HomeMy WebLinkAbout02/25/2008 Work Session
City of Springfield
Work Session Meeting
MINUTES OF THE WORK SESSION MEETING OF
THE SPRINGFIELD CITY COUNCIL HELD
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 25, 2008
The City of Springfield Council met in a work session in the Library Meeting Room, 225 Fifth
Street, Springfield, Oregon, on Monday, February 25,2008 at 5:37 p.m., with Mayor Leiken
presiding.
ATTENDANCE
Present were Mayor Leiken and Councilors Lundberg, Wylie, Ballew, and Pishioneri. Also
present were City Manager Gino Grimaldi, Assistant City Manager Jeff Towery, City Attorney
Joe Leahy, City Attorney Matt Cox, City Attorney Bill Van Vactor, City Recorder Amy Sowa
and members of the staff.
Councilors Ralston and Woodrow were absent (excused).
1. Lane County Financial Discussion.
Lane County Commissioner Faye Stewart presented this item to the Council. For many years,
Lane County has received funds from the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-
Determination Act (Secure Rural Schools Act). That funding source reached its expiration in
2007, but Congress has renewed those funds for one additional year. Lane County does not
anticipate that these funds will be renewed for another year and are anticipating severe budget
cuts for FY08-09. The loss of the Secure Rural Schools Act (SRSA) funding would be
approximately $47 million. He noted that out of the $47M, about $20M went into the General
Fund with discretion by the County how to expend those funds. The other $27M went into the
Public Works Department and Road Funds with little discretion on how those funds would be
expended.
Commissioner Stewart said because of the uncertainty of this funding, direction was given to
Lane County staff to prepare three budgets for the General Fund. The first was a budget
without the Secure Rural Schools funds. He referred to the documents that were distributed to
the Council and staff the week prior. The first column on the budget document indicated
renewal of the SRSA funds and the County holding at the same level. The second column
showed a step-down budget, based on the DeFazio/Wyden plan which was a multi-year bill that
called for the County to have a ramp down of revenue. He explained. The third column was
the proposed budget if there was no additional SRSA funding.
Commissioner Stewart said the packet included all the prioritization sheets that the Board of
Commissioners started with. He referred to a booklet with additional details on the services
considered. He explained the information in the booklet and explained how the Board of
Commissioners worked from the lists to determine how to cut $20M from the budget. He said
it was a difficult process.
Mayor Leiken asked how many jail beds were available for local offenders.
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Council Work Session Minutes
February 25,2008
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Commissioner Stewart said there were 151 beds in the jail and nearly 100 at the forest work
camp. There were about 90 at the Community Corrections, but that number had been reduced.
Mayor Leiken noted that the budget without the funding would reduce that to 12 beds.
Commissioner Stewart said that was correct.. He discussed the difficulty in making the decision
to close jail beds and releasing criminals back into society. He referred to the services that were
retained at the non-renewal level. Some things were mandated by law to provide. He noted some
of the other cuts that would be required if there was no SRSA funding. These cuts would affect
all jurisdictions in the County.
Councilor Ballew asked about the columns in the funding table that referred to funds leveraged.
Commissioner Stewart explained.
Councilor Ralston noted that under the 'no renewal' scenario, Women, Infants, and Children
(WIC) was not getting any funds. He asked why they chose to cut a program that was the highest
mandated and leveraged 231 percent.
Commissioner Stewart said it was a difficult exercise. He explained how they went through the
process and looked at where they could make cuts. He said this was a starting point and Lane
County staff would take it back and try to prepare budgets from the worksheet. The rest of the
Board would discuss the ramifications of the cuts.
Councilor Ralston said the Human Services Commission (HSC) met today and had already
looked at the cuts for their department. He said this would be a difficult process for the HSC as
well. They had gone through the exercise last year anticipating the cuts. He discussed the closure
of the Buckley House, the alcohol and drug addiction treatment center. The problem with that
was multiple. He explained and said the HSC would need to deal with some of those problems.
The reality was that some of the things being cut were critical services.
Commissioner Stewart said he was wrestling with the same issues.
