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HomeMy WebLinkAboutApproved Minutes - 2009-11-30 Special``� O, LAME OJk.FCO CITY COUNCIL SPECIAL MEETING MINUTES November 30, 2009 gEGON Mayor Jack Hoffman called the special City Council meeting to order at 5:11 p.m. on November 30, 2009, in the West End Building, Santiam Room, 4101 Kruse Way. Present: Mayor Hoffman, Councilors Jordan, Hennagin (5:17), Olson, Moncrieff, and Tierney. Councilor Johnson was excused. Staff Present: Alex McIntyre, City Manager; David Powell, City Attorney; Robyn Christie, City Recorder; Denny Egner, Assistant Planning Director; Jane Blackstone, Economic Development Director; Bob Galante, Redevelopment Director; Megan Phelan, Human Resources Director 3. STUDY SESSION 3.1 Lake Grove Village Center Plan Case Study (Gordon Price follow-up) Mayor Hoffman explained that this review of the Lake Grove Village Center Plan was in response to Councilor Tierney's question of where the City was going with this plan. He spoke of setting the context for the upcoming goal setting discussion. He asked for discussion of the Plan in light of Gordon Price's presentation. Mr. Egner mentioned that this PowerPoint presentation was the one staff presented in advance of the public hearing. He reviewed the 10 -year process it took to get to the plan, beginning with Metro's designation of Lake Grove as a town center and the City amending the Comprehensive Plan to reflect that designation. He referenced the Boones Ferry Road Corridor Plan (2001) for a five -lane facility, the 2002/2003 State grant to do a town center plan for Lake Grove, and the subsequent design charettes intended to reach consensus on ideas for the plan. He recalled that the Planning Commission decided that there was too much disagreement around the concepts coming out of the charettes, and suggested forming an advisory committee to work out the details of the plan. He indicated that the Implementation Committee ended up reviewing the entire plan and making many revisions before Council adopted the plan in 2008. He reviewed the basic goals incorporated into the committee's charge statement. These included creating a vital center, increasing safety on Boones Ferry Road, improving pedestrian and bike access, increasing the number of residents, promoting sustainability, protecting the character of the adjoining neighborhoods, and providing opportunities for integrating public development. He noted that key plan components included village commons and gathering places, ideas related to Boones Ferry Road, and a mixed use center with strong linkages back to the neighborhoods (Exh. B, p.8). He discussed specifics relating to the overall project goals listed in Exhibit B, p.5. He mentioned the transportation related goals: transforming Boones Ferry into a Great Street, enhancing alternative modes of transportation, and enhancing the pedestrian environment and connectivity. He noted the idea of creating a raise center median on Boones Ferry with intersection left turn lanes, bike lanes and walking areas. He mentioned a Code requirement to help create mixed uses: any stories above two stories had to be residential. He discussed strengthening the Lake Grove community's sense of place. He discussed the concept of a walking path that connected a series of open space gathering places along Boones Ferry down to the Lake Grove Fire Hall. He explained that the Village Commons became a `floater' b cause of disagreement regarding its location, although it would be somewhere City Council Special Meeting Minutes Page 1 of 8 November 30, 2009 near Mercantile Village. He described how turning Hallmark Drive into a festival street could connect back into the Village Commons and Mercantile Village. He discussed enhancing village character through storefront building standards and wrap around corners. He mentioned designing the side streets to merge back into the residential districts. He spoke of the numerous pedestrian -friendly improvements identified to improve the linkages back into the neighborhood. He indicated that the Code had a number of graphics illustrating how the buildings should move up to the street frontage, as well as minimum and maximum height standards for the side streets. He reviewed the rezoned areas, noting that the Council did not adopt all the rezoning proposed as part of the plan. He commented that the plan did not result in any real increase in density; it shifted existing allocations of density and commercial uses and dealt more with form. Mayor Hoffman commented that areas without sufficient density for walking to stores often ended up as auto -dominated shopping areas. He asked what the incentives were for developers to add retail if there were insufficient rooftops to support retail. Mr. Egner mentioned the assumption that the area was underbuilt in terms of intensity of possible uses. He explained that the plan assumed that both the retail and residential densities planned for the area before Council adopted the plan were the appropriate densities. However, the City was not seeing those achieved. Mayor Hoffman asked where the people were going to come from to support increased retail activity in the town center. He argued that they would not see retail densities until they achieved residential density. He disagreed that the number of probable residential units built into mixed use buildings would provide sufficient density. He referenced the model in Vancouver, B.C., of retail along the corridor, mass transit, housing above and within the block, and intense housing within one to two blocks of the corridor. Mr. Egner mentioned a principle in town center development that housing led, followed by retail. He commented that it might take some partnerships to make things happen. He indicated to Councilor Hennagin that developers did not always develop to the maximum density allowed because that required expensive forms of housing, costing