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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCC MInutes - 11/13/06 Meeting M I N U T E S Eugene City Council City Council Meeting Council Chamber—Eugene City Hall November 13, 2006 7:30 p.m. COUNCILORS PRESENT: Jennifer Solomon, Bonny Bettman, David Kelly, Andrea Ortiz, Gary Papé, Chris Pryor, Betty Taylor. COUNCILORS ABSENT: George Poling. Her Honor Mayor Kitty Piercy called the meeting of the Eugene City Council to order and welcomed everyone to the meeting. 1. CEREMONIAL MATTERS - Recognition of Sandy Shaffer Mayor Piercy said the League of Oregon Cities asked members to submit the names of people who had contributed to the health and well-being of their respective communities. City of Eugene representatives submitted the name of Recreation Manager Sandy Shaffer and Ms. Shaffer had been selected to be honored. Mayor Piercy read a certificate of appreciation from Governor Kulongoski. Ms. Shaffer received a round of applause. Mayor Piercy asked Ms. Shaffer to explain her position with the City. Ms. Shaffer stated that she was manager for the Sheldon and Amazon centers and that part of the award was due to an initiative taking place in the community from the Lane Coalition for Healthy and Active Youth. She accepted the award on behalf of herself and the coalition. Presentation by Friends of Eugene Public Library - Dale Crawford, President of Board of Directors of the Friends of Eugene Public Library, made the presentation in conjunction with the Friends board and the 300 volunteers who work with the Friends “all year long.” He presented a check for $100,000 to the City for the Public Library. Mayor Piercy thanked him and expressed appreciation for all of the work of the volunteers. The Friends of Eugene Public Library received a round of applause. 2. PUBLIC FORUM Mayor Piercy reviewed the rules of the Public Forum. MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 13, 2006 Page 1 Regular Meeting Formatted: Bullets and Numbering th Eugene Drix , 307-½ East 14 Avenue, member of the West University Neighbors, said there had been a tree behind the Lemon house for 100 years and the tree now had to be taken down. He explained that the house had belonged to Charlotte Lemon, who had been active in the neighborhood until her death at 92. He invited the councilors to attend a potluck and ceremony on behalf of the tree on December 2. Mr. Drix was also concerned about the two holes in the downtown area. He felt they were a great starting point for the community to work together to put something good on those properties. Peter Ferris , Bayview Mobile Home Park, 955 Mill Street, Waldport, reviewed the talking points on his Petition for a Moratorium on Park Closures in Eugene signed submittal, entitled the . He asked that the council consider the proposed moratorium on mobile home park closures while it considered passing an ordinance that would protect mobile home residents. He said the mobile home community wanted this to occur before anyone could take away the mobile home park lands from them. He asserted that there were 1,500 people in Bend and in the Portland area that would have liked to have had a proactive city council in this regard. He believed that something similar to the moratorium the City enacted on condominium conversions in 1979 could be put in place. He related that St. Vincent DePaul had data that it cost $150,000 to reconstruct a lost affordable housing situation. He hoped the City would pass an ordinance similar to the one passed in Wilsonville. He stressed that an action taken by Eugene would have tremen- dous influence statewide given that Eugene was the second largest city in Oregon. Libby Sherman , 1475 Green Acres Road, Space #31, related that she was a “baby boomer.” She retired from 36 years of flying as a flight attendant, but had lost her pension because the major airline she worked for filed for bankruptcy. She found some financial balance in her life by living in a mobile/manufactured home park in Eugene. She averred that mobile home parks were not just for the elderly, disabled, or people without families. Rather, she said more people were finding that the parks offer communities of caring people who help each other. She loved her mobile home park and wanted to work to save the parks. She noted that she cared for her 80-year-old mother in her home and she found that people in her park were supportive and informative. Additionally, she and her mother felt safe in the park. She asked that the council not allow what had happened in Portland to happen here. She asked the council to help preserve and protect the mobile home parks so that people could live without the fear of losing what they had left. David T. Boehm , 1699 North Terry Street, Space #182, stated that he had retired at the age of 76-½. He worked to that age so that he could pay for his house, pay for his carport, pay for his new roof, and