MINUTES OF THE METRO COUNCIL COMMUNITY PLANNING COMMITTEE

Tuesday, February 20, 2001

Council Chamber

Members Present:  Rod Park (Chair), Rod Monroe (Vice Chair), Bill Atherton, David Bragdon, Rex Burkholder, Carl Hosticka, Susan McLain

Members Absent:  

Chair Park called the meeting to order at 2:10 p.m.

1.  CONSIDERATION OF THE MINUTES OF THE FEBRUARY 6, 2001, COMMUNITY PLANNING COMMITTEE MEETING

Councilor Bragdon said it was the OTAK (not OTAC) consulting firm.

2.  RELATED COMMITTEE UPDATES

Joint Policy Advisory Committee on Transportation (JPACT)

Councilor Burkholder said JPACT met and Chair Park raised the Community Planning Committee issues regarding both the regional/federal priorities, and the Metropolitan Transportation Improvement Program (MTIP) process and direction. There was support for Metro becoming more involved in the process, despite some concern. The JPACT considered the questions raised by the Metro Council representatives valuable, because other JPACT members were dealing with the same issues. They encouraged receiving guidance from Metro in the form of suggestions from a partner in the process versus orders from above. The Metro Council should always be aware of that relationship with JPACT. It was important that the Metro Council representatives of JPACT framed the questions properly to locate the answers Metro needed.

Chair Park characterized the JPACT meeting as low-spirited. However, JPACT realized that the Metro Council would be much more involved in the issues with more spirited dialogue.

Councilor Bragdon referred to the Community Planning Committee’s healthy, exciting discussion of the JPACT involvement issue February 6, 2001. He added the role of the Metro Council regarding transportation planning issues to the list of topics to be discussed with Mike Burton, Metro Executive Officer, at the Metro Council Retreat, which could be helpful. He sensed a lot of interest in that subject. It was an area where some of the relationships had not been clearly defined.

Councilor Atherton mentioned Councilor Burkholder’s comment that JPACT was concerned how Metro asked questions. He asked Councilor Burkholder if he had any suggestions for how Metro should ask questions.

Councilor Burkholder said it was a good issue to discuss at the retreat. He sensed JPACT wanted to hear policy-level questions versus questions regarding specific projects. They wanted to hear questions related to the role of transportation and Metro achieving its growth management goals, and a discussion of the relevant issues (MTIP, federal requests) to ensure that happened properly. Then the JPACT could provide guidance on those issues. They would welcome that approach. However, there had not been much of that type of discussion. Otherwise, everyone would get defensive.

Natural Resources Committee

Councilor Hosticka said the Metro Natural Resources Committee met and approved its 2001 Work Plan. The Committee was still working on the Goal 5 timetable and their approach to that issue. The inventory maps were distributed to the local governments for their input. The next step would be a discussion of criteria of regional significance. He planned to give all Metro councilors an opportunity to participate in that conversation.

3.  UPDATE – PERFORMANCE MEASURES

Gerry Uba, Metro Program Supervisor – Planning, referred to two handouts: Survey Questionnaire: Level of Satisfaction Related to the 2040 Growth Concept, Target Responder: Planning Commission Members of Local Jurisdictions, February 12, 2001 and Breakdown of Scored 2040 Performance Indicators, February 16, 2001. (Copies of these documents can be found in the permanent record of this meeting.) He also referred to the 2040 Fundamentals documents in the meeting packet.

Chair Park cited 2040 Fundamental No. 7 and asked Mr. Uba if he knew if Mr. Kelly, when he mentioned “educational support” was referring to K-12, high-tech college graduate courses or something else.

Mr. Uba said Mr. Kelly referred to education, in general, which included both of them. He said one key criteria of No. 7 was to make sure Metro identified indicators that were closely related to land-use, especially in areas where Metro had authority. However, K-12 and high-tech education was not one of those areas.

Councilor McLain agreed it was important that the fundamentals not be too general. However, if one was stated specifically, they should all be stated specifically, not just a few. She mentioned 2040 Fundamental No. 6 and said similar language already existed in Metro’s Future Vision that described all the fundamentals. No. 7 needed to be revised. She disliked the phrase “assuring land.” Metro should be thinking about infill and redevelopment, not necessarily new land. She was not sure what that meant. “Regulating centers for identity” meant nothing. She agreed with Chair Park regarding “educational support” and asked what that meant. She asked Mr. Uba to reexamine the language of some of the goals bullet items and the descriptions in the future vision. She questioned why Metro was rethinking and redoing what had already been described.

Chair Park asked Mr. Cotugno how much detail needed to be included in the 2040 Fundamentals document.

Andy Cotugno, Metro Planning Director, said Mr. Uba created the fundamentals to try to coordinate a multitude of details in the 2040 Growth Concept, Regional Growth Goals and Objectives, and Future Vision, describing multiple directions, into very basic categories so Metro could group whatever measures it planned to use into those categories. It was intentionally designed to be fairly general. He believed Mr. Kelly intended to create a more active statement that connected to some of the things Metro did. Mr. Kelly missed the point on the last item. However, Mr. Kelly objective was probably correct. It ought to be more proactive related to what Metro did, not the responsibilities of others in the region. Mr. Cotugno believed the statement should be fairly general so Metro could group everything into one of the seven categories that the agency measured. Metro should strive to do that.

Councilor Bragdon believed it should include more than what metro did. There needed to be an indication of how the region performed, even if Metro’s policies were somewhat tangential, particularly in the economic area and some of the social indicators. He mentioned concentration of poverty and research by Myron Ornfield in Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota regarding the concentration of children on school lunch programs. This could highlight economic or fiscal disparity associated with the benefits of growth. These indicators should be included even though Metro was not an anti-poverty agency. However, the affects of sprawl and lack of redevelopment were important.

Councilor Hosticka said if Metro was measuring performance the agency should focus on outcomes (as Councilor Bragdon mentioned) and not necessarily Metro’s activities in the document. No. 2 was a major policy change or discussion regarding whether Metro’s goal was to protect and restore or simply protect. That was not a simple word change. He was not sure if the committee wanted to get involved in that discussion or if it had been discussed and closed. There should be a lengthy discussion before the Committee moved forward with No. 2.

Councilor Burkholder argued the Committee should become less specific. He considered the fundamentals a way to organize the categories of issues the Committee was concerned about. Therefore, the Committee could look for more specifics later when they examine performance standards (benchmarks, etc.). He said the question for the Committee was whether the fundamentals reflected the important issues the Committee should be measuring to gage Metro’s success. He said the less specific the better. In No. 3 he proposed deleting the language that followed “system.” The one category of issues that was possibly missing, which he would include with No. 2 and the natural environment, was the health conditions of the people in the community (obesity, asthma and other health conditions associated with the region’s physical environment and/or transportation system), which could be measured and benchmarked. And decisions made by the Committee affected that. Otherwise, the fundamentals should be as broad as possible and used as category headings.

Councilor Atherton referred to No. 2 and enforcing existing environmental laws, and enforcing and protecting to standards. It was an important concept that needed to be reflected in that policy goal. He asked if Metro and the region meant it when the agency referred to standards (Clean Water Act, etc.).

Mr. Cotugno said they had not reached that step but envisioned in Mr. Uba’s work program concluding which things they should measure. They had to sift through dozens of different types of measures to identify one that best reflected what should be measured. Then they had to determine a benchmark (standard or goal) that should be reached for each measure. They needed to know how successful something was compared to a relative yardstick.

Chair Park compared the process to a fly-over view. Later they planned to lower their altitude when they determined what they wanted to measure.

Mr. Cotugno agreed.

Councilor McLain agreed with those who indicated Metro needed something identifiable to measure. She was comfortable with the seven 2040 Fundamentals because there was policy for all of them. However, they all needed to be the same with detail or no detail. But there should not be a combination. There was nothing that could not be fixed with good language changes. The goal was to determine what Metro wanted to measure, which required fundamentals that described what the system would look like. The Committee could fix the detail now or later. She preferred now to determine how specific or general the fundamentals should be.

Chair Park referred to No. 4 (separation of communities) and asked for a description.

Mr. Cotugno said Metro adopted the policy that related to separation between Metro and the next ring of cities.

Chair Park understood but Metro adopted policies for many other things. He asked if the current issues rose to that level.

Councilor McLain reinforced that they should either be all general or all specific. Separation of communities was one of the two five concerns for citizens inside and outside the region.

Chair Park asked if there was a separation of cities policy with Forest Grove.

