MINUTES OF THE METRO COUNCIL BUDGET & FINANCE COMMITTEE

Wednesday, February 16, 2000

Council Chamber

Members Present:  Susan McLain (Chair), Bill Atherton (Vice Chair), Rod Monroe

Members Absent:  None  

Also Present:    David Bragdon, Rod Park

Chair McLain called the meeting to order at 1:37 P.M.

1.  Consideration of the Minutes of February 2, 2000 Committee Meeting.

2.  Finalize Committee Meeting Schedule

Chair McLain directed attention to the memo dated February 8, 2000, FY 2000-01 Budget Schedule and Process. She announced that Councilor Monroe had a conflict on Mondays so all Monday meetings were rescheduled to 3:00-5:00 PM. There were three dates effected, March 6, April 3 and 17 with the latter two dates set on an if needed basis. She asked everyone to review the schedule and let the clerk know if there were any conflicts by the end of day. A copy of the memo, amendments form and hearings schedule are included in the public record.

She noted that Council staff had developed an amendment form that had been sent to all departments. It should be used for any proposed amendments to the budget ordinance. On the Affected Line Item(s) line an attachment could be referenced, since a table, etc. might be required rather than a narration. John Houser and Michael Morrissey, Council analysts, were available to assist with the form if help was needed. A second memo dated February 10, 2000 outlined the Committee Work Plan and is included in the public record.

Councilor Monroe asked if the February 24 cancelled Council meeting date might be used as an alternative date on the schedule. Chair McLain suggested that the Committee might have a better feel for the need to add in another date once the present meeting had concluded and it was seen how much of the scheduled material had been covered. She asked Mr. Houser to check with Committee members at that time.

Chair McLain explained that all presentations would be given first for a holistic overview of the budget. That segment should be completed by March 6. Budget presentations were divided into sections: General, Enterprise & Support and Miscellaneous Funding. Some departments would present in two categories in an effort to better understand how they were affected and where the revenue came from. The Chair invited all Councilors to attend these meetings so that department staff would have the widest audience for their presentations.

3.  Ordinance No. 00-847, For the Purpose of Adopting the Annual Budget for Fiscal Year 2000-01, making appropriations, and levying ad valorem taxes, and declaring an emergency.

GENERAL FUND DEPARTMENT PRESENTATIONS:

•  Transportation

•  Growth Management

•  Parks and Greenspaces

•  Executive Office

•  Council

BACKGROUND ON PRIMARY FUNDING SOURCES

Chair McLain said that staff analysts would review each departmental budget presented today and prepare questions for distribution at the March 1 meeting. The responses would be distributed at the March 6 meeting with deliberation and analysis scheduled to begin at the March 15 meeting. She introduced Tony Mounts, Financial Planning Manager, who gave an overview of Metro funding by department. A copy of the overview, Budget & Finance Committee, is included in the public record.

Mr. Mounts noted that during the Executive Officer's presentation to Council last week, Mr. Burton responded to a question about the Growth Management budget with the number that included only direct expenditures. The figure was 4.4% including non-departmental expenditures.

Andy Cotugno, Transportation Director, spoke to the Transportation Department budget and his presentation is included in the public record.

Presiding Officer Bragdon asked his opinion on Federal lobbying and the most cost-effective way to do it, especially in regard to PAC/WEST.Communications. Mr. Cotugno responded that Tri-Met contracts with PAC/WEST at a cost of probably $150-200k/year of which Metro contributes $15k. Essentially, participation had granted Metro equal partnership even though, in reality, Metro was a junior partner. He felt Metro had received terrific access and service. However PAC/WEST represented a regional program rather than Metro's particular program. For example, Metro was pursuing a $1 million grant for a Kenton Street Station. Metro's own lobbyist would pursue it more effectively than PAC/WEST would as a general purpose regional lobbyist. Nevertheless, a personal lobbyist would not supplant the need for a regional lobbyist.

Presiding Officer Bragdon asked if the Transportation and Growth Management departments were working together on the TCSP grant. Mr. Cotugno said that yes, they were working together on the TSCP Urban Reserve Planning Project, but Kenton Street was a separate TCSP grant that Transportation was pursuing alone. He noted that Kenton Street was not in this budget, but if the grant application was successful, it could be added in June.

Councilor Atherton questioned what part of this budget encompassed the core group who responded to problems brought forward by Councilors and their constituents. Mr. Cotugno answered that it was the Regional Transportation Planning section that responded to such tasks. They were directly involved with local agencies on planning activities.

Councilor Atherton stated that the three counties spent about $6 million on planning while Metro's planning budget was $4.4 million. He asked if the counties duplicated any of Metro's work. Mr. Cotugno responded no, rather Metro planning complemented their role. Each county needed to know what was being done regionally; Metro provided that coordination. All three counties used Metro Travel Forecasts rather than doing them individually.

Councilor Atherton asked if Mr. Cotugno saw any changes in the level of Federal involvement in transportation issues for the future. Mr. Cotugno said that there was a movement to have more Federal dollars dedicated local jurisdictions to use as they saw as the region's primary concerns. Joint Policy Advisory Committee on Transportation (JPACT), of which Metro was a member, had allocated $1 million in Federal funds to the South corridor transit program. However, JPACT made its decisions based on what the committee saw as the regional needs rather than just Metro's vision of regional needs.

Elaine Wilkerson, Growth Management Manager, spoke to the proposed Growth Management Department budget. The document is included in the public record.

Chair McLain directed attention to the debit of 1.47 fte under Functional Plan Compliance and Code Review. She asked how this would effect their work with people coming forward with exceptions.

Ms. Wilkerson responded that the remaining 1.6 fte would address exceptions, as well as compliance document review and some review of code and comprehensive plan amendments. Since much of the compliance work was complete the ongoing work on Title 3 and Goal 5 would be handled by the Long Range people in conjunction with the Functional Plan group.

Councilor Monroe asked Ms. Wilkerson to develop a prioritized list with justification of items she would restore if funds were found for any minor restorations to the department. She noted that Goal 5 was a new program, but felt it underpinned the success of recovery and restoration of regional natural resources. Therefore she assigned it an even higher priority than many existing programs. Chair McLain added that the prioritized list should address what Ms. Wilkerson viewed as the most important work, whether new initiatives or charter mandated and should be distributed to all Councilors.

Councilor Atherton asked if she saw any duplication with work done by the counties; could there be a shift in planning work? Ms. Wilkerson responded that counties put the majority of their dollars into new growth of unincorporated areas. The amount of money they expend on long range planning was very small and, in fact, they contributed to Metro long range planning by actively participating on Metro Technical Advisory Committee (MTAC) and on sub committees. She felt that there was little duplication.

Councilor Atherton cited the Bethany effort and Sunnyside Road in Clackamas County, where counties had gotten into the new city business, as exceptions. He asked if she knew what portion of the budget was in response to State-mandated work (SB 2709 and 2463). Ms. Wilkerson said that amending the Urban Growth Boundary (UGB), the UGB Report, Goal 14 code changes and the legislative process added up to at least 2.5 fte. The dollar amount was substantial.

Councilor Park suggested that this work would still be required without the mandate, albeit over a longer timeline. Ms. Wilkerson agreed that a lot of this work probably would be done as part of Metro's performance measures, but funded differently. In her 3-years at Metro 2.5 out of 10 fte had been devoted UGB process maintenance.

Mr. Mounts gave an overview of regional parks from the overview previously mentioned, Budget & Finance Committee.

Charlie Ciecko, Regional Parks and Greenspaces Manager, spoke to the budget. The document is included in the public record.

Councilor Atherton said that greenspace maintenance cost $700-750k per year and asked what the Nature Conservancy spent. Jim Morgan, Parks and Greenspaces, responded that the numbers used to benchmark future operations costs were from mid-peninsula, Colorado and California where maintenance cost $219-242 per acre on fully developed systems. Metro, however, was in the position of maintaining or landbanking with the lesser goal of keeping lands from degrading.

Councilor Park said that budget figures showed that expense exceeded revenue by approximately $347k at Blue Lake Park. He asked if there was something that could be done to bring this figure down, or if another entity (similar to the Tualatin Hills Park and Recreation District [THPRD]) might take over operation of the park. Mr. Ciecko answered that staff was currently engaged in an economic feasibility study on operations and maintenance along with reviewing economic opportunities for the park.

Councilor Park asked if Metro might be better off concentrating on natural settings-type parks and if a group like THPRD might handle an activities-oriented park like Blue Lake better. Mr. Ciecko responded that Blue Lake was in fact a regional park as shown by user demographics; a good portion of its users came from outside the proposed district. To his knowledge Gresham had expressed no interest in adding Blue Lake to the city's park system. He said that Metro had assumed certain responsibilities to Multnomah County with the acquisition of Blue Lake. He agreed that Blue Lake straddled the line between open spaces and recreation, but had the capacity to provide greater resource value than it currently had. The staff study would attempt to balance the two opportunities.

Presiding Officer Bragdon asked if other districts had like facilities that operated at a profit, or were they usually subsidized as a public service. Mr. Ciecko said that he knew of no park that paid its own way, nor did he believe that any park could, particularly with the direction outlined in the Regional Plan under which Metro parks operated.

Presiding Officer Bragdon asked him to describe the ongoing activities associated with landbanking. Mr. Ciecko responded that there were 110 properties spread across the three counties that required periodic visits to check for hazardous situations and garbage dumps. The properties contained miles of roads and fences that required maintenance. There were outbuildings, rentals and agricultural leases that required oversight; many responsibilities were acquired along with property ownership, even at the minimal level of Metro's operation. . Additionally, several hundred acres of property were in various stages of reforestation. Staff was accumulating baseline data on the properties in order to provide a better picture of what Metro's acquisitions included. Landbanking was budgeted under Administration.

Bruce Warner, Office of the Executive Officer, gave a high level summary of its budget and is included in the public record.

Councilor Atherton asked what type of surveys had Metro done recently. Mr. Warner responded that the last survey addressed citizen concerns in regard to Metro services. The intent was to get benchmarks again with the next survey and then compare results, i.e. had the moods and attitudes of the public changed in any way. The expenditure budgeted was $12k.

Presiding Officer Bragdon asked for an explanation of the reasoning behind housing the person dealing with Endangered Species Act (ESA) issues in the Executive Offices. Mr. Warner answered that with the ESA listing of salmon and steelhead it became clear that coordination of Metro responses was needed. As a new position it was quartered in the Executive Office, but perhaps this was a good time to review the siting. He felt it was a critical position in light of Title 3 and Goal 5 work to be done. Chair McLain added that she agreed that a closer connection to the rest of the work force involved in these issues would seem to be more efficient.

Mr. Warner responded that it might help the Committee if he brought back more information on how work teams were set up and what David Moskowitz, who held the position, was involved in, especially outside the agency.

Councilor Park asked if he was concerned that maintaining the open spaces program, which took 12% of the budget, had become very expensive for the agency. Mr. Warner affirmed that new funding sources should be examined. Chair McLain said that long term capital renewal and replacement needs should cover park issues as well. The Committee will examine these issues in May.

Jeff Stone, Council Chief of Staff, presented the Council Budget and is included in the public record.

Chair McLain said that Council should set the example in thinking outside the box on how to cut expenses in the Council budget. Mr. Stone recommended that current staff be reallocated to cover the jobs cut. Chair McLain agreed that the key to working with limited resources was to be creative and condense work by identifying the Council's top priorities. Mr. Stone welcomed the Councilors' help in setting these priorities.

Presiding Officer Bragdon offered an amendment for the Committee's consideration that would cut subscriptions and dues, travel to conferences, training and conferences and expense accounts. It is included in the public record. He agreed with Mr. Stone's recommendation to cut the outreach, analyst and presiding officer assistant positions. He saw this as an opportunity for the talented Council Assistants to take on more responsibilities.

Councilor Atherton agreed and felt it was part of the Councilor's job description to do outreach. Chair McLain said that the number of people who have commented to her that they watch the televised Council meetings was amazing. Some had asked for live coverage. Mr. Stone responded that staff had made a grant application that would facilitate live telecasts. Additionally, Presiding Officer Bragdon's amendment would keep the General Fund allocation flat and cut the Support Services budget by 31%.

Mr. Mounts summed up by saying that the packet presented suggested trends relevant to long range planning. He cautioned that there was vulnerability to change with funding based on excise tax. Projections were based on the expectation that current economic trends continued. Planning funds were difficult to forecast since they were based on obtaining grants and could change radically. The basic conclusion was that the amount of excise tax, given these assumptions, would not meet the current level of ongoing needs. He hoped it would provide a basis for the May discussions on long term funding to cover overall agency needs.

Chair McLain said that she had asked Jennifer Sims, Administrative Services Director, to dust off the Metro Tax Study Committee Report and Recommendations to the Metro Council, dated November 15, 1993, along with a update for the Committee to review potential funding sources. The report is included in the public record.

Ms. Sims said that the update, (last page of the Overview, Budget & Finance Committee), would be fleshed out as the Committee went forward. She welcomed any additional ideas from the Council.

4.  Councilor Communications

MEETING RECESSED UNTIL THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2000 AT 2:00 PM (COUNCIL PUBLIC HEARING AT FAIRVIEW VILLAGE)

There being no further business before the Committee, Chair McLain adjourned the meeting at 4:05 P.M.

Respectfully submitted,

Pat Weathers

Council Assistant

i:\minutes\2000\budget&finance/02020bdm.doc

ATTACHMENTS TO THE PUBLIC RECORD FOR THE MEETING OF FEBRUARY 16, 2000

The following have been included as part of the official public record: