Springfield City Council — October 12, 2020

0:05 there we go so uh welcome everybody uh to the october 12th work session from the eugene or springfield city council um i'd like to call this meeting to order neil with roll call counselors van gorden here mo here more here stair here wood row here stationary here thank you very much um moving right on to the first item which is the regional and state transportation policies that would be uh emma newman take it away good evening counselors

0:52 thank you for having me good evening evening i'd like to good evening i'd like to discuss two different efforts that are launching um one is at the regional metropolitan level and the other is at the state level so the first is that the metropolitan policy committee which is the regional body that works on transportation policy is launching a process to update the regional transportation plan this is a pretty substantial update that is revisiting the goals policies looking at establishing some performance measures the overall effort is stemming from some federal regulations around regional planning for transportation there's more information about that process in attachment 3 if you'd like some more details

1:37 the second piece that is launching is that the land conservation and development commission which is part of the state is launching an equity and climate-friendly rulemaking process it's incorporating direction from governors brown's executive order on reducing greenhouse gas emissions that she issued near the beginning of this year in 2020 so what i'm here to discuss this evening are two parts i'm seeking council direction on how you would like to communicate between city council and staff on both of these topics there's a proposed communication plan that is open for discussion in your council briefing memo attachment one so i'm here to ask if the council supports that communication proposal

2:22 or if you'd like to make any adjustments and then the second piece is that there has been some communication to the state and at the regional level around this process that we've seen coming our way with regards to greenhouse gas emissions reduction planning at the state level i have an update to share with you this evening that i was i was just notified today that i was selected for the rulemaking advisory committee process so we'll have some springfield representation on that committee thank you congratulations emma thank you and so thus far this is kind of just the launch to the process i've highlighted some key items from the rule making charge that the state was discussing as well as

3:09 some key priorities that have been some themes throughout communication thus far but i'm here seeking your input on are there any additional springfield priorities to emphasize as we start engaging with the upcoming state process is there anything that you want to adjust anything missing and with that i would like to turn it over for discussion or questions anybody have any discussion uh questions comments i just have one comment and i think uh being involved myself and councilor van gorden involved with the mpc and i've been involved with the mpc for quite a while now i really appreciate the comprehensive document you put together here and

3:55 reflecting what what springfield needs is you know and basically what it boils down to is that the springfield still needs to we want to be flexible and not guided by other people's you know commandments so to speak but we also want to be a partner and i think this is a good segue to working with those folks and still addressing the governor's orders and there's there's room to work in here we just you know we're just being very watchful and we have some good staff that's helping us watch that so i i appreciate that effort a lot and they've really done us good on city council

4:44 um so just the the lack of implementation funding and so i'll just um direct this to you emma um partially we have seen in the past that the state has provided some funding for biking and pedestrian is that part of this you know is that going to continue you know i i realize the state has had to even cut back on some of their other transportation funding but how are they going to help us make possible this reduction in green get in a gas how's it called okay so that's one of the ways they're

5:29 going to help make it possible by providing funding for pedestrian and bicycle and another question i had was is there any possibility that the state might consider funding city-owned vehicles that would be electric great questions um so as you can see we've started to echo that that need for implementation of funding there's been some research done that was actually referenced in mayor lemberg's comments to the commission earlier this year that you can have all the great policies in place and visions set out and if there's no money to actually build the bike paths or to operate buses or to maintain our roads then you're only

6:16 going to get so far i think we're all very familiar with the timeline that it took to um develop like the mill race path the middle fork path some of these regional paths that are really significant and there's i would say even less funding available for that type of thing at this point in time but that's why it's important to engage in the regional and the statewide conversations around how to allocate limited transportation funding and then are there ways to increase revenue to pay for the infrastructure maintenance and enhancement and then with regards to electric vehicles um we could provide some more information on that but i know that there are some state incentives with regards to electric vehicle purchase and that's something that i'd be happy to follow up with more if you're interested in more

7:02 information i would be interested i realized that ltd for instance is looking to fund more electric buses i mean it's one of the things that we have a con we have control over are the vehicles that the city owns and operates um we don't have so much control over private vehicles and how much uh pollution they put into the air so just looking for ways in which we could actually make a difference and um you know it's those goals as i recall when we did that um

7:50 the scenario planning the scenario yes when we did that scenario planning those were fairly high goals that um the state was asking us is has any of that changed are we still there is that still what the expectation is so the state has set targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and one of the reasons for the governor's executive order and directing multiple different state agencies to more ambitiously work on this is because the current trajectory is not going to achieve those reductions and achieve those targets so there's a number of different things happening with the department of land conservation and development the oregon department of transportation department of energy and the department

8:36 of environmental quality to all partner and take the lead on different efforts clearly the state holds some of the authority for making changes to certain elements uh some things happen at the city level and some are as you were speaking to kind of the individual with a personal choices that community members make thank you i see you steve go ahead you're next okay i'm sure there's been some studies made within the city on replacing existing vehicles with electrics over time and hopefully within that study they're gonna how long how much for how much longer will they last under the main less maintenance that

9:22 will help pay for them in the long run so make it easier so ideas thank you steve do i see any other comments from other other counselors counselor steer go right ahead thank you counselor missionary um ammo during the um during the run-up to putting this plan together was there any discussion given to uh buying some bicycles as loners and if so were there more than one stop considered i i think that there are there are cities that have a program of loaning bicycles where you can only return them to one place and it seems as though that would make them less popular

