Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the August 12th, 2025 Eugene Planning Commission meeting. I'd like to call this meeting to order. My name is Jason Leer and I'm the chair of the Eugene Planning Commission. To begin this evening, I'd like to call on Commissioner Isacson. I can't see if he's there from the virtual post here. Is Commissioner Isacson there? Um, it looks like we do not have Commissioner Isacson. Okay. Commissioner Edwards is our backup. Are you ready, Commissioner Edwards, on the land acknowledgement statement? I am. Okay. Please begin.

All right. Uh, since time and memorial, the Calulia people have been indigenous stewards to our region, building dynamic communities, maintaining balance with wildlife, and enacting sustainable land practices. This land acknowledgement is a way of resisting the eraser of indigenous histories and to honor native communities by inviting truth and reconciliation. Following treaties between 1851 and 1855, Helia people people were dispossessed of their indigenous homeland by the United States government and forcibly removed to the coastal coastal reservation in western Oregon. As we consider the impacts of colonization, we also acknowledge the strength and resiliency of displaced indigenous people. The city of Eugene is built within the traditional homelands known as Calapouia, iligy. Calipulia descendants are citizens of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ron community of Oregon and the Confederated Tribes of the Silit Indians of Oregon. They continue to make contributions in our communities here and across the lands. We express our respect for the inherent political sovereignty of all federally recognized tribal nations and indigenous people who live in the state of Oregon and across the nation. Therefore, the planning commission recognizes that what we do today will affect the many generations who will come to trust.

Thank you so much, Commissioner Edwards. And uh thank you to everyone joining us in this virtual meeting format today. Our meeting will begin with public comment followed by an informational work session on the urban growth strategies equity atlas. Anyone wishing to join the meeting online can do so by following the instructions listed on the agenda for this meeting. Planning commission meetings can also be viewed by watching the live stream available on our website or the broadcast on Comcast channel 21. For those who join the meeting via computer, device or phone, your microphone, webcam, and phone are automatically muted when you enter the meeting as an attendee. If you wish to participate during the public comment portion of the meeting and haven't already done so, please raise your virtual hand now to join the speaker's queue in one of two ways. For those viewing the meeting on a computer, laptop, or other device, click once on the blue hand icon. For those listening to the meeting on a phone, press star 9. Public comment is an opportunity for individuals to speak to the planning commission on any topics except for items scheduled for public hearing or public hearing items for which the record has already closed. As a reminder, your hand must be raised to be in the queue for public comment. Uh Crystal, do we have anyone?

We do. Yes. All right, take it away.

So, hi everyone. My name is Crystal Fischer. Uh the planning commission has allotted a maximum of 10 minutes for public comments this evening. To ensure that anyone wishing to speak has an opportunity to do so, each speaker will be limited to three minutes. I will announce whose turn it is to provide public comment as well as who is up next. When your name is announced for public comment, I'm going to enable you to allow to speak. Uh, which will allow you to unmute but not for video. Uh, please do not unmute until it's your turn to speak for public comment. I will let you know when you have 30 seconds remaining in your allotted time. Uh, when your public comment is concluded, your microphone will be muted. Please note though that the use of profanity is prohibited and any instances of profanity will result in immediate termination of speaking privileges. Uh, with these instructions out of the way, it looks like we have Eric Richardson up first for our public commentary tonight. Uh, followed by Greg Bryant. All right, Eric, I'm going to go ahead and let you uh unmute now.

Begins when you start speaking. Yes.

All right. Well, I'd just like to thank you all for uh holding this public meeting to discuss your equity atlas and all the work that has gone into that process. Um, I have lived in the city of Eugene uh since 1971 off and on since I was a child and I've raised five children here and so equity is very important to me and in this current curtain uh current situation we're in with our federal government really repudiating some of the equity work that has gone on in our nation for the last 75 years. Uh, I'd like to just be a part of moving this work forward because this is really uh for the good of the people, workingclass people, everyday people uh who really care about their neighbors. And so there are three things I'd like to bring up. I looked through the draft report and I I just like to uh emphasize uh three institutions that really do have to do with some historic efforts uh coming out of the African-American community and really uh led in part by Willie Mims and that is the establishment of the Lane Community College dental program uh was in response to the lack of dental care for African-American children uh in our community in Lane County and Eugene in the 50s and 60s. And so there was a push for that. And then the fact that the HUD office and the section 8 offices in Eugene because there was a push from the African-American community, Mattie Reynolds and others pushed for uh the moving of that office from Springfield to Eugene so that there would be ease of access to the African-American community because of the restrictions that were placed there by personal choice in Springfield. And so and then the last one uh excuse me uh was uh that uh the

human rights commission in the city of Eugene uh to look into the beginnings of that structure and why that start that was also in response to some of the work that was coming out of core in the 60s. So, I just think that the uh our community has had a long relationship with civil rights and I applaud all the work that our community and city continues to do and thank you very much for supporting equity uh in Oregon Lane County and in Eugene. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Eric. Greg, I'm gonna go ahead and promote you now if you allow allow you to unmute and your three minutes will begin when you start speaking.

Okay. Thank you very much. Uh I'm Greg Bryant and I'm on the board of the South University Neighborhood Association. Uh I moved to Eugene in 1973. I I I believe the commissioners here understand the relationship that that's putting it charitably between comprehensive plans and reality on the ground, especially regarding quality of life issues. Um, I have an immediately relevant example and I'd like to read from an op-ed that I published in Lookout Eugene last month. Uh, it's about heat shade and heat waves. Uh, uh, these heat waves remind us to keep Eugene livable. In a new video on urban heat islands, Vbecandis surveys Eugene surveys cities around the world, auditing quality of life, health, and safety in a heating climate. He surveyed Eugene. Like most US cities, Eugene is not taking the simplest steps towards keeping people happy, cool, and in touch with nature. The simplest step is to preserve the the city's trees and the city trees. At the moment, building permits have priority over city trees. Trees are killed whenever they slightly bother any construction project. Like most quality of life issues, trees are not considered at the start of a permit's application review, despite ordinances and a department that's trying to protect them. Consequently, architects and developers rarely think about them. After permit review, their death is rubber stamped and our city gets hotter. Instead, construction should be shaped around existing trees, making buildings and neighborhoods better. But don't we replace old trees with young trees? It's counterintuitive, but mature trees are better at carbon extraction. They need much more carbon than young trees to maintain their structure and accumulate carbon faster than small ones. And it takes decades for new trees to pro provide serious shade. So, preserv preserving old trees is an emergency. Shaded trees and sidewalks can be 50° Fahrenheit cooler

than treeless ones. A bonus, buildings are more beautiful, natural, and profoundly humane when they are adapted to good things in their environment like trees, nice buildings, good walking paths, and established gardens. So, how should it work? Let's say a developer wants to stuff a three-story rental forlex into an RO1 neighborhood, and this action would kill a mature city-owned tree. The developer should reduce building height and the number of units. This fits the neighborhood better, leaving gardens and a per and permeable surfaces with cooling, nature protecting, storm water filtering, and carbon sequestering effects. But that's not happening today. Thank you. I'll leave you with that thought.

Thank you so much for the comments, Crystal. Was there anyone else? Were those the two? Um, I believe that's uh everybody we have. Just give him one more minute in case anybody wants to or one more rather. Um yeah, looks like that's all we have right now.

Wonderful. Um as always, feel free to contact staff if there are comments you were not able to provide or wish to get to us in a different manner. I'll now close public comment. Um do any members of the commission want to respond to public comment? Doesn't look like we have any response at this time. And so moving on to our next agenda item, I'd like to turn it over to Terry Harding to begin the staff presentation. Following the staff presentation, the commission will have the opportunity to ask questions. Take it away, Terry. Thank you, Commissioner Lear. I'm going to let Leah have a moment to share her screen and we have presentation for you all this evening.

Great. Thanks, Leah. Um, welcome everyone. It's good to see you again here in person. Uh, tonight we're are presenting to you our project, the Equity Atlas. A project that we believe will help move the city towards more equitable planning. This project is an important step for the city in taking actions to redress past and current harms caused by government sponsored displacement, exclusionary land ownership policies, and housing injustice. I've been working for the city since 2006 and I went to planning school at the UO in the late 90s. For most of my planning career, uh, this history was absent. It was ignored by educators, city leaders, and planners. It wasn't until about 2019 or so that city planners started to acknowledge some of this history and our role in perpetuating inequity. Over the past six years or so, our team's focus has shifted towards creating a city where more people feel like they belong and where we try to include underrepresented voices in our work. This project continues that thread and we're committed to doing better in our planning from land use and housing outcomes to how we engage the community. Our hope is for city staff and the community to better understand a picture of Eugene's history that's not always been acknowledged. better understanding the systemic nature of past and current harms can help us try to address them. Uh our team has been out in the community a lot over the past decade and one thing that we continually hear is that the city needs to take action to increase equitable outcomes. Um not just write reports or um write plans, but we need to take action. And I'm hopeful that this project is one of many steps in that direction. So, sort of setting the stage. Um, so our agenda for tonight is we're going to discuss the equity atlas project goals, phases, and scope of work. And then

we'll walk through a specific thread of history uh thread through time that highlights impactful decisions from Eugene's history of displacement. We'll then talk about next steps and have time for questions and discussion. Um before we get into the presentation, I just want to highlight that this work would not have been possible without our research intern Abram Tapia who took a job as the city planner for the city of Rockaway Beach recently. So he's not here tonight.

His work on this project was immense. The picture on the slide is Abram presenting to the community advisory panel on the thread that we're going to share with you tonight. Yeah. So, with that, I'll kick it over to Leah. Okay. Thanks, Terry. Good evening, commissioners. Again, my name is Leah Roush. I'm a senior planner um on our long range team. Um I'm going to give a little bit of background and kind of our motivation um and goals for this project, as well as touch a little bit on how this research will inform some of our ongoing work through urban growth strategies, which we've talked to you about um through the last several several meetings of the plan vision. So creation of the equity atlas was originally motivated by a few things. Um so first as we've talked about in this group um the state has implemented a new framework for housing planning through the Oregon housing needs analysis. We have some new requirements to plan for more fair and equitable housing outcomes within that work. And one of the components of that is that we really have to ground our planning in a better understanding of past harms and discrimination in land use and housing access. We also need to connect that kind of historic understanding to our current fair housing issues um and kind of community context related to where housing is located, where people are located, and kind of the proximity to benefits and burdens across the community. The state also awarded us some grant funding to do this initial work. Um and that enabled us to take kind of a more comprehensive approach than I think we would have been able to otherwise. We also recognize that the city doesn't have a lot of information kind of readily available on some of this history um for staff to use or to reference and we hope that it can be helpful for some of our other city work as well. So the equity atlas and kind of that name in particular is inspired um from Charlotte, North Carolina's equity atlas which is a part of their comprehensive plan. Um so there's a

