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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCC Minutes - 02/27/06 Meeting M I N U T E S Eugene City Council City Council Meeting Council Chamber—Eugene City Hall February 27, 2006 7:30 p.m. COUNCILORS PRESENT: Jennifer Solomon, Andrea Ortiz, David Kelly, Betty Taylor, Gary Papé, George Poling, Chris Pyror. COUNCILORS ABSENT: Bonny Bettman. City Council President Jennifer Solomon called the meeting of the Eugene City Council to order. She noted that Mayor Kitty Piercy and Councilor Bonny Bettman were in Washington, DC, as part of the United Front lobbying effort. 1. PUBLIC FORUM Councilor Solomon reviewed the rules of the Public Forum. Carol Berg Caldwell , 84474 Parkway, Pleasant Hill, lauded the work of Leadership, Adventure, Education, and Direction (LEAD), a non-profit organization for teenagers. She referred to an article in The Eugene Weekly about a recent fundraiser sponsored by LEAD to help build a downtown teen center. She averred that a community teen center dovetailed with two significant issues that Eugene faced: 1) improved public safety and 2) the revitalization of the downtown mall. Regarding public safety, she related that LEAD members hoped for a well-run, viable teen center so that young people will choose meaningful skill building, art, and community-oriented activities rather than drugs. She also felt that larger stores would look more favorably on a community that backed a responsible productive teen center and would be more likely to open outlets in the downtown area. She thought shoppers feared the young people who hang out downtown. She opined that the system and government often catered to business interests while turning a blind eye to those who “live on the edge.” She asked the council to consider, in its deliberations regarding mall development, securing a space for a teen center. She said it was in the best interest of all of the community. Tamara Torrence , 1845 Villard Street, asked the council to do whatever it could within its power to address the ruling on the City youth activities levy. She wanted to ensure funding for the young people of the city of Eugene at the same level it had been funded since the levy was first enacted. She underscored that 24,000 young people benefited from the levy, which funded music, physical education, sports, drama, counselors, librarians, and nurses. She said the program and people funded by the levy were “priceless to our children.” She reminded the council that since the passage of Ballot Measure 5, public schools in the state of Oregon had suffered. She related that Oregon has the second highest class sizes in the country and its school year is nearly three weeks shorter than the national average. She said employers demand an educated workforce and used a good public school system as a recruiting tool to attract employees. Her husband had been recruited to work at the University of Oregon in this manner. She felt employers could no MINUTES—Eugene City Council -- February 27, 2006 Page 1 City Council Meeting longer tout local public education as a benefit of living in the City of Eugene. She asked the City Council to stand up for the city’s children. Jennifer Geller , 2069 Olive Street, stated that she has two children in School District 4J and is a member of Stand for Children. She asked the City to appeal the repeal of the levy. She said the State was currently funding education at $428 less per student than it did in 1992. She felt the funding limit had come at a time when schools were asked to do more and when fixed costs continued to increase. She hoped the community would continue to work on adequate funding because the public education system was essential for young people, the economy, and society at large. She urged the council to exhaust all legal options available before a “radical anti-tax individuals” sacrifice the public good for their personal benefit. She asked the City, if it chose not to appeal the recent rulings, to pursue other options available, such as referring a different kind of levy to the voters so that the local school districts could continue to provide excellent education for the community’s children. Betsy Boyd , 2190 Washington Street, asked the City to appeal the tax court decision that found the categorization method for 20-67 unconstitutional. She also wished to thank the City for initially placing the levy on the ballot. She explained that she participated with the original group of parents that worked to ask the City Council to do so. Ms. Boyd said she also served as a member of the School District 4J Budget Committee. She related that those who had been involved with the campaign believed the tax court judge made a mistake in saying that all services when delivered within a school take on the character of education. She underscored that the activity levy clearly kept close track of services, such as sports, music, physical education, library, counselors, school nurses and costs associated with maintaining gymnasiums and facilities. She averred that those activities were separate from core curricular instructional time, funded under the State school funding formula. She said the recent repeal by the courts clearly thwarted the will of the voters. She reminded the council that leadership for the levy had come from parents and city officials. She averred that the community still relied upon its leadership to make sure the community stayed strong and provided its youth with access to a range of activities that would otherwise be unavailable to them. th Jasper Freedom , 972 West 4 Avenue, a fifth grader at the Family School, spoke on behalf of LEAD. He stated LEAD’s mission to develop the leadership skills of low-income teens, empowering them to address community problems and change the world. Through LEAD, young people were taught leadership skills, public speaking, and how to have fun in the outdoors. He said LEAD also worked to enhance self- confidence and self-esteem within teens, teens that often had few positive role models outside of LEAD. He underscored that young people in the LEAD program were in school, were not in the juvenile justice