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HomeMy WebLinkAbout12/06/2012 Work SessionMINUTES OF THE JOINT ELECTED OFFICIALS OF THE SPRINGFIELD CITY COUNCIL, EUGENE CITY COUNCIL, AND LANE COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS THURSDAY, DECEMBER 6; 2012 A joint elected officials meeting with the City of Springfield, City, of Eugene, and Lane County was held in the Springfield Library Meeting Room, 225 Fifth Street, Springfield, Oregon, on Thursday, December 6, 2012 at 12:OOpm with Mayor Lundberg presiding. ATTENDANCE Mayor Lundberg welcomed everyone to Springfield City Hall and opened the meeting of the Springfield City Council. Mayor Piercy opened the meeting of the Eugene City Council. Commissioner Leiken opened the meeting of the Lane County Board of Commissioners. Present from Springfield were Mayor Christine Lundberg and Councilors Wylie, Moore, Ralston, Woodrow, and Pishioneri. Councilor VanGordon was absent (excused). Springfield City Manager Gino Grimaldi and other Springfield staff were also present. Present from Eugene were Mayor Kitty Piercy and Councilors Clark, Poling, Brown, Taylor, Farr, Zeleaka, and Pryor. Eugene City Manager Jon Ruiz and other Eugene staff were also present. Present from Lane County were Board Chair Leiken and Commissioners Bozievich and Sorenson. Commissioners Handy and Stewart were absent (excused). Lane County Administrator Liane Richardson and other Lane County staff were also present. I. Adjustments to Agenda There were no adjustments to the agenda. 11. Financial Stability PartnershipTM and BankOn Lane County Jeff Towery, Assistant City Manager, City of Springfield introduced Elena Fracchia, United Way Associate Director for Income. Several years ago United Way of Lane County made a transition to an Impact Lane County and adopted the three impact areas of education, income and health. The Financial Stability Partnershiprm (FSP) was the income initiative. Ms. Fracchia introduced others who were here to help her present. They included Claire Carpenter - Seguin, NEDCO Executive Director; Hank Hale, Co -Chair of the Financial Stability Partnership, Heather Billings, Oregon Community Credit Union; and Tracy Lipman, Co -Chair of the Financial Stability Partnership. She reviewed the outline of their presentation. The mission of the United Way of Lane County was "Improving lives through the caring power of community". They do this by mobilizing community in two ways — with direct impact work which supports services of individuals and families; and by creating lasting change in the community conditions by finding long -term solutions that take some of the challenges off of our social and public December 6, 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 2 of 10 services. They believe that those two things working together improved the lives of Lane County residents. In order to do that; they needed to align people to collectively work on similar projects. There were a number of ways to help our most vulnerable residents in the community such as by offering a helping hand out of a difficult situation, or creating opportunities for them to help themselves. Everyone in our community was interconnected, whether part of the vulnerable population or not. United Way of Lane County was working to join people together to create lasting change. The building blocks for quality of life were education, income and health. Around education, United Way of Lane County was working to get kids ready to learn through the Success by Six initiative and the Promise Neighborhoods. Around health, they had the 100% Access Coalition who were working to get vulnerable residents access to quality health care. In the third area. financial stability, they were helping new families towards financial stability. Those three goals were lofty and no one organization or entity could address them, fix them or create opportunities for enough people to make a difference if they weren't working together. Hank Hale served as Co -Chair of the United Way Lane County's Financial Stability Partnership, one of their three strategic initiatives. There was a myth of the good life in Lane County. Oregon and Lane County had beautiful landscapes, but also a disproportionate percentage of poverty or financial instability. Of the approximate 350;000 people who lived in Lane County, about 60,500 or 17% lived below the Federal poverty line, an increase of 12,000 people since 2007. Of the approximate 140,000 households in Lane County, almost 31;000 or 22% received food stamps in 2009, an increase of almost 10,000 families since 2007. These people lived in a community with a beautiful environment, but were not able to enjoy it as they were concerned about their next paycheck, or how to afford a home for their family. They were forced to make choices between food and medicine, food and rent. They were one emergency crisis away from financial disaster. Mr. Hale reviewed some of the other Lane County data: median family income — $40,584 (Oregon self - sufficiency index lists a required $43,000 to live comfortably in Oregon); bachelor's degree or higher — 30 %; percentage of students who did not finish high school in 2011 — 33 %; paying too much for housing — 44 %; hourly wage needed for 2- bedroom apartment - $14.73; and unemployment in Lane County (October 2012) — 8.4 %. He discussed how each of these factors effected financial stability. It was our job to ask how the data translated into everyday experiences of people in Lane County. Over the last two years, United Way of Lane County had spent time in the community asking people what type of community they wanted to live in and what it meant to be financially stable. He referred to a slide showing the responses from the community. Some of the top three included safety, employment and jobs. Financial stability to these families meant getting to the end of the month with money left over. Mr. Hale said the Financial Stability Partnership asked what it would take to increase the number of people in Lane County who could get to the end of the month with money left over, to save, invest, pay down debt, or make needed wanted purchases. Financial stability included three major components: stable income; stable financial resources; and affordable household costs. A stable income meant a job and/or income supports. Having stable financial resources meant having both savings and assets, and manageable expenses. Affordable household costs included housing/utilities, transportation and food. Today's discussion would focus on manageable expenses, and in particular access to the mainstream financial system. December 6. 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 3 of 10 Ms. Fracchia said the target population for this initiative was low- income working families, however they did not want to overlook the fact that financial instability did not just pertain to those people. People making a good wage or who owned 'a home could also have financial instability if they had a lot of debt. The focus of their work was the more vulnerable. but their work extended to all areas of the community. People made approximately six to ten financial decisions each day. The Financial Stability Partnership looked at how people were making their decisions. Some people learned financial skills from family, some from classes, some from financial planners, but most through trial and error. Five percent of Lane County households were unbanked and sixteen percent of Lane County households were underbanked. For those that didn't have a mainstream financial account, managing expenses became more challenging and expensive. They were more likely to use systems that depleted rather than protected or increased their finances. Many of those systems were considered financial predators. Ms. Claire Carpenter - Seguin said one solution was BankOn Lane County, a unique partnership which brought together three different groups to work on the problem together — financial institutions, the non - profit community, and the public sector leaders. The mission was to raise the awareness of the importance of having an account with a mainstream financial institution while simultaneously providing the individuals with the financial education and resources needed to successfully enter the mainstream. This would empower the residents of Lane County to become more stable. There were two different approaches to help people using this model; to increase the supply of basic checking or second - chance checking accounts; and provide access to safe and reliable financial education through the community partners. BankOn Lane County was for three types of people: the unbankable, unbanked and underbanked. The unbanked didn't have any sort of experience with checking or savings accounts and didn't understand how the system worked. The underbanked had an account, but continued to rely on other services that depleted their resources. BankOn Central Oregon organization had determined that families paid over $800 a year for alternative banking service fees. By educating people how to better manage their money and use the mainstream banking system, that money could be saved for other uses. The participants would also benefit by building their credit, learning to be more financially independent, and keeping their money in a more secure environment. The convenience of using mainstream banking would also be a benefit. Initially, all participants would be coming from referrals through social service and non - profit organizations. By June 2013, the program would reach beyond the direct referrals and go to the people who made less than 200% of the poverty level. She explained why this figure was chosen. Phase I of BankOn Lane County would be focused on one new pilot program that involved people from some credit unions and other financial partners. This program would be called the Savers Alliance. This program had been piloted for about a year with about 20 participants from NEDCO and Goodwill. The committee had been working with these people to move them through the Savers Alliance matrix, which was a series of steps towards the ability to enter mainstream banking through financial education milestones. This would help those that hadn't been able to get a bank account, those that may have had an account, but through mistakes no longer had an account, and those that were in a new financial place. People could enter the matrix at any step along the way and work with the councilors to move through the matrix and graduate as a mainstream bank patron with good credit. December 6; 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 4 of 10 Ms. Fracchia said Phase 11 was where they introduced the grander BankOn initiative. During the pilot program, they started with the most challenging of the three populations, the unbankable, with great success. They were now looking to expand that success with BankOn to include additional financial institutions and additional opportunities that might not need as much individualized work as those in the Savers Alliance. The committee hoped to do a soft