10:14 so i think you might be getting a kind of bike share system is that correct that's right a bike share system yeah so back i think it was february of last year we brought in a discussion to the council and the direction that we received from you at that time was to pursue the expansion of bike share further into springfield if it's a possibility right now there's some conversations at the state level about how bike share is run with the economic impacts of covid earlier on this year a lot of bike share systems that were run by some of the larger companies were being taken out of smaller communities but thankfully the local system here is primarily sponsored by peace health with a very generous sponsorship which retains that local control um so i

11:01 continue to be in communication with the city of eugene staff to see where they're at for the operations of the peace health ride bicycles and when there are opportunities and uh even if there aren't opportunities i keep continuing to voice our interest in expanding bikeshare in springfield things just haven't sinked into place and made it happen quite yet but i'm hopeful for that in the future okay i i was thinking that the the ideal sites for the bike share program might track pretty closely to the main bus depots maybe the one on the one downtown off of b street and then the um one um the the maybe pioneer plaza and then

11:46 another one out in thurston somewhere but okay thank you councillor steer and i have counselor van gorden up to bat so um i think there's prob like well there there's a couple of different layers here first of all like having said it sat on nbc i thought that emma you and tom have done a really good job of keeping joe and i sort of up to speed and going the right direction um when it comes to specific sort of bike share questions or like how do we think about transportation one of the big things and you know obviously when i worked in transportation it was purely on the private sector was that you know it was to look at it from just pure

12:31 um when we think about how we treat our fleet and how we how we look for alternatives look at it from a pure uh financial return perspective so like from from a city perspective if you know we have you know plan inspectors that you know we look at replacing with an electrical car because it's cheaper to run i'm okay with that i know that eugene uses e-bikes during the summer sometimes i would be okay with that like just just more generally uh you know a general look at how how our fleet operates i'd be comfortable with but that's kind of not a little bit unattainable to what this regional and state transportation goals are um emma like in we keep hearing this uh

13:16 refer to the governor's executive order and we've heard it when we've heard housing doc you know the housing governance um side of things when mark was talking to us two weeks ago we've heard it with from you um so is it fair to say that the greenhouse gas executive order is pretty much driving a majority and rule making when it comes to transportation and land use right now in the state yes i would say that that is a key factor for the department of land conservation and development rule making process it's focused a lot on transportation planning rule which is the state rules that determine how we have to do transportation planning but it's also going to touch on some other elements as well and then park and then part of the sort

14:01 of you know communication from the npc is the federal plan that we're required to do and how we we sort of think about and talk about that as well right right okay like i i think we've got the right categories as a council to keep talking about this is a pretty complicated far-reaching topic but really telling continuing to tell rule making bodies that we want a lot of flexibilities really critical to meeting um meeting outcomes for the community oh i'm sorry one more question emma um do you remember that like do you remember the uh presentation that that came out of the odot's climate office it's been at ompac at npc a couple of times they're they're projecting with our

14:47 current plans right that we will that we will achieve a co2 reduction over the next 30 years just not as much as the governor would like right correct okay thank you thank you counselor van gorden is any other comments from counsel emma do you have enough direction to proceed i didn't hear any amendments to what was provided in the packet so unless there's any final thoughts on that wolflin will plan to continue communicating with councilors patinarian van gorden with their roles on the metropolitan policy committee and providing updates uh when it makes sense to do so through this rulemaking process

15:32 that's exactly what i got out of it as well thank you so much emma thank you have a good night youtube all right uh moving on to the next item uh number two would be revisions to council operated policies and procedures to allow for boards committees and commissions batch recruitment and opportunity for council annual review uh headed off by mary b and and aj go ahead uh good evening counselors uh this is mary bridget and aj um is obviously here running the meeting we're here before you tonight to um in a work session talk about some potential changes to your operating policies and procedures and then also give you an update on the

16:18 batch recruitment for the council committees so i thought i would start there and then we would go through the proposed changes and get your feedback the idea with the operating policy and procedures is that could come back in a regular session for your approval on the 19th so um just as a refresher the council had given direction to change the recruitment process for the council committees those committees are like the library advisory board museum committee b-pack etc to batch them meaning to only do recruitment once a year potentially twice a year if necessary before that you are interviewing as

17:04 needed and it was a lot of interviewing time so we thought we would try this new um process um right now the council is scheduled to have those interviews of potential interviewees in november at your work sessions the current recruitment is open until friday october 23rd there are openings on several committees library board museum committee the b-pack springfield police advisory committee historic commission springfield arts commission springfield planning commission so if you're a liaison or if you know somebody who's interested in those

17:49 um if you could uh encourage them to apply that would be great um staff has been doing an advertisement push on social media it's on the website they've put out several news releases so i think the word's getting out there but if you think of other ways you'd like us to promote it or other people that you would be interested in having them serve if they want to contact us that would be wonderful um and then a couple other things um we are in the application is a straightforward application where all the questions are same for applicants because one of the things that you're able to do with the batch is if you have a candidate who is applying for one committee but you think they might be a fit on another committee you could ask them if they wanted to serve on that committee

18:36 or if you had more vacancies or something so it gives you a little more flexibility and we are going to ask one change in the packets you receive for the applicants um and the sort of dovetails with the conversation you had at your last meeting about people providing their name and address when they testify so on the applications right now people submit their name address and email and that information gets published in our weekly packets and goes out to a lot of people and we've gotten some complaints about that just that people don't really like having their personal information out published like that i mean understanding it's technically a public record but it's one thing to have something be a public record it's nothing to actually publish it

