Springfield City Council — May 24, 2021

0:06 thank you pleasant voice lady are you ready aj yes hopefully my voice is more pleasant because we are recording i am going to call the work session of the springfield city council to order with roll call mayor van gorden here councillors pitts here mo here bradley here stared i'm here all right we have two items tonight the fire court ordinance with roy emery and and then the cdbg draft fun allocation roy do you want to start us off

0:55 good evening mayor and counselors my name is roy emery and i'm the interim fire marshal for eugene springfield fire and i'm here to request a public hearing and first reading for the new proposed springfield fire code the state adopted the fire code adopted by the city must be consistent with the state fire protection statutes and the state fire code and so the code adopted by the city can be equal to or more stringent than the code adopted by the state the state recently adopted a new fire code in 2019 from the 2018 international fire code so we're a little behind the curve with this code here adoption of this code will enable eugene

1:40 springfield fire to provide a high level of fire safety protection within the city examples of additions to the new fire code are language addressing plant extraction systems laboratories in higher education mobile food preparation units capacitor energy systems and large assembly gatherings the proposed ordinance will take effect uh july 1st and uh helps springfield far code to be compliant with the state far code like i said with amendments which became effective in november of 2019. i didn't prepare a lengthy preparation just will entertain any questions you have my assumption was this is a pretty regular process that

2:25 occurs every three to five years for the code process um since we're late with this process there's going to be another fire code coming down the road in 22 2022 2023 also steve do we have any additions that are local to the fire code that are different than the car code the additions are springfield specific language in the fire code yeah yes there are um those were included with the attachment and the information packet okay i had read it but i didn't pick that part up yeah well you didn't have the mark because i'm new you didn't have the marked up copy that i had that said this is specific to springfield

3:10 yeah that would be interesting to know okay but i don't want to take your time now of course but maybe maybe you get something like that to me i'd be happy to thank you um any other questions all right so it sounds like we're good to roll this one over to the public hearing so we can do the for doing the first reading i think it's on the schedule in two weeks so we appreciate the time um thank you all right aaron fifield is next with draft cdbg allocations

4:08 good evening mayor council as oh i said hello oh hi um so as part of the coronavirus aid relief and economic security act also referred to as the cares act the city has been allocated an additional 366 652 to help address community needs these funds need to go toward projects that are eligible under the community development block grant program the cdbg program which primarily is to benefit low-income persons in springfield projects also need to show that they have language quote prevent prepare for or respond to the coronavirus and the city has about two and a half

4:53 years to spend these funds so in the packet i've included a list of eligible projects that match the sort of meet the criteria of the cares act so again both responding to coronavirus but also needing to be eligible under the cdbg program the projects on the list the cost of those projects surpass what's available and the projects themselves have come from a variety of conversations in the community through the lane county human services commission most recently through the cbg rfp that we did this last spring some of those unfunded projects that would also qualify under the cares act and then some regional meetings we've had with lane county staff you'll see the the eoc the emergency

5:38 operation center has been funding homeless outreach that's expected to end at the end of june there's an opportunity to continue that project under these funds um so the list is there um and i'll just point out that the cares act um is just one funding source that we're receiving in the community um there are other funding sources coming to our community not just to the city so example you don't see rent relief as an option the county itself is receiving about 60 million and sort of posing that question to them recently to say this is an eligible source is there a need here and they're like please no don't allocate any more right now they're still trying to figure out how to distribute that so it's sort of acknowledging there are

6:24 other needs in the community that you don't see addressed through this list um this is the list of sorry this is the list of sort of like known and heard um projects but also just want to point out part of this process is a public process so i'm looking for a draft um list of priorities and projects for me tonight then that list will go out for public comment there'll be a public hearing by the community development advisory committee and so if there are other needs or questions ideally that comes through that public process and then the advisory committee will hold the public hearing have a discussion and ultimately make a recommendation of funding to you all but the final decision will come back to you during regular session at the end of

7:09 june so um yeah i'm available for questions um i was eager i have two somewhat disparate questions um well one's a question and one's a comment um one is um i have a i have a bias for the work that the springfield eugene tennis association is doing and i know we were not able to fund them in the last round even though we chatted about them and i know the committee chatted about them um and so i would love to just sort of keep that at the forefront of people's minds because a lot of their work is directly um working with folks who are affected by the pandemic and are having economic challenges the other thing is

7:56 um this is this money can be used for anything that's otherwise cdbg eligible so one of the things i'm wondering about is down payment assistance i'm not sure how we would i mean i think that we could if we looked at you know people who were in precarious housing or people moving people out of rentals into housing so i'm not sure how to tie that to um the pandemic or to cover relief but i i would love to sort of put that on the shelf too to think about how could we increase our down payment assistance to actually get people into houses that's it those are my uh damien uh hi