pay for the refrigeration and heating unit. He was now retired with only an Individual Retirement Account (IRA) that he had put away and Social Security. He said if he was forced to move he would have to drain his IRA and eventually would not have enough money for food. He stressed that he was just one of many people on fixed incomes who could not afford to move. Jerry A. Harden , Briarwood Mobile Home Park, 1400 Candlelight Drive Space, #224, averred that this was not a political issue; rather, it was an issue of fairness. He and his fellow signers of the petition believed the council would deliberate and come up with the right answer, which would be to declare a moratorium on park closures. He related the story of a friend in a Beaverton mobile home park who felt secure in the mobile home park she lived in one year ago, but was now renting a dilapidated house having been forced to move. He alleged that a “prominent park owner” asserted that every mobile home park was for sale at the right price. He said he was a member of the Lane County committee studying park closures and the committee was far from ready to make recommendations. He cited the two most serious unresolved issues: 1) a lack of vacant spaces to move homes to and how to address this; and 2) no one knew who would pay for an improved compensation package. He underscored that there were not enough vacant MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 13, 2006 Page 2 Regular Meeting spaces in the Eugene/Springfield area to accommodate “even one medium-sized park closure.” He said one proposal called for the developer to pay moving costs in excess of a payment from the State and a counterproposal called for an even split of this cost between the State, the City of Eugene, the developer, and the tenant. He opposed having the homeowner pay “a subsidy” to a developer who caused their eviction. He added that many homes were too old to be moved. He also asked the council to consider what happened to the tenants who did not have thousands of dollars “up front” to pay for moving. He said the inventory of market-rate apartments was limited and the rents were nearly double the cost of park space rent. He noted that St. Vincent DePaul reported a waiting list for affordable housing of more than 400 families and other agencies reported a wait of one to two years. He presented the petition, signed by 976 people. Tom Mitchell , 3355 North Delta Highway, Space #45, asked the council to consider a moratorium on the closure of manufactured home parks in Eugene until adequate protections were put in place for those people who may face eviction from their homes. He stated that he and his wife lived in Eugene for 46 years, the last 8 of which were spent in Lakeridge Manufactured Home Park. He had gathered 136 signatures in 12 days. He attributed the eagerness of people to sign to concerns he and his manufactured park community had about plans for a hospital to be constructed near the River Ridge Golf Course. He noted that the park entrance was directly across from the 11th hole. He said traffic past the park entrance was projected to increase by 60 percent if the hospital was built. He believed that if the City Council approved the hospital’s request to change the zoning the Lakeridge property would become more desirable to developers. He said the manufactured home park residents enjoyed a good relationship with the current owners of the park, but no one could predict the owners’ reaction to a purchase price that could far exceed their investment. He pointed out that one-third of the residents of the park were widows. He added that the double- and triple-wide homes in Lakeridge were not mobile and would be expensive to move, but even if they could be moved there were no parks in the Eugene/Springfield area that could accept significant numbers of these houses. He predicted that with the coming retirement of baby boomers would increase the need for affordable housing. He believed the “wave” of park closures that “started in the Portland area” was moving down the valley toward Eugene. He asked the council to “please be ready with a plan to forestall that wave.” Tonya White , 4785 Skyline Road South, Space #207, Salem, said that she was a former tenant of Emerald Valley Estates. She indicated that two years ago, the 20 residents of the park were given eviction notices just after Thanksgiving. Of the 20 homes, only one homeowner was able to afford to move. She stated that all of the other homeowners were forced to give their homes back to the bank. She explained that it cost between $12,000 and $17,000 to move a home and put it back to the same standard it was when started. She said the one homeowner who was able to move her house had purchased the home with a life insurance policy left from her deceased husband and then spent all of her savings to move her house one mile away. She shared that for her the experience had been