City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening.

Today is Wednesday, August 5th, and this is the regular city commission meeting. I am zooming in from a remote location, and I'd like to convene the meeting and do the roll call, please, Mr. Riley. I mean, excuse me, Mr. Lee.

Commissioner Smith.

Here.

Commissioner Marl. Here. Commissioner Wilson. Here. Commissioner Mitchell. Here. Mayor McGrath.

Present.

Mr. Wilson, would you please lead us in the flag salute?

Of course, we can't hear him, but that's okay. Thank you very much.

So tonight on our agenda, we don't have any ceremonies or proclamations, but I understand we do have some public comment. So for public comment, these are for items that are not on the agenda. And if you've given your slip to Mr. Lee, he will read off your name. Please come forward and give your name and city of residence. And you have three minutes. And thank you so much for attending.

It appears I was mistaken and we do not have any public comment for the evening. Okay. All right. Well, let's skip that then.

All right. Next on our agenda, we have presentations. We have the downtown Oregon City by annual update. And I'm assuming that the executive director is present.

And come on up.

Are my two friends in the audience?

Yes.

Good evening, Mayor and good evening, Commissioners. For the record, I'm Anne Griffin, Economic Development Staff for the City of Oregon City. My task tonight is simple. It's a pleasure to introduce the team that's here from the Downtown Oregon City Association to present their annual presentation to you. This report is part of their obligation that's spelled out in their MOU with the city, and they're gonna let us know all of what is going on. We have Juliana and Seth Henderson from the Board of Directors. Please take it away.

Hi, Juliana Allen and I reside in Happy Valley, Oregon, Executive Director of the Downtown Association. Do you have to say it too? Everybody has to say it. Okay. Can you guys hear me okay? Okay. So. Can hear you just fine.

Okay.

