City Council - Regular Meeting

Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat.

Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Good afternoon and welcome to the April 22nd, 2026 city council work session. Thank you for joining us in this hybrid meeting format. For work sessions like this one where there is no opportunity for public comment, those wishing to access the meeting can do so by watching the live stream available on our website, the broadcast on Comcast channel 21, or by calling in to one of the phone numbers listed for this meeting on the public webcast and meeting materials web page. Thank you again for joining us. I called the April 22nd, 2026 work session of the Eugene City Council to order. I will now turn to the city manager to introduce our first topic.

Uh, thank you, council president. Um, at the April 19th, 2023 work session, councilors expressed an interest in beginning neighborhood planning for the Bethl and University areas. On October 23rd, 2023, staff proposed the approach to neighborhood planning for both areas, considering updates to state laws and available resources. Today, the Office of Equity and Community Engagement staff will present the results of visioning and priorities exercises to those two areas. Staff will also present a proposal for citywide engagement about Highway 99 and updates to the implementation of the action plan for the River Road and Santa Clara neighborhoods.

Thanks, city manager. Good afternoon, councilors. I'm Fabio Andrari with the Office of Air Community Engagement. Hello. Good afternoon. I am Cindy Kohler. I am the neighborhood and community leaison.

Thanks for making space for this conversation, a whole 90 minutes. Uh we have an agenda with five items uh to present to you and they'll be glad to have a conversation at the end. So we are going to start presenting an overview of the approach to neighborhood planning that we have been using. Uh then we will present results from the visioning and priority uh processes that we conducted for Bethl and university areas. Uh we are also proposing uh community engagement effort around highway 99. Some updates on the implementation of the action plan for the river road and Santa Clara neighborhood planning process that happened a few years ago and then discussion and answering your questions. So to start, let's ground us on the approach to neighborhood planning. Uh the city has a long tradition of neighborhood plans. Uh those in the past were used as refinement plans to our existing uh land use plans. But some changes in the state law uh made it very difficult for us to continue with that kind of planning process. Uh most of the policies we have in place now, they apply citywide. Uh we also have some limitations in terms of resources that were available for this kind of neighborhood level planning. Uh in addition to the changes in state law, we have now uh plans that apply to the city of Eugene separate from our metropolitan region such as the envision Eugene and the 2035 uh transportation system plan. So the current approach is the one that we present to you on October 23rd, 2023. Uh it's an approach that starts with conversations with community members. So here we are using the Bethl area as an example. We convene a group of community members to help us uh draft a process that would result in us identifying what

is the vision that they have for the neighborhoods, what are the needs and priorities. Then we worked with staff across the organization to look into existing plan plans and also programs and projects to understand uh what is the connection between all the things that staff has already worked on or that staff are working on right now and the requests and the vision coming out of the community. So those plans uh were shared with community members to a series of uh planning uh workshops and Q&As. Uh we also collect data from the community that will inform uh updates to those plans or identify gaps that are not yet accounted for in our existing processes and the resulting neighborhood plan that we hope to present in uh we will start working on that soon after this work session would be uh an illustration of that conversation. We can help residents understand everything that is going to happen in their areas and city staff will understand the things that residents are asking for that we have not yet planned for or we have not included in our programs and projects or that we do not have funding to deliver. Um the planning process has involved multiple teams. So our office has been coordinating uh the conversation, scheduling, gathering of information and also coordinating with city staff. So I'm here with Cindy Ker. We also have Julian Aras who has help has been helping us throughout this process. Uh we had help from staff from all departments in the city. Here is a list of all the teams that helped us and also some other partners like residents, the neighborhood associations have been very engaged. uh the school districts uh nonprofits and businesses the University of Oregon in the case of the university area plan and also some other community

stakeholders that we identified throughout the process. Uh this overview of the planning stage they apply to both planning areas. Um we started with a pre-planning that uh consisted in us identifying residents and members of the neighborhood associations who'd like to advise staff in this planning process. Uh we draft community engagement plans for both areas and we made several announcements to let residents and the community at large know that this planning process was about to start. Then we organized a series of listening sessions between November 2024 and May of 2025. Uh the topics for those planning sessions uh were selected by residents. They were pretty much the same for both areas except that in Bethl economic development was the first priority and for the university they want to discuss campus activities and short-term rentals. All other topics were the same for both planning planning regions. Uh we will present more about those info sessions when we are describing what happened with uh each one of those planning processes. Uh then when once we had completed those info sessions and had a draft vision, we started the general outreach. uh we prepared mailers and copies of those have been included in the packet for today. So we have this uh beautiful uh mailers that were sent to every addresses in the region and that created more engagement mostly online to the engage page and that helped us refine uh the vision and priorities that we are presenting today. So what you see today is a list of the desires and the requests from the neighborhoods. So they have not been vetted by staff. Uh that information would come later on. So if

you see on the slide uh here we are on April 2026. The next stage is happening right now. So we have staff from all departments looking into the requests that came out of the communities and the staff are trying to understand what is feasible, what is already accounted for things that we have funding. So the next step would be coming up with an action plan that help us know uh what would be necessary for us to deliver on the vision and priorities identified by residents and the implementation timeline would vary based on the resources available in the capacity. So that would be probably a future update to council and the conversation with you today may help us understand what needs to be done. Uh with that let me start presenting some of the results for the Bethl uh plan. So the theme for that vision the draft vision was a thriving connected inclusive uh community. It was a vision for the Bethl area neighborhoods which includes uh the train uh neighborhood and also parts of the industrial corridor and the west Eugene. So you can see the full uh planning area on this map. uh the idea is that we would present an experience of planning with instead of planning for. So does the vision that we are presenting although summarized and packaged by staff we are representing what we heard from residents. Uh we had several of those uh listening sessions uh as illustrated here. I staff would present what is already in place uh and then we would open for questions from residents. We also offer opportunities after each meeting for residents to engage with staff in one-on-one conversations in the lobby. Uh that picture is from the Wame High School. Uh those conversations were super uh helpful for staff and for residents. And for the Bethl region in every one of

those planning meetings, we had to ask people to leave because we had a limitation time with the school and residents want to stay engaged. So staff were exchanging cards and people were asking questions that were answered outside of the meeting space because there was a lot of engagement and interest which reflects uh perhaps the needs of the community. They have been waiting for that planning this planning process for a long time. Uh in addition to those planning events and the online engagement we were present at community events. Here is a picture from the we are bath celebration. Uh that was the first time we presented a draft of the vision and priorities uh to residents and people comment on what we were displaying there and we collect information that helped us revise uh that vision before we mailed it to all residents in the planning region. So the a summary of the the visioning process at Bethl. Uh at those meetings we had a total of 230 residents engaging uh six community meetings. Uh planning was the first one to explain the new planning context and all uh the citywide planning process that would be impacted by and would inform what is happening at the Bethl uh visioning process. uh a very interesting conversation on economic development which was the number one priority for Bethl residents at the start of the planning process. Uh housing safety, transportation and sustainability were the other topics. We had online feedback collected to the engage page. We attended the we are bath celebration and that all resulted in 75 community identified priorities and those were the priorities that we mailed to every address in the region. Uh here is a small piece of that mailer and we

had over 13,000 uh addresses receiving that information that generated 2700 uh engagements through the engage portal. So we could see that sending those mailer mail mailers increased the number of people who actually opened the mailer, clicked on the QR code or the link and went to the website and browse through the materials and provide additional comments for the Bethl region. At the end of that process, we went down from 75 to 71 priorities. Some of them were combined and Cinder will now present uh the vision and priorities as they stand right now.