Councilor McLain said no, they were inside the ugb. Her point was whether inside or outside the ugb, citizens in the communities did not want to grow together. The state had a different opinion regarding that issue when it involved exception land between cities. Then the state required the cities to grow together.

Chair Park asked if there was agreement from the committee with Councilor McLain’s suggestion to delete language in No. 4 following “just outside the region.” The Committee might want to choose alternative language. He asked what “just” meant.

Councilor McLain said there were many performance indicators that determined whether Metro was working with neighboring cities.

Chair Park asked if Vancouver, Washington was considered a neighboring city.

Mr. Cotugno said Metro ha d a specific requirement in its Charter to coordinate with Clark County. Metro created it own directive through RUGGO’s and the 2040 Plan to coordinate with the neighboring cities and maintain separation between cities, which was the expressed goal.

Councilor Burkholder believed people were comfortable with the 2040 Fundamentals as general organizers for the goals of the regional 2040 Plan. He wanted to see a short list of 3-5 major objectives for each fundamental that would be subjected to analysis with the performance standards. That would answer Mr. Kelly’s questions and many other specific questions.

Chair Park suggested Mr. Cotugno redraft the fundamentals and then come back before the Committee.

Mr. Cotugno addressed Councilor Hosticka’s point and said the “and restored” was a change from what appeared before, not just an expansion. He believed through the Goal 5 vision Metro said “and restore.” That was what they articulated and it differed from what they had in the draft. He believed the Committee should consciously include it instead of saying they were only trying to protect.

Councilor Hosticka said the Natural resources Committee was working with the performance measures as they pertained to Natural Resources. Maybe the dialogue could continue there.

Chair Park asked the Committee if it would be comfortable putting "protect and restore the natural environment" as a general, overall cap. He noticed agreement from the Committee.

Mr. Uba referred to the 2040 Fundamentals, attachment C and D documents in the meeting packet. Then he referred to the Breakdown of Scored 2040 Performance Indicators document. Finally, he referred to the Survey Questionnaire: Level of Satisfaction Related to the 2040 Growth Concept, Target Responder: Planning Commission Members of Local Jurisdictions document.

Mr. Cotugno said the overall project had three parts: 1) a statistical analysis, 2) survey/feedback from the planning commissioners regarding how the process functioned and 3) survey/feedback from the public. He and Mr. Uba were describing the second part today. They planned to describe the public survey portion at a future meeting.

Chair Park referred to the priorities and Attachment D, 1a and 1.2b. He asked Mr. Cotugno to define gross land consumption per dwelling unit and what it did and did not include.

Mr. Uba said it included the land being used for residential development across the region. The wanted to make sure they knew how much was available and how much had been developed.

Chair Park asked if gross included the Greenspace protected land and roads.

Mr. Uba said it would include the land inside the unregulated or unprotected Greenspace areas as well as natural areas. Areas that were protected by regulation (Title 3, etc.) would not be included in the measure.

Chair Park asked if the same applied for employment.

Mr. Uba said yes.

Chair Park said it should be made clear that was removed from the calculation.

Dennis Yee, Metro Senior Economist, said gross followed the same concept used in the Urban Growth Report.

Chair Park said the term still needed to be explained.

Councilor Burkholder asked about the project rankings. He asked if there was a common thread that linked the project ranked lower.

Mr. Cotugno sited the criteria in the meeting packet. He also offered to provide a spreadsheet that listed the actual scores. He said the results were all over the map. There was no consistent theme. However, they had the data for each project and criteria carefully selected by a variety of regional officials.

Mr. Uba referred to the presentation documents.

Councilor Atherton mentioned the survey of planning commissioners and the general public.

Mr. Cotugno said they would contain very different types of questions. They planned to provide a draft of the general public survey to the Committee within a couple of weeks. The survey discussed today for the planning commissioners was for a very educated audience. They had been performing the comprehensive planning changes requested by Metro and were aware of the issues. It was for an inside crowd audience. The general public survey will refer more general public value type questions.

Councilor Atherton considered public surveys very interesting. It may me useful to use some of the quality of life questions asked frequently over the years.

Chair Park said the issue would be discussed further at future Community Planning and Natural Resources committee meetings.

Mr. Cotugno said they would provide the councilors with copies of the scoring sheets.

Chair Park agreed the background information would help them answer questions.

