[2:31] I call the meeting to order.

[2:33] Good evening and welcome to the June 1st, 2026 study session

[2:36] of your Ashton City Council.

[2:38] This evening we have two agenda items, the update

[2:41] regarding the state mandated land use ordinance amendments,

[2:44] Senate Bill 9 74 and House Bill 2138,

[2:48] and then the community Wildfire re Wildfire Resilience Bond.

[2:52] Sabrina.

[2:53] Thank you. So tonight our first one, we're gonna go

[2:56] through an informational update regarding upcoming state

[2:59] dated amendments to chapter 18 of our land use ordinance.

[3:03] So I'm gonna have Director Goldman go through those changes

[3:06] that are dictated by Senate Bill 9 74

[3:08] and House Bill 2 1 3 8.

[3:22] Good evening, mayor Council, Brandon Goldman.

[3:25] It's not on Brandon. There you go. Thank you.

[3:28] Good. Brandon Goldman, community Development Department,

[3:31] Derek Seaverson, planning supervisor.

[3:35] So thank you for hearing us this evening.

[3:38] We wanted to give you an overview of

[3:41] recent legislative changes at the state that are going to be

[3:45] impacting all communities throughout the state of Oregon.

[3:48] Essentially the purpose of tonight's discussion is intended

[3:51] as a informational meeting in order to update the council

[3:57] specifically about Senate Bill 9 74

[3:59] and the city's ongoing efforts

[4:01] to implement that legislation.

[4:04] So no, no action is requested of council this evening,

[4:07] but other than comments

[4:08] and questions that you may have, so the purpose

[4:11] of the presentation is to provide an overview,

[4:14] explain the legislation adopted by the bill, discuss

[4:17] how it changes land use process within Ashland

[4:21] and the decision making process,

[4:23] and also outline the next steps in this legislative

[4:27] amendment process.

[4:29] And I also wanted to provide an update in terms

[4:31] of the planning commission's review of this.

[4:33] They have previously reviewed Senate Bill 9 74 as part of a

[4:39] review of all legislation that impacts land use,

[4:42] but most recently on May 26th,

[4:44] the planning commission looked at section 9 74 specifically

[4:50] and have made some recommendations.

[4:52] So in terms of the overview,

[4:56] the 2025 Oregon legislature adopted several significant

[5:00] housing related bills.

[5:02] As you're well aware, they're all intended

[5:04] to increase housing production

[5:06] and reduced barriers to residential development.

[5:10] Senate Bill 9 74 is among the most consequential of those

[5:13] because it directly affects

[5:15] local land use review proceedings.

[5:17] And I'll go into what those changes are specifically.

[5:21] But unlike many housing bills

[5:22] that focus on development standards, density, housing type

[5:26] or financing, Senate Bill 9 74 primarily focuses

[5:30] on the process and the legislature's objectives were

[5:34] to reduce delays associated

[5:36] with processing land use applications by ensuring

[5:40] that those which they consider urban housing applications

[5:45] are dealt with administratively as opposed to

[5:47] through a public hearing process.

[5:50] And it limits the number of hearings that a project

[5:54] may be proposed, potentially presented before.

[5:57] So the bills really shift certain housing applications

[6:01] away from the traditional quasi-judicial legislative process

[6:06] and forwards them to administrative re review.

[6:09] And what that means in a nutshell is

[6:11] that an applicant doing a subdivision for instance, instead

[6:14] of going to the planning commission for review

[6:17] and decision would be presenting to city staff

[6:21] applying the same standards that are in place now

[6:23] but approving or denying it at an administrative level.

[6:28] So the current process

[6:31] and application is submitted to the city staff reviews

[6:35] that application, identifies the components that are met

[6:40] or are not met and provides that staff review

[6:42] to the planning commission.

[6:44] The planning commission has that hearing

[6:47] and it makes a decision for the city.

[6:49] If an applicant or a neighbor

[6:52] or an infected party wants to appeal that decision,

[6:55] they appeal that decision to the city council.

[6:59] And the city council is then the final decision maker

[7:01] of the city following a council appeal

[7:05] that an applicant

[7:06] or a neighbor can appeal that to the land use Board

[7:09] of Appeals Senate 9 74 changes that process substantially.

[7:14] Essentially the first decision is made by staff, then

[7:18] that goes to the planning commission on appeal

[7:21] and if the planning commission's decision,

[7:24] which then becomes the final decision of the city, if

[7:27] that's appeal, that goes directly

[7:29] to the land use Board of Appeals.

[7:31] And as such, the city council currently serves

[7:35] as an appellant body but would not do so

[7:37] after 9 74 specifically

[7:40] for urban housing applications.

[7:42] And we have to make that distinction

[7:44] because there is a category within 9 74 that says

[7:49] what qualifies for

[7:50] that expedited review process and what doesn't.

[7:54] Did you wanna take questions as we go? Yeah. Councilor

[7:58] Hansen.

[7:59] Thank you Mayor. Thank you very much.

[8:00] Brandon, as I read this, I was curious,

[8:03] the first step makes absolute sense in the new process,

[8:07] but then taking city council out of the mix there

[8:11] and going straight to Luba, I don't know

[8:14] how long a Luba appeal is, so could you help me

[8:18] in understanding, maybe you can help shed some mind on

[8:21] what the state was thinking and taking

[8:24] out the council appeal.

[8:25] It seems like that would be a more expedited process.

[8:28] And then relative to with these residential applications,

[8:32] how long would a Luba appeal take for just perspective?

[8:36] Yeah, I, I think that if a application was

[8:39] to conclude at the end of a council appeal,

[8:42] that would likely be a more expedited process, correct?

[8:46] That's right. However many applications have a council

[8:49] decision and then are appealed to Luba.

[8:51] Right? So the city is obligated under existing

[8:54] and future rules

[8:57] to process a decision locally within 120 days.

[9:01] So that's our shot clock. So this doesn't look And does

[9:04] That change at all from the old,

[9:05] It changes to a hundred days

[9:06] for affordable housing applications,

[9:08] but those are a very limited subset of applications.

[9:11] Right, okay. So most the shock clock stays 120 days

[9:16] and we would review that application

[9:18] through the staff decision with time

[9:20] for a planning commission appeal.

[9:22] Currently we try and expe expedite that so that an appeal

[9:25] before council can also be completed within

[9:28] that 120 day period.

[9:30] So the final decision

[9:32] of the planning commission usually is after 60 days.

[9:35] And so if an applicant can appeal to Luba at that point,

[9:39] it could theoretically save them two months of local process

[9:44] by jumping to the state appeal board and a Luba appeal.

[9:49] I'm not sure exactly on the timing.

[9:51] We've had one recently

[9:53] and I'd say that added probably about 60 days

[9:55] to their review process. Okay.

[9:58] Thank you Councilor Dale.

[10:02] Thank you Mayor. And thanks Brandon.

[10:04] Yeah, councilor Hansen asked a lot of what I was asking,

[10:07] what I want to know well about relative to the timing

[10:11] and so it still is something that, yeah, I still kind

[10:15] of am a little, a little concerned about pulling the city

[10:18] council out of that process,

[10:19] even though I understand the timing of it.

[10:22] Is there a potential Is is is first question is,

[10:24] is Senate bill 9 74 unequivocal on that is the process,

[10:29] there is no local ability

[10:33] to provide an option to appeal

[10:36] to the city council before Luba?

[10:38] Yeah, I believe so. I think that the intention is

[10:40] to have an administrative decision by staff

[10:43] with one one appeal.

[10:45] Okay. At the local level.

[10:47] So then my second question would be, going back upstream

[10:49] to the staff decision process,

[10:51] what have you guys found in your, in your opinion,

[10:55] has been the things that cause the most delay or

[10:59] otherwise getting these types of

[11:03] administrative approvals being you're seeing them denied,

[11:06] what are, what mostly happens when they're denied? Sure.

[11:09] I Well I'd like Derek At the administrative level, I'm

[11:11] Sorry as well.

[11:12] Yeah. You know from my experience, the

[11:15] current planning application denied at either an

[11:19] administrative level or at a planning commission level

[11:21] is often because an application itself is either incomplete

[11:26] or requesting a, a variance

[11:29] or a modification that is not commensurate

[11:32] with the intention of the the code.

[11:35] So in terms of approval process,

[11:37] those can also be slowed down.

[11:39] If we receive an application from an applicant

[11:43] that is at 80%,

[11:44] but it's missing key information, at which point we'll have

[11:48] to reach back out to the applicant, ask them

[11:50] to submit addendums to that application.

[11:53] So it's really, the delays typically happen

[11:56] before we deem it a complete application.

[12:00] Once we deem it complete, we send out the notice

[12:03] schedule the hearings and it moves along

[12:05] that timeline in a rather expeditious manner.

[12:08] But there can be a lot of back and forth

[12:10] before an application is considered.

[12:13] Complete

[12:15] Question, Just a quick follow up.

[12:17] Do you find that, do you find that in that back

[12:19] and forth, that there's too much subjectivity

[12:21] or do you feel that it's right on as far as it just,

[12:23] the applicant is actually just specifically missing

[12:27] basic pieces of information that deem it incomplete?

[12:29] Might be for Derek as the planning manager to respond.

[12:32] It's typically that the applicant is

[12:33] missing specific pieces.

[12:35] Our code calls out for each component of the application,

[12:39] what has to be submitted to meet requirements.

[12:42] And if we're writing an incomplete letter,

[12:44] we're referencing specifically the code says you need

[12:47] to provide this in a MC whatever and you haven't done it.

[12:53] So it's, it is rarely subjective.

[12:54] The other thing I would note in terms

[12:56] of denials is denials are exceedingly rare.

[13:00] I think in 25 years as a planner, I think we've denied

[13:06] three applications.

[13:08] It, it probably is more common

[13:10] to have a reversal from Luba than a denial from staff

[13:13] or the planning commission.

[13:15] And that's because we have to begin

[13:18] with a pre-application process

[13:20] and then a completeness review process

[13:22] where we're really working with the applicants

[13:24] to get a complete approvable application

[13:26] before a notice ever goes out. Thank

[13:29] You.

[13:30] And I have a number of other questions from counselors.

[13:33] Just a reminder that we, we do need to move through this

[13:36] and, and these are required changes

[13:38] from the state government.

[13:39] So just keep that in mind. Councilor Kaplan.

[13:42] Thank you Mayor. So my question, I guess it has to do

[13:46] with the relative cost.

[13:48] It sounds like the staff

[13:49] and what I'm hearing from you is

[13:50] that the staff review involves some back

[13:52] and forth about completion and all of this sort of thing.

[13:55] So the changing that

[13:57] to a staff decision sounds like it wouldn't add additional

[14:00] costs for staff 'cause you're already doing a fair bit

[14:02] of review and then prepping of the planning commission,

[14:05] the packet, all doing, all that sort of thing.

[14:07] So there might actually be a savings

[14:08] 'cause you wouldn't have to go before the planning

[14:10] commission on most of these things

[14:11] unless there's a final an appeal. Is that right?

[14:15] I agree and in the event that an application is submitted

[14:18] and it's reviewed administratively, that would,

[14:22] we'd still send out a notice to all the impacted at

[14:26] neighbors, get feedback from them

[14:27] and then make a staff decision if it's not appealed,

[14:30] that is consistent with what we do currently

[14:32] where we send out notice to the neighbors advising 'em

[14:35] of the planning commission meeting.

[14:38] Where it does add potential workload

[14:41] for community development staff is in the event

[14:43] that if staff decisions are regularly appealed

[14:47] to the planning commission in order to exercise

[14:50] that public engagement,

[14:51] at which point we will be doing those notices multiple

[14:54] times or twice.

[14:57] Right. Councilor boom. Yeah, thank, thank you.

[15:01] Yeah, I mean I, this is, I, I understand

[15:03] because you know, some councils are gonna be kind

[15:05] of anti-development, anti-growth

[15:07] and we want to, obviously in Oregon, we want to encourage

[15:09] that this council's been the opposite.

[15:11] I mean, we've reversed planning commission decisions

[15:14] because we wanted to be more pro-growth.

[15:16] So I'm looking at the definitions under 9 74

[15:19] and it's this comprehensive plan amendments

[15:20] and zone changes to increase density are included in those

[15:23] definitions, which are obviously a high level decision.

[15:27] And we're talking about an unelected body that is going

[15:30] to be the final decision maker.

[15:31] So the question is, is the only workaround here is

[15:34] to essentially properly vet

[15:36] and make sure that we're appointing members

[15:37] of the planning commission that are gonna be aligned

[15:39] with our more pro-growth vision.

[15:42] So I'll, you highlighted a very important point

[15:45] and a distinction that was discussed at

[15:47] length at the planning commission.

[15:49] You know, a number of the changes subdivisions,

[15:53] variances handled at administrative level are likely things

[15:57] that would typically go before the planning commission,

[15:59] but not rise to the level of council zone changes,

[16:02] comprehensive plan changes.

[16:04] Those have always required an ordinance

[16:06] and they require an ordinance under state law

[16:10] and an ordinance by definition has to have a public hearing.

[16:14] So we see a conflict between existing ORS 2 2 7

[16:19] and Senate bill 9 74 where one says you have

[16:23] to have a hearing, another says

[16:24] that you can't have a hearing.

[16:26] So in terms of process, our guidance is to look

[16:30] to Department of Land Conservation and Development

[16:33] and ask them to opine on how we process that.

[16:37] In doing so, their response essentially was

[16:39] that they are going to be doing rulemaking beginning in

[16:43] January of 2027 to address

[16:47] the implementation steps for 9 74.

[16:50] But that does not exempt the city from the responsibility

[16:54] to adopt code amendments prior to that date.

[16:57] So we're anticipating from the planning commission,

[17:00] the commission did not recommend amendments

[17:03] to the city's existing zone change procedures at this time.

[17:07] Again, noting that that's a public hearing requirement

[17:12] until, and given the lack of guidance from the state

[17:15] regarding the application

[17:17] or implementation of 9 74 looking, the commission

[17:21] recommend maintaining that procedure

[17:23] until additional direction is provided.

[17:26] We don't see a lot of zone change

[17:28] for increased residential density in the event we do.

[17:32] I'm sure legal counsel will be involved in terms of how

[17:34] to process that,

[17:36] but at this point in time, our recommendation

[17:38] and consistent with the planning commissions will be

[17:41] to draft amendments to 9 74, incorporating all

[17:46] of the legislative requisite changes with the exception

[17:49] of the zone change in comp plan change,

[17:52] which would then still have to come to council

[17:54] for review and approval. Got it. Thank you.

[17:57] Yeah, Councillor Sherell.

[18:02] Thank you Mayor. Thank you both.

[18:03] This is super exciting

[18:05] and I realize it's only informational only,

[18:07] and I don't want to get too far into the weeds,

[18:09] but can you talk either of you briefly about

[18:12] what we expect this will change,

[18:14] what we expect this will streamline

[18:16] and how it affects what we see as one

[18:18] of the largest barriers to housing production in the

[18:20] country, which is the not in my backyard attitude

[18:23] and how the appellant could potentially take

[18:27] responsibility for some of that burden.

[18:29] And, and can you, can you share how you, you think it will

[18:33] affect production in our city?

[18:35] Sure.

[18:37] Some immediate changes that I would foresee is, you know,

[18:41] given the recommendations,

[18:42] we're looking at some discretionary changes concurrent

[18:45] with the state mandated.

[18:48] One is how we process subdivisions currently,

[18:51] and I'm gonna get a little bit into the weeds.

[18:53] Subdivisions of 10 units

[18:55] or more are, are considered type two actions

[18:58] that have an outline plan, a final plan,

[19:00] it's a two step process

[19:02] and applicant has to submit a full application,

[19:05] get approval, and then do all the engineering, submit

[19:08] that and get that approved.

[19:09] So we are looking at changing that 10 units to 20 units

[19:14] and as an administrative approval you could see housing

[19:17] developments of 20 units

[19:18] or less that come in with one plan to develop it, submit it

[19:23] to staff for an administrative review, we'll review all the

[19:27] requisite requirements, everything from street access,

[19:29] street wits, building setbacks, building heights, all

[19:33] of those and approved at the staff level.

[19:36] And if not appealed to the planning commission,

[19:39] then the applicant could really accelerate

[19:41] that development and move forward.

[19:44] It will have some benefit to the applicant to process it

[19:47] as a type one planning action

[19:50] versus a type two planning action.

[19:52] Not just in that timing ex accelerant, but also

[19:55] because the application fee

[19:58] for a type one is less than the application fee

[20:01] for a type two and reviewing all the applications

[20:04] that we've had over the prior year, there were only three

[20:08] that would qualify under that standard

[20:10] and they'd save about $1,500 per applicant on that.

[20:14] So that is a cost savings for the application.

[20:18] The second part of your question, I'm forgetting now,

[20:20] It had, it had to do with the appellant bearing some

[20:23] of the burden if there's an appeal

[20:26] and if they lose the appeal,

[20:28] they potentially have a responsibility to reimburse the city

[20:31] for time and potentially legal.

[20:34] Yeah. Which would hopefully in turn discourage people

[20:36] that are not quoting a direct clear

[20:39] and objective standard to resist housing.

[20:41] Right. To, to have less incentive to try

[20:43] to just waste somebody's time and cost them money. Sure.

[20:46] I I think there's two different appeals.

[20:48] The appeal to the planning commission of a staff decision

[20:51] would have an a, a appeal fee,

[20:53] but it doesn't have that responsible for attorney fees.

[20:57] That an appeal of a needed housing to Luba that is found

[21:02] to be an unnecessary appeal that didn't cite,

[21:07] you know, reasons for overturning or remanding.

[21:11] Luba can award attorney fees

[21:13] and those attorney fees could be if the city's attorney was

[21:17] a respondent or the applicant's attorney was a respondent.

[21:20] And that was legislation that was passed, I think in 2024

[21:25] to really stop abuse of legislative

[21:28] or of appeal process for, you know, appeals of clear

[21:33] and objective standards that are met.

[21:35] Follow here? Yes.

[21:37] Yeah. Thank you. Thanks for for clarifying that.

[21:39] Hopefully that will have a, a positive effect.

[21:41] And then the second question I have is

[21:45] with all this downward pressure from the state to really,

[21:49] this is implemented when the governor signs it,

[21:51] I believe based on emergency

[21:52] and we're trying to catch up state planning goals,

[21:56] say we're gonna do rulemaking for this next year.

[21:59] You have staff that's working on all

[22:01] the incoming applications.

[22:03] I understand that we maybe have a, a vacancy

[22:05] that we can't fill right now due to budgetary constraints.

[22:08] Like how can this body help your office

[22:11] get the people it needs to write

[22:13] and implement these plans that the state has mandated on us

[22:16] that's already in effect

[22:17] that we don't even have code for yet.

[22:20] Yeah, it's not in effect yet.

[22:22] It goes into effect July 1st.

[22:24] We're not gonna be able to go

[22:26] through the planning commission and city council hearing

[22:28] and adoption process for the ordinance adoption by then.

[22:32] But an applicant could apply under state law

[22:34] and we would process it on July 2nd in that same

[22:38] or July 1st in the, according to the state rules.

[22:41] But to answer your question, Derek has already gone

[22:44] through a code audit and identified all the sections

[22:46] of our code that need to be amended

[22:48] and we have that draft language.

[22:51] I took that to the planning commission on May 26th.

[22:53] They reviewed it and had made a number of recommendations

[22:57] that we can incorporate in terms of, you know, definitions

[23:00] and looking at being consistent

[23:03] with state law in a few areas.

[23:05] So our expectation is to bring that back to the

[23:08] planning commission in July of this year

[23:10] for a public hearing and to counsel I think on August 18th,

[23:14] I put on the look ahead to bring this forward.

[23:16] At that point in time, I do fully anticipate

[23:20] and I just want everybody to be aware that

[23:22] after the Department of Land Conservation

[23:25] and Development has completed their rulemaking, we may need

[23:29] to go back into our ordinance and revise it further.

[23:32] But that should be a matter of house cleaning rather than

[23:35] this big change having already been implemented. Thank you.

[23:39] Okay, Great. So let's go ahead and,

[23:41] and move, we'll go through the whole presentation

[23:43] and hold our questions till the end.

[23:45] Go ahead. Sure. So this map here

[23:48] or this flow chart, you've seen it in your packet.

[23:52] It really shows what it, what it applies.

[23:54] I know the text is too small to read on the screen

[23:57] for anybody at home, but I also wanted

[24:00] to note a special thanks to City of Medford

[24:03] and their long range planning staff who was going

[24:05] through the same process and created this flowchart.

[24:08] So we adapted it with their blessing to City of Ashland so

[24:12] that it showed the code changes, which I think reflects

[24:15] that all cities are doing this independently at this point.

[24:20] So I did want to talk about implementation challenges.

[24:27] So, and as I stated

[24:28] before, the primary one is

[24:29] that the state's legislative rulemaking

[24:32] process has not yet begun.

[24:34] Ideally that would've been completed

[24:36] before cities would be in a position to draft code.

[24:39] But the state has, you know, in the meantime

[24:44] we aren't prevented from utilizing the state's codes.

[24:48] Unfortunately my notes are not viewable.

[24:52] But nonetheless the, I think our approach was to

[24:56] adopt all the code amendments that are required

[24:58] for compliance to retain the existing procedures where

[25:02] that uncertainty, and that gets back to

[25:04] what we talked about in the questions that

[25:08] Councilor Bloom brought up in terms of zone change

[25:10] and comprehensive plan change.

[25:13] And we will obviously continue to monitor LCD's rulemaking

[25:18] and I just wanted to again reassert

[25:20] that applicants can utilize the applicable state

[25:23] authorization provisions under Oregon law prior

[25:26] to completion of the code amendments.

[25:28] But our goal is to complete them, you know, within a month

[25:31] or two of that July one start date.

[25:34] So given the number of applications that we received,

[25:38] there may be a couple that proceed that,

[25:41] but we should have it in place by the time

[25:44] a new subdivision comes in.

[25:46] I'm not sure of any pre-app applications even

[25:48] pending for such actions.

[25:53] So as I noted,

[25:54] the Planning commission reviewed it on April 14th

[25:56] and that was a broader discussion about other house

[25:59] bills and Senate bills.

[26:01] But they did make a number

[26:03] of recommendations when they reviewed it on May 26th, namely

[26:08] that the planning, the subdivision threshold

[26:12] that I mentioned that's currently 10, we presented

[26:14] to them whether they would consider 20 as a viable change.

[26:19] And again, that's a discretionary

[26:21] change on behalf of the city.

[26:23] They were amenable to that.

[26:25] They also looked at revising the design standards within

[26:30] the normal, or I'm sorry, the neighborhood mixed use area

[26:33] of North Mountain Plan.

[26:35] That is the only area within the city

[26:37] where we have residential design standards.

[26:39] One of the provisions of Senate Bill 9 74 is to

[26:44] not allow those design standards

[26:46] that could restrict housing design,

[26:49] but the state law includes a sunset on that, that

[26:52] because this is an effort to accelerate housing development,

[26:57] the state law says that that

[26:59] limitation on design standards is

[27:02] to sunset on January 2nd, 2033.

[27:05] And so the planning commission suggested

[27:07] that we modify our code not as a permanent change

[27:10] to no longer require them,

[27:12] but to tie it to that sunset date

[27:15] of January 2nd, 2023 consistent

[27:19] with Senate Bill 9 74.

[27:22] In addition, we're looking at urban housing applications

[27:25] and it is those applications that

[27:28] are outlined in your packet material

[27:32] to really look at the Senate Bill nine 70 four's definition.

[27:36] We had the term in our draft de definition that presented

[27:39] to them that proposed facilities

[27:44] and the state law actually says the word planned

[27:47] public facilities.

[27:48] And so the planning commission recommended that we modify

[27:52] the word proposed to be planned to be consistent

[27:55] with state law, recognizing that there's a different

[27:58] between difference between a public facility that is part

[28:01] of a plan that is planned by the city

[28:04] and a proposal of an applicant.

[28:07] And we already talked a little bit about the zone

[28:09] change procedures and rulemaking.

[28:13] So I, I did want to note that the Planning Commission

[28:17] in our discussions, you know, they were concerned

[28:22] that the process would reduce opportunities

[28:24] for local engagement

[28:26] and involvement by eliminating the Planning Commission

[28:29] review of planning actions

[28:32] that our qualifying housing applications

[28:35] and that they would no longer be an initial

[28:38] decision making body as you know, under the proposed

[28:42] or the framework presented by 9 74.

[28:45] They would only review projects on appeal.

[28:47] And so that may limit the amount of work

[28:50] that they do on a regular basis,

[28:52] but they also do a lot of long range planning work.

[28:55] So it may free up additional time for them

[28:58] to focus on those endeavors.

[29:00] So with that, essentially the next steps are planning,

[29:05] commission, hearing, recommendation count, council hearing

[29:08] ordinance, adoption process monitor, DLCD

[29:13] and then have new codes in process

[29:17] and help applicants through that new, that new process.

[29:23] Questions Councillor Bloom.

