Springfield City Council — May 3, 2021

0:03 and we are ready all right i'm going to call the work session for the springfield city council to order with roll call mayor van gorden here councillor pitts here council ramon here counselor rodney here councillor stare here councillor woodrow and counselor petitioner president thank you looks like we've got two items tonight the first is uh the engineering design standards and procedures manual with jeff pascal thank you mayor and thank you councillors um pleased to be here to bring these updates to this to the eds pm as we refer to it in the department the acronym but the design or just the design manual

0:49 but uh what you have before you is a long time coming we've been working on them for quite a while and they've been sitting for quite a while and it's a collaboration of effort between dpw staff and the city attorneys staff to in essence for chapter 12 rewrite chapter 12 for clarity and trying to streamline some things and clear some things up on how we process public improvement projects and and the procedures we use and so that it's uh easier understood by developers and developers reps and uh several of the folks who worked on it i sure are listening in tonight and i know christina i see her there so if i get stuck on anything

1:35 that's the legal area she can jump in and answer any of those questions um but tonight i hadn't re-read the chapter in a while and so prepping for tonight i've reread it a couple times without track changes on it this time and not to over simplify but the reality is is we're not changing how a public improvement gets initiated or built or that acceptance process that final when it becomes a public infrastructure what we did is really tried to reorganize and clarify the chapter and and streamline and simplify how we talk about roles and responsibilities to that the pip agreement if you look at the current pip

2:20 agreement it's 11 pages long the new one's three pages so really we're referencing a lot of where all of the requirements are and and rather than what the old pip agreement really did was in essence reiterate a lot of what was in the chapter so that's kind of one of the ideas of simplifying it the other is is simplifying the communication on how we communicate with the project team by basically taking it from a three-party agreement where the engineer signed in as is a party to the project even though they may not have been the financial backing or owner in the project and so we have a separate kind of a concurrence or acknowledgement with the design professional now as we're allowing for we still require pes but this allows an overall

3:05 coordinator and contractor signs acknowledgement but our agreement really on getting a public improvement built is with the developer owner and so that's where the permit is some other key things which i've noted in the ais you know we aligned it with how we're currently doing business which is in some ways we allow for reduction of security when we reach a certain point that wasn't very well documented in the current chapter so it's like it wasn't available or wasn't really clear to all developers or owners who may come in and so now we're kind of clarifying and it's everybody can see where those opportunities are should they require them or request them we also as noted aligned the chapter

3:51 with house bill 2306 from 2019 which allowed for substantial completion and so what that really means is there's some requirements and definitions in that bill that went in and it allows a developer to request building permits once they hit substantial completion so the project may not be ready for acceptance by the city council or acceptance by the city but we can allow them to start requesting and submitting for and getting building permits so they can kind of start concurrently building homes now they can't get certificate of occupancy until after the pip is ready for acceptance so once it's signed off by the city engineer and ready to go to the council and if you'll

4:37 note one of the reasons we worded it that way is we do have a lot of projects that sometimes come in and they're ready for um they're ready for acceptance but council may be at recess or the timing of getting to a council meeting is not there and so rather than be in an awkward position where we might be holding up certificate of occupancy during those periods we've kind of left it that once the city engineer deems that the project's ready to go to council and signs off and all the everything's basically all the boxes are checked we're just waiting to schedule a meeting then we can issue certain certificate of occupancy so they can actually start selling homes which for those developer owners is kind of a very important thing to start getting some cash flow [Music] back from the project just looking

5:25 through the rest of my notes we tried to simplify the insurance to what our current practice and really clarify that because we do get a lot of questions on insurance requirements especially for engineers and and contractors and trying to really align with what our current practice is at the city [Music] and i think for the most part like i said i think it's just really that simplifying and streamlining to for a quick overview of chapter nine chapter nine is really just aligning our um drafting standards with our current practice in essence we've gone through some transition and change over over and we're really trying to what we tried to do on the capital side was really

6:13 standardize our drafting procedures and then basically take that and put it in chapter nine so what our expectations are as far as that and really tried to modernize and standardize and so really nothing earth shattering there it's just like i said some cleaning up language and with that i'm ready for questions like i said if there's some legal questions i know christine is here leonard you are mute leonard thank you mayor um so uh jeff thanks for this report um i um i stumbled a little bit

7:00 over a reduction of security if i'm a developer or a builder why um why would i apply for reduction of security so typically they are developers or owners bond the project and they have to bond the project at 110 and so they're paying for that bond that security and if they're able to reduce if it if it's a you know if it's a half a million or a million dollar project that means it they could have if they do a set-aside letter or security deposit then they have that cash tied up but if they're using a bond they're paying an annual fee for that bond and by being able to reduce that they can reduce the fee they pay to keep that bond and so we do from

7:45 time to time get requests especially at substantial completion there may be a period of time you know depending on the timing of when that happens there may be a period of time between there and the warranty period before it's the project's complete and final and we sign off everything from acceptance to warranty and so there could be a substantial savings to them by being allowing them to reduce that security and would we grant the reduction in security based on what we perceive as the stability of the project and its investors well we base it on the completeness of the project right so what where's the status of the project so that's what the substantial that's what the security is for

8:31 is to ensure that the project gets built and completed and so we're not allowing for reduction in accept it for certain key points and i think if you read the language it's like they have an opportunity at substantial completion and that's once they do it at that point in time then the bond stays the way it is through warranty period um and then we've gotten to warranty period where we've allowed at times them to reduce it there as well but it kind of gives them that option of that one time but it would be based on the amount of work that's left to be done and it's really security for the city if a developer were to go bankrupt or walk away from a project we've had that happen one time since i've been here west wind the

9:16 developer went bankrupt walked away and we had a partial project sitting there and that was a case where we had prematurely allowed they had done a set-aside or a deposit and we allowed them to kind of reduce that and then we didn't have enough money the city itself didn't have enough money to complete that project [Music] that that's certainly something we'd want to avoid i um i'm comfortable with the reductions you've made and i appreciate it um i'm i'm always for killing fewer trees if we don't have to thanks steve i have some questions some of them refer to practices we had a long time ago uh determining if the pipe is straight