launch of the BankOn program in June of 2013 with participants from the Eugene and Springfield area, eventually reaching out to all of Lane County by Fall of 2013. The plan was to start slow to see how it worked, then reach out to all of Lane County, including the rural areas. Ms. Fracchia said the Savers Alliance would be rolling into the BankOn program in June 2013, bringing all three groups — the unbankable, the unbanked and the underbanked — into the same program. By adding the unbanked and underbanked they could reach out to the wider public. There had been a lot of interest already. BankOn was designed to create excellent banking experience, connect participants who previously had limited access or exposure to financial institutions, and provide an introduction to safe and affordable well - designed banking products. At the heart of the program were the partnerships and the connections through our banks, credit unions, financial educators and coaches, local government leaders, and non -profit organizations. This was the first joint effort in Lane County that was bringing together big banks, small banks, commercial banks, and credit unions and asking them to put their differences aside to work towards the common goal of helping Lane County residents. Those organizations were now driving the work and were very excited about this project. The other group that was at the table were the financial educators and coaches. They had different ways and methods of financial education, but were setting differences aside to find common things they could teach. The program was about connecting the dots between the financial educators and the social service providers in the community with the financial mainstream. There would be some baseline measurements and requirements for the products being offered to the individuals to ensure they were affordable and safe. There would be requirements and measures for the financial education so the participants would be certified to get their first bank account. The Steering Committee was already asking those questions and figuring out what it would take to get to a BankOn product. Ms. Fracchia said there were a number of community benefits with this program. National BankOn models used the phrase "Financial inclusion" as a core component of this initiative. Financial inclusion was a missing link in our community and they were working to bring a wider range of people into the mainstream banking system. They hoped BankOn would build trust between financial institutions and the people they would be working with who may not have that trust in financial institutions. The products and partnerships were designed to promote success and create a more financially empowered community. This program also created opportunities for members of our community that didn't normally have the opportunities to connect with the mainstream. Ms. Fracchia said other BankOn models had seen success when endorsed by local government as it made people feel they were safe. Today, they were asking for endorsement of this initiative and ongoing support as they continued the effort. The elected officials could be part of the Steering Committee if they chose, orjust provide the seal of approval from the local government. This program was valuable and the increased financial stability was very important in creating a stronger economy, creating jobs and creating opportunities for people to move up in their-jobs. They wanted it to be December 6, 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 5of10 affordable to live in Lane County and a place people could stay and raise their families. This was one of many stepping stones that could move them in that direction Councilor Ralston asked for the figure of 200% above the poverty guideline. Ms. Fracchia said it was about $44,000 for a family of four. Councilor Ralston said that was not poverty. Ms. Fracchia agreed and said the national poverty level was about $23,000 for a family of four. Oregon's self - sufficiency level provided information on what it took to live comfortably in Lane County. Mr. Hale said the objective was not to solve the problem of poverty, but to help Lane County families become more financially stable. Councilor Ralston understood that and said education was the key. He felt the payday lenders were criminal. The reason people didn't have bank accounts was because they had overdrawn on their account many times, but that didn't make us responsible to step in and help. Just having elected officials endorse the program didn't help their cause. He wanted to know how much it would cost and who would pay for it. He felt they were asking for more than an endorsement. If it involved staff time or funds; there was a problem. He thought it was a great idea, but he needed to know what it would cost. Ms. Fracchia said there were many people serving on the Steering Committee by giving their time and effort. She referred to the packet which listed those individuals and institutions that had signed on to participate. They had submitted a grant application which they hoped would cover the costs so they did not need to ask for additional funding. If additional funding was needed, they were working on a funding model for sustainability. Councilor Ralston said he would like to volunteer to serve on the steering committee. They needed to have a bankina association that they would be willing to work with the participants without charging a fee. They needed answers to good questions because there would be a cost to someone. Ms. Carpenter- Seguin