Springfield City Council — May 19, 2025

0:04 I'm going to call the Springfield City Council work session to order and somebody need to call the role. Mayor Van Gordon here, councelor Weber here, councelor Mo here, councelor Rodley here, councelor Blackwell here, councelor Doyle here, and councelor South here. Thank you. All right, we have one item this evening which is the Springfield Fiscal Stability Task Force final report presentation. gonna turn over to Ann Marie. Fantastic. I was gonna take it for Great. So, we can start over there. Um, good evening, mayor and council. Uh, tonight uh we're presenting the fiscal stability task force final report. Uh, this report captures uh the working recommendations of the task force which met for nine consecutive weeks between January 15th and March 12th. Uh, joining

0:49 us tonight is Karen Gaffne and Emily Levis from Funk Levis for a presentation on the report. Uh, also joining us online, I believe she's online now hopefully, is Sarah Emmeds with Eco Northwest, the author of the report. She's not there now, she should be soon. And she'll be available for questions. And we also have some task force members joining us. I'm not going to introduce them at this time as many as part of her presentation. Um, any questions before I turn it over? We're ready. Great. Great. and Sarah Emmens from the Northwest is um online as well in case there are questions. Um I'm going to save my introductions for

1:35 those of the um task force members that are going to speak tonight. Um but I would like to acknowledge some of the members who are here in the audience. Um, Senator Lee Byer, um, Alicia Beamer from Peace Health, and Joy Pendowski. Um, anyone don't believe I missed anyone. So, our our hope tonight is to uh walk through a bit of again the process of how we got here, how decisions were made, a bit of the criteria on the different options. um talk about what is recommended in the task force report and then really the

2:20 point is to to turn it over to task force members to to talk a bit about this. Um Erin said to me how are we going to work this uh to turn it on and slide up the side little switch on the left side. Sure. technology not my thing. Okay, there it is. So, just reminding everyone of um what this was. It really was a technical advisory committee bringing together uh people from the community with very different um skills perspectives um to

3:06 really tackle the fiscal sustainability in the four areas. Um looking at cost cuts, revenue options, and then some more long-term economic development legislative proposals. Everything was on the table. So there was nothing that we were told we couldn't talk about, nothing that staff didn't let us talk about. Um, it was really quite impressive. Um, want to talk a little bit about Sure. Just to uh talk a little bit about the task force approach to their work and I know you heard some about this at the last meeting too. It was time inensive with weekly meetings um reading and homework in between um those sessions. the committee members stayed very focused on their charge that we'll

3:53 remind you of um a little bit here, deeply engaged and and really committed to their ground rules of leaning in with their perspectives and really listening to each other. And those were keys then um to ultimately getting to consensus on the recommendations that we'll talk about tonight. Um the this is a rough outline of our meeting schedule. From the the very first meeting, we had an intensive and shared process roadmap of how we were going to share information, develop an initial list of possible recommendations in each of those four areas, and then debate, discuss, and refine until there was a final list that everyone could support. And so that was through those three months of

4:38 meetings. our task force charge. As a reminder, the target for the task force was to identify recommendations of ongoing funds to address a $4.5 million structural gap. The process was running parallel with the budget process that's happening right now. Um so the preparation of the fiscal year 26 proposed budget. Um, this builds on top of the recommendations that are already included in the city manager's proposed budget. Um, that includes ongoing reductions of $1.3 million in the um reductions to the library, fire and life safety, police development, and public works. Um, so the proposed budget also

5:23 includes the addition of $1.75 million of one-time revenue to cover service needs. Uh so we tried to put all of that together in a chart for you just to really show that um first of all the longer we wait to implement changes the bigger the gap becomes um and to understand that the task force recommendations really are on top of actions that are already happening and there were a few things that were not in scope and it's important just to remind you at the outset u that the task force did not include specific recommendations around important issues such as deferred maintenance and long-term investments in things like street maintenance or fire

6:09 station. Um that are all very important in terms of the city work and the task force did note how these additional unmet needs really make the problem even more critical that you face today. We aren't the only community facing these issues. many other places have either been through a process or starting on a process. Um but what we did was we looked to benchmark with what other processes have been um and looked at the ways that they went about it but then we brought it to really be the Springfield way what mattered to this community. um in looking at different options, we very much wanted to make a subjective

6:55 process more objective. So looking at criteria, um but there's a a good balance for criteria. You don't want to have so much that they don't make any sense and you really can't make a decision. So we did narrow it down to seven. Um number one being what's the impact to the general fund? That really is the the job of this is to look at the costs and savings, but that these were not in fiscal sustainability. These weren't one-time things that wouldn't help an ongoing issue. Um because as you know, even the 4.5 target, it does not solve the problem forever. It gives us breathing room for in five years.

7:43 We very much wanted to think about this in an economic uh competitive perspective as well. Um spring Springfield is known as being open for business. Um works well with its business community as witnessed by how many people were on this task force. And so we wanted to look at anything um that would impact economic competitiveness for the city of Springfield. um impact to the community is really thinking about the livability and access to services for community members. So looking at anything that would impact that um that it was something we could

8:29 control and that we could implement with practicality. It doesn't help to say we want to win the lottery once a year um for $10 million if you really can't uh practically implement that. Um that criteria came in um although I'd love to win the lottery for that for viability and and feasibility that was really something that was a workable solution and again something we could control. And finally, when we thought about this, we wanted to bring in a factor of community fairness. Um, we all know that there are different members of the community. We wanted to make sure we thought about any of our

9:15 solutions and recommendations with an eye on community fairness. So, this gives you a sense of the process that the committee used to ultimately reach its consensus. Um, as part of their homework, task force members each generated a list of potential recommendations to consider and um, brought that to the meeting and we put all of those ideas up on the wall for discussion questions and ultimately then using that seven uh, seven level criteria to score each of those ideas. Um, then we brought it back. Uh, the task force discussed them again once we had the scoring. um asked questions

10:00 again, narrowed the list, discussed some more. Uh then they went home and did homework on those recommendations. Each person looked at the options that were still on the list and prepared their own suggested package of how they would propose the city reach that goal. Um brought all of those packages to the meeting. We put them up on the wall again. We talked through them. people listened to each other, adjusted their ideas, and finally settled on a short list of recommendations that everyone could support. And that's what's in your final report. And if you watched the videos, you saw the lively discussions and the back and forth with this

10:45 committee and the way that committee members really listened to each other. Yeah, it um I deeply appreciated felt really privileged to work with this group of people that leaned in to this task. Um so u just to give you a flavor of what that was like. So on this slide we have uh the initial ideas that came in under the bucket of cost reduction ideas. Um so you can see there's a wide range of ideas that were discussed. Many of them more than once they were measured against that criteria. Um, and ultimately, um, when we said everything was on the table, the the group took that seriously and then whittleled that down to the final list of recommendations that you'll hear

11:34 tonight. And we'll give you the same opportunity to look at the full list of ideas around revenue options that came in. Um, again, each of them were evaluated against the criteria and went through that final process of narrowing the list down. We didn't give you the list for economic development or legislative, but those were in the the full report. So without really further ado, let me talk a bit about the committee's final recommendations and where um we settled um from a committee standpoint on their recommendation by consensus to what they how they got to that $4.5