little snippet of that on the right here. um and that their equity atlas really helps to inform and prep provide direction for their comprehensive plan um which we are thinking about as well. So um with that background we kind of looked at what our goals were for the project. So um our first goal was to just better understand some of the policies and actions that created some of the systemic and long-lasting inequities in land use and housing in Eugene. To start this process, we've developed a timeline of historic actions related to housing and land use that have had inequitable impacts and shaped our current patterns in the community and our built environment. So, right now, this is kind of an extensive draft cat resource that really just cataloges the events in a rough timeline. We recognize that we've probably missed some things, some events or actions. Um, partly because many of them have been emitted from kind of uh available written resources. This document is really intended to inform staff of the long history of harms that have caused inequitable impa impacts um but doesn't necessarily highlight the strength and resilience of many of the communities who faced racism or oppression or displacement um over many years in Eugene. One of our next steps is then to dig into our kind of current patterns and current contexts. Um, part of the state rules are looking at patterns around integration and segregation as well as the distribution of benefits and burdens across the city. Another project goal is to really just have a single location for us to reference um and better understand this part of Eugene's history. And then our last goal is really to inform policies and actions through our upcoming work that are anti-displacement, anti-racist, and anti-discriminatory.

So just to look at it another way, some of the specific planning projects we see this work informing. So one is the uh comprehensive plan. Um so the equity atlas can support the plan's community context section which is part of the introduction to the plan. um as well as you know draft policies that you've already seen around community health, community engagement, compact development, housing and land use. Um this work also informs our climate friendly area selection. Um part of the designation process includes identifying actions to mitigate potential housing displacement. And as I mentioned, this historic context will also inform our state required housing planning work, including a fair housing issue area analysis, which will consider current issues in housing access, the specific focus on people of color, people with disabilities, tribal communities, and low-income folks. And it will also inform our housing production strategy as we identify actions that promote more fair and equitable housing outcomes, again, as required through the new state planning rules. So, with all that lovely background and context, I'm going to hand it over to Stuart to bring us um on one thread through time. Good evening, commissioners. Uh my name is Stuart Warren and I'm an associate planner on our long range planning team. Uh as Leah said, I get to talk to you about one thread that we pulled out of all this research. That research is mostly contained in this attachment A in your packet. Um if you look through it, you notice it's super long. And so we could have pulled a lot of different threads out of here, but this is one thread that we think really does a good job of connecting kind of past actions to kind of our current context. Um, and we acknowledge that um, it doesn't capture the entire story of discrimination in uh, land use, housing or displacement. Uh but we do think it provides an important insight into this history and it provides context to why different communities today in Eugene experience

housing and land use or access to land in different ways. And this thread is just one small snapshot of all that research I was talking about. Um before I jump into this history, I want to acknowledge that it's a pretty unsettling, often violent and oppressive story. And so I just want to flag that before we get into it. um it talks a lot about discrimination and racism, oppression, and theft of land. Um and so those are kind of unsettling for a lot of folks. So I just want to acknowledge that upfront. Um and just ask you to take care of yourselves through this. Um and lastly, before we get into it, want to point out the QR code on the screen and the the URL. Those will take you to our online story map version of the story where you can sip through it and spend some time looking through it if you'd like to. It's also something we're prepared to share with community at this point as well, which is kind of exciting. All right. So to start us off, since time immemorial, the Calipul Calipulia people have called this place home. They had a rich, diverse, and dynamic cultures um and really had a sacred connection to this land. Through generations of effort, including things like controlled burns and partnership in the ecosystem, they created ideal conditions for agriculture and hunting in the southern alignment valley. In the early times, they were decimated by early epidemics u that were introduced by European ships that landed on the coast um which were then followed by periods of violence, assimilation and removal from their homelands. This is the first example that we can find in research that talks about u restricting access to land for people in this area. Next slide. Starting around 1850, Congress began giving away giving away 640 acres of land to white male settlers mostly in the Oregon territory which included at that time Washington, Idaho, and Oregon. And donation land claims

were taking land from the Calipuli people before trees were made. So this was not their land to give in the first place. The Calpuya's sacred connection to the land created ideal conditions for early settlers uh for farming and grazing livestock which made this place attractive to many of them to move here. Eugene Skinner and Hillyard Shaw were some of the early settlers who moved here and they claimed land right here in Eugene and their names linger on today. Obviously Eugene was named after Eugene Skinner and then uh Hillyard Street was named after Hillyard shop. And the image on the right side of the screen is an early map of the donation land claims here in Eugene. And the highlights show both Eugene Skinner's uh claim as well as Hillier Shaw's claim. Thanks, please. And this is a a modern-day aerial image of downtown Eugene, which shows the approximate locations of Eugene Skinner and Hillier Shaw's land claims. And I just want to connect that um or this image to the ability of these families to generate generational wealth over time. And just think about how important it was for them to be able to have access to this land early on and what that must have uh created for them over time. Next, please. Our research also documents many examples of legal exclusion and dispossession. Um, here on this slide, we're going to talk about three different examples of how black, indigenous, Chinese, and other people of color were legally excluded from owning land, dispossessed of land, or excluded from citizenship. In 1857, people in Oregon who could vote, which were white men at the time, adopted the Oregon Constitution. And in 1859, Oregon officially became a state. That constitution included provisions that made slavery illegal, but also excluded black people from legal residence, owning property, making contracts, voting, or using our legal system.