19:21 and so we are asking if moving forward we could redact those items we'll have those items as part of the application but if we could just redact that in your packet if you want to get that information we could get it to you separately but it just might be something that makes people feel a little more secure when they provide that information so if anyone has any feedback on that aspect so we can i got a counselor van gorden followed by counselor woodrow and in my comments also but go ahead counselor van gorden no adam counselor steered i'm supportive of redacting or redacting it and still collecting the collect you know still collecting information as part of the application and then redacting it from the public review i think that would be appropriate

20:07 country woodrow yeah i'm fine with that the only thing i wonder oops holy we're still not hearing you really yeah it's broken up i it must be her wifi okay it says it is there can you hear me i can hear you now

20:53 can you hear me yes we can can't hear me yes we can no i might let me let me get in the camera and see what happens can you hear me now yes we can okay thank you are you guys telling me i have a small collection so it's messing up because i'm fine with the thing i wonder if there's a way to have a word in me i wonder if there's just a way we can have the ward mentioned some somebody like to have um a span across the city i think we got what you were saying uh definitely just just the ward would be yeah

21:41 that's what we got out of what you're saying i think you're pretty broken up i i am yeah that's basically you were saying is just make sure we had that ward where they lived in yes okay is there anything else merrily no okay thank you all right so um and i'll just go ahead and chime in too i have i have no problem with that i think we we must have their address address on their applications i totally uh we definitely need to have that i

22:26 believe um also you know even if we want to get into if it has to be into a verification process down the road i don't know but it's good information to have up front to verify their residency because that's part of the requirement of the committees and commissions based on particular committees and commissions but i am okay with that being redacted before it's published and just have it as a record back in the cmo's office but i concur with concert ben gordon um i think it's important that we don't put out um pii out on the web as bad as it is already to prevent doxxing et cetera so i think that's a good idea anybody any i got some head nods yeah looks like we got a concurrence all the way across the board mary b

23:12 great thank you that will um that will help us does anyone else have any questions overall about the batch recruitment process or um anything out of the update i left out i i think personally i'll just jump in i think that the batch recruitment process can was quite a project and i think it's put together pretty well and also does allow us some great flexibility if we see a candidate that may not be in a appropriate for one committee or not enough room for that person to move them over potentially if they're interested to move into another committee that that's great flexibility okay great um the next item is you oh i'm sorry sorry maybe it looks like oh stevie didn't have anything okay go ahead and marry me

23:57 okay um the next thing i wanted to do um and you just have to bear with me uh this is real in the weeds but we have to make some changes to your operating policies and procedures to implement the batch recruitment also your operating policies and procedures is something the council is to review on an annual basis so we thought we would combine both of them the attachment in your packet is a copy of your current operating policies and procedures and then it has in blue some commentary and then the changes are in a legislative format either struck through or underlined so i thought what i would do is just go through those and get your

24:43 feedback and then if there's anything else you see as we're going through it that you've always wondered about or um that you have questions about we can certainly approach it then um does that approach work everybody else good yes okay yes head nods okay okay sounds good maybe okay all right get ready to be you know it's exciting exciting stuff here but here we go first page on uh page 1 of 20 section 2.1 is uh talks about when your meetings occur and that also you take a recess for summer

25:29 and this past year you took a recess for spring break in march and this is just an addition to allow that to happen it doesn't mean you have to do it it just gives you that flexibility and makes your rules more more consistent so it adds the month march into section 2.1 oh i think because it's there we should always start it in march what do you think people sorry trying to be a little bit you know levity here go ahead um if that's all right we can make that change for approval okay i have a question about that sure so it makes it sound like we're

26:14 taking a lot of money you know time off is there any provision about how much time you know because you mentioned march june july and august and then again december and january i notice it does say time for so it doesn't mean we're going to take those entire months but is there any restriction on how much time we can take is that something that's a part of would that show up in policy you know it's not in your policies um that for example the council has to meet a certain amount of time uh per year and remember all this is meant to do is to give you the flexibility to take that time should you need to for example in december sometimes you'll start your break in

27:00 december but really the first monday doesn't start until after january so we but you're basically meeting all through january so um to answer your question there's no requirement of you having to meet all for a certain amount of time throughout the year um and really it's just to give you that flexibility if during those times you wanted to have a recess that you could okay thank you go ahead mary bridget we're ready okay okay the next change is section three under that same section that's also on page one of twenty um the first part is really just some re uh wording to make it more clear talking about counselors being expected to

27:46 attend all work sessions and regular meetings um but it does change it if you are if a counselor is going to be absent to notify the city recorder and that helps her organize the meeting and ensure that there's a quorum and then it also is it used to be called the mayor the city manager and when it was multiple people sometimes they um it made it more confusing because you know the right hand wouldn't be talking to the left hand necessarily and you wouldn't know who wasn't coming so it just gives one person to be the person who has the information about someone being absent

28:37 the next change is more significant um and more substantive i guess i would say and that's going to section on page 2 of 20 section 3.2.6 so these are excused absences from counsel you know um for example illness family emergency schedule vacation um and this is adding if the council would like a um an employment conflict reason for an excused absence um and then what that does is that allows if you have a work conflict that that can be excused so i don't know if it was preface and and i don't know if the council was aware that um christine and i sat down earlier this

29:24 spring or later this spring i guess it doesn't matter later this spring and went through all of these that we took several hours going through all these with the intent of making things better for staff for organization and also easier for council to operate specifically for example you know leonard your schedule is always all over the place and we were thinking that the the employment issue is an issue and but it's real and your volunteer and it should not be something that's going to hamper you and or discourage other people from becoming counselors just because of those rules so that was that's we went through all these and then turn them into mary bridget and

