[4:38] I call the meeting to order. Good evening and welcome to the June 15, 2021 study session of your

[4:45] Ashland City Council. I start the evening tonight with some sad news. We have learned of the passing

[4:54] of St. Helen City Administrator John Walsh from an accident in the Columbia River. John was a dedicated

[5:00] public servant in Washington and Oregon and had served the community of St. Helen since 2012. He had

[5:08] served also in state-wide leadership roles to advance the profession, and there are a lot

[5:15] of people hurting across the state right now with this news. I would like to invite Sabrina

[5:19] if you had some thoughts.

[5:23] Yeah, thank you for recognizing John. He was a great administrator and a nice friend to be

[5:28] able to call on, so we will miss him.

[5:31] So our thoughts are with his family and his community as they navigate their way through these

[5:37] difficult times.

[5:39] On our agenda this evening we have three items. This first one is a finance update. So you'll

[5:46] we have invited all members of the Citizens Budget Committee to join us for this financial update.

[5:52] This is one of the things that we are looking to

[5:56] we're working out in terms of the structure of how the Citizens Budget Committee operates in the

[6:09] will be our first agenda item, and then we will have a presentation on story town, and then

[6:15] we'll discuss the manufactured home, park zoning, amendments, and code updates. So we'll start

[6:21] with the finance update, the third quarter fiscal year, 26 financial update and forecast Sabrina.

[6:29] Yes, thank you to members of the Budget Committee for coming tonight. This is requested as we

[6:35] wrapped up this year's budget process, or this is my name's budget process, excuse me. So thank

[6:40] for returning. So tonight we're going to go over an update on the budget as well as some kind of key

[6:45] items we're tracking as we roll into our second year of the biennial budget. And with that, I'm

[6:51] going to hand it over to Brad. Thank you, Brad. Good evening, Mayor and Council and our citizen members.

[6:57] We have Linda Adams, Jim Fredericks, and Shane Hunter. We are welcoming tonight. Thank you for joining us.

[7:04] So we are going to prepare and present. We prepared and will present at the third quarter financial

[7:09] update but we also did some estimates for the end of the year and we will also meet again

[7:15] once we have the you know an estimate and more solid financial numbers for the full fiscal year

[7:22] that will be in the fall at some point to reconvene again per request it as well.

[7:30] The third quarter financials that are in your packet include a summary of the fund balances, a summary of revenues and expenditure citywide, a statement of resources, requirements and changes in fund balance by fund, and a summary of cash and investments.

[7:49] This is a chart showing the year over your third quarter revenues and how they compared year over year.

[8:03] So, in summary, for the third quarter city wide revenue is at 78.2 million or a 5% increase from the prior year.

[8:14] Primarily in taxes, this is due to an increase in the public safety fee as well as the wildfire risk reduction fee, and the creation of the park speed this last budget.

[8:24] Food and beverage tax was at 6.2% higher than last year at the same time period, transient

[8:31] lodging tax, 10.1% increased in the prior year, and higher than the prior year for

[8:37] licenses and permits and system development charges.

[8:43] Intergovernmental revenue was higher and that's mostly due to the public work's tap system

[8:49] upgrades, some conflagration reimbursement for our fire department and some state revenue

[8:55] sharing. It's steadily holding steady right now, which is a good sign for us, charges for

[9:01] services at the point of March 31st. Remember, it was lower than the previous year because

[9:07] of a mild winter, we may see that change with the heat coming on with electricity for our

[9:14] conditioning, as well as watering come. But we'll report that later, quarterly update.

[9:20] Finds and researchers are higher than the previous year, mostly due to increased parking

[9:24] revenue, fine revenues, excuse me, interest on investments is decreased compared to the prior year

[9:30] as expected. It's at 78.7% and we are monitoring that closely. We have investments with Wells Fargo,

[9:38] as well as we retain most of our funding in our local government investment pool because the rates are

[9:45] holding higher than outside investments at this time. Miss Lanes revenue increased over the prior year

[9:53] due to the sale of clean fuel credits and decommissioned assets in our equipment fund.

[10:00] When we decommissioned assets, we put them up for sale on guv deals and we have a good

[10:05] response in selling those decommissioned assets.

[10:11] This is a chart showing your a year for the third quarter for the expenditures, same time

[10:15] period year over year.

[10:18] And the third quarter is the first year of the biannium, 75% of this year.

[10:24] Personnel Services is a 70.2% of budget, materials and services is at 68.8% of budget.

[10:33] DET Services trending as expected based upon repayment schedules.

[10:38] And Capital Outlay is trending as expected based upon the time of projects with this spring

[10:43] and some are coming tends to be higher capital improvement

[10:46] because of the weather.

[10:48] And all of the expenditures are within budgetary requirements

[10:53] and as expected for the third quarter.

[10:57] This city's net position, the fund balance city wide,

[11:00] we're at 84.8 million versus 89.8 million the prior year.

[11:06] And that is as expected, the general fund is 16.8 million

[11:11] versus 20 million the previous year.

[11:13] Street fund $3.2 million versus $3.9 and that is due to more capital projects this year than last year.

[11:22] Water fund, summer release, $16.9 versus $19.3.

[11:28] Telecommunications fund as well. They've done some capital work, $2.6 versus $3.

[11:33] And then the capital improvement fund as you see in your packet shows a negative fund balance.

[11:38] And we brought that to council and we were requested a transfer from the general fund to cover

[11:45] that $200,000 over expense for the community center and pioneer hall so the next quarterly

[11:53] report you will see that fund balance as a positive.

[11:57] Cash investment city-wide is at $79.2 million versus $83.6 million for the previous year.

[12:05] And that is what happens when we do these large capital projects we do draw down our fund balances.

[12:13] Tonight, we are incorporating information for National Parks and Recreation as well.

[12:18] We presented this to the Commission when we had the joint meeting.

[12:22] And this is just a summary and more detailed explanation of the third quarter is presented by the Park staff to the Commission.

[12:28] Revenue is slightly higher than the previous year and expenditures are within budget expectations.

[12:35] General Fund is at 67.4 for personal services, materials and services 64.1.

[12:43] And then the Parks Capital Improvement Fund balance is almost 3.5 million at this point with the expectation of the

[12:57] Can you go back one slide if you don't mind if you would mind briefly clarifying for those following along?

[13:05] Would you provide a brief definition of what within budget expectation means?

[13:11] So, at this point in the year, we are at 75% of the year.

[13:17] So, when we build the budget, we would not expect the expenditures to be any higher than 75% at this point.

[13:24] And with personnel services, we have some savings from some vacancies through parks, and then

[13:31] from materials and services they have done some reductions in the materials and services.

[13:36] So it's coming in as expected.

[13:37] And is that, do we have that written down?

[13:39] Is that a policy that we go by or is that just something we use?

[13:42] Just kind of internally is financial best practices.

[13:44] It's financial best practices.

[13:46] And because we budget on a biennium year, if we do see that it is going over slightly, we

[13:52] are not in violation because we have the two-year appropriation, but we definitely would watch

[13:59] at the second year if it came in.

[14:01] At the end of this fiscal year over a hundred percent, we would definitely be watching it

[14:05] for the next year.

[14:07] Thank you.

[14:11] This is a chart provided by the Parks staff showing their CIP and their balance, their general

[14:20] fund revenue amounts and their budget execution on regarding their appropriation levels.

[14:30] As part of the financial update, we've incorporated an update on our low income assistance

[14:37] programs and at the end of March, we had 451 qualified customers. 28 have reached a $400,

[14:46] $400 threshold and for those budget committee members that might not be familiar with this,

[14:51] We offer up to $400 discount per calendar for per fiscal excuse me per fiscal year and that is a

[15:00] 30% reduction on their water, sewer, and electric charges. And what was budgeted for this year alone was

[15:08] almost 283,000, and at the end of March, we were at 96,000.

[15:15] Before you move on from there, can you just clarify if qualified customers means that they are participating in the

[15:26] are.

[15:26] Not just people.

[15:27] We've identified this.

[15:29] They are receiving the discount.

[15:37] As part of the financial update, we also provide an update on our utility receiver,

[15:42] which is the amount that is owed by our utility building customers.

[15:49] So we have 2.6 million of the 5 million total that is owed that is passed due.

[15:56] 1.3 million are on payment plans right now and 1.3 are not and subject to delinquent processing.

[16:05] So each month we bill between 2.3 and 2.6 million dollars.

[16:10] That's why you see that difference between the 2.6 of the 5 million.

[16:15] That the 5 million is the total amount that we have billed.

[16:19] Not including those that may have just billed 10 days prior to this that are not considered past due.

[16:30] A normal is this as a year-to-year basis.

[16:34] So, this actually is, we are working towards getting back to normal.

[16:41] We went through several years with COVID and with the almedifier and with staffing levels

[16:47] where we were not able to pursue delinquent processing.

[16:52] So we are getting back to being able to be more normal in normal times we would not

[16:58] have 2.6 million that are delinquent.

[17:02] So the city has offered extended payment plans

[17:05] and worked with customers on getting assistance programs

[17:09] qualifying for the $400 assistance as well

[17:13] and trying to help them manage paying off their delinquent balances.

[17:19] And this is a reminder, please raise your hand

[17:21] to be called on Councillor Schrell.

[17:24] Thank you, Mayor.

[17:24] Thanks, friend.

[17:25] That 1.3 that's not subject to delinquent processing

[17:28] is that part of the description you gave, maybe six right months ago, where if individual residents

[17:35] have left residency and we can't further track them, we're writing that off and getting

[17:39] enough, our books completely?

[17:42] No, what that 1.3 is their on payment plants.

[17:45] So it is still a delinquent, but they're meeting their monthly payment plan amount, so they

[17:50] are not subject to disconnect, they're not part of the delinquent processing.

[17:54] We pull them off of that and as long as they maintain that payment plan and pay down that balance each month

[18:00] We don't consider them delinquent. Okay, and then what just follow-up mayor if I mean what what portion of that

[18:07] Peace of millions of dollars

[18:09] Can we get off our books because they've left the system? Do we have a number for that?

[18:14] These are all current customers. Okay, and then the amount that we dropped off

[18:18] Do we ever get that part off of our books?

[18:20] So we have sent that with the assistance from the Department of Revenue and to a collection agency

[18:26] where we have asked them to help us with pursuing those delinquent amounts. And we're making

[18:32] some progress. We're just starting with the Department of Revenue because of the taxis and just

[18:38] just coming, you know, right about this time that we are starting to see some returns.

[18:43] And that's the amount of that is, do we know, so much the total is?

[18:46] The total was 2.3 million.

[18:48] 2.3, okay. Thank you.

[18:50] Yeah, you're welcome.

[18:55] And this is the aging, which is what we call it, the total that is outstanding by fund and by the time period.

[19:04] So you can see that at this point we had that 2.4 that was considered current charges.

[19:11] When is those that are over 120 days passed due?

[19:18] As part of the financial update, we also do a forecasting update.

[19:23] And we'll go over our process for forecasting.

[19:28] We gather and analyze historical averages.

[19:31] We develop sets of assumptions.

[19:34] We continue to evaluate revenue and expenditure streams.

[19:38] And we update the forecast periodically.

[19:44] We've presented a forecast twice now,

[19:47] and this is the third time where we have made adjustments.

[19:50] Each time we have presented the forecast,

[19:52] Some of the adjustments that have been incorporated in the forecasts are the increased fuel costs that we are seeing coming in.

[20:00] Increased fire department overtime due to the dry winter.

[20:05] And incorporated into a worst case scenario, the sunset of the food and beverage tax.

[20:11] In previous discussions we've provided in a worst case scenario, tonight I'll show you a best case and what our estimate is for the end of the year,

[20:19] removing the worst case, so we can focus on something that might be more realistic at this point.

[20:27] Some potential impacts that we'll need to keep mindful of we are currently in an ambulance study and a regional fire study.

[20:36] Both of those are under way or soon to be under way shortly.

[20:39] That we hope in the next several months we will have some analysis done to help us with our forecasting and our budgeting next process.

[20:46] We need to remember we have some unfunded capital needs.

[20:50] We need to remember what possibly the impact of the future of SOU as well as the closure

[20:57] of Ashland Community Hospital.

[21:00] Before you move on.

[21:02] Councillor Duking.

[21:03] Thank you, Mayor.

[21:03] Thanks, Brent.

[21:04] Quick question.

[21:06] It says unfunded capital needs.

[21:08] And I know that the capital funds right now are in the red.

[21:14] They've been in the red since March, and I believe you said, and I know it's because

[21:19] of the community center, but funding will come later and apply to capital funds, however

[21:29] it says it's unfunded, and we continue to do capital projects, correct?

[21:37] This is a general fund forecast, not the utility, not the enterprise funds.

[21:42] So we're looking at the general fund forecast.

[21:45] Yes, OK.

[21:46] Yes, thank you.

[21:47] You're welcome.

[21:50] Councilor Dan.

[21:51] Thank you, Mary.

[21:52] Yeah, Brian, just to follow up on what Councilor Ducane was saying.

[21:55] Kind of is one of the things that kind of kind of messes with the story

[22:01] that the numbers tell is that we do extract capital out of the general fund.

[22:06] Would it be something now that we've got the budget committee here to potentially,

[22:09] at some point in the next month or so or the relatively near future before we get into it

[22:14] is think about actually moving that to a separate capital fund and then anything else that's

[22:19] within the general fund that may be considered long-term obligation or other things.

[22:24] Did you speak to what we might want to think about best practices that we could do?

[22:27] Right. Right. Absolutely. So we-

[22:30] We have a capital improvements fund that historically has held the majority of the large capital projects within it.

[22:37] The general fund truly should be our facilities division and lower maintenance items that are not these large capital projects.

[22:46] We should have them in the capital improvement fund.

[22:50] Councillor Dukin.

[22:51] Thanks, Brian.

[22:52] So, as I look at that, because just moving down the list here, we don't know the impact of SOU as

[22:59] yet, can you speak to us about the community hospital?

[23:05] So we don't, I mean, I'm going to move forward one slide so we can see the numbers we've put together.

[23:11] So as far as the community hospital, we don't know what sections of the hospital have generated the most revenue as far as utility building.

[23:21] So what we've pulled together here is the Ashton Community Hospital and their utility billing

[23:29] impact is $835,000 a year.

[23:33] Granted, we understand that there are sections of the hospital that are still operational.

[23:38] But if the hospital were completely deceased, that would be the impact to the utilities.

[23:44] So the Oregon University, the amount of food and beverage tax that is contributed to

[23:50] the city is roughly 40,000 a year.

[23:52] The utilities that SOU pays for SOU facilities is 2 million.

[23:58] And then, family housing.

[24:00] Those folks that are in family housing

[24:02] that we don't know if they were to cease.

[24:04] If it would be re-rented, again,

[24:06] is about $225,000 per year.

[24:10] A follow-up concerto came.

[24:11] Thank you, Mayor.

[24:12] Would we take, and then I'll shut up,

[24:14] but would we take money that we receive from the hospital

[24:18] to pay that utility, to pay the utilities, money that we receive from the hospital.