12:24 million. Sorry, I hit the button wrong. It's going backwards. Sorry, I already mentioned that technology was not my thing. There we go. So, um number one, um looking at reducing the library budget by 500,000. Um what you see here are the seven criteria and how we um rated things. All of the options are in the appendices of the report. Um we also have um because we decided seven wasn't enough, we brought in other considerations. So looking at ways um or things that we wanted uh city council to think about this. Again, this committee

13:09 really looked at these options and coming up with this outside the political spectrum. Um, we brought this, we bring this to the city council to to look at our work, to think about it, and to hear how we came here. Um, it was important for the committee um to look and come up with something that was a a cut for the city of Springfield. As you know from the PSU study, there's not a lot of there there in your budget. You have cut quite a bit. Um and um as we looked at all of the possible reductions, we felt that that this one was um while something nobody really wanted to do, um it did give a a cut

13:57 that that helped us make up some of that um $4.5 million. Um there was much discussion about um fundraising a library district ways to um do other things but this was what made it into the report. The second thing as we move on from cuts to um revenue options uh the discussion was to develop a shared payroll tax with guard rails to generate um $2.3 million. So, I'll talk a little bit about that language because it was very specific. A shared payroll tax would be from the um employees and

14:43 employers um shared equally. Uh it would not be complex. There would not be uh exceptions. This one gets out, this one stays in. Um but the committee was very clear on guard rails. This was not an open-ended thing. it very much had specific guard rails to um to limit what would be done with this. There was a lot of discussion around competitiveness um competitiveness of of Springfield. Um, so, uh, the numbers are not final, but as we look at, uh, what this might mean in in real dollars for businesses,

15:28 um, it's about $50 a year for an employee. And, uh, depending on how many uh, employees you have, uh, $50 per employee for uh, that. So, a business that has like mine that has 10 employees, it would be $500 for myself and $50 for each uh employee. The third thing on the list um was to increase the current levies and uh to cover the full cost. This would allow us to generate $1.3 million. In

16:13 looking at the budget and looking at um what the current levies do, the um police and jail and also the fire, we recognize that some of the indirect costs um costs were not covered. Um and so there was the recommendation from the committee that you increase these uh to cover the full costs recognizing that the fire is uh this November and the police and jail is in November of seven.

16:59 Um, one of the ideas is to implement traffic cameras. This has been done in cities in California as well as we benchmarked on two cities in Oregon, Medford and Beaverton. Um, this isn't really a revenue generating uh option as much. While there may be some savings with um behavior modifications, you may not make as much. So, it's not something to um bet that you'll get $5 every two weeks from it. Um but we felt it was something to be included that it could those dollars could go towards public

17:44 safety. So, you could tie it directly to it. And there's also ways then um for people visiting areas from out of um town to also help with some of the defray some of the costs in this area. So we talk about this as improving health and safety much more than a revenue option as well as we had quite a bit of discussion on decreasing um police overtime. As all of you know, this is a complicated thing with how long it takes to bring on new employees. Um, a lot of things that go into this. Um, we dug in pretty deep on this and really thought a lot about the health and the safety of your employees and

18:30 ways um both the root causes of this and um some of the concerns for some of our employees. So, this was a recommendation. Um, I will tell you, um, again, in working with cities and and, uh, school districts and others throughout the state, um, Springfield really is an unbelievable staff in that the more we dug into this, the more they opened the books, the more they said, "Talk to us about it." um we had a committee member who really wanted to learn more, who wanted to bring their expertise. It was a wonderful partnership. So, um I'll just

19:15 give a little bit of kudos to your team on this and and it's part of the reason it made it into this report. All right. Um, as Anmarie said, in addition to those two buckets, the committee also talked a lot about long-term strategies. If we can um do this 4.5 million to buy ourselves some time, then we wanted to look at uh recommendations in areas of economic development and legislative strategies that could help with the long term. Uh the task force recommends uh a strategic review of your properties um to determine what should be sold, what might be developed, and what should be retained. Um and to take the time to do

20:02 that work and properties that were identified for potential sale could help reduce again, they'd be onetime revenue and could help reduce that deferred maintenance um backlog. task force also recommends that the gateway UGB area be evaluated as part of the city's broader economic development priorities and that meant um really focused time, resources and partnerships that are required to bring that area closer to development readiness. So on many of these we need to invest upfront in order to yield the longer term um revenue. Third, the task force believes the business retention and expansion should be a high priority and a potential revenue growth strategy for the city. So that means a a strong

20:48 business retention and expansion strategy that can help grow Springfield's economy, create jobs, and diversify the task force or the tax base. So u investing there and then finally recommending the city work with other communities to advocate for reforms on measure five and measure 50. uh the core financial challenges that are facing not only Springfield but um Oregon communities in general and um putting time in that area. In addition to those priority items, uh the task force identified um a number of strategies that didn't rise to the level of recommendations but are still important to ensure that Springfield's economic growth and long-term fiscal sustainability. Um, so

21:34 I imagine this list looks pretty familiar to you. Um, uh, the task force urges the city to pursue or continue to pursue these additional economic development and legislative goals. Again, knowing that, um, all of these will take time in order to pay off. So, there's a need to put some focused effort on those now to be able to yield results down the line. Okay. And then finally, um, throughout their discussion, the task force reflected on a number of considerations, principles, really threads that ran throughout their conversation and wanted to lift up three areas in particular as

22:20 you look toward implementation of recommendations. First, it's really critical to develop a plan to address that backlog of deferred maintenance that just felt like it was hanging out there with the task force. Um, so they underscored that. The second was the importance of true community engagement as this work moves forward. Um, the city's challenges are complex and in some cases not well understood by the public. Um so a critical piece uh is to prioritize community outreach engagement as part of the implementation so that we really bring the community along with us as you move through your next steps. And then finally the task force encouraged a simple strategic

23:06 approach to implementation. Um introducing too many changes at once risks confusion in the community and unintended consequences. Um so a thoughtful phased approach um would the task force felt would really support the long-term success and greater buyin. Again, I wanted to remind you of the members of the task force um with us tonight, Senator Lee Byer, Alicia Beamer, um Joy Pendowski and the audience. Um and uh at the table I asked four members to speak on behalf of this. What we thought we would do is um I'll introduce

23:52 all of them and we'll go down the the table and then have a a break. Um I'm sure you're tired of listening to me. Oh. Um, but have a break after the committee members and then we can come back and I'm sure any of the committee members would be happy to answer questions as would um Sarah from Eco Northwest. We really relied on her data to make a lot of the the decision making. Um so let me start and introduce um Jeff McGelry is a member of UA Local 290. Um he's a dedicated community volunteer and um frankly I see him everywhere. He knows everyone and he's

24:37 um he's quiet but when he talks everybody wants to hear what he has to say. Um Amy Yogi is retired from the UFO library. um her resume and the things she's involved with are just um they floor me and I think of myself as a volunteer who can't say no. She's worked on the illumination project. She's worked in the history museum um a volunteer caregiver sacred heart hospice board member for hearts and hospice resale store. She also worked very extensively on the illumination project. The woman who needs no introduction, Bonnie Mickelson, CEO of

25:22 the Springfield Chamber. We're really thrilled to have her here and to have had her voice at the table on this committee. Um, and finally, Michael Culver from International Paper. He's the controller and man manager of manufacturing excellence. So, I'll start with Jeff and we'll just walk down the the tape. All right. Thank you, uh, Mayor Van Gordon, city manager Newton, counselors, appreciate being able to speak tonight. Uh, those that know me know that public speaking is what I hate doing. So, I normally work under under that. But just a few things uh serving on this task force. One, totally out of my comfort zone of of of budgets and stuff that I normally deal with on a

26:07 day-to-day basis. But, you know, looking at everything there, uh, the one thing we really did, and we had great access to any information we wanted from the city staff and, you know, Nathan and Neil, everybody did great and the Eco Northwest stuff is more information than than than we could believe. Uh, one thing we did learn is how lean and mean Springfield runs. And, uh, that's that's awesome. Uh, but also something to keep in mind, it's taxing on your employees doing that. And that's something you really need to keep in mind. And and it's great that it's so efficient and everything, but that's all the way through, you know, city staff, public works, police, fire, everybody. Uh so it's great that they're on track there. You know, we also know, you know, found that the fire and EMS has already made

26:53 some concessions where they're using like less uh you know, services uh for for non-critical uh ambulances and stuff, which you don't see that in every city. Not everybody's done that. the police are really starting to use a lot of the public safety stuff when it's a non-emergency situation, you know, uh, type of situation. So, there's already been a lot of really good things that that Springfield's done. Uh, so it made our job even harder looking looking for more stuff. Uh, and, you know, just wrapping that up, you know, the key things to keep people living here, wanting to work here, and grow in this community. you know, just like you said, overworking staff and stuff like that. You got to have competitive pay, good working conditions and just a good place

27:38 to be. So, those are all things that I really focused on when we made these recommendations. Amy, um, thank you. I thank uh Mayor Van Gordon and uh city manager Nancy Newton and the city council for uh inviting me to speak on this uh I uh budget items that I have. I will speak about the um budget options for the Springfield Public Library and the uh Springfield History Museum. I will also add a little bit uh because I'm connected as a volunteer to the um emergency management uh of

28:26 Springfield. Um so as as part of the process of the task force, we were collecting information uh how many usage of the library and I realized that um as as with most people uh they have no idea what it what it means or they have no uh say background in it. So I I uh presented my perspective. Um, I worked for 36 years at the University of Oregon and 22 of the last 36 uh or 22 of the were the last years that I worked and it was at the University of Oregon library system. I uh the night library and I was

29:13 um in the interl loan office. Um being being in the largest library in the state at the time uh interl loans was all about resource sharing. It was all about sharing our resources with uh university and and uh educational libraries uh public libraries, governmental libraries uh but also school libraries uh to to be sure that they had access to our books and our uh information also. That was very important to us. resource sharing.

29:59 Um, and in in the time in the time uh that I was the 22 years, we saw a lot of budget cuts. I mean, right now we're looking at uh Eugene Public Library. Um, I saw where uh they were having the book sale and they mentioned that the Eugene Public Library the last two years of their budget they have had no funding for new books. All of their new books came from the money raised at their annual book sale. And uh we also went through um a time when uh Eugene School District

30:45 4J ended all primary school lobbies uh libraries. Uh that was that was devastating uh to us that that our young children would not have access that easy access to library books. Um, and we also saw the end one summer of uh, Lane County Library Districts. They ended the bookmobile that went out on the weekends to those towns um, that had no libraries. They took books out for the kids and for the families at on the weekends and they they stopped that. They said it was they couldn't afford it anymore. And and what I said also to our

31:31 committee is that once these are eliminated, they are never brought back. So I wanted us to be careful about what we recommended. Um so um so we looked we looked at the options available as far as cuts but we also looked at and everyone was very careful to uh share with all of us that there are um options uh that that were about sustainability about not just cutting and cutting and cutting but actually building and building this financial sustainability of the library and the history

32:20 museum. So um so one of the options was the library levy which which is based on what the community can support in order to grow or uh nurture the library and the Springfield History Museum. I I saw it firsthand. I've lived here in Springfield for 48 years and and it's just been in the last three years that I became involved with the illumination project which is a major initiative by the Springfield History Museum to feature under reppresented um communities. And so we every every year they feature one community and 2022 was

33:06 was our turn, the Asian-American community. Uh we went out a team of five or six of us went out and and uh we made a a video uh video of our leaders. We did a photo exhibit um with text of who we are, who we have been, what we have come from and it was it was it opened a whole universe to all of us and it it just made us so proud. Um and that was not the end of it. We were encouraged to uh ally ourselves with the next community and the next community uh and the one before us. We we are allies in ways we have

33:54 never been before. And in this way, the Springfield Public Library and the History Museum is building our community by acknowledging our presence. They're building a stronger community. And that has to it makes me really optimistic about having a library levy because we now have more people invested in the growth and stability of the history museum and the public library. So, and and I I truly

34:39 um love our committee, our task force for whenever this was presented, whenever it they were always considerate of the library and its value in the community. So, the other thing I wanted to talk about is emergency management. Um and and that is uh response to disasters and and our major major disaster that we see on the horizon is the breaching of the levy, the 42nd Street levy because of flooding from the McKenzie River and um with our emergency manager Ken Vogny u our volunteer members are training

35:25 with public works to do sandbagging in case we have to build dikes to do um flood wall diversion of water. And so this ongoing we're so excited to be a part of that to be part of the solution. Um and there are not just Springfielders involved. There are people who work here and they they have an interest in protecting their workplaces. So it's all of our cert members are joining in to um work on these teams in case of that disaster. We're also collaborating with Eb because uh Eugene does not have any

36:11 surface water in some areas. So if Haydenbridge water treatment plant closes down, those people have to buy bottled water or do something. um they don't have any running water. So Cert is working with um Eugene Water and Electric Board to uh set up water distribution sites where we set up a manifold, they set up a pump to pump water, we distribute water to people who need it and they can drop by, we can fill their bottles and they can head home. So, so in both of these cases,

36:56 um, the public library, the Springfield History Museum, and emergency management, we're building community, and we're building community that cares for our future. So, I'm I'm just really proud of what our task force is recommending. Thank you. Funny. Yes. with that what I appreciate one of the things at at the end of the day this is hard work these are hard discussions nobody wants to go down these you know it's not the favored road to go down but the optimism remained and I think that's a testament to not only who the mayor invited into uh to serve on this committee but how we showed up uh not

37:42 just for the committee but for the community and I too left with uh a great deal of optimism but also of respect for the way Springfield does business. So, what a couple of things that I'd point out. And by the way, I was invited to speak today, but I wasn't told what to say. Just like during the committee meeting, I was not told what to say. Um, I also want to make sure that um, it's understood that these are my uh, thoughts and perspectives and opinions and the chamber um, leadership has been behind this because number one, we believe uh, and that we have an interest in shared goals and outcomes that uh, with our city partners and our community at large. But we also understand it's important to be at the table and to have a discussion to learn and walk through

