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HomeMy WebLinkAbout07/07/2008 Work Session City of Springfield Work Session Meeting MINUTES OF THE WORK SESSION MEETING OF THE SPRINGFIELD CITY COUNCIL HELD MONDAY, JULY 7, 2008 The City of Springfield Council met in a work in the Jesse Maine Meeting Room, 225 Fifth Street, Springfield, Oregon, on Monday, July 7, 2008 at 6:03 p.m., with Mayor Leiken presiding. ATTENDANCE Present were Mayor Leiken and Councilors Lundberg, Ballew, Woodrow, and Pishioneri. Also present were 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 Wylie and Ralston were absent (excused). 1. City Attorney Office Evaluation. Acting Human Resources Director Ardis Belknap presented the staff report on this item. The results of the annual evaluation have been received, tabulated and are now ready for Council review and discussion with the City Attorney's Office, The firm of Leahy, Van Vactor & Cox LLP received high marks recently during the annual review of its performance of the city attorney duties which are summarized on attachment I in the agenda packet. Thirty evaluations were distributed; of those, seventeen were returned indicating ratings of excellent, good and did not observe. Ms. Belknap said there were two changes to the contract for the City Attorney's office: the percentage increase of2.9% in fees; and the City Attorney's office providing primary back-up to the City Prosecutor. The City Attorney contract renewal would be on the Consent.Calendar during tonight's Regular Meeting for Council's formal action. City Attorneys Joe Leahy, Matt Cox and Bill Van Vactor joined Ms. Belknap at the table. Mr. Leahy thanked everyone for the good evaluation. It had been great for Mr. Leahy and Mr, Cox to be able to bring Mr. Van Vactor into their office. His knowledge was an asset to their firm and the comments regarding Mr, Van Vactor were positive on the evaluation. Mr. Leahy noted that the work flow in the contracts area had been tremendous during the last month and a half. The City staff was very busy. He acknowledged Leslie Wilson and Terri White for their great job monitoring contracts. He felt his office could always do a better job in timeliness. They had done a better job with Mr. Van Vactor's assistance. Mr. Cox agreed. It was great having Mr. Van Vactor in the office and he had been a wonderful help, Mr. Cox planned on gaining as much knowledge as possible from both Mr. Van Vactor and Mr. Leahy as long as they remained at the office. City of Springfield Council Work Session Minutes July 7, 2008 Page 2 Mr. Van Vactor said it was a privilege to join this staff. Both Mr. Leahy and Mr. Cox had been excellent mentors to him with the new laws. He thanked the City for the opportunity to serve on behalf of the City in this legal capacity. Councilor Woodrow thanked the attorneys for their professionalism, They worked in a very friendly manner with the Council and he appreciated that. Councilor Ballew said the responses were all positive. Mr. Leahy said he was still working on some information for Councilor Ballew and he appreciated the Council's patience. He commended Mr. Van Vactor for doing a great job on the ethic reform. Some of the issues related to the new laws had no answer. If the Council had questions, it was best to askthe City Attorney's office or the State, Councilor Lundberg said she was comfortable knowing the City Attorneys were doing their job" and keeping the councilors and the City on the right track. Council could be bold in their decisions because they knew the City Attorneys were there to cover the legal issues, She thanked them for their recent presentation to the editorial board at the Register Guard on a difficult situation. Councilor Pishioneri said when he thought of the City Attorney's office, two words came to mind: prudence and practicality, The attorneys had a difficult job selling to others what was prudent to others. They were always looking at Springfield as a whole picture and chose their battles well. He had a lot of confidence in the attorneys, They had a lot of integrity and a lot of respect from him. Councilor Ballew said she would like periodic seminars to the Council on their responsibilities. Mayor Leiken said he appreciated what the City Attorneys did, He thanked Mr. Leahy for not only being the City Attorney, but also taking time to meet with him personally. His wisdom went beyond that ofa City Attorney. Mr. Leahy understood the City's culture and had formed a relationship with the elected officials. He had helped the Mayor grow as a public official and a person. The City had been fortunate to have senior staff and the City Attorney's office in place over a number of years. The secret of Springfield's success was teamwork between elected officials, City staff, the City Attorney and the citizens. Over the years, he had heard Mr. Leahy talk about the citizens, and that's the way it should be, They should receive glowing evaluations. He thanked Mr. Van Vactor for his help with the new Ethics Laws. He appreciated the counsel, the work they did, and felt the team would continue to move forward. Mr. Leahy said the City Council was the City Attorney's client, as well as the citizens because the Council was representing the citizens. Councilor Ballew said she learned early on in civil service, that if the Councilors didn't follow the attorney's advice, they were on their own. Discussion was held regarding the increase in wages, Mr, Leahy noted that the City Attorney's office had worked about 600-800 hours over where they should be, about 600 of which were law clerk hours. He said they would talk to Council next year about the number of hours. City of Springfield Council Work Session Minutes July 7,2008 Page 3 Mayor Leiken said land use issues alone were very complicated. Issues that came before the Springfield Council were the same as those in larger cities. Mr, Leahy acknowledged the great work on tonight's liquor license issue from Bill Van Vactor and Matt Doden, law clerk. Mr. Doden had done an excellent job in putting the presentation together. 