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HomeMy WebLinkAboutApproved Minutes - 2006-10-18 (02) OF LAKE oSivf `�� . c., . 1 Vo City of Lake Oswego vi.,Wr , Natural Resources Advisory Board Minutes OREGON October 18, 2006 APPROVED I. CALL TO ORDER AND ROLL CALL Co-Chair Craig Diamond called the Natural Resources Advisory Board meeting of October 18, 2006 to order at approximately 6:30 p.m. in the City Council Work Room of City Hall, 380 "A"Avenue, Lake Oswego, Oregon. Commissioners present besides Co-Chair Craig Diamond were *Co-Chair William Gaar, Sarah Asby,Nancy Gronowski, Morgan Holen, Douglas Rich, and Stephanie Wagner. Guests present were Audrey Mattison and Ron Hanson, Friends of Springbrook Park. Staff present were staff liaison, Jonna Papaefthimiou, Natural Resources Planner; Lisa Hamerlynck, Natural Resources Coordinator; and Susan Millhauser, Sustainability Planner. II. ANNOUNCEMENTS The following presentations to the Board were to take place at the next meeting: Ms. Holen would discuss the Clean Streams program, consultant, Duke Castle, would discuss Sustainability; and the City Manager would explain the City budgeting process. III. APPROVAL OF MINUTES The Minutes of April 19 and May 17. 2006 were corrected and approved by unanimous vote of those members present and eligible to vote on them. Ms. Wagner abstained from the vote. IV. REGULAR BUSINESS Springbrook Forestry Plan Board members examined the draft Springbrook Forestry Plan that had been developed by Friends of Springbrook Park and refined and expanded by a forestry consultant and City staff. Ms. Wagner questioned the goal of accomplishing a mixed canopy forest in an accelerated time frame. She also recommended the City first set citywide goals, policies and priorities for maintaining and enhancing natural areas. She said the plan was too aggressive regarding tree removal and the use of poisons. Ms. Wagner advised there were less aggressive ways to encourage reforestation to occur in a more natural progression, and there was not enough emphasis on controlling invasive, non-native species, such as ivy and blackberry bushes, which should be the City's initial goal. She would suggest a longer time frame for achieving the mixed forest than the draft plan City of Lake Oswego Natural Resources Advisory Board Page 1 of 5 Minutes of October 18,2006 anticipated. Ms. Hamerlynck agreed with Ms. Wagner that hardwoods should not be designated as "invasive species." She also explained she was going to develop a protocol and budget for addressing City-owned natural areas that she would present to the Board. She anticipated the new AmeriCorps volunteer would begin work on a survey of vegetation that would be helpful. Board members suggested the City's philosophy and policy regarding natural areas maintenance should be part of a Community Forestry Plan. Ms. Wagner, Ms. Holen and Ms. Hamerlynck planned to meet with the chair of the Friends group and work on the draft plan. Board members anticipated they would continue to discuss the plan and an Natural Resources Advisory Board (NRAB) recommendation at a future meeting. Ms. Mattison explained that it had been the forester, and not the Friends group, who recommended an accelerated reforestation program; Friends had not specified how and where new planting should be done; they had only done modest planting (about 36 trees) in the past three years; and the survival rate was only 2%. The Friends representatives offered to work with the NRAB to refine the draft plan. *Co-Chair William Gaar joined the meeting and Ms. Hamerlynck left the meeting at 6:00 p.m. Sustainability Update and Discussion Susan Millhauser, Sustainability Planner, updated the Board regarding the City's sustainability effort. She reported that the City Council supported the concept of "sustainability," and the City was making an effort to modify its operations and work toward that goal and it was also promoting a couple of"green streets" projects. She said the City minimized the use of pesticides, herbicides and phosphorus products and had purchased six hybrid vehicles. She anticipated the City Council would soon consider more ways to work toward sustainability, including special "green" buildings certification; a new surface water management plan; an ordinance, or an education campaign related to the use of fertilizers; "dark sky" standards; and perhaps even a demolition ordinance that would encourage deconstruction. Ms. Millhauser said the City was considering applying for a Metro grant for a "car- sharing program" that would make the City fleet available to program residents in the evening; the City had a goal to increase its use of biodiesel in heavier trucks and equipment from 5% to 20%; and the City hoped to take advantage of"ultra-low sulfur" diesel fuel when it was available. She said the City had an intra-departmental steering committee looking into such activities and goals. She confirmed the City did not yet have an overarching set of goals, targets and strategies related to sustainability. They were also discussing things like possible ways to address local housing options for staff who commuted long distances, and "living wages" clauses in agreements with contractors. She said the City reported what it was doing on the website, which featured a link to a sustainability section. During the questioning period, Ms. Millhauser confirmed the steering committee planned to recommend goals to the City Council. She explained the City belonged to the Natural Step Network, which provided pro-bono services of environmental expert coaches like City of Lake Oswego Natural Resources Advisory Board Page 2 of 5 Minutes of October 18,2006 Dorothy Atwood and Duke Castle, who helped the City and the steering committee with special projects. One such project was to decide whether the City should set up its own vegetated waste composting facility, or contract for that service. She said the City government was also considering how to encourage the community to work towards sustainability after the City had addressed its own operations. She confirmed that any businesses that wanted to know what they could do could contact her for more information. Ms. Millhauser cited the example of some Canadian cities that had begun to establish community-wide programs by first working with a core group of stakeholders (an "early adopters program) that helped each other achieve sustainability goals. The Board asked what incentives might be utilized to encourage people to change their behavior so the community could meet sustainability goals. Ms. Millhauser noted that the Lake Grove Village Center Plan advisory committee incorporated incentives that encouraged "green building" and storm water treatment in the draft Code they proposed, and she advised the state also offered tax incentives. Co-Chair Diamond presented a memorandum that suggested how the Board could begin to influence the City Council's sustainability