30:09 aj so that you can go through and clean them up but that that was the that's what prefaced all this was was us going through that so you folks have some historical knowledge go ahead leonard yeah thanks i um i just wanted to say that the uh that mayor lundberg had always been very tolerant very understanding of war conflicts and it it was much appreciated i'll pass that along yeah and that's been my same experience when i've traveled before that like now we're sort of codifying what we've done in the past right counselor more you had a hand up go ahead yes i realized that the thing i wanted to comment about was in

30:54 the previous section and so if we're finished talking about this if we could go back to the location of the our regular meetings of the common council it's a 1-1 the regular meetings of the common council shall be held in the city springfield city hall council changes the location must be in accordance with city code section 2.050 i wondered what that code was if if there is any other provision for where we might meet oh that's a great question so i can tell you that under public meetings law you are um jurisdictions are required to meet within their jurisdiction

31:39 um so that's one another area and i'm i can look up um that section of code that area the code has general information about running the city see jurisdictions are then anywhere within the city yeah that's just under state law that just means that you know the um you this springfield city council should have its meetings in springfield and then sometimes when you have joint meetings you can go to the county or the city of eugene but it's to keep the meeting where the public reasonably believes it would be okay so in the event that we wanted to have for instance a town hall meeting or something where it was not a

32:24 we weren't going to vote necessarily but where all councilors could show up i mean there's always this issue about how many of us can be together at the same place at the same time but you know is there any provision for us for instance meeting in the thurston area at some time just to have a listing session or um you know in other parts of the city and i realize right now we're meeting meeting virtually so we're meeting everywhere all the time but in the event that we ever go back to actually meeting in person is there i just wondered about how restrictive this is that we have to meet in city hall what if there were a problem with city hall

33:09 i mean we could meet in the for instance the justice center or something like that yes you could so remember that um these rules are your operating policies and procedures you can deviate from them in certain circumstances so i would say certainly if we had an emergency in that building and let's say remote didn't work you could meet someplace else in springfield if the council wanted to have some other kind of meeting you know if you recall but when we were going to do the visioning project um more in person we were contemplating town hall type meetings and having more than one counselor be there having a potential for that and we were just going to notice those i think the difference with those is they're not quote city council meetings

33:54 with the agenda and everything that you guys do at a council meeting or work session so we might notice it as a quote public meeting so we don't get sideways with public meetings law but it doesn't mean you have to conduct it like you would any every city council meeting but i do think having a consistent place to have your city council meetings lets the public know where you're going to be right well i understand that but i just sometimes i i've i had suggested in the past that we might do something different and i was pointed back to this which made it or law but it sounds as if it is it is our policy and so therefore if we agreed you know the council agreed to change or do something a little different or to do a town hall where we could all

34:40 be present but not be making not voting that that would be possible i believe that is possible so are you done councilman so just so for the future into this document correct me if i'm wrong mary bridget there's any part of this document that if the whole council feels they want to deviate from with the consensus of the council the majority of the council and mayor whatever we can do that it's not this is not law correct that's right so you have the ability to change these policies it's a two-thirds vote actually uh by the president counselors who are present and um i think that you know remember i agree they're not um they don't have

35:25 the same level as your charter in terms of having to adhere to but the more you rely on these and act consistently with these then the more you can keep yourself away from an attack that you don't follow your rules so that's always something to keep in mind but just like you were saying counselor more if you wanted to do if the council gave direction they want to do a town hall meeting or meet in a different place of town we could either temporarily change these rules and make that happen or do some other change that shows your direction and that you wanted that to happen thank you mayor brady so where were we on employment conflict for an excused absence for city council meetings and i think we had

36:12 an agreement you know a consensus there anybody disagree with that change perfect next item okay next small change is just um encouraged to give the city recorder 24 hours notice if you plan to remotely participate which is a little mute now that we always remotely participate but we drafted these before when that was a bigger bigger threat so um that changed and then the next change is actually on page 5 of 20 and it's section 9.3 this has to do with records requests for electronic records it's just updating it so if we get an electronic

37:00 a record request for electronic records we'll notify you um so you're aware um and then if you have any records that may not be on the city system then you would know okay i can get those over to the city and it's just cleaning up the language a little bit doesn't really change um the process um but just updates it i think we're all good head nods good okay that sounds good next item ma'am great next change pikachu seven of 20 and this is section 1.2 and so um this is talking about work sessions and this sets out what your agenda generally

37:46 is at a work session and as you know your agenda at a work session is different it's not as many items as you have a regular session there was a section about committee reports but you guys generally don't do that in your work sessions you do that in your regular meeting so it's just housekeeping to clean that up and up to you whether you want to remove that or not i'm good with it the way it's written i think we've been working pretty good anybody else want to change it all right oh go ahead letter counselor steer yeah i uh thank you counselor pissionary i um i think it's a good idea um because uh it really um gives us an opportunity at the public meetings to explain to everyone what's going on

38:32 on our committees and uh i think it's better to just do uh kill two birds with one stone so to speak and counselor mo i have a printout of this i don't have the page numbers on it so i printed out before everything was going on but i do have a comment on 5.6 when when i can do that we can do that i'll put a note on there okay all right okay and i agree with you leonard holt you know it gives greater a greater a much greater reach when we report on committing uh committees at the end of council sessions okay so we'll keep that section in your regular meetings you'll have the opportunity to report on

39:17 your committee reports or other business but not have it in the work session okay great okay um this section 1.4 is not something that gets used very often this is another proposed change um but you could there are some you know instances where you may call a special work session um and that would be um you know the city manager and council leadership could do that it used to have but the proposed changes to remove um the mayor and three members of the council as the ability to call a special

