City Council - Special Meeting

Here. Thank you. On tonight's agenda, we will begin with an executive session. We will go into public session at approximately 6 p.m. with the first reading of an ordinance and then conclude with a work session on fiscal sustainability. We have an executive session pursuant of ORS 192.6620 to consider matters related to safety of a governing body and of public body staff and volunteers and the security of a public body facility and meeting space. Generally, members of news media may attend executive session. However, the news media must not report on information from the executive session. Eve

WE ARE ALREADY IN SESSION, SO WE ARE RETURNING FROM EXECUTIVE MEETING. WE WILL BEGIN WITH THE FIRST READING OF ORDINANCE NUMBER 4884LU32026-00094, SCHOLE HEIGHTS AND SCHOLE VALLEY HEIGHTS PUD MOD ZAM A32026-0081. On September 15th, 2026, during the regularly scheduled city council meeting, a public hearing will be held regarding an ordinance amending the zoning map for five parcels in the Shoals Heights and Shoals Valley Heights PUD LU32026-00094, Shoals Heights and Shoals Valley Heights PUD MODSCMA32026-0081. Okay, we are on to our work session for this evening, which is a work session regard

I THINK WE SHOULD DO A LITTLE BIT OF QUESTIONS BEFORE WE MOVE INTO THE NEXT ONE. THAT WAY I KNOW I COULD SEE THE COUNCIL FEVERISHLY WRITING. SO LET'S TRY TO PUT A, THIS COULD GO ON FOREVER. SO AT THIS JUNCTURE I'M ONLY GOING TO ALLOW IF YOU CHIME IN ONE ROUND OF QUESTIONS. YOU CAN'T COME BACK IN 11 TIMES BECAUSE WE NEED TO MOVE FORWARD TO THE NEXT ITEM, WHICH I KNOW IS UNCHARACTERISTIC, BUT I WANT TO GET US TO THE END TO BE ABLE TO ASK MORE QUESTIONS. I DO WANT TO ASK, I'LL START Tell me how you frame and came to this because I'm surprised at some of it in it And I'm surprised that I don't see

I guess I was looking at like was staff outside of the executive team consulted with this?

Council, any questions? Please tip your card if you have any. Councillor Husson.

For the record, I would view that as a question, not a comment.

Yeah, I would say, when I look at these council goals, they're not gonna change much, and rather than go through an exercise where we wordsmith what good governance means, I think we have lacked the ability to have that in-depth conversation, which is why I think the city manager is kind of recommending that we go that path, so just keep that in mind.

Thank you, Mayor. How much are we spending on consultants this year?

there was a whole bunch of stuff in there i'm drawing a blank off the top of my head here but very little of that was actually true consultant that is hired to do some service that is otherwise provided by the city because i think um i can't speak for it like that's pretty high on my list and not because it's not important work everything we do is important work but i want more of our important work done by our important people you've asked about this a number of times and i know there's reasons to do that and sometimes it's cost beneficial to do that but we also like like that's an important

I'll be paying very close attention to that too In my mind this represents to maybe two and a half percent So were there scenarios where we asked? the entire city to give us two to two and a half percent of cuts and what would that look like because I see I see I'll get where I'm going to just ask the uncomfortable question. This feels like purposely uncomfortable for us to make us make a decision. And I'm not saying that's the case. I'm just saying what it feels like. Like, oh, we're going to cut the things that are really visible to make it difficult to do versus something else. And that's l

that additional context I'll say my comments obviously but I would like to reiterate what a couple others like for our November retreat I think it makes so much sense for us to spend like I don't want to talk about our goals anymore I think we have to spend our November retreat talking exclusively about these and these cuts and getting this right because the reality is I don't think If we go out to levy, I don't think it would pass right now based on the thousands of doors we knocked in this for this May election. And I don't, I just worry about that. Like, I don't know that that's going to be

Councilor Titor, first to the gate. Oh, you were first. Were you first? Did Councilor Hartmeyer pray? She's hiding behind the computer. She's so skinny now I didn't even see her.

Spoken like a true marketing person. We'll be switching out the banner this year to put the dollar in. And I will tell you, because I think Jocelyn is sitting over there, we drive to Salem together probably 25 times a year and talk about this. Anytime you're welcome to drive down with us and I will tell you that this is a. Massive topic of conversations with local government and showed up in the governor's prosperity council recommendations. But the problem is the state legislature does not rely on property taxes they rely on income taxes there's no incentive for the state legislature. to take

I'm trying to sum up kind of where council's at to give closing remark feedback at the end. Can you help me understand what you mean by make the community whole? You'll support cuts if we make the community whole. Like, what do you mean by that?

That makes sense. Okay. Councilor President?

I'll start with questions. This is a revenue question. I know that new development is heavily a good thing in Oregon and in cities because of measure five and 50. We passed the Cooper Mountain Plan. I know that's not a budget question, but at the end of the day, we've got to get that developed. That's a revenue question for me. and don't answer tonight because i know you don't have the answer but like we like what is this strategy and what do we need to do because it's it's we've passed it a while ago and it's still sitting at the up there and we got to get that developed so not necessarily a

Actually, we cannot. It's voter approved.

Believe we can I believe it. I remember hearing that or can we get clarification?

Yeah, like I remember someone saying that at some point.

Let's get attorney feedback. I don't think the council has the ability to overturn a voter-approved levy, but can you do that tomorrow and get back to us? That feels like a top-of-the-question feedback of can the council, do we have the authority

to overturn bureau like are you are you saying i'm saying like the 150 million dollars we're not required to spend it like we can eliminate and and in the program today with obviously the existing bonds in place that's what i mean so maybe i'm not clarifying but we can stop that stop you know and and reset stop future debt yeah but but reset the tax ultimately right does that make sense

I don't think you're correct, but let's get the attorney's feedback.

The reason I ask questions is, to me, we've looked at this through a few different lenses. We haven't looked at massive shifts in the way we're operating. I don't support that. It would be a really big... LEAP FOR ANY OF US, SO DON'T TAKE ME AS SUPPORTING THAT, BUT I'M CURIOUS TO KNOW. THAT WAS MY LAST QUESTION. AS FAR AS COMMENTS, I WOULD LIKE TO SEE US MOVE INTERNAL AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. SO I KNOW I ASKED A QUESTION EARLIER ABOUT CONSULTANTS. I KNOW TO YOUR POINT, LIKE, IT'S NOT QUITE JUST, WE'RE NOT JUST BUYING OUTSIDE KNOWLEDGE OR OUTSIDE PROJECTS, BUT I THINK I know that there's expertise

Okay, I'm gonna go and then we'll have Councillor Kimme and then we'll, if there's second comments, then I'll wrap up where I think we are. I do know that we have enough council direction for the $750,000 in cuts, but I wanna hear from everybody tonight. I also hear that we have agreement on taking our council retreat to do more of this work. I agree with Councillor Husson about just getting Feedback from staff and pitches, but we do need some work on What these cuts would mean like this is this report? I know took an awful lot of time I see you in your office late at night when I'm back here

I appreciate that, Councillor Teeter. And I will say, I hear a lot of feedback from staff that you're doing these things, meeting with the judges, going on ride-alongs, doing the work and getting educated. So I appreciate your comments. And I also want to say, I see it. You called me last week about meeting with other elected officials and the questions you were asking. And I would just encourage the council to do the same thing. And my list here wasn't intended to be RETRIBUTION ON STAFF WORK, BUT I HAVE A VERY DIFFERENT VIEWPOINT AS SOMEBODY THAT'S IN THIS BUILDING FULL TIME, SOMEBODY THAT M

No, I was just going to actually thank Councillor Harden for helping me communicate better because if that's what you heard and I heard it in your voice and I believe you, you're my friend, that was not my intention was to call into question staff. In fact, it was quite the opposite, which is a deep appreciation for our staff and more, like I want more of their input. I want more, so like I was really bad at communicating that, so thank you for pointing that out and allowing me to clarify that. I just, like I think about it as a person who manages people myself, just because you're doing a cer

did not communicate that well so thank you for calling it and giving me the opportunity to clarify that thank you uh i would say in similar vein i asked counselor hassan to clarify what she was asking for it helps us all be better i think a lot of times where i myself included waiting to talk next and so i like DON'T NECESSARILY ABSORB WHAT EVERYONE ELSE IS AROUND ME IS SAYING, BECAUSE I'M TRYING NOT TO LOSE MY TALKING POINT. AND I WILL SAY THE OTHER, IT IS SIGNIFICANTLY HARDER TO HAVE GONE FROM FIVE TALKING OFFICIALS TO SEVEN. FOR ME, OR FOR ALL OF US, AS SOMEBODY THAT DID COUNSEL WITH FIVE F