[29:25] Yeah, quick question about

[29:27] the design standard requirements and,

[29:29] and basically aligning ours

[29:31] with the sunset date with the state.

[29:33] Is there a way that we can just remove those design

[29:35] requirements, design standard requirements sooner

[29:38] and just completely get rid of

[29:39] Them?

[29:40] There is, I, I think that the North Mountain neighborhood,

[29:43] that one particular neighborhood, the ordinance is embedded

[29:47] with a lot of illustrative designs as to what type

[29:50] of housing and truth, I'd say probably 80% of

[29:53] that neighborhood is fully built out.

[29:55] But there is one large parcel adjacent to Bear Creek

[29:58] that still would have under the North Mountain plan

[30:01] would be subject to those.

[30:02] If they come in for a development

[30:03] before 2033, they would not apply.

[30:07] Or if the council or the planning commission removed

[30:09] that sunset date, we would modify that code

[30:13] to remove all those design standards.

[30:15] Those were applied by the city. So they could be removed by,

[30:18] Is there any reason why we wouldn't?

[30:21] It would be incongruent with the remainder

[30:23] of the development that was designed

[30:25] and built for the residents

[30:27] that bought into the normal neighborhood area anticipating.

[30:31] So it would be an aesthetic, an aesthetic concern.

[30:33] It's an aesthetic, yeah. Concern. Okay. Thank you.

[30:36] Other questions? So one quick question is a follow

[30:41] up to Councillor Bloom's question.

[30:43] And that is, so if we, we align the sunset dates,

[30:47] then the, this comes back into play at

[30:50] that point the council could look at

[30:51] what has happened in the intervening time

[30:53] and decide whether it wants to just keep going with

[30:57] what we had or revert back

[30:59] to those existing elements. Correct?

[31:02] Correct. Okay,

[31:03] Thank you.

[31:04] That's, that is very helpful. Any other questions?

[31:10] One last question and that is, I know

[31:12] that we're in conversation with other planning departments

[31:15] as this, as the state moves forward to

[31:18] implement these these rules is are there any discussions

[31:21] maybe at the League of Oregon cities about,

[31:24] you know, how well it's working?

[31:25] I think it's always good if there's a feedback loop back

[31:27] to the state this that says maybe this piece

[31:30] of it is working really well,

[31:32] maybe this one is giving us more trouble

[31:34] or maybe there's a different way to expedite this housing

[31:38] and kind of, you know, in, in the overall goals

[31:40] that I believe we all share, which is to get housing built.

[31:43] Is there, is there a particular

[31:45] place where that's happening?

[31:47] You know, I, I think through League

[31:49] of Oregon Cities is one mechanism from a staff level.

[31:52] The Department of Land Conservation and Development

[31:55] and the Housing Accountability Office

[31:57] have set up regular quarterly meetings to talk about

[32:02] the implementation of these statewide housing measures.

[32:04] And so having sat in on a number of those, there is a lot

[32:07] of feedback provided

[32:09] to DLCD from staff from various jurisdictions about what's

[32:14] working and not working or where confusion exists.

[32:17] So that is really a new initiative,

[32:19] I would say over the last two years

[32:21] that DLCD has begun those more regular outreach efforts.

[32:26] Well, yeah, I just, I know there are concerns in

[32:29] conversations I have with other folks around the state

[32:32] that sometimes legislation gets put in place

[32:35] and it's a little bit of a one size fits all

[32:37] and it doesn't quite work for different sizes

[32:39] of communities the way it was intended.

[32:41] So I just, this is a big change

[32:43] and I think there's going to be a, a bit of experimentation

[32:46] that, you know, if the state is on some level experimenting

[32:49] a bit with how we can move,

[32:50] so move much more quickly without losing the,

[32:53] the original goals of our land use system.

[32:57] So in addition to 9 74, I was prepared

[33:00] to talk a little bit about 2138.

[33:02] Yes. And

[33:05] so essentially the 2138 is a statewide authorization

[33:09] of single room occupancies housing.

[33:12] So 2138 was adopted as part

[33:15] of the le legislature's broader approach

[33:17] to address housing types across

[33:21] various communities

[33:22] and ensure that communities were not

[33:24] restricting specific housing types.

[33:26] So the bill requires cities

[33:28] to allow single room occupancy housing in areas

[33:31] where multi-family housing is permitted subject

[33:34] to reasonable siting and development standards.

[33:38] So Ashland has no code reference

[33:42] for single room occupancies.

[33:43] However, we have approved a number of them over the years.

[33:47] Essentially we've looked at multi-room four

[33:52] bedrooms off of one shared kitchen,

[33:53] even if those bedrooms all have their own bathrooms

[33:57] as being considered a multi-family single unit

[34:00] and have approved a number of complexes

[34:02] that are effectively single room occupancies.

[34:06] But this measure will drive the city of Ashland

[34:09] to actually incorporate that into our code.

[34:13] And really the intent is to provide housing for

[34:17] seniors on fixed income, young workers, single individuals,

[34:21] people with disability, people that may benefit from a small

[34:24] single room occupancy that might be cost burdened

[34:28] by renting a full apartment.

[34:31] So to give you a visual of

[34:33] what a single room occupancy looks like, again, this is

[34:36] that four bedroom example of four rooms each of

[34:39] with their own bathroom, but with a shared common area

[34:43] and kitchen, they could each be rented

[34:45] and leased independently from one another.

[34:49] So there are private rooms

[34:51] with their own private sleeping area, you know,

[34:55] the code or the not code.

[34:57] The legislation indicates that an SRI has

[35:00] to either have shared bathrooms or a shared kitchen.

[35:04] So there is not a provision

[35:06] by which every unit could have its own kitchenette

[35:09] and bathroom that would be essentially studio apartments.

[35:14] But again, it's, I I want to clarify

[35:16] that this is not affordable housing in a traditional deed

[35:20] restricted sense, but by merit of the housing type,

[35:23] it is lower cost and is one

[35:25] of the most low cost housing types that can be developed.

[35:30] So again, 2138 expands that options where

[35:35] to allow single room occupants anywhere

[35:37] multifamily is allowed.

[35:38] So that would be in all of our R two and R three zones.

[35:43] And again, I think the clear

[35:44] and objective standards are necessitated, one

[35:48] of the provisions in the code was

[35:50] to not have burdensome parking requirements.

[35:54] Ashland eliminated all parking requirements.

[35:56] But I think some communities that might have wanted

[35:59] to restrict them would say that every housing unit has

[36:02] to have two parking spaces.

[36:04] So that four unit example that I showed has

[36:06] to have eight parking spaces,

[36:08] which I would say is probably not reasonable.

[36:10] So I think the state was looking to ensure that those kinds

[36:14] of requirements were not chilling for the development of

[36:18] single room occupancy.

[36:21] And again, this is another case where the next steps

[36:24] in this case, we do have to do a code audit

[36:27] and look at the local code

[36:28] and make proposed amendments to the planning commission.

[36:32] And ultimately this city council

[36:34] to adopt this one becomes operative in January of 2027

[36:40] as the implementation date.

[36:41] And again, people can implement state

[36:43] under, directly under state law.

[36:45] However, DLCD is not gonna continue complete rulemaking

[36:50] for this until 2028.

[36:52] So it's a little bit of cart

[36:54] before the horse on both of these bills.

[36:56] So we'll adopt something

[36:57] and then subsequent to the rulemaking may need to come back

[37:00] to the table for revisions.

[37:03] So that's really all I had

[37:05] on that one, unless you have questions.

[37:06] Councilor Dale? Thank you Mayor.

[37:08] Thanks Brandon on that one. I have a quick question.

[37:10] Relative to the term reasonable sighting

[37:13] and design standards, can you speak a little bit to

[37:15] what effect, if any, it would have on historic districts?

[37:18] Because I know recently there's been applications

[37:21] specifically in, in historic districts

[37:23] and even in transition areas where things that have been

[37:27] rejected for conditional use permits were things like

[37:32] electric split ductless units happened to be visible

[37:35] or the roof line was too broad in size mass

[37:38] or you would know the exact words.

[37:40] And that was something that came out

[37:41] of the planning commission.

[37:43] And it was specifically in, in the case that I was, I was

[37:46] watching was for an SRO

[37:48] and of course a lot of those come out

[37:50] of historic district standards.

[37:51] So are those then become, are those overridden

[37:54] or are those, how does that work relative to our historic

[37:56] District?

[37:57] Well, the, to use the example that you're bringing up, a,

[38:02] the applicant was proposing to build a building that was

[38:06] I think probably 30% larger than the maximum permitted

[38:10] building size in the zone. Well,

[38:11] They weren't the only ones.

[38:12] I I agree with you on that.

[38:13] Sure. And so in, in that case,

[38:15] that's why a conditional use permit was required.

[38:17] Had it been an SRO application that

[38:20] met the size requirements,

[38:22] there would've been no design review

[38:24] even in the historic district.

[38:26] The historic commission could provide recommendations

[38:29] for roof pitch dormers compatible siting.

[38:33] But ultimately if an applicant building a single family

[38:37] home, or in this case an SRO chose to present a design

[38:42] that was not historically compatible, were it not

[38:45] for the conditional use permit

[38:47] and the request to exceed permitted area,

[38:49] there would not have been a limitation on

[38:51] those design elements.

[38:53] We do have a, the split minis that you brought up,

[38:57] we do have a limitation in our code that applies universally

[39:00] to all housing types is to not put mechanical equipment

[39:03] between the face of the building and the street.

[39:07] So they would be in a position

[39:08] to relocate those onto the backside of the building in order

[39:12] to meet that standard.

[39:14] Maybe I'm still confused, Brandon. Thank you.

[39:16] And I, I appreciate it. I got most of it,

[39:17] but I'm still to the example that we're talking about

[39:20] and others like it is, I understand

[39:23] that these are coded in outright so forth as a, as a review.

[39:26] But then what I'm not understanding is when a conditional

[39:30] use permit comes into play for, let's say an adjacent reason

[39:33] or a semi or non-related issue,

[39:36] like in this particular case it was maximum floor,

[39:39] whatever it was, then we, we also apply these things

[39:44] that would otherwise be not applied if it, if not

[39:47] for the conditional use permit

[39:49] for something that's probably unrelated.

[39:50] And I think Derek can probably speak better to this than I

[39:52] as the planner that worked on that application.

[39:54] Yeah. So in, in our four national register listed historic

[39:57] districts, we have specific historic development standards

[40:01] that, that apply when a sub property subject to site review

[40:05] or conditional use permit, the state law says

[40:08] that any residential project is supposed to be subject only

[40:12] to clear and objective standards.

[40:14] But that state law does specifically exempt

[40:17] historic standards from that

[40:19] because they recognize the value in

[40:21] where communities have gone to the effort

[40:23] of identifying historic districts

[40:26] upholding a certain level of design. Okay,

[40:29] Thank you.

[40:30] So, and if I could just elaborate on that, one

[40:33] of the design standards that the city wrestled with is

[40:36] how large could buildings be

[40:38] dependent on their lot size within historic districts

[40:41] to be compatible with the districts as they built out?

[40:44] So where you have a lot size, that's 5,000 square feet.

[40:48] The code in this case said

[40:50] that the building couldn't be larger than 1,918 square feet,

[40:55] but the applicant was proposing a building that was,

[40:58] I think about 2,600 square feet.

[41:00] And so that's put them out of the outright permitted,

[41:06] you know, clear and objective standards

[41:08] and asking for a conditional use permit, which is to say

[41:12] that even though I'm exceeding those maximum limitations,

[41:16] I've designed it in a way that minimizes that adverse impact

[41:20] and makes that argument.

[41:22] So that is a discretionary act on behalf of an applicant

[41:26] to go beyond

[41:27] what the code would allow outright under a clear

[41:30] and objective standard and ask for a special exception

[41:34] to those standards through the conditional use

[41:36] permit. Understood. Thank you.

[41:38] Council Rell. Thank

[41:40] You Mayor.

[41:41] Thank you both. Again, just my, my sub question is

[41:44] that sunset date of 2033,

[41:46] that has to do with design standards.

[41:48] Does that cover historic too?

[41:52] So again, we don't have

[41:53] for single family homes design standards that apply to

[41:59] single family homes.

[42:00] Even in historic districts, you'll have a review process

[42:04] by which if you had a conditional use

[42:06] permit that could be applied.

[42:07] And that's still a recommendation,

[42:09] not an outright codified.

[42:11] So we do have some design standards in our code that apply

[42:14] to single family residential.

[42:15] They're not held to them through site review,

[42:18] but it talks about having a gable two

[42:22] of some specific elements in terms of a gable roof, a porch,

[42:25] And those would fall off. And those at that date,

[42:27] Those can't be applied until that sunset date comes.

[42:31] Okay, got it. Unless the council chose otherwise.

[42:33] Got it. My direct question had to do specifically, like

[42:35] with the technical definition

[42:37] of A-A-S-R-O single room occupancy.

[42:39] You mentioned that they were only allowed in multi-family

[42:42] zones and I, I, I'm, I'm not sure

[42:44] that I'm interpreting the enrolled bill correctly,

[42:46] but I believe that the benefit of the SRO is

[42:49] that they're allowed outright in any zone within an urban

[42:51] growth boundary, and if they're in a multifamily zone,

[42:53] they get to use the maximum density multiplier.

[42:56] Yeah, I we haven't yet gone through the ordinance

[43:00] to implement it, so Okay.

[43:02] But that one Is, I wouldn't say that we would've

[43:04] currently, if you came in in a single family zone

[43:06] and wanted to do a four unit SRO one one kitchen,

[43:09] we would consider that one dwelling.

[43:11] Okay. And as such, approve it with just a building permit.

[43:14] Yeah. So, so it is an,

[43:15] an outright allowable use in a single family zone today

[43:18] and that that is enrolled currently Correct. Believe

[43:21] It is not codified in the sense that it defines SRO

[43:25] explicitly and listed as a permitted use in that zone.

[43:29] So that is one of the changes that we'd have to come back

[43:32] to the planning commission and council to make it clear.

[43:34] Okay. But until then, if an applicant was trying to

[43:38] exercise that state law,

[43:39] because it is in effect in the DLCD,

[43:42] if the DLCD had clear language,

[43:44] we could use a state standard

[43:46] and apply it until we get our rulemaking done

[43:48] and our code updated. Correct.

[43:50] As of January of 2027 is when

[43:53] that becomes effect under the state.

[43:56] Okay. I, I guess I, I guess I'm still not clear.

[43:59] So this, this, this bill is signed into law, it's enacted

[44:04] It's current, and in that bill it indicates

[44:05] that it goes into effect on January 1st, 2027.

[44:09] I, I believe it says that it was enacted when it was

[44:11] signed by the governor because it was put into law for

[44:16] I'll The applicable standards

[44:17] Take a look at it.

[44:18] Okay. Again, I

[44:19] Thought, has anybody applied

[44:20] for an SRO since this has happened?

[44:22] No. No. So we, we haven't had to cross that bridge yet.

[44:25] Okay. All right. Thank you.

[44:27] Councillor Hansen. Thank

[44:30] You.

[44:31] Councilor Sherell asked a question, the, the first round

[44:34] that I was hoping to get, like a percentage kind of

[44:39] read these, these are exciting changes.

[44:41] I, I believe they're exciting,

[44:43] but historically we've been at like a 2%

[44:46] growth within the city.

[44:48] Does that sound right? Annually, year to year?

[44:51] Less than one in

[44:52] Years.

[44:53] Less. Less than one. So my, my thumb was on the scale there,

[44:56] what do we think these changes might do?

[44:58] I mean, how excited is the building community about these?

[45:00] Is this like meh or is this like we might get, you know,

[45:04] a floodgate opening up here.

[45:06] Is this gonna be a game changer, like 5% growth?

[45:09] I mean, are we gonna have to change any kind of like our,

[45:12] our, you know, growth strategy or anything of that nature?

[45:15] So twofold, what do you think the development community is,

[45:19] is, is has told you so far about this

[45:21] and then what do you think this might

[45:22] do to our growth numbers? Yeah,

[45:24] I haven't had conversations

[45:26] with the Home Builders Association

[45:28] or other groups that would be able to articulate whether the

[45:32] expedited process will change their development plans.

[45:36] I would presume that market forces

[45:39] probably have a greater impact in terms of

[45:41] what development is in the pipeline then

[45:45] whether it takes 120 days or 60 or 90 days.

[45:49] But obviously every month that you have holding costs is a

[45:53] cost for a developer.

[45:54] So it could essentially by expediting the processes,

[45:59] it could ensure

[46:00] that you get more housing units on the ground faster.

[46:03] I just don't know if it's actually creating a incentive

[46:07] to create housing that would not otherwise be proposed.

[46:10] But that's my own personal opinion. Well, fair enough.

[46:13] Derek, have you talked to anybody that

[46:15] I had one developer indicate that they intend to submit

[46:18] some applications as soon as this takes effect,

[46:22] but they haven't done a pre-app,

[46:23] they haven't given any details.

[46:25] Okay. It's still still early days.

[46:26] Yeah, that's great feedback though. Thank you.

[46:31] Okay, any other questions? Well, thank you both.

[46:36] I think that there's a, a, a lot of interest in seeing

[46:39] what this does in terms of our local housing development

[46:43] and seeing where that takes us

[46:44] and seeing what else we might need

[46:46] to do alongside of the state's changes.

[46:48] But so appreciate the detailed update

[46:52] and letting us know what's coming.

[46:54] Thank you. Okay, we move on now

[46:58] to our second agenda item,

[47:00] the community wildfire resilience bond.

[47:02] Sabrina?

[47:05] Yes. So I think Mayor, I can hand it over to you,

[47:07] but the mayor has brought this forward with some outside

[47:13] work with Veridian Ecosystems as well

[47:17] as our wildfire division.

[47:19] So they have a presentation tonight.

[47:21] Mayor, I don't know if you wanted to introduce further.

[47:23] Sure. Thank you. So Woolsey McKernan welcome.

[47:28] Woolsey is a local resident

[47:30] and has been following the work that we've been doing

[47:32] with our community Wildfire Protection Plan.

[47:35] And his company, Veridian is one of the companies

[47:40] that is really looking to see

[47:42] what are the innovative financing mechanisms

[47:45] that can help a community build its resilience in this

[47:48] particular case related specifically

[47:49] to wildfire risk management and wildfire risk reduction.

[47:53] So we, Woolsey reached out to me, I met with him,

[47:57] I know Councilor Kaplan has also met with him.

[47:59] We've talked through some of these elements

[48:01] and it, it seems like what they're thinking of is something

[48:06] that could potentially work for Ashland.

[48:08] And so what we're looking at this evening is

[48:10] to understand the model that they're discussing

[48:13] and also come to a decision

[48:15] as a council about are we interested in continuing the

[48:19] conversation and deciding

[48:20] what this might look like in the future.

[48:22] So with that I will hand it over

[48:24] and Woolie welcome Chris as, as well.

[48:27] Would you like us to ask questions as we go?

[48:30] Totally comfortable, if that's fine with me.

[48:33] Okay. And just, just so everyone knows,

[48:35] and I know everyone has had the, has had the slides, some

[48:38] of the details happen a little bit later in the slide

[48:41] presentation, so it's also the case

[48:43] that if we ask a question

[48:44] that's covered later, please just let us know.

[48:46] Great. Okay, go ahead.

[48:47] Sounds good. Good. So maybe just to get us started

[48:51] in dialogue with some of you

[48:52] and thinking about what makes the most sense to sort

[48:55] of orchestrate the dialogue here today.

[48:58] We thought it was best to start with Chris and the city

[49:02] and the work that's been done to date to make sure

[49:04] that we're all on the same page.

[49:06] And from there I'll pick it up

[49:08] and then talk about how we can go

[49:10] ahead and put this in motion.

[49:12] Thanks Ley. Good evening. Pleasure to be here again.

[49:17] I'm, I hear as Woolsey said, to provide some context

[49:21] to this, not necessarily to lend any particular support

[49:24] or not, but also,

[49:27] but to say that the last time City council

[49:31] had a touchpoint on this decision was

[49:33] to approve the CWPP last year in August,

[49:36] the CWPP actually got signed

[49:38] and executed in October at the end of fire season

[49:42] through the last signature with the Oregon

[49:43] Department of Forestry.

[49:45] And as such, the CWPP has been kind

[49:50] of at work in our community though the biggest barrier still

[49:53] remains funding.

[49:56] And one of the challenges

[49:57] that we foresaw in the CWPP was acquiring the amount

[50:01] of budget necessary to move at the pace that would be needed

[50:06] to significantly reduce the threat in our community

[50:10] to lives, infrastructure, economy, the whole package.

[50:14] And that still is a significant challenge, especially

[50:18] with the dwindling availability

[50:20] of grants at the federal level.

[50:23] In particular, the grant that we are kind

[50:26] of counting on community Wildfire Defense Grant, which is

[50:29] where we got the funding from the CWPP process in the first

[50:32] place is appears to be stalled out.

[50:34] I don't know if that funding is even gonna be

[50:37] available in the future.

[50:38] There's supposed to be one more year of

[50:41] eligibility left under that program,

[50:43] but there's been no talk of it at all at the federal level.

[50:49] The the state does have some dedicated wildfire funding.

[50:52] We've been able to secure about $200,000 of

[50:55] that from the Oregon Department of Forestry.

[50:57] But on the side of the Oregon Fire Marshal's office,

[51:00] we still don't have a grant program in place though

[51:03] that's been promised in its coming.

[51:05] But at the same time we know

[51:06] that funds are gonna be very competitive

[51:08] and it's gonna be hard to get an amount out of the state

[51:12] that would make a big impact on the overall budget

[51:16] and our ability to move forward at a a quick pace.

[51:20] So I think woolsey's gonna cover most

[51:24] of the details on the funding.

[51:27] We've tried to provide as much of the factual basis

[51:29] for this on our program and our experiences in the past

[51:34] and what's been done to date and our work with a FR

[51:36] and with programs in the community to build that resilience

[51:42] so that he's able to present something to you today

[51:45] that makes the most sense as possible.

[51:47] So with that, I'm gonna step away

[51:49] and if you need something from me, feel free

[51:51] to call me back, but I'm gonna leave it

[51:53] to my very capable colleague. Thank

[51:55] You.

[51:56] Thank you. Thank you Chris. Thank you.

[51:58] And thank you mayor and council

[52:01] and the public that's here in attendance for allowing me

[52:04] to make this presentation here today.

[52:06] Thank you Chris. So I'm

[52:11] a member of this community

[52:14] and as a member of this community I well appreciate the risk

[52:18] upon which I feel every day

[52:21] and in thinking about sort of the last 10 years

[52:24] of my career here

[52:25] and where I can make impact wildfire resilience is certainly

[52:30] foremost has been foremost in my mind

[52:33] and in particular the thought about the dearth

[52:36] of capital required across the west

[52:38] to solve the intractable problem of lack of availability

[52:43] of capital broadly in all 11 western states.

[52:47] So for us,

[52:50] and for me in particular,

[52:51] given my background in municipal bond finance,

[52:56] I've been thinking about how forests are not treated

[53:00] as infrastructure forests from a protection

[53:03] of a community standpoint

[53:04] and how they should be treated as infrastructure.

[53:06] And if the tree is infrastructure,

[53:08] they should be financed as infrastructure.

[53:11] And in that context that's leveraging municipal bond

[53:14] finance to do so.

[53:16] So my colleagues, myself of course,

[53:18] and my colleagues all living in the west broadly,

[53:21] I've been engaged in a process of understanding

[53:24] what the city has done, the CWPP, the background, working

[53:28] with the various members of the community here, businesses

[53:33] that have been involved in all of the work to date

[53:36] and trying to understand what has been done as well as

[53:39] how we could orchestrate a bond to help support that.

[53:45] So in thinking about that, and I'll try

[53:49] and roll through these slides

[53:50] and to the extent you want to interrupt, certainly.

[53:52] Okay. The status quo relative to

[53:56] what Chris just noted is a little under a million dollars a

[54:00] year that's allocating towards a fund

[54:03] that enables work to be done, some salaries to be paid,

[54:08] but ultimately that delivers us resilience in decades.

[54:12] There are other options on the table

[54:15] to the extent someone has the means they can go to

[54:19] write a check to make their home resilient,

[54:23] they can perhaps pursue a heloc,

[54:26] but not everybody can obviously do that commercial pace,

[54:30] which is very much my background available in six counties

[54:33] across the state of Oregon.

[54:35] Not here in Jackson, would be another mechanism,

[54:38] but ultimately that's an individual ability to do so.

[54:43] Some of you may have been exposed

[54:45] to the Blue Forest partnership in the Rogue Basin,

[54:48] that is another mechanism to, for,

[54:50] to fund the forestry work.

[54:52] But broadly that's in the forest.

[54:54] And as you just heard from Chris, broadly, I would say

[54:58] public funds, federal, state and

[55:00] otherwise are not available as they used to be.

[55:04] So what we are proposing is a wildfire resilience bond.

[55:09] And I'll walk you through the details of

[55:11] that first at a very high level.

[55:13] Hold on just a moment. Yep. Councillor

[55:14] Bloom.

[55:15] Thank you. And thank you for, for everything so far.

[55:17] So kind

[55:19] of the question popped in my head when you said what we're proposing.

[55:21] So I'm curious, how does Viridian fit into all of this?

[55:24] Are you just offering this to us for no cost?

[55:29] Great question and I probably should have stated

[55:31] that at the outset I'm an interested member

[55:34] of the community, number one, right?

[55:36] Number two, I've got a background

[55:37] that I wanna bring relative to the problem.

[55:40] And then three, the company Veridian.

[55:43] And what I focus on is delivering this across the west.

[55:47] I'm acting as a developer

[55:49] and ultimately developers are paid on the extent

[55:52] to the extent that something like this is

[55:53] pursued by a community.

[55:55] Cool. Great. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

[55:57] Yep. I should have stated that up front. All good. Yep.

[56:01] So by background,

[56:03] basically the idea here is everybody appreciates we have a

[56:07] payment mechanism in place here within our community.

[56:10] The idea is to basically take that payment mechanism,

[56:13] pull it forward to today so that we can get

[56:15] after the work that's required

[56:16] and outlined within the CWPP over a very short tenure

[56:20] of time, three to five years versus decades.

[56:24] Ultimately that bond would be sold to investors,

[56:27] the proceeds would fund the treatment required

[56:30] and we would be leveraging that water, water surcharge

[56:33] and then the repayment would be paid back

[56:35] over up to 30 years.

[56:38] It's not a blank check, it's not a federal or state program.

[56:43] It's not currently an obligation to the city's general fund,

[56:46] depending on the structure it may be.

[56:48] And we should talk about that at the tail end. So just

[56:54] Ahead council Ga, just real quick, thanks.

[56:55] Well can you, can you explain

[56:57] what did you mean when you said generally

[57:00] how it depends on how it's structured.

[57:02] So you're saying that it's what I would understand

[57:04] to be a revenue bond that comes through rates specifically,

[57:07] but that's not, it's not a geo that comes through the,

[57:11] the taxes, the general funds, but

[57:13] but you kind of said it, it depends.

[57:15] So did I miss something there or, or what is it?

[57:18] What does it depend on?

[57:19] Yeah, we're gonna, I have a slide dedicated to that

[57:21] So Okay, perfect.

[57:22] I'll, I'll wait for it. Yep, thanks. It's coming

[57:24] Up Councilor, Just Councillor Duque?

[57:26] Yes, thank you.

[57:29] Just to kind of underline that, a quick question.

[57:34] You said that I believe you said

[57:36] that we would leverage the water rate fund, so that is

[57:41] how this would be paid back, correct?

[57:43] Currently? Yep. Okay, carry on.

[57:47] I have more questions later, thank.

[57:49] Okay, great. Look forward to them.

[57:52] So just background setting the context

[57:55] from a understanding standpoint.

[57:59] Municipal bonds of course have had a very long history in

[58:01] building this country and they're broadly defined

[58:05] as no generation being able to pay for something

[58:08] that's long dated Golden Gate Bridge

[58:11] would be a fine example.

[58:13] Environmental action would certainly be another.

[58:16] And broadly, I guess as I think about my own community here,

[58:20] thinking about Ashland having access to a tool

[58:24] that would enable us to do something fairly significant

[58:27] and not being a city of 2 million, but a city of 21,000.

[58:31] So broadly focused on really us thinking about we the

[58:35] people solutioning this.

[58:37] I see now looking at the slide

[58:39] that we've got a little formatting issue there,

[58:40] but I think the most important thing in the context

[58:44] of Ashland is that

[58:47] our balance sheet is very strong.

[58:50] We have a very credit worthy counterparty in

[58:54] the city of Ashland.

[58:55] The headroom that is available against Measure five

[58:59] is significant and broadly we versus others in

[59:04] the state of Oregon are in a very good financial place

[59:07] relative to thinking about this as a solution

[59:10] for wildfire mitigation.

[59:13] The broader context is federally,

[59:17] the executive order from the Trump administration has been

[59:20] to focus on cutting down trees,

[59:22] cutting back on various initiatives

[59:25] at the forest service level.

[59:28] You heard from Chris that broadly grants are not available

[59:32] as they used to be state level.

[59:34] We now have a Z tax

[59:36] and a rainy day fund that provide some funding, not enough

[59:41] for anything contemplated within our CWPP

[59:44] and broadly across the state.

[59:46] And I think fiscally, locally, you know, we have a number

[59:49] of challenges that you all wrestle with every day.

[59:52] So broadly the solution is in people's hands.

[59:56] So let me walk through exactly

[59:59] what this would look like from a financial standpoint

[1:00:02] and what would, what we would be modeling.

[1:00:05] So first, first

[1:00:07] and foremost would be extending the work

[1:00:09] that has already been undertaken by a FR in carrying

[1:00:12] that across the line.

[1:00:13] I'll talk about the specifics here in a minute.

[1:00:16] Continuing the work in the wildland urban interface

[1:00:20] on properties that either have been mildly addressed

[1:00:23] or yet to be addressed.

[1:00:25] And then most importantly, focusing on the home hardening

[1:00:28] because that is one thing

[1:00:29] that we have not done here in the community

[1:00:31] with any great level

[1:00:32] of focus other than against the FEMA money that we received.

[1:00:36] And that's broadly focused on neighborhood led outreach

[1:00:41] and the idea with a bond paying for the program,

[1:00:44] the contractors, and ultimately the work that has

[1:00:47] to be undertaken and code enforcement would be undertaken

[1:00:51] by the city itself.

[1:00:52] Self stepping back to appreciate

[1:00:57] what other other communities have done and are doing.

[1:01:01] I think if we look at first, the only city in the country

[1:01:05] that has orchestrated a bond for wildfire mitigation,

[1:01:08] that's Flagstaff, Arizona,

[1:01:10] they did a $10 million general obligation bond.

[1:01:14] The majority of the population voted for that.

[1:01:17] They did treatment.

[1:01:18] If you were to zoom in on Flagstaff, you would see it

[1:01:21] as a true donut.

[1:01:22] They've done work all the way around the city.

[1:01:24] Fire has swept through fire was stopped

[1:01:28] before it got to the city.

[1:01:30] And they've done a number of studies

[1:01:32] around the impact at at the city

[1:01:34] level relative to that work.

[1:01:36] Rogue Valley has our forest resilience bond

[1:01:39] that's broadly out in the woods.

[1:01:42] Marin County is another example.

[1:01:43] We would point to measure C

[1:01:45] that delivers 20 million in annual revenue to Marin County.

[1:01:50] Again, majority approved not a bond yet.

[1:01:53] They're considering pivoting now to a bond.

[1:01:56] And then I've got a whole bunch of other communities

[1:01:58] that have measures similar to our own.

[1:02:00] So we're not, we're not alone here, high level for

[1:02:05] you all and, and many

[1:02:07] of you here in the room know these inputs.

[1:02:10] But broadly what we've done is put together a financial

[1:02:13] model, thinking about the inputs that we've orchestrated

[1:02:17] through the various partners here,

[1:02:20] and then the required activities against the CWPP.

[1:02:24] So structures, 12,000 of them, the water meters,

[1:02:27] which is the current approach, 52,000 acres,

[1:02:31] the treated acres of 13 seven, 7,000 left to do.

[1:02:35] And then maintenance return intervals every 10 years.

[1:02:38] And really funding home hardening the remaining vegetation

[1:02:43] work defensible space, the public outreach,

[1:02:46] which we've started and have

[1:02:47] to continue doing the admin and inspection.

[1:02:51] And then partnering with the insurance market to come along

[1:02:54] with us bond levers

[1:02:57] and we'll have lots of debates about this hopefully.

[1:03:00] But ultimately the number of homes to harden

[1:03:03] and whether we're using IBHS

[1:03:05] or California recently released a a standard

[1:03:09] that perhaps might be more promising.

[1:03:11] What expense we would orchestrate against each home,

[1:03:17] the acres that we can afford to treat,

[1:03:20] what the public outreach

[1:03:21] and education looks like, who we're touching

[1:03:24] and whether that's city staff, the non-profits

[1:03:27] that we have here in our community or for-profits.

[1:03:31] And then grant funding to buy those things down.

[1:03:34] So what we've done here is lay out three scenarios

[1:03:39] for you all to appreciate.

[1:03:41] The first being the base case

[1:03:43] and the base case is our existing $7 a month water fee

[1:03:47] that we have in place and what

[1:03:49] that would look like to bond that.

[1:03:53] And we focused on just delivering against the home

[1:03:55] hardening, assuming that we all appreciate that that is the,

[1:04:00] the mechanism that we need to play catch up on more

[1:04:03] so than just the forest itself.

[1:04:05] And in that context, our $7 fee would allow us

[1:04:10] to do a bond of $10 million,

[1:04:13] which would assume no further grants.

[1:04:15] And that continues our $7 a month fee.

[1:04:20] Ultimately without a bond not doing that.

[1:04:23] That would take us 241 years to get

[1:04:25] to resilience if we're working against that.

[1:04:29] And obviously that would not do the work

[1:04:31] of forestry outreach education,

[1:04:33] and then the administrative overhead.

[1:04:35] The second case is the CWPP case.

[1:04:40] And if we just take the inputs relative to the CWPP,

[1:04:43] the target was to harden 90% of the homes in our community

[1:04:49] at $6,600 per structure.

[1:04:52] And then that was completing all the acres over 10 years.

[1:04:56] And that ultimately would add up to $154 million bond,

[1:05:00] excluding grants.

[1:05:03] And that would ultimately be a $67 a month water fee,

[1:05:07] or $800 a year per resident

[1:05:10] or per resident that's paying the $7 fee currently.

[1:05:15] And ultimately there would be nothing that would be out

[1:05:18] of scope that would be a hundred percent solution.

[1:05:20] So that seems quite rich and probably out of reach.

[1:05:25] So what we are recommending,

[1:05:27] and this is where the debate would come, is something in

[1:05:30] between where we would go

[1:05:32] after 50% of the homes from a hardening standpoint,

[1:05:36] lower the base cost to $3,000 per structure, get

[1:05:40] after the remaining 7,000 acres, include the 30 years

[1:05:45] of maintenance because obviously you manage

[1:05:47] the veg, it grows back.

[1:05:48] And that would ultimately deliver us a $48 million bond net

[1:05:52] of a $10 million grant.

[1:05:55] And that's assuming that we would pursue some level

[1:05:58] of grant support, which would deliver a $33 a month

[1:06:01] or $392 a year expense.

[1:06:05] Councilor Bloom? Yep.

[1:06:07] Yeah. Thank you. So my question is around

[1:06:11] this is obviously you've got revenue bond, right?

[1:06:14] And so what is the, the legal

[1:06:15] and financial risk we have if a future counsel decided

[1:06:20] to get rid of the, the fee, the wildfire fee entirely,

[1:06:23] or would they not be allowed to get rid

[1:06:24] of the wildfire fee at that point?

[1:06:26] Yeah, after you've actually sold a bond to investors,

[1:06:30] you would not be allowed to get rid

[1:06:32] Of.

[1:06:33] So we, so we would effectively be tying the hands

[1:06:35] of the community to that fee on their utility bill for

[1:06:40] Whatever period of time the bond was going to be in place.

[1:06:43] That's correct. Yep. That's correct. Okay. Yep.

[1:06:47] And we'll see, that's how all bonds operate.

[1:06:49] Operate, right? They all work that way

[1:06:51] because whether it's a 10 year or 20 or 30.

[1:06:54] So the fact that it's connected to this particular fee

[1:06:58] is just the fee that it's attached to.

[1:07:01] It's not the, the dec, the decision isn't

[1:07:06] flexible because of this particular type of repayment.

[1:07:09] Just correct for our listening audience. Yep. Okay, great.

[1:07:12] Thanks. Okay, go ahead.

[1:07:15] Okay, great. So as

[1:07:19] to structuring the question, councilor Dale

[1:07:23] earlier is, you know,

[1:07:26] I think just spend a minute here on this, you know,

[1:07:28] currently, obviously this would be constructed

[1:07:31] as a revenue bond to the extent we were gonna pursue

[1:07:34] a bonded mechanism against our existing $7 or whatever.

[1:07:38] We might change it to city council authorization,

[1:07:43] faster to market prospectively, maybe higher interest rates.

[1:07:49] And in my view, a bit regressive on low to moderate

[1:07:53] income residents.

[1:07:55] And I think there's a different model

[1:07:57] and mechanism we might pursue.

[1:07:58] And then there's of course a general obligation bond,

[1:08:01] which would include the full faith and credit

[1:08:04] and backing of the city itself.

[1:08:06] Lowest interest rates, extremely marketable as a green bond,

[1:08:11] which is ultimately what this would be.

[1:08:14] And the first of its kind broadly in the, in the country.

[1:08:19] And obviously would include voter approval

[1:08:22] and prospectively an increase in property taxes.

[1:08:25] And then a whole bunch of o other options

[1:08:28] that are worth discussion.

[1:08:30] The first, as I noted to

[1:08:33] many communities across California

[1:08:35] and the West are pursuing, assessed the same approach

[1:08:39] that we've taken, but using assessed value to try

[1:08:42] and make it a bit more of a measured expense relative

[1:08:46] to the communities and their ability to repay it.

[1:08:49] There's the opportunity to, of course, flex this $3,000

[1:08:53] or whatever number we choose based on the ability to pay.

[1:08:59] We've had some dialogue about partnering

[1:09:01] with our local banking community

[1:09:03] to provide a credit facility that would allow borrowers

[1:09:07] to pursue doing more on their property

[1:09:10] to the extent they wanted to.

[1:09:13] There's an idea that's been talked about relative

[1:09:17] to the city supporting a loan loss reserve

[1:09:20] to help buy down the interest rate as we do

[1:09:22] with our energy efficiency program to date.

[1:09:25] And then there's the question of

[1:09:26] where the bill gets financed, whether it's

[1:09:28] through the utility bill, property tax or otherwise,

[1:09:31] and then debt collection

[1:09:33] and bringing this home, you know, ultimately

[1:09:36] what we're focused on here

[1:09:38] from a delivery standpoint is really just delivering

[1:09:42] something that delivers to safety

[1:09:44] to the community structure losses.

[1:09:46] If we look at peer reviewed research structure,

[1:09:49] losses have been reduced

[1:09:51] by roughly half when we pursue defensible space

[1:09:55] and home harming measures combined.

[1:09:56] And that's ultimately what we'd be orchestrating here.

[1:10:01] And then if we look back on spend relative to safety,

[1:10:07] also great studies have been done

[1:10:09] behind the landscape level work

[1:10:11] that would be orchestrated here.

[1:10:13] This is all about local jobs in the local community.

[1:10:17] And then ultimately when we talk about the insurance

[1:10:21] industry and the partnership there, you know, the idea is

[1:10:24] that by doing this work,

[1:10:26] we're ultimately focused on delivering insurability in our

[1:10:30] community and there's a path to something else.

[1:10:33] But ultimately I think we're focused on insurability

[1:10:35] as sort of first and foremost.

[1:10:37] And then the last thing to say is there's a fair amount

[1:10:41] of research that's coming out that looks at city's decision

[1:10:45] around resilience relative to their ability to bond

[1:10:47] and raise money and be a viable community

[1:10:51] generally in the capital markets.

[1:10:53] And that's another consideration.

[1:10:56] So we're, you know, I think really what I'd ask

[1:11:01] of council is we've got a plan in place.

[1:11:04] We've got revenue authorization

[1:11:06] and position, I think we have the community will,

[1:11:09] we ultimately don't have the capital to go ahead

[1:11:12] and execute on that plan.

[1:11:14] This is an idea to pull that capital forward

[1:11:16] and go execute on a bond of some size

[1:11:19] and that, that bears debate.

[1:11:21] But ultimately, we're focused on protecting close

[1:11:24] to $3 billion in property value,

[1:11:27] over $90 million in annual revenue associated

[1:11:30] with the tourism, 500 million in payroll here.

[1:11:34] And ultimately this would be an initiative

[1:11:37] for Ashland made in Ashland.

[1:11:40] So this is a lot of information.

[1:11:42] I'm looking forward to some questions and dialogue

[1:11:44] and perhaps engagement with my community members behind me.

[1:11:48] But ultimately, I would love to have you consider

[1:11:52] authorizing a working group to consider this more broadly

[1:11:56] and work through a number of next steps

[1:11:57] that are outlined here. Thank you.

[1:12:00] Councillor. Dale. Thank you, mayor.

[1:12:02] Thank you Will, thank you very much for,

[1:12:03] for getting to that other slide.

[1:12:05] So just so that I can do some math when I get home tonight.

[1:12:10] So you had said that it's a, that your preferred option is,

[1:12:13] or the one path would be the 48 million net of 10 million,

[1:12:18] which we we're not sure we're gonna get,

[1:12:20] but the math was based on getting the 10 to get it to 48.

[1:12:23] So then what is the, the term that we would be using 30,

[1:12:28] I would assume 30.

[1:12:29] And then what are the reasonable interest rates

[1:12:31] that you would say, like if this were to happen tomorrow,

[1:12:33] what would you say in your experience?

[1:12:35] Would we, could we expect, just so

[1:12:36] that I can run my own numbers for both a rev and a go bond?

[1:12:39] Sure, yeah. I, I, the feedback we've received

[1:12:44] to date is sub four in a geo bond context

[1:12:48] and barely north of that from a revenue bond context.

[1:12:51] Okay. Thank you Councillor Hanson.

[1:12:55] Thank you Willie. And I appreciate your love for Ashland,

[1:12:59] bringing your professionalism here into this circle,

[1:13:02] applying it to our, our, our problems here.

[1:13:05] Would you just hold our hands as homeowners

[1:13:09] here in Ashland, we have, you know,

[1:13:13] let's just make a theoretical house

[1:13:15] that has vegetation right up against the house.

[1:13:18] They have a wooden fence, you know, they have some kind

[1:13:20] of low lying fruit

[1:13:22] and they're looking at, at home hardening,

[1:13:26] and there's an opportunity on the table.

[1:13:28] Don't know what what mechanism yet,

[1:13:31] but is this free money to a homeowner?

[1:13:35] Is this a lending strategies this tight?

[1:13:38] Could you just kind of walk us through it,

[1:13:40] just the basics really quick?

[1:13:42] Yeah, so I think first the context in responding to that,

[1:13:46] Eric would be, I,

[1:13:49] as an individual property owner can go ahead

[1:13:51] and execute an incredible strategy from a

[1:13:53] home hardening standpoint.

[1:13:55] That doesn't mean anything

[1:13:56] unless I get my property owners to my right,

[1:13:58] left, front and back.

[1:14:00] So it is a, we're all in this together context

[1:14:04] and in that context, people without

[1:14:08] specific code enforcement are not gonna go make those moves.

[1:14:12] So code enforcement would be one,

[1:14:14] and I would, you know, urge Chris

[1:14:16] or others to comment on that.

[1:14:20] The context here is that we would be providing a,

[1:14:24] an allocation of capital to community members

[1:14:29] based on the science relative to the spread of embers

[1:14:33] and wind direction

[1:14:34] and the work that Oregon State has already done

[1:14:37] and continues to do in support of our community.

[1:14:40] And identify those neighborhoods that are at most at risk

[1:14:44] of taking out the city and,

[1:14:48] and basically put

[1:14:49] to those individual property owners an amount of money

[1:14:52] that yes, would allow them to harden their homes.

[1:14:55] The scope has to be agreed

[1:14:57] and defined by, by both by science as well

[1:15:01] as what's reasonable relative to expenditure.

[1:15:03] And then the only thing I would add is the amount of money,

[1:15:08] I believe should be in the context of what people can afford

[1:15:12] to pay ultimately.

[1:15:14] And the water meter fee

[1:15:16] is a very flat rate approach.

[1:15:19] And it's great, it provides capital to the community

[1:15:22] and the city, and I appreciate that.

[1:15:25] But if we did it on an assessed value basis,

[1:15:28] then it would be a bit more reasonable relative to

[1:15:32] how we're applying those dollars. So follow up.

[1:15:35] So thank you for that. I, I get that.

[1:15:39] And now to take it a step further, my neighbor

[1:15:42] and I are looking

[1:15:45] or have been told that these are the prescriptions

[1:15:48] for our individual properties and mine's $3,000

[1:15:52] and what, they're both $3,000,

[1:15:54] but I have the means to, to pay that back.

[1:15:56] My neighbor does not, would my neighbor essentially get that

[1:15:59] as a $3,000 grant from this?

[1:16:02] And then due to my, my financial situation,

[1:16:05] I would be paying it back in through the water fee

[1:16:08] or for, through some other mechanism?

[1:16:10] Yeah, I mean, currently it would broadly just be

[1:16:13] through the water fee if we're sticking

[1:16:14] with a water fee. So that's, that's,

[1:16:16] No, no.

[1:16:17] I'm sorry. What I meant to say is, would my neighbor get it

[1:16:20] as a grant essentially, but I would be paying additionally

[1:16:24] because, because our finances are different.

[1:16:27] Yeah. I mean, I guess if the, the difference being

[1:16:30] that if you switch to an assessed value, you,

[1:16:34] because you, you have a bigger house.

[1:16:36] You have, you are of means you'd be paying more into

[1:16:40] that bond than your neighbor would

[1:16:42] Be, but, but it wouldn't take any extra capital out of my

[1:16:46] Pocket.

[1:16:47] No, because you've already been paying monthly

[1:16:48] a larger amount of money than some,

[1:16:50] than your neighbor might be.

[1:16:52] And and so to get the message out there yeah,

[1:16:55] it would level it out so everybody would be allocated these

[1:16:58] resources and then

[1:16:59] therefore hopefully the adoption would,

[1:17:04] would be voluntary and robust.

[1:17:07] Yeah. And I, I think you start with voluntary,

[1:17:09] but then there has to be a migration to

[1:17:12] A more of that, that that will thou must do it. Right,

[1:17:16] Right.

[1:17:17] Because I, we've had, I guess we've had experience relative

[1:17:19] to the carrot, which was something,

[1:17:21] but we didn't probably get

[1:17:22] As much.

[1:17:23] Thank you for clarifying. Appreciate

[1:17:24] It.

[1:17:25] Councillor. Shell, thank you mayor. And thank you Woolsey.

[1:17:29] I've got a, a list of like five questions I'm gonna bang

[1:17:31] through, but I, I feel that they're important

[1:17:33] and I'm looking at all the questions through the lens

[1:17:35] of like, what value does the Ash lander get from this?

[1:17:38] And I really appreciate our staff.

[1:17:40] I know when the CWPP came out, it was, it was like, hey,

[1:17:43] we're gonna start with maybe 10 million a year.

[1:17:45] The city's gonna lead the way,

[1:17:46] and now it's like another cost burden on the citizens' back.

[1:17:49] And I, I think it's a good cost burden

[1:17:51] and I think it's probably worth it,

[1:17:52] but what value do we get?

[1:17:54] And I looked at some of the peer research

[1:17:56] that you were talking about defensible space, of course,

[1:17:59] but like what, like what do we get when it comes

[1:18:01] to like a deliverable?

[1:18:03] My first question is what's, what's our deliverable?

[1:18:05] Like how do we be assured that we have water

[1:18:08] to fight the fire or that we have staff on the truck,

[1:18:12] the money, if it's defensible space

[1:18:14] and ber resistant applications

[1:18:16] and removing flammable shrubs

[1:18:18] within a certain area of a house.

[1:18:20] Like how do we tie the operation to a, to an,

[1:18:23] an outcome for the citizen?

[1:18:24] Yeah.

[1:18:26] Well, I, I, I can't speak to water availability and,

[1:18:30] and I don't know if anybody else can

[1:18:34] speak to that, but

[1:18:36] The stuff on the big red truck that puts out fire,

[1:18:38] nobody, I'm kidding.

[1:18:40] I'm kidding. We'll see.

[1:18:43] So I can't, I can't speak to that.

[1:18:44] But I think, you know, if that's an expense of, of something

[1:18:46] that, you know, there's an allocation of capital that has

[1:18:50] to be orchestrated in that particular direction for

[1:18:54] whatever the need is, then that's certainly,

[1:18:55] it's a CapEx item that would be considered here.

[1:19:00] I think number one, it's it's base level insurability now

[1:19:04] that I've been doing this and looking at doing something

[1:19:07] similar to what we're orchestrate

[1:19:09] or what we're trying to orchestrate here

[1:19:12] in California in particular, you know,

[1:19:15] base level insurability is a massive

[1:19:17] issue south of the border.

[1:19:20] My colleague here in Siskiyou County is, you know,

[1:19:23] first lost his insurance

[1:19:25] and now is paying four times more than he was

[1:19:27] through the fair plan.

[1:19:30] We as a state are fast behind.

[1:19:32] We and Ashland are fast behind.

[1:19:34] So I think base level insurability is the number one

[1:19:36] thing that we can deliver.

[1:19:39] The second context is the emerging examples

[1:19:42] and the movement of the insurance industry broadly to

[1:19:46] address and understand what these investments can deliver

[1:19:50] relative to risk reduction and how they should be.

[1:19:54] The industry broadly should be thinking about

[1:19:58] delivering insurance, number one,

[1:19:59] but also delivering a, some meaningful

[1:20:04] either reduction or some meaningful measure of support.

[1:20:09] And those examples are beginning to emerge.

[1:20:12] And I'm not up here to say that they, you know,

[1:20:15] it's a quid pro quo of one versus the other,

[1:20:17] but ultimately, you know, that's, that's where we need

[1:20:20] to head as a society here in the west.

[1:20:24] And I think, you know,

[1:20:25] that's probably like the number one thing from

[1:20:27] a resilience standpoint.

[1:20:29] Thank you. That, that kind of hit on one

[1:20:30] of my other questions that I believe was really relevant

[1:20:33] to the, to the private, the private market, right?

[1:20:36] If we do, right, in theory there's firewise programs,

[1:20:39] there's several programs that we've looked into as a city,

[1:20:41] but we have no guarantee

[1:20:43] that if we're using middle case example of $36 a month, that

[1:20:47] that, you know, say it's X amount a year,

[1:20:52] that that cost isn't gonna guarantee us

[1:20:55] anything from an insurance standpoint.

[1:20:57] 'cause we can't dictate what they charge us,

[1:20:59] but we can see what we're currently paying.

[1:21:02] So that, do we have any data that shows

[1:21:04] our mid case scenario of say it is an, a percentage

[1:21:09] of the assessed value compared to what insurance is costing.

[1:21:13] Now if somebody were

[1:21:14] to buy a home to move into this community,

[1:21:16] We don't, we don't have that data not in our community.

[1:21:20] There's those, those points of evidence are starting

[1:21:23] to materialize in other communities,

[1:21:25] but we do not in this community to do.

[1:21:27] Okay. But that would be part of the engagement here would be

[1:21:30] to orchestrate that

[1:21:32] and be in partnership with a variety of insurers

[1:21:35] both locally and at the state level.

[1:21:38] So the similar engagement that I'm having here,

[1:21:42] we're also doing at the state level to pursue a,

[1:21:46] a similar effort

[1:21:47] and initiative that would orchestrate pulling in

[1:21:52] state level actors at from an insurance

[1:21:54] standpoint at the state level.

[1:21:56] Awesome. That's awesome.

[1:21:57] And one more just to, to be respectful of time. Yep.

[1:22:00] When we look at potential, the potential of,

[1:22:05] of working with other agencies

[1:22:07] and potentially looking at an impact study of

[1:22:10] what it would look like to maybe join forces

[1:22:13] with a local fire district

[1:22:14] and what that would look like as a bond measure.

[1:22:17] Have we talked at all with any

[1:22:19] of our other organizations in the area through a study

[1:22:23] that's, that's currently going on to look at what

[1:22:25] that would, what kind of partnership we could have?

[1:22:27] So we're not going out for a bond for one thing

[1:22:29] that looks like fire and safe and life safety

[1:22:32] and then we're coming back and looking at something else

[1:22:34] when we potentially examine consolidations.

[1:22:37] Yeah, we have, relative

[1:22:41] to the work that SFR

[1:22:43] and the rest of the community has,

[1:22:45] has done across the rogue basin.

[1:22:49] And that would orchestrate towards a, a county level bond,

[1:22:54] which is perhaps something that could be pursued.

[1:22:58] Obviously there's a variety of political and

[1:23:03] otherwise views at the county level

[1:23:05] and we would have ultimately less control in orchestrating a

[1:23:09] particular bond initiative at the county level.

[1:23:12] There's a consideration as I just referenced,

[1:23:15] in thinking about the state

[1:23:17] and how we orchestrate a bond at the state level

[1:23:19] and that's, that's ongoing but you know, this

[1:23:25] and sort of where we've, the genesis of this has been off

[1:23:27] of an existing water fee that's in place

[1:23:31] and a CWP that's in place in this community

[1:23:34] and trying to raise capital

[1:23:36] and bring that money forward so that we can get

[1:23:38] after the work broadly.

[1:23:40] But I think the whole concept

[1:23:43] of the Jackson County as a target,

[1:23:47] I've not fully unpacked that just yet.

[1:23:49] Thank you so much for the work you're doing,

[1:23:51] Councilor Bloom.

[1:23:54] Thank you. So the way I see it, I mean we really kind

[1:23:56] of have two, two paths forward here

[1:23:58] and one with this, this revenue bond option is,

[1:24:01] it would be council authorized

[1:24:02] and we'd essentially be kinda going back to

[1:24:04] what I was saying earlier, locking in a high fee

[1:24:07] for residents for the term of that bond.

[1:24:10] The other alternative is the, a geo bond, right?

[1:24:14] Going to the voters. Now, we were kind

[1:24:15] of having a side conversation about this earlier,

[1:24:17] but could you speak to what kind of effects, if any,

[1:24:20] this would have on the city's ability to go forward and,

[1:24:24] and raise property taxes up

[1:24:26] to the limit if there was some other need

[1:24:28] that the city had for that?

[1:24:30] Yeah, I have not fully unpacked that.

[1:24:33] I've had some initial dialogue with Jordan

[1:24:36] and Sabrina around that.

[1:24:38] That's work that has to be undertaken

[1:24:41] to fully appreciate measure five

[1:24:43] and 50 in the headroom, both with the existing debt

[1:24:47] that the city has as well as the loan

[1:24:49] that was recently underwritten undertaken relative

[1:24:51] to the water treatment plant.

[1:24:53] So that work has to be, has to be done

[1:24:56] and then ultimately a better path to guidance

[1:24:59] for city council and the mayor's

[1:25:01] consideration ultimately. Thank

[1:25:02] You.

[1:25:03] Okay, council Catherine?

[1:25:05] Yeah, I I just wanna speak to that just for a second,

[1:25:07] but then I have some other points that I wanted to make.

[1:25:10] My understanding is that a general obligation bond goes

[1:25:13] against our debt capacity,

[1:25:15] not against our measure five and measure 50.

[1:25:17] Measure five and measure 50 is property tax assessment.

[1:25:21] So that would be our property tax

[1:25:23] or a local option levy for example.

[1:25:26] But that the actual bond, any bond

[1:25:28] that goes against our general f full faith

[1:25:29] and credit is against our debt capacity.

[1:25:31] And I think you said in there that we have very low

[1:25:35] debt in this city.

[1:25:38] I, my my sense is it's, we've got probably

[1:25:41] among the lowest levels of debt of any city in, in Oregon.

[1:25:45] We do very, and that's a great thing. That's a great thing.

[1:25:48] But that's not the same as measure five

[1:25:52] and measure 50 limits on tax, $15

[1:25:55] of taxes per per thousand cap ceiling.

[1:26:00] Is that, just answer that. Yep. And our headroom is at 2 66.

[1:26:04] I know you were, I know you were

[1:26:05] 'cause you had this conversation, but I wanna make a confer

[1:26:07] confirmation of that because that's not, that's not

[1:26:10] what you were going, where you going will see, i I

[1:26:13] I wanna just, we'll see.

[1:26:15] Thank you very much for this presentation.

[1:26:16] It's, you gave, it was a lot here

[1:26:19] and you went through it pretty quickly,

[1:26:21] but I'd like to see if I can boil it down to a couple

[1:26:24] of big concepts.

[1:26:26] 'cause I think what's really, what's really at under

[1:26:29] discussion here, first of all, going back

[1:26:32] to last August when Chris and Mark and,

[1:26:36] and

[1:26:40] presented the community wildfire protection plan,

[1:26:43] which was a big thing and a big audacious thing.

[1:26:47] It took two years to put together.

[1:26:51] We asked a lot of questions

[1:26:52] and we said, yes, we're totally committed to this

[1:26:54] because we don't, it's an existential threat to Ashland.

[1:26:57] We've gotta do something about our wildfire risk.

[1:26:59] It's the highest priority of our, of our community members

[1:27:03] to try to deal with that.

[1:27:06] We didn't do it before, we didn't do it

[1:27:09] after in response to the community wildfire protection plan.

[1:27:11] But 'cause we approved the $7 wildfire risk fee,

[1:27:15] monthly fee on the utility bill before that.

[1:27:18] But it was with that in mind, knowing

[1:27:20] that we were gonna put some money in place

[1:27:21] to help implement it.

[1:27:22] And I think you've done a pretty good job of showing how,

[1:27:25] you know how little that is in comparison to

[1:27:28] what actually needs to be done now.

[1:27:30] It wasn't supposed to do everything that's city,

[1:27:31] that's money that comes into the city.

[1:27:33] We knew Chris and Marshall and, and,

[1:27:37] and Mark told, told us that some of these things were going

[1:27:40] to be paid for some of this cost,

[1:27:42] a hundred million dollar costs that Chris estimated was

[1:27:45] going to be paid for by the city.

[1:27:47] Some of it's gonna fall to the community members.

[1:27:49] So the $7 fee doesn't have to cover everything.

[1:27:52] But you made a really,

[1:27:53] I think a really important point when you personalize it

[1:27:56] to your own personal situation

[1:27:58] where you can do whatever you want in your house,

[1:28:00] but if your neighbors around you don't do it to make sure

[1:28:03] that they're putting screens of the right, you know,

[1:28:07] aperture so that embers don't get into your attic or your,

[1:28:12] or your ground, your crawl space, you know,

[1:28:15] that house is gonna go

[1:28:16] up, landscaping and all that sort of stuff.

[1:28:18] So we're all, we are all in this together.

[1:28:20] So every one of us need to do something here.

[1:28:24] And, and the bottom line is not everybody

[1:28:26] has the ability to do it.

[1:28:27] Some people do have the ability to, to use savings or,

[1:28:32] or borrowing to do some

[1:28:33] of these things on their house and others don't.

[1:28:35] So we wanna make sure that everybody can do

[1:28:37] So Councillor Yeah, just for a moment, we are at 6 58.

[1:28:41] If we would like to continue this conversation, we need

[1:28:43] to contract for some additional time.

[1:28:45] Councillor Dale, move to

[1:28:46] Extend for 15 minutes.

[1:28:48] Is there a second? All in favor.

[1:28:50] A Okay, carry on. Councillor Katherine. Great.

[1:28:52] So we, we talked, we, we talked in the,

[1:28:56] in approving the wildfire,

[1:28:57] the community wildfire protection plan about what is it

[1:29:00] that the city only the city can do.

[1:29:01] There are certain things that only the city can do

[1:29:03] and we need to make sure that we're resourcing that.

[1:29:06] And there are other things that we know that

[1:29:08] others in the community can do,

[1:29:10] but it's really important that the city do certain things

[1:29:13] to make that possible.

[1:29:14] There are homeowners that need to do certain things

[1:29:16] and the city can do some things to make that possible.

[1:29:18] Or there are community groups that are doing things

[1:29:20] and the city needs to do certain

[1:29:21] things to make that possible.

[1:29:23] So I'm looking at all of this as the constellation of money

[1:29:26] that's gonna be there, making sure

[1:29:28] that we've got enough resources to be able to stand behind

[1:29:32] what the city needs to do to make sure that we can

[1:29:34] help our community members who don't have the resources

[1:29:38] to do some of that home hardening.

[1:29:40] That they're gonna have the ability to do that

[1:29:42] as well without overspending to, to on people

[1:29:46] that really probably could, like you said,

[1:29:49] you could do it on your house.

[1:29:51] I've ideally we wouldn't give you a $3,000

[1:29:54] to do the work on your house.

[1:29:55] You would, you would do it yourself

[1:29:56] or you maybe the city would facilitate some sort of

[1:30:00] loan for, for, for that.

[1:30:02] That's right. So it seems to me that all of this,

[1:30:04] what you've stood up is a, we've got a bunch

[1:30:06] of design questions that we need to current.

[1:30:09] 'cause you put, you put a whole bunch of options here. Yep.

[1:30:11] And I'm trying to boil it down.

[1:30:13] So it seems to me now this is where the, my question is,

[1:30:15] what are our, what are our questions that we need

[1:30:18] to really get to as a, as a council?

[1:30:20] And I think there probably does need

[1:30:21] to be a working group on this if we wanna, if we want

[1:30:23] to chase it down.

[1:30:25] One thing is, you know, you, you talked about a revenue bond

[1:30:29] leveraging the wildfire risk fee.

[1:30:31] It's $7 or it could be higher,

[1:30:33] but whatever it is, that's one avenue.

[1:30:36] A second design question is whether it should be, instead

[1:30:39] that goes into equal parts on every single person

[1:30:42] that pays a water bill in this hou in this town versus a

[1:30:46] general obligation bond, which is to taxpayers based on

[1:30:50] dollars per thousand valuation.

[1:30:52] Yep. So that's a progressive application of the,

[1:30:56] of, of raising this money.

[1:30:58] Either way it would fund, it would fund a re a bond

[1:31:03] that would give us money upfront to do the work that needs

[1:31:05] to be done, how whatever that is.

[1:31:06] And we need to estimate how much that is

[1:31:08] and how who gets access to it and all those things.

[1:31:09] So who gets access to it?

[1:31:11] How much it is, is, is another design question then.

[1:31:16] Is this gonna be equal grants to everybody

[1:31:18] that's in all homeowners and assets?

[1:31:20] You, you mentioned $3,000, is that right? The right thing?

[1:31:23] So there's another design question, which is how much

[1:31:25] of it is grant, how much of this

[1:31:26] loan, all those kinds of things.

[1:31:29] And what do we need to do in

[1:31:30] order to get sufficient coverage?

[1:31:31] So where are we gonna prioritize it?

[1:31:33] And this is just the portion

[1:31:35] that's within the city limits on the urban areas,

[1:31:38] around residences, around commercial buildings.

[1:31:41] It's not even talking about the, the continuing the work

[1:31:44] that was we've done for many years up in the watershed.

[1:31:47] So that's the other design issue, which is how much

[1:31:49] of this is down here in the city, how much

[1:31:51] of it is in the watershed?

[1:31:53] Do am i, have I missed some of the design issues

[1:31:55] that we need to tease out there. There, there

[1:31:58] Are others.

[1:31:59] But that, that's the core, core.

[1:32:00] There's, that's the core of it

[1:32:01] Right there because I'm, I'm sensing that if we can get to

[1:32:04] that core and try to really tease it out,

[1:32:07] then we can have a lot more, you know,

[1:32:09] practical conversations about, you know, what, you know,

[1:32:12] what else we can, would, can accomplish. Is that okay?

[1:32:15] Excellent. Thank you. Councillor

[1:32:17] Duque.

[1:32:18] Goodness. Thank you.

[1:32:22] Thank you for your presentation.

[1:32:24] And this is a wealth of information.

[1:32:28] So my thought around this is just kind

[1:32:31] of dialing it back a little bit is this is

[1:32:35] wildfire mitigation.

[1:32:37] Well, I wish we could mitigate it,

[1:32:39] but the risk is important to all of us.

[1:32:42] So looking at this hardening something

[1:32:44] that I know from my experience living here, there's

[1:32:47] so many HOAs in Ashland that have taken it upon themselves

[1:32:52] to actually make sure that their neighborhood is resistant.

[1:32:57] I'm grateful to live in one.

[1:32:59] We have put in, we put fireproof fences, gates

[1:33:03] around and fences.

[1:33:04] And I see that happening more

[1:33:06] and more in so many neighborhoods, not just HOAs.

[1:33:09] So I applaud everybody that has the means to do that.

[1:33:13] And then there's others that don't have

[1:33:15] the means to do that.

[1:33:17] So something that my colleague ca,

[1:33:19] counselor Kaplan mentioned is shaking this out.

[1:33:23] My concern is we added a $7 surcharge to

[1:33:27] that water fee for this purpose.

[1:33:30] And, and at that time we added additional fees

[1:33:34] to our utilities.

[1:33:36] Some people, a lot of people are in a bad way.

[1:33:41] So when I look at this coming in front of people

[1:33:45] at a $33 rate per month,

[1:33:47] that means 40 bucks per month just looking at this

[1:33:52] $40, that's gas, that's food.

[1:33:56] And I appreciate what was brought up earlier.

[1:33:59] However, I believe

[1:34:02] that Flagstaff in Marin County, it went to the voters.

[1:34:05] Is that correct?

[1:34:07] In both cases? Yes.

[1:34:08] Yes. And so looking at Ashlyn,

[1:34:14] I, are you proposing that it goes to the voters?

[1:34:18] That is not my decision.

[1:34:20] There's two paths that have to be debated

[1:34:24] And I, I believe they definitely have to be debated

[1:34:27] because I just want to say

[1:34:30] that the way I look at it right now,

[1:34:32] implementing this now is not the time.

[1:34:35] You know, and it's like, when is the time?

[1:34:37] I don't know, wildfire could happen any given day.

[1:34:41] And so i I am not, you know, God,

[1:34:44] I can't make say hey or nay on that.

[1:34:46] However, what I do know is that an additional fee.

[1:34:51] I don't see it happening right now.

[1:34:53] And, and something that was asked earlier about

[1:34:56] what can we do as a body, I am not in favor

[1:35:02] of any type of code enforcement on any individual

[1:35:06] to have to do this.

[1:35:08] So a work group

[1:35:12] and get more information.

[1:35:14] But I'm sure that I'm just looking at the faces.

[1:35:17] It seems like you have a lot of support here,

[1:35:21] but I would like to look at other opportunities

[1:35:25] or send it to our community and let them vote on it.

[1:35:28] Thank you. Thank

[1:35:29] You Councilor Dale.

[1:35:31] Thank you mayor. So I know that all of us in this room,

[1:35:35] or most of us could spend correct hours.

[1:35:39] So my question to you would be for someone, you know,

[1:35:42] my neighbor that I'm going to speak to this about

[1:35:45] that has very limited attention

[1:35:47] span is going about their way.

[1:35:48] So what would you say in 30, 60 seconds max,

[1:35:52] where I'm having a brief conversation of relative

[1:35:56] to this program and counselor sll talked about value.

[1:36:00] Tell me what success looks like

[1:36:03] and how is it going to be measured to someone

[1:36:05] that can only has 30 seconds to get that in explanation?

[1:36:08] Yeah, I think success is that we have

[1:36:12] insurance period.

[1:36:14] And to the extent you have a mortgage, you probably do.

[1:36:17] I do. You're gonna continue to own your house

[1:36:20] and not lose it to the lender

[1:36:21] because you can't get insurance.

[1:36:23] That's what success looks like at the, at its highest level.

[1:36:26] Right. Thank you. Yep.

[1:36:30] So we are coming to the, the end of our time here.

[1:36:34] I wanted to just add in a couple of thoughts.

[1:36:37] First, thank you Woolsey for both this

[1:36:39] and for the conversations that we've had

[1:36:41] leading up to this conversation.

[1:36:43] One of the things that we have seen in the last 10 years is

[1:36:47] wildfire go from being something that sometimes used

[1:36:50] to come in and, and,

[1:36:52] and grab a couple of houses at the outskirts of town

[1:36:54] to being something that has the potential

[1:36:57] to cause catastrophic damage to this community

[1:37:00] that we might very well not be able to recover from.

[1:37:03] So when we think, when I think about what does the wildfire

[1:37:08] situation look like for us, to me it's safety.

[1:37:10] When people ask me what keeps me up at night,

[1:37:12] a fleeing event in this town with us built up the side

[1:37:15] of the mountain and having the demographics

[1:37:17] that we have is the part that keeps me up at night.

[1:37:20] What we know is that wildfire risk is

[1:37:23] increasing year over year.

[1:37:25] It is moving very quickly.

[1:37:27] It is outpacing communities across the west

[1:37:30] and the risk that we have, I mean,

[1:37:33] when we look at these numbers,

[1:37:34] when we think about things like $50 million, you know,

[1:37:37] when we're looking in those kind

[1:37:38] of ranges, it's a lot of money.

[1:37:39] It is serious to my colleagues' point, to ask this community

[1:37:43] to make that kind of investment.

[1:37:46] And it is also an enormous amount of money

[1:37:49] and people that are at risk if we don't figure something out

[1:37:53] that allows us to go forward quickly to get to a place

[1:37:58] of maintenance rather than taking the risk of trying

[1:38:00] to do the incremental piece year over

[1:38:03] year, decade over decade.

[1:38:06] I think there are a couple of things

[1:38:07] that are really important that I've seen from this council

[1:38:09] as we've gone through conversations about utility billing

[1:38:12] and about how this is impacting different kinds

[1:38:16] of things are impacting our residents.

[1:38:17] And that comes back to Councillor Hanson.

[1:38:19] Your point around, you know, how do we build a system

[1:38:23] that is equitable, right?

[1:38:25] That that, that actually works

[1:38:27] for the people in this community, for the people

[1:38:29] who can't afford to pay it, for the people

[1:38:31] who can't afford to pay it.

[1:38:32] And how do we move together as a community into a place

[1:38:36] of greater, greater resilience and greater safety

[1:38:40] and greater protection, which is, which is right at the top

[1:38:43] of of the list for me.

[1:38:45] What the, the question in front

[1:38:47] of the council this evening is, would we like to continue

[1:38:52] down this path with Woolsey

[1:38:54] and his team of identifying

[1:38:56] what those different pathways could be?

[1:38:58] So of course, we're in a study session now,

[1:39:00] we all know we're not making a decision here, but,

[1:39:03] but what I am envisioning is that we would continue to work

[1:39:05] with them and we would come back to the council.

[1:39:07] We some options that have been clarified.

[1:39:10] So would the coun, is the council interested in these

[1:39:13] different kind of pathways and, and whittle it down?

[1:39:17] And then if the council is still interested,

[1:39:19] then we continue to develop whatever the pathway is

[1:39:23] that the council believes is the

[1:39:24] best interest of the community.

[1:39:26] So with that, what I would recommend that we,

[1:39:29] what I'd ask the council to do is

[1:39:31] to essentially authorize me and another one

[1:39:34] or two counselors to continue to work on this with Woolsey

[1:39:38] as an expression of interest in this potential program.

[1:39:41] And what I'd like to do is just go around the horn

[1:39:43] and find out each person's,

[1:39:46] each person's thoughts on moving forward in that way.

[1:39:50] Whoever would like to start. Councillor Sherell? Yes. Okay.

[1:39:54] Councillor Dale. Yes.

[1:39:57] Yes. But I, I don't think

[1:39:59] that we should pursue even having a

[1:40:00] conversation about the revenue bond.

[1:40:02] That's just my piece of it.

[1:40:03] So in, in this, if we, if we move forward,

[1:40:07] then we would come back with a variety of different options

[1:40:10] for the, the council to consider.

[1:40:13] And may I actually have a qualifying just question

[1:40:15] to staff and Sabrina is, is you good with staff involvement

[1:40:19] as part of this and have the resources to be able

[1:40:22] to allocate to this?

[1:40:24] Yeah, I think what will be key for us is

[1:40:26] what financial mechanism you want us to model

[1:40:30] or if we're modeling both.

[1:40:32] So we'll need to kind of figure out

[1:40:34] where this fits in the work plan.

[1:40:38] Back to you Councilor Bloom. So,

[1:40:39] So yeah, I think that that raised the question is we can,

[1:40:42] I think we can go around and say, yes, we want

[1:40:43] to have a working group and pursue this,

[1:40:45] but I think we should also make a decision.

[1:40:47] Do we want to explore both or do we wanna explore one

[1:40:49] because it it costs staff different amounts of time,

[1:40:51] different amounts of effort.

[1:40:53] And why spin our wheels if we kind of all agree

[1:40:56] that maybe there's a, a better singular path

[1:40:58] On that.

[1:40:59] So let me clarify the, the request in front of the council,

[1:41:01] the request is for the working group to assess

[1:41:05] multiple pathways that include the revenue bond

[1:41:07] and come back to the council with those pathways for further

[1:41:12] refinement and decision about whether that's a way forward.

[1:41:15] Councillor Rell? Yes. Councillor Dale?

[1:41:18] Yes. Councillor Bloom. Okay. Councillor Kaplan? Yes.

[1:41:22] Councillor Duque. No, I don't wanna pursue the bond. Okay.

[1:41:27] Counselor Hansen? Absolutely, yes. Okay.

[1:41:31] So we have our, our guidance from council.

[1:41:35] I would, I will plan to be part of this conversation

[1:41:38] and then also looking for two other people.

[1:41:40] So if you are interested in being on this working group,

[1:41:43] please reach out to me and let me know.

[1:41:45] And then if we have more than two other people interested,

[1:41:48] then we'll we'll have some conversations

[1:41:50] and see who should serve on it with me.

[1:41:54] Okay, great. Well that takes us to the end

[1:41:56] of our agenda this evening.

[1:41:58] Thank you all so much for coming.

[1:41:59] Thank you again, Woolsey and,

[1:42:01] and all of the folks who've come out

[1:42:02] to hear the conversation meeting is adjourned.

Ashland City Council Study Session

Agenda

Transcript