HomeMy WebLinkAbout12/05/2011 Work SessionCity of Springfield
Work Session Meeting
MINUTES OF THE WORK SESSION MEETING OF
THE SPRINGFIELD CITY COUNCIL HELD
MONDAY, DECEMBER 5, 2011
The City of Springfield Council met in a work session in. the Jesse Maine Meeting Room, 225 Fifth
Street, Springfield, Oregon, on Monday, December 5, 2011 at 6:15 p.m:, with Mayor Lundberg
presiding.
ATTENDANCE
Present were Mayor Lundberg and Councilors Pishioneri, VanGordon, Wylie, Moore, Ralston and
Woodrow. Also present were City Manager Gino Grimaldi, Assistant City Manager Jeff Towery,
Assistant City Attorney Mary Bridget Smith, City Recorder Amy Sowa and members of the staff.
1. Downtown Circulation Study Update.
Management Analyst Courtney Griesel and Traffic Civil Engineer Kristi Krueger presented the staff
report on this item. Ms. Griesel noted that Ms. Krueger was doing a lot of the focusing in the
transportation and engineering component and City Planner Mark Metzger was involved with the
stakeholder and citizen involvement component. Tonight was a brief check in to let Council know
where the City was.on this project and how they were doing. There was no data available at this time,
but would be presented by the consultant after the first of the year.
Ms. Griesel said the overall goal of.the project was to look at circulation downtown, to correlate the
circulation activities to the recommendations and themes in the Downtown Plan and in the stakeholder
interviews, and to look at feasibility of downtown enhancements. City staff had been working with the
consultant, Kittelson & Associates, to identify stakeholders and perform interviews with those
stakeholders. The list of categories of the -stakeholders was in the agenda packet and included business
owners in Springfield, freight industry leaders in the region, both residential and commercial
developers, as well as downtown businesses. The consultants felt very confident with the variety of
stakeholders. Members of the Downtown Citizen Advisory Committee (CAC) also did interviews.
Some of the themes that were expressed both in the Downtown Plan and in the interviews included,
but were not limited to, lack of safe bike facilities downtown, feel and safety of downtown at night,
social concerns about particular businesses in downtown, and the speed and pedestrian environment on
South A Street. All of the concerns were included in the Attachment in agenda packet. Many of the
concerns were more social, rather than regarding traffic. Based on the consultant's review of the
Downtown Plan, the stakeholder interviews, the CAC work and their initial survey of downtown, their
initial opinion was that a two -way conversion may not be the likely feasible near -term project that
addressed the concerns and needs identified. Staff felt that opinion needed to be respected as the
consultants were professionals, but also asked the consultant to continue the analysis assessment of the
two -way conversion and bring data to the staff that could be presented to Council in late January or
early February. The consultant's recommendation was to continue to move forward, present a sketch
level analysis in January or February, and determine whether or not to continue moving forward with
the two -way conversion or look at alternative projects.
Ms. Krueger said the two items they would receive from the consultant in later January or early
February included the sketch level analysis of the two -way conversion. This analysis would provide
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Council Work Session Minutes
December 5, 2011
Page 2
the impacts of what it would take to do a two -way conversion, how it would affect businesses, and a
cost estimate. At that time, the consultant would also bring ideas of what could be done now that
would address the goals for downtown. Some of the near term transportation projects the consultant
was considering included larger pedestrian bulb -outs than what was currently in place, priority
location for bulb -outs, pedestrian level lighting, priority locations for street lighting for both
pedestrians and road lighting, street furniture, building maintenance and aesthetic improvements. The
City could also identify potential private/ public partnerships to improve the aesthetics, identify
consistent branding and wayfinding related to bikes and pedestrians, parking, and identify specific
intersection or street improvements that could enhance multi -modal travel within downtown. The
consultant would analyze those items and bring them forward to share with the Council. Staff wanted
to check in with the Council to see if they were moving in the right direction, and if there was
anything else they would like added.