These provisions were made illegal by the 14th and 15th amendments to the US Constitution about 10 years after they adopted, but they remained in the Oregon Constitution until 1927. In 1882, US Congress passed a series of Chinese Exclusion Acts which prohibited the entry of Chinese laborers and required existing Chinese residents to register or be deported. And marked a time of discrimination in housing, attending schools, entering many many professions, serving on juries, voting, and holding office. These acts were repealed in 1943. In 1887, the US Congress passed the DAW Act, which carved Indian reservations into 160 acre aotments which were given to the head of indigenous families. In order for them to become US citizens, they had to claim those lands. Unclaimed lands were deemed surplus and distributed to other white settlers. In 1901, 40% of Confederated tribes of the Grand Ron uh Indians were deemed surplus. And the image on the right is an advertisement um from the US Congress or sorry the Library of Congress advertising Indian lands for sale. Slide please. Legal legal exclusion and dispossession began to fade as mechanism for excluding people of color in Oregon in the early 1900s. But other avenues of exclusion were used. Which brings us to our next action that restricted who could legally own land in Eugene. In the early 1900s, racially restrictive covenants were used to restrict black, indigenous, and other people of color from owning or living in homes throughout Eugene. Racially restrictive covenants were attached to land deeds and were legally enforceable in a court at the time. In 1948, the Supreme Court decided that they were not legally enforceable, which didn't they actually didn't decide that they were illegal. They just said they

couldn't be legally enforced in a court. Um, but they could still be socially enforced. And we we found evidence that a lot of uh real estate boards actually did enforce them beyond this time. In 1968, fair housing laws made racial restrictive covenants illegal. And in 2018, we had our first streamline process in Oregon adopted where someone could remove these racial restrictive covenants from their land deeds. Um this is a deed uh from a house here in Eugene. It was uh created in 1942 and it contains a racial restrictive covenant which reads no member of any other than a Caucasian race shall use or occupy any building on any track or otherwise use any portion of the above described lands. Outside of the legal sphere of exclusion, there's evidence that exclusion was socially enforced. Laws were not necessarily written, but norms were enforced by local residents. For example, several cities in Oregon were considered sundown towns, including Eugene. Sundown towns were places where people of color were at a heightened sense of danger, harassment, violence, and arrest after sunset. These social norms were forced through advocacy for exclusion, discouraging or harassing people of color, organizing through hate groups like the KKK. Um, interestingly enough, Eugene was actually the state's KKK headquarters in 1937. These often violent acts drove people of color out of the city limits or prevented them from moving here at all. But our research shows that sundown towns, racially restrictive covenants, legal exclusion and dispossession all shape Eugene's demographics much like redlinining done in larger cities around the United States. And the image on the right is a a picture taken looking north down Lamp Street towards Skinnerb and it shows the KKK sign that was placed on top of

Skinner where now the University of Oregon insignia is. This just one example of how uh people like the KKK were uh intimidating people of color and immigrants in Eugene. Next, please. With all these barriers, people of color still move to the Eugene area. The across the bridge community was founded in 1942 outside of city limits uh in the current day Alton Baker Park. At the time at its peak it was around it was home to around 100 residents and the first black settlement in the area. Uh in the area during the time flooding was a regular occurrence so conditions were not great. Uh they didn't have running water or access to sewer services but they still had uh community amenities um including things like a church. Um, in 1949, Lane County demolished the community's homes to build the Ferry Street Bridge. Some residents received notice, others did not. Displaced residents relocated to three main areas around Eugene, including Amazon Creek uh, in West Eugene, Glennwood, and the Skinner View area, which will become important on the next slide. These sites were not in city limits at the time and were not a major improvement to the living conditions they had at the across the bridge community. But some of the um the sites they moved to actually were still prone to flooding, didn't have running water or access to sanitary services. Um and the picture on the right is uh we believe to be pictures of some of the across the bridge community members who had to walk over a mile to get access to clean water at the time. Slide please. As I mentioned, one of the relocation sites was near Skinner's View. Um, which brings us to another displacement event here in Eugene. In 1964, Lane County's housing authority uh built the first public housing project called Parkview Terrace. This housing unit is still built or still exists today and it's across the

street from the Campbell Community Center if you know where that is. Um, this displacement when they built it displaced 12 households, nine of whom were black. And our research suggests that some of those members or those households that were displaced were actually displaced from the across the bridge community as well. Seven of the nine black households found barriers to relocating um to other housing around Eugene. And so a committee formed that was led by the Congress for racial equity um that helped to relocate those people experiencing barriers. U and our research suggests that some of the barriers that folks were facing to relocation were actually racially restrictive covenants. even though at the time they were not legally enforceable, they were being socially enforced by um homeowners um not wanting to sell to black individuals and they were citing racial restrictive covenants as the cause. Next slide, please. The last topic in this thread are uh local land use plans. Tools like zoning and local land use plans replace other means of exclusion like racial cutments. These tools were used to preserve specific neighborhoods livability. Exclusionary zoning practices made it illegal to build certain types of housing in certain areas or too expensive to build certain types of housing like affordable housing in specific areas. In Eugene, some of these practices were institutionalized through zoning maps and development regulations and area spec specific plans like neighborhood plans and special area plans. A few examples of how these plans excluded low-income and people of color are preserving desirable areas for middle and upper class neighborhoods by only allowing single unit detached homes which were too expensive for lower income residents, requiring uh really restrictive review standards that increase the cost of building multi-unit housing, and regulating more affordable housing types like multi-unit homes to areas that are close to hazardous industrial areas or busy streets. Some of these policies have been superseded by changes like mental

housing, but many of them remain as adopted policy today. Many of these practices were n raceneutral on their face, but our research shows that they had the effect of economically and racially segregating cities across the United States. And with this thread, we see how policies from over the last 200 years have been used to exclude people and how they've evolved and how many of them linger today and impact how different communities experience access to land and attainable housing. And now I'll turn it back over to Leah.