said the Savers Alliance programs included financial institutions that had agreed to make a very special product just for Savers Alliance participants as part of this collaboration. She provided an example of the process with the financial institution involving the participant and financial counselor. The banks had to be on board with a special product. The pilot was exciting and was working, so they were confident the model was right. It would now take everyone working together to figure out how it could be continued with the BankOn program. Mr. Hale said consumers who found themselves outside the mainstream financial institution were coming to people like Ms. Carpenter - Seguin and were being educated by NEDCO or Goodwill staff so they didn't fall back into bad habits. The participants in the program had to achieve a level of financial literacy before the banks* would let them back in. The banks could waive one or two overdraft fees per year in this program. December 6, 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 6 of 10 Councilor Ralston said education was huge. They needed to keep people out of predatory lending. Councilor Taylor said she would be happy to endorse; but would need to know what the support meant. She asked how people could find time to attend classes if they were already working more than one job. People went to payday lenders because banks wouldn't give them a loan. She asked how they would keep people away from payday lenders when they needed the money. Once someone was poor, everything conspired against them to keep them poor with late fees and extra charges for not paying. She asked if the banks would be helping people to get a loan so they wouldn't have to go to payday lenders. Ms. Fracchia said this program was designed to create stepping stones to get to the point where people could become borrowers. There was some risk associated with this for the financial institutions. In August 2011, the financial institutions were brought together to ask them what could be done about the issue. The financial institutions suggested the BankOn effort and creating financial education and financial literacy as a key component to taking on that risk. With a certification from one of the qualified partners, participants would be able to go to one of the partner financial institutions who would work with them. This was a program that started in 2006 in San Francisco and had huge success. Many other cities had also done this project. Financial institutions were asking for a lot of certification and requirements and the financial educators had a high bar of what was needed to become financially stable. Fundamentally, there were challenging pieces to financial stability. Through. the education of this program, they hoped to increase success. Ms. Carpenter- Seguin said NEDCO formed a community development financial institution, in part in response to the OUR Credit Union closure, but also because they believed that prior to being ready for a mainstream banking relationship, there were needs around loans. By coupling credit builder loans with the financial education, they were able to get people ready to move into their first loan with a mainstream bank. The institution they started was called Community Lending Works, and was one piece of the puzzle that could help some people rebuild their credit. Commissioner Leiken also had a question regarding the difference between endorsement and support. The County was not able to support financially, but would endorse. He noted that Mr. Hale was a retired bank president so was connected locally and throughout the State. Having Mr. Hale involved with this gave it a lot of credibility. Students used to be taught how to write a check in high school, but that was no longer taught. Oregon was fourth from the bottom in percentage of high school graduates. They needed to look at the education side and also the median income in Lane County. Washington County's median income was $60,00., Part of that was because of economic transformation. This was a good idea because there were a lot of people that didn't know how to manage their finances and had never been taught. He appreciated the fact that those in the financial institution were on board. Mr. Hale spoke regarding endorsement from the public agencies. Eventually when BankOn was ready to be rolled out to the public, there would likely be ads about the program listing the participating mainstream financial institutions. The other side of the ad could state "supported by ... " listing the cities and County and that would be huge from their perspective. That would not indicate endorsement for any given financial institution, but rather the collective effort of those participating. Ms. Fracchia said cities and counties across the nation were experiencing budget cuts and faced a lot of challenges. Those. involved in the program felt it was very important for the public officials to know December 6, 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 7 of 10 about and endorse the program as important for the community. It was important for the committee to come and talk with the elected officials and provide them with the opportunity to participate in whatever way they felt most comfortable, either by participating on the steering committee or pronouncing support for the program. Councilor Syrette said this was a fantastic program and was an important piece to helping economic stability for our region, along with higher wages and affordable housing. If a large number of people were not