38:29 those hard conversation, ask the hard questions and challenge ourselves to get to the other side in a a better way. So um I'll give you a person couple personal thoughts. I um I did have reservations when I was asked to join the committee. uh made sure that those who invited me knew I had lots of questions, lots of opinions and healthy skepticism always was encouraged and and certainly I found the experience to be uh uh genuine in that regard and it's been mentioned here in the many ways. Um uh naturally my lens is from uh economic development and what's going to support our community. That should not exclude or preclude the fact that what business sees of value in Springfield is

39:16 different from some of the things that Amy and Jeff mentioned. It certainly is part of quality of place and life, affordability, uh what makes Springfield a special place to uh be that be called and known as as we are now a preferred place to live and to work and to raise a family and to grow a business. So this is something um that I think we uh continue if we continue to do uh things the way we do things I have a lot of confidence that we'll make right decisions at the end of the day no matter how hard it might be. Uh we do have that a track record to be proud of. Our business climate consistently outperforms neighboring cities uh the county and the state by as much as one

40:02 and a half to two points in the most recent survey. The chamber conducts these surveys annually and has done so for three years. Uh that is certainly not by accident. Um businesses here they feel supported, they feel welcome, they feel valued and celebrated and they choose in many many ways they choose to grow and invest here. So I believe that this trust is found in the idea that the city's here to help business thrive. It's a competitive edge that does work in our favor and is one worth protecting as we go forward. So, a couple of uh three things that I'll call out that I felt was super valuable and call attention to that you heard tonight, but as you continue to deliberate on these

40:48 strategies. Uh the first one is that scorecard criteria that you were presented and uh you were showed five um options uh that that was measured against that score those seven criteria plus the plus plus plus the added value ones off to the side on the notes. Um there are more and they're in the full report. I'm sure you've had a chance to look at those. These uh I found to be extremely useful in in interpreting the reasoning and the thought behind each option. You might share that you might uh think differently. It's a good starting place to ask more questions and to better understand um it goes beyond beyond the bottom line. The dollars and cents of an option

41:35 and factors such as the fairness and the impact on economic competitiveness, feasibility, all those are really really important and helpful. Again, beyond that dollar and cent line item number, um you'll probably note there are no slum slam dunk plays. we we were very aware of that and all the more reason we continued to explore and do our homework and study thoroughly. Um second thing would be um we're all very aware we came into this room with a shared goal and um some unconventional ideas some conventional ideas the task at hand and then we left and we realized pretty quickly that we don't live in a bubble here in Springfield nor does the city.

42:20 We're not immune to both market induced or policy induced, be that at the local level, the state level, the federal level, conditions that are outside the city's direct control. So I would just say that underscores the need for ongoing assessment of context and balance and strategic scenario building and then that ever elusive um timing, the right decision at the right time. Finally, I'd encourage that council see this report as a really solid starting point. So, we know your work is really hard. I tend to be very conscientious and aware of the work that you do. We

43:05 work so closely. It's so important your decisions and how they impact our community. We also work with partners outside Springfield. And so we're very aware of how difficult it is right now. Um Springfield's reputation as a practical, fair, and trustworthy is one of our greatest assets. So again, I'd underscore that. Make sure you know that. The chamber certainly sees that and recognizes that and hears that in unsolicited feedback all the time. So when when you have that trust, it brings confidence. and it brings confidence that when we're challenged, we will find innovative um solutions that are also reasonable. So again, I'd end this is

43:50 this really is an opportunity for Springfield to do something different. Um we look at peer communities as a benchmark, but we should be a leader among our peers and be that model of excellence that other communities look to us for. So, thank you mayor for the opportunity to have a seat at the table. Michael last. It is never good to follow. Thank you. Sorry. So, it's also my honor to be here to address the council this evening. Um, I represent our national paper. Uh, and as Amry noted in my intro, I've been a member of Springfield's Mills leadership team for the past 15 years. Um just for a little context, our facility

44:36 celebrated its 75th operating year last year in 2024. Um we produce about 600,000 tons of linerbort uh and to customers on the west coast of the United States as well as Southeast Asia. Um we have endused customers that you all know, Amazon, Pepsi, um IBP. Um so hopefully those ring bell with you. just shy of 300 employees and an annual payroll in excess of $50 million. Our cash cost, just for relative perspective, is about $150 million. All spent within about a 65 mile radius of 42nd Street. Um, and we also happen to be

45:21 Lane County's largest property taxpayer as well. So that's the lens with which I just wanted to give a little perspective of my my background was also clearly said I do have an MBA an undergrad degree in finance and accounting as well as an operational um degree as well. So really my intent this evening is to talk about my experience working on the task force and a lot of the things you're going to hear are echo the sentiment Jeff and Bonnie described. Um, you know, the talent the group was very, very diverse. And so I'd be remiss if I didn't recognize the mayor and the city manager for bringing together a really truly diverse group of people, but also tremendously talented. I was very

46:06 honored to work with them for the nine weeks that we were together. And actually, can't believe I'm saying this, I kind of miss them. Um, also I do have previous work experience in one of those communities that we benchmarked before I spent my 15-year career here in Springfield. I spent about four years in Albany uh working at a integrated pulp and paper mill there as well. I also had the opportunity to help the city of Albany with similar uh issues and concerns that are facing a lot of municipalities as current force. One thing that was very um obvious to me through my own personal work experience in the city of Albany and the benchmarking work that was done by Eco North was the similarities between those two cities, right? A

46:52 strong sense of community and an unwavering community really reminded me a lot of my time there. And so that gave me I think a really unique lens with which to view the issue which is very easy to put in terms of dollars and cents. Right? I could have been out of here in two hours and told you exactly how to fill your structural deficit and come up with that $4.5 million. But to do that would have been a disservice to, you know, really what the mayor asked us to do, which is really explore all of the opportunities and the options uh that were put forth and and really come up with some of our own. One of the things I really want to touch on is the importance and I know it's a very sensitive topic and it's not lost on me but um I think from a large employer in the community cost reduction is key right I think it's very important

47:37 that even though through the benchmarking and the work Eco Northwest did this is a very efficient municipality my compliments to the city manager there is no fat anywhere as Jeff said it made our task extremely difficult. Um, but the flip side of that is that it's as far as credibility goes, I think it's important that the city be willing to say we're willing to do make a hard decision before we go and talk about revenue options. Revenue options impact us all directly whether we own a business, we work in a business, or we live in his community. So I think that's critical as as it relates to credibility and trust with community

48:23 constituents. But really the fundamental question at hand is how do we balance revenue versus the services provided by the municipality and their cost ultimately right? Which good or for bad is really driven by people, right? People are what drive majority of the city's cost. So that issue isn't isn't lost and wasn't lost on the task either. Right? So our initial step as was defined was really to figure out what were those critical services. Right? And those mostly center around health and safety things that I think everyone in the room can get behind could understand without right emergency services without a a an active engaged lease force this isn't the have a community we want to work live and play in every single day. But it also

49:09 went beyond that and there's critical community services that are provided by the city. I think that's really where the difficult decisions and that those tough conversations happened. Um but what I want to convey is that our proposal includes very targeted changes and and Amber used my comment like to use guard rails, right? So it isn't a license to never stop being efficient to never make those hard decisions around costs, but always use that as one of the balancing points for the decisions that you make going forward, right? And so the key is how do you provide those services against the backdrop I call affordability, right? Something that we can all live with. So revenue diversity was also critical to