4.  UPDATE – LOCAL TRANSPORTATION FUNDING PROPOSALS

Mr. Cotugno updated local transportation funding proposals. He mentioned the Washington County STIP (State Transportation Improvement Program) projects and continued funding issues. He mentioned regional jurisdictions that were considering adopting street utility fees and bond measures. He also mentioned funding proposals in the state legislature. There was interest in a 2-cent gas tax. Cities and counties were strongly lobbying to do something. There were also a variety of programs that were being supported, unconstitutionally, by the highway trust fund. Therefore, the fees needed to be raised or eliminated. It was likely the state would propose legislation to raise the fees. The situation had a tremendous affect on the highway trust fund. There was some movement toward imposing a fee on studded tires.

Mr. Cotugno also mentioned the Regional Business Alliance for Transportation (RBAT), which was an outgrowth of the summits convened by Dick Reiten and Tom Bryan to gauge business community interest in transportation issues. They planned to form a standing regional business alliance on transportation issues which would be convened under the auspices of the Metro Chamber with a board comprised of representatives from approximately 10 different business associations around the region, as opposed to an ad hoc summit. The proposal was to adopt some type of organizing resolution to make a 5-year commitment to participate in RBAT. It was proposed to be a business group. Therefore, public agencies would be included on an ad-hoc or non-voting basis. Metro Transportation would have a seat at the table. However, the purpose was to gain business support for transportation funding. He referred to the Regional Business Alliance for Transportation (RBAT) document. (A copy of this document can be found in the permanent record of this meeting.)

Councilor McLain mentioned JPACT and Metro's role, recognized by the federal government, as the metropolitan policy advisory group involved in the federal and regional transportation funding process. She said the role of the group was confusing if the membership was not statewide.

Mr. Cotugno said there had been much discussion regarding that issue by the people who attended these groups. They did not want to substitute for Metro and JPACT's function in developing the overall plans. Mr. Reiten said they had the plans but needed the ability to implement the plans. The public and business associations did not know what was in the plans or what was required to implement them.

Councilor McLain asked if he was describing a communications conduit.

Mr. Cotugno said they identified 3 goals or objectives for their group. Two were communications and 1 was funding oriented. Communications was an essential element to secure funding. One, was building alliances with the business community, communicating with them and getting them on board. Second, was communicating with the public and providing the same type of effort with them. Third, was to determine methods of funding the programs.

Councilor Monroe said the permissive legislation would be statewide for transportation authority without providing them with additional funding powers. It would allow for such groups at the regional level instead of by county or city.

Councilor Bragdon asked where the need was considering the two existing regional bodies (Metro and JPACT), and the regional transit agency and regional port authority, that handled transportation issues. He did not see the public request to create another regional body.

Mr. Cotugno said RBAT was not set on you strategy or agenda, but instead was simply looking for the flexibility to pursue whatever options made sense.

Councilor Hosticka said, based on his significant experience with transportation funding issues at the state level, that the state was too big any other unit of local government too small to deal with transportation funding problems. He saw a great need for regional authorities, whether it was ultimately Metro or not. Some type of regional authority was necessary.

Councilor McLain saw the issue differently. She agreed with the role of RBAT to create a vehicle to produce funding. However, she disagreed with the desire to create a more complex funding system to administer that funding. At times, having a Metro Council and JPACT was complicated enough. Metro had a leadership role that should be distinguished at regional meetings. She opposed duplication of authority.

Chair Park asked if Washington County reduced the STIP process whether they could reinstitute it later.

Mr. Cotugno said the real question was if they did not dedicate the dollar amount to a specific set of transportation projects what else would it fund out of the general fund and the local budgeting process. Whatever budget process it would get committed to it would be tough to get it taken away. It would be rededicated not reduced.

Chair Park asked if there was any movement with the 2 cents to do a CPI (Consumer Price Index) inflator to stop the bleeding.

Mr. Cotugno said it was discussed but there was not much support. The legislature was beginning to believe the gas tax was in jeopardy. Over time they should be concerned about identifying a replacement. He said there seemed to be movement toward appointing an interim task force to create a recommendation regarding what the replacement for the gas tax should be. There might also be a pilot project created to test a vehicle miles traveled (VMT) tax. There was discussion regarding creating a VMT-oriented tax through self-reporting, or electronic odometer or wheel recording devices.

Councilor Hosticka asked if Metro joined RBAT whether the agency needed to pass a resolution that authorized the payment of dues.