Councilor Wylie asked if there was any other funding source to attach the SRSA funding to.
Commissioner Stewart said there was a supplemental road funding bill, which the funds were
attached to last year. That should be formed late March or early April. The County didn't know
if the funding would get attached, but it was the best vehicle left. He explained several other bills
that were possibilities, but less likely.
Councilor Wylie asked if there was time once they found out about the funding, to get on the
November ballot for a jail supplement or something similar.
Commissioner Stewart said there was time, but there wasn't anything they could do to save the
cuts if they didn't have the funding by July I. They could put something to the voters in
November, but even if it passed, the services wouldn't be able to be added back in for a year or
s~ '
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Council Work Session Minutes
February 25, 2008
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Mayor said he appreciated Commissioner Stewart coming to share with the City Council. He
said they didn't envy the Commissioner's task. Hopefully, they would hear something positive
from Washington DC. It looked more and more like this was the time for the Lane County Board
of Commissioners to have more discussions with the cities to discuss these fmancial issues. The
Federal Government had let jurisdictions down in the timber producing counties. One of the
major partnerships between the City and County were the road funds. The City was now looking
at increased issues due to those cuts. It was time to ask the citizens what they wanted and how
they wanted to pay for it. That was a discussion that should begin with the Lane County Board of
Commissioners working with cities on how to pay for services. He appreciated Commissioner
Stewart sharing this information with the City Council. It said a lot about Commissioner .
Stewart's leadership. The County and City needed to work together and he assured
Commissioner Stewart that he could count on Springfield leadership to work on these issues in
Washington DC or locally. Once Lane County determined a work plan, all cities in the County
would need to be involved and work with the County in developing such a plan.
Councilor Lundberg said it was best to figure out what needed to be done. She said the
information was very helpful. The City needed to know what the ramifications were going to be
and what this meant. She was hopeful that would be publicized well. In the meantime, the City
needed to talk about what to do. The City needed to be involved. The resources available needed
to be used. She asked ifthere was still work being done to address this long term.
Commissioner Stewart said there were efforts being made with the O&C counties with the
Bureau of Land Management (BLM) trying to get a management plan approved. If the
management plan was approved this year, the County could see some revenues in three years at
best. If it got caught up in courts, it could be six years out. Once the funds were available, it
would take time to ramp up to reinstate services. In reality, it could be ten years before the
County had a viable source of revenue to replace the General Fund money. The Road Fund
issues would be completely different.
Councilor Lundberg said she remained hopeful that there would be a time when they could
utilize that source of revenue. There needed to be funding stability.
Councilor Woodrow asked if the figure for jail operations included funds from the cities.
Commissioner Stewart said he didn't think it did because it didn't include the Jail 1145 funding
and the agreements with the Federal Government. The only thing it included was the officers that
did patrol in Creswell and Veneta because the County supplemented that. He said with level 2
service, it would open another 61 beds, plus the 12 for a total of73 beds.
Councilor Ballew said there was a Task Force in place, but she wondered if there was any
indication the State would provide assistance.
Commissioner Stewart said hadn't heard any results yet. The Governor had put together a Task
Force and the State staff member for that committee understood the situation clearly and was an
advocate for fmding ways the State could help in any way possible.
Councilor Ballew said there were some things the County did within cities and others in the
unincorporated areas. He asked if anyone had looked at entering into addition intergovernmental
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February 25, 2008
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agreements (IGA's) to shift some things around. She assumed the City could take up some things
it could get a revenue source with it.
Commissioner Stewart said he hoped the County would get creative and look at some of those
ideas. He discussed the issues and options. This was the initial start. The County Administrator
was working with department managers and trying to get creative. He discussed other issues,
such as the Commissioners telling the Sheriff, an elected official, how to run his department.
Councilor Wylie said her questions were already answered.
Councilor Ballew asked about the timeline for their decision point.
Commissioner Stewart said the budget would be adopted by June 30, 2008. Staff would be
coming back to the Commissioners with some prepared budgets by the end of March. The
County's budget process would then start in April, with the Budget Committee adopting a budget
in May. If the County was faced with making these cuts, they would need to send out some
notices by May 1.
Councilor Wylie asked ifthe City was supportive of the effort in Washington DC.
Yes.
Commissioner Stewart said if Council felt they were not getting the information they needed,
they could call him or staff and ask.
Mayor Leiken thanked Commissioner Stewart for coming.
2. Lane Transit District (LTD) Discussion..
Mayor Leiken welcomed the L TD Board. He asked that both the Board and City Council
members introduce themselves. Those in attendance from the L TD Board were Gerry Gaydos,
L TD Board President and members Mike Eyster, Greg Evans, Ed Necker, Dean Kortge, Debbie
Davis, and Mike Dubick.
Mr. Gaydos called the LTD portion of the meeting to order at 6:10pm. All members were
present.
Mr. Grimaldi reviewed the agenda for tonight's meeting.
Mark Pangborn, General Manager of L TD, said the City Council and L TD Board had met jointly
about once a year for a number of years because there were so many services to the community
that intersected.
Mr. Pangborn presented a power point presentation. He talked about where LTD was now. He
provided a service overview: the bus, RideSource, event shuttles, ErnX, Commuter Solutions,
and the Breeze. He referred to a graph in the power point regarding ridership, service and service
area population. The population in our community was using the bus more and more for their
transportation needs. He further discussed the graph and explained some of the trends and
reasons for increased ridership.
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Council Work Session Minutes
February 25, 2008
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Councilor Pishioneri asked when the high school free ridership program started.
Mr. Pangborn said it had been in place for about three years. It was started with a sample of just
a few high schools and was expanded to offering to all middle and high schools. That did have a
significant impact in ridership numbers. He also noted that Lane Community College (LCC)
started a group pass this last year.
Mr. Pangborn continued his presentation by discussing the comparisons LTD had made with
their service and other cities. He noted the cities used for this comparison and discussed the areas
of comparison, which included: boardings per service hour; boardings per capita; cost per
boarding; cost per service hour; cash fare comparison; and fare recovery.
Councilor Ballew asked about the boarding per service hour figure.
Mr. Pangborn said the figure was the number of riders per hour per bus.
Councilor Ralston asked about a figure on the chart and asked if the difference was a subsidy.
Mr. Pangborn said that was correct, it was a payroll tax subsidy. They did have some advertising
revenues, but seventy-five percent of their operating revenue came from payroll taxes. Tri-Met
and L TD were the only two transit districts in the State that operate from payroll taxes.
Mr. Pangborn said L TD conducted a survey of riders in 2007 to fmd out why people were riding
the bus. He explained the results of that survey. It included information on why people rode the
bus (no vehicle, shared vehicle, economic reasons) and also how they paid for the bus fare (cash,
group pass from employer, student pass). He discussed the EmX and noted that only nine percent
of those riding the EmX were riding for free.
Councilor Ralston asked if they thought people didn't know EmX was free.
Mr. Pangborn explained why many people choose not to ride even if it was free. There were a
number of people, however, that were trying the ErnX and fmding it very convenient.
Councilor Ballew asked what percentage of total ridership was using EmX.
Stefano Viggiano, Assistant General Manager of L TD, said about fifteen percent.
Tom Schwetz, Director of Development Services at LTD, discussed the Fare-Free Service at
LTD (attachment B, page 13 in the agenda packet). He said the Metropolitan Policy Committee
(MPC) had encouraged L TD to consider implementation of fare- free service. He gave an
overview of the fmancial and operational impacts. With the group pass program, student transit
pass program, and those under 5 and over 70 years old riding for free, about 49 percent of those
riding the bus rode for free. On the cost side, the biggest concern would be a loss of about $5M
in revenue. That would need to be made up in some other way, such as cutting 20 - 25 percent of
the service. Another issue was the RideSource service. RideSource was a mandated American
with Disabilities Act (ADA) service that was required to be complementary to the existing
service. If not charging on the regular service, they could not charge on the RideSource service,
which was the most costly service. There were constraints to moving toward a free-fare system,
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Council Work Session Minutes
February 25, 2008
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and L TD felt they were currently in a good position with the number of riders that already rode
for free. He asked if Council had any questions.
Councilor Ballew asked if they would get an additional $5M in revenue if they did away with all
of the free ridership. That could allow them to decrease rates across the board.
Mr. Schwetz said some ofthe riders in the 'free' category were actually those that had a group
pass. The group pass was paid by the employer, so was not actually free.
It was noted that 49 percent of the population were in that category, not 49 percent of the riders.
Councilor Ballew asked about the elderly riders.
Mr. Pangborn said many elderly people rode the bll:s, but not very frequently. He noted that
people over 70 years old could receive a free pass by showing photo Ld., but many didn't use the
pass. L TD was considering lowering the age for that pass to 65 years old. The whole community
was paying for transit service so they were trying to market it for the community.
Councilor Ralston asked about 49 percent figure.
Mr. Schwetz said 49 percent of the population in the district held a group pass, a student transit
pass or ride for free pass because of their age. He said they had the pass, but may not use it.
Mr. Dubick said one of the reasons they were considering lowering the age to 65 was to get
people comfortable using the regular bus service because it was less to operate than RideSource.
They were currently taking money from the General Fund to help fund RideSource. RideSource
was mandated by the Federal Government through the ADA, but was not federally funded. Some
cigarette tax funds were provided for this program.
Mr. Schwetz spoke regarding Applicability of Rail in the Eugene-Springfield Metropolitan Area
(attachment B, page 21 in the agenda packet). He said the information in the agenda packet
described the cost per mile for construction of various modes of rail. There was some interest in
looking at rail in the future. The attached table gave a good comparison of various street car and
light rail systems across the country and included the EmX system. The EmX did quite well in
some of the performance measures related to annual cost per boarding and annual boardings per
route mile.
Mr. Pangborn said people often asked why L TD didn't put in light rail rather than EmX. He said
light rail was ten times more expensive and was not needed in this area.
Mr. Viggiano discussed Springfield service. He referred to a chart showing boardings by route.
He noted the number of ridership on the Springfield routes. Springfield services were some of
LTD's most productive offered. He referred to a map in the power point presentation that
showed boardings by location. He noted the number of boar dings at the Springfield station on
South A Street. The downtown Eugene station was the hub of the bus service and served a very
large volume. Secondary hubs had been formed, such as the one in downtown Springfield, which
was growing all the time. He discussed the upcoming change to the Gateway route for 2008 that
would include International Way and the anticipated ridership growth that would occur in that
area. The frequency would increase from 30 minutes to 20 minutes during the day. Because the
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February 25,2008
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RiverBend Hospital was scheduled to be open this summer, there was an interim route strategy
for the next two years until the EmX was. fInished. He explained the route.
Mr. Pangborn said there were several buses that made that route.
Mr. Viggiano said Symantec was not currently on the route, but would be on the new route.
Many businesses along this route currently provided group passes and would now be served with
the new route. He noted that the next big change would be in 2010 when they implemented the
Pioneer Parkway ErnX. He described the process they would use to determine those changes, and
whether or not to use connector routes. He discussed the curren(routes in Springfield and noted
some areas that could receive additional service in the future.
Councilor Woodrow asked if consideration had been given to an ErnX line out to the Thurston
Station, up Highway 126 an~ back to Pioneer Parkway.
Mr. Viggiano said they hoped to eventually have an EmX route that went out to Thurston and
back to west Eugene. In 200 I, it was decided to service Gateway due to the large amount of
growth in that area.
Mayor Leiken discussed parking in the downtown. He asked if L TD would be interested in
working with the City to look at putting in a parking structure or garage. It would be beneficial to
both the City and L TD, especially once the EmX line was in place and going out to Gateway. He
hoped the L TD Board would consider this partnership for the future. Urban Renewal could play
a part in this as well.
Mr. Necker asked if a parking garage adjacent to Springfield Station would be a good location.
Mayor Leiken said he didn't know, but that could be a starting point. Other areas could be
considered as well with input from citizens.