8:44 good evening um so i mean this might sound a little frivolous and and and i do agree with a lot of things that well i agree with everything that council riley said as far as you know pretty much taking care of the basic needs of people but i mean i think in the last year year and a half or so we've all gone through a lot and i wonder could that money be not a large amount but you know small amount be used for how can i say this something fun that's going to potentially bring the community together so we can get to know each other and celebrate each other and relieve a little stress i mean is that even a possibility my short answer is no with particular funds um i could do some digging um

9:30 but um yeah i don't know if counselor would draw instead i'm just thinking i'm wondering if we could combine it with a service that a program provides if we had catholic community services and our oasis program combine it with a harvest dinner that would then provide food for the families and food for the neighborhood and then at the same time be a gathering um and maybe it might be able to we might be able to help fund that outreach with that would with something like that i mean that would follow and deceive cb cdbg money um because it would be a food and clothing outreach and that kind of thing but it would combine a gathering type um is that something that you were

10:16 thinking of damien damien something like that uh i really wasn't thinking of anything specific but i i honestly really like that deal i mean i i think that there are a bunch of organizations that are doing some amazing things that benefit the community and you know what if we yeah i mean i i that's a fabulous idea something some i think we might be able to work our way around through the side door on those if we work at it damian did you have anything else leonard uh thanks mayor so um i think the biggest quantum leap that we can address here is between the completely unhoused and

11:03 putting a roof of some description over their heads once once you've got a roof over your head then you can worry about getting a better roof over your head but the two places the the the two sources of um or goals of revenue that we're considering right now that directly consider the uh concern the on house that i see was daisy chain and white bird and so i would give first priority to those if we're triaging the um the use of these funds i also heard from carry it forward that there is a fairly urgent need for a hospice room um for people who are in their last days

11:48 as a homeless person and if we could allocate i know that it's not part of the funding the work it's currently considering but if we could add some funding for um a hospice room along with the equipment that that would require in one or another of our shelters then that would be most welcome that's all i got thanks i've heard that i support that that's very important um so go ahead merely i just was curious just if if they had any particular location they were looking at

12:33 yes um they were uh they were looking at the the shelter that was recently converted near mill street um down down near island park um and and i i i can't remember the specific address merrily but it's down in that side of town okay thanks yeah so aaron do we have in the emergency repair program how's it doing for money because i think that would be another go-to place to sort of keep people housed and respond to the crisis yeah um you know i think this last year was a good indication um you know through the cdbg one-year action plan that you um approved this in may um we sort of

13:18 match the funding for what we projected the need was so that was i don't say fully funded but projected to be fully funded um yeah i would i'll add the same sort of question came up counselor broadly about the down payment assistance program and so while it wasn't funded in that action plan it's got previous years funding available both on the anyone can apply if they're eligible but also you've funded square one villages down payment assistance for that innovative program but um yeah so and then uh for seed act you're gonna we're gonna essentially kind of give some of these notes to them let them have a public hearing and then come back with a recommendation

14:03 is that kind of the process yeah in an ideal world um you come up with some numbers attached to some of these projects that add up to 366 thousand and 652 um and then that gets put out for public comments and so the public has a plan to comment on so one of the questions um um i think i am interested in looking at continuing that white bird [Music] outreach and again i i more probably than without the medical focus level i think that's something that sort of speaks to where we've got a lot of people that are sort of still sheltering in place and being able to sort of continue that outreach

14:48 makes a lot of sense to me um i think i would have questions about ceta before i would agree to fund them i've seen some of their monthly reports and i what i really can't wrap my head around and um is they sort of come into sort of rental requests and rental support and rental um and if we think of sort of covid response really what i would love to see them tie in sort of those requests to actually are are they just sort of fielding the questions are they suppo are they providing you know case management resources are they just that first level of outreach but like jump from the point of i understand that they get are the first people to get the call and they're essentially running a call center what i would really love to see that

15:34 jump from how do i get from that conversation to sort of stable housing and how they're sort of being case managed from there and they may not do that but like before i would agree to fund them i would want to want a little bit more information um yeah i didn't realize the county was getting 60 million for rental assistance right because that's a that's a huge need and a huge amount of money that goes along with it go ahead corey one of the and i'm i'm not sure if these have to be previously vetted but it sounds like since we have a couple of years to spend it the gaps that i see on this list is nothing that's really tackling like the unhoused youth or youth who are precariously housed

16:20 and i think that that's something maybe it's an opportunity for us to look into um whether it's a partnership with the school district or i don't i don't know what i'm making it up but i think that's a place that's kind of missing and if we have a little time to to see how we can support that that's something that i also would be interested in looking into erin did we fund um there was i thought there was another project and it didn't get funding off of the original cdg yeah it was a construction project for downtown in in downtown eugene by an organization called youth era youth era i forget how they pronounce it um and they were looking for help constructing um part of their uh hostel

17:06 in the back um i sort of had some outstanding questions to them costs and timing um and hadn't really heard back um so i can certainly follow up with them i i think it it gets a little tricky of um you know how is something eligible um with the cdbg regs in terms of sort of an activity in eugene and then part like this would turn into a davis bacon federal age um a wage termination project which is fine they just hadn't anticipated those costs when they submitted their proposal and so there were some like if that's the case can you still afford it and what is your need is and so there's some outstanding questions i would still have on what and what that

17:51 is okay um i think i think maybe select some price uh some probably money for aaron and then leave a little bit more if you're interested in getting more information that probably would be helpful um sorry can you repeat that first half i just um i said i said may that it would probably would be helpful if we still kind of put you gave you some dollar figures that we were looking at and then we left a little bit of money left over if we're interested in this youth era project uh to give you a chance to go back and get some more information about it and and i'll add anything you put forward as a draft is just a draft and it can change drastically after the cdac holds the public hearing and it comes back to you so that sounds fine and i have i'm happy to

18:36 share my screen and we could all see numbers too if that if that would help would help and leonard while she's pulling this up um great thanks um thanks mayor i um i also wanted to put in a good word for springfield eugene tennants association as councilor rodley did they've been doing some good work and i'd like to see some money uh sent in their direction as well that's all i got thanks so i so i heard um white bird ceda um the tenant association ceta not the economic kind um no to uh

19:22 so i think it's white bird cedar maybe youth e.r.a do you miss anything else daisy chain for unhoused mothers and then if we could fit the if we could try to fit the fair housing council if they're developing training um i don't know that i would support them putting on like i would support them recording the training we all live in this virtual environment and it's going to have a longer shop span that way so maybe if we could see what that all adds up to aaron then and go from there oh yeah i realized i meant to put this in excel not in words so real time happening um sorry about that um

20:12 okay so i'm looking at the dollar amounts that we have um so we had daisy chain at i'm just going to take notes at 56 000. um you said wiper it's a 177 you mentioned ceta um so sita there's a range is there a number you would like to include

21:03 why do i remember they asked for 25k originally um yeah i think it was about 13 000 they had asked for originally so okay so let's start with 13k okay and see what the um and then and i'll say like again this the funds can be used for two and the next two and a half years so if there is if we come up short and you would like to have like a two-year you know funding that's that's certainly possible um

21:48 all right so right now we're at 246 i believe the youth era was at a ballpark at 45 000 i believe is what their construction ask was so that would give you put you at 291 yeah and that is i missed it's a it does not include the wage determination rate um does the hospice fall in here anywhere i i don't think i've heard anybody's numbers on the hospice yet like i would love for more information about the hospice like leave a little bit okay um but i've not heard a number floating around leonard yeah i um i would love to see just a maybe a pilot program even 15 20 000 uh devoted to creating a hospice room would be

22:35 would be most welcome yeah so i guess i have a question on particulars in terms of what the actual activity that we're paying for is is if it's um if it's rent or what um i don't know that buying equipment is eligible um you can certainly if you want you could leave you don't have to we don't have to get up to 366 000 you could leave it here and this kind of gives what you said like let's fund some let's put something out there for people to comment on there's something to give um you know if if something in the hospice realm comes in through the public comment that sounds like it's eligible and you want to support it

23:20 um that could i'll get some responses from some of these others that that would be great because i i think that everything i've seen about it is either is a phone call saying somebody was interested in it and if um and the idea like we what we're saying is we as a group are interested in if they have to develop an actual project and i'll say like a lot of these questions are you know we're talking about social services are really these regional efforts with the county that we're working on so these can certainly be questions we bring to the human services commission or the poverty and homelessness board to say we want to develop more of a program for unhoused youth and how we're sort of addressing those needs so um these aren't options like cdbg funds

24:05 but they're not the end-all for the only opportunity to solve some of these issues but okay this is good okay um is anybody seeing something we're missing or they want to add for them we're going to get another shot at adjusting this when we can turn it all on its end head in you know two weeks i'm gonna can i add one i heard sorry fair housing council did you want me to i could upgrade that here is that okay okay okay aaron it's leonard again um is there uh i i know that equipment is not part of the purview of this funding um would uh would staffing for the uh for the hospice care i i hate to sound like a broken record on

24:52 this would that possibly qualify yeah no i think staffing is one of those certainly eligible like the yeah the staffing is in eligible use yes okay thank you leonard i think you just have to call i'm assuming you heard it from chris because he called me about it is call him and just ask him to sort of like to have he's got to develop more of an idea sure and he can he knows where to find aaron yeah will do okay um any other comments or questions before we wrap this up all right aaron sounds like she's got what she needs um i appreciate it um we're gonna

25:37 adjourn the work session um we're gonna meet oh i think we're on a different are we on a different league aj for ceta yes you are and and the estimated start time for that is 7 10 so if you would like to take a few minutes for yourselves then we can meet on the next link all right we'll see you all on the other side all right we're takers