49:55 me. This task force heard me say it over and over again. Revenue diversity is a requirement unless we want to do this again two, three, four, or five years from now. And I would encourage the council to really take that to heart. We need to do something different because we can't shrink the pie. We've got to find alternate means of funds to provide these these these very vital and key community services. Right. And also we feel very important that this gives the council and staff the ability to walk that tightroppe between services provided and cost and affordability. Um not only today but for the next five years and beyond. Right? I know that the the the mayor charged us with how do we get for the next five years but honestly

50:41 as much as I miss the folks that I work with doing this again in five years in my opinion is abject failure. Right? What we want to do is give council and staff the tools they need to make those hard decisions and continuing to do the things they're very good at. It's not to say it's going to be easy, but and it's going to be very challenging, right? We understand that. But the list was not compiled lightly and includes tons of very vigorous dialogue. So I was the giver and then the receiver right between members but it ultimately forged a very strong and most importantly practical solution set. It is a framework with which followed will

51:26 lead to sustainability. In closing, I'd like to thank staff for both their critical work they do every day. So, run an extremely efficient operation and also the hours they put into the process to answer the numerous question posed by the task force with tremendous grace at every single step. I took the no sacred cows to heart. I challenged quite vigorously at times some sacred cows. Um, and at every corner the response I got was data, not opinion and not emotion. And it made it very very hard decisions less hard. Not easy by any stretch, but less hard. And lastly, I would like to reinforce

52:13 the importance of having community members be a part of the solution to the city's challenges for both the perspective that the task force provided and the work they will continue to do to help carry the message to your constituents in our respective areas of influence. Thank you. Thank you to all the committee members. And honestly, I could have picked any of the committee members to come speak to you tonight. um they were all so engaged um so thoughtful with everything they did. If we could bring the presentation back up, I just wanted to remind everybody on the the timeline one more time and then we thought we would take a break. Um and

52:58 you're welcome to come back. Oh yeah, I guess it's me now. You're in charge here. Turn it on. Is it on? Turned it up. And turn it on. I didn't do this kind of stuff because I'll hand it over to you. Um so, um as we go to the timeline, really where we started was back in September of 2024, um with the city council work session. um in January through March was the time for the the task force to do their work. Um we give the report to you tonight.

53:46 We'll um look at answering the with questions and we have one more session um really for your discussion um beyond what happens tonight. But really then we move into the hard work which is going out to the community making decisions at that point. So um what we'd like to do mayor is just take a break for everyone. Um I don't know what time you'd like to come back. I'm not in charge. I'm not looking at all which is unusual. The first thing I would like to say is thank you to the committee. Um they you guys still take my phone calls which I'm really grateful for but um it was an immense amount of work and it gave us a very good starting point and your

54:32 perspective and um skills and insight is going to be really helpful in this conversation. Um I'm going to look at council like if you could take five minutes here or if you guys are still good you want to keep going we can just dive. Okay. I'm I'm hearing no break. So, I think the two things we want to get out of this next part of the conversation is to just really open it open up the conversation for the council to either ask clarifying questions um maybe identify things that you know I first look that you're interested in pursuing um just generally start with your feedback and then we'll see where the conversation's going to go. how this conversation is going to go will really shape up um our extra time on the 30th.

55:18 And the way I keep thinking about it is if we can get to some basic idea of what we want to do, how we make it our strategy, um it's going to make it easier to, you know, solicit feedback from the community about, you know, what we're thinking with that. Who wants to dive in first? All right, councelor Blackbolt. I just want to say thank you also so much for just diving into the weeds head first and uh going through this process. It was some great dialogue and lively conversations. I enjoyed watching the videos and I just really appreciate all that you guys brought in your time. Thank you. And I do have a question. Are we going to go through kind of each recommendation and then ask our questions or are we just um It depends.

56:04 Do you have question? Do you have questions by each recommendation? So, yes. And I'm gonna kind of look at everybody else. Do people have questions kind of by recommendation? All right, let's do it that way. Let's Can we pull up the pull up the recommendations? This is sort of choose your own adventure. where I turned it off and I turned it on. It's just I'm not good. We're gonna go all the way back to the first one. Blackwell, would you like us to start at the beginning? Sure. Sure. The library. Okay. So, a couple

56:49 questions that I had on that. Uh the 500,000 does cutting it one day a week equate to $500,000 or is that cutting other services from the library? So, I'll start, but I think the committee members or it really was um more just a target number of 500,000 and we sort of left it up to city staff, library staff to figure out the best way to do it. But, um at the beginning there was some idea that maybe a day could get us there. But at the end of the report, we really left it as that was our target amount of of dollars that we felt um

57:36 could come from that part of the budget. Anything I missed for this? Okay. And then regarding the the levy option, I I like that idea. If if this was the road we went down with cutting possibly some hours from it to give it back to the voters to see if that's something that they would support and even maybe expand on, would that be something that would be on like for 2025 or is this I think it would be up to us to choose the date. Um so that would be something we'd probably want some feedback as far as time goes. Um because we have a we do have a levy that is gonna well I think we're talking about when we want to put the fire levy out next week. Um so I think that would be a

58:23 place to get additional feedback. Does anybody else have questions about the library and let's flip to can we flip to the next one? Does any initial questions on this one? Go ahead, council. How is it different than Eugene's uh payroll tax? Several things. Um and I'd be happy if Sarah would like to weigh in as well. Um Eugene's much higher. There are exceptions. It's rather complicated.

59:08 Um I should ask either Sarah or Nathan. Um is Eugene's shared between employees and employers? It is. Um Sarah, are there other details in the benchmarking against Eugene? I know this was uh quite a bit smaller. Yes, that's right. So Eugene has a pay an employer tax rate of 02% um but a slightly lower rate if there are two or fewer um FTE in the firm and then on the employee side the rate is 444% um but it's 33% at at or around minimum wage and then it's exempted below minimum wage. So when Amarie said it's complicated, it's it's it's kind what I

59:54 would call a graduated rate with some exemptions and carveouts. So in addition, it's probably more complicated to collect the dollars. Correct Sarah as well because it is a more complicated thing. So one of the things from the committee is they wanted this to be fairly simple, straightforward, shared between employer and employee. And then just as a followup, that's great. Just as a followup to that, I guess I'm kind of wondering, it says the biggest concern is the negative impact to economic competitiveness. I'm just curious, I mean, are we looking that in terms of the state, nationally, or where are we where are we most concerned about the a

1:00:39 lack of economic competitor that is coming from? I just I'm looking at I'm also looking at Mike, you know, I would like committee members. I think both Bonnie and Michael could give some good start. Yeah, I'll just add um I think well part of the thing is somewhat subjective. It's hard to know. So you see that uncertain or uh possibly negative or it's uncertain. So we don't know. We can't predict. what I would uh my probably bigger concern about this is perception and if we um I you know we can't get away from um uh some uh less than uh good examples

1:01:28 of communities that have done this and implemented this and you know AC across the state. So I think that you're battling with the perception of other communities having tried this more so than you are perhaps with the fairness or you know some of those other priorities like does it actually help a structural deficit? Potentially it does. There are still a lot of questions out there. What happens in an economic downturn? And yet if it's matched with um growth, it could also be viewed as an incentive for the you know local governments to partner with industry for growth in you know economic development. So it's um it's not clear. It's not

1:02:16 clear. It's uncertain. I think you're really um the biggest concern that I might be paying attention to is what happens in the next couple months at the state package, what happens next door, what happens in other taxing districts including the county. So all of these things unfortunately do come to play even though it could be in many other ways um a solution for some of those structural and those budget gap issues. So that's just my honest top of mind. Michael, did you want to say something? Sure. Just just additional context around uh this recommendation is is key in my opinion. Revenue diversity because you are capped

1:03:03 for revenue diversity. Revenue diversity. So absent this, you have nothing that can grow beyond because of the limitations and the restrict by measure five and measure 50. This gives this community another revenue option that again is subject to the downturns of the economy and revenue loss and payroll losses in the city but also is subject to revenue increases. And one of the concerns that the city has is that as I stated in my comments, your cost structure is driven by the people cost and they haven't signed a contract extension with the labor union anywhere near the limitations of measure five and measure 50. As those revenues or those payrolls increase, this revenue stream increases at a commensurate amount and

1:03:48 it it gives you some again some diversity and some flexibility. I think the competitiveness comment really more directly to your point is about um it starts I think it's highly competitive. I think we were very deliberate about.1% it just like we were very deliberate about making sure we shared between the employer and the employee because they both benefit from having a um vibrant community to operate in and work in. Um but really it's up to honestly council to maintain that competitive nature. We look next door very clearly and and and just based on the numbers far less than Eugene's and that's intentional but it can only stay competitive if council continues to be

1:04:33 very um metered in how they use that knob or that lever to offset cost increases. I think the council's job first and foremost is to challenge staff to make sure they continue to run very efficiently and only turn that revenue dial um when when absolutely necessary when it's critical community services that are at risk. Um so that's that's that's the additional Thank you. I appreciate that. Thank other questions on Yes, counselor. So, I'm one who doesn't like taxes like a lot of people, but I work in Eugene and the reality is I don't even notice that on my chick. It is so small. And so, when you say that it's

1:05:18 significant, I would propose that we match whatever Eugene is in terms of cost or have a flat dollar amount that you could make. Then you don't have to worry about these continuous like, well, do we need to do more? Do we need to do more? But I think the big thing is that we need to do what we say we're going to do with that money. That's been the big issue in Eugene, I have found, is that people said this was supposed to be for for police and for safety and what's it going to because we still have all of these problems, right? And so the one thing that I'm really proud of being a part of Springfield is that when it came to the bond measure, we did what we said we were going to do to the point that the people were willing to double that on the next one when we went out for it again because we were able to do that.

1:06:03 So, I don't know how we manage that, but I um I feel like that's like I said, I'm never one to be for taxes, but this one is one where I understand the logic in it. And and it truly, even though people hear the word tax, it's kind of like gas tax 3%. It's just nothing, but it feels like the word tax. Um I I don't even notice it. So, I don't know that it needs to be this weird like do this percent and that percent, but maybe even a flat number that just says that will get us through that five years. So, rather than because you're saying this is just a you just for this year or next year or whatever, why don't we look forward and be looking at how much are we going to need in the long term and then we sustain that where we're not

1:06:49 having to go back and ask people for more money in three years or four years. So, just in other words, rip the band-aid off. Yeah, I think you also need to I can have the most additional comment is think about um the administrative cost for how you implement and collect those dollars because remember this is a gross number not a net number. So is there an FTE administer it? So you got to think about those net costs and again really this gives council that tool to say what do we need to do and um you know make that difficult decision around do I start higher in an effort to maintain a continuous level or start at the very minimum and maybe there's alternate means I mean you look at the the library levy for instance at 42

1:07:36 cents per thousand it generates $2.5 million in additional um revenue for the city right and So maybe starting out low if the riberry levy is something that the council chooses to go towards maybe 0.1% shared between employer employee is the optimal solution and it will get you past this 5year window. Just something to consider. Well just keep in mind too that the reason why Oregonians have not voted in sales tax is because we've seen how it starts at 3% and then before you know it you're paying 9%. So, you know, right, and I think that's why the committee was very clear in their language that there needed to be guard rails around this um in looking at a payroll tax um because of the economic

1:08:21 competitiveness and the the things that makes Springfield very businessfriendly. All right, Councelor Weber, you want to jump in here? Yeah, and I don't really have any questions because honestly, you guys all did such a great job chewing through this that I just feel really um really solid about the the recommendations that you've brought forward. Um and I appreciate part of the conversation around the concern about the public's appetite, our community's appetite for how high we would go on this tax. But I do also agree with councelor Doyle. think we could have a conversation around maybe going a little higher and building in a buffer on the front side of this. I mean, maybe it's not go as high as other cities do, but maybe we we find some balance point that

1:09:09 that kind of doesn't put us at a point where we're like, did we make the right choice and having to come back, you know, sooner than later to expand that. Don't forget distribution. We were um the same way about the library one meeting. Sorry guys. We were very clear in our report that we operated as a committee to advise the city council. Really is up to the city council on the final decisions as well as the political well and Iation and I think this is really good feedback to get ready to develop this into a strategy. a couple of places I would like more information um about are what

1:09:56 potential guard rails would actually look like, right? Because that some of these questions haven't been asked yet and it's a reasonable thing to ask the staff for is to say, "Okay, if we wanted to have a conversation with the community, it's clear that whatever we do has to have guardrails, what would that look like?" The second question specific to payroll taxes um that I would be interested in is that timing question right from a from a staff perspective and I and I'm going to back up about um what one step and just look more broadly across the whole package of options is I think understanding what the recommended sort of timing of this and how it you know impacts against our pro you know our challenge is important for us to make um for for us to make

1:10:43 broad choices about how to how to navigate our way through this. And then I think uh I think lastly and this is this is a question if this continues to develop we really need to have some sort of easy tool that just explains you know if it's five employees it is roughly this if it's 10 employees it's roughly this and the question that I have is coming back to this e question of economic competitiveness is if if We I would love I guess a little bit more perspective on does is this a more economically competitive choice? And the the the thing I keep thinking about is our big manufacturers, our big employers, right? If we don't

1:11:30 when we tax property, we're really taxing investment in in the community and do we get a do we become more competitive if we diversify our revenue a little bit um to allow the return on people's capital to be a little bit more competitive than the rest of than the rest of other questions about this one in particular? I'm going to have them flip through. We're going to see if anybody's got other It sounds like we have some interest in learning more about the payroll tax. Um, and Steve, do you want to jump in here? I have a comment here. Sure. I've been watching our budget process for years and I've been watching the surplus get less and less and less until it's gone. We don't have it

1:12:16 anymore. So, we can't depend on that. So all cities in Oregon are in the same same shape. Tell everybody out there is out of money. They're all trying to find some ways to solve the problem. And uh those changes are fixes for the current situation. It's not going to make everything go away. In the long run, the same problems are going to go up and income is going to go down. I think this city needs to in the long run reassess how we run the city and have services, income, whatever. But in the long run, we got to make a look at the big picture, make some changes.

1:13:08 Okay. Any any other questions? Great. I'm fine if we want to keep flipping through this and see if any's got better than you guys. Thank you. You have something to say about this one. Oh, go ahead. So, I just want to make it very clear that I am really frustrated with the fact that we have a library that get to take from the general fund, but we make our police and fire have to go out for levies. I don't understand the logic in that. If it was my choice, the library would be on a levy 100%. And then that way, the people have a choice on whether or not they want that service. Whereas police and fire, we don't have a choice. That is services that we must provide in terms of, as you would mentioned, Michael, the health and safety being number one. I

1:13:54 think that the library provides great services, but I was also, and I made this clear during the budgeting process, frustrated with the fact that that budget was brought to us. We had uh departments like police and fire that were willing to make cuts. And the only cut that was brought to us with the library was a position that they're not going to refill. there was still a $50,000 um capital uh cost and not a penny of that was offered to be reduced. And so I feel like that was a little frustrating to me. So I mean I feel like the library should be on a full levy. That's $2 million right there that we would have and then we wouldn't have to tax our people. It would be something they could choose versus a this payroll tax. It's not

1:14:40 going to be a people's choice. So, sorry had to throw that out there. It's all good input at this point. Anybody else want to jump in on this one? Just a clarifying question. I know there is some some amount of um administrative overhead that we're able to handle as a city or that's not or that is currently being done by the police departments, etc. Um are is when we're talking about current levies, we're talking about we we're looking at after we've kind of shifted as much as we can with respect to the current levies as the risk. Is that correct? So I might have

1:15:26 to come back and think of how I want to reask the question. So I think I think I know the general context of what you're getting at because I'm obviously working in government. I'm so familiar with using levies for funding. Um, ordinarily you have the levy pay for the you expend levies funds first before you start tapping into the general fund as a general principle for how you expend the dollars. Is that what you were kind of getting at? Yeah. Um, I guess what I'm wondering is within the context of of public safety is the committee looked carefully at places where we could say, you know, eliminate an administrative position within the police department and wrap that into city core services. Is that correct? Or is that I mean is that outside the scope of what their work was?

1:16:12 It wasn't to that level of specificity as far as staffing because I think it's important to remember that while the task force was doing their work, we were on a parallel track with the city putting together our budget. There were already cuts that that uh were asked of the police department. Um there was one position that was laid off, another position that was not hired but was vacant. Those were two um community service officer positions. Um so that was happening. It just kind of happened with the timing, but they were both happening at the same time. So um the budget committee finished finished their work last week as you recall and then that will come before you in the council meeting. But that was the cut the net

1:16:57 effect to law enforcement. It was a $250,000 cut. Cool. Thank you. All right. Other questions about questions specific to the levies? Um, are people comfortable saying that we want to pursue this? You know, like if I if I think about the conversation the 30th that it's going to be a lot easier on the staff if we have a sense of, hey, this is stuff that we're more comfortable with pursuing or this is stuff that we have additional additional questions about. This is one that I think it would be helpful to tell them we're more comfortable with working out some of the details, but there, you know, we've had these levies for, I don't know, 20 years or so. Go ahead. Just to just be adjusting the levy to cover those administrative costs that are not covered currently

1:17:42 with the levy itself. I think there's two things here and and Marie, keep me on this here. I think it's understanding those indirect cost and then adjusting the cost to account for operating oper overall operating costs. Correct. But it's dependent upon the voter saying yes. Correct. So the voters say no. Now now where how do you fund the police? How do you fund fire? I'm just saying that you have to look in terms of things that you can told sorry we don't want that anymore. Um would police and fire would be one that we can't not have. So just something I mean I just it just sucks that they have to every five years our staff at the jail have to worry about whether or not they're going to have a job or not. I just that's got to be a

1:18:27 that's always bothered me for them. Go ahead, Councelor Rodley. Um, and this looks back to what you mentioned timing and you were talking about timing. I think that um, uh, for if we're if we're giving staff info to come back with. I think I'm interested in not just like the timing in terms of how fast could we get something up and going, right? So a payroll tax as part of it is like what would that look like in terms of the timing um but also just sort of the intersection of the things right we already kind of know in our minds we're thinking okay we've got the fire levy we've got the police levy so just thinking about that in terms of how those would layer together um over time

1:19:14 that makes sense naughty so she understands yeah so almost like a chart or a timeline of it in terms of thinking about chart really what I can't share really to think about it because I think that's part of the point that the committee share about the public engagement is just to to really help folks understand because if we're coming at them and people are like oh my gosh they're going to tax me for all the things they're going to raise my wastewater fees they're going to do it all at once but if we can look at it over time and think about that I think it'd be useful and also understanding that a dollar today is better, right? With the, you know, if you're not implementing till year five, it's actually not four and a half

1:20:00 million dollars. I think we're ready to keep any initial reaction to public uh to traffic cameras. I really like this from a public safety standpoint. Um, just driving through the city, the number of red light runs I see and the just the number of accidents, nasty accidents caused by that. I think it's something that we really need to consider just even at main intersections where those accidents are really happening. Council Black Wolf, I agree. Looking through to it through a safety lens, I I agree. There's certain intersections in particular that would probably be good candidates for that.

1:20:52 All right. Anybody else? Okay, let's keep looking forward. Any questions about this one? Uh, go ahead. This one I was a little confused about because I feel like police departments always have overtime and I don't know if ours is like in balance compared to other police departments or what the overtime and also I think Neil mentioned something about um that we're more fully staffed now than we were. So is the data incorrect there that we had this overtime because we weren't fully staffed and now we're near nearly fully staffed and so that over time would decreased. So they saw some data from earlier that our overtime

1:21:37 did shoot up. It was because we had a lot of vacancies back during the pandemic and with the um George Floyd incident. We had a lot of folks left the force. We've been rebuilding over time and even as most recently as this year it's improved significantly. So it's something that'll self-correct in in a sense or potentially. Yes. But it was quite a bit of discussion of of the increased costs to your budget with overtime and making sure that this was a real focus. um because it does hit your budget and it's a place where it could be helped. Um I had two takes on this one. The first one was that I think it

1:22:22 is a good operational and administrative thing. Um and it would be helpful for us to put again from it was we think about adopting the strategy just to be upfront about it and tell and you know continue to make it a priority with the city manager, right? like to to manage you know our overtime costs. So I think that's kind of one you know sort of one component. The other component that I think would be helpful for some feedback from staff is if I remember right this is driven also by some state changes that make it harder and like spots from tradingmies as being uh there being fewer spots out there. So I think from a legislative perspective I think there's this question that goes okay how do we how do we advocate um for you know just

1:23:08 increased funding to allow new officers to come come online quicker. So may if I may um go ahead I I think that those are two very good points I would want to address each one. Let me start with the last one you raised as far as the number of policemies that are currently held. I think that that is something that we should be tracking and supporting u funding for the department of safety and professional standards training. That's the department that um coordinates uh training and certification for all law enforcement in our state. Uh the other part is the comment about overtime and I think that overtime is all what you said councelor Blackwell is absolutely correct around um not just police but also fire. They're a very high stress

1:23:54 occupation, very high burnout rate. Um, and so that they tend to have more overtime anyway. Also, just because the nature of their work, right? You never know when you're going to have a a call that requires a lot of resources. Um, that is a common thing. But I think one of the things we might want to explore and I don't want to talk too out of my lane, but at time there is a school of thought about investing more and actually almost overhiring in a sense, right? so that you have more positions in your budget that reduces the need for overtime. You try to get more people on board and if you try if you look at it that way it requires more of an investment to actually make a reduction. So that's something I'd like to explore further with the chief. Dr.

1:24:40 Rodley, thank you. Um, and I appreciate that perspective because I was thinking of um a point that Jeff made early on about um the need for us to really be paying attention to our staff and how we take care of our staff. And I think that um so that's the lens that I bring when I'm thinking about the the working to decrease the police overtime. And I know that there's been some creative work with the fire department to try to like break out roles to try to help to diminish that because I think that um the idea of of supporting more definitely helps us to address that stress and that risk across the board. So I think that's another thing to be thinking about in terms of this. It's just like, you know, and it'd be

1:25:25 interesting and I' not like for in three weeks, but I I I mean, I would anticipate that when you have high overtime, you also have people who are, you know, maybe using more of the health insurance and there's just a lot more stress on folks um because they're working these longer hours. So, yes. Anybody else? Keep flipping through them. Yeah. Um, unless somebody wants to make comments about the legislative and economic strategies. When I read through these, these were mostly aligned with what you know we had we have talked about over the last year. So, I didn't feel like I didn't write anything down that I wanted to say, but I want to give you folks a chance if if you had a comment you wanted to make about legislative or economic strategies.

1:26:13 Go ahead. I was glad to hear you guys talk about Gateway. you had a lot of conversation around the gateway area and it just it made me think I mean that's on our mind as well all the time and it was an area that we looked at for CFAC and decided that wasn't the correct area for for CFAC but it's it reminds me of like you know the riches are under your feet or you know that saying and there's so much potential there that as we develop these other areas I think we have to keep that top of mind still and be working on it to some degree in the background without spreading ourselves even thinner but to have some kind of plan for that moving forward for when these um developments are finished or near complete. We've got something coming up in the in on the back burner. Thank you for those comments you guys had on that.

1:27:00 Go ahead. answers don't. Was there ever a discussion about, and I know it's a little bit tricky with Oregon tax law, about a vacancy fee or a vacancy uh search charge for underdeveloped properties or properties that were not um you know, just not being used or long-term holds or that sort of thing. I'm just kind of curious if that came up in the discussions of your deliberations and if there was any really strong feelings about it or frustrations about it um that people would like, you know, I wish we could pursue this, but I don't recall it coming up, but Michael, correct me if I'm wrong. I don't recall it coming up, but it has come up since the task force uh disbanded. And I find that to be one interesting thing. I'd like to see it through the lens of the evaluation criteria. I don't know, you

1:27:46 know, if it's a high fiscal impact opportunity or if it's somewhere in between, but it certainly is a creative solution. That's why I think it's important to continue to be open to that conversation and that comprehensive strategy because there might be things that weren't haven't thought about yet. So, thanks for asking. That's a great one. that actually uh I talked with Bonnie the other night about that because it's something that I've actually been researching um when we had someone come to the council about a month ago and and he had mentioned that uh taxing blighted and um vacant buildings and so I started doing some research on it and looking at communities that actually do that and there's there's a lot more to it because

1:28:32 you also have to look at the other side of it which is okay well if I'm going to tax somebody for not developing and then when they develop I'm going to tax them more for the fact that they've done development. You know, you've got to be able to find those incentives as well on that side. But, um, I think that it's it's a twofold, not not necessarily all financial, but about our community and how there's so many blighted buildings on Main Street in particular that um, how do we incentivize people to do something with that? So, yeah, I I definitely would like that. Um, and I mentioned it to the mayor as well. I was hoping it would come up. It's slowly coming up. It didn't make it didn't quite make the report. Sorry, Emory. Did you have something you wanted to jump? I did. The um the videos that were a part of all of the work, there

1:29:17 was really extensive discussions on a lot of the things that you brought up. Um but I would like to offer if it's okay for the committee members um that please ask any of them um after this meeting um for their feedback, any questions that you have. There's a wealth of expertise that um frankly when you were at a meeting you said you were really surprised by the things they were coming up with and the things that they were dis discussing. But I'd just like to say, and I did make eye contact with her, um Alicia Beamer from Peace Health really dug into the overtime. So if you have questions about that, um Michael also had good feedback on that on the

1:30:03 payroll tax. Michael um Vonnie, but in our audience um Senator Byer with just his background in legislative issues and and tax policy and statewide um he was extremely valuable and Joy Pendowski from Chambers um construction just on economic development and really thinking about a business perspective. Really anybody that's on this task force would welcome your call. Um, so I just wanted uh to offer up for them to work. Just don't have me call. Um, so I think we would want to hear more about a vacancy fee or I don't know what they're it's a blighted and vacant

1:30:50 building. Yeah. And it may be worthwhile if I may just to especially look at some of the current um like the I'm gonna see the up our economic development areas those ones as a as a strong path forward and Ally has some really good information because of the community that she came from in Pennsylvania and how it is benefiting and how it is really successful in their in that community in Pennsylvania. We are at the end of our 90 minutes, so I want to give you guys a chance to be respectful of when we were supposed to, but I'll delay into this conversation. But if anybody have any other comments for the staff, we're going to pick this up on the 30th of June, not May. Got to clarify 2:30 is coming up. Did anybody

1:31:35 else have any last minute questions? Okay. Um, the two last two comments I had and then Nancy, I'm going to ask if if you got all the feedback that you needed. Um, when we come back in June, can we find a date and be really explicit about when we're like when we can put this out out for public comment, whether or not that is a hearing or that is timeline. I do hear some questions kind of in the in the back behind me. The public's still going be very interested in that and I would like to hear a little bit more about um sort of actively soliciting uh soliciting some feedback. tell you that your dance card is completely full until the end of the

1:32:20 fiscal year. So, you will be picking this up in the fall. And then the last I think thing that I just wrote down is like is we talked about a lot of different ways to work our way through this like this is this is a point that a lot of like Steve brought up that a lot of cities have are in this situation and it's probably 40 years of different policy choices and I just want to echo the importance of just economic growth here right you know as we continue to care for our businesses and care for our community that you know economic growth is going to help a lot here. So, Nancy, do you have enough feedback? Is there some play to get get us to the 30th? Is there something else that we need to dig into tonight? I think I have everything,

1:33:06 mayor. Um I feel you know between myself and Nathan who is uh making notes as well but it you know sort of as a recap you know further discuss you conceptually agree with the uh recommendations put forth by the task force but we want to learn more about you know what this means in actuality. So what this could uh some tools as far as so people can understand if there were some kind of an instrument like a payroll tax, how how could people figure out how that would affect them personally or their business? Uh talking about the timing and how uh different initiatives may layer over each other. Um and taking a broader look at that. Um certainly having a work session on some of these issues that have come up since

1:33:51 the task force met such as the vac the building vacancy tax. I think that's an incredibly interesting um concept. I'd like to learn more myself. And also um further discussion, I know we started this, but further discussion on CEDA property disposition and what is our long-term goal for that. And if I miss anything, we have another opportunity on the 30th to talk about it more. Great. Right. I'm seen head nods from the council. Thank you everybody. I know that a 90-minute work session item is a long work session item. So, thank you so much for hanging in there with us. We are good evening.