Mr. Evans said the Board had held conversations about a long-range vision for their Park and
Ride system and increasing the parking capacity around that. As EmX and the system grew, that
could happen at some point. Currently, they were maxed out, but they would consider that
partnership in the future. LTD was looking at public and private partnership to increase capacity
around Park and Ride locations and structures.
Councilor Wylie said during her time on the L TD Board she learned that a good transit district
was not trying to get people to get rid of their car, but was a partnership and part of the whole
transportation picture. The Park and Ride was part of that partnership.
Mayor Leiken asked if L TD had an expectation from the City to have a role at looking at service
providing areas.
Mr. Pangborn referred to a chart showing the Springfield Outreach schedule which listed
Springfield neighborhood meeting, community groups, City staff, and Council from fall of 2008
through fall of2009. LTD would like strong participation with the entire structure ofthe City.
Because it involved service to Springfield citizens, they expected it to be a partnership in
planning.
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Council Work Session Minutes
February 25, 2008
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Mr. Mel Barnes, a Springfield resident, spoke from the audience. He said he took groups from
the Senior Center to the Springfield Station to teach them how to ride the bus and the ErnX.
There were a lot of people that didn't have bus service to their neighborhoods or near their
homes, especially off of Jasper Road. He also had people ask him where they could catch a bus
and he had to tell them there was not a bus route there.
Mr. Gaydos said local match was very important. Creative ideas were needed to find revenue.
Mr. Pangborn said Mr. Barnes had worked hard to help fmd appropriate routes.
Mr. Schwetz spoke regarding the Franklin Boulevard Project (attachment C, page 1 in the agenda
packet). Mr. Schwetz said the documents included in this packet were the same as those that
were going to Washington DC for the United Front trip. It described a project that went from the
Courthouse in downtown Eugene to the Springfield bridges. The City had been conducting a
stakeholder outreach in the Glenwood area. The concept for that corridor had not yet been
presented to Council, so he just wanted to highlight this project was in progress.
Councilor Ballew asked where Federal fmancing came from that went to LTD.
Mr. Schwetz said the general FTA funding was part ofthe Transportation Trust Fund. Gas tax
and other funding sources were also provided.
Mr. Pangborn said about 80-85 percent ofthe Federal funding was from a Federal gas tax, and
the remaining 15 percent was General Fund money. President Bush's proposed budget to
Congress included a cut in some funding for both highways and transit.
Mayor Leiken said Council had a lot of interest in the Franklin corridor. That project was one the
City and L TD would need to continue to work on together, especially regarding the alignment of
Franklin Boulevard. .
Mr. Necker said the Board knew Glenwood was soon to be in process, and they wanted to be
sure to include transit as an important part of that redevelopment.
Mr. Dubick said he attended the open house held at Roaring Rapids and felt that the preliminary
concept he saw there was very impressive.
Mr. Viggiano said the Pioneer Parkway EmX item was put on the agenda a couple of weeks ago,
but L TD and the City Council were still in the middle of those discussions, so it would not be
productive to go into details of the design at this time. He said instead, they would give Council
an update on the Gateway Station.
Charlie Simmons, Facilities Services Manager with L TD, spoke on the Gateway Station. He said
L TD approached Gateway management a few years ago about moving the location of the
Gateway station. The mall did not understand why the station needed to be moved at first. Mr.
Simmons explained that it was important to move the station out where there could be faster
service for the EmX and still serve the Gateway Mall. Also, getting through the parking lot to
and from the existing Gateway Station was a real challenge. He showed the proposed location for
the station. This station would serve both regular service as well as ErnX service. There would be
two bays for each route for both directions.
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Council Work Session Minutes
February 25,2008
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Mr. Simmons said it was also important to L TD how the platform would work. They would
reduce the lanes on the road around the mall and put in a covered crosswalk from the station to
the mall. The fewer lanes provided a calming of traffic in that area. He referred to the diagram
showing the walk connections from the neighborhoods. The covered walkway was proposed to
be transparent to allow a view of the mall and General Growth (the management of the mall) had
begun to embrace that design. L TD would go out to bid in March and hoped for construction to
begin in late spring or early summer, with the facility ready for the holidays. It was currently at
70 percent design with a budget of about $1.6M for construction.