40:05 could you hear any of that yes we heard a lot of that not much of you okay sorry about that i don't know if that was me okay it's all good i love this virtual stuff so this has to do with um calling a special work session clarifying that city manager and council leadership can call a special work session and read and changes it from the mayor or three members of the council sounds good to me my head nods looking good people smiling all right moving on mary b thank you okay good deal uh moving on to section um 5.1 on page 9

40:51 of twenty and steve she has it on the screen for you i'm sorry to interrupt i'll just let steve know that she has this up on the screen for you to read if you're getting to that spot i'm on on the let's see 5'46 right she's coming okay and she's coming up two years go ahead so this just allows sometimes people will contact um the council and instead of their three minutes they want more time and they can't they contact the city ahead of time and and get approved by that um and this just allows for additional time instead of ten minutes sometimes people want five minutes sometimes they need something else so it's just updated for flexibility it's not

41:37 something that happens often but it can't happen sounds good to me i got a thumbs up flexibility merrily is happy everybody's happy okay 5.6 5.6 um counselor mo um i think this is the one that you um had a comment about i do okay just like when we're batching the applications for the committees the address is pretty pretty sensitive at the last council meeting a lady spoke up that she was a lot of people are afraid to do that when they testify which the rest of the council agreed with and i do too and on 5.6 it says uh uh when they address the council they should state their name at an address or location i think it should be

42:23 name and ward or name city and board or urban growth boundary it's really nice to know sort of where they come from in springfield when they speak but i don't need to know where they live okay any other um comment yeah i think a lot of us we're like you know we're on the same sheet of music i think just maybe a little tweaking to this one because it is in order mary b yeah yeah just explicitly taking the address out i think would be what would be it the rest of them is our friends yeah and definitely insert ward and just like steve would say it was actually within and ugb would be a great location to have so kind of clean that clean that up

43:10 go ahead steve there are there are some places in springfield are in eugene address but they're in like ward two glenwood so um it it's it can be confusing but i like to be more clear if we can yes and then sherry moore definitely had your hand up i'm sorry i missed you a second ago that's fine um i just noticed that it says all persons addressing the council shall do so from the podium after first having lally so we no longer are having people address us from the podium so is there is that something that we just need to take out no we're just in a special circumstance [Laughter] go on for a while i

43:55 you know if in the public and in a public meeting maybe we could say from the podium but um this they they they are dressing from a virtual podium at the moment when they when they speak yeah you bring up a good point i you know what we our staff have been talking about sort of behind the scenes is that you know even once the pandemic subsides and we're back to more public meetings it's very likely that public meetings you know all over oregon and will be different in that they'll be a hybrid of a remote and a public meeting in person you know we haven't worked out the details of that yet but i do think that that's a good point that it could very

44:41 well be that people have the opportunity to ema you know send written comments to um testify via their computer from home or their phone or come in and so i'm foreseeing that once we sort of figure that out more we'll come back to you with some other changes that are going to be more um inclusive of that process so i do think that's a good point um because definitely these rules were written contemplating an old-fashioned city council meeting where you come in and do your three minutes and speak at the podium so i think that's a i think that's a valid point and we'll probably have changes maybe in the near future about that thank you very me i got a recommendation just we got a quick fix how about when acknowledged to speak

45:26 before the council they shall first having loudly and clearly say to their name etcetera they shall you know after after loudly clearing exciting their name but actually just after acknowledged and permitted to speak before the council then blah blah blah blah and it doesn't matter where they're at oh okay yeah um okay i will uh we'll look at wordsmithing that to be um more general so just for for uh office procedural here and i'll get you just a second sean the um i think the spirit of our conversation is to tweak that to make it more applicable to nowaday times and then we can move on without having to go back to the council to say hey was this tweak okay

46:11 is the council okay with that ask your question again it's instead of having to come back instead of mary bridget necessarily coming back to show us how she tweaked 5.6 that we can entrust her to to contemplate how the people are addressing us whether it's from a podium or from virtual etcetera but but allow her to just um put the correct words that are applicable oh sure sean go ahead i'm sorry i'm like i'm comfortable with that i i just think we want to sort of express our intent here right because we're gonna ch if we just change language and strike podium technically it's accurate but we want to sort of acknowledge that that means that you know we would expect

46:56 we might see somebody virtually or something like that um be a little bit more explicit the only the other thing that i would um maybe take out like is maybe we could switch to something like provided their name like clearly their name i don't know where loudly and clearly came from that seems like oddly specific um but you know just provide your name i think would be fine okay and i appreciate uh joe that you mentioned when they're acknowledged because i don't you know we don't necessarily want somebody standing up in the chambers and shouting at us from where they're standing you know i'm so i can see where the podium came into play in the past but i agree that we do need to you know change it so that it's a little more

47:41 applicable to today and into the future so i would trust mary bridget to do that um what are we we're not voting on this tonight anyway are we or what are we doing we're just discussing we can't vote in a work session but we can give them a head nod for consensual consent consensus and we're good with it to move forward so yeah we're going to take care of this and i think it'll be coming up well you will vote on it at a regulation right now scheduled for the 19th so you will get to see the final final if you um and hopefully you'll probably just be in the consent calendar be my guest yeah yeah um one one aspect of this and i did really appreciate the discussion you had at your last meeting about people not feeling comfortable

48:26 um they want to address their government but they don't want to share their address one wrinkle and sorry to be the lawyer for a second is that in lan when you do land use hearings um it generates this thing called the interested parties list which is you are obligated to send a written decision to people who testify often and so i would like if it's all right with you to be able to explain that and insert that in your rules because you do land use hearings so rarely that i'm worried if we don't put it in your rules we'll forget and then we won't do it and it will be kind of a create confusion when we're when we're getting ready to do a hearing and your land use hearings are often very significant so the smoother we can have those go the better so

