CC Minutes - 04/18/07 Work Session

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M I N U T E S Eugene City Council Work Session McNutt Room—Eugene City Hall April 18, 2007 Noon COUNCILORS PRESENT: Andrea Ortiz, Chris Pryor, Betty Taylor, Bonny Bettman, George Poling, Jennifer Solomon, Mike Clark, Alan Zelenka. Her Honor Mayor Kitty Piercy called the meeting of the Eugene City Council to order. She recognized Ms. Taylor, who wished to place a motion before the council. Ms. Taylor, seconded by Mr. Clark, moved that the City Council direct the City Manager to institute proceedings in eminent domain for the Joe Green (Map 18-03- 20-00, Tax Lot 101) and Beverly (Map 18-03-20-21, Tax lots 101,200,300,302) properties—more particularly described in Exhibits A and B and further moved that the manager or his designee prepare an authorizing ordinance for a public hear- ing on May 21, 2007. Ms. Taylor said it was a crucial time to take action as applications to build on both lots had been denied. She said reasons to acquire the property included water quality as pollution in Amazon Creek had been the subject of cleanup efforts and development on the properties would further pollute the headwaters. She said other reasons included connection to the Ridgeline Trail, protection of wildlife habitat and rare plants, and danger to potential homeowners from slides if building occurred on the sites. She referred to a letter from Art Johnson regarding the City’s liability if building was allowed in slide areas. Mr. Poling expressed dismay with the procedure as he was contacted by the neighborhood association the previous evening about the proposed motion by Ms. Taylor and the motion was not distributed by email until 4 a.m., which gave other councilors very limited time to study the issue. Mr. Poling, seconded by Mr. Clark, moved to add the following language to the end of Ms. Taylor’s motion: “Finally, the City Manager shall (1) identify at the time of the public hearing a plan for adding to the urban growth boundary and the buildable lands inventory acreage that is equivalent to the acreage to be acquired by the City, and (2) delay completion of the acquisition of the property covered by this motion until the acreage is added. Mr. Poling said if both parcels, which represented approximately 65 acres, were removed from the buildable land supply within the urban growth boundary (UGB) then that amount should be replaced, although it did not need to be in the form of a single parcel. He was interested in allowing a one- or two-year period for that to occur, but had received legal advice against including a future timeframe. City Attorney Glenn Klein explained that including a future time period for addition of equivalent acreage could not be done because the council could not bind a future council, or even itself, to approve a future MINUTES—Eugene City Council April 18, 2007 Page 1 Work Session