[24:25] How do we do that? How does that impact us?

[24:29] The hospital pays their utility bills. Does that mean just like anyone else?

[24:34] So this is the amount that the hospital prior to closing parts of it paid in a year.

[24:40] Okay. That's now we don't know.

[24:41] But now we don't know. Okay.

[24:44] Councillor Cafflow.

[24:45] Thanks, Mayor. Thanks, Prince. I just wanted to get a little bit on this number about utilities

[24:53] that the hospitals pay. That's an example. Because the electric fund looks like it's

[24:57] a big number, $800,000. Do we know how much of that, $800,000 is the fixed charge,

[25:03] fixed meter charge per year versus the use charge because if the hospital is not operating,

[25:10] they're not paying for electricity that they use, and then neither is Ashland buying electricity

[25:17] in order to sell to the hospital. And the way our hospital, the way our electric utility

[25:22] operates is we cover the fixed charges with the fixed charge and all of the commodity charge

[25:29] all of the charge for use goes pretty much to buy generation transmission distribution.

[25:35] We don't have that broken out here, but definitely as these next few months go on, we will see the change.

[25:44] So we could do some analysis of it to see, you know, like you're saying, are they leaving certain sections of the hospital connected, but not using the kilowatts that they would typically.

[25:57] Yeah. So. Okay. Okay. Thanks.

[26:01] Community member Hunter. That was basically my exact question.

[26:06] Is that 800,000 that we're paying to somebody else and only 35,000 that we keep

[26:12] where or how does that ratio work?

[26:20] Okay. This was the best case scenario that was

[26:23] projected when we started doing the forecasting. And this is the estimate that we've now

[26:30] we were devised with closer year end estimates, you know, constantly like I said that we

[26:37] are looking at the forecast and revising for instances that we know are coming up.

[26:47] For the year end estimates, using May 31st, which so that's the last month that we actually

[26:52] officially have closed, their franchise D and the electric user's tax was reduced due

[26:58] to the mild winter, we had intergovernmental revenue that had increased that we incorporated

[27:03] The interest on investments decrease, as I had mentioned, the capital increased.

[27:10] We increased the capital for administration for a year one.

[27:13] In case there is a need for that, if there is something for city hall.

[27:19] Fire over time has increased due to the dryness of the winter.

[27:24] Decreased parks capital outlay because we're not showing that they had spent nearly what they had budgeted.

[27:33] They're most of their capitals in their parks capital improvement fund, not in the general fund.

[27:39] And then we also increased the use of contingency.

[27:42] As I mentioned, we transferred $200,000 from contingency from the general fund to the capital improvement fund.

[27:52] So this is the scenario based on the axles as of May 31st.

[27:59] showing that we still are in the red fiscal year 30, so it is something to keep in mind

[28:08] in something to continue to assess when new known economic indicators come across that

[28:18] we continue to monitor fuel is unknown at this point.

[28:24] we are estimating that that will remain where it has been.

[28:30] It's anywhere from 28 to 40% higher,

[28:34] depending, it seems like, depending on the week.

[28:40] So the last piece I wanted to mention was just on Friday.

[28:44] The city was notified that we received this certificate

[28:48] for achievement and excellence in financial reporting again.

[28:52] And this is for our annual audit.

[28:54] And this is the 38th consecutive year

[28:56] that the city has been awarded this.

[28:59] And what this is, and thank you to those

[29:02] that have served on the audit committee,

[29:04] and to all the staff that participate

[29:06] and ensure that we do receive this award,

[29:11] it fits judged impartially as a panel

[29:14] to see if we meet the standards of their program.

[29:18] And one thing that it encourages

[29:20] is demonstrating a constructive spirit

[29:23] full disclosure. So we have once again for the 38th time earned this award. So it's the highest

[29:29] form of recognition in the area of governmental accounting and financial reporting. So congratulations

[29:36] to everyone involved on that. Councillor Cappell. Thanks, Mayor, and congratulations, Brandon,

[29:43] to the whole team that participated. Could you just do that back up one slide? Because you

[29:47] to comment that in with this forecasting we would be in the red in 2029 and 2030 and I can see

[29:54] the little tiny red numbers down there. But I just wanted to clarify that's in the red

[30:02] The policy requirements. It's not in red that we've run out of money. It's in the red that we've actually reached the minimum balance policy.

[30:12] So, if we see that continuing to persist, what we would want to do is make sure that, I mean, I think it's an alert to us, but it's not for folks at home who may say, when you're in a red, you're completely out of money.

[30:24] out so you've over-spent your balance. So we have, would have time to, to let you adjust

[30:28] to that. Absolutely. Absolutely. And as part of the budget process, reviewing our policies

[30:33] and making sure that they are set where it is appropriate. So American? Yes. A follow-up.

[30:40] Great. So this has been terrific. This has been terrific and I really appreciate that we're

[30:43] getting the budget committee together for this and getting it up to getting it up to

[30:47] so close to the end of the, to the end of the fiscal year as well, because you are able to provide

[30:52] kind of a true thing. We know that we've heard last year, we always know that a budget is an estimate.

[30:57] Last year we had estimates, we had an estimated revenue, just talking about the general fund.

[31:02] We had an estimated revenue, we had an estimated expenditures, and big picture compared to the

[31:08] estimate last spring exactly a year ago. We are basically what we expected for revenue,

[31:16] and we had a little bit less expenses than we thought about $3 million less expense.

[31:21] So, in fact, while we expected to draw down the general fund balance by about $5 million,

[31:27] to cover the first fiscal year's expenses, we're only drawing it down by $2 million,

[31:33] as I said, if you go, so that's something to take note of, it seems to me.

[31:38] Then looking forward, you've updated the numbers now based on this year, instead of a year ago,

[31:44] so we've got much, much better ability to forecast so that nobody's got a crystal ball,

[31:48] and you've outlined a number of things that could be,

[31:50] could be a wrong.

[31:51] It's the same sort of thing.

[31:52] We've expected the revenues to be about the same,

[31:56] and we expect the expenditures to be a little bit less

[31:58] than we expected.

[32:00] So if I put it all together for the big picture,

[32:02] I come up with three conclusions,

[32:04] and I just want to run these by you

[32:05] and see if you would agree with these.

[32:07] The first conclusion is that we're

[32:08] in slightly better fiscal shape today

[32:10] than we expected what you approved the budget last year.

[32:14] Second is we've drawn down our general fund

[32:16] balance slightly from where it was at the beginning of the fiscal year.

[32:20] And we expect to draw it down a little bit more in the second year of the Bay Area.

[32:24] That's not super alarming, because that's what we expected.

[32:27] That's replanted.

[32:28] Because I'm looking back and remembering back in 2019, we had a fund balance general

[32:33] fund balance for about $5.4 million dollars.

[32:36] And by June 30th, 2024, it was at $20 million dollars.

[32:40] So bringing it down was really following policy not to have these excess fund balances that

[32:44] There are money that's not being used as well as the rest of the rest could be.

[32:49] So that brings, would you agree with that?

[32:51] Yes.

[32:52] And then the third thing I think is most important for looking forward to our task here is we

[32:56] need to plan carefully this year and it's as we prepare for the next Miami.

[33:01] We need to make sure we're not going to be able to continue to draw down fund balances.

[33:05] We're still going to be above the fund balance in that chart that looks like we're going

[33:09] to be above the fund balance as we go into the next Miami.

[33:11] But I, as a, well, I may not be on the budget committee or the council next spring, but I will, I would expect the council to, uh,

[33:20] uh, to really look hard at the budget for the next by and make sure that we've reached some efficiencies in this by and

[33:27] and I know that we've been working on number of efficiencies, so that we do see the expenses even further.

[33:32] And I know we've got some big items that you've, that you've mentioned that we're looking at fire and ambulance,

[33:36] and other thing that we're doing utility billing,

[33:39] they're software updates and things like that.

[33:42] That really, we have to ask the hard questions

[33:44] that we're going to be able to make the right decisions

[33:46] in order to bring revenues and expenses

[33:49] into line for the next by any event beyond.

[33:51] So that we don't hit that red situation

[33:53] that you're talking about.

[33:54] Is that a fair?

[33:56] You know, there were a lot of numbers, a lot of lines.

[33:58] I just wanted to bring it all together

[33:59] and make sure I grasp the essential message.

[34:02] Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.

[34:03] it is it's it's it's monitoring it closely it is you know not jumping to oh my goodness

[34:09] it's the worst case scenario but being realistic about it and what services as a community

[34:15] we are going to provide what we can afford and then having that good discussion about those items.

[34:21] Great thanks thanks for all you do and you know tracking all of this and bringing it to us in a

[34:25] cool here. Hey. Councillor Ducane.

[34:32] Councillor Ducane. Councillor Ducane. Thank you Mayor.

[34:34] Thanks, Brent. I'd like to continue on what Councillor Kaplan was talking about, and follow

[34:39] up on that. So I would agree that we're training downwards. We do have significant

[34:47] 229 percent of our reserve in there. So yes, money sitting in a general fund that's doing

[34:53] nothing is a savings account that we shouldn't be using. That we should be providing essential

[34:58] services. The question that I'm curious about, though, is we don't want to come anywhere near

[35:03] that red. We certainly don't. That's, that's like red lights flashing. We just, we, I mean,

[35:09] and that's in 1, 2, 3, 4 years. And that's relatively best case here, as you would said.

[35:14] So the question that I have is I understand wanting to monitor that, but that might be something

[35:18] that we need to consider as Councilor Kaplan Senate. But figuring out a way that we institute

[35:23] some sort of policy update to be able to catch this, knowing that we can't make a gigantic change.

[35:30] But we might be able to think about what I don't want to get into is, we're in budget season now,

[35:37] where at least staff is, and then this will come back in March for the budget committee.

[35:43] So the question is, is should we consider updating policies that allow us to kind of catch this now,

[35:50] and to be able to do something and say, well, if we're 229% of policy, should this council consider transferring

[35:56] some to a reserve fund that is willfully inadequate.

[36:00] Do we transfer some to infrastructure and do we consider putting a policy in place and thinking

[36:06] through it?

[36:07] Mindfully that allows us to get that trigger that we need to stop a downward trend operationally

[36:14] before it gets to a point where completely understand monitoring but life and services happen

[36:20] that we are actually forced as a community and as staff leadership and as council leadership

[36:26] to actually do something about it.

[36:27] Would that be a suggestion from your lens

[36:29] that we might want to consider as a relatively urgent matter?

[36:33] Well, absolutely.

[36:34] We do need to have these discussions.

[36:37] And Councilor does need to have these discussions.

[36:39] And if there are policies that need to be changed,

[36:42] we need to start looking at them sooner than later.

[36:45] Absolutely.

[36:45] The finance staff, city manager's office,

[36:48] all the department heads, we will start working

[36:50] on the budget pretty intensely.

[36:53] Probably in October.

[36:55] So, the direction, the policy, you know, that all will be helpful when we start looking

[37:03] at our next year estimates and seeing where we are going to end this biennium.

[37:12] Councillor Tukain.

[37:13] Thank you.

[37:15] I was, when you were going through the slides, I noticed you had one on parks, and ours

[37:23] was pretty in detail, but I was wondering if we could have a copy of that slide because

[37:29] the park...

[37:31] And I would love to be able to have a closer look at that. Maybe others might want to.

[37:36] Sure, that was presented to the Parks Commission.

[37:39] That one, yes, that, that you have.

[37:41] Oh, sure. This will absolutely be given to you folks.

[37:46] Yeah, as part of the minutes.

[37:48] And I can email it out too.

[37:50] And maybe our budget committee.

[37:53] So, and I have a question, Mayor.

[37:55] So, looking at something that Councillor Dale brought up.

[37:58] are in budget committee process. And as looking, as we approach the time to actually reconvene

[38:07] and roll up our sleeves and take a look at it, I don't know who determines what that process

[38:14] is. But for our actual budget meetings, and I don't know if it's our city manager who would

[38:22] put that together, but I'm hoping that this coming by NM, we could have more time to actually

[38:30] ask our directors of different departments directly, our questions, and having more time

[38:37] than them just the process that we had last year.

[38:40] I didn't think it was that effective, and I would like to see it more depth, more ability

[38:46] to ask questions, and to answer questions.

[38:50] So that's a question for Sabrina, I would say, you know, if there's thoughts about the process that we want to undertake or what is needed, I think they should be directed to you, Sabrina.

[39:03] But do you have any international thought for this process coming up is to have a Council retreat prior to really getting into the budget so that we can go through and set some of the policies and goals for the banal budget.

[39:17] As a reminder, we will have the strategic plan to help guide us, hopefully, through this next process.

[39:23] And I think that will be important because we're going to want to orientate our departments to funding the areas which are of council priority.

[39:32] And so, starting from there, I think it's always a balance of respecting the public and the budget committee in council's time and recognizing that what is the appropriate level to review the budget for

[39:47] the body versus, you know, getting into the weeds, which may not be appropriate.

[39:54] Father, Councillor Duking.

[39:57] Thank you, Mayor.

[39:58] And thank you, City Manager.

[40:00] And I appreciate that you appreciate everyone's time.

[40:03] And having a retreat, I think, is important.

[40:08] And I also would like to be able to spend time with our community, so that they too.

[40:15] some people want to get in the weeds.

[40:16] Some people have some very valid questions,

[40:20] and maybe we might need to take more time on.

[40:23] So outside of the retreat for Council in the Budget Committee,

[40:28] I would like to also be able to have that time in front

[40:31] of our community so that they too can see the depth

[40:35] and the reasons why we do this by anym.

[40:42] So one of the things I think to follow up

[40:45] behind some of the comments that have been made here is that there's a whole series of conversations

[40:49] to your point, Councillor Dukain, that are lining us up for this budget process so that we're

[40:54] not making policy decisions in the middle of the budget process. We've been taking a number

[41:00] of those on. There's a number more that are in the pipeline where we're looking at our facilities,

[41:05] we're looking at what are those costs that we need to be mindful of and we need to be planning

[41:11] for in the long term, and then what is appropriate for us to be tackling in the next

[41:17] by any of them.

[41:18] There's a whole series of conversations that we've got lined up that are designed to

[41:23] answer some of those questions so that staff can put the appropriate amount of money towards

[41:28] those different priorities as Council has identified them.

[41:32] We should actually think about that as a body, as a Council body, that we are already having

[41:37] The discussions, the policy discussions that have the budget outcomes, so that by the time that we get to that process, we aren't still working out those questions, and having to ask staff to adjust in midstream because we're shifting things.

[41:56] So I think we're all kind of saying the same thing on some level that we want to understand

[42:02] in real depth where those investments are going.

[42:05] And we want to see how they connect to the commitments and the goals of the larger community.

[42:12] But I think this is a really good conversation to have.

[42:18] That was everything.

[42:19] I was happy to answer any more questions.

[42:21] Any other questions?

[42:25] Okay.

[42:25] Well, thank you so much, Britain, and thank you to the Citizens Budget Committee members for coming out tonight for this overview.

[42:32] We are continuing to work on this forecasting question and the process, and so we appreciate you spending the time with us this evening to go through this process.