Okay, so this is our, as Anne mentioned, our bi-annual update, and I'm excited to be here. And also I want to start off by, Thanking everybody because this is, I am on my way out. I have been in school for the last three years and I finally finished. So I am leaving here very soon. So I'm thankful for the opportunity to have worked with you guys so much. And I wanted to give like a kind of an update as an overall, like where we started. when I started in this job, which Adam and Mike, Denise and Rocky were there. Scott, I don't think you were here yet. And where we are today and in pulling this presentation together, it was, like I know this organization has come a long ways since I started here three years ago, but like pulling the actual data and pulling the actual, like numbers and everything together really made me realize just how far this organization has come in the last three years. So I'm really excited to share with you all what I found. Okay. I apologize for the small print on the slideshow. Ryan told me it was gonna be like that and I said it was fine and turns out he was right. But this time I have a printed copy in front of me, so I'm not trying to read that. So three years of building momentum. When I started, we had seven active board members and active was probably a kind of a generous term. One active committee meeting, very limited business engagement, event focused organization. They were doing a lot of events, very, very event heavy and not a lot of other things that the main street organizations are supposed to be doing and very limited kind of confusing brand presence. And where we are today, we have 14 active board members, two new ex officios, And that is a solid statement. We have 14 very active board members and we are incredibly thankful to have all of them. We have four engaged committees that have active work plans and are actually doing things on their work plans. We have a strong business collaboration and advocacy. We are a mission driven organization and we have consistent branding with over 4,000 followers on Instagram. And when I started, we actually had to make new social media accounts because in not surprising news, we couldn't get into the old ones. So in just under four years, we're at 4,400 something on followers on Instagram. So I'm really proud of that. Like I don't wanna gloss over that, but I'm really proud of that and I'm really thankful for all the support from the board of directors and the business community. Okay, another thing that we have worked on is becoming a trusted community partner. So when I started, again, I mentioned earlier that the organization was pretty focused heavily on events and kind of like didn't really pay attention to the other pillars of Main Street, which are design, economic vitality, organization, and promotion, right? Promotion to the events. That's kind of the easy one to do and easy one to see that we do. um but being being a community partner sorry was something that was really important to me like we don't operate in silos we need to operate like as part of a team, right? Like, and so our relationship with you all at the city has meant a lot to me. You know, we partner a lot with Public Works, you know, with the contract with the elevator that we do and also the events like Public Works is such a great partner for us. Economic development, shout out to OCPD for being willing to meet with me once a month and any business owner as well. He is always game for meeting with us, which is incredibly appreciated. So the business community, that is another partnership that we worked on developing. Like I mentioned, when we first started, when I first started, excuse me, the relationship with the business owners was pretty not great. And I can speak from personal experience on that because I was a business owner on Main Street and I didn't like this organization. I was like, they don't do anything. It's a party, right? Like they're just doing events and there's no like, what's in it for me? It's honestly what I said as a business owner. And so when I started, it was really important for me for both Ryan and I, we started around the same time. So actually like go out and talk to the businesses and say, hey, like, what's up? How are you doing? What do you need? Like, what are the problems that you're dealing with? Like, and it's not that we always had a solution, but we were there consistently, like willing to listen. And if we could provide that resource, that information, like then we'd be willing to do that, right? Property owners, that's a new one for us. So that's fun. I have a new property owner sitting right next to me over there, actually, which is very exciting. The relationship with OCBA and the chamber also has grown a lot in the last few years. And also the community organizations, right? Like Father's Heart and Loved One, Brandy and I actually sit on one another's boards as ex-officios. So that... that partnership has been really, really helpful because obviously in downtown, there's a lot of issues with houseless humans and mental illness. Yeah, okay. Oh, watershed. If you don't know, which I think everybody does, because you better know by now, Tara's on our board of directors and she owns Watershed. She is responsible for creating this community hub. This slide is all about supporting downtown businesses. And when I think of a downtown business that is there for the community, is like this literal hub for businesses, for just people to meet, like it's Watershed. Our office is right next door to Watershed for better or worse on some days, but we jokingly call that our second office because we go over there and you know, I'll be gone, I'm just getting a cup of coffee and I'm gone for an hour. And I was like, well, I ran into this person, then I ran into this person and I ran into this person. what Tara and her husband have created is just a beautiful space, which is exactly the kind of business we want to see in downtown. So part of what supporting downtown businesses look like has been doing preliminary meetings with new businesses prior to opening. There have been several, several new businesses that have opened up. name anyone in particular, but there have been several businesses that we've met with prior to them opening. And I believe that that was, had a hand in them choosing to open up their business in the downtown area. And we do serve as that information hub. So if, you know, we don't always have the solution for people, but we can always listen and then connect to the proper resources or that's the goal, right? So connecting businesses with whatever resources they need, creating opportunities for promotion, Ryan over there, he does all the marketing and the promotion and the creative director and the promotion and the highlights of the business community, of the community that is downtown. I cannot speak highly enough of the brand presence, I guess, for lack of a better way to say that, that he's cultivated for downtown Oregon City. We also gather data through surveys and direct outreach. And of course, you probably all are familiar with our advocacy for three-hour parking. Thank you for that. Street tree protection, the event permit process, it's still working on, so thanks. Okay, next slide. So part of the Main Street organizations that are again, not always seen by the general public are the pillars called design. So that's like unification of the district investing in these long-term projects that are going to better the district, like yes, immediately, but also in the long term. So we have been able to do a project called well at trees, which you all should be probably are familiar with tree lights in excuse me, tree in the tree wells of the trees in downtown on main street. Thank you for the grant for that one as well. And a new one that we're doing is the way finding project that we just secured a grant through Metro, the enhancement grant as well. We have also provided several letters of support for district wide products. Often business owners will say, hey, I wanna do this thing. Can you give me a letter of support? Yes, absolutely. So that's another way we have continued to support the downtown. I forgot when I was gonna let you say something.

Yeah, I don't remember.

I'll figure it out. Okay, since we all love data, actually I don't love data, but everybody else loves data, so here we are. Summary data since 2023. So first city, I know we all haven't even talked about that yet. I will at the end of the presentation. But when this was our third year doing it, we have had an 18% increase in first city attendance from 2023 until now. And that is based on the elevator counts So it's not a perfect summary, but it's as close as we can get, right? So we have had very consistent increase in for city attendance since we began. Yes, like I mentioned, over 4,000 Instagram followers, 14 board members, four active committees, And I also wanna highlight this next part right here. So our record sponsorship support in 2026 this year, so far we've raised 34,000 in sponsorships, which is, I mean, just look at the other numbers. So last year it was 21,000. the year before that was 16,000 here to date. So I think that really speaks for itself and speaks for the board, right? Having 14 active board members that are really engaged and like, hey, I know this person that owns this business has been just so helpful to the financial health of the organization. This was actually kind of fun, calculating how many new businesses opened. So we had 23 new businesses open since 2023. And then I knew the follow-up question would be, well, how many closed, right? Because that's what people say. We've had nine close only. So that's pretty solid net there. We've secured grant funding and we have literally had thousands of volunteer hours. And I know that because we have to track it for our Main Street accreditation. Okay, so lessons learned. What have I learned? What have we learned in these last three years? Yeah, the biggest thing that I've learned is that thriving downtowns are not built on events alone. They are built on all these different things that I'm going to talk about. The biggest one is relationships, consistent communication, and strong partnerships. when Ryan and I will go talk to business owners or, you know, if our door's open, they'll come in. And again, there's not always something we can do, right? The problems that they're having, like that we all understand the economic, uncertain economic times that we're in. And so there's not often a solution, right? There's not often a, hey, just do this and this. Yes, we can have ideas. Yes, we can bounce them off of one another. But at the end of the day, like when people just feel heard, that is... It goes a long ways. And so even though we haven't had like, okay, this is how you can increase your business and whatever, X, Y, and Z, we can at least be there with an open door and say, yeah, that's really hard. I'm really sorry, that sucks. And maybe offer one or two like small tweaks, right? So I'm a big believer that a strong organization, business is built on relationships and not just that consistent communication, building strong partnerships, collaborating, we all know how important that is, long-term investment and a shared vision. So I have Seth Henderson sitting up here with me. And as we were going through this presentation, there was a slide in it that I was like, yes, that's where I want you to talk about why you're here basically, like why you chose to do an investment in the downtown. And now I can't remember what slide it was. So I'm gonna say it was this slide. So I'm gonna just toss it right over to Seth for a minute.

Great. Seth Henderson, Vice President of Downtown Oregon City Association. All my information is on file. I know this will come as a complete shock to you, but when Juliana wanted somebody to talk about development and investment in downtown, she thought that potentially I would be a good individual to cover that. Bruce, Comics Adventure, have you guys all been to his store? Yep, everybody's nodding. Set Brand had the ability to pick where he wanted to relocate his business and he chose downtown Oregon City. Do you know who he talked to about that? Tara. Tara, Watershed Cafe, opens a cafe on Main Street in Oregon City. Do you know who she talked to about that? I have no idea. I want to hire them for sales. Kayla, on our board, opening a Pilates studio. So I hope you realize that DOCA is actually, to some degree, acting as an incubator for downtown, an extension of the city's economic development working with Ann. So it's a lot more than just an organization that puts on events. Do you know why the county received any proposals on the courthouse property? That would be because of DOCA. Mike knows, but it was actually DOCA that set up conversations with the developer that did the city of Milwaukee's city hall to see if there was a way to keep the courthouse and renovate it. And again, it was DOCA that was looking to facilitate those discussions. There is a $30 million investment in downtown, and that is directly due to conversations with the local downtown small businesses about what they wanted. And that was facilitated by TOCA. Recruitment for the great grants that the city has established for rehabilitation of the buildings downtown, that is Anne working with DOCA. So again, just the upshot of this, I hope you realize what DOCA has become over the last three years and the trajectory that we're on. And I hope you believe that your funds that you've committed to the organization are being well spent and go much further than just putting on three events a year. Appreciate your time.

Thank you, Seth. Juliana, do you have a wrap up on the, uh, for city for this year? Well, look what the next slide is Denise.

That was probably where I was gonna ask you to talk then that makes perfect sense. Thank you Seth, by the way. Okay, so first city celebration in summary, I might already mentioned this year that we have seen an 18% increase since 2023 per the elevator counts. I believe it was up 11% since last year. Also, this year, we had two dedicated performance stages. One was the music, the music stage in Liberty Plaza, which we were very thankful to be able to use. That was great. And then we also set up a cultural stage over on 8th Street as well. And so the sponsorship revenue increased. Again, massive thank you to our board of directors. There was a meeting I had to have a little come to Jesus moment with them back in, I don't know, March, April or so saying, hey guys, we are way down on sponsorships. And you know what happened is the board came together and really pulled that through. So that was really great to see. and overwhelmingly positive community feedback. It's only a half joke when I say the measure of a successful event or the measure of the event is like how many people complained? How many people yelled at me? I like two. So I'm gonna say that's pretty good. Overwhelmingly positive feedback from not only the community, but the businesses that participated as well. Oops, okay. Challenges ahead. So we all are aware of the overall economic uncertainty of the times that we are living in. And, you know, that's a challenge that everybody's facing, right? Like that's not exclusive to the Downtown Association. That's not exclusive to businesses. like all of us are in these weird like economic times where we're, it's just something that we, it's uncertain. We don't really know what's gonna happen. So that is definitely a challenge that I foresee this organization having to overcome in the next three years, which hoping to pass that on to somebody that's willing to, and like confident that they can take on these challenges to the best of their ability. Rising event costs, that is true. Last year for city cost, just under $60,000 to put on. This year we were able to trim it by 10, 10,000. So it was 50,000, but it was, you know, it's a massive cost to put on these events. We also have seen a lack of engagement and funding for nonprofits just across the board. It's a challenge to raise funds for nonprofits. Again, this is not exclusive just to the downtown association, but it's really kind of across the board. It's difficult to fundraise right now. I'm guessing probably because of how uncertain many people are with their finances at this moment. So the current MOU no longer reflects the true cost of delivering for city trick or treat and tree lighting. And because this is an important piece to talk about, I'm gonna very high level highlight the finances because that is part of our agreement with our MOU. So our current operating budget in 2026, excluding the elevator and bathroom contract, because part of our thing is like no, without city funds, right? So I just took that chunk, excluded it from our current budget. So our current budget is about 228, $228,000. So the current MOU is 60. And I know we received that $12,000 for city event grants. So that's a total of $72,000 contributed from the city to our annual budget, which equates to 32% of our annual budget targeting the MOU is 50%. That's where we stand on that. So I wanna close with like similar to the challenges that the city has with the budget management, where expense inflation is outpacing revenue growth, DOCA is continuing to try to do more with less. Eventually this will impact the quality of events or what events can be produced. And there's my face. So I wrote a little thing. I said, thank you. It's been an incredible privilege to serve downtown Oregon City for the past three years. With your support, I believe DOCA has built a stronger organization and become a more valuable resource for the community. I sincerely appreciate the support of the commission and the city staff in building a partnership that will serve downtown's future for years to come. So thank you.

I'm happy to answer any questions as well. Gentlemen, do you have any questions? or comments?

Just go right ahead. Thank you. No questions, but I just truly want to thank you for all the service you provided our downtown businesses community at large. Really, really appreciate everything that you've given over these last few years. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate that.

Well, first of all, congratulations on another successful First City Celebration. I appreciated that you highlighted the cultural stage and because I spent a bit of time down there after I was done volunteering at the DOCA booth and it just struck me how The Oregon City that I grew up in, that was not something that I could have expected to be able to see in my hometown. And that meant a lot to me. And I keep trying to emphasize to people that the way that we're going to be an inclusive community isn't going to be by having five people in a room at City Hall discussing things that are never gonna see the light of day for our residents. It's going to be by being out there in the community and showing what our values are. So I really, really appreciate that. by every measure since I've started on the commission, whether it's for a city celebration, whether it's the social media and the marketing presence, whether it's just the engagement with city staff and commission, it is improved. So I am very grateful for your work and your leadership. And I've been so impressed, especially to have someone who has been a Main Street business owner to bring that perspective to this organization, which was desperately needed. And so you leave this organization on a firm foundation and all I can say is well done. I appreciate that, thank you. Michael?

Yeah, it's night and day difference. I have to admit, I was a part of that seven person board that really probably wasn't doing much. And I'll take part of the blame for that. I was there and it was a struggle. But it's a night and day difference. I mean, you've filled your office space with board members now. It's wonderful. And as I said, it's just a night and day difference. And the cooperation and collaboration that you've managed to build up with the other two business-related organizations in town and with Ann is wonderful. is gonna serve whoever replaces you very well, whoever fills the position. I don't think you can be replaced. Boy, that's trite, isn't it? I'm sorry. It's an old cliche, but you are gonna be very tough to replace. You've done tremendous work and thank you very much.