strategy. He recalled the Board had previously decided to study the topic before they considered whether to make a related recommendation to the City Council. At their last meeting they had heard reports about approaches several other cities had taken and the results they had seen. He recalled that a City Councilor had advised the Board to start by scheduling educational programs with the Councilors and then suggest related, easily achievable, shorter-term goals. He asked if the NRAB members wanted to ask the Council to commit to steps, such as setting a citywide, quantifiable, goal and implementation policies related to greenhouse gas emissions and global climate change. During the questioning period, Board members wondered how they could support the work of staff, and not get too far ahead of staff effort in advocating regulations that would affect citizen's behavior. Ms. Millhauser clarified the City was currently focused on controlling its own operations, so it could eventually build the sustainability effort on successful projects. Co-Chair Diamond clarified that he was now suggesting that the City act as a "champion" of citywide sustainability. He also confirmed that he anticipated that he would seek the input of the Natural Step Network coaches about how to do that. A Board member noted the memorandum suggested that Lake Oswego was the right city to become a leader in sustainability, partly because it was in a good financial position to do so. He suggested adding cost/benefit information to support that statement that showed the value to the City of becoming known as a model "clean and green" city. Board members agreed to work with and seek the advice of consultants from the Natural Step Program because program consultants were already working with the City Council and they could provide examples of how other cities had set up successful sustainability programs. The Board's anticipated their next steps would be to hear a presentation from consultant, Duke Castle, at their next meeting, and then decide on a strategy and recommendation to the City Council at the end of that meeting. The Co-Chairs were scheduled to present NRAB recommended goals at a December 12, 2006 meeting with the Council. *Ms. Millhauser left the meeting. City of Lake Oswego Natural Resources Advisory Board Page 3 of 5 Minutes of October 18,2006 NRAB Goals and Achievements Board members re-examined NRAB 2006 Goals. Goal 1 called for development of a natural area park management program. They recalled that Lisa Hamerlynck, Natural Resources Coordinator, had just reported she was in the process of fashioning a framework and policies related to management of City-owned natural areas, and the City Council had allocated funding that allowed her to focus on that. They decided to ask Ms. Hamerlynck to update them on her work so they could report that accomplishment. They generally agreed that 2007 Goal 1, Item 1 should be to encourage a citywide policy and framework related to managing natural areas, which was to include a citywide invasive species eradication program. The new Goal 1, Item 2 was to encourage implementation of the management plans in individual parks, such as, Iron Mountain Natural Area Park, Bryant Woods Natural Area Park, Woodmont Park, and Springbrook Park. They observed activities related to 2006 Goal 2, to support the City's Sustainability Program, were that they worked with staff on related issues, researched the topic, discussed their approach with individual Councilors and then determined their next steps (see above Sustainability discussion). They anticipated they would discuss related issues with other City committees, including discussing use of biodiesel with the transportation committee. They generally agreed to draft new language for Goal 2 that the NRAB would encourage and help facilitate moving the sustainability goal beyond City government operations to development of a community-wide sustainability vision and then an implementation program that would identify the City of Lake Oswego as a leading "green" community. They anticipated other priority goals for 2007 would be to draft and present a community forestry program, and support the Clean Streams plan. They agreed to consider specific draft language for their new goals at their next meeting. Ms. Gronowski and Ms. Holen offered to draft the community forestry goal language, and Ms. Asby offered to draft Clean Streams-related goal language. Phosphorus Ordinance Update Co-Chair Diamond reported that he had attended a City Council meeting the previous week and heard a panel discussion regarding a proposed phosphorus-free ordinance. He reported many issues had been raised and he planned to attend future Council meetings when the Councilors continued the discussion. Water Conservation Update Ms. Asby, the NRAB liaison to the Water Conservation Committee, reported the Committee had met three times and that staff and the consultant were about to draft a water conservation plan for the Council to consider in January 2007. She explained that the City got its water from the Clackamas River, and the state was now requiring water rights holders to adopt conservation plans that met certain state requirements. She distributed material showing the recommendations the group had considered. She said the Committee supported the idea of increasing the water use rate above a certain base level of customer use, and they wanted implementation accelerated to 2007. She said City of Lake Oswego Natural Resources Advisory Board Page 4 of 5 Minutes of October 18,2006 they favored using the incentives proposed in the Lake Grove Village Center Plan. She advised that the greatest amount of water use was by residential homes, and the Committee favored the use of rebates for low-water toilets. Other Board members related the City of Palo Alto offered rebates for water-efficient washing machines. She reported the Committee also favored use of gray-water systems (also known as "purple pipe") to recycle used water, but the City Code did not allow that, and it would be hard to retrofit such systems into existing development. Board members suggested one of their 2007 Sustainability sub-goals could be to explore the feasibility of changing the Code so it allowed gray-water recycling. They held that the Board should be notified and asked to comment whenever a proposal like a draft water plan was contemplated. They asked Ms. Asby to alert the Board when the draft plan was available for them to examine, and to ask someone to present it to the Board. Community Forestry Proposed Action: Recommendation to City Council The Board agreed to postpone this discussion until their next meeting. V. ADJOURNMENT There being no further business Co-Chair Diamond adjourned the meeting at 8:45 p. m. Respectfully submitted, Jonna Papaefthimiou Natural Resources Planner City of Lake Oswego Natural Resources Advisory Board Page 5 of 5 Minutes of October 18,2006