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HomeMy WebLinkAbout210414 WS MINUTES – Eugene City Council Work Session April 14, 2021 Page 1 MINUTES Eugene City Council Virtual Work Session Eugene, Oregon 97401 April 14, 2021 12:00 p.m. Councilors Present: Emily Semple, Jennifer Yeh, Mike Clark, Claire Syrett, Matt Keating, Randy Groves, Greg Evans, Alan Zelenka Mayor Vinis opened the April 14, 2021, work session of the Eugene City Council. 1. WORK SESSION: Growth Monitoring Program Update City Manager Sarah Medary, Planning and Development Senior Planner Heather O’Donnell and Information Services Division Project Manager Mina Roth presented information on the Growth Monitoring Program. Council Discussion: • Councilor Evans – thanked staff; asked if staff were doing an analysis of migration patterns of who’s moving here demographically: with regard to income, where they’re coming from, what their housing needs are and reasons why they are moving to Eugene; stated it’s important to know who is coming here and their housing needs for creating housing for the future; referenced his discussions with Councilor Clark on how many people would be coming from Portland and anticipated around 35,000 over the next 15-20 years; stated his concern about where all these people will live unless there’s focused sustained growth on transportation corridors and similar kinds of urban lands. • Councilor Syrett – expressed excitement about this work, and that the resources being dedicated to this important work and data-driven analysis will only be more important with decisions on the UGB and accommodating thousands of new residents; stated the significance of being able to dial into the data in this comprehensive and technical way; is grateful Council made this decision in the past during Envision Eugene work; stated that this work has an ancillary benefit, as it can be used to analyze other things not directly related to housing that are important to managing the City. • Councilor Zelenka –thanked staff and noted improved sophistication in the work; stated interest in data on affordable housing units and incremental affordable housing units and how many the City is getting; asked if data will show what type of middle housing has been built, how many, and how affordable they are; stated that income level and rent level are metrics needed in the data to capture if the City is creating more affordable housing units; inquired about the percentage of multifamily vs single family housing, what the City is projecting for the future, and the City’s ability to have useful data on that; asked about quality-of-life indicators and how to measure them; inquired if there will be information available regarding industrial land and the size of the properties that are developable; asked if the dashboard will be publicly accessible or only internal. • Councilor Clark – thanked staff and expressed excitement for this work; asked for a more definitive date from staff about when the report will be available; stated his own goal for this work to have been done already and his concern if it extends beyond this year; said that in asking if the City’s policies and assumptions are delivering in the real-world appropriate housing in our community, it’s important to have metrics for the outcomes in the first place; noted that the current housing market is lopsided and that with the first Urban Growth MINUTES – Eugene City Council Work Session April 14, 2021 Page 2 Boundary (UGB) work, population was underestimated, and the effectiveness of creating density models and multifamily housing and how that would translate in the marketplace was overestimated; stated that some of his fears are coming to pass right now with the very low supply of houses and very high demand; stated that it is a problem and hard data to make better decisions sooner rather than later is needed; expressed that he would be happy to advocate at Budget Committee for more planners to get the work done. • Councilor Groves – thanked staff for the presentation and emphasized importance of this work for the future of the community; stated the need to collect data on out-migration and reasons why, and cited the Realtor’s Association as a potential source for this information; further noted that out-migration data is needed to see trends and patterns to identify problems as they’re developing and give more time to respond to changing conditions for the local economy; stated another important data point is income to see what industries to target to bring high paying jobs into the community; noted need for data for industrial land size and space to help the local economy grow with green technology jobs; expressed that these were useful data points from a policy stand point; stated desire for community members to access the dashboard. • Councilor Keating – thanked staff for the report and said he looks forward to the dashboard; noted the popularity of the Pacific Northwest and Oregon especially, with its low COVID mortality rates; questioned how much COVID and climate change factor in the decision of those who move here; stated his belief that the projected numbers of incoming population may be low. • Councilor Semple – expressed excitement for this work and thanked staff; advocated for more input. • Councilor Zelenka – stated the ongoing problem of available affordable housing and his belief that there’s also a market failure and economic issue; commented that the data is information to inform policy; advised staff to think about how this will be used by Council to form policy and what questions they will be asking. • Councilor Clark – inquired if there will be similar data available