10:04 you ever heard of candling handling yeah i have a bid item candling so you can see a candle through yeah that's how you do it that's a reloading term well anyway i'm looking at on yeah i can't find my pages page nine under compaction requirements this is also something we used to do have crushed rock in there can you use pea gravel no why not for road base we allow so because yeah because the round you can't get so we allow it in some trench in the past we typically don't because we require compaction testing on our trenches too if it's part of the base so typically under current construction

10:50 practices everything's considered road based because they're not putting the trench in coming back and then doing the road base later at pea gravel you don't have to compact it i can tell you some other stories about that now thank you other questions okay so jeff i've got sort of two quick questions how long is um so when you look at the drafting standards as a whole right there's some pretty specific standards to accept plans in there does that impact our ability to accept them electronically

11:38 no we have separate electronics acceptance standards for how we get it in and that's a different chapter okay so so this is kind of our review set in the information we want to see so when we're reviewing it so it's clear to help us understand what they're going to do so we don't have a lot of back and forth on questions and like i said we kind of base it on what we do as far as our capital projects so everybody's kind of understands what they're reviewing and it is kind of an industry standard but then yeah separate chapter for electronic acceptance so that we get the layers in that we want and and they can go right into gis and so one of the question when you introduce this as a topic that comments you made was that we were updating this based on changes

12:23 to state law so when if we read this from you know if we read in the news that this legislature changed some new bill from you know how long from when we received that bill to when we see the when we would see an updated document like this so for the substantial completion changes and christina just popped up but it went into effect in january if it was approved in 2019 and they went into effect so we've actually utilized it a couple times because it's already in effect like i said and so that really was the substantial completion part was what we were trying to align if i could add also mayor um terry white

13:09 worked in this the engineering um an engineering permit position for a very long time with the city and then she retired recently which is wonderful for her she worked very closely with me on that this project and i think it was delayed for a little bit of time getting it to cancel just because she was transitioning out of that um role and so um there was just a little a little we would have gotten it too i think a little bit earlier but she she also worked very hard with me um through this to get this project complete so that was great um as jeff said we they have been implementing substantial completion for those entities that know about it but it's better to have it integrated into the processes and procedures because then

13:54 every builder who's not necessarily aware of the state law knows that it's available to them and we have a standardized way to enforce how we're going to go through documenting that something is substantially complete but they have been able to make a one case-by-case determination using the definitions that are in the state law before we were able to adopt the edspm changes um if it was something where we would have gotten this to you before january 2020 if it had to be in our eds pm in order for the state law to take effect but since they were able to do it um in the interim we went for a more full update to chapter 12 and just took a little more time on that okay perfect and the only other question i think i had was um so once we sort of heading on this here what's the next step

14:39 the next step i'll be bringing it to the council probably just on consent calendar for approval um one thing there i uh having read it again with track changes off i did note there's some minor things that we'll need to do for editing some some language things but it's nothing substantial as far as changing any requirements one of them is as uh as christina noted terry white's email is listed in there specifically so things like that like like i said as i read it again with track changes off i just caught a few things that that i highlighted um yeah and i and i'm looking around at where people's questions are you you know correcting or formatting i don't think anybody's gonna have a concern with so yeah in general that nothing

15:25 substantial would change in any of these editing and if it did i would wouldn't be on consent calendar i'd be noting that to you again so perfect all right any other questions before we let jeff go all right thank you so much jeff all right thank you all right looks like the next item is with the master fees and charges update with sam sam could you help me with your last name sure kelly and then quattrocky quatro quattro oaky uh grandpa just say it means four eyes in italian but it's a real rough translation so i don't know if i can trust grandpa on that one perfect uh thank you mayor and council i'm happy to be back here again these are the rest of the master fees and charges

16:10 last week you saw stormwater wastewater and then santa pack solid waste these are the rest of them the city has i guess just briefly in the most recent guidance from council we were told staff was told to use a cpi from um bureau of labor that's kind of the western region class size b and c for cities and so that we looked to for this time we recommended a 1.6 increase across the board for all the fees and that was what i gave my colleagues to kind of work on the cbm i gave you highlights fees in each section that were either higher than one point or different 1.6 or were new and we're added this year and kind of some reasons behind that um i'm happy to walk through them all with you or

16:55 specific ones you want to talk about or questions that might be better i'm here to answer questions and hopefully if this all goes well come back in two weeks for resolution and fully adopt all of the fees joe so i have a couple questions in regards on page attachment one page two of three section five and now of course i'm trying to find it where i'm all notes there it is

17:43 so it has um under section five under the attachment to page 16 it references page 16 name and address searches and it goes to say that um they have a an increase in request and this this new fee is dedicated to those requests and it says it will help cover the costs to print listing involvements associated to a specific person or address and the fee amount and description were based on the salem pd so and then but then you go down to the next reference of page 17 18 and it says where the with the body cams that this new fee will be added to cover the cost of supplying camera footage and the same thing with page 18 regards to research requests and other records not requested it says uh

18:30 the previous uh charges the previous requests were charged using a fee structure but the fee amount description were based on the hillsboro so but does it and it says there this new fee was implemented to cover the cost so so we are making sure that those two requests are covering actual costs but then how come the name and address search is not covering the actual cost and just helps cover sure inconsistent yeah i'm not sure i can fully speak to that might need to check with police and then circle back um i did want to add the the body worn camera one is also based off salem and hillsborough i'm sorry i missed that line so all three of these are really based off similar jurisdictions i would imagine that the name or address search follows that

19:15 um what is it thirteen dollars per search and that sort of been the general rule that police found and that's why they're marrying that one um i i'm happy to look into that one more and get back to you afterwards but i couldn't speak exactly why that one's not uh staff time like the other two are yeah and maybe because other agencies use it doesn't make it the right way but um so i think i think we need to be consistent and we need to cover our costs i have no problem with people asking questions but they need to cover costs so it's not uh having our folks spin their wheels i'm taking notes but that's a very good point i'll get back to that one thank you all right and again it and hillsboro is pretty similar to our size but i believe salem is quite a bit larger agency than

20:00 springfield pd so it should we should be using a like-sized agency if we're doing that or like-sized city so that's the only questions i had there and i don't think it has anything did anything here have to do with the fees we are charging for land use application fees did those change no those not change that office that just the the 1.6 and then some of the sdc is changed by a different amount uh that amount comes from an engineering standards uh journal that we use okay because that was a question had come up and i'm still actually trying to get an answer but it's you know why are we charging for a fee