devastating as it had for many of her neighbors. She averred that it devastated people’s credit and there was nothing to be done about it, no laws to protect her or her neighbors. She felt they had been dealt with in “a shady manner.” She explained that the home had been her grandfather’s and, as a result of its loss, he was now unable to borrow money to put a roof on the house in which he currently lives. She stressed that this was an affordable housing issue that threatened to put people out on the streets. th Bob Cassidy , 1401 East 27 Avenue, noted that the Eugene Water & Electric Board (EWEB) wanted to move earlier on the proposed Roosevelt project than it originally planned and that it would save approxi- mately $3.5 million. He personally did not object to EWEB making these kinds of business decisions as they made good business sense. He thought it also made sense for EWEB to “cooperate with the MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 13, 2006 Page 3 Regular Meeting community.” He believed that the collecting of tax money, as suggested by the City Manager, was a good, common-sense business idea, and he had testified to EWEB commissioners in support of the plan. He did not feel that EWEB should become a public service monopoly; rather, EWEB was a part of the community fostered by the City Council. He thought EWEB should function independently rather than subject all decisions to the City Council. He believed, however, that there should be a better way to communicate between the two. He suggested to the EWEB commissioners that they form a standing committee with representatives of the two bodies to meet periodically and foster the exchange of ideas, cooperation, and to work through conflicts. Charles Biggs , 540 Antelope Way, said he had gone to the Metropolitan Planning Committee meeting held on the previous Thursday. He expressed his outrage at the cost of a traffic camera project that was part of the implementation of the 2003 Intelligent Transportation Plan for the region. He related that the eight traffic camera installations were slated to cost $800,000. He felt that the reason no one objected was because the money was from the federal Metropolitan Transportation Improvement Program funding and was “just taxpayers’ money.” He said he had looked further into the plan and “tallied” the total for the camera project. He alleged that the total was $22 million with another $1 million in software. He wondered why no one had “raised their eyebrows.” He suggested that members of the public should call their councilors and ask them why this money was being spent in that manner. He said he would be back before the council to further report on this matter. James R. Seaberry , 1475 Green Acres Road, Space #162, spoke in support of the proposed one-year moratorium on mobile/manufactured home park closures. He felt one year was insufficient and suggested the moratorium be for seven years. He pointed out that people could work to upgrade the mobile home parks and make them better places. Zachary Vishanoff, Patterson Street, thanked staff “for wrangling over how people can get paperwork to” the council. He looked forward to being able to “finalize” that so he could provide the council with “the right documents” so that councilors could understand “the problems with the planning.” He alleged that the University of Oregon was using money from the sale of Westmoreland student housing to purchase the “Joe Romania site” and would use this to “help facilitate mixed-use development on Franklin and the pie-in-the- sky basketball arena.” Mr. Vishanoff felt the borders of the Walnut Node had been “drawn up in a cookie cutter fashion.” He suggested the City “go to Salem” and ask for “more free money” in order to study the historic preservation of the Fairmount Neighborhood. He noted that a historic review of the River Road/Santa Clara Neighbor- hood had been undertaken and some of the borders of proposed mixed-use areas had been altered as a result. He felt this was a good idea because it caused less animosity from the neighbors. He reiterated that the City should ask the State for money to conduct such a study of the Fairmount area. Additionally, he opined that the butterfly lot should “get a public hearing” before it was sold. Mayor Piercy closed the Public Forum and called for council comments. Councilor Kelly thanked everyone who took the time to come down. In particular, he wished to thank people for their organized and eloquent remarks on the mobile home park situation. He averred that nothing was more fundamental than food and shelter. He said society and government did much to protect the roof over peoples’ heads. He thought there were likely many layers of legal complexity surrounding this issue and thought a work session for the councilors was in order. MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 13, 2006 Page 4 Regular Meeting City Manager Taylor asked City Attorney