2. Request for Proposals: Springfield Downtown District Urban Design Plan and Implementation Strategy. Planning Supervisor Linda Pauly presented the staff report on this item. Page 2 of 2 was distributed as it was missing from the agenda packet. DSD and Public Works staffhave identified key Downtown planning and revitalization work tasks which will require contractual services. Staff has prepared an RFP to seek proposals from qualified consultants to prepare a Downtown Urban Design Plan and Implementation Strategy to guide and coordinate revitalization and redevelopment initiatives within Springfield's downtown core. The project will include a focused citizen involvement program and public review process. The selected consultant will work with staff, Downtown advisory committees, Historical Commission, Planning Commission and the Council to generate work products which will provide the City with: I. an adoption-ready vision for Downtown; 2. an adoption-ready plan to give physical form to that vision; 3. an adoption-ready implementation strategy which identifies short and long term initiatives and catalyst projects. Key elements: · an illustrative Downtown District Urban Design Plan . Downtown Design Standards · a comprehensive parking management program and identification of the appropriate locations for downtown parking facilities · a proposal for infrastructure and utilities improvements and modifications · proposed revisions to the Downtown Refinement Plan, Development Code, and other planning documents as needed to implement the plan Once proposals are received, the Scope of Work will be adjusted to match available funds. It is also expected that this project may need to be phased. Once proposals are received, the Scope of Work will be adjusted to match available funds, It is also expected that this project may need to be phased, Councilor Ballew said it seemed comprehensive, but difficult to know what to do first. Without a vision, it was difficult to know what would work. Ms. Pauly said a lot of visioning had been done over the years and significant steps had been made; however, no overall strategy had gone through the public process and been adopted by Council. The purpose was to bring together all the things that had been done in one package. City of Springfield Council Work Session Minutes July 7, 2008 Page 4 Everyone would be brought to the table, such as the parks district, utilities, etc, A plan was needed to include things such as signage, streets, etc, to market the downtown. Councilor Woodrow wanted to make sure they were not stepping on the toes of the Downtown Urban Renewal Advisory Committee (DURAC). That committee had made a lot of progress already and he didn't want them to feel like their work was not valued. Ms, Pauly said she was scheduled to meet with them on July 16 to get their comments and let them know the direction Council wanted them to go. Several members of that committee could be stakeholders on this project. Councilor Lundberg asked why they didn't just use that entire committee. Mr. Tamulonis said the DURAC was set up to advise the urban renewal agency; If the Mayor or Council wanted to add responsibilities to that committee, it could be done. Staff was hoping to give that committee about three or four months of background material and then suggest they provide input for this larger process and playa role, There were thirty other people that were interested in the downtown committee and some of those people could be brought in as well. Councilor Lundberg said over the years a number of studies had been done on downtown. All of that information should be used as well as new information, As much as possible, she wanted to use those that were interested. The charge of the advisory committee could change somewhat so they could be used. She didn't want to alienate the advisory committee and was comfortable using the advisory committee members with expertise in this process. It could save time. Councilor Ballew said the DURAC had more specific tasks than this visioning project. Ms. Pauly said her understanding ofthe (DURAC) was to deal with the funding mechanism for downtown urban renewal and making recommendations on how the money was spent. The process she was proposing would involve someone with' expertise in downtown revitalization in Oregon to give us pointers on how to get all these groups to work together. The DURAC was just one group. There were many groups interested in downtown. Councilor Ballew said it may not be a duplication of the DURAC. Ms, Pauly said this group would make policy recommendations that would go through the Planning Commission and then to the Council. They would relate to design standards downtown and would help the City evaluate the best sites for different uses. Councilor Ballew said it could be like a super committee that drew from the Planning Commission, DURAC, and the Historical Commission, She asked about the time commitment. Ms. Pauly said it would be similar to the Commercial and Industrial Buildable Lands (CIBL) Committee, meeting monthly for about six to nine months. Councilor Woodrow said he agreed with Councilor Lundberg. The DURAC had different agenda items they needed to look at, but the members of that committee were talented people and Springfield citizens. He didn't want to see a consultant from another city telling us how to City of Springfield Council Work Session Minutes July 7, 2008 Page 5 rebuild downtown Springfield. A cohesive interaction was needed with the talent of the DURAC members. Councilor Lundberg agreed. The people that had come forward for the DURAC loved downtown and were local. She suggested laying out the