Thanks, Stuart. So, as Stuart said, that's just one thread uh to pull. Um it covers just seven events spanning 200 years. Um but we knew we know know those events have profoundly shaped the Egene we know today um and continues to influence the lived experiences of people here. So while the policies and actions described here again don't tell the whole story, they continue to act um impact people's access to housing and interactions with our built environment. So we're excited to have a baseline, a starting point for this work. We also rec recognize we've got a long road ahead um to really dive deeper um expand on our research and really think about um what we do with all of this information. So we presented the draft story map um so that online tool that the QR code would lead you to to our community advisory panel supporting urban growth strategies as well as to the city's equity and community engagement network. Um we heard a few things you know that this work was generally supported in the community and at the city and appreciation that the city is working to better understand this history. We also heard that we need to include an element of storytelling um to ensure to also highlight the strength

sorry an element of what storytelling

to um highlight some of the strength and resilience of communities of color people with disabilities and other marginalized groups. We heard that this work needs to be flexible and evolving. Um the research needing to live um serve as kind of a living document, not something that um sits in city archives. Um and that it isn't just the city's history or the city um organization's history, but a history that needs to be archived, shared, and cared for by the community as a whole. Our adviserss also voiced a lot of excitement about what could come next, whether that's through further research, storytelling, or exploring more ways to share this information. So again, I showed you this already, but um this is really just a draft, a first draft of this work, first step in our work, and over the next two years, we'll be focusing on pulling pieces of this history into the comprehensive plan, into our housing planning work. Um, and as is required by the state, we're obligated to plan for housing that helps to mitigate um, our current fair housing issues as informed by some of this historic context. So, we wanted to give you some kind of initial examples of what those steps could look like um, as well as what we're already beginning to work on. So, Stuart mentioned, you know, middle housing is, I think, a great example of a concrete step to remove exclusionary housing policies citywide. Um, more recently, Stuart and others have been integrating this understanding into our draft comprehensive plan policies that you all have seen over the last few meetings. And, uh, for example, through the cent's concept, we're planning for more housing in amenity rich neighborhoods so that more people can have affordable access to opportunity. And then we've got a lot of work ahead to take other steps to red address past harms through our housing policies, plans, investments, and other actions that the city can take.

So with all that in mind, um we're really just starting by sharing some of these resources across the city organization with the community. Um in the longer term, we're planning to seek out additional funding to continue researching or finding what we have filling in the gaps um and collaborating doing that in collaboration with the community. Um, concurrently, I just wanted to mention another project um, which is managed by Annie Low, who manages our historic preservation program. She's been coordinating um, on the development of a historic context statement on the history of Eugene's black community. Um, the purpose of a historic context statement is really to identify the places and spaces that represent the resilience, surve perseverance, and self-determination of the black community. we have kind of a similar resource for the LGBTQ plus community in Eugene. So, in addition to the Equity Atlas work, we're taking some steps to secure additional grant funding for her preliminary work um specifically to co-design an engagement process to help to vet and verify um some of this historical record. So, with that, okay, thank you to Leah and Stewart. Um, this has been a really uh satisfying project to be working on and we're pretty excited to be putting it out into the world even though it's an an initial step. Um, it it's really exciting to start to talk about this with you all. Uh, so because we're so early in the process, we don't have a lot of specific questions for you. We would love to know what you're thinking, what your reactions are. If you have thoughts about ways we could share this or additional things we should think about, we'd love to hear it. But that's really it. You're going to hear this stuff more and in more detail as we

progress with the housing products that or the work products that um Leah and Stuart are are working on as next steps for urban growth strategies. So that's that's the presentation and Jason's gonna take the clue.

Oh yeah. Thank you for a great presentation. Really really interesting document. Probably one of the most um engaging documents that we've been presented. So really cool to see that history and have it so localized. I'm sure people will want to have some comments or reactions or maybe they will. So, if anybody would like to uh share any feelings or comments, this is probably a good time. I raised be kind of loose for it. Whose hand is raised over there? Is that Commissioner Edwards has her hand raised? There we go. Go ahead. Say something at the same time.

Um I So, thank you guys. I found this um all this incredibly interesting and I mean a lot of this is information we've sort of seen in pieces before but I was just was like you know kind of eye opening and I think we've have acknowledged that you know we need to kind of like kind of work to rightsize the way that we looked at things in the past my what struck me as I was was reading through it was what are what do we want to see in the form of outcomes Because as I was thinking about it and I was thinking, okay, we we like we fixed this, we changed this, whatever. What is it actually we're trying to see and how would we measure it? Right? Because as I'm thinking about how communities have been segregated and it's things like graduation rates among minority communities and things like that that I I I feel like we need to tie that somehow. But as that was what was missing to me or what I would like to be as you know someone working with policy in order to know what policies and how to change them we have to be thinking of what where we're trying to go

with it. So to me that was like the ma the big thing that was sort of missing from um I mean maybe that's kind of the point but that was the thing that struck me. It's like all right so what are we trying to create here? Yeah I can tackle it a little bit from the housing lens. Um