[42:42] Thank you.

[42:47] And we will carry on with the other two agenda items.

[42:51] The next one is the presentation regarding Story Town with Matt Hoffman.

[43:01] Sabrina,

[43:04] thank you, so we've invited Matt Hoffman of Story Town to come and give us an overview

[43:07] on what they're working on.

[43:14] Just as a lot of commercials and just as a reminder, we have

[43:17] supported Story Town with some of our tourism tax funds and so it'll be nice to get an update

[43:23] on where those dollars have gone. Story Town is the one who has put out our event calendar,

[43:28] so if you have not downloaded our event calendar, please do so, so you know what is going on in

[43:34] And when they are ready, we'll let Matt.

[43:37] Yes, and while they're getting set up,

[43:39] I would just encourage everyone who is seeing this,

[43:43] this meeting too.

[43:44] If you don't have the app already,

[43:46] to definitely go get it right now, the Story Town app.

[43:49] So, I know I have found some fantastic events

[43:53] that I did not know were happening,

[43:55] because I said, what is happening in Ashland tonight

[43:58] and Story Town was right there.

[43:59] So we will open this up and take us away.

[44:06] So when I speak, OK, that makes sense.

[44:09] Thank you for having us.

[44:11] Yeah, we're excited to be here to share your one of Story Town.

[44:17] And I'm excited to invite, it is now the team of Story Town,

[44:21] Carolina, Lebanon, and Montana Houser, who are my colleagues now in this mission.

[44:31] So, yeah, Story Town, you're one.

[44:33] For those of you who haven't met me, a lot of you have this mission started.

[44:40] Well, first of all, I'm from Ashland.

[44:43] Born and raised, graduated, brisco, elementary, the middle school,

[44:50] the high school and Southern Oregon University. So I have gone through the whole

[44:55] education system in Ashland. My parents both weren't very involved.

[45:00] In local education, my dad at the university level, as a professor and the ed program. And then my mom, as an administrator with the school district.

[45:09] So this mission for me began when I moved home and with my kids after 23 years of living in Los Angeles and working in advertising as a commercial director and filmmaker.

[45:21] My kids are in the public schools and it came to my knowledge that we had a crisis because

[45:28] there are not as many kids in the school as I remember when I grew up here.

[45:33] So Briscoe was shut down, so I was asked to join a committee to come up with some ideas,

[45:38] some marketing ideas of how we could potentially market Ashland to young families and maybe

[45:46] add some kids to the school district.

[45:47] So that was the birth of story town.

[45:51] The mission at kind of at its core is to bring more young families to Ashland and to encourage families that are already here to stay.

[46:01] So in addition to that, the broader mission of story town is to revitalize our city through year-round cultural events,

[46:09] Creative Infrastructure, Economic and Workforce Development with the goal of making Ashlin an ever-flowing and attractive destination for young families and artists 365 days a year.

[46:23] The year one goals for storytelling were one to rebrand Ashlin to fill the calendar in the parts of the calendar that are a little bit dark because we're so dependent on the Shakespeare economy.

[46:37] To foster collaboration between organizations, there's so many wonderful organizations in the town including the city of Ashland and then ultimately to solve problems.

[46:50] So the first highlight of your one was the branding effort and story town in and of itself is a branding effort.

[46:57] It's a rebrand for Ashland. It's a new lens to look at the town so that we don't get just sort of pigeons into just being the Shakespeare town.

[47:06] even though we love Shakespeare, and it's done so much for the town, we feel that by rebranding

[47:12] ourselves as story town, we can offer a broader perspective. It can help us expand the calendar

[47:18] to include times that aren't as busy as the Shakespeare season. It speaks to a wider audience.

[47:26] It adds to the legacy of OSF, we'll not detracting from it in any way, and I think it helps us put

[47:33] Ashlyn, culturally, stamps us on the map as an epicenter for culture.

[47:39] You could say Portland, Stumptown, Eugene is track town.

[47:43] Why couldn't Ashlyn be story town?

[47:47] Highlight number two of year one is a story town app.

[47:50] So the big challenge I think was the calendar.

[47:53] We recognized the calendar.

[47:54] It could be filled at other parts.

[47:56] So how do we do that?

[47:58] I think the foundation of an app, a technology that

[48:02] offers everyone's a solution to what's happening.

[48:06] So we built the Story Town app in collaboration with White Rabbit and now I feel that we

[48:11] have the foundation for a year-round calendar in the palm of your hand.

[48:15] So with the Story Town app, we now know what's happening.

[48:19] We've personalized a single source calendar.

[48:21] We have this element of surprise and delight for parents and people that live in

[48:27] or visit. So if you're a mom who comes to Ashland and you're wondering what to do,

[48:32] you've suddenly downloaded the app and now you know what's going on. And it

[48:36] becomes the foundation for year-round experiences.

[48:41] Another highlight of year one was

[48:43] this idea that we need to come up with original programming to fill the calendar

[48:47] with at a time when it's usually dark. So we launched the first annual Ashland

[48:53] sarcasm festival. And I will allow Montana to jump in here. She ran operations for us.

[49:03] You're one.

[49:07] If you could, yeah, pull that. No, you're fine. I'm just encouraging to pull

[49:10] that in nice and close folks can hear you at home. So I just wanted to tell you a story about

[49:16] fashion sarcasm festival in Numbers.

[49:19] I love Numbers in a spreadsheet, so that's kind of really

[49:22] where I thrive.

[49:24] Some of the Numbers from Ashensark has

[49:25] in Festival where 2,500 total attendees across all of our events.

[49:30] We had over 50 comedians booked, whether that was a single person,

[49:34] or a troop, a variety of people and their crew.

[49:39] Over 42 nights booked at local hotels,

[49:42] and that included Ashensprings Hotel, Plaza

[49:44] in an Ashland Motel and Columbia Motel, I can't believe I forgot, we had a great event at

[49:50] Columbia Motel just in my mind. So we were able to engage with all these different hotels,

[49:55] putting our comics there in accommodations that they loved, whether they were regional,

[50:01] local, or national touring comics, they were all able to say downtown and experience

[50:06] and everything that Ashland had to offer. And our business partners told us and experience

[50:11] boost in their sales from 47 to 55% which we were really excited about because you know that

[50:17] first week of December isn't always as bustling as we'd like it to be and they were able

[50:22] to, oh cool, another slide, um, able to, um, you know, experience that boost, um, some other

[50:30] numbers that I like talking about. Um, we had, we employed 17 local Ashland residents so that is,

[50:39] you know, students from SOU, that was other young professionals who are

[50:44] events operators.

[50:46] And in total, across the people that we staffs across the, you know,

[50:51] production, print services, hotel booking, all of our business partners,

[50:55] only from the sarcasm fest budget, not even the story time budget,

[50:59] we were able to keep $44,000 in the Ashland economy,

[51:03] which I was really excited about being able to just funnel that money directly

[51:06] into the community I care about.

[51:08] 17 of our 20 events sold out, which is pretty epic for a first year event and we had

[51:15] people coming from 32 states, over 30 cities, beyond Ashland, Phoenix, talent and

[51:23] Medford, which also felt pretty exciting and a number of attendees were able to go to a bunch

[51:28] of different events, whether it was the Bomber on Friday and Lakeland on Saturday or scout

[51:34] on Friday and local 31 on Saturday and Brooklyn on Sunday, we had people that were crossing

[51:40] all over the place, a bunch of different venues. And okay, there's my 47-55% revenue increase.

[51:49] And for me, as an operations person in large-scale events, really working with teams and people

[51:56] and a variety of stakeholders is really exciting and ways to find how we can all collaborate together

[52:02] and find everyone's strengths, whether that's the SOU students and figuring out what their strengths are,

[52:07] or figuring out what type of performance is best fitting for a local 31 or a brick room

[52:13] being able to work with everyone. It's just been a total joy.

[52:19] Get it over to Carolina who's running our marketing.

[52:24] Thank you so much, Carolina Lavagnino. Being part of story towns, being a really

[52:30] Exciting journey. And as a resident of Ashland for the past 26 years, I've seen so many remarkable things happening

[52:39] here, but this organization has done something very special in very short time, and I am delighted to be part of it.

[52:46] Let's talk about impactful marketing and PR with Ashen Sarkas and Festival, we were able to promote

[52:52] Ashland as a destination, as Matt has mentioned, beyond theater, as a destination that has

[52:59] something going on in winter, besides Mount Ashland, and as you will notice on the slide,

[53:07] we've secured two stories in the Oregonian, we had a really long interview on the Oregon Public

[53:14] broadcasting, long story on Oregon Arts Watch, just to name a few.

[53:20] That's said, we've been noticed by travel Oregon, we've been noticed by travel sad

[53:25] Oregon, we found them in support of our festival, just in the first year, and to have

[53:32] this kind of reach from media and then with marketing from digital to print, and to reach

[53:38] people as Montana has mentioned from over 30 cities and secure accommodations, I find it

[53:47] very successful for a first year event. So we're looking forward to continuing.

[53:53] Thank you.

[53:58] Another highlight, which we're actually just pulled ourselves away from tonight.

[54:04] We're in the middle of setting up for the bike valley and Carolyn is setting up food trucks for the free

[54:08] concerts in the park, you know, one of the issues is if we, if we keep

[54:14] Ashlyn kind of pumping year-round, we're going to have to come up with some

[54:17] interesting ideas to deal with cars and parking. So this little kind of

[54:22] sweet gesture of the free bike Vela has become something that's kind of

[54:25] stuck with the organization. We're doing it seven times a summer. People are

[54:31] able to ride their bikes rather than come in cars. It encourages people to

[54:35] it out. It really kind of hits the the bike culture of Ashland, which can continue to grow.

[54:41] And then it's also this great collaboration that we have with the SOU student body.

[54:46] We have some of the kids that have graduated that are staying in town the summer so that they can work the bike valley.

[54:52] And it kind of just brings me back to the idea that a lot of kids that I grew up with their parents met at SOU.

[55:00] And then there was a pathway for them to stay in Ashland.

[55:03] Before you move on, Councillor Cain has a question?

[55:07] I just wanted you to tell everyone who's watching what this event is tonight that you

[55:13] got pulled away from.

[55:15] Thank you, Gina.

[55:17] Council member, to Cain's.

[55:20] Tonight is Dead Floyd.

[55:23] It's an epic Ashlyn, a free concert in the park series that we've been doing in conjunction

[55:29] with Epic.

[55:29] Epic is another great group that we love to collaborate with.

[55:33] And yeah, yeah, we careally and I both sit on the board of Epic as well, and Montana

[55:39] obviously is helping with operations and the sarcasm festival.

[55:43] But tonight is a free event.

[55:45] It starts at 6 o'clock, so anybody that's tuning in.

[55:49] Yeah, there's a free show at 6 o'clock, DJ, camouflage, and then dead Floyd.

[55:53] It's a Pink Floyd Grateful Dead Chirby ban.

[55:57] There's food trucks.

[55:58] There's a beer garden, and there's free bike valley.

[56:05] Yeah, highlight number five, and this is one that just organically came together.

[56:10] So we have the three of us who bring, I think, each our own special expertise into this organization.

[56:18] The eventorship program is really exactly what it sounds like. It's mentorship for events.

[56:24] So in a small town, oftentimes, a small event that could become popular, stumbles out the gate.

[56:29] people don't know about it, it's not organized correctly, so we collectively have an expertise,

[56:35] specifically Montana has a, I think, a world-class expertise in the ability to mentor people into running a successful event.

[56:46] We're already, we've got something that you go online and fill out a form so that we know and we can kind of weed through the events that line up with our

[56:59] mission, but already it's been very fruitful and very excited about it.

[57:07] So the next three years

[57:08] for Story Town year 2026, this is year two. We intend to grow the calendar apps so that it could

[57:15] become a business, it could generate income that then goes into the nonprofit. We're doing the

[57:21] second annual sarcasm festival, and Montana is deeply involved in getting the programming for

[57:27] It's going to be even better than the first year.

[57:30] The eventorship program has been launched and we're beginning to help others and even

[57:34] identify the next potential big springtime event which could be a bike gravel bike race

[57:40] that would involve a lot of families and kids.

[57:43] We're calling that one the convergence at this point.

[57:47] And then we're also in the process of really formalizing our governance so that we can

[57:52] the legitimate non-profit organization.

[57:57] Year 3, 2027, we're hoping that the Story Town Apple become a business listing, and they'll

[58:04] be subscription elements to that that also can draw income for the organization.

[58:09] The sarcasm festival, we expect that to become a West Coast destination, something that

[58:14] draws people in from LA, Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, and the surrounding cities.

[58:20] We're hoping to launch that springtime family festival to add another pillar to the calendar year.

[58:26] We want to grow our sponsorship base.

[58:29] We are primarily funded at this point by one or two very generous individuals.

[58:34] But we need to expand our donor base.

[58:39] We're also hoping to land our first major foundational grant.

[58:43] It takes organizations a couple years to be recognized to the point where they can get legitimate grant.

[58:49] So, it's a process that we're hoping to survive that long, and then by 2028, we're adding our third signature event, a musical event in the winter time.

[59:00] We think a winter music festival sounds like a perfect mix for Ashland in that dark time of year.

[59:06] We're hoping to expand the mentorship, and then more than half of the budget is self-sustaining with 12 months of operating reserves.

[59:15] Also, by year four, we think that we're going to be able to show and prove that there's a significant economic impact for the city through this organization.

[59:26] The ultimate goal is by 2020-28 that we could have this sort of four-quarter calendar, where quarter one in the winter would be a music festival quarter two.

[59:36] And the spring would be a children's outdoor festival.

[59:40] We're calling that the convergence.

[59:42] And then obviously, Oregon Shakespeare Festival

[59:43] is that pillar that we really rely on,

[59:46] quarter two, quarter three, specifically the summer.

[59:49] And then the fall, late fall, early winter,

[59:51] the sarcasm festival will become another pillar.

[59:54] So that we have sort of this, yeah,

[59:57] I'm calling it the lattice to-

[1:00:00] We grow the calendar around these four pieces of kind of this lattice.

[1:00:06] So that's year one. We feel that we've done a lot. We're excited about what's ahead and the seeds have been planted. We're hoping to get more support and to grow this mission even further.

[1:00:20] Okay, questions.

[1:00:24] Councillor Cathern.

[1:00:25] Thanks, Mayor.

[1:00:26] Thanks, Matt and Montana and Carolina.

[1:00:29] This is really great.

[1:00:31] You've done so much already in such a short time.

[1:00:33] Remember, when you had the first big event

[1:00:36] didn't over next to the Snyder Art Museum just a year,

[1:00:40] a little over a year ago, maybe a year and 15 months ago.

[1:00:45] So at that point, it was just a dream still.

[1:00:47] So, thanks and congratulations on all this.

[1:00:51] Some of the things that you talked about

[1:00:52] seem to touch on some other organizations

[1:00:55] that do similar kinds of work.

[1:00:57] There's a little bit of, you know,

[1:00:59] chamber promotion.

[1:01:00] There's a little bit of events promotion

[1:01:02] for, you know, you talked about

[1:01:05] Epicaston and Fulfill Festival at your work with.