system, and were committed to live within the law. He related that former members of LEAD, which began in 1998, were now high school graduates who were attending college or working in the community. He stated that LEAD was growing and wished to be able to support more teens, but it needed the support of the community in order to do so. He reported that LEAD cost nearly $100,000 in 2005 and served 47 teens. He pointed out, as a point of comparison, that it cost approximately $50,000 per year to house one juvenile offender. He stressed that it was much cheaper to fund LEAD for teens that it was to put young people in jail. In closing, he stated that LEAD gave him the self-confidence to speak to the council and to “be who I am.” He promised the council that LEAD representatives would return for the next council meeting and would continue to testify until they had a teen center. Jessica Spaulding , 120 Aberdeen Street, said she had been involved with LEAD for two seasons. She shared that LEAD recently received two anonymous donations totaling $15,000 to help finance a teen center. She related that two of the teens, with the support of two staff members, held the first of an ongoing series of trainings called “Empowering Teens,” which 30 people attended. She said LEAD had been invited MINUTES—Eugene City Council -- February 27, 2006 Page 2 City Council Meeting to give a presentation on building a teen center to the Northwest Regional Conference of the Human Service Education Association in April. She noted that the presentation would be given by two teen coordinators and two staff. Members of LEAD were also invited to the national conference of the same organization. She stated that LEAD conducted its fourth annual “Plant-a-Thon” fundraiser, planting 2,100 trees at Camp Harlow, adding that the event would be held in another part of Lane County in 2007. Patience Murray , 38965 Dexter Oaks #6, said she was 13-year-old who joined LEAD in September 2005. She related that prior to joining LEAD, she was depressed and suicidal. She suffered from social phobias, including a fear of going to school. She related that after joining LEAD she decided to stop being depressed. She said LEAD was teaching her to be herself and make a difference in the world. She stated that some young people grew up with LEAD and the program made a big difference to them and to her. She averred that LEAD changed lives and she hoped that it would change many other lives. She thanked the council for letting her speak. Will Ross , 60 North Adams, also representing LEAD, asked the council for the chance to prove that the organization could be successful and a positive contributor the community’s environment. He asked, on behalf of LEAD, for the use of the vacant downtown fire station at City Hall for a teen center. He acknowledged concern for the safety of the community’s teens and agreed with that concern. He felt the teens were “no more special” and in need of safety than City employees, who were all in the City Hall building. He realized that there were risk management issues but said that LEAD was confident it could reach a “place of agreement.” He said the center would not be a drop-in center, but would include an intake process including parent signatures and screening. He stressed that LEAD had strict rules for participation, including compliance with all laws such as truancy, smoking, and substance abuse. He said the unoccupied space would provide an open recreation area, rest rooms, activity rooms, and areas where LEAD teens could do homework and get mentoring. He opined that LEAD could not have designed a better space than the vacant fire station. He remarked that the City provided unsupervised skate parks and hoped that the City would see that the center could work out. He said LEAD would pay its own utilities, janitorial costs, and any other costs incurred by its occupancy. He stated that no youth would loiter in the open courtyard, adding that even if they did, it would be a great way for youth and the Eugene Police Department to come closer. He commented that LEAD was so confident in its program that it was willing to move in with the police department. He asked the council to consider how many other youth groups would be willing to have the police as a neighbor. He said this was a rare chance to help the youth of the community without any cost, and asked the City Council to give favorable consideration to LEAD’s request. Krystine Watkins , 1049 Barstow Avenue, stated that she was a LEAD graduate and had been an active member of LEAD for eight years. She averred that LEAD developed her potential as a leader and helped her achieve her goals. She related that when she joined LEAD she had an intense social anxiety disorder and a fear of public speaking. She said LEAD helped her rise above her fears and develop her potential. She transitioned from being a LEAD teen to a volunteer and then to a staff member as of last August, becoming assistant director of LEAD. She said growing its leadership from within LEAD’s own ranks was consistent with LEAD’s mission to be an organization by and for low-income teens. She observed from the teens who spoke that they demonstrated a lot of great potential. She shared her vision for LEAD, which was to make it a national program. Toward this end, she related that she was documenting the LEAD curriculum so that it could be replicated in satellite areas across the United States. Requests for start-up information had come from more than a few locations in the United States and Canada. She was pursuing the means to do this through her educational goals. She said she was currently applying for the Family and Human Services major, with minors in non-profit management and Spanish at the University of Oregon. She added that part of what she was doing in her attempt to duplicate the program and make it national was to fundraise. She MINUTES—Eugene City Council -- February 27, 2006 Page 3 City Council Meeting said she was working on creating an endowment fund to sustain the LEAD program and help to afford the teen center. She reiterated that the teen center would be a vital community resource. In her studies, she had seen