Jerry Lidz to speak to what would have to be done in order to have a productive work session. Mr. Lidz stated that the City’s authority to impose a moratorium on mobile home park closures was not entirely clear. He felt the City likely had the authority to regulate such closures, though there was some dispute about that. He said if the council decided to proceed with an ordinance to enact a moratorium it would involve the usual ordinance process. City Manager Taylor stated that the Housing Policy Board (HPB) had a subcommittee that had been working on this. He recommended letting the subcommittee report on its findings. He added that at this point he and the Mayor were looking at meetings toward the end of January for scheduling purposes as the end-of-the-year docket was relatively full. He noted that Councilor Solomon served on the HPB subcom- mittee on mobile home parks and asked her to speak about it. Councilor Solomon stated that the subcommittee was working “eagerly” to bring proposals to the council in early January so that it could keep the process moving forward and provide the protections that the tenants deserve in the event of a mobile home park closure. Councilor Kelly thanked Councilor Solomon for her work on this issue. Councilor Ortiz echoed Councilor Kelly’s thanks and also thanked everyone who had testified. She stressed that this issue was very important to her constituents as there were several mobile home parks in her ward. Also, the issue of homelessness was very important to her. She said she was working on the initiative to end homelessness in ten years and stressed the importance of trying not to have more homeless people. Councilor Taylor called it an urgent matter and said the council should do whatever it could as quickly as it could as it was important to prevent homelessness. Councilor Papé thanked everyone who came down to testify. He concurred with Mr. Drix regarding the two holes downtown. He said the City needed to find some good private investment in order to make them into “two wholes.” Councilor Papé also agreed with Mr. Cassidy that the council needed to improve relations with the EWEB commissioners. Regarding mobile home parks, Councilor Papé averred that the real solution needed to happen at the State level. He wondered if this was part of the Council Committee for Intergovernmental Relations (CCIGR) agenda. City Manager Taylor reminded him that it had been one of the amendments to the legislative statement the council passed. Mayor Piercy acknowledged the work of Mr. Ferris and Mr. Harden, as they had worked on the mobile home park issue for a long time. She encouraged them to persevere. She noted that people from the Falconwood Park had come to the most recent Mayor’s “One-On-One” talk and she and Councilor Papé encouraged them to come to the council meeting. She felt this was a venue to increase public awareness. She also wanted them to know that bringing something to the attention of elected officials helped to further one’s cause. She said while this did not mean that the problem was solved at this point, it did mean that they had “gotten [the council] moving” on the issue. MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 13, 2006 Page 5 Regular Meeting City Manager Taylor stated that he would be at the League of Oregon Cities meeting on November 17 and one of the most important subjects of discussion was to be the league’s legislative agenda. People with expertise on the issue were slated to participate. Mayor Piercy added that Mayor Leehan from Wilsonville intended to be there. She noted that Wilsonville was working on this issue as well. Councilor Papé declared that nothing happened at the legislative level without passion behind it. He commended the speakers for their ability to passionately articulate their situation. 3. CONSENT CALENDAR A. Approval of City Council Minutes - September 25, 2006, City Council Meeting - October 9, 2006, Work Session - October 9, 2006, City Council Meeting - October 16, 2006, Work Session - October 16, 2006, City Council Meeting - October 23, 2006, Work Session B. Approval of Tentative Working Agenda C. Adoption of Resolution 4891 Endorsing the Lane County Food Policy Council D. Adoption of Resolution 4892 Supporting and Promoting the Federal Endangered Species Act of 1973 and Recovery of Threatened and Endangered Fish and Wildlife Species E. Adoption of Resolution 4893 Publicly Committing the City of Eugene to Sustainable Practices and to Businesses that Produce Sustainable Products and Services Councilor Solomon, seconded by Councilor Ortiz, moved to approve the items on the Consent Calendar. Councilor Kelly said he submitted minutes corrections electronically. Mayor Piercy deemed the correc- tions, without objection, approved. Councilor Bettman asked to pull the minutes from the work session of October 23, 2006, as she requested a correction. The Minutes Recording Section had reviewed the