighborhood parks. Ms. Taylor determined from Mr. McVey that all members of the RAC participated in the discussions, with varying degrees of attendance at each meeting, and that there was no minority report. Ms. Taylor observed that she always liked to see a minority report. Ms. Taylor also had problems with the make-up of the RAC. She said that the Citizen Involvement Committee no longer existed to review the membership of such committees. She assumed that it was now up to staff to decide who sat on such committees. Mr. McVey confirmed that the committee was a department advisory committee for which staff selected the members. Ms. Taylor also supported a system-wide approach to the growth allocation for neighborhood parks. Ms. Bettman, seconded by Ms. Ortiz, moved to amend the motion by directing the City Manager to proceed with proposed modifications to the parks SDC based on inclusion of a charge for all nonresidential development and a methodology for neighborhood parks based on a system wide level of service. MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 25, 2006 Page 7 Work Session Ms. Bettman said the Lane County Home Builders Association commissioned surveys that established the connection between nonresidential uses and parks. She thought the 16.4 percent allocation was justifiable. In regard to the level of service, Ms. Bettman said that it was true that SDCs were complex and she questioned why the council would make it more complex by adding in a geographic factor. No other SDC included a geographic factor. Adoption of the amendment would not make a difference in the rates, but it would make the SDC more simple and consistent with how the City calculated other SDCs. Mr. Kelly agreed there was no dollar difference involved but the council was faced with a choice between two consistencies. The council could be consistent with other SDC methodologies or consistent with the PROS Plan. He would not support the amendment because he favored consistency with the PROS Plan. Speaking to an earlier concern voiced by Mr. Poling, Mr. Kelly referred him to 127-128 of the AIS and noted that nonresidential development was divided into different classes and assessed a different amount to reflect the varying levels of impact. The amendment to the motion failed, 5:3; Ms. Bettman, Ms. Taylor, and Ms. Ortiz voting yes. Mr. Papé confirmed with Mr. McVey that the revenues involved were allocated for capital projects only. Mr. Poling thanked Roxie Cuellar and David Hinkley for their e-mail correspondence regarding the topic. He said that he would vote to support the motion and send the item to a public hearing, but his mind could change following testimony. The motion passed, 6:2; Ms. Taylor and Ms. Bettman voting no. Responding to a question from Mr. Kelly, Mr. McVey confirmed that the RAC was a department advisory committee rather than a council advisory committee. He said the council could direct the City Manager as to how the department collected input. Mr. Kelly requested a memorandum from staff on why it might want to continue the RAC. The meeting adjourned at 1:28 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Dennis M. Taylor City Manager (Recorded by Kimberly Young) MINUTES—Eugene City Council October 25, 2006 Page 8 Work Session