20:46 a charging application fee when the development application is actually a land right where they are permitted to do so to be permitted to build and so why would we be charged an application fee is for something you have a legal right to do okay i'm not sure either if jeff wants to come back up he may know if not i can i can circle back with you all afterwards yeah because that because the new law changes there's things that people have a right to do and we can't say no and so why are we charging application fee to get permission to do it all right um counselor pictionary i'm sorry i was i am listening but i i my status changed like mid-set questions

21:31 so if you could repeat your question i might be able to answer it or at least help sam find the answer later well with recent changes in law and development laws it seems as though that we haven't changed our process so when a person is coming in we're still requiring them to pay a nine for example 930 dollar application fee for something they have a right to build and we can't say no uh christina might be better at answering that question i'd have to find another i'd have to research the answer counselor pictionary i'm not sure what statutes you're specifically thinking of um but

22:17 in general um the state if you're talking about the state law changes for mental housing um we are working on implementing those they actually haven't taken effect as to springfield yet but even under those new statutes people have a right to have permitted for example a duplex any place a single-family house is allowed if they comply with our standards so in the same way that people have a right to get a building permit if they comply with the building code the same thing applies to other types of development state law already limits the amount that can be charged for those types of permits to the city's cost of reviewing the permit application and so we're entitled to charge essentially a fee for the city to provide that service

23:02 otherwise the time to review an individual permit to make sure it complies with the standards would be borne by all the taxpayers as opposed to the person who's developing um their specific property and it is intended to be proportional and related to the service that they're actually getting from the city because the question i had and i'm still trying again trying to find out is is that a person was put in for a type 1 application and charged 900 to determine if an adu could be built when we already permit those when those are already allowed there they are permitted as long as the standards are met and so the my understanding is that the 900 is the it covers the amount of time it takes for staff to review the application and make a decision about whether the clear and objective standards

23:48 are met for that if the fees are if council feels the fees are not set at the right level then that's certainly your prerogative to discuss but um it's not a legal issue to charge a fee as long as it is um not more than the city's cost for reviewing that permit okay so and that even applies for an edu air adu that is going to be placed within the same footprint footprint of an existing struct dwelling there are standards that apply to internal um conversions of adus as well yes yeah neither are some electrical and water issues but okay thanks i appreciate that thank you

24:35 sam could we go back to the body cam um and i think we're 16 page 16. joe had a good question about whether or not that that was based like where that where that came from from my jurisdiction perspective and at 39 an hour are we actually and i don't are we actually recouping our full costs there i'm not seeing 39 dollars an hour for that one i'm sorry this one is uh per hour rate um including outsourced materials uh for the body worn camera footage so it's on the bottom of 17 it's a video telephone maybe i'm reading that wrong oh that's a that's a separate fee i apologize yeah those are super ones so we're we're saying for body worn

25:21 cameras in in car video footage it's no charge for the first half an hour then actual cost of staff time plus materials and outlook outsourced services um how do i guess that my question's a little bit different like how does that actually get set and charged because we're essentially saying we're not publishing the rate and then is that by an individual or is that by i just i guess talk to me a little bit more since that's this is gonna be a new thing for us yeah and it is a new fee and so this was the first kind of taking a chance at that there are other fees that have that same language staff time is kind of what the language used previously and so that i believe what police used for this one uh the materials and outsources they wanted to keep in mind that um in case of complexity of redactions

26:07 or other kind of methods they want to have that back that feel ready to go um but if the concern is is that the timing um that was standard language some of the other fees we had used but christina might also have some input there all right i'm just gonna jump in and help sam if that's okay um the the staff time is calculated by taking the employee who actually does the work and reviewing what their cost to the city is per hour to employ that individual so for example when i have to review um spend more than half an hour reviewing public records for redactions or exemptions then my staff time gets charged by my salary plus the cost um the cost to the city to employ me essentially so that's the fully loaded rate that's the fully loaded rate yes

26:52 that's my understanding and for when we've used that language in the past we give them an estimate beforehand yes if the estimate if the and it's set by public records law if the estimate is going to be larger than um i'm sure that aj can jump on and let you know what that dollar amount is but if it's going to be more than a certain amount um we provide an estimate up front and typically charge a deposit as well and we also have a practice of um providing when media make requests that are in the public interest providing that um without charging okay so so we should think about this rate is similar to how we deal with public a public records request yeah so this it's intended to be very similar

27:39 steve oh yeah this it's going to be this is going to be a new thing this this is body cameras and there's going to be probably for a while a lot of people coming in wanting to get some footage out of that thing and it's gonna be a real shocker if they don't have an idea beforehand what that might cost them and so this actual cost doesn't tell them that and and i i'd like to see a number out there so when they come to come to the counter they pretty much know exactly what it's going to cost i don't have to do that because it's a shocker it's very good corey uh and this is this isn't really about the fees it's

28:24 more of a as i'm listening to this and i'm thinking about this and we don't know what's going to happen just sort of flagging and putting a pin in for do we have the capacity are we prepared so if we're thinking that this is going to increase you know to staff time to be doing this in addition to public records requested stuff i'm just wanting to know if we do now have the capacity or we're thinking about it and we're preparing for that i don't know who wants to take that one as far as the staffing as far as the staffing question because i think that's a police question if we've got that because i think we were supposed to hire an fte for it

29:10 and that was my recollection as well mayor that there was a fte included in that body worn camera package to deal with that very same issue kind of broadly of how many requests are we going to get but i can talk with police for you on that one okay so the other question that i had and me it was that with with the overall rate generally applied how much additional revenue are we talking about here for the city that one it's like one and a half percent i think you said yeah that's correct um that's an excellent question that i had not thought to prepare for ahead of time um it would require a bit of of kind of crystal ball gazing on how many permits you may be getting and those kind of things but i'm i'm happy to do that kind of work that'd