more than they could get back on it. He explained that in order to maximize the retail and housing square footage on any given site, the developer had to build underground parking on the site; that did not pencil out during the pro forma analysis. He commented that that was also a problem in the Downtown. He indicated to Councilor Hennagin that the Metro garden site was the lot with the greatest redevelopment potential in the corridor. He explained that the plan protected the residential character of adjoining neighborhoods through design standards affecting the edge of the districts, such as village transition areas with tiered building heights to take the height down from 45 feet along Boones Ferry Road to 28 feet at the neighborhood interface. He showed several graphics illustrating village transition areas. He described how the streets changed from urban forms at Boones Ferry to village forms in the neighborhoods. He indicated that there were Code provisions relating to architectural styles, building heights, stepped back buildings, and other design features. Mayor Hoffman asked whether the concepts in the plan would work in the market. Mr. Egner indicated that there were examples of the product described in the Code around the region, such as the Sellwood Library. He mentioned that a major discussion point for the goal of supporting businesses in the Village Center had been the idea of building three parking facilities (north, south, and central). He spoke of interconnected parking lots as an alternative to Boones Ferry Road. He observed that connecting up the existing parking lots was not an easy thing to do. He discussed the goal to identify and implement funding mechanisms to sustain economic vitality. He spoke of creating funding mechanisms to build some of these projects as a catalyst for private investment. He presented a graphic identifying 26 different pedestrian improvement projects to City Council Special Meeting Minutes Page 2 of 8 November 30, 2009 create a better network of pedestrian ways in the district, none of which were included in the Boones Ferry funding estimates. He explained that the Planning Commission pulled the staff cost estimate from the plan out of concern that the figure was not up to date, and because it was a 'scary' number. He recalled that the Advisory Committee and the Planning Commission assigned priorities to the projects but they never identified a funding source for the projects. He commented that one of the biggest flaws in the plan was the lack of the tools needed to make this big wish list happen. He indicated to Mayor Hoffman that he did not know of a study on whether there were sufficient people to use the proposed pedestrian facilities. He explained that staff's intent was to make it safer for the existing residents to walk into the district from the adjoining neighborhoods. He recalled that the Advisory Committee got the Council's permission to look at the 2001 Boones Ferry Corridor Plan again. The resulting change in focus retained an echo of what had originally been a primary feature: the concept of side street linkages to the neighborhoods. Councilor Jordan acknowledged that the lack of financing mechanisms was a flaw in the Plan, but pointed out that the Committee could not reach consensus on creating a redevelopment district. She mentioned that the City's application for MTIP funds for projects to do parts of the Boones Ferry Plan did not succeed because it was a five -lane road, and not what the Village Center Plan proposed. She indicated to Councilor Hennagin that those strongly opposed to a redevelopment district did not like that kind of government financing of things. Mr. Egner indicated to Councilor Hennagin that the connected parking lots might not take the form of extending the lane from Bryant to McDonald's. He said that ideally it would be a lane jogging through a series of connected parking lots as it ran parallel to Boones Ferry Road. He presented a summary plan listing the Plan features. He asked whether the Plan was consistent with the Council's vision of the city. He asked if there were financing strategies that they should discuss. He reviewed the next steps. He recalled that the consultant who reviewed the safety issues (the first phase of the Boones Ferry Refinement Plan) already reported to Council. Although the consultant identified a number of issues, he did conclude that the plan worked to improve safety in the corridor. Mr. Egner mentioned that staff was preparing the RFP for the second phase of the Refinement Plan, which included design work and a financing study to design the best ways to finance the projects. He mentioned staff's application for two Metro construction excise tax grants: planning for the Foothills area and figuring out financing for the Lake Grove area. He indicated that the funds for Lake Grove would hire consultants to do the kinds of analyses that would also serve as prep work for an urban renewal plan, but which had to be done in any case. COUNCIL QUESTIONS Mr. Egner indicated to Councilor Olson that the grant process had two deadlines. Staff intended to submit the letter of interest that was due next week in order to get Metro staff feedback about whether the proposals were reasonable, and then come back to Council before proceeding with the actual grant application. Mr. Egner indicated to Councilor Hennagin that staff was not yet working on Phase 2 of the Boones Ferry Road Refinement Plan. He said that tonight the Planning Commission was discussing the public involvement process for Phase 2. He explained that Phase 2 had a number of decision points in terms of implementing the plan that staff would bring to Council, since the Council was the ultimate decision maker because it would make the funding decisions. Mayor Hoffman described the next phase as putting the street design on the map, drawing lines on people's properties, and getting public input. He estimated a cost of $100,000. Once Council City Council Special Meeting Minutes Page 3 of 8 November 30, 2009 approved that work, the next step was to construct it, assuming that the City could figure out how to get the money to construct it. He estimated a construction cost of $20 million. He raised a point mentioned previously by Mr. McIntyre: why go through this process if, at the end of the day, the City did not have any money to do it. Councilor Tierney observed that the emphasis in the presentation tonight has been on Boones Ferry Road. He asked what project or combination of projects would serve as the catalyst, as he did not think that the street alone could be the catalyst for the village plan. Councilor Jordan pointed out that the street was important right now because how much of its 100 -foot right-of-way the City vacated made a big difference to the property owners in terms of having more land for redeveloping their properties. She contended that if the Council did not adopt the suggested 80 -foot right-of-way, then no one would redevelop because no one would know where even the sidewalks would go. Mr. Egner clarified that it was a 50 -foot setback from the centerline on either side, as opposed to a City right-of-way. He indicated that the Plan would reduce that setback to 41 feet on either side, which would give property owners nine more feet of land area to work with along the street frontage. He mentioned that there were still some problems with turning movements at intersections. He indicated to Councilor Tierney that staff has heard from the business community that there was uncertainty and unwillingness to invest without knowing exactly what the street design would be. He confirmed to the Councilor that the City had to define the right-of-way, rather than actually build the street, in order to provide certainty to the property owners. Mayor Hoffman agreed that they needed to have a line on the ground because the property owner had to know where the sidewalk would be. Councilor Moncrieff held that another reason to do the road first was access. She argued that there was the needed residential density within one-quarter mile of the Lake Grove Center, but they needed to provide good access for both pedestrians and cars. She spoke of developing the maximum density in the zone in order to provide more residential density to support the businesses. Mr. Egner indicated to Councilor Hennagin that if a property owner wanted to redevelop his property right now, staff could give him a pretty good idea of where the line would be. Councilor Hennagin asked how, without a study by experts, the City could determine whether the density allowed under the current standards was sufficient to support the corridor, or whether the Council should allow more density down the side streets. Ms. Blackstone indicated that the Council would hear the answers to some of those questions at the January 12 meeting presentation of the Mary Bosch retail marketing analysis. Ms. Blackstone said that Ms. Bosch found that there was unmet demand for retail services within the trade areas of both Lake Grove and the Downtown. She indicated that the demand was there, even from the existing population, to support the existing retail establishments and to add strategic retail businesses. Councilor Hennagin wondered whether it would be primarily auto -driven, as opposed to pedestrian or bicycle. Ms. Blackstone indicated that Ms. Bosch did not look at the land use planning element. She clarified that Ms. Bosch focused on the Downtown, as opposed to Lake Grove. Mr. Egner mentioned that the staff did some retail analysis in 2002/2003 for their first planning effort, which also found that Lake Grove was underserved by retail. He commented that he was not certain what was keeping the retail from moving in, as there was demand for it. Mr. Galante explained that unless the neighborhood density doubled, the 500 to 1000 units that would likely be constructed would not change whether retail would locate on Boones Ferry Road or not. He mentioned that it was unlikely that developers would build to the maximum allowed density; typically developers built one-third to one-half of the maximum density throughout the city. City Council Special Meeting Minutes Page 4 of 8 November 30, 2009 He commented that walking would not be a factor because they were discussing only the Boones Ferry corridor, and not the neighborhood. Councilor Jordan mentioned the possibility of a County vehicle registration fee increase; the County would designate the money for road improvements and pass it back to the area in which it was collected. She commented that it would be a big enough pot of money to provide some good matching money. Mr. Egner indicated to Mayor Hoffman that he thought that they would use a combination of financing strategies to pay for these improvements, as opposed to relying on only one financing strategy. Councilor Jordan spoke to figuring out the cost to do the design handbook at the same time as the analysis. She mentioned that the developers have been asking for it. Councilor Tierney asked why the City should hire a consultant to tell the Council what the financing options were, when the plan already spelled out those options. He described it as fundamentally a political issue, as opposed to primarily a resource issue. Mr. Egner indicated to the Mayor that the work would involve costing out the projects in the plan and doing the type of analysis done for an urban renewal study to identify what the build out values might be. He mentioned discussing different options for generating revenue streams to pay for the projects. He commented that he thought that the political process was what projects the Council picked and prioritized, and how the Council matched up the revenue streams. Councilor Moncrieff concurred with Councilor Tierney that determining the funding mechanisms seemed like a political