participating in our financial institutions, that was a flow of money that was not coming into a system that could generate more wealth for the rest of the community. She hoped the Eugene Council would endorse this as it was a much needed program. NEDCO had a strong track record of working with people and getting them to more prosperous situations. This wasn't necessarily people in poverty, but rather a range of people in different financial situations who could benefit from this program. She was ready to offer support. Councilor Pryor said the cities of Eugene and Springfield_ and Lane County spent a lot of time talking about prosperity and economic development and there were two sides —the business side and the worker side. This program was an important resource for the worker side in order to create prosperity. There could be a concern that this program encouraged or endorsed bad behavior of those that didn't act responsibly with their finances. He felt that it didn't, but rather curbed and controlled that kind of activity by giving them the tools so they could build a better financial stability. He didn't feel that a number should be used to measure success because it depended on a number of factors. Oregon bad created a standard around what was needed to be sufficient for a family or an individual and that was a more effective way to approach this issue. In Lane County there was a gap between what a family needed to be self - sufficient and pay for housing; food, utilities, childcare, medical costs, etc. and what they were earning. This was a great conversation and was one step towards solving the problem. Their endorsement showed they not only supported economic development from the business side, but also from the worker side. Councilor Woodrow said part of the gap may be the working poor who may make enough per month, but couldn't afford the bank charges. She asked if there was an element in this program to reach out to that segment. Ms. Fracchia said many of those people fell under the category of underbanked. For those people, the program looked at how they could get them financially self sufficient and not making choices that incurred account fees. Councilor Woodrow said trust was a key element with financial institutions that needed to be renegotiated. Another piece was pay level. Ms. Fracchia said they couldn't change their incomes, but hoped as they got better jobs they would continue the practices they learned through the program. One of the checks and balances of this program was including both financial institutions and financial educators. A big piece was teaching people how to talk to the financial institutions. Councilor Woodrow said she understood they needed to lessen the gap. It was a large segment of our population. December 6, 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 8 of 10 Mayor Piercy said this fit in with the work they had been doing on their Regional Prosperity Plan and she hoped they made the effort to determine how that was built into that plan. They had been very interested in financial literacy for many years and she saw a real need for this type of program. Financial stability was part of making a healthier and better community from both the business and the worker side. NEDCO had a long history of being successful in this type of work. While doing this program, they may need to think about how to do a financial literacy with younger people before they got to that instability. That would be a key piece to this program. She referred to the comment about trust and said trust went both ways. It was very hard for people to trust anything, but trust was required to move forward. She was willing to support this as much as possible. Mr. Hale said those that had been involved with the Financial Stability Partnership with United Way had identified four ways the elected officials could help Lane County residents become more financially stable: 1) increase the number of reasonable paying jobs in Lane County; 2) increase the amount of affordable housing; 3) encourage the schools to put financial literacy back in the curriculum of the school systems as part of the graduation requirement: and 4) bring in the counselors from NEDCO and Goodwill to talk with the elected officials about the program. Mayor Piercy said the Regional Prosperity Plan included those same things. Councilor Farr agreed with both Councilor Pryor and Mayor Piercy. He was very supportive. Financial instability was not discriminate. He saw people who seemed like they should be financially stable, but were not because of obligations. When resources were drained, they needed to find ways to get them out of that downward spiral. He was very enthusiastic and would like to hear more. Commissioner Sorenson asked if they had a sample resolution that each jurisdiction could use. He noted that they did have economic development funds that the State provided to the cities and County to be spent on specific things. He asked how much money they thought they would need to implement the program and if they wanted public funds. Ms. Fracchia said they would develop a resolution and send it to the jurisdictions. The cost was going to depend on the funding received. They were currently look into grants and had a national funder they hoped would be on board. Right now the financial institutions and agencies participating in the Savers Alliance were currently doing this without additional funding, which was not sustainable. They were looking at how they could create a sustainable model with those