common denominators among the program participants, including the connection between boredom and negative peer culture which influenced youth crime and other community problems. She averred that the teens in LEAD would be active members in the teen center and would have a positive influence on teens not actively enrolled in LEAD. While she recognized that cost was an issue, she did not believe it was any longer an option not to have a teen center. John Brown , 101 East Broadway, commented that he had been upstaged by the youth group. He said he could not speak as eloquently as them. While he had not intended on speaking on behalf of LEAD, he urged the councilors to give their support to the organization. He thought the group had “it together,” and needed to be given a chance. Mr. Brown stated that as president of the Cal Young Neighborhood Association, he was present to testify on behalf of public safety. He said burglaries in his neighborhood, and likely throughout the City, were occurring in such record numbers that apathy had risen to a level at which people were no longer reporting them. He related that people thought it was pointless to report these crimes because no one would come, no one would take a report, and nothing would happen. He reported that his business partner had his vehicle broken into twice in the span of 48 hours and had to re-key five buildings as a result. He said that he spoke to a neighbor who had been burglarized twice over the course of three days. He recalled that Councilor Papé’s car was broken into last year and the only thing not taken was his council packet. He averred that it was a citywide problem. He said in a community where one had to steal three cars before being incarcer- ated, it was time to address the issue. He commented that the City could build all the parks and facilities it pleased, but it did no good if citizens were not safe. Vicky Scheuerell , 65 North Lawrence Street, shared her outrage at the repeal of the youth activities levy. She said she was part of the original group who worked the phone banks to pass the levy. She related that she talked to very few people who were against the levy. She shared her recent experience canvassing people to educate them about why funding was needed. She stated that most people did not need this education as they already knew that the community needed more school funding. She urged the council to look at the situation and to understand that the voters passed the levy. She stressed that the people who did not want the levy were in the minority. She asked the council to do what they could to further the appeal. Zachary Vishanoff , Patterson Street, opposed Item D on the Consent Calendar, an extension of the completion date for a project that qualified for the Multiple-Unit Property Tax Exemption (MUPTE), calling it a tax break stolen from the university neighborhood. He alleged that the neighborhood had not been given the opportunity to have a discourse on the issue. Mr. Vishanoff alleged that the governor was working, through his staff, on mixed-use development in the Fairmount Neighborhood. He thought the council should rule out eminent domain proceedings in that neighborhood for “Phil Knight, Frohnmayer, or our governor.” He asserted that the media should be covering this story, but likely did not understand the issue. th Drix , 307-½ East 14 Avenue, wished to remind everyone that Eugene was a community and the “best city and town in the State of Oregon and the U.S.” He thought the solutions to the City’s problems should be very simple. He said there was a hole in the center of Eugene, a “hole with a soul” in the center of Eugene and Eugene needed to come up with a goal to fill the hole. He believed that everyone working together, those watching on Metro Television included, with the combined spirit and intelligence of the community MINUTES—Eugene City Council -- February 27, 2006 Page 4 City Council Meeting could come up with some ideas for the center of our town that would be based on “human connection,” teens, seniors, “ramblers,” “geeks,” and everyone. He proclaimed that Eugene could inspire the world. nd Jana Jackson , 1012 East 22 Avenue, stated that she was a candidate for City Council Ward 3. She advocated for getting the City back to basics and funding core services first. She was disturbed to hear the Public Works Director discuss the potential of special fees to fix roads and lights. She averred that the reason cities incorporate was to have roads and infrastructure, public safety, and education. Those were the things she wished to “bring back” and fund first. She said whatever money was left over she would choose to fund other social services and the arts. Ms. Jackson also congratulated the LEAD members, calling them fantastic. She added that she agreed with Mr. Brown regarding the need for money for public safety. Continuing, Ms. Jackson noted that Item C in the Consent Calendar was the adoption of Revised Neighbor- hood Association Charters and asked that the council “vote it down.” She said the South University Neighborhood Association, of which she was a member, experienced trouble with a lack of transparency. She related that the charter had been modified to allow board meetings, which were supposed to be public, to occur over the internet and via conference calls. She averred that not all members had access to the technology and, given that inclusiveness and being open to the public was important, she opposed adoption of the revised charter. Councilor Solomon closed the Public Forum. Mr. Kelly thanked those who spoke. He was impressed by the work of the LEAD program. He noted that a lot of detailed thinking had gone into the LEAD presentation and asked the City Manager what it would take to convene an initial meeting between relevant staff and LEAD members. He asked for a memorandum on the results of the meeting, should it be held. City Manager Dennis Taylor said scheduling such a meeting was possible. He related that he had a conversation with the Executive Director of Library, Recreation, and Cultural Services (LRCS) Angel Jones regarding the recreation aspects of the LEAD presentation. He thought it