Mr. Cotugno said yes, so the Committee had not given Mr. Cotugno the authority to join the group. However, he planned to propose a staff report and resolution to join and that would be when the Committee would take action.

Councilor McLain planned to provide some input.

Councilor Monroe said during the last Summit 2000 meeting Metro made it clear the agency's contribution would probably be in-kind (with Metro planning information).

5.  RESOLUTION NO. 01-3034, FOR THE PURPOSE OF APPROVING PORTLAND REGIONAL FEDERAL TRANSPORTATION PRIORITIES FOR FFY 2002 APPROPRIATIONS

Councilor Monroe described the resolution and trip to Washington D.C. in two weeks to lobby the Portland region's Congressional Delegation. The region wanted to communicate with one voice to obtain federal funding for all the badly needed priorities.

6.  METROSCOPE/CENTERS PRESENTATION

Mr. Cotugno referred to his Use of the MetroScope Model and MetroScope Process Flow. (A copy of this document can be found in the permanent record of this meeting.)

Councilor McLain said she had some questions and concerns regarding where the growth would go.

Mr. Cotugno referred to his presentation.

Councilor Bragdon asked whether the model incorporated or accounted for the clustering tendency of particular industries (metal shops, high-tech and their suppliers).

Mr. Yee said they received an annual data tape from the state employment office and used it to geo-code or locate by business type or industrial classification where the jobs were clustered. Therefore, such a map was available and they could share it with the Committee.

Mr. Cotugno said the overall employment in the model was stratified into approximately 13 different categories with different locational characteristics. Similarly, the housing model was stratified between different income levels, and between single and multi-family.

Chair Park asked if scenarios a and b were the bookends for the far outside reaches with the other scenarios inside that more theme oriented with variations within the parameters.

Councilor McLain mentioned assumptions, state laws, RUGGOs (Regional Urban Growth Goals and Objectives) and urban reserves.

Mr. Cotugno said he never mentioned urban reserves.

Councilor McLain mentioned the need to update and refine the process, not throw it out and use a new tool.

Mr. Cotugno agreed and mentioned the productivity analysis, which was an essential element.

Councilor McLain said they were still on the same track. She accepted it all as more technology that was looked useful. However, there were a few elements that were questionable. She referred to the grouping of the transportation zones and land-use. She asked him to reconcile the state law, 2040 Plan and Metro goals, and the fact that some industries like to cluster together.

Mr. Cotugno said the state law established a hierarchy that required Metro to use urban reserves first. There were none, so Metro moved to the second category and used exception lands or completely surrounded EFU (exclusive farm use) lands as a second tier. Finally, Metro could use EFU lands that were not completely surrounded as a third tier. There were very generally criteria that established how Metro moved down that priority hierarchy. The criteria accounted for factors like protection of natural resources and efficiency of public service provision.

Councilor McLain agreed with most of that. She saw a lot of policy decisions, implications and assumptions and wanted to avoid making a bad decision. She planned to spend a lot of time working on the issue. It was important not to give the issue a life of its own or too much credibility, yet. She did not want Metro to get ahead of itself. Although, it sounded like an exciting, new possible tool with detail that would be exciting to analyze. However, there was a lot of work to be done before they could make any policy assumptions.

Mr. Cotugno said he planned introduce MetroScope with MTAC (Metropolitan Transportation Advisory Committee) on February 21, 2001.

Councilor McLain said Scenario B was the one she was most concerned about because of the referenced to where needed to fulfill market demand. The market would go where you let it go and would take what you give it. It would take cheap land before it would take high land. The Metro functional plan supported using land within the ugb more efficiently. She asked how they reconciled that scenario with compliance with the functional plan. She asked if it would be 100 percent compliance or something less. It would make a big difference for how that model performed. She wanted to know what type of compliance staff was assuming for Scenario B.

Mary Weber, Manager – Community Development, said staffed planned to use existing zoning as the base data for the model. They were also seeing 2040 Plan compliance. The base for each Scenario assumed every jurisdiction had Title 3 in place and completed their rezoning. Therefore, the scenarios basically played out general policy choices and how the public could influence the market and direct it to meet the values of the region. In that context, having book ends were like refinements. Scenario A was similar to the 2040 Plan concept on the ground. It required additional refinement. Metro needed to do more to achieve 2040 Plan densities that were zoned for there. The same concept was true for the market scenario. Metro would want to know what the market would do and what it would take. She mentioned the problems with the Ursamatic. This model was very different. It was a learning experience.