Appreciate that. Rocky?

i'll just say that i also um went down to first city festival i intended to go down for a short time and ended up being down there most of the afternoon so um i thought it was a great event and uh echo what uh the rest of the commission has said yeah i will also concur i was on the

serving on the transition. And I think when the board recommended that we hire Juliana, one of the things that I was very pleased about is that she already had a relationship of being a downtown business owner, and that's made a lot of difference. I think the other thing that has made a difference is that she had a good partner and a good staff person in ryan brinkley and the two of them played on each other's strengths and that was really really helpful and uh he has been um julian on his right hand person i won't say right hand man even though he is a man he's the right hand guy and he's the right guy for the job the other thing that i will add to uh Seth's comment is that I've been aware for the last five years that one of our citizens, Tory Blackwell, has been trying to talk comic adventure into coming downtown. So he may have talked terror, but I can tell you that Tory put the hard sell on him about coming to downtown Oregon City, and I'm very glad that he did. I just opened my comic book box there, so I'll be there on a regular basis. But thank you, Juliana. Thank you, Seth. And thank you. I can't see who's in the audience, but I'm sure Ryan is in the audience and some of the DOCA board members. But thank you to everybody for their participation. And I'll look forward to seeing you at our next board meeting. And thank you to Anne for coming up and doing the introduction. We appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thank you.

And I'm sorry that we're missing my two little friends. So they didn't come today, I see.

The two Allen boys. So Dana, Dana Webb, our public works director, do you want to come on up with the chair of the, I'm not sure who's doing the presentation for the advisory committee transportation, but come on up please.

She's got her laptop.

There he is.

Good evening, Mayor and Commissioners, Dana Webb, Public Works Director. I am gonna hand it over to Tim Morgan, the Vice Chair of the Transportation Advisory Committee for their annual report.

Good evening. My name is Timothy Morgan. I've served on the board since January of 21. And I assume you've all received a copy of this. I don't know if you want me to do the CliffsNotes version of it or the fully read version.

The Cliff Notes version will be great. We did get it in advance and thank you for that.

All right. So basically the board consists of eight board members discussing various transportation issues within the city with a lot of coordination with a lot of other government agencies, including ODOT and every other person that has to do with traffic. One of the things that we did in 25 is we changed the meetings schedule from every month to bi-monthly. So it would be on the second Thursday of the months of January, March, May, July, September, and November. We increased the time for the amount to make up for the one month that we're missing in between. And it seems to be a better effective use of the city's time and public works so that they're not having to prepare all the reports for us so that way we can kind of consolidate it and every other month so far that's worked out quite well and it's helped on the tenants and if there is something that's special that needs to be taken care of they will communicate to the board members and we'll you know we have it marked on our calendars as not being presented, but open. So we've had on occasion where we've had to fill in because something came up and to meet that request. So it's better use of everybody's time. Let's see here. Annual pavement maintenance report, public works director Dana Webb presented the 24, excuse me, 2024 pavement maintenance report. pavement maintenance report, noting nearly 130,000 in-house asphalt repairs continue to use contracted slurry seal services and plans for grinding and overlay paving on the Malala Avenue in the late 2026, following the ADA ramp upgrades throughout the city. The committee's best practices guidelines rules were set. We had a visit from the city recorder, Jacob Wiley, presenting us on the overview of the committee's best practices, governing documents, member responsibilities, public meeting requirements, and emphasizing the transparency and proper record keeping. This also involved the advisory role of the committee and the key procedures related to voting of the conflicts of interest. and meeting the management. So we've been refreshed each year on that to keep us in line. I won't go on to this subject, but 205 Abernathy Bridge project, I'm sure you're fully aware of all that. And we have been participating in that. We've had some visitations from ODOT. um and project leaders on the project to try to coordinate the city's efforts um you know related to that so um i don't think anything i can tell you would be anything new that you don't know about um okay um Other things, we looked on the local street standards. Dana presented information on street standards noting the community concerns about traffic impacts from recent land use projects. She has also reported on the city's evaluating vehicle volume thresholds, collecting data on 20 representative streets to inform the proposal for the city commission. The committee also includes raising neighborhood traffic from new development to potential needs for future and traffic calming measures. That helps us eliminate unnecessary expenses to see if it's really worth putting the money into it with the temporary traffic calming device that we can install and then remove as it is, or if there's public works projects, it's diverting traffic to city streets that are in neighborhoods that start causing a lot of phone calls. We've done the signage of the Trillium Park HOA. There was another project in there, the three-way stop sign at Gaffney Lane and Berta Drive. This is where we get public comments about traffic diversions and bring to our attention to look on what remedies are available to create a safer environment in those areas. Other updates are, throughout the year would include the Claskamas County evacuation plan. That's something that we've been discussing a lot over the years since the day we had the fire issue, how we can better map a plan of evacuation. I personally have never seen so many horse trailers in my entire life and until that fire, didn't realize we had such a large population of livestock just outside the city limits all transiting through. So that's something that needs to be continued on. I know it's been discussed on some of the meetings I've attended. The other is Clackamas County Transportation System, the Holcomb Project and Safe Routes to Schools Initiative. We also dealt with the 20 is plenty program, which is the speed limit. And that's been kind of tabled for a while. ODOT budgets and legislative developments and the 2025 traffic count program that Public Works puts together to see the traffic volumes and to various areas for better future planning. Let's see, we got the neighborhood traffic facts as neighborhood traffic facts sheet was reviewed and updated by the transportation advisory council, excuse me, committee and coordinating with public works. We reviewed the revisions of the 2024 which one of them was the 20 is plenty. And the other things we went back to was on the 2024, 2025 TAC goals in alignment with the city commission's priorities. That's pretty much a summary and cliff notes of what we did in the last 12 months of 2025. Any questions that you may have? I'm sorry for my voice. I think it's the air quality. It's the smoke.