tape of the meeting and had requested the opportunity for Lane Council of Governments (LCOG) staff member, Tom Schwetz, to review the proposed clarification for accuracy. Councilor Solomon pulled Item D. Councilor Papé pulled Item B. Roll call vote; the motion to approve the Consent Calendar, with the exception of the minutes from the work session of October 23, 2006, and Items B and D passed unani- mously, 7:0. Regarding Item B, Councilor Papé asked if there would be time during the EWEB/City Council joint meeting and tour to discuss other issues with the commissioners. Mayor Piercy responded that she met with EWEB President Sandra Bishop and had been in contact via email. She said there would be time for discussion. City Manager Taylor added that 25 minutes had been set aside for discussion. MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 13, 2006 Page 6 Regular Meeting Roll call vote; the motion to approve Item B passed unanimously, 7:0. Councilor Solomon explained that she pulled Item D because she objected to groups coming and asking the City Council to take positions on federal legislation. She could not support the resolution as written. She supported changing the Endangered Species Act so that it contained an acknowledgement or an analysis of economic impacts to local communities. She also wanted to amend it so that it included flexibility in crafting habitat management plans and to create more accountability in measuring successes. Mayor Piercy commented that all three of the resolutions in the Consent Calendar had been vetted by the CCIGR. Councilor Bettman averred that a similar resolution had been supported by the City Councilors and community leaders from all over Oregon. She listed some of the organizations that supported it. She read from a letter sent to Senator Ron Wyden that spoke to the importance of the Endangered Species Act. Councilor Papé ascertained that the CCIGR vote had been unanimous. Roll call vote; the motion passed, 6:1; Councilor Solomon voting in opposition. 4. WORK SESSION: Report on Sister City Trip Mayor Piercy stated that the delegation to Irkutsk included City Councilor Taylor, President of the Irkutsk Sister City Committee Galina Groza, David Piercy, and herself. She expressed her appreciation to all of the delegation and to the people of Irkutsk who made them feel so welcome. She felt it was a very important time in the United States to foster friendships with other nations in the world. She commended the people in Irkutsk for taking their growing democracy and the protection of the environment very seriously. Councilor Taylor said every effort had been made to welcome, entertain, and educate the delegation about all aspects of the area including arts, education, and health care. She had been very impressed by the friendship between the sister cities and the work that the sister city committees had done to strengthen the relationship. She felt the Mayor had done a good job of speaking for Eugene. The Mayor provided a narrative as slides from the voyage were being shown. She called it “a lovely and informative trip.” Councilor Papé asked about the status of organized religion at present in Russia. Mayor Piercy replied that people there were very religious and that there was a lot of effort to bring back the churches. Councilor Ortiz wished to acknowledge the Boy Scout troop in attendance at the council meeting and welcomed them. Mayor Piercy said the people of Irkutsk wanted to show the delegation from Eugene all of the progress that had been made there. They also made four requests of the City of Eugene: they wanted to rejuvenate their Rotary contact and visits, they wanted a stronger relationship between their technical university and the MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 13, 2006 Page 7 Regular Meeting University of Oregon, particularly in the areas of urban planning and architecture, they asked that local children participate in the international children’s art shows of Irkutsk, and that they would like to have more educational exchanges. Councilor Taylor expressed gratitude for the Sister City committee and especially to Ms. Groza for keeping the relationship with Irkutsk going. She also thanked Council, Public and Government Affairs Manager Mary Walston for her help in preparing and facilitating the trip. She had been impressed by how much work the people in Irkutsk had done to entertain and inform the delegation from Eugene. Mayor Piercy echoed Councilor Taylor’s last comment. She said they would be joined at dinner by experts in the areas they had visited during the day so that they could continue the day’s conversation. Councilor Taylor added that the food had been very good and very plentiful. The meeting was adjourned at 8:42 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Dennis M. Taylor City Manager (Recorded by Ruth Atcherson) MINUTES—Eugene City Council November 13, 2006 Page 8 Regular Meeting