Councilor Woodrow said the Downtown Organizational Committee with NEDCO was working on
aesthetics and branding. She asked if they would be working in partnership with that committee.
Ms. Griesel said they had involved Ms. Carpenter- Seguin from NEDCO and other committee
members early on in this process. They could continue to work with them.
Councilor Woodrow said it would be a great partnership. She asked about the issue of pedestrian
safety on South A. There weren't a lot of reasons to cross South A along most of that street.
Ms. Krueger said the safety of people walking along South A was more of a concern because of the
speed of the vehicles and the close proximity of the street to the sidewalk.
Ms. Griesel said there were concerns if re- alignment was considered of how to address the affect on
businesses and neighborhoods to the south of South A Street, and how to keep the connection for those
people who wanted to get downtown. They wanted to look at how to make that area safer and the
connection to downtown strong.
Councilor Moore took a tour of Redmond during the League of Oregon Cities (LOC) Conference.
Redmond had changed their downtown street and there were probably other cities that had
experienced similar situations. She thought it might be helpful for the consultant or staff to talk with
the staff at Redmond about how they alleviated the businesses' concerns.
Ms. Krueger said Kittelson had worked on many conversions so were familiar with different towns
and cities around the United States. Staff would ask them to. talk with Redmond or any other cities that
had faced similar situations about their experiences.
Councilor Wylie said she went on a tour in Bend when at the LOC Conference. Someone from
Kittelson was on the tour as a roundabout expert. They were very knowledgable and she felt we
should listen to what they were saying.
Councilor Pishioneri referred to page 4 of Kittelson's report and the section on 'Identification of near -
term transportation- related projects ... ". He felt their list made sense and he would like to move
forward with their recommendations. He would like to see things get done, and this was a good
opportunity. The list included great ideas and a good starting point. He would like to put in some of
these things to see how they worked. The report spoke of lack of parking enforcement and he felt that
should be a priority along with some of the improvements.
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Council Work Session Minutes
December 5, 2011
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Councilor Woodrow said she recalled a presentation made to a downtown committee on street lighting
from .former Councilor Terri Leezer. She thought staff might want 'to find out what had been presented
at that time.
Community Development Manager John Tamulonis said former Councilor Tammy Fitch was also on
that committee.
Councilor VanGordon asked if they could see the highlights from the interviews. He agreed that we
should look for something that could be done sooner rather than later, such as several small .
improvements.
Ms. Griesel said she was pleased to hear that staff was on the same page as the Council. Staff felt there
was value in continuing with the analysis of a two -way conversion since it had been a topic for many
years and would provide much needed data.
Councilor VanGordon asked if the consultant found from the interviews that a two -way conversion
was not wanted.
Ms. Krueger said the consultant's concern was with the physical constraints and feasibility. That
translated into a high cost. Staff felt'it was important to study the two -way at least at the sketch level.
They could then decide if they wanted to get a more in depth study done. It was important to get the
study done, and then determine which direction to proceed.
Mayor Lundberg said the point of a possible two -way conversion was to slow traffic down and make it
more pedestrian friendly. She would agree that if we could get short term fixes such as lighting and
bulb -outs to enhance pedestrian safety, that would be welcomed and she would be in favor. She felt it
was important to look at the two -way further, and that we were moving in the right direction.
2. Accela Update and Demo.
Information Technology Director Rod Lathrop presented the staff report on this item. Mr. Lathrop
introduced Deyette Kelly from Development Services, who would be providing the demo on the
Accela program.
Mr. Lathrop said the Accela application was provided in `the cloud' which meant the City didn't have
to do any server upgrades.
Mayor Lundberg asked Mr. Lathrop to explain `the cloud' for those that were not familiar with it.
Mr. Lathrop said most of the applications in local governments were done with a client server
technology, which meant that the servers were onsite. The servers hosted databases which provided
the data for the applications on the individual computers throughout the City. The new model of
computing was to host the servers off site. The Accela servers were hosted in a server farm in Utah.