Councilor Lundberg asked what they considered the holiday season.
Mr. Simmons said early to mid-November. Ifthe project was not complete by then, they would
stop the construction and wait until the end of January to fInish the project. The current site
would go back to parking once the new station was complete. He felt it was a win-win for the
mall and LTD. This project was part of the Connect Oregon grant.
Councilor Pishioneri asked how much funding was devoted to lighting.
Mr. Simmons said he believed it was about $86,000.
Councilor Pishioneri asked how effective that covered walkway would be in protecting
pedestrians with wind blowing through.
Mr. Simmons said General Growth didn't want a covered walkway that would block the
visibility of their front entrance. The cover protected against rain and sun. The number of days
there was heavy wind and rain was fairly minimal, and this cover should provide a pretty high
level of shelter area.
Mr. Pangborn said one complaints before EmX was put into service, was that people thought the
stations would be too high to offer protection from the weather. Now that they have been built,
there were no complaints about people not being protected.
Mr. Simmons said when there were vertical surfaces that blocked visibility, there were
vandalism and security issues. The walkway being open was a good compromise.
The LTD Board adjourned at 7:08 p.m.
The Springfield City Council reconvened at 7:20 p.m.
3. Glenwood Refinement Update Proposal.
Planning Manager Greg Mott presented the staff report on this item. Planning and Public Works
staff have prepared a joint work program and preliminary schedule to conduct a comprehensive
update of the Glenwood Refinement Plan. Staff proposes to structure the projectinto two major
tracks:
1. Infrastructure framework plans for the whole of Glenwood; and
2. Plan Districts for specific cohesive areas within Glenwood.
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Council Work Session Minutes
February 25,2008
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Segmenting the plan update into two tracks with separate plan district adoption dates will require
duplication of some work program tasks (e.g. preparation of reports and notices, public hearings
for adoption of separate plan amendments, etc.), and will likely impact staff and/or consultant
efficiencies in generating work products. However, clear identification of specific phasing needs
at project initiation will assure that such impacts will be minimized. Staff believes the critical
importance of the Glenwood Riverfront Districts, Franklin Boulevard Corridor and McVay
Corridor Districts warrants prioritization.
Funding for the new Public Works positions and the consulting services needed would be part of
the proposed SEDA budget for this coming year.
Mr. Mott said staff last brought this to Council in September of 2007. At that meeting, Council
considered five different options in pursuit of different planning activities in Glenwood. It was
Council's preference to do an update to the Glenwood Refinement Plan. The proposal included a
cost involved in that update. Since September staff had gone through this. He credited Linda
Pauly, the planning supervisor that would be overseeing the work on this project, for coming up
with the ability to use existing planning staff to do this work. There would be some costs for
contractual services. He referred to attachment 2 in the agenda packet that showed an outline of
events through this process, with a range of when those things would happen. Once staff began,
they would be able to provide a more detailed work program. The concept was to approach this
in a way that looked at Glenwood in three redevelopment scenarios. There were two riverfront
districts (McVay and Franklin) and the interior section, which was also made up oftwo districts.
Each district had different characteristics. Staff thought they would fast track the two river
corridors for two reasons: 1) if something were to occur in the riverfront area, that could inspire
others to redevelop; and 2) infrastructure was already in Franklin and a proposed design for that
corridor. There was also a possibility of development along Me V ay and extending sewer south
along McVay would be a top priority. Staff believed they could engage the citizens and
stakeholders, the City Council and SEDA Board to get some corridor planning done in the next
twelve to sixteen months. That would be staffs initial focus, and then look to the interior. It was
hard to predict everything that could happen, but there was a receptive audience in this area and
it would be advantageous to get started. There was a significant fmancial commitment in going
forward with this project. Staff was hoping to establish with contractual services the greenway
setbacks. It would be proactive if the City did that rather than making every property owner do
that as they redeveloped. ECONorthwest, who was doing the work for the City on the land use
inventories, could also be asked to do an additional focus on Glenwood and revamp the
redevelopment analysis in this area.
