MINUTES OF THE METRO COUNCIL TRANSPORTATION COMMITTEE MEETING

Thursday, February 21, 2002

Council Chambers

Members Present:  Rex Burkholder (Chair), Bill Atherton (Vice Chair), and Rod Monroe.

Members Absent:  None.

1.  Call to Order and Roll Call. Chair Burkholder called the meeting to order at 10:10 a.m.

2.  Citizen Communications on Non-Agenda Items. None.

3.  Committee Reports.

•  Bi-State Transportation Committee. Councilor Monroe said this committee’s February 28^th meeting had been cancelled, and their next meeting was scheduled for March 28^th, after the Federal Priorities presentation trip to Washington, D.C.

•  JPACT. JPACT met February 14^th, Councilor Monroe reported, and finalized the list of priorities for the federal request being submitted to Washington, D.C. The JPACT delegation, which he would head, would be in the District of Columbia March 5 - 7 hoping to receive unanimous support for the priorities listed.

•  Southwest Washington RTC Board. This Board, Councilor Monroe said, played an integral part in the I-5 Trade and Transportation Study, pushed hard and, he believed, successfully to get the Washington legislature to contribute their share of the Columbia River channel deepening money. Now they’re primarily looking at how to continue the effort on the Delta Park bottleneck, make the appropriate land use commitments on both sides of Columbia River, and plan for a new I-5 bridge and a light rail loop through Vancouver.

•  South Corridor Policy Advisory Group. This group met a few weeks ago and was well on track to continue studying light rail in the I-205 Corridor to the Clackamas Town Center, light rail and a busway option from Milwaukie to downtown Portland, and they also made a decision to allow a separate study to go on at the request of key Portland leaders for a more elaborate and expensive possible light rail connection from Milwaukie through downtown Portland, with various options. He said he wanted to particularly recognize the key work of Kristin Hull of Metro’s Planning staff in meeting with various neighborhood groups in Clackamas County and keeping them reasonably happy.

Chair Burkholder added that there had been a workshop on February 26^th at Metro, which Councilor Atherton attended as well as Gina Whitehill-Baziuk of Planning staff. Ms. Whitehill-Baziuk reported, at the committee’s request, that this was the first all assembly for the South Corridor Study and approximately 50 citizens participated. She said there was a good representation from across the board on the various local advisory committees, and that this was the first time they’d had the opportunity to tell what had been going on in their area and to exchange information. There was discussion on the downtown issue and the citizens met Mr. Chris Kopca of the Downtown Development Group. The workshop was to explain the Environmental Impact Study and show how it worked, as well as the alternatives. The feedback received was that people thought it very informative and they enjoyed understanding the details. Councilor Atherton said the thing that struck him were the details of the timeline and how tight that was.

Chair Burkholder said he assumed that when the decision was made on which project to build that it would be in the Federal Priorities request next year. Councilor Monroe said it would and another key issue was how to come up with the local match,

4.  Consideration of the Minutes of the February 7, 2002, Transportation Committee Meeting.

5.  MTIP Air Quality Conformity Determination.

Mike Hoglund referred to his memo and other agenda packet material regarding this item, which he briefly reviewed for the committee, as well as the material he distributed regarding citizen comments (e-mails from Mr. Pat Russell and Mr. David Ganslein, and made a part of this record). Chair Burkholder said Mr. Russell had also mentioned his concern at the MCCI meeting the previous evening, and he and Mr. Hoglund discussed Metro’s response.

Chair Burkholder opened a Public Hearing at 10:29 a.m.

There were no testimony cards, and no person came forward to comment.

Chair Burkholder closed the Public Hearing at 10:30 a.m. Mr. Hoglund said the Air Quality Conformity Determination would become a piece of the MTIP resolution that will be reviewed by JPACT at their March 14^th meeting.

6.  Draft Resolution – For the purpose of Revising Regional Transportation Management Association (TMA) Policy to Provide Additional Regional Funding Options for TMAs.

Mr. Tom Kloster, Transportation Program Supervisor, Planning Department, gave a brief overview of the TMA resolution, and Mr. Bill Barber, Senior Transportation Planner, Planning Department, followed with an update on the TDM Subcommittee, providing more detailed technical information and conveying some of the results the current TMAs have achieved. The staff report to the draft resolution gave very detailed information on proposed funding options and how they would keep TMAs operating and the discussion focused on this. Regarding the funding options, Mr. Barber added that this was a new transportation planning area and there were other options likely to emerge as the program was developed further, and he’d like to not close the door on these other future funding options.

Mr. Andy Cotugno, Planning Director, said TPAC hadn’t been ready to move forward on this because they weren’t clear on the grant total cost, the long-term implications of the price tag, what the status quo would need, levels of expansion and when and what those would cost. On March 1^st they would be looking at the price tag and the long-term implications. The actual allocation decision, he said, was done through the MTIP process.