this is the first step in developing what's called our contextualized housing need which is basically like that 26,000 units that we know we need over the next 20 years. What do those units look and feel like? What types of housing are they? Where are they located? What are the characteristics of that housing? Um that analysis um will really guide our planning from the land supply side and the housing production side. What policies and investments and actions we can take. Um we can look at things like we need to plan for more accessible housing units. um we didn't get into it today, but um knowing the limited housing choice that people with disabilities have had and have today, um we know that's a kind of a fair housing issue. We know that's grounded in some history around um disability rights um and the ADA. Um so in our housing planning, putting forward policies, tools, actions we can take to increase the supply of accessible housing units. I think that's like one pretty tangible example for me. There will be others around um more housing in like amenity rich neighborhoods where you have great access to um transportation infrastructure and parks and schools and um all the things that make a complete community and making sure we can provide more housing in those areas. um access to um transit, housing with access to transit and other transportation options. Um those are all I think outcomes that we have some land use tools, we have some financial incentive tools, we have other policies and investments we can make. Um those are kind of what the outcomes are, I think. And um part of what the state housing

rules tell us to do is to make sure those are grounded in some of those like historic patterns, historic acts. Um but yeah, that's what's coming next. So there's going to be a lot around that. Awesome. Thanks, Leah. I think I'll just add on to that.

Just gonna add on a quick little bit to that. Um, as far as like other metrics we can use, our interns have been surveying lots of different comprehensive plans from around the United States, looking at what sort of like quality of life indicators they include in their community context section of their comprehensive plan. And these would be indicators or data that we can measure fairly easily and that shows uh an overall quality of life. This might be things like um in Charlotte Equity Atlas they looked at voter participation as a metric for people being engaged in like their planning processes. So that's a potential for us to look at. And I would be remiss without uh mentioning the growth monitoring program. Part of their thinking for like a third phase is doing like a quality of life indicator um phase where they're actually measuring more quantitative or qualitative data um for how people are enjoying living in Eugene sort of thing. So, we're trying to mesh all those pieces together right now.

Other comments to share? My turn. I don't think he can see me. Um, I can hear you. I have questions and comments. Um, when did this work begin? Um we probably started the research process just about a year ago now. Abram probably started doing some of the the research

one year. Okay. So um I want to acknowledge the gargantuan amount of work accomplished. It's extremely impressive and almost overwhelming. Um, Terry, you mentioned in 2019 the city began to shift to consider equity. I'm not exactly sure how you stated it, but I wonder what was present in 2019. What was there an ad? What brought about the beginning of a shift in the thinking? Mhm. And depending on your answer that leads into actually my

comments. Yeah, thank you for the question. I was reflecting personally on my time with the planning division. So I've worked here since 2006 and the context was extremely different in 2006. Um, and so I think the change has been gradual, but around 2019, state law, social events like resurgence of Black Lives Matter, uh, and social movements like that began to, um, influence the kinds of issues that we were researching. So, I think that's part of it for me. And then at the state law level, they were beginning to work on House Bill 2001 and the mental housing legislation and requiring in those administrative rules that we do outreach to specific affected communities. And so it's all kind of come from several different directions to influence the overall work.

Okay, that makes sense. Um what it appears to me is if you think about it over this long period of time we're seeking real truly to create an entire paradigm shift if you will or a cultural shift. And to do that it needs to be totally integrated into all aspects of our lives. Um, and it takes time. I don't know, it takes a generation or two. I'm not sure how long it takes. I I I can only draw on at the University of California when we sought to institutionalize sustainability throughout the entire system. We needed to have it literally written into every job description, presented to every group office, written up into applications and everything everywhere. And it took 10 years maybe. Took a while. the ka bringing it to the level of consciousness partly because there's so much assumption about it that's unconscious and I think some of that is probably still true here. I read something the other day from someone at the university who talked about how odd this thing was that she was reading because there's such a consciousness of inclusion and I thought where do you live if you think that that's the way it is everywhere. Um, so I don't know what this will take, but

I feel it will need to be much broader and much bigger and much more public. And we ought to have some kind of a I don't know, maybe you're part of a citywide team or something to um help to bring this forth. It's really important work.

Thank you. Um I I want to acknowledge that point you just made about the city organization and more um public exposure. Um Leah mentioned this that we recently presented this work to the city's equity and community engagement network. So that is an interdep departmental group um from all the departments around the city that meet um regularly to talk about equity and policy and community engagement and policy. Um, so that's an example of a group that we would like to share this work with and ask the question, how does this relate to your work in these other departments?

Because we have a pretty good idea of how it can relate to our housing products and things having to do with what we're working on. Um but it could have a lot of value in other departments and we've already heard that um from the work that parks is doing uh for the across the bridge memorial that will be placed um near the river to uh Mattie Reynolds Park design and process there. There are a lot of examples for how it shows in other ways. Great.

I really appreciate that. I had a a quick question um which is are these types of narratives or histories going to be written you know all across the state or is that something that's being done you know predominantly because of interest from the city is is this I saw it was coming from from state funds

yeah that's a great question commissioner um the state requires cities of 10,000 or more for the most part to go through um own a housing planning process um and this requirement of doing kind of an inventory of historic harms or actions of discrimination is a part of that planning. So over the next six years I guess as other cities um pick up their state required housing planning they will have to incorporate this at some level. um it's so new that I don't think we're necessar we haven't seen it from other cities really yet but yes um larger cities will need to do this work at some scale

um I think I saw your hand up Commissioner Yang and a warm welcome as well since I haven't had the opportunity to say thank you very much

I have a brief comment and a couple questions the comment is that I thought that was a tremendous amount of work and was a really humbling um lesson for me. Um, but beyond a historic lesson, I was wondering if we can highlight economic benefit of equity based policies in city planning that can be incorporated into our urban uh, planning strategies in the future. And I think that it's a if we can make a stronger economic or business case and that would be looking into the future a little bit that would bring people together. That's I I wonder if there's a way to

quantify or estimate those impacts uh in that way. Uh and then the other question the other question I was have is that since you're going to start sharing with community panels and do we have a good strategy to to do this external communication because you commented you know it's a violent history is I mean um how do we bring people together to reflect to engage uh instead of trigger more resentment

and so we're not just looking into past harm, you know, um dark history, but more looking towards what we can do to make it better.