49:11 um if that works for you i think what i'm hearing is um have acknowledged by the council in there and uh ward or ugb um and if it's all right with you address if we're in a land use hearing you want to be part of the interested parties list is that okay i'm good with it we got head nods and thumbs up merely good with that yep okay great thank you okay is section 3.2 page 11 of 20. this is another um sort of housekeeping this is to um the council gets reimbursement for expenses it's putting a 60-day window to submit expenses it's really just an

49:56 administrative matter to help us better manage that and that would include mile reimbursement requests correct yes okay just making sure council knows that that's sherry struggling what are you trying to say counselor he was looking at me and i was looking at sean anyway moving on mary b before i get through it okay let's go to the next one quickly okay quickly all right page 12 of 20 section 4.2 and i apologize i think i i did not underline this but it's the last sentence this has to do with when you are um

50:42 when counselors are speaking to um the public or at an event um you know it gets to that idea as a council speaking on behalf of the whole council are they speaking on what their views are and it's just trying to clarify that if you're speaking on behalf of the council you say hey i'm speaking on behalf of the whole council or if you're speaking on your own behalf in your role as a counselor but just your views just to clarify that if they if they're invited to speak so in the situation where a counselor um wished to speak

51:27 to a gathering and wasn't necessarily invited um you know do they have to be invited i mean so i guess i just need a little clarification there because if i were at a group meeting and i wanted to speak not on behalf of the council necessarily but i would identify myself as a counselor and then speak on my own behalf how restrictive does this you know we have to be invited to speak yeah yeah i would think that that if you're invited as a counselor you're going to be welcomed there but if you're going there just to speak and not invited guests then you're there as a citizen

52:13 but you still have to identify yourself as a counselor and and identify the fact that you are speaking no no my understanding is that i'm a counselor 24 7. that's not like a policeman you're a counselor i need some clarification about that and and i see you two lettered after that after mary bridget responds um well i think that i think that's a good point that you're trying to get at the difference i think of in a community event you're invited to speak or a community event that you may attend in your role as a counselor but let's say it's not like you know something where you get a a specific invitation but you might still show up

52:58 i'll not only show up but may want to share with the group um you know i share as an individual but i felt i in the past i've always felt i needed to identify myself as a counselor but that i'm speaking on my own behalf if i'm not but i'm not representing the council unless i'm actually am representing the council which i don't represent the council but i do represent myself as and i am a counselor does that make sense yeah you know one workaround we might be able to do is maybe this in which they're invited is is more problematic that way it could be just a community event in your role as a counselor you know if you want to attend something as a counselor and you're

53:44 you want to just be clear whether you're speaking me counselor more this is what i think or us the springfield city council this is what we think is that does that work that works for me but is it true that i am so i'm just going to clarify this with counselor pictionary that i am a counselor 24 7. i'm asking you mary bridget oh i'm sorry i thought you were asking cancer missionary i think you're applying this to him i'm sorry about that i um i think that uh the way i would frame it and i'm not trying to split hairs is that when you are um let's see how to say this when you're in your capacity um no matter what time it is you're a

54:30 counselor um and it's important to say that you're a counselor i think if you are just an you know doing something as an individual you should say hey i'm not here as a counselor i'm just being an individual so i i do agree that i think that your role as a counselor and what people perceive is that you're kind of quote always on i guess um i think i i do see it that way but you owe it but you should always clarify when in fact you're speaking as an individual for yourself not necessarily representing the city or the council i think that's a good practice okay thank you and leonard and then followed by sean well it it i um i think that that is the fix

55:15 on mary bridget i was i was going to suggest um add to the end of that sentence in in their capacity as a city council or something like that but um i um i i would say that there are times where you're clearly not speaking in your capacity as a city councilor and i would say if you're let's say you're a coin collector or you're a dnd player if you're going to a coin collecting convention and you're speaking to other coin collectors i don't think you need to identify yourself as a city councilor and i don't think that you would have to do it at a d convention either because it was clearly it's clearly not related to your duties and so i i would i would use that as an example of a time when you wouldn't be required

56:02 even inside the city limits to identify yourself as a city councilor isn't that correct i'm asking you mary b yeah i think that's a great example okay and sean go right ahead i'm concerned that trucker lynn is uh questioning coin collecting or d d plane [Laughter] um i guess i'm not super concerned about really litigating all the rules here down to the t i think it's right like it's upped us to sort of back back up and talk about the intent of what we're like and how we act appropriately in the community

56:48 because the reality is is that we're all we've all been doing this a long time and we should be really clear with people when we represent the voice of the city and the voice of the council and what you know we should be really clear with people when we really don't and we're just speaking our pontificating our own opinion and i don't know that mary bridget's going to be the one that's going to be able to litigate that down to the actual t i think it requires a little bit of judgment to really put ourselves in positions where when we're ready to speak for us as a body we know those moments and we can do that effectively and when we're not we should be really clear with the people we're talking to about what our opinions are and what our beliefs are because we're representing ourselves we're both at the same time

57:33 i'm just so can i just say that i have been told that i could not speak at a public gathering because i was a city counselor even though i was speaking for myself and so that's why i'm asking counselor van gorden i look i don't know the exact situation for one like i can tell you what i've done in the past is when if i've been asked because a counselor is an elected official on places i've just been clear it's like my opinion on say leadership and how voting works or whatever is sean's opinion it's not the council of springfield's opinion right and i think it's really easy to get lost in that and we just want to put our kind of put our hands in the middle and say like guys we're there's days when we speak for the whole council there's days when we don't and we've got

58:18 to be really crystal clear with the community when that's the case okay i think this horse is pretty beat up but makes a lot of sense and very important are you good to go with what you have mary b on this one yep i think i got it the um next change is page 14 of 20 section 2.1 and this is when we're getting into boards and commissions and committees um so this just is a change um that council leadership thought it would be good to have the statement of purpose for each committee on the application so i think that lets people know who are interested in um being on the committee you know

59:05 what the role of that committee is each committee has a statement of purpose and it really is when a committee is created just to give some focus to a purpose of that committee um yes i wanted to say i agree with this one um a lot because i think we sometimes have people show up to interview for a committee that have a different idea of what the committee is for um than what the committee is actually doing so i think to have a stated purpose that's it's fairly specific i mean it doesn't have to be you know lengthy or anything but fairly specific as to what the purpose or mission of a of a committee is i think that's really good

59:50 gives people applying for an opportunity to to get a handle on it ahead of time okay great well if that works then we'll add that thumbs up people good right on okay the next section is um just a little further down the page 2.3 and this talks about this is when in your first regular meeting in january when the mayor appoints the council liaison spots to the city boards commissions and committees so as you all know you're all liaisons on several committees um old language was that the council was in disagreement they may overrule an appointment if it is a council um representative meaning i think what this is trying to

1:00:35 say is that if the mayor made a decision and the council was like no i don't think he you know that person should be the liaison they could override it um and that's just asking to remove it it's not something that um i have seen um ever happened but i suppose it could since you know rules so that's uh one proposed change about that okay and the next okay next one is um this is on page 15 of 20 section 3.7 which we just ended up redrafting and this is really the batch recruitment section

1:01:20 so it allows you it it just says um that you'll fill vacancies um as needed uh you can fill them however you want to fill them so if you want to batch them or you don't want to batch them you can you can do that um it sort of generalizes publicizing a little more instead of things like having to be in the paper or other things so it talks about media and website postings um and then it talks about filling out an application on a form provided in the city manager that gives us a lot of i think regularity and consistency in the information you're getting you do have interviews for applicants um budget committee and planning commission mwmc

1:02:06 um are ones that you'll do interviews for and i'm thinking lrapa probably needs to be in there um sometimes those bodies will give you a recommendation they don't have to um this council has it's my understanding the direction is is that you like to hold the interviews for the other committees as well but you would like some flexibility if someone is reapplying for a second consecutive term and um they want to be on a particular you know for example they're reapplying to be on the library board that they don't have to be interviewed again and the mayor and council president could uh waive that interview the council still has the opportunity to appoint that person so they still have the final say it just sort of speeds up the interview process

1:02:58 i said a question about term limits do we have in here i and i didn't see it being addressed term limits for people on committees i think those are on the committees oh i'm sorry i'm pumped in they're listed on the committees uh that's a great question those are um i believe they're i won't be able to find it right this second but they're in here for your operating policies i think people do two consecutive terms and they have to take a year off and it could come back thank you um the next change is section 3.8 on the next page

1:03:43 and this has to do with following the interviews you know you all discuss um and arrive at an appointment by consensus and then actually they're not appointed until the at the next regular meeting you know the council takes that action so this is some old language about if you can't reach a consensus you do written votes and if there was a tie the mayor would break the tie and i think it's just a suggestion to remove that language as um as not being current sounds good to me anybody else we got i heard merely say yeah so okay looks good mary b all right page 17 of 20 we are getting to the end i promise um this is just section 3.15

1:04:30 updating how we'll train committee members volunteer committee members about ethics there used to be a specific statute about planning commissioners but it's been repealed so as you remember we drafted that guide we're going to give the volunteers all the guide and then have a quick training with them about their responsibilities in terms of public official ethics that's your conflict of interest use of office kind of stuff yes um i've got one quick question did anybody else have a question on that one so maybe on that one um it says here that it's uh the committee it's let's see that get a briefing by the board commission community task force chairperson or staff liaison um i would like if

1:05:16 unless people disagree i would like to make it mandatory that staff liaison is involved in that and that that the chairperson can be but if the chairperson gives them some sort of briefing and training and that relieves the staff liaison from doing that i don't know if i i like that it kind of hurts with with us with consistency because a chairperson is a temporary position and it and could go askew i need some clarification what do you use what are you saying on 3.15

1:06:02 you're saying that the liaison would would um give the first sentence the first sentence where it says right or task force chairperson or staff liaison regarding duties and responsibilities of the members of the body so what that's doing is is allowing a chairperson to do the training etc or the the briefing of that committee to that person but yet the chairperson is is sometimes and actually is a revolving seat but the staff liaison should be provided consistency so i don't have a problem with the chairperson helping another person but but i wanted to make sure that our staff liaison for each committee and commission is directly involved with new

1:06:47 people being appointed and that they get given abreast and and fill in the workings of each one of those commissions and committees so you're just saying remove the um you're saying that they would receive a briefing by the staff liaison is that what you're saying well i don't want to eliminate the chairperson i want to be able to allow the chairperson to do that but always the staff liaison so i guess you could just eliminate the chat chair person and they can do that on their own without having to be saying it's okay okay i just want to make sure the staff is involved in that not not drop it off on somebody that's that's a chair volunteer okay

1:07:39 any other questions about that one we good to move on yep okay okay page 18 of 20 is section 5.9 and this is sort of related to training um volunteers adds a sentence that violation of this provision may be cause for removal from a board commission committee or task force this has to do if there are um kind of the same discussion if they're there speaking on their behalf as an individual or as a representative of the city and just recall that volunteers serve at the pleasure of the council so you have the ability to remove somebody if um they are not complying with the rules of boards committees and commissions and i think this is just um clarifying

1:08:24 when people are out in public i like it yes all right everybody else good pretty good head nods okay okay last one page 19 of 20 adding a 6.8 and that's just um having minutes from boards commissions and committees available for the council so um i think the city manager's office can sort out how they want to do that if they want to send those to you periodically or just have them available but it's just allowing i think the council to have more of a connection to those minutes

1:09:09 gary yes so i don't know how difficult it would be most often minutes are electronic anyway i'm wondering if they could be posted on the website under the committee so that people could have an idea of what's going on in these different committees i'm not sure that would be a requirement necessarily but it just seems to me that they provide minutes to the mayor and the city council that also should be provided to the public yeah i can certainly check with um the city manager's office about doing that that seems reasonable

1:09:55 um yeah so i i like the provision i think um i think we would all benefit for uh for additional access to you know additional to access to minutes um i don't know that emailing them to us is the right answer so if the cmo comes up with the way where you know they exist in a file directory or something and we can go get them when we need them or we know how to go get them um i would be okay with that work i'm good self-serving i'm doing a little self-service i don't necessarily need them emailed to me okay and i'm gonna go i'll go ahead uh i didn't see you merrily go ahead i know i've i i understand what shawn's saying if that is the case i think it would be helpful if we had a um a month calendar as to when the

1:10:43 meetings were held so that then we would know when to look for them if we wanted to find them so i mean if it was just provided for the counselors just what when each meeting happens during the month so that if we had a specific one we wanted to follow up with we would know when when that meeting was was being held that that's all so i have no problem with what sean said just just make it make it easy so we know when those meetings those minutes might be available and sherry so if in fact we have a month calendar is that something that could be provided on the website again for the public to be aware of when those meetings are being held yeah that's a great point i think they are already on the

1:11:28 um events in the on the website but i can confirm that and um i think this brings up a good point another thing aj and i looked at in this project was updating the website on boards commissions and committees i think it needs a refresh and uh so it's more friendly to the public and for the volunteers thank you yes i agree ron go ahead um this may be a little like this may be a little bit of a tangential question because it may exist in the bylaws of individual committees what drives when the agenda's published and when the actual packet of information gets out it seems like

1:12:13 based on um based on the committees that i sit on they come out at all different times because there's something where we write down that this is what our goal and plan is to get the information for committee members that's a good question i'll i'll answer it and then aj can jump in so i think the sort of backstop is the note these are all these meetings are subject to public meetings laws so the backstop is the state statute which is at least 24 hours um the council you have a and planning commission both those committees meet more regularly they have a very set time you know packet comes out thursday meetings monday uh set process i don't believe the other committees do have a set process for when their committee when their pac quote packets come out um unless aj

1:13:00 knows differently and i don't think it's something that's necessarily approached in the bylaws and so this is aj yes um you are correct mary bridget as far as it's at the discretion of the staff liaisons with the knowledge that they must provide it at least 24 hours prior that being said we have allowed flexibility in our boards commissions and committees with the exception of the planning commission of course they are similar to council as far as publishing and packets but we have allowed for flexibility therefore um oftentimes agendas will be posted of boards and commissions they will send the agenda out to interested parties but they don't necessarily send out the entire packet

1:13:46 um the packet does go to the committee members so it's been a matter of flexibility that being said we can standardize things it it just reduces that flexibility i i would my opinion is i would be really interested in taking that kind of approach and being just a little bit more consistent with when they come out and making sure that we're sort of doing the logic check to that our volunteers have an opportunity opportunity to read and digest packets um but that that's my opinion on it thank you so quick question nancy is or aj nancy correct me if i'm wrong all of our upcoming events and committee meetings are already on the website correct this is nancy yes that is correct okay

1:14:32 so that takes care of that um and also there are links there i if there's not links then i would encourage just like with sean saying just provide links so there may be a link to their packet for each meeting that's on the website something that's that can connect them to the information makes it easier and i too do not want a uh an influx and an increase of emails based on all the activities of the committees and commissions because if i am curious about that i know where to find that um so okay is that clear as much with you guys no i think that's helpful that's um that's good feedback those were all of the changes to the operating policies and procedures that

1:15:18 we were going to um propose um so unless any other counselor has anything else they'd like to see we can finalize these and have these back to you at your next regular meeting to adopt sounds good to us head nods everybody's good merrily yes yes okay all right thank you mary bridget it's a lot of work thank you a.g i know you put a ton of work into this as well so uh anything else for the good of the order on the work session from staff okay having none our executive session is slated for seven o'clock um as far as notice does this apply to where we cannot start our executive session before seven mary

1:16:04 b um i just need to confirm with aj i think it's an approximate time is that right aj that's that was my understanding i thought it is an approximate time that being said we will need a few minutes to get out of this meeting and go into the other meeting platform which is the go-to meetings um so by the time we get in there it's likely to be closer to seven o'clock um and and we do need to be able to clear the chambers and everything so i would say if everyone's comfortable just plan on being into your go to meetings platform by seven o'clock um i'm question aj where are we finding that it you received a calendar invite

1:16:50 a calendar if you did not accept it in your email you would have received a calendar invite it may be in your email inbox or it will be grade on your calendar okay thank you so after that from aj i guess we can go ahead and close this meeting and go back and come back to the executive session and whenever she's ready to get everything together we can start when she's ready