[1:01:08] Could you just nail the,

[1:01:11] how you work with others,

[1:01:12] how you work with other organizations

[1:01:13] so that everybody is lifted together

[1:01:16] and benefits rather than, you know, everybody kind of competing for limited pie?

[1:01:21] Yeah, that's a great question. At our core we're sort of designed to collaborate and we encourage

[1:01:28] everybody to do like the folk, their version of the, the folk collective or epic Ashland.

[1:01:35] We support any organization that also supports the growth of people coming to Ashland for experiences

[1:01:43] and then the app, obviously, everybody gets to use the app.

[1:01:47] It's definitely an Ashland focused technology,

[1:01:50] but it's already spreading a county-wide.

[1:01:53] So I think we, yeah, I don't know if you want to.

[1:01:57] Yeah, if I can add, I would say that storytelling

[1:02:00] with the Condor app and now also web-based Condor

[1:02:06] provides a platform for epic, for wild-time productions,

[1:02:10] all kinds of organizations that are already contributing to this community to

[1:02:16] inform. Firstly, if we inform locals, they'll tell their friends then now that

[1:02:21] we have a web-based option, anyone in Los Angeles, Seattle, New York City can

[1:02:26] check out what's happening in this remarkable time. So our goal is to really

[1:02:32] help elevate everybody. We are in the small community, but we have a great

[1:02:37] ecosystem. We want to strengthen the ecosystem through what we're doing, whether it's

[1:02:42] eventorship, whether it's our Ashun sarcasm festival. As you know, so the map, I did not mention

[1:02:47] that, but we activated multiple venues of which many are not really event venues. They are

[1:02:55] restaurants, they are stores, and they suddenly became improv workshop places, or a roast of

[1:03:07] different way and we want to elevate everybody because this is an amazing town and we can offer

[1:03:13] so much more than that's been offered for a long time. Councillor Taylor. Thank you, Mayor.

[1:03:21] Matt, good to see you. I hope you're other projects is going well.

[1:03:28] The question was similar to

[1:03:30] Councillor Kaplan's, where there's certainly synergies that we see with specifically travel

[1:03:35] in our DML and they kind of do this thing,

[1:03:38] but this is really kind of the next generation

[1:03:40] where we're adding.

[1:03:42] Certainly it's not, like Councillor Coffin said,

[1:03:45] we don't want to be getting too close and elbowing each other

[1:03:47] because there's certainly more than enough room

[1:03:49] to really kind of expand the message

[1:03:51] in all directions and vectors.

[1:03:54] But what can we do or they do to help assist

[1:04:00] with, you know, they have a large marketing reach,

[1:04:03] I assume you maybe reach out to maybe not

[1:04:04] sure, but is there anything or are they helping or have shown an interest in saying it let's leverage

[1:04:11] what they're using as well as far as where they've gotten the message where they have their

[1:04:16] ad buys and they have their publications out in all of these large cities. I mean, Katherine

[1:04:20] Cated is a nice job of going through that I just but I was looking through there. Their annual visitor

[1:04:26] guide now is hoping at sea story town and it wasn't in there yet and so that definitely what I

[1:04:34] and that maybe you guys have can speak more to that or what you'd like to see happen in that

[1:04:38] regard.

[1:04:40] I think it's happening.

[1:04:42] Is it?

[1:04:42] Okay.

[1:04:43] Yeah.

[1:04:43] And I know that an actual publication is a snapshot in time, so there may have been some sort

[1:04:48] of, don't care, whatever.

[1:04:50] Next time you go to Oregon Shakespeare Festival, you're going to see a mention of all

[1:04:54] storytelling in the Bible.

[1:04:56] And so we're trying to be smart about utilizing our limits of resources.

[1:05:02] So, marketing budget, but when it comes to collaboration, we've been very close collaborating

[1:05:07] with Ashen Chamber and travel Ashland both sides, the local and visitor facing, as well

[1:05:15] as travel southern Oregon, travel Oregon.

[1:05:18] So,

[1:05:21] every press release, any kind of opportunity to cross-promote whether it's social through

[1:05:25] new sletters, et cetera, we've been partners with

[1:05:29] Catherine Cato with Centron and Dana.

[1:05:32] Oh, it's Danny, thank you.

[1:05:33] Yeah, and I would just point out what's, I think,

[1:05:37] kind of special and unique about our organization is that when we put

[1:05:40] in event out there, like the sarcasm festival, there's just

[1:05:43] natural collaboration happening that's just kind of effortless.

[1:05:48] People maybe are not even aware of it.

[1:05:50] It's just sort of the, just the fact of when you've got that much of

[1:05:54] town, participating as you see in the map, all of these different businesses, and there's

[1:05:59] just such easy crossover. So, I think, you know, the day that we started the sarcasm

[1:06:04] festival was also first Friday, and there was a shopping sit. So, a lot of, you know, there

[1:06:10] was just a natural cross-breeding that happens when there's just more stuff going on in

[1:06:15] the town. So, all of this is, the whole idea of this is that it's just sort of the catalyst

[1:06:20] for more stuff and to collaborate together.

[1:06:26] Yeah, thank you.

[1:06:27] Yeah, if I may, I think that's outstanding.

[1:06:29] I think one of the things that is spoken to Sandra and Katherine,

[1:06:33] they've been extremely receptive as well as that I think we've done a very nice job of our anchor events,

[1:06:39] and those are always phenomenal, we've known them for years.

[1:06:43] And one of the things that I know I've had discussions is part of being on,

[1:06:48] Lee, as under the, to each of those boards and organizations is to, is to do what you're doing,

[1:06:52] which is to, I mean, they're really good at the home runs.

[1:06:55] And what we're doing here is getting the base hits and we're getting filling that calendar

[1:06:59] and basically saying that there's, that there's never a time when you can say, when anybody

[1:07:04] can say, there's nothing going on.

[1:07:06] And I think that we, I think if we have that, just, you know, that just get on base, just

[1:07:10] get on base, that really leads to what we're trying to achieve at the end.

[1:07:15] So this, I think, is just phenomenal.

[1:07:16] So thank you.

[1:07:18] Councillor Cappell.

[1:07:19] Yeah, I just wanted to just be enforced this.

[1:07:23] This is a thing that I love the best.

[1:07:24] Most of the, of course, sarcasm festival.

[1:07:27] I am going to went to the events in the, in the bummer,

[1:07:29] and that was,

[1:07:30] It's pretty impressive to see that full night of tonight. But what really jazzed me was all of these

[1:07:37] different venues, seeing a stand-up comment in Z-space. It's just that was super cool. I just

[1:07:45] love to see more and more of our local venues, just kind of jumping in and seeing how this

[1:07:52] helps everybody and helps everybody. But all of us live in the town, because that's coming back

[1:07:56] which you said before, is making this just a fuzzy fiber in place to live?

[1:08:01] Yeah, I was just going to maybe kick kick in, what's going to happen?

[1:08:06] Year two of the sarcasm festival, because it's worth kicking it up and out.

[1:08:10] Oops.

[1:08:12] Just to kind of speak to that activation of all the different venues around town,

[1:08:17] as a festival producer, and normally I produce festivals outside of Oregon,

[1:08:22] this is actually the first event I ever did inside of Oregon,

[1:08:24] which is really exciting for me to not have to fly anywhere when I get to say in town.

[1:08:30] But I think about how South by Southwest in Austin, Texas, takes over the whole town and

[1:08:36] it goes way north into the college in south and west and east of the main downtown area.

[1:08:41] And that's exactly what we can do with the sarcasm of us, so we can be activating downtown

[1:08:45] ashton, but we can also be activating by the college, we can be activating by the three

[1:08:52] way we can be activating at Caldera, we can expand, you know, this team has, in my opinion,

[1:08:59] what it takes to make this bigger and bigger, if the appetite is there, and it's just

[1:09:04] really exciting to see that in year one, we were able to activate 12 venues and over 20 performances

[1:09:10] throughout downtown, and again, that was just year one, like we can keep going in this year,

[1:09:15] we're going to have even more performances and even more venues, activating even more

[1:09:19] unique programming. So yeah, it's exciting to be able to bring that to the place that you live for me.

[1:09:25] And if I can add to marketing part of that, when we have more venues, we have more ambassadors. They are

[1:09:32] speaking on our behalf. So my role is so much easier because suddenly every social channel, I'm just sending

[1:09:38] them materials, push it. And so the voice is louder and clearer and everyone gets excited. And suddenly

[1:09:46] that energy flows through entire town and everyone is talking about it so we can really make

[1:09:50] it impactful beyond Ashland and Rauvari.

[1:09:53] Thank you.

[1:09:54] Cancels Israel?

[1:09:55] Thanks, Mayor.

[1:09:56] Thank you all.

[1:09:57] We're so lucky to have all of you.

[1:09:58] This is like an All-Star team up here.

[1:10:01] There was a hard question that came up at your presentation at the Center Museum this winter.

[1:10:08] And somebody asked about the brand of story town Ashland and you did touch on maybe going

[1:10:14] county wide, you're also talking about, you know, some state sponsors, ship stuff.

[1:10:18] Can you speak, maybe briefly, on, is there a plan to scale it outside of just story

[1:10:24] town, Ashland?

[1:10:25] Or do we want to stay Ashland centric, Ashland focused if you could maybe elaborate on that a

[1:10:30] little bit?

[1:10:32] It's a great question.

[1:10:34] Growing up here, obviously Ashland is always going to be the cultural center.

[1:10:39] So I think if there's any sort of major cultural event, Ashland is always going to be

[1:10:43] natural center of that. But to your point, if we were to say throw a really large outdoor

[1:10:50] festival, Southern Oregon is an amazing outdoor place. And Ashland is a great leaping off

[1:10:57] point for many people. But if we get big enough where we throw one of these major outdoor

[1:11:02] festivals, similar to what they do in Bellingham, Washington, they do something called the

[1:11:07] Northwest, tune up, which brings in a bike race, they bring in music, and all these experiences,

[1:11:13] but that's a community of 90,000 people.

[1:11:16] The infrastructure, Ashlyn, I don't think could sustain that.

[1:11:20] So if we were to grow these festivals at a certain point, I think it naturally leads into the

[1:11:26] valley.

[1:11:27] And if there's maybe some silo effects that are happening within Ashlyn, I think even the

[1:11:33] Sally's, the silo effect in the valley is pretty significant too.

[1:11:37] I think it could be a great way for Ashlyn,

[1:11:40] Mepford, and the surrounding areas to collaborate.

[1:11:43] And so that we don't have this feeling of we're here,

[1:11:47] you're there, which growing up, and even today,

[1:11:51] I think, still continues a little bit.

[1:11:53] And maybe trips us up a little bit.

[1:11:56] Yeah, thank you.

[1:11:57] And then the second question I kind of had was the cross pollination,

[1:12:02] or the collaboration, not competition with really the social media space, and maybe participating

[1:12:11] with some sort of campaign on social media with the city. I don't know if that's something

[1:12:16] that we can do through our PR arm, but if the city has 10,000 followers that you don't

[1:12:23] have, how can we help you, I guess? Maybe the city manager can speak to that if that's something

[1:12:28] we could do.

[1:12:30] Yeah, I think, you know, we've been recently doing that with OSF, so I think as we continue

[1:12:36] to, you know, monetarily support partners in the city, we can explore other ways to provide

[1:12:41] support as well.

[1:12:43] Well, and I know that we've been including that, we did a push initially, but we included

[1:12:48] in our e-news and just constantly reminding people to download the app, Councillor Dale.

[1:12:53] Thank you, Mayor.

[1:12:54] Thank you, Councillor Schwell.

[1:12:55] I mean, you guys led kind of right into the question and it just occurred to me and you mentioned one word in particular, which I'll get to in a second, but maybe this question primarily would be for Montana too, just given your operational logistics around festivals and so forth.

[1:13:11] But it was we were looking at the sarcasm festival and it had the snapshot of downtown and we were talking about expanding to Southans, Ashland University, other parts of town. One of the questions that I, that occurs to me is,

[1:13:25] and obviously it occurred to you guys too and so if you don't have an answer ready that's fine

[1:13:29] I would love we would love feedback at some point but is the infrastructure question is and you're

[1:13:36] diluted to Valleywide but let's just keep it in Ashland here for a second and say okay what what

[1:13:42] can we do in this south part of Ashland or down the universe here what kind of infrastructure needs

[1:13:48] would need to be in place or considered to be able to put on larger scale events because

[1:13:54] normally it's our job to generally speaking stay out of the way but the other the other side

[1:14:00] of that same coin is there are some things that only this group in this city can do so we would

[1:14:05] want to be able to see how we can encourage or be able to provide support and logistical supports

[1:14:10] to kind of tee it up but we don't know what we don't know relative to those kinds of events and other

[1:14:15] parts of town. Sure so just thinking about being able to expand into different areas of

[1:14:23] and even just starting with downtown Ashen, you know, in our first few years we are, we feel

[1:14:28] we are ready to expand and in downtown there are venues that we could happily easily expand

[1:14:34] into, you know, we see them activating every night right now except for Mondays. You know,

[1:14:39] there's the whole OSF suite of spaces that we know we could bring amazing comedy to. We could

[1:14:46] even activate the armory if they would have us. We could activate places that SOU and we could

[1:14:52] activate, again, like down in the south on the south side, I think Ashton Hills Hotel.

[1:15:00] All have infrastructure that is available for us, but I think at this point for us, it feels like our budget

[1:15:06] is what stops us from expanding, because there's desire from our community to be able to do more

[1:15:12] events more frequently and more diverse type of event, not just stand up comedy, not just these

[1:15:19] 12, 15, 20, 30 people, and the only thing that keeps us from doing more is that everything costs

[1:15:27] money. So as far as infrastructure goes, you know, some of the venues don't have as robust

[1:15:35] an infrastructure as one would hope, but we have amazing partners in Southern Oregon that

[1:15:40] can bring in sound lights, video that we can partner with, that are some of the people that we

[1:15:45] partner with last year. And there are a lot of other local producers that can help us bring each

[1:15:51] little area to our biggest and best vision so that it creates something that is really

[1:15:58] feels like part of the sarcasm festival and not just a pop-up show in an auditorium.

[1:16:03] For me, again, as a festival producer, the festivals that I work on are so vibe forward,

[1:16:10] sorry for lack of a better word, but like they're on brand.

[1:16:14] They create and aesthetically immerse you and that's what I think I want to make sure people

[1:16:19] feel immersed when they come to our events.

[1:16:21] They're not just going to another Saturday night at a local pub.

[1:16:25] They're going to a festival.

[1:16:26] They're going to an experience, which I think,

[1:16:30] you know, not everyone does.

[1:16:32] So I think that's how we send a part from other people, too.

[1:16:35] Thank you.

[1:16:36] Can't so do King.

[1:16:41] OK, well, I have a couple questions.

[1:16:42] I'm going to come back to you, Adam.

[1:16:45] Well, it's great to see you all.