Yeah, it's a great um question. I we are working on a communication strategy right now. Um and so we'll get, you know, advice and guidance from our city communications staff. um both for kind of internal communications, how we share this within the city as well as kind of with the broader community. Um and I think exactly what you bring up is something we heard from our community advisory panel is just really making sure that to balance kind of the light with the dark of this is a a dark history. It's a a painful one. Um but there was many acts of kind of resilience and um folks continuing to make community here um in spite of all of these challenges. So, I think that's something we want to do more of. We want to do more around um kind of vetting and um going through this history in in conversation with the community instead of just kind of as a research project, which is kind of what it's been up to this point. Um and we know that we uh are planners and not historians. So there is some level of like what resources do we need to do this well and to do it accurately and to do it um humbly. So I think we're look at this point looking what are the resources we need? Can we get more grant funding to do this? How do we do it in coordination with our historic preservation partners? Um but yeah, I think that's the direction that we hope to go.

I think something else we heard from our community advisory panel too was like the humanizing nature of what we need to do with this work. So part of that storytelling is like bringing real people into the conversation and and sharing their story out with community so they can see someone who they can recognize as a a member of their community who has gone through some of this stuff and and can talk about it in a way that makes them feel some sort of like humanistic um attachment to them. So I think that's part of if we do get this grant funding what we would like to start working towards at least. But I think the biggest thing is we recognize this is a gigantic effort, gigantic project and will likely continue to be for a while.

You can literally create an oral history with the storytelling, you know, to formalize an oral history. Yeah. And there's lots of other folks in the community that are doing that already. So also taking advantage of you know resources that the university has um the museums here have um other cultural groups um organizations have started to collect oral histories. So also um not duplicating effort. Other comments or questions? Commissioner Bas, I was just testing to see if you could see.

Not at all. Um well uh I thank you for this. Um I I have to say I guess when I went through it humbling is a good is a good way to characterize this. Um, I appreciate all all the work that you guys did on this and and uh I guess kind of putting that out there, putting it out in front of the community, giving the community some opportunity to understand uh some of this or a lot of this um I think uh at the end of the day is going to be pretty powerful. Um u a lot of us touched on some of this when we were doing metal housing and got started in it. some of these same things. Um I think we I also feel like at least personally I know some of us touched on it as we we're working on um beginning to do the land acknowledgement statement and our work with you guys and with with Genevie uh some of these issues. But to have it all kind of brought together uh the way that you did is uh it's really I think really end up being really valuable. Um, I'm uh we talk in all in all of the stuff that we've done in the last couple of years, we talked about centering the interests of people who've been disadvantaged, those peoples who have been disadvantaged through land use decisions and actions and so on. Um, which is really important for us to do. Um this feels like such a powerful kind of concrete step into uh that centering process. Um it Mr. Edwards mentioned outcomes. I was

thinking trying to think through outcomes today too and I I don't know um you know there's work to do to get there but this is a this is really an important step to allow us to kind of get to a position where we can talk about that in the community. Um I uh it it kind of opens the door I I was trying to think of words to apply. It feels pretty illuminating. it it kind of opens the door for the community to have uh certainly more understanding and more discussion about this. I suspect there's people in the community who are aware of it. I also suspect there's people like myself who maybe knew bits and pieces, but to be able to see all of this and understand it can be really powerful. Um and I so I think one of the when I think about outcomes I think I well I guess I I I kind of want to make one more linkage here. Um you you talk about you're engaged in looking now uh kind of internally and how to internally and externally communicate about this and what sort of strategies to employ and so on. Um, that's good. That's a good thing to do. Um, I went back today and pulled out the community engagement plan that we all put together last February for urban growth strategies. And um I don't want to I this shouldn't take the place of what you're doing right now to figure out how to communicate about this, but we've got a document that has a lot of work in it about how to talk about urban growth strategies and all the parts and pieces which this is a pretty prominent part of and um so I I

don't know it that in a way is kind of a living document or maybe ought to be a living document. So I don't know if there's any opportunity or any energy around going back and taking a look at that. There's kind of some places if you go through it where this this kind of thing I think could be brought this particular uh item could be brought out more prominently. Um the other the last piece I want to say along that line you talk you talk about in the material well there's the equity atlas. I'm always trying to understand what we're dealing with here. You got you have this thing called the equity act atlas which I believe is sort of this document we were given to read and and inserted in that or part of that or connected to it is this uh the story

and and you went through a bit of that tonight. um and talked about one of them being public facing guess kind of the the story board or whatever it is and the other one being used more internally and again I I guess I'm wanting to maybe suggest or maybe encourage that we I I think a lot of this should be I know you have particular meanings to public facing and how you want to employ all that stuff but um this feels like it ought to be a pretty pretty uh I want to say kind of a prominent part on on the web page for urban growth strategies and as you look as we look at this uh kind of the related work that it ought to be there and kind of available for people who are interested. So using it internally I I my own opinion is it shouldn't be tucked away somewhere and hard to find. It's very that's very good information. So those are a few thoughts I've got. Yeah, that's great feedback. And I think um there we have more work to do, I think, to get that document like ready for prime time. Um and we want to keep adding to it and we know we're going to give feedback and um continue to refine and vet and verify what's there. Um, I think something we've heard through the development of the Black Historic Context statement as well as this is there's only so much that the written record tells you. Um, and so actually like verifying that with um, people who have experienced it. And so thinking through kind of how that shows up in a longer written resource um, is something we're working on. So I hear you and I I agree with you. We want the resources to be available and out there and we want to make sure we're doing our due diligence, I think, is a

big part of that. Very good. It's very good work. Any other comments to share? Uh, Chair Lear, Commissioner Ramy here.

Thank you. I, you know, I'm listening to these other wise commissioners talk like, what do I have to add to that, you know? So overall it was through this is a brilliant document first of all both both the sort of internal um comprehension of it and the outside facing storyboard those are really really I just looked at the storyboard really engaging and really easy to understand and I think certainly in line with everything we've heard over the last four or five years where we've been doing fair housing training so it's not that long of a time but it I don't I don't from that tiny bit of insight I think we're missing anything. Nothing obvious jumps out at me. But I did I did um underline this phrase. We're going to help the city shape policies and actions to redress past and current harms. To redress past and current harms.

So I'm thinking earlier today like what is that? And even as I was Mr. Edwards is in not so many words was the same suggesting what do we do next and what can we do next and you had some pretty interesting examples which I thought were were sort of got me going and I think uh there might be an overlap with the urban form part of the work that has to do someone talked about livability someone talked about accessibility to activities and places where people want to be and how do we how do we maintain that or how do we expand that And when I think about urban form, what part of what I'm missing is a map that tells us that tells us where in the community we're healthy and where in the community we're not healthy. And this is simply another filter that we could apply to that. Where do we have people who have been historically disadvantaged? Are they overly settled in one area

or are they not? And can we overlay that map with where do we have really great neighborhoods that we know about? And the third component is where do we have areas to grow. So as we grow, we can redress past and current harms by thinking these two things together. Keeping neighborhoods that are active and vibrant that people want to live in and making sure everybody has a chance to live in those neighborhoods. And we can't do that really, I don't think, unless we know where we are

because we don't know where those neighborhoods are. uh you know we could intuitively know where they are but I think having that map that North Carolina map I don't know how they did that but I was like how did we do that and I realized oh no that's numbers so that kind of tool to me is so much more is so so informative you don't want to follow it blindly but it just gives you a sort of a broadbrush sense of oh this is what's happening these people who have been historically displaced and discriminated against are settling here. These people who have the great neighborhoods, they're here. So, how do we build something that goes forward that begins so that everybody's in a great neighborhood and everybody's where they want to be?

So, and this is just another filter for that. And I hope you can come up with some interesting tools to to get us there. Yeah. The good news is that's one of our next steps is a mapping element. Um so that contextualized housing need I mentioned um

really what we're still kind of scoping exactly what this looks like but really exactly as you're saying layering where people live where we have housing of different types um and what you're near like what benefits what burdens you are near near to um and trying to figure out how to analyze those complex layers together to inform our future planning of where we need more housing of certain types. Um where we want to increase housing density um places that have great access um and their proximity to housing of different types and people who live in that type of housing. Um so yeah, that's definitely one of our big next steps and figuring out exactly how we do it. I don't imagine it will be quite as like shiny um as what Charlotte, North Carolina, but we're going to do our best. We have some very talented GIS staff. So that will be something we'll be working on over the next year and you will certainly get to see it and weigh it.

Yeah. Is there a guarantee funding for next year or two or is it year by year because it's pretty much depending on funding, isn't it? We are in the process of applying for bianual funding from the state. Um so we're mostly funded by the city's general fund which is also on a bianual budget cycle. Um, but we are actively seeking grant money to supplement the work. And it's a pretty compelling case when there's a state requirement to do the work that we ask the state for the money to complete the work. So, we think we'll get some money, but we don't know how much yet.

All right. Well, I think everyone's had an opportunity to make a comment. I can't see any other hands there. They're really tiny from this vantage point. Uh, next on our agenda, um, is items from commission and staff. Are there any items or info to share from commissioners?

Nothing. Okay. And staff,

I can just mention your next meetings. Um on August 26th you have a virtual meeting for a hearing and action on the Kenny Loop zone change and then a next meeting in September on a plan amendment and I believe that will also be virtual. Those are next on on your plates and the slope room is under construction. So that's really exciting. Um, we've been waiting a long time for that and I was told this morning that it might be done or the target date for completion is October. Um, so hopefully our next major meeting on urban growth strategies is scheduled for the end of October and hopefully we'll be downstairs in the slope room for that.

Something forward to.

Yeah. And sorry, I just wanted to jump in. Um I saw Eric Richardson you had your comment up during the commissioner kind of comment period after the staff presentation. I just want to encourage you if you have any comments that you'd like um staff to know about. Please um contact the staff person in the agenda for today with any of your um comments as well. Uh and we'll make sure to you know address any questions you may have as well. But I just I saw your hand was raised and I didn't want you to think we had forgotten about you or we're ignoring you. Um just this was that that period was for the commissioner comments um and questions. So thank you. Thanks Crystal. Uh thanks Terry. Thanks everybody for preparing an amazing report and a great presentation. Uh thank you. This meeting of the planning commission is now adjourned. Hope everyone has a great rest of your week.

Thank you.