Councilor Atherton mentioned the model’s feedback loop on land price. However, he asked about the costs of growth. He asked about how a policy that growth paid its own way would affect the model.

Mr. Cotugno said the model would be sensitive to where Metro located differential costs.

Councilor Atherton asked if the model recognized that expanding into green fields should technically cost more than using areas where there was existing infrastructure.

Chair Park paraphrased Councilor Atherton’s question and asked Mr. Cotugno if the model assumed the current fee structures in place.

Mr. Cotugno said yes and Metro could assume those fees were different in different places.

Councilor Hosticka mentioned leakage, said it was a loaded term and that it begged some value questions by the word itself. He wanted to know what it really meant. He asked if it meant they modeled where the growth was going, or that there was less output than input regarding jobs and people with the forecast.

Mr. Cotugno agreed. He did not think they should have used it. First, they forecasted the grand total amount of growth, stratified by different types of employment and population groups for the 5-county region as a whole. That did not distinguish where, it just total how much. Second, they used the 4-county component (it was a 4-county model) to forecast how much growth would occur in the four counties. It required a minor focus on Yamhill County. They treated it separately as its own growth apart from the 4-county model. Then, the model is locational at that level of detail. How much growth would go where? However, a certain amount of growth will be allowed in the model to go outside the 4-county region. They did not try to define specifically where it would go south of the region on Interstate 5 (I-5). Ultimately, the leakage amount was how much growth came into the Metro ugb territory. The term they used in the Urban Growth Report was capture rate. How much of the total growth that was captured by the Metro ugb. They used 70 percent (of the 4-county region) for housing and 82 percent for employment (of the forecasted growth increment).

Councilor Hosticka asked if he could use the term “growth avoided.”

Mr. Cotugno said it was not intended to reflect simply whether the policies slowed or accelerated growth. Instead, it was trying to show where it got located.

Councilor Hosticka was not sure what the number represented in the whole modeling process.

Mr. Cotugno said it was the portion of the growth that Metro would normally expect to see in the 4-county region that got pushed outside the 4-county region into neighboring counties.

Councilor Hosticka asked if Metro knew that happened.

Mr. Cotugno said Metro did not have the information to do an economic forecast of Marion County. However, they were trying to account for how much regional growth might end up in Marion County.

Mr. Yee mentioned his 4-county forecast. That was how big the region would grow. MetroScope attempted to take the 4-county growth and determine where it would be located in the future. Leakage, an economics term, referred to a second step.

Councilor Hosticka said Metro did not want to use terms that assumed that keeping those numbers at the agency’s forecast levels was the goal or necessarily a good thing.

Chair Park said the capture rate has been a historical document during the last 30 years. However, it was a charged argument.

Councilor McLain referred to the MetroScope Process Flow document. The data output that was missing was the issue of agricultural land needed to maintain the agriculture and keep the service providers in the region. There was an updated report from 1998 by the Department of Agriculture and others regarding preservation of a viable farming industry in the region. That should be included.

Mr. Cotugno said MetroScope would not indicate what the farming economy needed. However, it would indicate how much farmland would be consumed. That component was necessary to measure the significance of that consequence.

Councilor McLain said it was not enough. They needed to determine where to put that equation.

Councilor McLain also mentioned the transportation-land use connection. She referred to very distinct documents. She was uncomfortable with the vague diagram and model. She asked what the model was.

Mr. Cotugno mentioned the refill rate and the inspirational.

Chair Park said Metro would use the modeling to make some public policy decisions, which involved more than simply raw data.

Councilor McLain said it was a matter of when to make the policy decisions.

Councilor Burkholder mentioned the scope and usability of the MetroScope information, and asked if it could be used to evaluate a specific project and possible land use changes it could create.

Mr. Cotugno said it was sensitive to fairly large-scale transportation changes.

Councilor Burkholder mentioned widening Highway 43 through Lake Oswego as an example and policy options.

Mr. Cotugno said they designed the scenarios to be structured around different types of policy choices for testing.

Councilor Bragdon asked if the different results of the model was the consequence of having centers work or did it highlight ways in which Metro can take action to make them work.