was certainly possible to bring in a Facilities Committee member to address some of the proposals they had heard. He remarked that he was impressed with the presentations given at this meeting and the February 13 City Council meeting. Regarding neighborhood charters, Mr. Kelly averred that neighborhood associations often had email conversations regarding emerging issues and this was nothing extraordinary. He said there were five charters up for review on the Consent Calendar. He acknowledged that two neighborhood associations passed a revised charter to formalize the practice of communicating via email. Councilor Ortiz thanked the youth from LEAD for speaking to the council. She said it was easy to make good choices when good choices were laid out, but it was harder to make good choices when such choices were not laid out clearly. She lauded the work of the group. Councilor Ortiz asked if the City Manager had been in contact with the school districts regarding the ruling on the levy. City Manager Taylor responded that he spoke with both superintendents immediately after the ruling and they all agreed that the ruling should be appealed. He said they were working on the details of both the impacts of it and the legal basis for an appeal. He believed there would be information for the council in the next packet. MINUTES—Eugene City Council -- February 27, 2006 Page 5 City Council Meeting Councilor Ortiz said it puzzled her that someone would put energy into something that hurt the community’s children. She was saddened that people would work to overturn something the community obviously voted for and supported. Councilor Poling congratulated the representatives of LEAD, adding that he was proud of LEAD partici- pants and that they should keep up the good work. He noted, regarding the Youth Activity Levy, that he was going to ask the same questions Councilor Ortiz asked. Whether he agreed with the judge’s ruling, the fact remained that more than 70 percent of the voters approved the levy. He felt the City owed it to the voters to respect their will and appeal that decision. He called youth one of “the best renewable resources” the community has. He underscored that today’s youth are tomorrow’s leaders. He found the state level of funding for education to be an embarrassment. He supported doing whatever it took to help youth obtain an education that would enable them to compete in the world. Councilor Pryor was pleased to hear a specific recommendation from LEAD. He said if it was possible to make something happen, he was a huge supporter of youth and teen centers and the City should try to see if a teen center could be created. Regarding public safety, Councilor Pryor agreed it was a core service. He stated that the City should never forget the fact that it was in the business of providing certain core services and public safety should be at the top of the list. He said he wanted “to move heaven and earth” to see if ways could be found to provide that level of core service to the satisfaction of the people living in the community. Councilor Pryor reminded the council that he also worked hard to pass the school levy. He said the relationship between the City and the school districts with regard to the community’s children was the same. He underscored that the basic concept of the levy had not been ruled invalid. He wanted to try every option to ensure the 24,000 young people in this community were taken care of. Councilor Papé commended the LEAD youth for the good job done on the public speaking. 3. CONSENT CALENDAR A. Approval of City Council Minutes - January 5, 2006, State of the City Address - January 23, 2006, Work Session - January 25, 2006, Work Session B. Approval of Tentative Working Agenda C. Adoption of Revised Neighborhood Association Charters D. Adoption of Resolution 4859 Extending the Completion Date for Construction of Residential Units Granted a Multiple-Unit Property Tax Exemption Under Resolution No. 4816, as Amended Under Resolution No. 4824. (Arthur C. Carmichael, Jr. and Larry Von Klein) Ms. Ortiz, seconded by Ms. Taylor, moved to adopt the Consent Calendar. Councilor Taylor pulled Item D. Roll call vote; the Consent Calendar with the exception of Item D was approved with a unanimous vote, 7:0. MINUTES—Eugene City Council -- February 27, 2006 Page 6 City Council Meeting Councilor Taylor reiterated her objection to the Multiple-Unit Property Tax Exemption (MUPTE) for the proposed apartment building. She asserted that the developers should pay property taxes on the improve- ments, adding that she did not believe the project benefited the City. Councilor Kelly recalled that he supported the project when it was initially proposed. He did not believe a delay in construction should be a reason to discontinue the MUPTE. Councilor Papé asked if there was a time limit, within the law, in the allowance of extensions. Urban Services Manager Richie Weinman reported that the project developers expected to begin construc- tion by the summer construction season. He thought the project could be completed by January 2007, but Mr. Carmichael and Mr. Von Klein did not want to be pressured by that deadline given the nature of construction work. He said though the law would allow them to return and ask for further extensions, they did not expect to do so. In response to another question from Councilor Papé, Mr. Weinman said the State statute expired in 2012 and Mr. Carmichael and Mr. Von Klein could technically ask for extensions until then, but reiterated that he did not believe they would do so. City Attorney Jerry Lidz added that the council was not required to grant them extensions, including the one before the council at present. Councilor Papé commented that his concern was based on the possibility that a developer could make it a practice to ask for extensions. Councilor Solomon called for the vote. Roll call vote; Consent Calendar Item D passed, 6:1; Councilor Taylor voting in opposition. The meeting was adjourned at 8:23 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Dennis M. Taylor City Manager (Recorded by Ruth Atcherson) MINUTES—Eugene City Council -- February 27, 2006 Page 7 City Council Meeting