[1:16:47] I remember when this was sort of a sparkle in the eye

[1:16:50] of what might happen in Ashton and lots of conversations in the living room and how can this come

[1:16:56] together to your point, Councillor Dale, with the other institutions and organizations

[1:17:01] that were already working in this space.

[1:17:03] And I think you've all brought something that is so fresh and interesting and complimentary to

[1:17:09] what else is already going on in Ashton.

[1:17:11] So thank you.

[1:17:13] I also have have appreciated that when the app came out and the question was, well, what

[1:17:18] about people who are looking to see what's going on in action and maybe aren't wanting to

[1:17:22] clog up their phone with yet another app for a city they don't live in that you all responded

[1:17:29] so quickly and we're able to put up something that is a web friendly piece for people who aren't

[1:17:35] so interested in having another app. And so this piece of this is really exciting for someone to just

[1:17:42] and say, oh, what's happening right now, and so for so much of our conversations here,

[1:17:49] we've, for the last several years, we've been saying we need the full run to not have these

[1:17:55] big dips, as you mentioned. We can't have it where we're on for nine months, and then we're just

[1:17:59] gone for three, and our businesses are just cleaning and trying to get to the next season. That's

[1:18:05] not how people travel anymore. And getting us to the point where someone is thinking across this

[1:18:12] region, something's always going on in astronaut.

[1:18:14] I don't even need to know what it is.

[1:18:16] I just need to get in my car and go.

[1:18:18] That's the kind of sense that I think we've been aiming at for a while is how do you

[1:18:25] fill in the rest of that calendar.

[1:18:27] And so, very exciting to see the mentorship piece of this.

[1:18:31] Have you been able to kind of look across the calendar and spot those holes?

[1:18:38] And what is your process for what that looks like?

[1:18:41] So we have early December now with the sarcasm festival that was clearly a dip space to fill.

[1:18:49] What does that look like for, especially the other three months of the December January February

[1:18:54] timeframe?

[1:18:56] What is your process for seeing a whole and trying to figure out how to fill it?

[1:19:01] Maybe not with a big festival, but just with those events, you know, supporting people who are

[1:19:12] So yeah, the event worship is really exciting because when I keep saying it's like we're not the only ones with good ideas other people have great ideas that

[1:19:20] We want to see happen and part of the event worship is

[1:19:24] People currently reaching out to us asking for help and in that they say

[1:19:28] You know, when is our event what age group is our event for who's our demographic and

[1:19:33] We're talking to everyone that reaches out to us, but we really want to put the most way behind the events that are in the off season

[1:19:41] So, there was an event that just got announced.

[1:19:45] It's ultimately ending up happening in Medford,

[1:19:47] but we were still helping them build this Southern Oregon Ren Fair.

[1:19:53] And, you know, they became to us because, you know, early,

[1:19:56] our late September is when our season starts to dip,

[1:19:59] and they want to engage with people that are probably like young,

[1:20:02] professional age young families,

[1:20:05] which I've had a very hard time convincing anyone in the millennial age group

[1:20:09] to that there's anything fun going on here,

[1:20:12] despite living here and liking it.

[1:20:14] But anyway, so they're putting on an event

[1:20:16] for the millennials and the Gen Zers to come through.

[1:20:21] And ideally, it can be a year over a year event.

[1:20:24] So we're trying to talk to people

[1:20:25] that are already see the vision for themselves.

[1:20:28] They see, this is our first year.

[1:20:29] We're gonna grow and grow and grow.

[1:20:32] Versus, we're gonna see how this goes one year,

[1:20:33] and then it could or could not stay.

[1:20:35] We're talking to people that want to see their,

[1:20:38] their event expand into, you know, beyond 100 people, beyond 200 people, and currently it's

[1:20:45] like a sort of word of mouth experience. But, you know, that's how we're kind of talking

[1:20:52] with people and identifying who, you know, we can kind of really push to get to that next level.

[1:20:57] Give anything else. Yeah, no. So, the mentorship program, or yeah, the mentorship program,

[1:21:03] If you go to the website, which is now the calendar app is now the website, but then if you

[1:21:10] look and see what's happening or you want to know more about Story Town, then it takes you

[1:21:16] to more informational about what we do announcements and it takes you to the eventorship where

[1:21:23] you can fill out a form and then the criteria that we've put in here which will change over

[1:21:28] time is really based on, yeah, like Montana was saying, if it kind of fits within our mission,

[1:21:35] it might become a story town event, but we encourage all events. So the calendar should

[1:21:41] just be full of events. We're really focused on those times of the year that are the crucial

[1:21:46] kind of down parts of the year, so that would be fall, winter, and spring. Even though Shakespeare

[1:21:53] does crossover into fall and spring, it feels like there could be this crossover so that

[1:21:59] we have these four pillars. So yeah, the the sarcasm festival does feel like it comes

[1:22:03] that kind of the crucial time to inject some life into the town before we go into the holiday

[1:22:09] season. And then from that there seems to be enough the holiday season kind of carries us through

[1:22:15] in the beginning of winter. It feels like we want to have something a signature event in the winter

[1:22:20] and music selfishly would be one that I would love to have a similar experience to the sarcasm festival but to have that a

[1:22:32] And then the spring time just seems like the perfect time. Yeah, outdoor, an outdoor festival that we celebrate,

[1:22:40] Ashlands outdoor, biking community, the running community, the trails, the Pacific Crest Trail, and make that really focused in kids.

[1:22:49] because, again, this mission is for kids and young families.

[1:22:53] I think the Spring Festival would be uniquely,

[1:22:56] kind of, perfectly aligned to be that festival where families could really come and enjoy an experience

[1:23:03] Ashlyn. Okay, just another follow-up question, and that is at the SLU event.

[1:23:09] Part of the conversation around what kind of events we would be trying to draw into town was also

[1:23:14] around innovative sustainability initiatives,

[1:23:20] and who is doing the really interesting things

[1:23:24] in terms of sustaining the natural world,

[1:23:28] building on the history that Ashwood has in that space.

[1:23:31] So is there, is there conversations happening

[1:23:33] around what those events might look like

[1:23:36] in addition to music and entertainment?

[1:23:39] I would say that the convergence, the biking event that will be in spring will be encouraging

[1:23:49] everybody to bike to really celebrate the beautiful outdoors that we get to live in and so

[1:23:57] that's one element really showcasing people what we have here but also our partnership with white

[1:24:02] and they're pushed for using AI for the good and really bringing in people experts that call Ashland all this region home and learning from each other.

[1:24:16] I think that there's so many opportunities when it's about supporting our town on so many levels.

[1:24:23] So, yeah, I don't think that we have all the ideas for all kinds of events yet, but we have to start somewhere.

[1:24:32] And if we are able to continue with Sarkans Festival, with Ed, then music and then the gravel and mountain biking race that attracts families, it will be a huge boost to local economy.

[1:24:47] Great. Councillor Tukay.

[1:24:50] Well, I was just going to say that I think the beautiful part of this idea, one of the things

[1:24:56] I like about this idea, is that the culture of Ashland is kind of built into it, so the

[1:25:02] sarcasm festival year two in the programming of the comedians that we're bringing, you know,

[1:25:07] one of the comedians is outdoors enthusiast, he's a fly fisherman, he's an educator, and

[1:25:14] also a stand-up comedian. So there's also sort of cultural things about Ashland that we

[1:25:19] want to really infuse into everything. So to your point, I think if we do the convergence,

[1:25:26] then there's just a natural crossover that we could have parts of that experience be

[1:25:31] about speaking about the things that are important and getting platforms to people that

[1:25:37] Yeah, okay, that, yeah, reflect the values of Ashland.

[1:25:44] Council, yeah, council, yeah, thank you, Mayor, okay, I don't have a question, I have a comment.

[1:25:50] And first off, I would love to thank all three of you, some of the people that are behind

[1:25:56] you for doing this, coloring outside the lines, thinking big, bodacious, vision and making

[1:26:04] good stuff happen. I appreciate, I love the sarcasm festival last year, timing was perfect,

[1:26:12] it was my birthday weekend, nothing ever happens on my birthday. And so that was so cool. I look

[1:26:18] forward to, I'm glad to look at your 2020 eighth calendar and how you see yourself growing and how

[1:26:26] you imagine that. Matt, you have a great team, Carolinas, my first friend in Ashland, love you,

[1:26:32] and Montana, I look forward to working with you more.

[1:26:36] And I think that my experience, something that was said earlier,

[1:26:41] about pushing it out, about telling other people,

[1:26:46] this is what's going on and this is what's happening.

[1:26:48] That's the vibe and the feel I got from downtown Ashwin in December.

[1:26:54] It was buzzing.

[1:26:56] It was just, I mean, the energy was there.

[1:26:59] So, to see it go beyond downtown, to A Street, to South Side, I am just so excited.

[1:27:07] You have all of my support and thank you.

[1:27:12] So I was just to add that I remember, you know, for a number of years there was just this

[1:27:17] giant gaping hole.

[1:27:19] And I remember thinking, I live here and I can't tell what's going on, right?

[1:27:23] I would find out about things two or three days later and say, well, if I had known about

[1:27:27] that, I would have gone.

[1:27:28] that would have been fantastic. And I remember we did a little exercise up here, just before

[1:27:34] you all got started with this. We were talking about the need to have some kind of a dynamic

[1:27:40] calendaring event, calendaring piece. And we all took out our cell phones and we all went looking

[1:27:44] at Ashland and Eugene and Salem, I think, and we said, okay, you're going somewhere for the weekend,

[1:27:50] go. Find out what is going on in these three cities and tell us where you're going now this weekend.

[1:27:55] I think we were all going to Eugene.

[1:27:58] Because we couldn't tell what was going on in Ascent.

[1:28:02] And this is all the work that you are doing,

[1:28:06] and the work that everybody else is doing in this new phase

[1:28:09] of where Ascent's looking for its visitor economy,

[1:28:11] and also to support our local residents.

[1:28:14] It's transformational.

[1:28:16] And I just so appreciate that this has been

[1:28:19] I know a labor of love for a lot of folks.

[1:28:22] It's great to see the trajectory to get it

[1:28:24] to that space, that more self-sustaining space,

[1:28:27] looking forward to seeing how the city can help

[1:28:29] with all of those elements, but it just has that feeling.

[1:28:34] I think all of this has the feeling that we want to have,

[1:28:38] as residents, and we want to share with our visitors.

[1:28:40] So thank you so much for your good work.

[1:28:42] Thank you for this update.

[1:28:43] Looking forward to seeing what happens next.

[1:28:46] Thank you.

[1:28:47] All right, take good care.

[1:28:50] All right, thank you.

[1:28:51] We move on to our third and final agenda item.

[1:28:54] this evening.

[1:28:58] I just have to get off the story town calendar and give back on to our

[1:29:03] studies session agenda.

[1:29:08] The third one is the manufactured home park zoning amendments and code updates.

[1:29:15] Sabrina, so tonight we will have Dr. Goldman and Derek, our planning manager. Go over four

[1:29:24] proposed ordinances associated with our manufactured home park zone. As a reminder, this is part of

[1:29:29] housing production strategy that this comes forward to Council.

[1:29:32] Oh, and Linda.

[1:29:33] I Linda.

[1:29:35] And so we also have consultants here tonight.

[1:29:37] So go ahead and let Brandon introduce them as well.

[1:29:43] Thank you, sir.

[1:29:44] Manager.

[1:29:45] Good evening, Council.

[1:29:46] And Mayor.

[1:29:47] Tonight's study session concerns four ordinances that are implementing a prior priority action from

[1:29:55] the adoptive 2023 housing production strategy.

[1:29:58] specifically.

[1:30:00] Locust on the preservation and modernization of our manufactured home parks. So, as you know, manufactured

[1:30:06] home parks represent one of Ashland's most important sources of low-cost ownership housing and housing

[1:30:14] stability. So, this project was funded through the Department of Land Conservation and Development

[1:30:20] through a technical assistance grant and developed with the assistance of 3J Consulting, who you see on

[1:30:26] screen, and I'll introduce in a moment, following an advisory committee that was established

[1:30:32] to deal with the manufactured home park ordinance development, stakeholder interviews,

[1:30:38] public outreach, numerous planning commission study sessions, housing and human services

[1:30:45] is advisory committee review, and as you know, prior council study sessions, and a unique

[1:30:52] joint study session between planning, housing and council.

[1:30:57] So the ordinance package presented tomorrow night for first reading is four ordinances,

[1:31:04] brief overview, ordinance 3296, establishes a manufactured home per zone and updates the

[1:31:11] city's manufactured housing regulations, including both state mandated requirements, essentially

[1:31:18] for allowing multi-family or I'm sorry manufacturer dwellings on individual individual lots throughout

[1:31:25] the city but most importantly looking at city initiated actions that implement housing manufactured

[1:31:36] home park preservation, reinvestment, and modernization. So that ordinance is the 50 page

[1:31:44] ordinance in your package. The next two ordinances, ordinance 3297,

[1:31:51] applies a new manufactured home park to two specific manufactured home parks within

[1:31:57] the city of Ashland, ordinance 3298, establishes a corresponding manufactured home park

[1:32:06] comprehensive plan designation, which then gets applied not just to properties within

[1:32:12] the city limits, but also within our urban growth boundary and there's two additional parks

[1:32:17] within our urban growth boundary that upon annexing to the city would be zone manufactured home park.

[1:32:25] Lastly, ordinance 3306 creates a new chapter 10.116, establishing notice of sale requirements,

[1:32:34] opportunity to purchase provisions, relocation planning requirements, and anti-harassment provisions,

[1:32:43] essentially tenant protections, and unlike the other ordinances presented to you this evening,

[1:32:49] this is not a land use ordinance, this is falls under the purely city initiated action,

[1:32:56] not a state mandated one. So, of note since the council's packet for tonight's study session was

[1:33:03] assembled prior to the Planning Commission meeting that was held on June 9th, the materials

[1:33:09] before you tonight, different slightly from the materials that are in your packet for tomorrow

[1:33:15] evening. Essentially the packet for tomorrow evening is able to incorporate all the planning

[1:33:21] commission recommendations that were provided on June 9th. So those recommendations from

[1:33:28] planning commission, including, including clarifying that manufactured home parks, manufactured

[1:33:35] dwelling parks, and manufactured housing development, various terms used throughout the ordinances,

[1:33:42] both in our existing code and our comp plan, are all synonymous terms. So we created a new definition

[1:33:49] that clarifies that further the commission recommended removing upper pines mobile home park,

[1:33:55] and 278 HIDOS host street from the proposed manufactured home park zone and comprehensive plan map designations.

[1:34:04] So the maps in tomorrow's packet show those corrections.

[1:34:09] And lastly, the commission was looking that Jackson Wells Springs should be removed from the comprehensive plan designation,

[1:34:17] as it doesn't strictly qualify as a manufactured home park in a traditional sense.

[1:34:22] So, as I noted, staff has incorporated those recommendations into the ordinance package that's

[1:34:28] in tomorrow's presented tomorrow evening at the public hearing and first reading and so those revisions are all incorporated.

[1:34:39] And with that, I would note that the purpose of tonight's study session is to provide council with an opportunity to discuss the proposed ordinances with staff and our project consultants and advance

[1:34:51] of tomorrow's evenings public hearing and first reading.

[1:34:55] So we're not asking the Council to make any direction or motion this evening.

[1:34:59] But with the Planning Commission hearing complete after first reading,

[1:35:06] the ordinance package prepared for Council,

[1:35:08] the consultants work on this DLCD funded project

[1:35:11] is largely complete at this point.

[1:35:14] So with that, I want to take this opportunity to thank Scott Fregnancy

[1:35:18] and Journey Guarining of 3J Consulting for all the work that they've done in the assistance

[1:35:23] with the ordinance development with the public engagement and the stakeholder interviews

[1:35:27] that they conducted throughout this process and generally just the support that they've given

[1:35:32] to staff to make this possible. And so with that, I would turn it over to Scott and Journey

[1:35:40] for a brief overview of the proposed ordinances before opening to Council for Discussion and

[1:35:46] Great. Awesome. Thank you Brandon and good evening to Mayor and counselors and I appreciate

[1:35:53] the time to be able to kind of highlight the hard work we've been doing over the last

[1:35:58] 9 or 10 months. I know it's been a priority for the city and something that we've been looking

[1:36:02] to have happen. So I feel like we've now formally started the adoption process and I'm happy to

[1:36:09] be where we are and proud to share what we've done. I'll share my screen now just for a quick

[1:36:14] point, presentation.

[1:36:18] The majority of my presentation, hopefully you can see that now, yeah, the

[1:36:25] majority of my presentation really is highlighting the code change, because I think that's really

[1:36:29] important to go through what we're proposing a little bit of background on the project, so hopefully

[1:36:33] I can get through this quickly and then allow us to answer any questions and have a conversation.

[1:36:38] In terms of a project overview, this was already mentioned but this really came out of your

[1:36:44] housing production strategy. It was one of the implementation steps and actually adopting that

[1:36:50] and following through some of the recommendations that came out of that specifically

[1:36:53] strategy DG, which is maintained quality and support preservation of existing manufacturing home parks.

[1:37:00] Brandon mentioned this too, but this was funded through DLCD.

[1:37:04] We received technical assistance grant, which actually funded us as consultants to help the city and support them through the process.

[1:37:12] You know, in terms of the project, for design standards, it really looked at setting standards for densities,

[1:37:17] lot sizes, set back utilities, and preservation of parts, and even potential to allow for some higher densities.

[1:37:25] And so you'll see that's included as part of this as well.

[1:37:28] And this was also mentioned as well, but...

[1:37:30] I would like to highlight this. We had a committee that was part of this that met three times over the last nine, ten months.

[1:37:36] We had that unique joint study session back in January where we had you all as the city council, as well as applying commission.

[1:37:43] The housing and human services advisor committee was part of that as well. So we're able to kind of share your initial direction that we were going to in terms of recommendations for these code updates.

[1:37:56] Once the code updates were drafted, we made sure we went back to our committee and March,

[1:38:02] as well as the Housing and Human Services Committee in April, and then we briefed the PC,

[1:38:08] Plan and April on April 28th so that they'd be fully confident before ended up doing

[1:38:14] the first reading that we had last week, which I thought was very successful, because they were

[1:38:19] You know, attuned and aware of these recommendations could you try to bring everyone along as we went through the process.

[1:38:27] We have an online open house that shows all the work products, you know, transparency big, and we have a ability to have surveys and basically present all the information as we move through the process, which is a great way to do that.

[1:38:42] The survey was published on April 27th and it went through May 31st, we had about 46 respondents,

[1:38:48] which was good, that gave us some good feedback as we moved forward. So that was a piece of engagement we did.

[1:38:56] In terms of the proposed manufactured housing zone, this was also mentioned, but I just want to highlight it again.

[1:39:04] We're really looking at four. I think when we started, we were looking at six different ones,

[1:39:09] but we've kind of narrowed that down because of some of the ones

[1:39:13] that were removed.

[1:39:14] So again, two of them were located within

[1:39:16] national city limits, so that's wings spread in toll and creep,

[1:39:20] that this will apply to, as well as the two that are

[1:39:23] in the urban growth boundary, but not yet in the city limits.

[1:39:27] And that's risky village and not very far.

[1:39:29] So those are just a reminder of what we're really looking at

[1:39:32] in terms of the focus of these updates.

[1:39:35] I want to go through the proposed code changes fairly quickly

[1:39:39] If you notice on the left hand side it talks about a section of code that is specifically updated

[1:39:45] I won't bother reading those numbers to you, but I do want to highlight what we're changing in those areas.

[1:39:51] This one is really important.

[1:39:53] We needed to add manufacturer home park zone to the other side because it's now a new zone.

[1:39:59] So that was added.

[1:40:00] These next two I wanted to highlight mostly because these don't necessarily have to do with manufacturing home parks.

[1:40:07] But we felt that since we're going through a zoning code update to comply with, you know, many of the new state laws,

[1:40:15] that there was a couple of cleanups housekeeping pieces that we could do.

[1:40:18] Number one was to update the child care facilities to be permitted on land zone for multi-unic residential

[1:40:23] or institutional uses, and that was being compliance with House Bill 3560.

[1:40:29] So that's, again, not really related to manufacturing home parks, but important to update

[1:40:34] to make sure that the city's code is in compliance with law.

[1:40:37] Secondly, updated residential treatment facilities and residential home street permitted

[1:40:42] on land zone for residential commercial employment and industrial and public lands.

[1:40:46] And that was specifically to comply with House Bill 2005.

[1:40:50] So those are kind of outliers with their very important.

[1:40:52] I think it was great to be able to wrap that into this process and not have to do as whole

[1:40:55] separate zone.

[1:40:57] It was only going to update as part of that.

[1:41:00] We arrived standards for manufactured homes on individual lots to comply with state required

[1:41:05] clear and objective standards, House Bill 2347 and RS197A.400, and that really is the new

[1:41:15] roles basically say that you need to allow manufactured home parks, or manufactured homes

[1:41:20] as in areas where stick built traditional homes are allowed as well.

[1:41:25] So that's not specific to parks, but it's specific to your overall, it's not code for resident

[1:41:32] Here's another big list.

[1:41:33] We revised manufactured housing development standards

[1:41:35] to use those clear objective standards that I mentioned before.

[1:41:40] We updated the allowable density.

[1:41:42] We allowed some dimensional changes and design standards

[1:41:45] to allow for more density to adding units in some of these parks.

[1:41:52] We removed mental and loss-a standards

[1:41:54] and instead we referenced building codes and fire codes.

[1:41:57] rather than saying that you have to have these specific size standards that we rely on those

[1:42:04] two codes instead. We revised a maximum of a lot coverage to allow it up to 65% so that was a

[1:42:10] little bit of an increase there. We updated SEPHX standards to be specific to fire and building

[1:42:17] code again for separation requirements and allow limited encroachments or portions and decks.

[1:42:22] I think you remember that discussion from our joint work session that we had a lot of talk about

[1:42:26] those portions of Dexon encroachment, but we made sure that if we make sure that they need those

[1:42:31] fire and building codes, we felt confident that would be the best way to administer that.

[1:42:36] We also updated private street and circulation standards, including turnaround requirements.

[1:42:42] That was specifically to address some of the standards that didn't match up with fire codes.

[1:42:50] Permanent pedestrian walkways and ADA accessibility requirements were added.

[1:42:54] But we updated landscaping standards to require a minimum of 35% of the lot area.

[1:43:01] We also had common open space and many standards.

[1:43:05] So for those areas that are shared space and open space and what those standards would be,

[1:43:10] we updated, we added standards for community serving buildings that would be permitted

[1:43:16] and as conditional accessory uses.

[1:43:18] So these were intended to be things like daycare or laundry facility or things that were targeted for residents on site but we're not typically allowed in manufactured home parks.

[1:43:31] We arise manufactured housing units standards to include removal of minimum lot-sized widths and patio requirements and we allow smaller units under 500 square feet to count towards the density calculations better reduced ratio.

[1:43:43] So thinking, you know, now, not all manufacturing homes are a single-wide or a double-wide,

[1:43:50] they come in all sorts of different shapes and sizes, and they're actually, they can be built

[1:43:53] off-site and sometimes even, you know, talk about, we talked a little bit about those 3D printed

[1:43:58] types of things and things like that.

[1:44:01] So we wanted to make sure that that was allowed under this new update.

[1:44:05] We revised standards for applicable to non-performing manufacturing, housing developments,

[1:44:09] to allow phased or partial compliance approaches.

[1:44:11] This one's really big, I think, because a lot of will be heard in the stakeholder interviews was that,

[1:44:16] you know, if we want to make any upgrades to, for example, our water or sewer or our sidewalk or road,

[1:44:23] then we need to bring the entire park up to compliance.

[1:44:26] So this lays out ways that you can do conditionally use permit to allow for a phased plan to do that.

[1:44:32] So that a park owner wouldn't have to have the cost burden of doing entire upgrades.

[1:44:38] as long as they can prove that they're going to do a phase approach.

[1:44:43] So I thought that was an important one to highlight.

[1:44:46] We also have to take a look at your performance standards overlay.

[1:44:50] So we revise those provisions to allow for caught housing,

[1:44:54] manufactured housing developments to utilize those performance standards.

[1:45:00] If they choose, if it applies. We add a reference to the code within the performance standard overlay for the applicability standards as well as part of that.

[1:45:14] We revised the outline plan procedures to exempt manufacturer housing developments and college housing from their outline or final plan approval, some middle requirement.

[1:45:23] So we basically wanted this as middle requirements to be the same as you would for other

[1:45:29] developments.

[1:45:29] So that was a cleanup there as well.

[1:45:31] We revised annexation standards to exempt manufactured home parks for residential annexation

[1:45:36] affordability requirements and allow manufactured housing developments up to 18 units per

[1:45:41] acre once their annex.

[1:45:43] So I think hopefully you recall that discussion.

[1:45:45] That was a big topic.

[1:45:46] I think during our joint work session as well is how do we, you know, this is naturally occurring

[1:45:51] affordable housing.

[1:45:51] So we didn't want to disincentivize annexation of these parts by requiring them to put in a affordable housing when it's already affordable.

[1:46:03] Get close to the end here. We had and revised the definitions and this was really important because as you know in the code we always have to define terms that are used.

[1:46:13] So we defined manufactured dwelling, pre-fabricated dwelling, manufacture of dwelling, park, recreational vehicle, and proportionate impact as part of this update.

[1:46:24] We added a new chapter, this one is really big too.

[1:46:26] This is probably one of the most important things that we heard from park residents.

[1:46:30] In fact, how are we going to protect some of these parks moving forward?

[1:46:34] So we added a chapter that establishes standards related to manufactured home park sale, closure, conversion, and tenant protections,

[1:46:42] which include notice requirements of opportunities to purchase by the residents, relocation

[1:46:49] assistance standards, relocation plan review procedures, anti harassment provisions, notice

[1:46:55] requirements to city housing staff and enforcement provisions. So this is a big one here.

[1:47:01] So I wanted to make sure we talked about that one. As Brandon mentioned, as part of these

[1:47:06] Updates, you have a new zoning map, so your new MHP zone is that dark brown and where it would apply, that's ordinance 3297, as well as your new map for your comprehensive plan, which would have a manufacturing home park designation on your compound map, and that is those four areas shown in red that didn't that dark brown for the comprehensive plan maps, so I wanted to make sure I highlighted those as well.

[1:47:31] And again, I think those are updated in your packet for tomorrow, maybe don't match the match that you have in your current packet, so just remembering that as well.

[1:47:41] In terms of next steps, your first reading as we all know is tomorrow and then a second reading is scheduled for next month on the 21st.

[1:47:51] So that's basically next steps to get through the adoption process.

[1:47:56] I'm going to have this slide back to you, Brandon.

[1:47:59] But I think you really did go over most of the planning commission recommendations.

[1:48:02] I don't know if you want to highlight any of those again.

[1:48:05] Yeah, and now I thank you, Scott.

[1:48:06] I'm not going to read through the specific ocean.

[1:48:09] It's in their packet.

[1:48:10] But I did want to note that the commission spent some time considering ordinance 3306,

[1:48:16] the relating to tenant rights and notice of sale.

[1:48:19] And the commission was generally supportive of the ordinance going forward to Council for

[1:48:24] But they did recommend that additional review be conducted by the City Attorney's Office prior to adoption.

[1:48:33] So essentially the commission did have a, on their motion, a motion to remand it back to the planning commission as a recommendation following legal review, but that motion wasn't seconded.

[1:48:47] and therefore it wasn't considered by the Planning Commission.

[1:48:50] So the Commission's final action was

[1:48:52] to forward ordinance 3306 to counsel together

[1:48:55] with the comments that it's made

[1:48:57] and the recommendations for further legal review.

[1:49:01] So prior, the history on this is prior

[1:49:04] to the Planning Commission's June 9th hearing,

[1:49:07] the Legal Department identified several areas

[1:49:09] that would benefit from additional evaluation,

[1:49:13] including the relationship between the proposed local

[1:49:16] requirements and organ revised statutes chapter 90 opportunities to streamline the ordinance that's presented in your packet through incorporating state law provisions by reference instead of restatement clarification regarding the administration of enforcement procedures and essentially further review by the city attorneys office to review the cities authority to impose requirements beyond those establish

[1:49:46] by state statute, so consistent with that planning commission's recommendation, staff is going

[1:49:54] to recommend to tomorrow evening that Council continue consideration of ordinance 3306 to have

[1:50:01] first reading to a date certain, July 21st, but while proceeding with first reading of the other

[1:50:08] three ordinances presented to you tomorrow night.

[1:50:13] So that was a comment I had on it.

[1:50:16] And then I'll just lead the motions up,

[1:50:20] but these are your recommended council motions

[1:50:23] for the public hearing tomorrow.

[1:50:27] And I think that's all that we have for presentation,

[1:50:30] but thank you, Scott.

[1:50:32] So while we have Scott and journey available,

[1:50:34] as well as Linda Reed and Derek,

[1:50:37] we're hopeful to have a good discussion on the ordinances.

[1:50:41] Councilor Dale.

[1:50:43] Thank you, Mayor.

[1:50:43] Thanks, Brandon.

[1:50:45] Scott.

[1:50:47] The, I had some questions.

[1:50:48] I was at the planning commission meeting.

[1:50:52] And I too observed there a little bit of, well, more than a little bit of concern, especially

[1:50:57] with the in in light of the city attorneys, significant concerns.

[1:51:02] And there seemed to be kind of a rush to want to put that forward.

[1:51:05] And I was able to speak to a couple of commissioners after the meeting.

[1:51:08] and it was a general feeling of let's get this the council to push it back and I personally wish I think we'll have to handle that.

[1:51:16] But I do have a couple of questions Scott specifically. I'll start with one which is throughout most of this process.

[1:51:23] It was the opportunity to purchase in the time interval there.

[1:51:30] And one of the concerns was that the Planning Commission had, in, in, in, in, in my opinion, 14 days.

[1:51:36] It's currently state law is woefully inadequate for that, and certainly support tentative rights.

[1:51:41] What I'm worried about is on the flip side of that that we might have some unintended consequences of this.

[1:51:46] And a lot of the research that I did stated that that, that sweet spot is about 90 to 120.

[1:51:52] I'm curious to why you expand that to 180, because most states have found that that actually does more harm than good

[1:52:00] to tenants, has been even resident communities and non-profit,

[1:52:04] says, do not go past 90 to 120 days.

[1:52:06] So what spurred that?

[1:52:08] I can't find it in any other state or any other cities

[1:52:10] in Oregon either.

[1:52:12] Yeah, no, that's a really good point.

[1:52:14] And through our research, when we did our pure cities review,

[1:52:19] of cities that do have ordinance that are similar,

[1:52:22] that 120 day mark was kind of the rule of thumb.

[1:52:25] And that was our initial recommendation

[1:52:28] as a consultant team.

[1:52:30] And staff was that that 120 days was consistent and it would kind of not been challenged to the past.

[1:52:36] It really I think was driven by comments from our steering committee to put that in there.

[1:52:44] And so that was a change that was driven by that committee and discussions with them through our three meetings throughout the process.

[1:52:52] And again, I think that the Planning Commission was smart and questioning that and I think

[1:52:57] it's something that I would love to have your thoughts on and consideration.

[1:53:01] I do agree that there are some cities that have, and some studies out there from research,

[1:53:08] and I've done as well, that's saying going past that 120 may do, could potentially harm residents.

[1:53:17] Yeah, sure.

[1:53:18] Yeah, sure.

[1:53:19] Thank you, Mayor.

[1:53:20] Yeah, I think that's important to go through the marginal benefit just really doesn't

[1:53:23] pan out for that 180 and I just really want to make sure that we're being very thoughtful about

[1:53:28] other options that we can get caught up on looking at just the timeline and thinking that

[1:53:34] longer is better when really we're doing more harm to tenants even though we're trying to do the best thing

[1:53:38] because then we have other issues that crop up so I would hope that if this gets remanded back to the

[1:53:45] planning commission and to you guys that you would look at other alternatives such as

[1:53:50] things like pausing, but you know, like a tolling or pausing for something that's out of the tenants hands, like an extended appraisal or something, you know, as opposed to just saying there's a hard stop on this because I think if they're not ready in 90 to 120 days, they're not going to be ready.

[1:54:05] I think it's what the data show. I have further questions, but I'll also really wait.

[1:54:09] Chao, thank you all.

[1:54:12] Thank you very much, everyone.

[1:54:13] Thanks, Brendan, thanks Scott, the rest of the team.

[1:54:16] I've been following this with interest, obviously for quite a long time.

[1:54:20] I appreciate the clarification of the legal departments, concerns over it and

[1:54:25] look forward to hearing.

[1:54:27] I guess we were not going to hear that for tomorrow, it's really a recommendation from

[1:54:32] the staff to put this down shortly a few weeks, really, down the road to really

[1:54:37] bring that in.

[1:54:38] And this is helpful to hear this back and forth about the 128, the 120 days, or the 180 days.

[1:54:45] I have a question about the, also, well, I guess my question really is putting forward the three ordinances with the zones, the maps and the creating this own.

[1:55:00] Does that need to be, what happens?

[1:55:05] Do we need to consider all these things together?

[1:55:08] Isn't the AMC kind of an integral part of that?

[1:55:12] I'm a little curious about, you know,

[1:55:16] you look at the table.

[1:55:18] What is it?

[1:55:19] The table 18.2.2.030 uses by allowable zone, right?

[1:55:26] There, it kind of defines once you create a zone, then there's not a lot of other things

[1:55:33] that can be done there except for the child care and, you know, larger facilities serving

[1:55:37] there.

[1:55:39] So, it's a really, you can't do anything else with it.

[1:55:42] So it strikes me that if that's created, there really does need to be rules around, you know,

[1:55:50] It's just not conversion, and I'm a little puzzled about this term conversion or sale because

[1:55:57] I don't know what you're converting to.

[1:55:59] You can't do single-family homes,

[1:56:03] you can't do, you can't do plexus, you can't do multi-family

[1:56:07] housing, so convert to a what?

[1:56:11] I think that's a fair point.

[1:56:13] The state law refers to conversion, and I think the expectation is that a property owner that had a manufactured home park zone in a multi or a manufactured home park in a multi-family zone could remove the park and redevelop it as apartments, for instance.

[1:56:32] However, through establishment of a zone, that opportunity for conversion essentially goes away.

[1:56:39] It has to be operated continuously operated as a manufactured home park provided the zone remains an MHP.

[1:56:48] So really what we're talking about is sale.

[1:56:52] The current sale either to a third party or sale to the residents, and we're trying to put in place all of the apparatus to make it possible for the residents to form.

[1:57:02] you know an entity that could actually question just themselves.

[1:57:06] So I think this, if I go back a little bit,

[1:57:10] and establishing the manufactured,

[1:57:12] or I'm sorry, the housing production strategy

[1:57:14] and looking as strategies to preserve manufactured housing

[1:57:18] within our community.

[1:57:19] A number of park residents came forward

[1:57:22] with a zone being a way to limit the allowable uses

[1:57:26] on those properties so that they could be assured

[1:57:29] their investments in their manufactured homes could persist, that they would not be displaced

[1:57:35] for redevelopment of the site.

[1:57:37] And so that is one, that is the manufactured home park zone, the comprehensive plan, and

[1:57:43] the chapter 18 amendments, all established that those protections.

[1:57:47] It also came out of that discussion that that does not protect the residents in terms of a sale

[1:57:54] to a third party that may continuously increase rents

[1:57:59] that may have those impacts that are foreseeable

[1:58:02] in terms of the manufactured home itself

[1:58:10] as an investment, but the monthly rents

[1:58:12] that they pay for this space is a cost

[1:58:15] that they have to consider.

[1:58:16] Through that process, we identified

[1:58:17] that resident-owned communities were the preeminent way

[1:58:22] to preserve that long-term security.

[1:58:26] If the park residents can acquire the property,

[1:58:29] we reached out to Casa of Oregon

[1:58:31] as one of those stakeholder interviews

[1:58:33] through the Management Advisory Committee.

[1:58:36] That said, the 15 days, as Councillor Dale said,

[1:58:40] is woefully inaccurate and adequate to pull

[1:58:45] all of the properties manufactured homeowners,

[1:58:49] get 51% buy-in, get them to determine

[1:58:51] their finances, how much of an offer on the property they can make, 15 days is exceedingly

[1:58:57] difficult to accomplish that.

[1:58:59] So we're resident-owned communities have happened.

[1:59:02] It's largely been a voluntary effort that happens before a sale is on the table.

[1:59:07] However city of Bellingham had a 120-day period that was seen as a case in which the residents

[1:59:16] would have that time to work with a nonprofit, the developed resident-owned communities

[1:59:21] and provide a counter offer to a pending sale.

[1:59:26] So that's how that chapter 10 was created to provide an ancillary protection for the escalation

[1:59:34] in rents and have security of ownership extent to the park as a whole.

[1:59:40] And talking with Costa, they said 90 days would be likely sufficient to accomplish that,

[1:59:47] But again, 120 days would give them ample time to determine whether the park residents were capable

[1:59:54] or not to make an offer on the property.

[1:59:58] To your question, in terms of adoption.

[2:00:00] Promoting three ordinances, and not adopting the chapter 10 that is evidently possible. It would still afford that first

[2:00:08] launch of protections in terms of limiting the potential for conversion, also providing opportunities for the

[2:00:16] manufactured home park owners to deal with those non-conforming situations, so they can do those

[2:00:22] improvements in a proportional way and not have to do all the improvements at once. Those are things that are currently

[2:00:28] not permitted in our code, and so I think that you could adopt 32.96, 32.97 and 32.98.

[2:00:39] And then address the chapter 10 changes and 33.06 at whatever time the council determines.

[2:00:48] I would note two council deals, comments in terms of working with 3J consulting.

[2:00:52] Their contract is completed, so I think we would be working closely with the legal department

[2:00:57] and city staff to make those amendments to 3306 to come back.

[2:01:03] Thank you, Brandon.

[2:01:04] We are at 7 o'clock if we would like to carry on.

[2:01:06] We need a motion to extend.

[2:01:09] Sure.

[2:01:09] I moved to extend the study session by 30 minutes.

[2:01:11] Sir, second.

[2:01:13] All in favor?

[2:01:14] Not right.

[2:01:15] Okay.

[2:01:16] Carry on.

[2:01:17] Did you have anything else on that?

[2:01:19] Yes.

[2:01:19] That was a very extensive year.

[2:01:22] We're going back and filling us in on a lot of the history

[2:01:25] And I appreciate that.

[2:01:27] I think it's a very, very useful.

[2:01:29] So I think another thing that you did mention, though, because you did mention the possibility

[2:01:35] of that that the park could be sold to a third party, and then there could be a, you know,

[2:01:41] rent increases.

[2:01:41] Large rent increases every year.

[2:01:44] There is also state legislation that now caps that, that is, well, that's six maximum

[2:01:49] six percent per year.

[2:01:50] That provides some protection there.

[2:01:53] So going back to the question of if we do three, which would lock into place these, the parks and so they can't be converted,

[2:02:04] it would also give the owners the ability to make the investments, without doing all of the investments for non-conformations.

[2:02:14] We've got a comment that you've shared with us earlier today.

[2:02:18] testimony, I guess for tomorrow, I don't know for allow to ask a question about that.

[2:02:21] But there's a comment from the I think the wings spread general manager, a varying

[2:02:26] that there could be that we need to explicitly call out an exemption, and it sounds like

[2:02:33] from what you're saying is that we wouldn't need to, that we're already handling that in

[2:02:37] the ordinance itself saying that the owner of the park could actually do some of the things,

[2:02:44] but not all of the things in order to become critical.

[2:02:46] So there's a distinction, the letter you see that's for a blanket exception, well we provided in the ordinance was a conditional use permit process in order to achieve that relief from non-conformities.

[2:03:01] So that conditional use permit process is different than an outright exemption or exception. It actually requires a hearing for making an application for that proportional impact.

[2:03:13] and say that I only want to do, you know, 10% of the road improvements to affect the new

[2:03:19] area being developed, but not the entirety of the site, and demonstrate that that is

[2:03:25] proportionate to the new impact from the additional units, for instance.

[2:03:29] So it is a little different than what was requested.

[2:03:32] Thank you.

[2:03:33] Councillor Stroud?

[2:03:34] Thank you, Mayor.

[2:03:35] Thanks for all the work that everybody's done on this.

[2:03:38] I know it's been a Schlog.

[2:03:40] This is going to be for, I've got a few questions.

[2:03:42] And I think this is one of the bigger zoning changes I've seen in this city, and I think it deserves much more time than the multiple meetings we've already had.

[2:03:52] But for Scott really, and I appreciate you revising some of the findings and coming back and having the removal of 278 and also the removal of one of our prime CFA areas that also has a commercial zoning on top of that, I think that's really good.

[2:04:09] I think there's a couple of things that I was all gonna hope for this and like the more I'm digging into it the more I'm I'm unsure

[2:04:15] Maybe you can help me understand

[2:04:18] My decision making process as we move into tomorrow's first reading mostly. It's gonna stem around the

[2:04:25] Maybe you're depending on the lower acceptance rate. We had some really good data that you brought forward

[2:04:31] several months ago about Portland coming in at 69 out of 70

[2:04:36] Park owners wanting to opt in and here

[2:04:39] I mean, we're getting feedback from Park Owners literally during this meeting a half hour ago saying

[2:04:45] we're just hearing about this and no thanks and my rough math is like nobody wants this.

[2:04:51] And I'm just wondering is there a reason?

[2:04:53] Is it our demographic here?

[2:04:55] Is there an option for property owners to potentially opt in or out?

[2:05:00] And my main overarching concern is one protecting this naturally occurring in affordable housing.

[2:05:05] But when I see all these lists of policies and I see CUPs and I see pressure being put on on tired landlords

[2:05:13] I see that cost running downhill to the tenant. So why last acceptance right here and how is this going to actually save the end user money as opposed to

[2:05:23] Increase their cost of living

[2:05:25] Well, I can I guess the the opt-in question. I'll start number one

[2:05:30] You just don't have very many, the first of all, and I think that there is, it is a big deal to do his own change that gives them a designation that's different than they currently have.

[2:05:42] I do want to highlight that we did reach out to every park owner.

[2:05:46] We offer to do interviews, and frankly, we got several that just were not interested in talking with us at that time.

[2:05:56] We actually reached out a second time, so, and I know that most of the residents were pushing

[2:06:02] to get owners and management to be involved in this because it is a big deal.

[2:06:08] So unfortunately, I hate to hear that people have heard about this yet when we've been

[2:06:13] talking about it so much and really been very transparent about it.

[2:06:16] But that's kind of the nature of doing this type of work is, you know, it's not important

[2:06:21] until we get to the point where we're actually serious about adopting a zone change, and I feel

[2:06:26] like that's kind of why we are in a situation we are now. I also think if I were an owner of

[2:06:33] one of these parks, I would want to preserve flexibility. This gives them flexibility in other

[2:06:41] ways, but it locks in the use of the manufacturing home parks. It does allow for additional

[2:06:47] units. It allows for them to do upgrades to parks, you know, proportionally, which I think is super important.

[2:06:55] So I kind of feel like that there is a, you know, it does allow for them to potentially

[2:06:59] receive more rent by, you know, giving them more flexibility in the way those parts of

[2:07:05] design and laid out kind of types of housing that they could, they could quote unquote rent for those

[2:07:10] ownership products. So hopefully that helps answer that one, that first part of your question.

[2:07:16] I also think that there was, you know, in Portland, there was, I think there was a lot of pressure

[2:07:23] that they were going to make that change anyway and there was, there was, and some, I think there was actually some,

[2:07:30] Financial incentives that the city was able to give them to kind of want them to opt in in terms of that. I don't know the specifics, but that I recall that when we looked at Portland specifically.

[2:07:42] The second part of the question was about if I may bear.

[2:07:47] Yes. Thank you. It was really just like how does, I mean, this is a sticky sticky one here, because normally we're looking to incentivize development, so investors will come poor money and to need housing.

[2:07:58] This is a little bit different because we're trying to, we're not incentivizing, we're just incentivizing the developer, but there are property owners within a portion of one of the two of these parks, potentially two of the parks.

[2:08:09] So it's, it's kind of an off, it's kind of an off-beat system, but the question really relates to how does this help the people that are on the margin right now, how does it help save them money?

[2:08:23] because when I read the responses from the park owners and the park managers, especially the ones with

[2:08:27] CapEx coming up, they're already cost burdened potentially with every increasing cost, look at our, you know,

[2:08:35] look at our public works budget, or look at your grocery bill, or your gas bill, and also the fact of

[2:08:41] capping rents, which I think is a good thing, but there's a lot of downward pressures, and we're not

[2:08:46] giving property owners an incentive here where we're really giving them more of a stick. So how does it

[2:08:50] the end user, which is the person that owns the manufacturer home and pays space rent or the person who rents the actual improvement and rents the space.

[2:09:01] How does this save them money in our town?

[2:09:04] Well, frankly, I don't think necessarily saves them money. It just gives them long-term protections for the housing and their ownership product.

[2:09:12] You know, I think it's really difficult to have a code, a zoning code, save people money.

[2:09:20] I don't think that that's the place of a zoning change.

[2:09:22] I think the whole key to this was to preserve that naturally occurring affordable housing,

[2:09:27] even affordable housing is getting more expensive.

[2:09:30] As you mentioned, everything is getting more expensive.

[2:09:33] And I can't deny that it is more of a stick.

[2:09:37] It's then incentive.

[2:09:39] But I do think there are incentives that light touching

[2:09:43] incentives that you can do through a zoning code.

[2:09:45] And I mentioned several of those already in terms

[2:09:47] of that flexibility for different types of units

[2:09:50] and increased density and being able to upgrade periodically,

[2:09:58] rather than requiring it to be all at once.

[2:10:01] So there are some incentives there.

[2:10:03] Interesting enough when we did that, the folks

[2:10:05] we did interview and talk with. We're very interested in those incentives. Let's so in the

[2:10:11] zone change, frankly. So I just, in the name of transparency, I want you to know what we heard,

[2:10:17] and that's what we heard. And then one more minute, the last one just relates to bringing a city ordinance

[2:10:24] and or 33.06 into a zoning code and a comprehensive plan amendment, which seems like that the intent

[2:10:33] is really good. I understand it in the state one page on the steps to go through to sell your park

[2:10:40] was kind of vague to me and I did a little bit more research and it seemed like it was really

[2:10:44] vague at the state level too, maybe because it's brand new and it hasn't been test driven,

[2:10:47] I would assume. But that also seems to be making the state language for a lot of housing policy

[2:10:55] seems to be less restrictive and we're adding what seems to be a good intention but is a restrictive

[2:11:02] covenant to an owner which potentially puts more pressure on sale and potentially more

[2:11:10] pressure on investment coming to our community. Can you speak to that? Or maybe Brandon

[2:11:14] or Derek, can speak to that if you can?

[2:11:19] Like why are we being more restrictive?

[2:11:22] Yeah, a couple of points I would say that the 3306 just for clarification is not a land use

[2:11:28] ordinance change or a comprehensive plan change, not a zoning change, is presented as an amendment

[2:11:33] to chapter 10, which is the same section where we have tenant rights for condo conversions,

[2:11:39] or if somebody converts apartment complex into condominiums, you have to give first right

[2:11:44] of refusal to the existing tenants. So it's similar in that capacity. In terms of incentives,

[2:11:52] I do want to note that one area in which a park owner may realize some increased value from

[2:12:01] their property versus the existing ordinance, if these are passed, is going from 13.5

[2:12:07] unit stake per acre to 18 units per acre and also allowing opportunities for small units to

[2:12:16] account as a half a unit so they could do two small units in the same footprint where there's

[2:12:21] currently and collect space rents on both. In terms of the how it benefits the

[2:12:28] resident and manufactured home unit owner, it probably gives them a security for

[2:12:35] reinvestment into their own and remove some security concerns over the potential for the home

[2:12:43] that they currently own to be required to be demolished through a conversion. And that was

[2:12:49] something that was unfortunately realized in a number of parks throughout the Rob Valley back in

[2:12:56] 2006, 7, I'm forgetting the exact year, we're property owners that had purchased manufactured

[2:13:01] home parks, faced a closure of their park, and the conversion of their park into a different

[2:13:08] use. And in that process, we're in a position to demolish the home that they still had to make

[2:13:15] payments on even after it was demolished, so that is not saving the money on a monthly basis,

[2:13:22] but it's providing security in the long term that they're not going to face that kind of significant loss.

[2:13:31] Brandon, just to follow up on that question, we also saw what happened in the wake of the

[2:13:45] developable space and so that's part of this as well. I know that when we started to have this

[2:13:51] conversation part of that was the conversion piece when the houses are still standing but the

[2:13:56] other piece was when we saw what was going on with manufactured parks after a fire was that all

[2:14:03] the said now those obstacles to conversion when the homes are there those obstacles are often gone

[2:14:11] at the point where now you've got a post-fire landscape, and so that is something else we should

[2:14:17] be thinking about in terms of not necessarily dropping the cost for a person on a monthly

[2:14:22] basis, but protecting that space as affordable, some sort of affordable housing.

[2:14:30] Councillor Dale.

[2:14:32] Thank you, Mayor.

[2:14:35] I am struggling to accept what I considered be significant ambiguity with the entire

[2:14:44] subsection of 10.16.050, which is the relocation plan and city review.

[2:14:50] And starting with a fact that it says the city may require the designation of a relocation

[2:14:54] coordinator to administer the approval of the patient plan to borrow from a term that

[2:14:58] I'd like to use especially when we're...

[2:15:00] When we're trying to tighten up and write well, well, written code, clearing objective standards or what we're looking for.

[2:15:07] I don't want to put our planning department in a situation where they're having to parse these code statements, such as may.

[2:15:17] Like, when do we do that? Why, how would an owner know? Do I do I do I not need that?

[2:15:21] A code should be, I mean, fine if you want to say, show where I think if that's something that this council chooses to do.

[2:15:26] But as you go into that, and you start looking at park

[2:15:31] under shell submit a relocation report and plan

[2:15:33] for city for review, okay, under what standards,

[2:15:36] a relocation report has four, so things here,

[2:15:39] but under what standards would that be considered acceptable

[2:15:41] or is that something that our planning staff

[2:15:43] is just making a call right then and there,

[2:15:47] maybe you might be able to speak to that.

[2:15:52] But I'm not understanding, if I were coming into this,

[2:15:55] I wouldn't know where to start here.

[2:15:58] I wouldn't know, okay, I write up an entire report and it may be approved.

[2:16:03] It may not just tell me what I need to do and I'll do it and make it so that I can follow

[2:16:07] the instructions and be clear with what I'm trying to accomplish here and what the city

[2:16:14] is looking to achieve out of it.

[2:16:17] But would it be fair to say that this is quite open-ended and do you think we can do

[2:16:21] some significant work to maybe tighten that up administratively?

[2:16:26] Do you want me to start Brandon or do you want to go?

[2:16:29] Go ahead Scott.

[2:16:31] I think that, you know, I think that you're getting to some of the apprehensions that

[2:16:35] Planning Commission have as well.

[2:16:38] And I think that the term may, I totally at 100% agree with you on being clear and objective,

[2:16:45] especially when administering code, that's very important.

[2:16:48] And I would, I'm not an attorney, but I really think it is important to have attorneys

[2:16:54] review code language like that because we don't want to get ourselves in a situation as planners

[2:16:59] where we have to make administrative decisions that aren't clear and set out.

[2:17:03] So I appreciate that comment.

[2:17:05] I think that we should work with this city attorney to make sure that it is something

[2:17:09] that can be administered cleanly and efficiently from both the city side and from that

[2:17:14] from an African side.

[2:17:16] I appreciate that.

[2:17:17] Thank you, Brandon.

[2:17:18] Do you have any idea?

[2:17:19] Yeah, I'll just reiterate what Scott said.

[2:17:21] I think that this is precisely the type of comment on 10116 that we'd like to relate

[2:17:28] to the city attorney for a careful evaluation to ensure that what we're requesting

[2:17:33] of park owners is readily achievable and clear to them.

[2:17:39] So, thank you.

[2:17:40] And I do believe that there's best of intentions here and I do believe that the staff and

[2:17:45] and all of us are trying to do our best to provide maximum tenant protections.

[2:17:50] I don't think that that's in question at all.

[2:17:52] I just want to make sure that we measure three times, cut one's kind of a thing.

[2:17:56] And I would definitely hope that we would get this back to have further review on it,

[2:18:03] because I think it's definitely worth doing, but we need to get it right.

[2:18:07] And I just interject one brief point.

[2:18:10] The difference between May and Shao, a good example is our tree ordinance.

[2:18:14] that says, we may require an arborist.

[2:18:17] We said, we shall require an arborist.

[2:18:19] You have to pay an arborist every time, regardless.

[2:18:23] May give staff the option to say, you know what?

[2:18:26] We came out and looked at it.

[2:18:28] Don't worry about it.

[2:18:30] It's fine.

[2:18:31] If I may may.

[2:18:32] Thanks, Derek.

[2:18:33] I appreciate that.

[2:18:34] And for a tree that makes sense.

[2:18:36] What I'm curious about here, though,

[2:18:38] is this is much more critical and has much more

[2:18:43] much more intense consequences. So I guess my question is, is if we were to say

[2:18:51] shall on this, if we think it is that important, and maybe I'll I'll I'll

[2:18:56] I'll Bali this back to you and say would you guys in planning feel comfortable with

[2:19:00] the shall because it is something that needs to be reviewed at this level because of

[2:19:04] what we're trying to accomplish. Now, if you were to say may that's fine, I'm going to

[2:19:08] come back and ask you for, well, if I'm coming with a may, then please let me know what

[2:19:13] But what your standards are, at least in some sort of policy that I can read up, but so it's

[2:19:18] not just the decision that I have no idea what I need to provide to you.

[2:19:23] But thoughts on shallows, what we're trying to do, or am I making a worse?

[2:19:27] No, I think honestly with a number of parks we're dealing with, versus a number of trees we're dealing with.

[2:19:31] I don't think shallows are a problem.

[2:19:33] I just think it's a tendency to try to leave some room for human judgment versus, and that

[2:19:40] absolutely appreciate that.

[2:19:42] And I was a great call out, but yes, thanks.

[2:19:45] So I just have a question about when we're looking

[2:19:49] at the parts that might eventually be annexed in.

[2:19:52] And the conversation around, you know,

[2:19:55] they're already providing affordable housing,

[2:19:57] so we don't need to have that 25% element.

[2:20:01] But I also don't kind of back to this space rent question

[2:20:06] that we may find that at some point down the road,

[2:20:10] they aren't necessarily providing affordable housing in the same way that they are right now.

[2:20:16] So as the rents go up, the question of whether this is truly affordable versus whether

[2:20:22] it's sort of workforce type, you know, potentially even higher somewhat higher end workforce type housing is a question.

[2:20:33] And so I would like to understand a little bit better that assumption that because it's a manufactured home,

[2:20:40] park, it sort of automatically means that these will be lower income, you know, providing affordable

[2:20:47] housing. Yeah, I think you're right. It doesn't automatically mean that it's affordable with

[2:20:52] the capital A. I think the term that I try to use in the introducing it was lower cost ownership

[2:20:59] opportunities within the city. So I think that the housing production strategy and the goal

[2:21:05] that Council set and doing this ordinance was recognizing that manufactured home parks are

[2:21:11] a needed housing type, and that is the needed housing type that is in short supply.

[2:21:16] So I think that the intention of removing obstacles or barriers to annexation in order to achieve

[2:21:24] that needed housing type is where that exemption from the affordable housing comes from.

[2:21:30] And I know it has been discussed in terms of naturally occurring affordable housing.

[2:21:34] And right now that is a truth, but you're absolutely right that is time marches forward.

[2:21:41] There are manufactured home parks around the country that are most people, some people

[2:21:45] consider cost prohibitive.

[2:21:48] So, nonetheless, it's a housing type that otherwise is not being developed from the ground

[2:21:53] up, and so we wanted to provide opportunities to embrace those parks on the perimeter into

[2:21:59] the community.

[2:22:00] And so the assessment is that there's more risk for the city's goals in leaving that as an obstacle to annexation than there is to removing that obstacle and having them come in without the 25% requirement.

[2:22:19] Okay. Thank you. Councillor Duking.

[2:22:24] Thank you, Mayor. Brandon, I believe before you had meant.

[2:22:30] Or maybe Scott mentioned, child care, laundry, things like that. Also, I believe I read in here, might have been yesterday's packet, tomorrow's packet yesterday tomorrow.

[2:22:43] Something about RVs also being allowed there in the park, if people choose to do so, is that correct?

[2:22:54] it is correct. So the state law stipulates how

[2:23:01] scope 4064 says wherever you allow manufactured home parks,

[2:23:06] you have to allow prefabricated units in those parks.

[2:23:09] So we changed the code to allow those.

[2:23:11] In reviewing it, further it doesn't specifically require

[2:23:15] RVs being included unless you've seen.

[2:23:19] So however, a number of our manufactured home parks throughout the city

[2:23:23] have RVs in them currently, and so we were looking at not having those RVs be considered

[2:23:28] and not conforming use and allowing them outright. Further it was discussed throughout

[2:23:38] this last 15 months or so that manufactured homes once installed and decades transpire

[2:23:46] can't readily move out of the park. And so that is in that park and if the park closes

[2:23:53] or is converted, they have to be demolished. Whereas mobile units such as a recreational vehicle can

[2:24:01] readily move from place to place. So it is another housing type that increasingly people are

[2:24:08] living in RVs as full-time residents and the only place is that you can live in an RV as a full-time

[2:24:16] residents under building code is in a designated RV park or in a designated

[2:24:21] manufactured home park. So again this is something that the city could

[2:24:26] remove from the ordinance but again it's our recommendation that they be

[2:24:30] permitted within manufactured home parks as well.

[2:24:35] You know I would just add that I think part of our process has been to look at ways to

[2:24:41] be more flexible and more open. We know that the state of Oregon

[2:24:45] is really pushing different housing types, especially housing types that are more affordable and

[2:24:51] are quicker to create and get people living in for a variety of reasons that we've seen,

[2:24:58] and we've also seen that there's been a lot of innovation in housing, things that we probably

[2:25:03] wouldn't have thought of 20 or 30 years ago. So I think we were trying to be responsive to those

[2:25:08] opportunities that may arise in the near future around pre-fabricated homes and potentially

[2:25:17] RVs. You know right now is it is the definition for the state of Oregon between

[2:25:21] a pre-fabricated home and RV is just that an RV is motorized or pulled by something with a motor

[2:25:27] and is designed for temporary housing where pre-fabricated housing is designed for permanent housing.

[2:25:34] But I think that that's a pretty fine line and at some point in the near future we could get to a place where the state of Oregon may see that differently and I think we want to have the opportunity to be flexible in manufactured home parks to allow for innovative housing types as they come on board and especially if the state of Oregon is supporting the development of those housing types so that we can get affordable housing on the ground quickly.

[2:26:05] All right, we'll thank you all very much for the presentation and answering all of our questions.

[2:26:11] I know we have a lot more, we'll quite a bit more discussion ahead of us, but also just so great to see us get to this point.

[2:26:19] It has been a while since we started the conversation and we know that it's a deep dive and it's a lot of thinking and a lot of work to figure out how to make

[2:26:28] this kind of a change appropriate for the community that we have and the circumstances that we have.

[2:26:34] So great to see that this is where we're at in this and looking forward to the next conversations.

[2:26:40] Thank you.

[2:26:42] And with that, our agenda is complete for the evening.

[2:26:46] Meeting is adjourned.

Ashland City Council Study Session

Agenda

Transcript