tasks that DURAC would be doing and that this other committee would be doing. The members from DURAC believed they had the ability and desire to create a vision. Once those tasks were outlined, it could be determined which group would take on which of those tasks, and then the bigger group could be brought together. She suggested capitalizing on the interest level of those people. Councilor Ballew said there was a separation between the City and the urban renewal agency. Using the DURAC was asking the urban renewal agency to make plans for the City, but that needed to be separated. Mr. Tamulonis suggested trying to mesh the meetings with the DURAC group to involve them in this process. Staff could come back to Council with a way to line that up, using a subset of the DURAC for this process and bringing back a proposal. Mr. Leahy said ifCotmcil was going to instruct staff to communicate with the DURAC, that was fine, Assigning responsibilities to that committee needed to be done through the SEDA Board, There was nothing legally wrong with the SEDA Board assigning this additional responsibility to the DURAC. Councilor Ballew felt a consultant was needed to pull this all together, whether the City or SEDA paid for it. All agreed, Councilor Lundberg said she would prefer the consultant was a local company and asked that more weight could be given to a local firm. Mayor Leiken said some consultants that weren't local knew Springfield. He gave examples. Mayor Leiken said he agreed with Councilor Ballew, It sounded like they were trying to put together a package for developers. There could be some separation between the City and SEDA. Some members of DURAC had background and could be involved, but perhaps not the entire group, Ifthere was an opportunity to check into the DURAC membership to see which of those members could be part of this process, that could be a good start, He referred to the Smart Growth Conference and said he hadn't been interested to see what they were doing in Portland and Atlanta because that wouldn't fit with Springfield. We had some momentum in the downtown and were ready to look into putting a plan in place. It would help to have a whole package that was consistent for developers. Councilor Pishioneri said it made sense to use some of the DURAC members. When they sent out the request for proposals (RFP) for the consultant, it should note that the DURAC would be integrated into this project. That committee would be a sounding board. The members of DURAC had a lot of investment in downtown. City of Springfield CouncirWork Session Minutes July 7, 2008 Page 6 Councilor Ballew said Council agreed to go forward with an RFP for a consultant. She asked if staff could give Council a memo regarding what the consultant would be doing and who would be advising them. The City should be the one to issue the RFP. Many tasks did take expertise and special training. The consultant would do the heavy lifting for the advisory committee. Ms. Pauly said the consultant could focus the DURAC on things the city could do. She asked if Council wanted the consultant selected by an internal committee or Council. Council said staff could choose the consultant. They asked staff to provide a list of those they were considering in a Communication Packet. 3. Strategic Plan Update. Assistant City Manager Jeff Towery presented the staff report on this item, For the past several weeks, the Executive Team has been working with Rhonda Costanza and Suzanne Durhiem of the Change Agency to create a strategic plan based on the results of Council Goal Setting and an Executive Team planning session each held earlier this year, The larger Management Team has also been working on defining the various outcome and process measures that will be used to measure progress toward the Council's goals. When fmished, the plan will clarify our: Mission - what business we are in . Vision - what we want to become Values - operating principles which guide all decisions Key Processes - what we must do well Goals - what we will do this year Staff will continue to refine the plan over the next few weeks, Upon completion, the plan will be brought back to the Council for review and ultimately, adoption. Two of the motivations for this effort were to create an opportunity to demonstrate progress towards the Council goals, and to provide staff with an opportunity internally to prioritize the many projects that staff deals with, He provided slides showing the draft mission statement, vision, values, key processes and goals, He showed a schematic of the process so far. Councilor Ballew asked who had been working on this plan. Mr, Towery said the Executive Team (ET) using the consultant. Department heads had also been working with their perspective management teams on details such as processes, Most of the management team had also convened in a half day session to put together the measures. Councilor Ballew asked if this would be a template for each department in the City. Mr. Towery said it would. He explained. Councilor Ballew asked if each department would have information on who would help them accomplish the goals. City of Springfield Council Work Session Minutes July 7, 2008 Page 7 Mr, Towery said they would, Each key measure would have an owner and supporting roles identified in the strategic plan, There could be multiple owners on several measures. Councilor Ballew said this would be valuable to the organization and hoped this would be used. Mr. Towery said this was easier than some of the other processes because they had collected all that had been used historically and brought it together in a central location. It would be accessible and easy to use. Councilor Ballew said it would be important that everyone in the organization knew the policy. ADJOURNMENT The meeting was adjourned at 6:55 pm, Minutes Recorder - Alny Sowa Attest: AmY~ City Recorder