Excellent. Hello Um so the the following slides present a summary of the vision and priorities resulting from the community engagement process and the views and requests of community members that we collected developed into six strong themes. Um full documents are available. This is a summary. So the full documents are available on the engage Eugene page. It's engage.ugene.gov and excuse me. And again, the vision and priorities identified by community members have not been vetted by staff. This is truly what we heard from the community. Safety is a top priority for Bethl and Trainsong residents. From concerns about traffic speeds to the need for greater police presence, the community is calling for action to make streets, crosswalks, parks, and public spaces safer for everyone. The community is asking for a police substation, uh, traffic calming and increased enforcement, especially near the schools, and better lighting along paths and in parks. And like Fabio said, economic development uh was uh a really strong focus point for the Bethl area, but economic development is about more than supporting existing businesses and bringing in new businesses. It's about community vitality. The community wants to see underutilized and vacant spaces transformed into attractive hubs of activity, entrepreneurship, and community connection. And interconnectivity was also a major theme in the Bethl area vision. Residents want to be able to move safely and easily through their neighborhoods and beyond regardless of how they travel. This is a call for transport for a transportation system that supports equity and access and allows for transportation options that reduce car

dependence while also connecting people to resources and opportunities and affordable housing is a deeply felt issue in the area. Residents are advocating for a range of solutions to ensure that everyone can have a safe, affordable place to live. They would like to see incentives for ADUs and middle housing in the Bethl area. This is a community that believes housing is a human right, and they'd like to see more transitional housing and wraparound services for the unhoused along with affordable housing for seniors and low-income families. Residents believe that thoughtful planning can create inclusive and stable neighborhoods. The residents in the Bethl area are passionate about their environment. They want to protect and enhance the natural areas of their neighborhood while preparing for the impacts of climate change. They want more trees, better maintained parks, and multi-use paths. This is a community that sees livability as intertwined with sustainability where clean air, green spaces, and healthy waterways are essential to quality of life. And at the heart of the Bethl's of BETHL's vision is a desire for deeper connection and sense of belonging. Multicultural events, community emergency response team workshops and training, and developing neighborhood identity all support a strong community. Bethl area residents want to build a neighborhood where everyone feels seen, heard, and valued.

So that was a summary of what we heard from residents at the Bethl train and the neighboring areas. We are now going to present the same process that we applied for the university and they were very similar. So for the university area we were considering four uh neighborhood associations areas. So we have the west university, the south university neighborhood association, the fairmont neighbors and the Amazon neighbors. Uh so that's what's illustrated in this map and also the unshaded areas are the areas pertain to the University of Oregon. Uh the format was pretty much the same. The the meetings with residents for them to understand what is already in place or being planned for. Uh providing lots of information, answering questions at the end and having conversations with staff. Uh we we had the same number of meetings with just that slightly variation between economic development which people at the university area did not ask for at the beginning of the process. uh they wanted to focus more on campus activities and uh regulations of short-term rentals which they see as a problem to that is also impacting housing in the neighborhood. We also attended community events to ask questions, present uh the boundary area and talk to residents and try to engage more people with the process. For the university planning process, we had less engagement in person at those events. We had 132 people participating in the beginning of the process. Seven community meetings. We had the same uh a similar engage Eugene page to to share information and collect feedback. We attended uh community events and that resulted in a much smaller set of community priorities. We had 75 at that stationary process for Bethl and 34 for the university. Then we prepare a similar mailer that went to every resident in

the area over 10,000 addresses. Uh that created over 1,500 uh engagements with our our project page. And one thing that was different uh between the university and Bethl is that the online engagement was much higher. At the end of that second stage in the visioning process, we almost doubled the number of requests. We went from 31 to 61. In the battle, we reduced by four. So engagement online for the university area was more uh important for the results that we'll be presenting now.