Ms. Weber said they started with the existing 2040 Plan policies as the base and then refined them with more detail. They chose the centers because they were the focus of the 2040 Plan.

Mr. Yee discussed the modeling process, focusing development and economic incentives.

Mr. Cotugno mentioned changes to the transportation system and improved accessibility.

Chair Park said MetroScope asserted a policy choice to evaluate its performance. He did not want MetroScope used to advocate someone’s policy agenda.

Mr. Cotugno said MetroScope was still in peer review.

Chair Park was uncomfortable with the fourth map. It appeared to involve some policy choices regarding where the sub-regions existed. The Council and Committee had not made that choice.

Mr. Cotugno said it was there to get the reaction it got to facilitate that discussion. He mentioned the political rhetoric and appropriate basis for performing sub-regional analysis. The sub-regions were intended to reflect major sub-parts of the region where there was economic employment activity that needed to draw a labor force. He referred to the emphasis on the jobs-housing balance in the 2040 Plan. The sub-regions in MetroScope were intended to focus on commute trip lengths.

Chair Park asked about the location for the town centers and regional centers.

Councilor McLain referred to Bethany because of that issue. Metro had to establish the sub-regions not the applicants.

Mr. Cotugno said it was simply proposed as a starting point to do the analysis.

Chair Park referred to the scenarios A through F in the MetroScope, which were all based on stated Council goals, preferences or issues. He asked what policy goal or Council policy was the map based on.

Mr. Cotugno said there was not any yet.

Chair Park asked what Mr. Cotugno used to create the map.

Mr. Cotugno said it was based on the market area surrounding the transportation corridors (I-5, Tualatin Valley Highway, Sunset Highway, Highway 205, McLoughlin) areas. It was partly jurisdictional. However, they were debatable.

Chair Park said that issue concerned him the most because it was the type of map that could create warfare. Metro had not created a rational basis for making those choices. Part jurisdiction, part county line, part whatever helped create confusion.

Mr. Cotugno said they needed to discuss further the various components of policy input. It was a sketchy definition of the basic policy building blocks without the details. He wanted to start on a couple scenarios and suggest the two easiest were scenarios A and E. The only change proposed for those two was the Columbia River capacity. There was the least amount of variation between the two. Scenario 2 was a different story and required a lot more staff time. It was not all computer analysis.

Michael Morrissey, Senior Metro Council Analyst, asked if Mr. Cotugno requested approval to begin. He also asked if Chair Park approved Mr. Cotugno’s request.

Chair Park said Mr. Cotugno planned to present it to MTAC tomorrow and the subject required more discussion.

Mr. Cotugno suggested discussing a decision regarding the two options the Committee wanted to analyze. Then they had 6-8 weeks to consider what the next two should be.

Councilor Hosticka requested more information at the next meeting regarding how the model actually worked so the councilors could understand the components built into it. He referred to the basic inputs, outputs and how the parameters related to each other with a higher level of detail. He asked what the policy inputs were.

Chair Park agreed the more detail the better. He asked Mr. Cotugno how many times MetroScope had been done.

Mr. Cotugno said they could share with the Metro Council the MetroScope results and evaluation information to demonstrate the process only. There was “noise” in the data, so no publication.

Chair Park suggested doing that at the next meeting.

COUNCILOR COMMUNICATIONS

Councilor Bragdon mentioned a couple solid waste items. The Metro Executive Officer, planned to send the councilors a letter regarding the Specialty Transport Services (STS) garbage-hauling situation today. He also said he asked the Executive Officer for clarifying questions regarding the withdrawn franchise applications and the caps. Some people were not satisfied with the information they received regarding that issue. More details were to come.

Councilor Burkholder attended a strategic planning retreat that promoted physical activity. They were interested in examining the region’s community environments and how they promoted or discouraged physical activity. He wanted to have Jane Moore, from the Oregon Department of Education, provide a short presentation for the Committee. Their arguments supported Metro’s 2040 Plan efforts and highlighted the health implications of a sprawling land-use pattern. Basically, it would be background information.

Chair Park suggested a presentation before the Metro Council would be more appropriate with the cable television coverage. The audience would be much larger.

There being no further business, Chair Park adjourned the meeting at 5:36 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Andy Flinn

Council Assistant

Attachments to the Public Record

Metro Community Planning Committee meeting of February 20, 2001