decision. She asked whether the City could use money from the street maintenance fee or the surface water management fee to fund any of these projects. Mayor Hoffman commented that he did not know whether the City could afford an urban renewal district on both the east and the west sides of town. He asked if the Council had to make a choice about an urban renewal district for Lake Grove, when did it make that choice. He wondered whether they needed to prioritize the financial analyses for Lake Grove and Foothills, or could they do them simultaneously. Councilor Moncrieff asked why they needed a consultant when staff has said that the projects were already prioritized with costs assigned. She wondered whether the Council could look at all the information during goal setting and figure it out. Mr. Egner explained that it was more complicated that in that he thought that they needed a strategic plan to implement the projects. He referenced p.43, which listed many projects as high priority. He said that he suggested a consultant because staff was stretched thin; if they did this work, then something else would not be done. Councilor Jordan spoke to first finishing the drawing the lines on the map and the handbook (as promised). She suggested revisiting this matter this time next year to figure out the financing options. She held that the Council has already set a priority in working with the Foothills property owners in 2010. She argued that it was premature to determine a financing strategy for Lake Grove, or even to prioritize and cost out the projects, because the City did not know precisely what was going to happen on the street. She pointed out that a cost estimate today could completely change in five years, and they would not be building in Lake Grove anyway until they found the funding. Mayor Hoffman commented that he thought it would be useful to have the financing information for comparison with the Foothills financing information with respect to how much the City would lose per year in the tax increment. He held that they needed to know what the assessed value of the corridor was, and the project costs to do everything, including the structured parking. Councilor Ti rn y reiterated his question of what catalysts the City would have ready, so that when the economy improved, the corridor developed according to the plan. He commented that City Council Special Meeting Minutes Page 5 of 8 November 30, 2009 the Boones Ferry corridor was a critical transportation link in the Metro area. He said that he would like to feel comfortable in doing the right thing in spending the City's limited dollars. He indicated that he thought there was the capacity for the City to be serious about Lake Grove and other parts of the community. Councilor Olson commented that one of the things that struck her the first time she read the plan was the heavy emphasis on pedestrian safety. She described it as a priority that took precedence over everything else in every decision. She observed that there were still pedestrian safety issues. She recalled talk about a pedestrian crossing demonstration project, which she felt they have lost sight of. She stated her opinion that three urban renewal districts would not be acceptable to either the Council or the citizenry. She agreed with Councilor Tierney that they spent a lot of money on consultants. She commented that she did not know that they needed to do that at this point, given that the financing strategies were listed in the report. She agreed that picking a financing strategy was a political decision. She agreed with Mayor Hoffman that they did need to put the lines on the map. She commented that most people in the room could figure out the assessed value of the corridor was not that complicated. Mr. Galante agreed that it was not a complicated process to look at the assessed value, plan for growth, look at the increment, and determine whether it complied with State law. He indicated that it was a question of whether the Finance Department had the time to do it. Mr. Galante indicated to Mayor Hoffman that there were different ways of identifying the projects in an urban renewal plan. He explained that often they first figured out the amount of money they would have available from the increment and then they figured out what they could build for that amount of money. Councilor Olson suggested goal setting as the proper place to continue this discussion. She recalled that Mr. Price had a sense that the Boones Ferry area was not ready yet to move forward, although he thought that the City should define the street and get the street improvements ready to go. Councilor Jordan pointed out that without the lines on the ground, no one would do anything. Councilor Hennagin agreed that the lack of those lines was a roadblock to private development. Councilor Olson agreed that they needed the lines and the design handbook in order for private developers to start spending money. Councilor Moncrieff asked if staff was looking for direction from Council tonight on how to proceed. Mr. Egner said that if the Council was not interested in the construction excise tax grant to fund a financing study, then staff would not write the letter of interest to Metro. He mentioned that just submitting the letter and getting the feedback from Metro had value. Mr. Egner indicated to Councilor Jordan that he did not think hiring a consultant would result in identifying more financing strategies than those listed in the document. He commented that people working in urban renewal in general might know of creative things that other communities have done, but there were not that many financing strategies out there. Mr. McIntyre concurred with Councilor Tierney that the report did identify most of the financial strategies available. He remarked that even if there were an unidentified federal program out there, it would be foolhardy to rely on it. He commented that part of the financial analysis needed to be how to combine these various strategies together to fund whatever the dollar amount would be, and how quickly. He explained that rebuilding the 2.5 -mile strip by next year was a completely different financial analysis than building it over the next 20 years. He argued that either staff or an outside consultant needed to set the parameters of that financial scheme before the Council made a financial decision about whether to move forward or not. He agreed with Mayor Hoffman that they would need the same analysis for Foothills. City Council Special Meeting Minutes Page 6 of 8 November 30, 2009 Mayor Hoffman observed that by doing these sophisticated economic analyses, the Council sent a message to the existing businesses and to the market that it was serious about this public/private partnership. Mr. McIntyre indicated to Councilor Olson that they could have the numbers ready for the January goal setting but not the economic analysis. Councilor Jordan commented that going through Metro for a grant was a positive step because it signaled to Metro that Lake Oswego was interested in doing something with its other town center. Mayor Hoffman mentioned that it was also keeping faith with the promise made to the people who started the project in 1999 and have worked hard on it since 2002/2003. Mr. Egner indicated to Councilor Olson that the next step was to send a letter of interest to Metro. Unless the Council said no, staff would submit the grant application in late January. He mentioned that this grant program was aimed at building public projects that would facilitate private investment, which meant catalyst type of projects. Mr. Egner indicated to Councilor Moncrieff that staff could provide at goal setting an estimate of the number of FTEs required to draw the lines and do the finance study. He mentioned that staff budgeted dollars in the long-range planning consultant budget this year to initiate the next phase of the Boones Ferry Road project. Councilor Moncrieff clarified to Mayor Hoffman that she wanted to know what kind of resources the City needed to do the work, whether that involved a consultant or staff. 3.2 Evaluation of Charter Officers Mayor Hoffman noted that the Council evaluations of the City Manager and the City Attorney were due in to either he or Ms. Phelan tomorrow. Ms. Phelan reviewed the timeline for the evaluations. She discussed several ideas for the Council members to keep in mind while writing their evaluations. She spoke of taking into account the entire review period of the last 12 months, and avoiding the 'halo and horns effect' of looking only at the last two to three months. She said that the evaluations were not the time for surprises, which were better dealt with through ongoing dialog. She emphasized the importance of specific feedback, whether it was positive or negative. She spoke of citing examples and reasons whenever possible. She mentioned setting the expectations moving forward. Mayor Hoffman reviewed the meeting procedures for the Charter Officer evaluations. COUNCIL QUESTIONS Councilor Tierney commented that the new evaluation form questions centered around expectations. He questioned whether the Council ever defined specifically what it wanted the Charter Officers to do. He asked how best to approach it. He pointed out that a '3' meant that the officer was doing everything well but not exceeding expectations regularly or all the time. Ms. Phelan suggested providing a lot of detail in the comments section. She observed that no process or form was perfect. Councilor Jordan recalled an incident from the first time that she did a superintendent's evaluation, and someone gave the superintendent a low mark in integrity. It greatly upset the superintendent that someone was questioning his integrity, yet no one was accusing him of lying or anything like that. She observed that people's interpretation of words could be difficult. She mentioned her concern that for the two past years, the Council has not provided the Charter Officers with specific direction regarding things that the Council members would like the officers to accomplish. She spoke to pinpointing specific desired accomplishments during this year's goal setting, which would give the Council something more concrete to evaluate. City Council Special Meeting Minutes Page 7 of 8 November 30, 2009 Mayor Hoffman commented that he liked the idea of having specific expectations in 2010 to serve as a benchmark for 2011. He mentioned having a philosophic discussion as one of the first items during goal setting of whether the Council agreed generally that the City needed to live within its means in 2010. Councilor Tierney indicated that he would like to hear from the City's Economic Development Office staff regarding this plan. He mentioned that he saw this as an implementation issue, as opposed to a planning issue. Mr. McIntyre noted that the City did not have an Economic Development Office when it did this plan, and therefore it fell to Long -Range Planning. He commented that he expected to shift this plan out of Planning and into Economic Development. Mayor Hoffman indicated to Councilor Olson that he chose the golf course for the goal setting meeting because he liked the food, it was an open location with room for the public, and it was a pretty environment. 4. EXECUTIVE SESSION Mayor Hoffman recessed the meeting at 6:45 p.m. under the authority of ORS 192.660 (2) (d) to conduct deliberations with persons designated to carry on labor negotiations. Mr. Powell reviewed the Executive Session parameters. 5. RETURN TO OPEN SESSION Mayor Hoffman reconvened the meeting at 7:07 p.m. 6 ADJOURNMENT Mayor Hoffman adjourned the meeting at 7:07 p.m. Respectfully submitted, TLO&�_ Robyn 6ristie City Recorder APPROVED BY THE CITY COUNCIL: ON -January 26. 201Q n _ Hoffman, City Council Special Meeting Minutes Page 8 of 8 November 30, 2009