Gentlemen, any questions?

Yeah, I have one. You mentioned that 20 is plenty. Is table the...

Yes, that was to do a lot with police staffing at the time about to do the enforcement and they really didn't have the resources. I think now things have changed a little bit in the last 12 months from when this report was worked on, but we haven't revisited with the chief yet to see if he's willing to have the manpower to go after those areas there. City of Tigard I know is one town that's done the 2020 and what was it? Oh, Lake Oswego, yeah. So it'd be, before we make some big changes, we really need to dive in on how it's been successful for them. Do you have anything else?

I'll just also share that the moving forward with that kind of a campaign has a decent sized capital outlay component. I don't have the numbers with me tonight, but we did inventory how many 25 mile an hour signs we have that would need a sign replacement. And then not all residential streets have a 25 mile an hour speed limit sign installed because it falls under the statutory speed limit of 25 in a residential zone. And so if we were to implement 20 is plenty kind of in a citywide way, we would have to install those 20 mile per hour signs. my understanding is without the posted sign, they would not be able to enforce it or ticket against the speed limit because the statutory speed would be 25. So there is a decent cost to implementing it. And so kind of that balance of ability to enforce the cost to implement, and then really trying to decide if that is the best use of that funding.

Have you looked into having any, applying for any grants for that type of a program?

I'm not aware of any grants, but we could look into it and see if we can find something.

So always a good opportunity if there's something available. Rocky, anything? All right, thank you so much, Tim. And thank you to the committee and thank you to Public Works Director Webb for coming on up and giving us the update on what's going on. All right, thank you, Mayor. We appreciate it. All right, appreciate it.

And thank you for submitting your report. You're welcome.

All right, next on the agenda, we have the adoption of the agenda and a review of the consent agenda items. Is there anything that anybody has any concerns about or do we have a motion?

I'll move to adopt the consent agenda.

Is there a second? Second. Second. It's been moved and seconded. Mr. Lee, would you do the roll?

Commissioner Smith. Commissioner Morrow. Aye. Commissioner Wilson. Aye. Commissioner Mitchell. Aye. Mayor McGriff.

Aye.

Motion passes.

Thank you so much for that. Next on our agenda, we have item number eight, but we don't have any public hearings tonight, but we do have two items under general business. And so we'll go to item 9A, stormwater appeal for 302 Bluff Street. And... I would like to turn this small portion of the meeting over to our city attorney to give us a bit of an overview and then we will proceed with having some testimony. The one thing I do want to ask before I ask Ms. Richter to speak is that we can, we need, it's not really a land use hearing, but I want to be able to give the, a conversation with us. And so would you be willing to go for 10 minutes of public testimony by the person who's going to be speaking, Mr. Nascita? Would that be acceptable to the commission? Okay, all right. Ms. Richter?

Thank you, Mayor McGriff and Commission. You have received an appeal of a stormwater charge. And so that is what is before you. You also received a bias challenge against the mayor asking that she recuse herself. And although I think it's questionable whether Fasano, which is the penultimate case we use for land use procedural due process, whether that really applies in this non land use case is unclear. I think it would be appropriate because you are acting as a quasi judicial body for me to just explain a little bit that This evaluation is of a appeal that requires an evaluation of the Oregon City Municipal Code criteria against a series of facts or evidence that the appellant has identified. And it's important that you're able to set aside any personal preferences on this matter and make a decision strictly based on the OCMC 1360 excuse me, 1316, 100 standards. I want to make sure I want it. So in, in furtherance of this, I'm just going to ask you ask the mayor, particularly since she's the one who's been challenged a couple of questions. Madam mayor, you understand that this is a quasi judicial appeal proceeding that requires making a decision using strictly the standards and the evidence presented.