This was the second major application that the City had that was hosted in `the cloud'. The first was
ConstructWare which was used for the Metropolitan Wastewater Management Commission
(MWMC). By having the companies doing their own data entry on these projects took fewer project
managers managing more projects with efficiency and cost effective.
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Council Work Session Minutes
December 5, 2011
Page 4
Mr. Lathrop said the Accela project had been `live' in the City for about 18 months. The vast majority
of this project had been funded by the State of Oregon from their surcharge fees on development
permits. The goal was to have the same permitting system across the State. Springfield was selected to
go first across the State with the new Accela Automation Electronic Building Permitting software and
hardware due to our acknowledged expertise in efficient, customer- focused development. The
template Springfield helped create would guide all subsequent implementations across Oregon.
Springfield purchased additional modules for Planning Applications, Code Enforcement,. and a GIS
Interface. The applications went "Live" on August 9, 2010.
Springfield was now open for business 24/7 enabling customers, citizens, contractors and staff to
access the most current information about building permits and development online. Fifty -two percent
of all new trade permits sold in 2011 had been issued online. Customers were also scheduling
inspections online, further enhancing convenience, timeliness and customer service.
The City now sold online permits, such as electrical, mechanical, small routine permits and other trade
permits. This was a tremendous benefit to the development community who could apply for their
permit online from their home or business. The status of applications could also be checked online,
another time saver for the citizen. Inspections were also scheduled online. Anyone could go online to
see what type of development was happening by address. One of the next steps was to set up an
electronic plan review. He explained the current process which included multiple paper copies through
the review and comment period. They now had the tools to do the plan review electronically by
scanning in the plans, making notations online which would become part of record. This process had
been tested internally, but not with the general public. The next thing to come online would be the
interactive voice response system which would be used over the phone line rather than the computer.
This service could also be used to schedule inspections-or check the status of permits.
Ms. Kelly provided the demo of the software which was through the State portal. Some things could
only be done as a user, requiring log -in. Non - registered users could also check to see what type of
development was going on at an address. It was noted that code enforcement files were not available
on this system.
Councilor Pishioneri asked if a search could be done for a whole street.
Ms. Kelly said it could and would bring up any permits for that street. She showed how that could be
done. Citizens could look at permits that had been issued both online and in the office. She reviewed
the information shown on the screen for a permit issued. Inspections could also be viewed online. She
demonstrated how a person could schedule an inspection. She noted the area where .status of permit
could be located. There was also a section for related applications. She explained. About 160
contractors in the metro area were currently signed up as registered users.
Mayor Lundberg said when this system first started there were a number of issue's, but now it was
moving along much more smoothly.
Ms. Kelly said the State had added links to flash presentations on how to use the system. The system
was becoming much more user friendly.
Councilor Woodrow asked if Springfield was the only jurisdiction using this system.
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Council Work Session Minutes
December 5, 2011
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Ms. Kelly said about 36 jurisdictions were now using this system. She named some of those
jurisdictions.
Councilor VanGordon asked how much time this was saving staff.
Ms. Kelly said it was freeing up time at the counter. There was still a small processing fee for all
permits, including online permits because they were reviewed by staff. If additional information was
needed, staff contacted the applicant. This system had increased the efficiency of the trade permits
significantly.
Mr. Lathrop said inspectors had laptops and could access this information in the field. That allowed
them to be more efficient with their time in the field.
Mr. Towery said when construction was booming, contractors were often doing multiple jobs in
multiple jurisdictions. This system helped save the contractors time and helped our staff work more
efficiently to assist the contractors. He provided an example.
Mayor Lundberg agreed.
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The meeting was adjourned at 6:55 p.m.
Minutes Recorder — Amy Sowa
Attest:
Amy Sowa
City Recorder
Christine L. Lundber�
Mayor