29:55 be interesting to me for sure um but i couldn't have her to guess other than a 1.6 increase from previous year would be a rough starting place maybe okay um other questions joe so just roughly where i know that we've been charging that five percent technology fee and i knew that we had a list of things that that we were going to make use of that and i have not had an update that i can recall in at least a year and so we i know that we're still collecting that and i would like to know where we are with that we had it we had a wish list and i don't know how far along we are

30:40 uh council of patient area i can give you a brief update i i referenced this in my budget message last week one of the things that i am proposing in the upcoming budget is you using some of the some of the technology obviously this wouldn't be all of it to fund a position that will enable us to create a virtual development center so that people can submit applications electronically and get a lot of that work processed through a more seamless electronic means rather than having to come into city hall so that that's part of that and i can and i can also um follow

31:26 up and get more information on on that specifically out to council but that's one that i have in the proposed budget yeah i remember mentioning that but it was it was a little bit vague um which i'm sure you don't have all the info anyway so i guess the other part to that i would like to know is that if it is going to make it easier for developers to apply and get permitting electronically et cetera if that's going to save staff time and how much that how much staff time is going to be saved and then from a developer perspective then i would say if i'm saving so many thousands of dollars in staff time to do this and i'm doing it electronically myself then how come i'm still paying the amount of fees that i pay that are supposed to be covering costs but if those costs have dropped how come the

32:12 fees have not so that's right well we would need to look into what the correlation is between staff time and developers coming into the development center because um i'm probably you're right i i do i don't have a complete list of what the software will do but among other things it will help the development staff be able to track projects within the system as well and so um there's kind of both sides there's an inward facing side that will enable us to be able to track projects better and then the outward facing part where people will be easier for people to access the city

32:57 um i don't know yet as far as i think it would take um quite a a number of people using that you know it will take some time to find out um what type of or quantify the type of savings the software would generate and that might may take a little bit of time um there's also the time factor of um people not having to you know leave the leave and come back to city hall for they'll they'll be able to have more uh uh quick interpretation and um communication with our staff yeah i'll ask for i can ask dpw to give you a briefing memo on that oh i'm all about supporting that for sure i think that's a great idea i have no problem with that

33:42 whatsoever and anything we can do to make it uh you know because time is money so um but we also should be able to be prepared to say okay we're we are also efficient sizing the city and how does what does that translate to does it translate for additional services for no extra cost does it translate into more availability i mean that type of thing because if if we have those developers come to us saying how come you know i'm getting this you know i'm paying this technology fee and yes i got this program but how come i don't actually see anything other than me now doing you know apparently or seemingly doing the work so it's it's it's just more information more like what you just said and how to support and how to articulate the reasoning behind it but

34:27 we just need to be ready to answer those type questions and have development staff be ready to answer those type questions because i'm quite confident they'll be asked right and i understand that and i think it's it's tempting to say that software will you know result in a one-to-one kind of correlation but it doesn't always work out that way in in in real time i can say that you know from a staffing perspective we are really lean throughout the city so i look at this as uh technology helping staff be being able to um with their current workload already um it might help with with time savings but it may not actually result in any kind of fde savings because we're already really really lean um

35:13 so i guess two points to jump onto that and one of them is probably a budget question for maybe tomorrow so i know that we're talking about this developer fee and i vaguely remember there was like half a million dollars to three quarters of a million dollars so in that sort of reserve account and i think what would be interesting to know is after we talk about the position in the development center right like and i'm sure there's cost of software associated to that how much are we expecting to be left in that in that in that account you know at the end of this budget because we're going to burn down some of it and i know that there's always been a desire on council to sort of keep investing in the technology portion of you know uh planning and public works so you know knowing how much more we

35:58 have to play with it will become really really an interesting question okay we'll get you um some history of that fund what our projected costs will be for the current fiscal year budget proposal and then what the impact will be to the friend yeah and uh that would that would that would be great welding other questions um other thing that sam are there fees on this list that we don't that we don't use every year uh there were a couple that we removed so a couple in the engineering side we had a fee for printing off our books no one asked for print off books anymore um and there were a couple uh on the

36:44 again in engineering the um development fee some of their projections we don't we don't have the tools to produce those anymore so those are now outsourced we want to make sure we don't collect the fee but leave that on there so folks know what to expect um so we have been kind of trying to make sure we're calling old fees that we don't use anymore as we go through these definitely oh that's perfect that's perfect all right folks um other questions or conversations about fees if not then i think i'm going to adjourn us and then we will be back at seven o'clock to discuss uh the regular session uh come here pardon me you're on the same link so if you'd like to turn your cameras off and your microphone's off you can stay and come back thank you

37:30 and we're coming back at seven right

45:10 neil are you ready to go we are ready i am going to call the uh springfield city council regular session to order with roll call mayor van gorden here councillor pitts dear counselor mo here councillor rodley here councillor stare here councillor woodrow and counselor pictionary president thank you and councilor woodrow is excused for the evening uh would you please join me for the pledge i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all

46:00 all right i've got a couple of instructions as we begin our meeting tonight i would like to ask members of the audience who are joining us online to please keep yourselves on mute until you are called upon to provide public testimony there are two items this evening designated for public testimony and will be listed at public hearings and visit business from the audience on the agenda if you're joining us online with a tablet smartphone or computer and wish to speak during that time please use the raised hand option to be called upon to provide the comment when the designated time is announced when we will call when we call on you please state your name in ward or general location for the record the order of public testimony is as follows anyone who has raised their hand or

46:48 and then anyone who has submitted an email in advance if there is time neil will read them into the record item please mayor your first item is uh springfield upbeat we have a few items under that item number one mayor's recognition national nurses week proclamation and mayor you have that item whereas the three million registered nurses in the united states constitute our nation's largest health care profession and whereas the nurses nursing profession plays a critical role in improving patient outcomes increasing access and

47:34 coordinating care while reducing health care costs and whereas the depth and breadth of the registered nursing profession meet the different and emerging healthcare needs of the american population in a wide range of settings and whereas the renewed emphasis on primary and preventative health care will require better utilization of all our nation's registered nursing resources and whereas most qualified registered nurses more qualified registered nurses will be needed in the future to meet the increasing complex healthcare uh consumers in this community whereas along with the american nurses association the spring facility council is declaring may sixth through twelfth is national nurses week now i sean van gorden the mayor of springfield do hereby proclaim

48:20 may 6-12 2021 is national nurse this week in springfield oregon energy all residents to join me in this special observance and thank a nurse next item please our next resolution mayor the next item is may is bike month proclamation the naq whereas the bicycle is an uh economical healthy and convenient and environmentally sound form of transportation and an excellent tool for the enjoyment of springfield scenic beauty that allows community members to follow social distancing guidelines and travel for essential trips and exercise during this covet 19 pandemic whereas

49:07 through the month of may the residents of springfield can experience the joys of biking while supporting community safety by attending virtual events wearing masks maintaining safe distances from others or riding with members of their own households or choosing less busy times and less busy routes for rides whereas community members can directly support the local economy by purchasing bikes or taking bikes to local bike shops through appointments whereas the bicycle industry sales and bicycle tourism contribute at least 440 million dollars respectively to the oregon economy annually and generate 7 thousand jobs whereas with money that's saved from lower travel costs people who ride bikes have more money to spend at local businesses to help grow our local economy

49:52 and support a vibrant recovery from coven 19 whereas creating a bicycle-friendly community has been shown to improve citizens health well-being quality of life grow the economy improve traffic safety support student learning outcomes and reduce pollution congestions and wear and tear on our streets whereas the city of springfield and springfield safe routes to schools are also promoting greater public awareness a bicycle operations and safety education in an effort to reduce collisions injuries fatalities and improve health and safety for everyone i sean van gorden the mayor of springfield do hereby proclaim may 2021 is as uh bike month in springfield oregon

50:39 and i challenge springfield residents to get out and ride on regional paths test ride an electric assist bike or visit local businesses by bike during the month of may all right next item please the next item is employee recognition diana chapel's 30 years of service and chief heppel is here with us for this item thanks neil and uh mayor and counselor and uh yep diana's pictures up there she actually might be in the um audience i don't know maybe bring her up and just say hello um while i go ahead and talk about this i find it great that we're acknowledging diana especially as tomorrow is international firefighter day which we'll be acknowledging

51:25 um tomorrow being may 4th but by diana other than 30 years of service among other accomplishments diana chapel is the second female firefighter employed by the city of springfield she's one of three individuals who have made it to 30 years of service milestone from the class of nine that were hired in march 11th of 1991. diane is known for her work ethic and dedication to the community we serve and this is evident in her long career with eugene springfield fire as a firefighter and as a field training paramedic where she passionately promotes best practices for patient care diane is also a swift water rescue technician and serves on the eugene springfield fire water rescue team when she's not at work diana supports our community by donating many hours over time to local toys for tots

52:11 campaign and participating in young women's fire camp she's humble about her career and accomplishments in states happily that this career has given her the opportunity to raise a family in our local community i'm grateful to recognize diana for her 30 years of service before city council and our community this evening and most of all thank you diana for your 30 years of service thanks chief diana you you do have an opportunity if you want to say a couple of words or recognize any uh part of your career uh you know i'm just really thrilled to have uh been involved with the city of springfield and now the eugene springfield fire department um it was a dream uh one that's come true and

52:56 hopefully i've got a few more years left and i'll still continue to stay in this community it's been a pleasure well thank you so much we are grateful for to have you um and recognizing 30 years of uh service is a is a huge milestone so congratulations thank you so much thank you all right next item please here the next item is the consent calendar i would make a motion to approve its consent calendar second it's been moved in second and neil can you call the role please yes counselor pitts all right that's

53:41 promo yes counselor rodley yes counselor stare aye councillor woodrow and counselor pictionary all right the motion passes uh five yeses zero knows and one absent next item please mayor the next item is public hearings we are going to pull one of the public hearings the ratification of the mwmc commission regional wastewater program budget there is another item that was inadvertently left off the agenda and that was the budget ratification so we will be rescheduling this to may 17th no fault of mwmc staff they had everything turned in just a

54:27 an oversight so we have one public hearing this evening and that item is the request to vacate an unimproved portion of public right-of-way row a budding private property at 5409 ivy street ordinance number one an ordinance vacating an existing existing unimproved portion of public right-of-way budding private property located at 5409 ivy street and melissa courinho is here for the stab report and i will pull her up right now

55:15 melissa you should be able to unmute your microphone there you go hi there good evening everyone let me just share my screen real quick oh actually neil may i share my screen you bet thank you all right sorry about the delay folks hello and good evening mr mayor and city councilors last month on april 5th the city council initiated the resolution to vacate this portion of unimproved city-owned right-of-way located along the northern side of ivy street abutting a private property at 5409 ivy street tonight the city council is requested to

56:00 consider a vacation ordinance to vacate the subject right of way but first the subject right-of-way is located within city limits you can see that in the red and it's located south of main street a little closer zoom you can see that it's west of bob straub parkway and you can see it in the corner with a yellow and here's again a zoomed in the picture of the the site and the subject right away uh because the previous property owner of 5409 ivy street wanted to retain the rectangular shape of the property when the hayden homes pinehurst phase 1 platt was being recorded the wedge-shaped portion right away was dedicated to the city in 2015. there were no costs associated with the right-of-way dedication to the city

56:46 the vacation was requested by the property owner the new property owner of 5409 ivy street in order to facilitate the construction of a garage that meets the minimum 18-foot springfield development code setback requirement from the front from the street frontage there are three applicable criteria for vacations or right-of-ways i will go through each of the criteria and share how this application sorry application meets each of them the first one is a vacation shelby and conformance with the metro plan and various plans of the city and indeed the subject right-of-way vacation will help meet the city's current transplant standards and also provide uniformity with for the row with within this area in this neighborhood

57:38 criteria two vacations shall not conflict with provisions of the city's municipal code and the development development code and with the vacation it will actually provide consistency with the city's municipal and development code standards and thirdly uh there shall be no negative effects on access traffic circulation emergency service or any other public benefits and the vacation of that subject right of way will provide no negative effects on access traffic circulation emergency service or any other public benefits one thing to note is that street side public utilities were installed within the public right-of-way during the original subdivision process in 2015 and therefore did not require standard public utility easements standard seven foot wide public utility

58:25 easements are required for ongoing protection and maintenance of utilities as per the springfield development code so as shown this is a recommended condition of approval so the city is requested to adopt this vacation ordinance with this condition of approval and if this vacation is approved and the subject right-of-way is transferred back to private property the property owner of 5409 ivy street must record and execute a seven foot public utility easement along ivy street frontage there is no negative financial impact on the city as the portion of the subject right-of-way was dedicated to this to the city with no finite financial exchange vacating the subject right away will provide uniformity with the adjacent right-of-ways

59:10 and consistency with our development code it will also transfer the subject property to the applicant which will allow him to meet setback requirements for his new garage because the vacation of the subject right of way will help create consistency with city standards as well as help facilitate the compliant construction of a garage addition at 5409 ivy street staff recommend adopting this ordinance with the condition of approval and that's it thank you mayor and counselors i'm here and i believe also the applicant is available for any questions you may have are there any questions before i open the public hearing

59:57 i got one for you sean then i'm gonna go ahead and open the shop yes got my hand up okay go ahead counselor efficiently so um if i understand this correctly the current law he bought this current owner bought the lot as a rectangular lot as part of the purchase price correct that is correct and so if i read the legal description of that lot because it doesn't indicate at least i didn't find it in a indicative underwear otherwise the square footage of that current lot or the dimensions that current lot are right around 108.9 by was it 120 is that right sounds right yes and then the right of way the

1:00:42 subject right away is 1500 square feet right so that's going to add about according to my numbers about 12 percent more land than what's than what they currently own is that correct that is correct um the applicant is aware that um you know that they would be taking this new this property back to their own private property and that taxes would be incurred based on that right but are we not saying that are we not saying that there's any value to that land as far as for example if that land was present when they purchased that land then the purchase price would have been affected at that time if it was greater

1:01:27 than what it is now correct i would imagine so um so yes okay so they're seeing a financial benefit off of city property well here's i i would argue that actually this right-of-way should have already been given to the private property um except for the previous property owner did not want to make that change the other thing is because of that portion of right-of-way is technically actually the responsibility of the prop the private property owner of 5409 ivy street so they've been maintaining that portion so right yes they are gaining some yeah no they are but

1:02:12 but regardless it it's their the valuation or this our resale price because they purchased it at a set a specific price that now they added 1500 feet to their property which now increases the value of their home or their property and home then they are seeing a financial gain off of city property which no matter which way you look at it and also but i do see that if they want to add a garage then that too will increase the valuation of their property which would be to the benefit of the city because of the tax valuation and that i understand so i guess i would be comfortable with

1:02:57 this however i would have a stipulation that they do in fact build a taxable building because of that transfer so that way the city does see a financial gain with this transaction as opposed to handing over valuation of that property to the property owner without any consideration back okay i i think i might need to consult with the city attorney on how to move forward with that um but i hear your concern and argument about that as well right i mean the other way i look at it it's increasing evaluation of their properties in their home and they bought it as it sits it's not like they they were

1:03:43 the ones that gave the property the city so they weren't out anything there this is all this is a net gain for them in valuation and actual real dollars so and and because we are supposed to watch out for the interest of the city and it's in its citizens then at least we should check this out and see if that is uh it's it's no extra if they're saying they're going to build a garage and they need to have this property to do so and i get that then it should not be an issue with them to be able to say yeah we're going to build a garage a counselor pissionary this is mary bridget on the line um i think uh it sounds like what you're saying is either asking for a condition of

1:04:29 approval that they will in fact construct a garage by a certain time uh for um on the property i think what i would recommend for tonight i can't answer at the top of my head whether that's that is a legal condition of approval but we can look into that have the hearing tonight and then see if that is in fact something that we can require and talk to the property owner this is a first reading so we can move forward with that and then bring it back to the council does that work i'm fine with it it just in previous practices where we have vacated property what not there's been consideration for those properties and we we not we don't very often just hand the property over without some sort of consideration or some sort of

1:05:14 evaluation back to the city yeah no i understand what you're trying to say i just don't want to promise you that we can do that without confirming that that's in fact something we can do but we can look into that right if we could move forward tonight on the first reading and then we'll get you more information that's fine by me counselor rodney just on the flip side of that i don't i don't know that that little strip is it's not it's not costing us anything and it's also not gaining us anything by just sitting there being this little strip that we are holding into at least this way it goes with that lot in perpetuity and is becomes part of the property

1:06:00 value of that property which makes sense to me so just putting that out there is it just i don't i wouldn't need to have a condition for it um to say they're absolutely gonna do these things because i think it just it increases the value of that piece of property yes which does benefit the owner yes and also it's not doing us any good just sitting there being something that we have on a map all right any other counselor missionary yeah and i i understand what you're saying corey for sure but historically speaking over the years it's something that that

1:06:46 city-owned property that is city just sitting there all of it across the city just sits there and all of it across the city all these pieces and parcels etc true do not make uh don't do any benefit for the city so to speak but there is value there is there's cash value to those properties and that we have been in my mind we have a fiduciary responsibility to to make sure that the citizens are uh get maximized values for what they own and it with this type of transfer you're increasing the actual size of the lot that was not owned and so that's an increase of cash valuation to it to a citizen and typically i don't know of where i don't think it's wise for a city

1:07:31 to be handing over cash valuation increases to citizens where that cash valuation increase should be spread out to its citizens to the rest of the citizens meaning some sort of some sort of of transaction that for example increase valuation by way of tax dollars or property tax which it will at some point and i just want to make sure that that it actually does have that increase and i'm not asking we're not asking for any money up front we're not asking to sell it we're giving it to them but i want to make sure that it increases the valuation and and 1500 square feet is not a sliver it's it's quite a bit of property in my mind

1:08:22 all right then i'm gonna go ahead and open the uh public hearing and see if there is neil do we have anybody that wants to testify specifically to this public hearing mayor i believe we do um [Music] dana hercut i know wants to wait for business from the audience so the next hand i see is sabrina white followed by bruce hamilwitz and sabrina i'll just ask are you are you here for this item sabrina you can unmute your microphone i'm just wondering if you're here for

1:09:08 business from the audience or that is actually owned by the city it was said that there was maintenance that those the private person did to that what maintenance have they provided there's no grass growing so they don't mow it you know you know what i mean sabrina you were mute i'm a little bit muted when you started so um could you just start all over with your name and what part of the city you live in and then we'll start from the top my name's sabrina white and i live out in the glenwood district ward 2.

1:09:54 okay go ahead with your testimony and it's to this specific matter not business from the audience right right it's just it's a question actually okay go ahead um it was said that the people that owned the property there did maintenance on that section of city property what maintenance there's no grass growing so they don't mow it i mean if they're claiming it they want it because of the maintenance and stuff that they have provided what have they done because it does join a city and public sidewalk um my apologies for a little bit of confusion there is in our code states that any um right-of-way abutting private property that private property owner

1:10:39 is responsible for maintaining um as specifics as for specifics of what maintenance has been done here at this site i am not aware of however the next speaker is actually the applicant and property owner so i'd like to give him a chance to speak okay thank you thanks sabrina mayor the next speaker is uh bruce hamowitz and bruce you should be able to unmute your microphone

1:11:26 bruce can you hear us you're still muted okay can you hear me now yes we can can you start with your name and location uh i guess we know you're the property owner and then give your comments please my name is bruce hamilton my wife anita and i purchased this property at 5409 ivy street in springfield this past summer it was a foreclosure the house and property was severely neglected and our intention and continues to be our contention to uh when we bought the land and the house was to do some drastic improvements on it um we had no idea that the uh

1:12:12 this right away in front of it was not part of the purchase when we when we uh did the acquisition uh i'm not a surveyor so i i did not understand all the little details of it but uh i did i had hired and continue to work with ellis design group um for the improvements we plan to do on this property and uh carol ellis our design person as she was working on the uh plans for these improvements uh came to find out that we did not own that little strip of land out in front uh it was a quite a surprise so i've been working with melissa and she's been very helpful and working us through this process for

1:12:57 quite a few months now we have made some improvements but we cannot apply for any permits yet until we have the ability to do the proper setbacks the garage is only one part of the improvements we have budgeted over two hundred thousand dollars improvements for this property the city will benefit from increased tax revenues i guarantee you that um and in terms of what we're doing to maintain that right-of-way right now it was a public health hazard there was broken retaining wall uh the adjoining neighbors when i moved in there complained to me about it and said that their children were not allowed to go near it because it was dangerous

1:13:42 none of the vegetation was taken care of there was a tree growing over the tree that was dying a big oak tree i had all the trees removed i had i removed the retaining wall i've i've done everything i can without permits but i cannot apply for permits until the city vacates the right-of-way for me so i i would like to do as much as i can as soon as i can but i'm just waiting for permission from the city that's all thank you thank you mayor i believe we have no other speakers on this item all right i'm going to go ahead and close the public hearing and this looks like it's the first

1:14:27 reading so there's no action next item please mayor the next item is business from the audience we have 41 attendees and hands are just starting to go up now so we'll just give folks a moment and if you're ready we'll get our first speaker first speaker is dana harkett followed by kevin shaper and dana your microphone should be unmuted hi can you hear me we can hi

1:15:14 uh dana herkett ward one um i mainly just wanted to give some input on the use of force presentation given by spd a couple weeks ago um just wanted to express how unnerving it was to hear all the palpable excitement around the potential training in jiu jitsu and new quote unquote pain compliance techniques it actually sent a chill up my spine listening to this discussion especially because there was just no such excitement in discussing de-escalation crisis intervention or more humane methods of interacting with community members in fact de-escalation and crisis intervention training were barely even touched upon in this presentation and to me that was telling and

1:16:02 is indicative of the festering issues of this department the culture and glorification of excessive force i'd also like to bring up that another police department that has been training extensively in jiu jujitsu and mma techniques since 2010 is the minneapolis police department and that's according to mpd defensive tactics trainer lieutenant johnny murcill's testimony on april 6th as you may know the minneapolis police department is also currently under investigation by the doj so this illustrates that no matter what type of force is trained even if it seems more sophisticated it's

1:16:48 really all dependent upon the officers who are administering the tactics learned in that force training and i think it's fair to say that there's little public confidence in thinking that the same officers who've been continuously named in misconduct lawsuits and have been fully immersed in the culture of spd for many years are also officers who will suddenly be able to exercise restraint and humanity if only they just switched to learning jujitsu and mma instead um i guess really just more than anything i want to urge you all to keep asking questions and to go beyond the surface level of what you're being told even when it might sound good we need to

1:17:35 have consistent oversight and constant eyes on and analysis of this department going forward thank you thank you mayor the next speaker is kevin shaper followed by claire roth and kevin your microphone should be able you should be able to unmute your microphone thank you uh first i agree with everything dana said i think uh extra jiu-jitsu for bullies doesn't make a lot of sense second uh happy uh happy bike month um seriously try an e-bike they're super fun and practical um now as you may know there was a single vehicle crash on franklin

1:18:21 boulevard in glenwood a couple of weeks ago which resulted in the death of the springfield residence the location looked familiar and i realized it was the same spot where two men died in a similar crash just a couple years ago i reached out to councillor mo and he told me that he has seen 16 fatalities in that spot this location is also noticeable because it's in the second phase of our franklin boulevard project and is a location that could have been made safer by now had we made different phasing choices or designed to achieve a project we know that odot has a bias towards expensive projects and that springfield does not as a city we get a lot done in a small budget as nancy said we're scrappy uh we should approach phasing decisions for main street safety projects using that same mindset portland's

1:19:06 northeast gleason safety project transformed 40 blocks of a five-lane arterial for just four hundred thousand dollars resulting in a ninety percent reduction in top-end speeders which is greater than nine miles an hour over uh without any reduction in traffic volume this is a road that has an almost identical average daily traffic volume as our main stream pbot's dirt cheap paint only reductions lane reduction strategy should be a part of the main street toolbox and it should be an easy choice for any part of the road that isn't receiving a more expensive treatment in the first phase you must consider the impact that speed has on traffic fatalities a person hit by a car at 40 miles per hour has a 1 in 10 chance of surviving at 20 miles per hour we have a 90 chance

1:19:51 of survival the most important thing we can do to make main street safer is to make main street slower and we need a strategy that makes that happen across the whole project area in an additional phase our most important task for main street is to keep the list of fatalities from growing how do you compare perceived harm to a business to an actual loss of life how do you compare families being shattered to drivers being inconvenienced for half a minute transportation activism for me started when john day age eight mackenzie hudson's age five tyler hudson age four were killed while walking home with a mom after buying ice cream in 2015. each time another person is killed or seriously injured i ask myself if i've done everything i can to make mainstream safer i know that because it's odot it's easy

1:20:37 to give up and get used to nothing changing but you have a rare opportunity to move this project away from prioritizing convenience and bring it back to safety and i hope you'll take it mayor the next speaker is claire roth and clary should be able to unmute your microphone now hello can everybody hear me we can excellent hello and good evening my name is claire roth state street coordinator with better eugene springfield transportation aka best best work on safe street started after the february 2015 crash at 54th and main street in springfield where as kevin just mentioned john day age 8

1:21:24 mackenzie hudson age 5 and tyler hudson age four were killed while walking home with their mother tragedies such as these are preventable through complete streets aka streets that are designed for the safety of all road users best advocates for all members of the springfield community to be able to move safely and comfortably throughout the community as mentioned earlier in this meeting better biking and walking infrastructure and complete streets means better business and economy and better quality of life people who are walking or biking are much more likely to stop and visit stores than people driving past at 45 miles per hour picture a main street that you visited once before before on vacation um what does it look like in your head it's probably comfortable people friendly

1:22:09 where people where folks feel safe walking and um going with their families and visiting the small businesses who at least in our community and beyond have been struggling for so long for the kobe 19 pandemic and could really use extra foot traffic springfield takes care of its community members and transportation safety cannot be an exception to that best has been paying attention to the main street safety project and excited to see what comes next it's never easy to meet the needs of all community members in our society but it is possible to support changes that will improve and save the lives of our friends and neighbors traveling through the springfield community thank you so much for your time thank you

1:22:57 mayor that appears to be our last speaker for business from the audience all right um great uh does anybody want to take an opportunity for council response before we move to the next item steve kevin shaffer mentioned that i told him about fatalities on that corner i grew up on that corner so i've been there for a long time but a few years ago i stood out there and started looking around and pointing at places where fatalities that i had seen in the past and there were 11 and since then there has been five more so i'm really concerned about that corner and and i'm working i'm working with you guys on it hopefully we'll get some more signage up there and you know be realigned when they do

1:23:42 do practical one i had damien first uh yeah it wasn't necessarily a comment i just wanted to reply to dana and ask her to please reach out to me so we can talk i heard you were in ward one and i would like to get to know you and hear some of your concerns please and i couldn't find you online so i think you're a ghost thanks mayor um i also wanted to uh just second steve's concern about the uh general traffic conditions in glenwood and on main street i live right off of main street and it's an interesting um comparison to gleason in portland

1:24:27 i think by narrowing the lanes in gleason they have made it considerably safer and they've reduced road speed so it's something we're going to be looking at thank you anybody else um i would just make one comment about the about the main street quarter i know it's coming up in the next couple of weeks for um for a work session so please tune in to that that should be uh a um interesting discussion um it every time we talk about main street what i always think about is how long it is and how many different areas of the community it touches and really picturing um councilor woodrow really out there driveway by driveway trying to find room for those crosswalks to go in so i just kind of envision that same same

1:25:13 answer as we move from concept to sort of design is that it really is going to take people talking driveway by driveway to figure this thing out and so i just urge a little bit of patience as we keep working through it just and i appreciate what you all are saying about the safety and just to add to that and i think a couple of the speakers pointed out the importance of having um walkable bikeable um neighborhoods as part of that as part of that safety and part of economic development they're absolutely right in that as people are moving by foot or by bicycle they're more likely to stop into some of these stores and use them so i think just in terms of the safety um making sure that we sort of build that in it's not just safety for drivers but it's really about keeping

1:26:00 our pedestrians our bicyclists and our folks who are use mobility devices safe so all right anybody else next item please any business from the city council any business um nope next item please here the next item is business from the city manager uh one item fiscal year 2022 community development block grant cdbg one year action plan aaron feifield is here with the staff report

1:26:47 good evening mayor and council tonight i'm bringing forward for approval the fiscal year 2022 cdbg community development block grant one year action plan as well as the award of federal cdbg funds to three community projects which applied through the spring request for proposals the one-year action plan before you outlines the specific community development and housing activities springfield proposes to undertake with the cdbg funds next year starting july 1 totaling about 740 000 the plan incorporates city council direction from your april 19 2021 work session which discussed the recommendation for funding by the community development

1:27:34 advisory committee that committee had met previously in march and april to evaluate proposed projects hold public hearings and allow for public comment on community development needs and the use of funds activities funded through this one-year action plan include funding the city's home repair program for low-income homeowners supporting non-profit social services awarded through lane county's human services commission funding for city staff to administer the program as well as funding for three community projects namely the c street co-op which would provide down payment assistance for a new model of home ownership for low-income homeowners that's coming through the square one villages

1:28:19 proposal another project the emerald arts center facade improvement helping to paint the downtown building as well as the catholic community services of lane county they have a project to construct an addition to their g street service center to provide a permanent home for the oasis program to assist homeless families with children in springfield uh both the one-year action plan and that list of community projects um to be awarded are included in your packet thank you great thank you um any questions

1:29:07 would you entertain a motion i would okay i'd like to make a motion that we adopt the fiscal year 2022 cd bg voters uh one year action plan as shown in attachment one second right it's it's been moved and seconded um neil will you call the role please yes counselor pitts aye councillor mo yes counselor rodney yes councillor stare hi woodrow and counselor pationary all right the motion passes five yeses zero knows and one absent um steve we gotta i wanna make a motion on the second part approve the award of fiscal year 2022

1:29:53 cdbg funds to those rfp applications listed in attachment 2. it's been moved and seconded um neil can you call the role please yes counselor pitts all right counselor mo hi counselor rodley yes counselor stare hi councillor woodrow and counselor pictionary hi five five eyes zero one in one absent motion passes next item please thank you aaron next item any other business from the city manager no further business thank you

1:30:38 thank you any business from the city attorney no no additional business tonight thank you all right um i will see the rest of you uh folks tomorrow for budget committee thank you have a great night um meetings adjourned leonard had something i think he was waving i was saying good night