Chair Burkholder asked about showing results in performance measures and said that would be helpful, and Councilor Atherton agreed. Chair Burkholder said he’d like to see those included in the staff report before it comes back to this committee. Mr. Barber said the programs were part of a broad regional Transportation Demand Management program, primarily housed at Tri-Met, but that mode share targets and reducing vehicle miles traveled were viable measures that could be customized. Mr. Kloster said employer surveys help, also. Mr. Barber added that a companion agenda item to this at the next TPAC meeting would be a TDM annual report.

Chair Burkholder thanked staff for their work.

7.  Draft Unified Work Program Briefing. Andy Cotugno said a draft copy of the Unified Work Program (UWP) would be provided to the councilors Friday, February 22^nd. For the grants to be awarded and the federal funding to start coming July 1, he said, March was when the UWP needed to be adopted, recognizing that changes would be made during Metro’s budget process

Another reason for this document was that it was required to reflect other significant transportation planning areas in the region, most of which were allocated in the MTIP process, i.e., implemented by other jurisdictions but that show up in the UWP document (there were a few places labeled as placeholders, he said, because there was not yet a clear definition of scope, but they were in there so the funding could flow when the scope was completed and submitted). A few nonfederally funded projects were also included more for coordination purposes and to go through JPACT.

The UWP was scheduled to go to TPAC on March 1^st, JPACT on March 14^th, and back to this committee for approval on March 21^st, for adoption by the Metro Council on March 28^th. In response to a question by Chair Burkholder, Mr. Cotugno said the UWP also needed to be approved by the Oregon Department of Transportation as well as the state highway engineer approving the self-certification resolution.

8.  Growth Conference, Transportation Component. Mr. Mike Hoglund, Regional Planning Director, Planning Department, spoke to the three pieces of information he distributed: 1.) an e-mail from Gina Whitehill-Baziuk regarding the Metro Let’s Talk Regional Conference, 2.) a copy of Let’s talk viewpoints – How can transportation serve our communities? Panel questions, and 3.) a copy of the Metro Conference Friday Workshop Format Transportation Issue Discussion (and made a part of this record). The plans for scheduling and configuring the panels and speakers and the approach they wanted to take, including the discussion, were outlined by Mr. Hoglund. He went into detail on the Transportation Issue Discussion questions and said he thought staff would try to add another question leading into the MTIP. Chair Burkholder said he liked the idea of asking the public the question of if they had a dollar, how would they spend it, and said he thought that would provide better information than whether or not they preferred a boulevard project over a maintenance project.

Mr. Hoglund spoke more about the conference, briefly touching on each event, and said there would be a few practice runs. He reminded the councilors that they’d been invited to at least one of those. He said staff would also like to have a group of non-planning people from around the Metro headquarters building and from the zoo to see how well the survey worked with them.

9.  Councilor Communications. Councilor Atherton said he was still working on his RTP funding policy option and he needed to talk to the committee members about it, but first had to work through the legal portions of it.

There being no further business before the committee, the meeting adjourned at 11:34 a.m.

Chair Burkholder reopened the meeting at 11:35 a.m. to hear the following testimony.

Mr. Boris Yevenshtein, Yellow Cab of Beaverton, 14095 SW Walker Rd., #57, Beaverton, OR 97005, asked to speak to the licensing difficulties he had with his taxis. He said he’d been working for at least a year for Beaverton taxis to have the same rights as Portland taxis. Mr. Yevenshtein said he’d spoken to State Representative Charlie Ringo (Beaverton - District 6) amongst other elected officials, and no one was doing anything to help. The Washington County taxicabs were not allowed the same rights as the Portland taxicabs, he said, and he hoped Metro could help him attain equal treatment for them.

Chair Burkholder said Metro had received correspondence on this and that this committee would have a resolution drafted to go before JPACT for permission for Metro to do the requested regional licensing. He also told Mr. Yevenshtein that, should this be approved, it would be a new function for Metro, but the process would be started. He apologized for the inefficiency of the government system, and said he would keep Mr. Yevenshtein informed on how this progressed through the process. At Chair Burkholder’s request, the committee clerk placed the correspondence Mr. Yevenshtein referred to in this record (a letter to Metro from State Representative Charlie Ringo, Beaverton - District 6, and another from four other elected state officials, as well as Councilor Bragdon’s reply.

There being no further business before the committee, the meeting was adjourned at 11:41 a.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Rooney Barker

Council Assistant

ATTACHMENTS TO THE PUBLIC RECORD FOR THE MEETING OF FEBRUARY 21, 2002

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

Testimony cards.

Mr. Boris Yevenshtein

Yellow Cab of Beaverton

14095 SW Walker Rd., #57

Beaverton, OR 97005