participants. Hopefully, they would have a national (under so they would not need to ask for local dollars. They would take any funds offered. Councilor Wylie suggested adding a piece on compulsive spending to their financial education. Many people got into problems because it felt good to spend money. She suggested they get in line for Human Services Commission (HSC) for funding as they determined their fmancial need. Councilor Clark said that on the national level issues like this were focused on blame, but on the local level they were focused on solutions. He was happy to support and endorse this effort. Commissioner Bozievich expressed his support and felt this was a critical need. He encouraged the committee to talk with Lane Community College (LCC) about the Women in Transition Program, Siuslaw Outreach Service, Womenspace, Lookingglass and all of the housing authority agencies to December 6, 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 9 of 10 . bring them in as stakeholders. He asked how this program dealt with the issue of people who couldn't' afford to get a checking account because of past debt. He provided an example of a woman he knew. Ms. Carpenter- Seguin said the counselors at NEDCO or Goodwill could help the woman with a plan, and it would be confidential and free. Commissioner Bozievich noted that an able bodied high school dropout could earn good wages as a choker setter on timber land. Councilor Pishioneri said about 15,000 bookings occurred at the Lane County Jail last year. Of those 15.000, nearly half didn't possess identification. Steps 7 and 8 of the BankOn program had a marketing outreach component and this population of offenders was one of the largest financial drains on our community. Even with a booking sheet and mug shot, financial institutions and the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) would not accept that as a form of identification. The banking industry needed to understand that there were special needs groups. There was a crippled system of people who had been barred from becoming successful based on past offenses. Most correctional institutions in the state had educational programs for inmates, but there was no outreach to those people regarding how they could succeed in the financial world. He was very supportive of this program and asked that they provide outreach to the correctional agencies as a partner. Information could also be put out in the lobbies where families came to visit inmates. Councilor Moore said they had renters who used cash, most likely because they did not have a bank account. There was concern that these people were at risk of being robbed of their cash. Money orders also cost money, which added up over time. She referred to one of the purposes.of the program to get people able to borrow, but she felt they didn't need people to borrow, but rather to save. Mr. Hale said banks actually needed loans at this time. Councilor Moore said she was very excited about this and wished she had more counseling when she was younger. She would be interested in getting involved in the educational component or as a mentor. Mayor Lundberg said it could be intimidating to go to bank, especially to get a loan. Having mentors or someone to accompany people to the bank was very important to provide that sense of security. She agreed that young people needed a sense of how to deal with an account. People used credit or debit cards and didn't write down how much they had spent so education was very important. It was important economically to try to make workers stable, help them get good jobs and teach them how to be successful. Commissioner Leiken asked if Junior Achievement was still around. Ms. Fracchia said it was and it included a financial component. Her understanding was that the entire school district had to sign on to it in order to work and if they couldn't afford to do the full program, it couldn't happen. There were people asking about that so it had been discussed. The committee was working with the Workforce Development Partnership and asking how they could participate and endorse the work they were doing to assess skills. There were many pieces of financial stability, and the Financial Stability Partnership was one small thing that could help and provide people with the skills they needed to make better choices. December 6, 2012 Joint Elected Officials Meeting City of Springfield City of Eugene Lane County Page 10 of 10 Commissioner Leiken said he used to go into schools and talk about Junior Achievement and also taught students how to write a resume and to interview. There were people in the business community who would be willing to take the time to assist. He didn't want to see our youth leaving the area to go elsewhere for opportunities. We needed the opportunities to be here. Mayor Piercy said it was important to recognize that many people didn't know the first question to ask when going into a bank. That was part of the literacy of this program. Ms. Fracchia said they hoped this would provide a discussion and outreach throughout the community regarding the resources available at our local financial institutions. Mayor Lundberg thanked them for the presentation and said they would look forward to the resolution. ADJOURNMENT Mayor Lundberg adjourned the Springfield City Council at 1:26 pm. Mayor Piercy adjourned the Eugene City Council at 1:26 pm. Commissioner Leiken adjourned the Lane County Commissioners at 1:26 pm. Minutes Recorder Amy Sowa City Recorder Christine L. Lundberg Mayor Attest:� L v A--- City Reco er