Excellent. So just like before, this is the summary of the vision and priorities for the university area and it's information coming from the community uh not vetted by staff. um and through the process five themes in the UN University area um came from the process. So safe travel in and through the university area is important to the community. Uh residents want to move easily and safely through their neighborhood and beyond using many different modes of transportation more so even than the Bethl. There's a lot of different types of transportation in the university area. Um they want improvements to the infrastructure including visual cues for crosswalks, protected bicycle lanes and sidewalks repaired in the area. This is a call for a transportation system that supports equity, reduces car dependence, and safely connects people to destinations and opportunities in and out of the university area. Safety is also a top priority for the university area residents. The community has concerns about traffic speeds and pedestrian crossings and they want more education about and enforcement of the social host ordinance and they want more options for students who live off campus to recycle or better dispose of furniture and household items at the end of the school year. This community cares about light pollution and they have a need for thoughtful installation of lighting to improve visibility. Access to affordable housing is also a priority in the university area. Residents are advocating for a range of solutions to address short-term rentals and infill opportunities to ensure access to safe and affordable places to live with consideration for the architectural history of the area. This is also a community that believes

housing is a human right and that inclusive, safe, stable neighborhoods may be achieved through thoughtful planning. University residents value the natural areas of their neighborhoods and want to protect and enhance these areas. Planning for impacts of climate change is integral in develop in developing the a neighborhood plan. This is a community that sees livability and sustainability as mutual values where serenity, clean air, and green spaces are essential to quality of life. Much like the Bethl community, at the heart of the university area's vision is a desire for deeper connection and belonging. Residents want to build a neighborhood where everyone feels they can participate in public processes, be safe, be seen, heard, and valued. Okay, that was the summary for the the visioning process for the two areas. Uh we do want to present a proposal on engagement around Highway 99. Uh that was a very strong topic of conversations with Bethl residents. At every single meeting that we had with them, Highway 99 would come up. And if you browse through the materials, uh the visioning document for Bethl included two pages on Highway 99 with a title called Reimagining Highway 99 as a corridor of opportunity and care. uh that call for integrated action around highway 99 aligned well with uh the city's uh interest in in doing more work on that area. So the executive team has been discussing how to integrate efforts that would be more visible to residents and it also aligns with uh a corridor study that the public works department uh has funding for through a

grant to do a safety study of highway 99 and the river road uh uh river road as well. Uh so we decide to combine all these efforts into a city-wide community engagement to understand what is the vision and priorities for uh highway 99 that can guide city actions and our partners actions as well moving forward. So we are going to present a draft vision and this draft vision is coming out of uh information from Bethl and Trains song residents and they asked that we start an engagement process using that draft vision. So the entire city that also benefits and use Highway 99 can can engage with.

So these, as Fabio said, these comments and requests were largely collected from the Bethl area residents. The community would like to see pedestrian controlled pedestrian controlled crosswalks with lights and physical barriers to prevent improper crossing. They would like traffic calming measures to reduce speeds and an evaluation of key intersections like the four corners area. They want a safer place for people who walk, people who ride their bikes or use mobility devices. And these changes refle reflect a desire to reclaim the corridor as a space that prioritizes human life and dignity over speed and convenience. So this vision is more about buildings. It's about creating a corridor that reflects the values of the entire community. Affordability, accessibility, and attractiveness. New housing developments, including affordable options are desired along with creating an environment that makes the physical environment more welcoming, walkable, and economically vibrant. This corridor holds many essential services for our unhoused residents. The community is asking for a more balanced and coordinated approach to ensure safety and dignity for everyone. This is a call for collaborative strategies that provide compassionate community-based solutions that recognize the humanity of all residents, the unhoused and housed alike. That's it. Thank you. So in in in just a summary of what we are proposing, uh we want to take that craft vision from BO and train song residents and use that as the base for the the citywide engagement process. Uh we have been working with staff in multiple departments. on that we have identified some of the projects

and programs and planning process that could be uh brought under the umbrella called reimagining highway 99. So our office can coordinate uh that process with our partners across the departments. Um we want something that would be similar to the neighborhood planning process that we're using right now. Identify a vision and priorities and then staff can work on creating an action plan. Uh some of the related programs that we're exploring includes vision zero, urban forestry, safe routes to school, uh options for economic development including housing production incentives, uh the pilot peer navigation program, safety and law enforcement, and the concentration or the location of service for the unhoused community. Uh some related planning processes include Highway 99 corridor study, that's an 18 months process that is starting right now. uh sidewalking field, we have that as part of the transportation system plan update starting next year. Uh LTD's long range mobility plan is starting still in 2026. Uh urban growth strategy that is ongoing and the first and last mile safety study that is starting 2026. So this would be a conversation that can include multiple city departments and also partner agencies like LTD and the school districts. So our final item to present to you today is the implementation of the river road and Santa Clara action plan. So that was the last uh neighborhood plan that was done under uh the land use format and the conclusion of that project that planning process happened when the new estate laws were already in place. So parts of that planning process were separated into an action plan and that's what our team has been supporting the neighborhood associations with implementation of um the plan that was

approved called for annual update meetings. Uh but when we had conversations with residents from both uh associations, we decided that it was better to instead of having a generic uh once a year meeting in which city staff from all departments present what has been done, they wanted more in-depth conversations and they asked for focus area uh individual focus areas u meetings. So they selected transportation as the first topic area for which they wanted an updated on and that meeting happened on February 10th of this year. Uh we had staff from our transportation uh planning team from safe routes to school and also from Lane County. Uh the residents have been selecting the topics. They identify the priorities. So if you remember the river road and Santa Clara action plan is very complex. It has almost over 200 items. So residents have been telling us which ones uh of the which priorities from each one of the focus areas are the ones they want to talk first. So we get a list of priorities we share with staff and then staff comes back to the meetings and present updates on those to residents. Uh the next meeting is happening on April 29th at the North Eugene High School. Uh same process, same format. where working with our colleagues in parks and open space that is the topic for that meeting and they also have invited uh staff from Lane County and from partner agencies so everyone is invited to tune in and watch that meeting u and we'll be keeping this process of engaging with residents and let them guide what is more important for them to discuss first and our team we do not provide our opinion on any of those conversations we just facilitate the process we gather information we summarize why we here at the min and we

share with staff on in different departments uh we hope that this process with river road and Santa Clara can be replicated with university and bathl so we will have to discuss later how we are going to keep this cadence of uh implementation meetings on three large areas of our city so right now we work with more than half of the city uh population those three planning areas uh but it's a very rewarding process. Uh I do want to mention and that picture you see is from the first meeting with River Road in Santa Clara. Uh the level of engagement we are seeing with residents is amazing. People are volunteering their time, expertise, interest, motivation and the interactions with staff are being very positive. So I believe like everyone is having a good experience throughout this process. And with that, we welcome your questions and conversation on this.

Thank you. Thank you for that presentation. Um, I'll open it up for council discussion. We do have first and then council.

Councelor Kaden, can you hear us? I will go to councelor Krauss and then I I I I can counselor and um my hand is mistakenly up so um sorry apologies for that. Thank you.

Thank you council president and thank you very much for the presentation. Uh I want to thank and extend my appreciation to the community members that were involved in this process. That takes their time and a lot of them are working more than one job especially in the Bethl area. I understand that. But I also want to thank staff for getting out there and working. I know that community engagement isn't always easy. I've certainly been on my share of those and have sometimes seen that staff outnumbers the community participants two to one. So, it's it's gratifying to see that people took advantage of this. I also um found it quite telling but not surprising the difference between the Bethl area their concerns and the university concerns. University area concerns are more about quality of life. Bethl residents are concerned about life. And I think that that's striking and hits a chord with what's been going on out there. Um, a question is, uh, I I think there's some really good suggestions that were made here. Um, what are our next steps as a council and when will we be speaking with the various departments like planning, police that are going to be actualizing some of this? I presume.

Yeah, that is the step that we're working on right now. So we have what we present to you is a summary of what the community is asking for. So we have a a spreadsheet with every individual request and the staff from multiple departments are right now uh vetting those requests to understand is it something that is feasible? Uh how soon could that be done? Is it already planned for or is it part of an upcoming planning process that's going to start at the end of this year or next year? And then we identify some of the requests that are just completely new that we have no uh planned process to to approach it or that we don't have funding and and that information will be available to us as soon as we have the capacity to finish that analysis. So I would expect to have at least a draft of that in about 3 to four weeks from now. That's because staff has already staff from multiple departments have already gone through some of those spreadsheets for both areas and enter their information. So after this work session, we'll be compiling that material. So we may have more information 3 to four weeks from now.

That's pretty fast. I appreciate that. Something city manager that would certainly help me and I would guess at least some of my colleagues is once we kind of have a our arms around this some kind of a timeline so we can see and it doesn't have to be perfect. you know, it can be adjusted, but just so that we have kind of an idea of scope and magnitude and timing. That's really helpful to have when we're engaging our constituents because those questions come up and it'd be nice to at least have something we can hold up and say this is this is the plan as of now. You know, there may be some changes. I'm getting comments already about the the uh satellite emergency department and timelines and why does it take 10 years and it's like that's not the city. You know, there's financing, there's all kinds of things that have to go into it. But I think it's important that our community understands where they are in the process and why some of this takes time, but we're trying to get it right. We're trying to do right by them. And so, um, I I'm thrilled by this work and I look forward to to hearing more. Thank you.

Thank you, councelor Groves. I see councelor Zelinka.

Thank you, Council President. Um, thank you, Fabio and Cindy. Good presentation. Um, my comments might seem a little might come across as a bit harsh, but they reflect what I'm hearing in the university neighborhood, and they're not uh focused on Fabio and Cindy, rather on the planning department. The the lack or lack of engagement in the university neighborhoods was quite telling. I think it's because of two things. Um, and they're focused on on on planning. Um, one, it took way too long to get to this. This is over five years in the working. And their issues became stale. They were unres uh issues like traffic and parking and housing and objections to ADUs in HB201 that they think that their neighborhoods are being destroyed. The quality of life issues around parties, social ordinance, noise ordinance uh enforcement, all those issues have gone unresolved for a very long time. and the longtime residents basically just gave up uh working with the city. They didn't feel like they were getting anywhere. The the engagement was mostly new people, new residents to the neighborhoods. The second reason was they basically lost trust. Uh the city has lost trust in the neighborhoods. Uh they're not seeing their issues addressed and they're not recognized in the refinement plans and the enforcement of their environment plans. um and and the enforcement of their provisions. Um and in fact the the staff proposing without agreement in the neighborhoods um changes that are un that are very objectionable. A good example is the east campus plan we were just talking about the other night with the UFO proposed changes that are very objectionable. And so there um and then other good example is the east campus

refinement plan's not even listed in the AIS as a related policy u which is surprising. Um so their opinion is why should we participate with the city and and uh because it's not going to amount to anything. They're not heard and they're not listened to and so that that's where they're coming from. Bottom line, the city has a lot of work to do. Engage them and it's hard to plan in this context. You'll notice there's not a lot of stuff here on the on the plan because it's just very difficult to do. Um, one last thing. How much time do I have? 27 seconds. Councelor

on the Norris ordinance, which is a particular issue that's come up over and over again. It's a big problem in the neighborhood. The problem is our website sends out incorrect and unclear information to people. U the noise ordinance to be clear says that loud parties, live bands, all that kind of stuff is never acceptable. But when you look on our website, it doesn't say that. And in fact, it's uh and I've had this reiterated to me many times. U has refused to put this information in their packets to new students because our website is so unclear. We need to change that. Um, and that would help quite a bit. Thank you, councelor Zanka. Would you like a second round? No, I got it in there. Thanks.

Okay. Uh, thank you. I have councelor Clark. Thank you, uh, Council President. I appreciate the report. Thank you to Fabio and Cindy. I appreciate all the information. Um, I will look forward to the three or four week um, essentially to-do list. That's that's what I heard. Do I have that close to right? That's what you'd call it. A something like that. A list of things that are going to be um from the from the neighborhood recommendations that council considered. My

sorry council just to answer your question. Uh that would be our vetting of the request to understand what is already accounted for and which gaps exist. So the conversation on what can be done to close those gaps will take a little bit longer. So what we will have in three to four weeks is the initial vetting of all the community requests that came out out of these two planning processes. How much how much additional time if any would it take to add a financial impact analysis to anything that comes to council as as a as a as a as that vetted list. I think we'll need to consult with staff in other departments and get back to you with that information. I I don't know whether it would require a a council motion, but I would hope that as we move forward with these these plans for individual neighborhood areas that before we make any kind of promises, we're we're understanding the the constraints that we're in budgetarily in a way that's that's meaningful and and looking at a financial impact analysis of any such plan. So, thank you.

