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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCC Minutes - 06/29/05 WS MINUTES Eugene City Council Work Session McNutt Room--Eugene City Hall June 29, 2005 Noon COUNCILORS PRESENT: George Poling, Jennifer Solomon, Andrea Ortiz, Chris Pryor, Betty Taylor, David Kelly, Bonny Bettman. COUNCILORS ABSENT: Gary Papd Mayor Kitty Piercy called the meeting of the Eugene City Council to order. Ms. Ortiz and Mr. Pap~ were unable to be present for the meeting, but Ms. Ortiz participated via telephone. Attempts to connect Mr. Pap~ via telephone were unsuccessful due to technical problems in the McNutt Room. Mayor Piercy conveyed a request from Mr. Pap~ that the council not conduct a vote on the West Eugene Enterprise Zone if he was not present. She said it was her understanding that it was a courtesy request and the council could decide whether to grant it. City Manager Dennis Taylor concurred that the request was a privilege that councilors could ask of the body and the body could then determine whether the issue was too important to postpone action. He said the current situation might warrant such a decision. Ms. Bettman noted that Mr. Pap~ was aware the issue might be on the agenda. She said that in the current situation, not taking action was taking action by default if the council did not take definitive action. She recommended that the council proceed with purposeful action rather than by default. Mr. Kelly pointed out that council ground rules said the body could take action even if there was a request to postpone if a majority of councilors present wished to take action. He said the fact that the enterprise zone would go into effect on July 2, 2005, meant the council was in that situation. He asked if a motion was necessary or if a show of consensus would suffice. City Attorney Jerome Lidz replied that a show of consensus was acceptable. City Manager Taylor explained why the West Eugene Enterprise Zone issue was added to the agenda. He said the council directed staff at its June 27, 2005, meeting to bring the interim standards to the County for consideration and report back on the County commissioners' action, which staff would do at the beginning the of enterprise zone discussion. He recommended that the Neighborhood Initiative Priority Issue Action Plan work session be postponed to a later meeting. A. ACTION: West Eugene Enterprise Zone Application MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 1 Work Session City Manager Taylor related that on June 28, 2005, the State approved the West Eugene Enterprise Zone application jointly submitted by Lane County and the City of Eugene. He said staff met with the Lane Board of County Commissioners on the morning of June 29 and recommended adoption of the interim standards that the council adopted by Resolution 4832 on June 27. He said that following a lively discussion, the County commissioners adopted interim standards that included all of the elements in Resolution 4832 except the $30,000 job cap. He said the joint application required both parties to agree on interim standards and, if there was a disagreement on interim standards related to job quality, the zone would revert to State standards. He said that award of an enterprise zone by the State made it unlikely that one jurisdiction could unilaterally withdraw the application and additional research, as well as additional conversations with the County, would be necessary in order to block implementation of the zone on July 1, 2005. He introduced Denny Braud and Mike Sullivan of the Community Development Division to review the situation and respond to questions. Mr. Braud noted that the City and County were awarded enterprise zone designation, to take effect on July 1, 2005. He said a consistent goal had been for the City and County to have standards in place on July 1; although agreement on those standards had not yet been reached as of July 1, and the zone would be subject to State standards and criteria related to job creation and type of business even though there were no local standards and criteria. He said it would be necessary for the City and County to reach an agreement in order to have local standards in place by July 1. Mr. Kelly clarified that the cap of $30,000 maximum tax exemption per job created was not actually part of the interim standards; it was an amendment to the resolution to apply to the State for an enterprise zone. Mayor Piercy acknowledged the arrival of Lane County commissioners Bobby Green, Anna Morrison and Faye Stewart. Mayor Piercy solicited a first round of council questions and comments. Mr. Poling thanked the County commissioners for their discussion of interim standards and particularly Commissioner Dwyer for his motion to accept the 1997 interim standards with a 25-percent benefit while continuing to collaborate with the City Council to develop permanent standards. He said that Commissioner Dwyer was clear in his comments that a per-job cap should be part of the permanent standards discussion with the City. Mr. Poling indicated he wanted the council to take action to accept the action by the County commissioners to include the 1997 interim standards with the 25-percent benefit and immediately begin collaborative discussions about developing permanent standards to include a per job cap. He asked the City Attorney if that would bring the City and County into alignment. Mr. Lidz replied that it would be necessary to amend Resolution 4845, adopted June 27, 2005, to delete the section related to the per job cap if the goal was to bring the resolution into alignment with what the County had adopted. Mr. Poling, seconded by Ms. Solomon, moved to amend Resolution 4845 by deleting sub- section (c) of Section 1, related to the three-year tax exemption benefit limitation of $30,000 per new full-time job created. MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 2 Work Session Mr. Poling said his understanding from the Lane County Board of Commissioners' discussion of the matter that morning was that by not adopting any interim standards, the State's guidelines would apply and the Board of Commissioners wanted to meet with the council to discuss community standards. He said commissioners' main concern was the per employee cap but they were willing to continue discussions on that and Commissioner Dwyer's motion was an effort to keep the City and County working together on the issue. Mr. Kelly said the council worked hard to find a collaborative solution that resulted in a 7 to 1 vote in favor of an application for an enterprise zone, which he felt was a factor in the State's approval. He said part of the solution was a per-job cap of $30,000 maximum tax exemption for each job created, which was generous and in line with benefits provided under the previous enterprise zone. He said the commissioners' discussion did not include the per-job cap; rather, timing was the topic. He said if Mr. Poling's motion passed, months of consensus and commitments among the councilors would be ;;thrown out the window" and he would not support the motion. He said if the motion was defeated he would introduce a motion to withdraw or terminate the City's application and designate a representative to work with County commis- sioners over the next year on an application that could receive consensus at the onset. Ms. Bettman said she felt there were some circumstances under which an enterprise zone could be a benefit to the community and she was willing to support it under those circumstances. She hoped that the council was willing to honor the collaboration involved in the application. In terms of the cap in the resolution, she felt there were legal implications to adopting standards or granting an application for benefit to the enterprise zone that did not include the cap as it would be inconsistent with the resolution. She said without the cap, the enterprise zone benefit was based on property value and investment, not on jobs, and the whole justification for the zone was job creation. She said the cap the council put in place provided almost all small and medium business under the cap with generous room to succeed and there were perhaps one or two very large entities that would benefit from the enterprise zone without the cap. She questioned the County's willingness to so generously transfer tax dollars that could be used to pay for public safety patrols and jails when it was claiming it did not have enough money for public safety. Ms. Solomon acknowledged the compromises made during development of the application, noting that she had compromised on the exclusion of the railroad yards in the zone when she preferred to have them included. She was agreeable to continuing to compromise in order to have a zone. She said the council had not had a significant discussion of the job caps, yet she compromised on including them in the resolution because she was willing to have a discussion at a later date. She said the understanding at the council's June 27, 2005, meeting was that all of the standards and the job cap were temporary but she continued to hear councilors state that only under those circumstances would there be an enterprise zone in Eugene. She questioned whether the council really wanted public input to determine community standards. She expressed concern that the City was ;;cutting off its nose to spite its face." Ms. Solomon emphasized that the standards were temporary and in the interests of retaining an enterprise zone and maintaining a relationship with partners she was willing to compromise. She indicated she would support the motion. Mr. Pryor pointed out that the City was 90 percent of the way to an enterprise zone. He said the previous months had seen an enormous amount of effort, collaboration and compromise. He said that withdrawing from the application would be like traveling from Oregon to New York and turning around and leaving when the arrival date was Friday instead of Thursday as originally expected. He said that agreement had been reached on standards, size and scope, a joint application had been submitted and approved and there was one MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 3 Work Session piece left to negotiate. His impression was that the piece was still negotiable; yet the council was ready to walk away from the application and that was a waste. Mr. Pryor expressed concern that the council would look foolish to the State if the application was withdrawn after it was approved because one final piece could not be agreed upon. He urged the council to work on the issue of caps and his sense was that the County commissioners were willing to discuss job caps. He said so much had been accomplished on the enterprise zone that the effort should not be abandoned. Ms. Ortiz asked for an explanation of the County commission's action. Mr. Braud replied that the City and County were asked to act on two things relative to placeholder interim policy and interim criteria for the new enterprise zone scheduled to start on July 1, 2005. He said the first was re-enacting the previous enterprise zone's public benefit criteria, adopted in 1997, as placeholder criteria and the second was introduction of the concept of capping the tax exemption. He said the City and County had not previously discussed a dollar amount for the cap but at the council's June 27, 2005, meeting, staff proposed a cap of $30,000 over three years for each new job that was created. He said the council agreed to both the 1997 criteria and a $30,000 cap at its meeting; the County accepted the 1997 criteria, but not the cap. Ms. Ortiz expressed frustration that the County had not accepted the cap. Ms. Bettman moved, seconded by Mr. Kelly, to substitute the following motion: "I move to repeal Resolution 4832 and to direct the City Manager to withdraw the City's application for designation of the West Eugene Enterprise Zone or, if it is too late to withdraw the application, to take the steps necessary to terminate the City of Eugene's sponsorship of the West Eugene Enterprise zone and, in addition, that the City Council designate a representative to contact the Lane County Board of Commissioners to begin working together to craft an application for designation of an enterprise zone for West Eugene that can achieve Board consensus and City Council support, with the goal of filing the application at the next time the State ac- cepts such applications. Mayor Piercy solicited council comments on the motion. Mr. Kelly stated that the motion made by Ms. Bettman reflected his feelings and he would support it. He agreed with Ms. Ortiz that it was disappointing the County commissioners were unable to accept a per-job cap on the tax benefit on an interim basis. He gave the example of an automated computer center that might have a large capital outlay while creating few jobs, but could be fully exempt from property taxes without the cap. He reminded everyone that during discussions of the enterprise zone, many people in the commu- nity spoke specifically about per-job cap. He disagreed with Mr. Pryor's statement that the City was 90 percent of the way to an enterprise zone as the per-job cap, unlike the other criteria, was a part of the application to the State because it was incorporated in the resolution. He objected to the statement that the council would look foolish. Mr. Poling asked if it was possible for a jurisdiction to unilaterally either withdraw the application or withdraw from the enterprise zone or if a joint resolution by both parties be required. Mr. Lidz replied that he did not know the answer as the issue had just been raised. His general sense, without having an opportunity to consult the statutes, was that if it took two parties to file the application and one withdrew, the application was effectively withdrawn. Mr. Braud said that termination might require both of the joint MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 4 Work Session sponsors but thought the statutes were probably silent on withdrawing an application because it had never occurred. City Manager Taylor added that the enterprise zone designation was granted on June 28, 2005, by the State and did not go into effect until July 1, 2005. He said that staff would pursue whatever policy direction the council adopted; however, his recommendation was that in addition to that action, in order to ensure that an enterprise zone did not go into effect on July 1 with nothing but State standards, the council adopt the interim standards accepted by the County. Mr. Poling remarked that County commissioners had not indicated in their discussion that they were opposed to an enterprise zone. He disagreed with Ms. Bettman's statement that there was a transfer of tax dollars involved. He said there was an exemption for three years on the improvements only, after which period the City would receive full tax revenue from that property. He said that it was companies that would make large investments in their facilities, regardless of how many people were hired, that would most directly benefit the City through an increase in property tax revenues. He questioned whether the substitute motion could be legally accomplished. Mr. Lidz noted there were several procedural issues underlying the council's discussion and suggested that before voting the council pause and review whether the motions on the table accomplished what the council wanted. He said that one possibility was a vote to amend the resolution from June 27 to align the City with the County, even if the council then wanted to vote to withdraw the application so that if withdrawing the application was ineffective, there would be some standards in place rather than none at all. Ms. Bettman stated that it was better to have no interim standards so there was pressure to develop some type of consensus around what the community wanted. She said that weak interim standards could be there forever because the County had no incentive to change them and it would be counterproductive to vote to be consistent with the County. She said there was another application process in a year and the council had already discussed the possibility of not making an application until then; withdrawing the application would mean the City started with a %lean slate" and the County would have incentive to collaborate in order to have an enterprise zone. She said the resolution included the cap and questioned how the City could move forward with an enterprise zone that did not have a cap and was therefore inconsistent with the resolution adopting the enterprise zone. She said the City was not at 90 percent; it was worse off than being at %quare one." She said that the council's ability to cooperate was destroyed if it went forward with an enterprise zone that does not honor the intent of the adopting resolution. Responding to Mr. Kelly's objection, Mr. Pryor said he was not implying the council was foolish but rather suggesting that others might have that perception if the City submitted an application and then withdrew it. He said he had heard no disagreement between the City and the County with regard to having an enterprise zone, the value of the 1997 standards, or the timing or submitting of the application. He said it appeared the disagreement boiled down to one element, the job cap, and the perception that the council and County commissioners did not trust each other enough to do the right thing on a job cap. City Manager Taylor agreed with Mr. Pryor's assessment. He said the problem was that the County felt if it adopted the job cap it would be the default standard and there would be no incentive for the council to modify it through a community involvement process; conversely, the council felt if a job cap was excluded there was no incentive for the County to consider the concept. He said that lack of opportunities to discuss the job cap with the County had also contributed to the problem. MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 5 Work Session Mr. Pryor said it appeared that while the County was aware there were discussions of a cap, the specific amount of $30,000 was new information. He asked if the sticking point was the job cap, the amount of the job cap or the timing of when the information was presented to the County commissioners. Mr. Braud said it was timing and the County's desire to take more time to consider whether a cap was a good idea and jointly work on the concept instead of putting something on the table late in the process. Mr. Pryor asked how the dollar amount of the cap had been determined. Mr. Braud replied that Ms. Bettman suggested the idea of a cap and her initial proposal was for $30,000. He said that amount seemed to be one around which consensus could be built. Mr. Pryor asked if there was a sense that if the council aligned with the County on standards at this point, there was agreement to establish a job cap in an amount to be mutually agreed upon at a later point. He said the only outstanding issue seemed to be the cap and there should be some way for the City and the County to address a cap without withdrawing an application that had already been accepted. Mayor Piercy solicited a second round of comments on the motion. Mr. Kelly said he watched the commissioner's meeting that morning and the merits of a cap were not discussed. He stated that the cap was intrinsic to the original application and asked for support for the motion before the body. Ms. Taylor said she was opposed to enterprise zones and felt that in addition to time for discussions with the County there should be time for discussions with the community. She was sad to hear the application had been approved by the State and felt it was the wrong thing, as more standards were needed instead of fewer. She said most people did not know what an enterprise zone was and were not aware of the City's application for one. She said that an enterprise zone should focus on sustainability and living wage, which the standards did not address, as well as a variety of jobs instead of restricting jobs to manufacturing and a different type of designation instead of geographical. She said all of those things needed to be discussed and more time was needed for those discussions. She would support the substitute motion. Ms. Solomon said that there had been many discussions to date and reminded the council that a majority of the beneficiaries of the prior enterprise zone were small, locally owned businesses that were able to expand operations and hire more people who stayed in the community and helped the economy grow. Referring to a lack of trust between the partners, she suggested that a sunset for interim standards be adopted that would require negotiation between the City and County on new standards. Mayor Piercy expressed disappointment about the current situation as the council had labored hard to reach this point. She said the tipping point on reaching agreement was the job cap and understood why removing it jeopardized the council's support. She also understood why the County felt it was not included in the conversation about a cap, although commissioners were aware one was being discussed. She was concerned because the enterprise zone could be an innovative tool with community standards to target economic development priorities. City Manager Taylor noted that members of the Board of County Commissioners were present and suggested a caucus during a brief adjournment to determine if there was a solution to the impasse. MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 6 Work Session Mayor Piercy expressed willingness to have that conversation if there was a possibility of reaching some type of agreement. Mr. Kelly raised a point of order that there was a motion on the floor. Ms. Bettman said that not only was there a motion on the floor, but by not taking action the council would be taking action and consequently bargaining from a position of extreme weakness. She said the council should act on the motion and then caucus later. She reminded those present that for every $7 in benefit the City paid, the County contributed $2, and when she brought forward the cap it was based on historic conversations by the Mayor's Economic Development Committee. The motion to substitute passed, 4:3; Mr. Poling, Mr. Pryor and Ms. Solomon vot- ing in opposition. The motion as amended passed, 4:3; Mr. Poling, Mr. Pryor and Ms. Solomon vot- ing in opposition. Ms. Bettman requested a legal opinion on the job cap being in the resolution and what impact that had when the County's action was inconsistent with the City's application. City Manager Taylor said that staff would report back to the council on how its motion could be implemented. He asked if discussions should be continued with the County regarding a way to accept the enterprise zone. Mayor Piercy said she had a sense that the council would be willing to work on the issue if there was a significant change on the part of the County regarding the cap. She said it was her intention to ask the commissioners if they were willing to reexamine the subject. B. Work Session: Neighborhood Initiative Priority Issue Action Plan This item was postponed to a future meeting. C. Work Session: Context-Sensitive Design Process for Crest Drive Neighborhood Streets City Manager Taylor introduced City Engineer Mark Schoening to continue the discussion of Crest Drive, Storey Boulevard and Friendly Street improvements. Mr. Schoening stated that his purpose was to respond to questions on the Crest Drive neighborhood transportation issue, share with the council some of the neighborhood outreach that occurred and outline some of the elements of a context-sensitive design process, particularly minimum design standards. He related that in January 2005 the council directed staff to address the issues surrounding street design prior to classification of streets. In response to an earlier question from the council, he said that the design processes for Ayers Road, Delta Highway and Garden Way were funded by transportation system development charges (SDCs) and the costs were carried forward into the local improvement districts (LIDs) that were MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 7 Work Session formed for each of those projects. He said if the City fronted costs for the design process on Crest Drive and the other streets in that neighborhood, the costs could be rolled forward into an LID if the council decided to form one. If there was no LID the City would have to find another funding source for those costs. He said the cost estimate of $240,000 for the Crest Drive design process was determined by looking at approximately 1.25 miles of streets on Crest Drive, Friendly Street, and Storey Boulevard, the neighbor- hood's desire for very detailed information on impacts on individual properties and trees and the need to design an entire street that included surveying, engineering and design work and extensive public outreach. Mr. Schoening said staff took the approach in January 2005 to package all elements together and request funding to move the project forward; elements included developing a context-sensitive design process and initiating the surveying, engineering and design, and public outreach. He said that neighborhood feedback was to take smaller steps and begin with development of a context-sensitive design process and reach agreement with the neighborhood. He related that the neighborhood association board passed a motion to that effect last week. He said when agreement was reached on the context-sensitive design process, the City would move forward with implementing the process.. Continuing, Mr. Schoening said elements of a context-sensitive design process included: · Establishing the goals and objectives of the process · Identifying the boundaries of the process (minimum design standards for a street in the neighbor- hood) · Establishing a decision-making model with the recognition that the council would make the final decision on whatever project or design was proposed · Developing a public involvement strategy · Establishing a schedule and budget for the process Mr. Schoening said that minimum design standards were a "sticking point" and he used a schematic to illustrate three street design alternatives, noting that those alternatives could be modified depending on the interests and values of stakeholders. He reviewed each of the alternatives and noted that the sidewalk standard was to some extent outside of the City's purview, as the State Transportation Planning Rule required a sidewalk on either reconstructed or new streets and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) established parameters for sidewalks in terms of minimum width, surface and physical separation from the street. He said a major issue for the neighborhood association was the minimum pavement design width of ten feet. He said the association preferred a narrower width but was told that the two ten-foot travel lanes or twenty feet of pavement would remain the minimum. Mayor Piercy called for questions and comments. Ms. Taylor observed that the process would take time and while she was pleased that public involvement included the entire neighborhood, she reminded staff that those with abutting properties were the most concerned. She asked staff to stop referring to "benefiting properties" and use the term "abutting proper- ties" instead, as she felt properties were sometimes hurt rather than helped and the use of the word "abutting" would be clearer. Mr. Schoening referred to State law governing LIDs, which allowed assessment of benefiting properties, not abutting properties. MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 8 Work Session Ms. Taylor said that she attended the neighborhood meetings and felt the last one was productive. She questioned whether everyone in the neighborhood understood that if the council paid for the context-sensitive design process it would be included in the LID and added to the assessments. She asked how many properties were involved and what the per person cost of the $240,000 process would be. Mr. Schoening said he could provide that information and pointed out that the normal cost of a capital project included engineering and design costs, which could vary depending on how extensive the process was. Ms. Taylor asked if there were exceptions to ADA requirements for sidewalks if the terrain was very steep. Mr. Schoening replied that if a car was able to climb a grade, a motorized wheelchair also could and there was no basis for an exception in that neighborhood. Ms. Taylor asked staff to look into the matter. Ms. Taylor asked how it would be determined which side of a street would have a sidewalk if there was to be only one sidewalk along the street. Mr. Schoening replied that would be part of the design discussion and one of the goals was to limit the number of times pedestrians would have to cross the street when walking from one point to another. Ms. Taylor hoped that stop signs could be added to the list of traffic calming strategies. Mr. Schoening said that traffic calming tools were included in the Arterial/Collector Street Plan and stop signs were a regulatory device to assign right-of-way rather than a traffic calming tool. Ms. Bettman commented that the City's position was that stop signs that were not warranted could open it to legal liability, which is why they were not used as a traffic calming device. Ms. Bettman stated that she had attended the neighborhood meeting and her impression was that the neighborhood's main concern over ten- foot lanes was, according to staff, off the table for discussion before the process began. She asked if the ten- foot standard could be flexible when there were extenuating circumstances, such as preserving heritage trees or a front yard, and the travel lane be narrower at that point. She pointed out that the ten-foot minimum lane width was the standard in the Arterial/Collector Street Plan for a collector street and the basis of the neighborhood's objection was that it did not want the street to be a collector. She said the City should be willing to make an exception to the ten-foot lane width where it was appropriate and reasonable and pointed out that there were many streets throughout the City that were very narrow and included parking on both sides. She thought it was unlikely that two fire trucks would be passing each other simultaneously going in opposite directions on a street, thus requiring a 20-foot width. Mr. Poling noted Mr. Schoening's remarks about ADA requirements for sidewalk surfaces and commented that during recent discussions of alley improvements the issue of a new technique with a pervious surface was raised. He asked if that type of surface would qualify under ADA requirements for a hard surface. Mr. Schoening said he thought it would, but one of the issues with pervious pavement was that underlying soils needed to be pervious. He said the soils in the Crest Drive neighborhood were clay soils and not very pervious. Mr. Kelly said he was pleased the last neighborhood meeting went well and the idea of designing a process made sense. He hoped that the process would be designed so that both the process and paying for the process would be broken into several phases with check-in points for the council and neighbors at the end of each. He indicated he was not opposed to eventual classification of the streets and what emerged from the design process would help with that discussion. MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 9 Work Session Referring to the ten-foot lane width, Mr. Kelly said that requirement was also in the Local Street Plan and applied to streets in general. He was unaware of any improved streets that were less than 20 feet in width although there were some old substandard streets that might have less than 20 feet of pavement left. He was comfortable with the ten-foot lane width standard, which was very narrow by national standards, but agreed with Ms. Bettman's comments about the need for flexibility in some situations. He said if flexibility was allowed it should be reflected in both street plans. Ms. Bettman commented that the street plans did provide that flexibility. Mr. Schoening agreed and said there were two aspects to the neighborhood's discussion of lane width; one related to the lane width for the entire length of the street and the other related to an extenuating circumstance such as a heritage tree. Ms. Bettman asked whether lane width flexibility under very specific circumstances would be a part of the discussion with the neighborhood and could be a part of the ultimate design. Mr. Schoening said it could be part of the discussion and said the council could see that element in the design, but there could be a minority opinion from Lane Transit District or Fire and Emergency Medical Services on how that would impact service delivery. Ms. Bettman asked if a motion was necessary to direct the City Manager to imbue staff with the ability to be flexible where appropriate with lane width. City Manager Taylor replied that the City's standard design guidelines included criteria for exceptions and Mr. Schoening had indicated an understanding of that and a willingness to work with the neighborhood. Ms. Taylor reiterated her request that staff stop using the term ~minimum" to refer to lane width when meeting with neighbors as it indicated there were no exceptions. Mayor Piercy thanked everyone for their work and adjourned the meeting at 1:30 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Dennis M. Taylor City Manager (Recorded by Lynn Taylor) MINUTES--Eugene City Council June 29, 2005 Page 10 Work Session