Yes, I do.

You have not prejudged or come to any conclusions about how you will vote on this matter?

I have not. I've reviewed the material and any decision will be based on the submittal, the criteria and the city code.

Are you able to set aside any personal or previous engagements with this appellant to make a decision considering this matter alone?

I don't have any bias or animosity or anything against this particular person whatsoever. He is a resident of the neighborhood association that I live in. We are in adjacent neighbors by a few streets. I do not have any bias or predetermined concerns about this particular application at all.

Thank you. Given this discussion, I'm assuming you intend to participate in this proceeding.

I do.

I want to give the commission an opportunity. Do they have any other bias related comments to declare?

I do not.

I do not. Don't forget about Commissioner Smith. I said I don't.

Okay, thank you. I think at this point I would turn it over back to the mayor or to Ms. Webb for the staff report.

Yes, is she still there? She needs to come back up. Thank you very much, Dana. Would you please go ahead with your report?

Sure, good evening, Mayor and Commissioners, Dana Webb, Public Works Director. Tonight, I'll provide a brief overview of the Public Works Director's decision regarding the request for the stormwater service fee exemption and refund. My presentation will focus on the applicable city requirements, the documentation submitted with the request and the basis for the administrative decision. I'm happy to answer questions after my presentation. So tonight the request before the city commission is an appeal of my decision denying the stormwater monthly fee exemption. And the decision you'll need to make is whether the applicant demonstrated compliance with the city exemption requirements. So on the screen here on this slide is the two criteria that were included in the Oregon City Municipal Code 13.16.100 at the time of the appeal. So that the code language did change in July. This code, this appeal came in in June. So those two criteria at the time of the denial was that the public storm drain service does not receive stormwater from property occupied by the person. and that the applicant provide evidence of legal disposal of stormwater to a private retention system, private storm drain system, public water body, or other receiving facility. And so those are the two criteria that were reviewed at the time of the appeal. Oops. So on this screen is a lot of text, but this is sort of just a high level overview of the timeline. So that initial exemption came in in early June, and then the denial was issued on June 12th. That same day, the applicant requested an appeal of that decision. And so I worked with the applicant to identify a timeline. We selected a July 1st hearing date, and I notified the applicant that any additional documentation related would be needed by Monday, June 22nd at 8 a.m. to be included in the item. I was provided a draft version on June 22nd in the morning with a notation that the applicant was still assembling the attachments with a note they would be provided by noon that day. So just a quick high level again, later that morning, I was notified the applicant was had an injury to their pet. And so they were at the emergency vet. So we had some conversations and I offered an option to push it out. to the July 15th meeting because we had to meet the packet deadline. And that I did note that I would be out at the July 15th meeting and that I could have another staff member present. At that time, they noted they would work to get the documents by midnight to me if they were able to. And then at that point it was sort of, we got to this, we weren't gonna make the packets. And so then their request was they could do the July 15th or the following meeting, but they stated a preference to have myself deliver this presentation because I'd been the one working with them. And so we landed on the meeting for tonight of August 5th. So that's kind of a little bit of the timeline of when it came in and how we got to this. And then that code change happened at the July 15th. city commission meeting. So just a review of the applicable criteria. So when we start looking at what is a legally approved disposal method, we would lean back on our stormwater and grading design standards. which do allow infiltration as an option. In order to use infiltration as your disposal method, you have to provide infiltration testing and analysis that makes sure that the area that you're using to infiltrate the stormwater is appropriately sized and located within the area. including information on soils. So really kind of that technical assessment that the ground that you're proposing to place that stormwater in, it can accept it. There was no technical documentation in the application packet related to infiltration testing or soil types. There was information on topography, but not any additional technical information. And so at that point, it was determined that the application for exemption was denied. So no evidence of a legally approved private retention or stormwater system was provided and the required technical documentation related to infiltration was not included. And so since those were not provided, we could not confirm those were met. So the decision was to deny the application. And so then the decision for you tonight is to determine whether the applicant demonstrated compliance with the city exemption requirements. You could choose to affirm or overturn the director's decision. That's my presentation.

Gentlemen, are there any questions of Public Works Director Webb at this time? Okay, I'd like to call up James Nesita.

Good evening, James Nesita. I live in Oregon City. I think I covered my bases. pretty thoroughly in my written submissions. So I will answer any questions the commission might have. Otherwise I'll just rely on what I said in my written submission. Gentlemen, are there any questions?

Portion of this particular meeting and allow for the commission to deliberate. information to include because none of those systems in multiple formats to be used depending on what used whether it's you know printing as a flag or as a sticker online etc this would be the first it's basically three to four colors to the world everybody put in we probably each need to say that though yes so everybody say second second second second second Thank you all. All right, Carrie.

Ordinance number 26-1011, an ordinance of the City of Oregon City adopting a new city flag.

Mr. Lee.

Commissioner Smith.

Aye.

Commissioner Marl. Aye. Commissioner Wilson. Aye. Commissioner Mitchell. Aye. Mayor McGrev. Aye. Motion passes.

Unanimously. City Manager Conkle, what do you have for us?

Just real quick, appreciate everyone's patience as we're dealing with some of the increased poor air quality. We unfortunately had to postpone National Night Out last night. We'll be coordinating and announcing, I think we're looking for a new date and working with our vendors and the musician to make that happen. Once we have a date settled in a location, We'll announce that. We're continuing to monitor air quality overnight and through tomorrow. Obviously, we have a concert in the park, movie in the park. Right now, they're predicting a change in direction of wind. Hopefully, that would help kind of blow out the valley, blow the smoke towards the east rather than towards the west. But I anticipate that'll be an afternoon decision tomorrow as we follow the air quality index readings that we have throughout the region here. Those are all the updates that I have, thank you.

Thank you, I have a question for you. So of course I've been getting lots of comments and questions about what are those people doing down at the railroad crossing on Singer Hill? And I presume that those were either railroad people doing work from their end, is that correct?

I've asked Dana, I thought that they were installing some new electrical poles at the crossing there, but Dana just came up and can verify that.

Yes, so the work down there is related to the quiet zone project and it's the utility relocation. So they are relocating some power poles to prepare for the quiet zone project. And it's being done by the railroad?

I'm sorry, you broke up.

Is it being done by the railroad?

No, it is being done. I believe it's a private contractor that's been coordinated to do all of the utility work for the agencies that hang on those poles.

Okay. So I maybe misstated, but I said that it was related to the quiet zone, but I didn't know who had hired who. So thank you very much for giving me that update. So commissioners, do you have any information news that you'd like to report?

I'm glad I didn't miss National Ride Out because I left on Tuesday and wanted to be there. So. Well, we'll get another chance. Yeah.

And then, oh, before we get, so Tony mentioned, I saw an email about the 22nd of August. I saw something come across my screen while we were having a meeting, while our meeting was, he wandered away. we'll we'll circle okay we'll circle back did you hear what i said no did not i'm sorry it was about i as the meeting was going on there was something that came across the screen and said please hold august 22nd and then it went away so okay i don't think i sent that off

Oh, that's a Saturday. Oh, I think I forwarded, sorry, let me grab it. There was an, So as many of you are aware, we worked with Soul Flag and another artist for the mural on Railroad Avenue. They are having an unveiling event on Saturday, August 22nd, from 10 to 11 a.m. down by Railroad Avenue down there.

to celebrate the mural. All right, thank you so much. Adam, do you have anything?

I do not.

Scott?

I do not.

Michael? Nothing. Okay, Rocky? Nope. I believe you all received from our city recorder the letter that we received from the mayor of Tadashina town inviting us all to go to Japan. So we can talk about that. But I just want to make sure that you knew where that came from from them. I do want to let you know that we had six middle school students from what i would consider basically tatashina town junior high i'm not sure that's what they call it and four chaperones who are in in oregon this week visiting with host families and learning all about oregon and their one number one comment to me was why they wanted to come on the trip is they wanted to practice their english so i asked them a lot of questions so that they could practice their english they will be leaving at the end of the week they're going to be going to the coast to one of the outlet malls so they can go shopping which is one of the other things they told me they wanted to do um other than that uh we will look forward to uh our next meeting on the 19th of august and if there is no further business we are officially adjourned i think this might be a rolls record so