regionally for outside the City of Eugene; stated the population data will be key for him; stated the population forecast Council established in 2017 underestimated the reality; noted that the metric used by Portland State University (PSU) has zero accommodation for climate refugees and other factors when forecasting population; stated the need to be able to look at the population in the city and neighboring areas over time; noted that simple data is available now for single-family permits to show that people are building fewer houses than ever before except following the 2008 recession, and Council needs to look at that data this year. • Councilor Keating – thanked Clark for his comments; pointed out the information showing the price of homes in Eugene as cheaper than Coburg was a bit deceiving as different regions of the community tell a more realistic story on housing prices; expressed a desire for a map of Tier 1 transit routes and the amount of housing along these routes; expressed a desire to have dialogue about zoning changes, building up, mixed-use buildings and replicate the success of 1059 Willamette along other transit routes. • Councilor Evans – stated his belief that the City will have refugees due to climate and terrorism in southern countries; elaborated that those refugees will add to the lower rung of the income ladder and overcrowding in housing units; stated it is very important for him to see data on what is driving people here permanently and those who may need more services than what are now offered. 2. WORK SESSION: COVID-19 Household Impact Survey Results City Manager Sarah Medary, Community Relations Director Laura Hammond, Planning and Development Permit Review Manager Amy Bradbury, Policy Systems Analyst Jason Dedrick, and Public Works 2021 Project Manager Stephanie Scafa presented an analysis of the COVID-19 Household Impact Survey results as part of the Community Recovery Team. MINUTES – Eugene City Council Work Session April 14, 2021 Page 3 Council Discussion: • Councilor Keating – thanked staff and appreciated that the survey was sent out via regular mail in addition to online; commented that it was alarming that most people did not get their COVID-related information from newspapers or periodicals; expressed further alarm that 45 percent of the community is potentially suffering from mental health crises; expressed that this is a pivotal moment and his desire for Council to declare a mental health emergency and take actions; inquired about food insecurity statistics relating to state assistance or local community providers. • Councilor Syrett – thanked staff for the presentation; stated that for her, the most alarming part of the survey was the difference between the responses from the white respondents and Latino community; appreciated Councilor Keating calling out the mental health impacts as she experienced anxiety during the pandemic; expressed that the call for action is for support, assistance and prioritized engagement of the Latino community and communities of color; noted that the City has expanded outreach to Latino residents but there is clearly a lot more that needs to be done to achieve a parity with what others in the community are experiencing. • Councilor Zelenka – noted the actual question in the survey regarding mental health asked about those who had experienced emotional distress; stated his biggest concern was about the impacts on Latinos and communities of color; explained that this recession is referred to as a K-shaped recession, as it has been great for those with houses and stock investments but devastating for the people with few assets; declared that Council needs to figure out how to help those folks hit hardest in the pandemic. • Councilor Clark – noted that the most important work that Council can be doing in the short term and immediate future is on housing and homelessness; stated that the majority of Council’s agenda should be full of action items to address those issues. • Councilor Groves – noted the significance of the homeless data in the survey results and said he considers that an urgent issue; stated the reality is that a lot of council’s solutions for fixing problems for both sides is finding places for people to go; noted a lot is not said in this survey and things are rated the way they are by people for different reasons; stated his belief in need to think beyond the literal interpretations of these issues and pull the solution sets together. • Mayor Vinis – noted that a lot of the anxiety over the COVID crisis is related to housing and stability, which has disproportionately impacted the Latino community and that those two things really are connected; noted the Council goals and process session coming up next week as an opportunity for Council to raise this up as a priority for the future. • Councilor Zelenka – noted that homelessness and housing received the highest numbers on the survey results; noted that the COVID-related topics such as business support, COVID concerns, jobs, schools reopening, and vaccines, represent a higher total across the board and therefore the number one thing people are reacting to; encouraged people to get the vaccine when they can. *Attached is the online chat dialogue during the work session. The meeting adjourned at 1:30 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Beth Forrest City Recorder MINUTES – Eugene City Council Work Session April 14, 2021 Page 4 (Recorded by Julie Adams) Link to the webcast of this City Council meeting here. *Eugene City Council Virtual Work Session Eugene, Oregon 97401 April 14, 2021 12:00 p.m. Zoom Chat MINUTES – Eugene City Council Work Session April 14, 2021 Page 5