Thank you, Councelor Clark. Um, I will put myself in the queue. Um, I appreciate this presentation and all of the work. Um, I am the the neighborhood planning process with the River Road Santa Clara. Thank you for giving an update on that. Um, I think taking that directive from the state where we're moving away from those neighborhood specific refinement plans to more citywide planning. I think I'm just really appreciative that we were able to take what we've learned from the neighbor the River Road Santa Clara planning process because we kind of did that both the the refinement and then moving into that kind of action planning and seeing what was successful about that and it's very obvious that you've taken those successes and really applied them into the vessel and university planning processes. Um I'm really impressed with the engagement levels on that and um the that we've been able to adapt to those requirements and changes. Um and uh something that really impressed me, impressed upon me when we I met with some of the neighborhood folks at um at the office was um you know some of these action plan pieces are like you know have a mural on a wall um which is very implementable and you know not very costly and things to an entire change in the River Road corridor in terms of our trans you transportation planning. And so, yeah, how how do we kind of hone in a little bit on that? What is actionable? What what can we do? What is part of code? What do we need to enforce or implement? I think it feels really overwhelming when you look at this action plan. I think it does for everybody. And I I appreciate you're like, we're taking just the data right now. We're distilling distilling. How do you see that process moving forward? and

um and part of council Clark's question of how do we how do we put that into the budget and what kind of process do we go through with prioritization because now we have three um of these action plans that we're going to try to to implement and fund. Yeah, I will go back to the one of the initial slides when we presented uh the approach because I think that can help us understand how we will package the information at the end of this uh planning process before we go into action planning. So here uh we said that the resulting neighborhood plan would be a conversation between what the community wants and what the city is already planning for uh programs that exist and the gaps. So the final format for that will result from the work that we're doing right now. So we we keep thinking about what is the best way to present this data in a way that people can understand uh the document when they when they engage with that. and we'll try to make it as visual as possible. So for example, you mentioned the the mural. So if we are working with the neighborhood plan, that's something that can be accomplished through existing programs like our neighborhood matching grants. So our office manage that those funds and the process and we can have information that this can be done. It takes this many months and this is the process to apply. So that's something that is easy for us to to deliver on. Uh for the Bethl region for example, there's a request for an overpass on belt line. That is something that may take multiple years that the city has no identifying funding or way to build it right now, but the community is asking for that. So the request from the community is there and we have to figure out how to present the information about what can be done with a more complex request like an overpass on a on a highway.

Thank you. I appreciate that. Can I add a little bit to that?

Um, one of the things with this planning process that we were really clear about was um expectations. Uh, what folks could expect. Uh, we asked for them to give us their thoughts, their ideas, their vision, their values. And it was um anything and everything. And fully recognizing and explaining that we may not be able to meet all of your visions. We may not be able to meet all of your goals, but we want to hear what they are so we can identify those in different existing plans and maybe connect those dots. And where we can't connect those dots, let's find a way to make this happen or something comparable, something that will meet the need. It was we were um we approached this from a place of um managing expectations. It was um it was a a collaborative process and the community got it and it was it was a really excellent planning process.

Sorry, just one more addition to that. Uh when we mailed uh the initial uh visioning and priorities document, uh some of those requests were mentioned by just one person in the neighborhood. So we did not vet uh the requests by the number of people who are mentioning them. We included everything that we heard and we gave it to the community to react to. That's why we got we got different results at the end of this communitywide engagement process. One plan got shorter and the other one almost doubled in size. Uh and the final version that has been included uh in your pocket, it has more weight given to the focus areas that were more important to more people that participated in the process. And we still have limitations because the number of people who participate is still small compared to the total population of each planning area.

Thank you. I think what I often see is there's outputs and then there's outcomes, right? And we are going to have this whole list of outputs. And how do we ensure that even if we did all of the outputs that the outcome is kind of that change that the people in the neighborhood want to see. I think this is there's this there's a hard that is hard to to make that happen, right? I'm from the nonprofit world where that's kind of the the thing that we always have to say we're going to do, right? Um, but in terms of especially government, I think we're like, we did the things, we did the tasks, now you're happy, right? Like, well, not quite necessarily. Um, how do you see us attempting to meet the outcome, not just to plug in the tests?

Okay. Yeah. So, just a couple of quick questions. Um, so this list we're going to get back, is there it is there going to be any prioritizing or going through our triple bottom line lens or any of that or are you just kind of going to bring back it fits into this plan or it's falls into one of those gap areas

I'd say that is to be determined uh we were looking forward to this conversation to understand what is helpful uh right now we are just working understanding from the different departments what is it that can be done to satisfy each one of those requests based on existing capacity, funding, planning processes, planned work, uh what comes next. It depends on the requests we get from from uh you counselors and and also direction on what is possible from our leadership. So

Okay. So I would imagine an item would have all right this item falls into this plan that we already have or this priority. What about like linking it to like our strategic plan or so that would also happen already and part of this planned work? We we can make that a part of the process. Yeah, I don't want to put too much aside. That sounds like a lot of work. Um but that sounds really great. I think that would be um super helpful. Uh the other question I have, so this highway 99 corridor study, it's going to take 18 months and it says starting now. Does starting now mean now or does it mean like

Yeah. Yes, probably the planning uh transportation team in public works can provide more detailed information. Uh what we heard in a recent meeting is that they are they have selected a consulting team who will be working in that process. So it is something that is started right now. So it's in the works right now but I would defer to that department to provide more detailed information on on that specific project.

Okay, that's great. Uh I was glad. And so the last thing I'll just say is um I really appreciated these flyers that you sent out. I think we often struggle with how do we communicate with our community and going to them. We can't expect them to always come to a meeting or turn on their Zoom. That's just not realistic. So it looks like from my analysis that they worked, that they were effective and they got the job done. And so, and while I realize they take a lot of staff time to create and they cost money to mail out, um we are constantly trying to figure out how can we reach people. And um so I hope we will take advantage of these opportunities when we can to continue doing this good outreach so people can sit on their couch right in the comfort of their home and learn about their city and what's going on and right there have a way to engage. I mean, can't ask for more than that. So, thank you guys for doing that. Thank you, councelor. Councelor G for a second.

Thank you, Council President. Yeah, I do want to echo my appreciation for the flyers that you sent out. I mean, picture can speak a thousand words, and I think that that's that's important in helping to educate the public. And just I don't have any more questions at this point, but just a general statement as we move forward. I think it's going to be very important that we are actually showing some action. Um, one of the things I do hear consistently, people get tired of the talk. They want to see basically uh our elbows moving and us getting some things done. So, I think it's going to be important to try and find strategic points in the areas of study and start taking some action just so that they can see the progress. I know that's not going to fall on you guys, but you know, it's our our larger city organization. And one of the things I'd really like to see us do in the coming couple of years is work on our credibility and try to try to raise that. So people when we say something, we mean it and we do it. And I recognize there's all kinds of good intentions, but so oftentimes we have plans that just sit on the shelf and collect dust. That's why I think the timeline's also important. So we have something concrete. we can show the public and we can take out into our our neighborhood meetings and our constituencies and say this is the plan. This is what we're working on. And I know I hit that earlier, but I I I just want for the people listening to understand that that's that's important and that we see that. Thank you.

There any other comments from or questions from council? Okay, thank you all. Thank you for the presentation. That concludes our agenda today and I now close the April 22nd, 2026 city council work session. We are agenda