Mayor Leiken asked how adaptable staff would be on this process. He gave an example of a
proposal coming in on a couple of pieces of property that might not match our plan completely.
He knew that staff remained flexible. He wondered if the timelines and financial feasibility
would be changed in an instance such as that, and how staff would work around that.
Mr. Mott said the two riverfront areas were pretty well defined. He didn't suggest there would be
many suggestions outside that definition. If something was too far out of that definition, Council
might be skeptical in supporting something. The presence of the river and types of uses allowed
along river narrowed the focus in that area. Often the things across the street would be consistent
and compatible with that as well. He didn't think there was much that could happen that would
be too soon. The main concern of staff was whether or not the City could provide services, but
that had nothing to do with staffs flexibility. The issues the Council would have to deal with
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Council Work Session Minutes
February 25,2008
Page 11
would be potential displacements in that area. That would occur anywhere in Glenwood.
Services were skimpy in the interior and Public Works was working on ways to address that
issue. Proposed land uses would find support by the design from Public Works.
Councilor Ballew said she was curious about the work ECONorthwest would do in Glenwood.
She asked if it would be similar to the work done by Leland Consulting for the area next to the
nver.
Mr. Mott said there would be some overlap because both efforts were geared towards coming up
with proposals, options and solutions to redevelopment.
Mr. Grile said the Leland study was a specific market analysis. This would be a broader
economic opportunity analysis. He explained the type of information that ECONorthwest would
gather.
Councilor Ballew felt that staff could come up with that information.
Mr. Mott said they wanted the study more grounded and not just anecdotal.
Councilor Wylie said the sooner we got started, the better.
Councilor Ralston said he agreed. It was hard for him to believe it would take thirty-six months.
The Glenwood Refinement Plan was pretty well laid out. He asked if they could move forward
on a fast track using the information the City currently had.
Mr. Mott described the process in doing the inventories, updating the database, evaluating the
supply and demand and making recommendations to redesignate properties. That process was
started about a year ago and would take another eighteen to twenty-four months.
Mr. Grile said there were two other pieces. There were certain statewide planning goal
requirements the City had to follow. There was a public involvement process and there was
infrastructure work that needed to be done in that area.
Councilor Ralston said the development community wanted some certainty. Development may
want to occur before the thirty-six months. It seemed a simple overview could be done first to
identify designations, and then start working on the details. Then if something happened in that
area, it would have already been projected to be a certain type of designation and we could move
forward on it faster. .
Mr. Grile said this process was phased in an effort to be responsive to that concern.
Councilor Ralston asked about the technical contract costs and asked if it was an additional cost.
Mr. Mott said staff provided Council with the cost of the DSD staff assigned to this project.
There was approximately $40,000 for contractual services in addition to that. The Public Works
budget was based on new full time employee (FTE) that didn't yet exist plus some contractual.
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February 25, 2008
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Assistant Public Works Director Len Goodwin said the primary need for the FTE was to manage
the contractual services to make sure they made better use of the City's money. It was more
effective contracting out.
Mayor Leiken said this was a policy decision to go forward with phasing. It was based on
Council's vision and staff's ability to move forward.
Councilor Ballew said the phasing made sense. Staff had a number of other things they were
working on at this time. She would rather see it phased so they came out with a good product.
Mr. Goodwin said they could get things down on the riverfront property quickly if phasing.
Councilor Lundberg noted how far we had come in Glenwood. Refinement plans didn't always
work out, so it was good to build on the momentum. She said she would like to see Glenwood
and the Downtown urban renewal tied in together. There were many variables and if we could
use our time wisely, the development would catch up. Phasing would payoff.
Councilor Ralston asked how much SEDA could fund for some of this project.
Mr. Grimaldi said it was very possible.
Councilor Ballew asked if it was the City's responsibility or SEDA's responsibility.
Mr. Grimaldi said that was up to the Council and SEDA Board.
ADJOURNMENT
The meeting was adjourned at 7:45 pm.
Minutes Recorder - Amy Sowa
Attest: