MINUTES OF THE METRO COMMITTEE FOR CITIZEN INVOLVEMENT

REGULAR COMMITTEE

Wednesday, December 18, 2002

Room 370A

Call to Order & Approval of Agenda

Members Present: Dennis Ganoe (Chair), Norm Andreen, Kay Durtschi, Jane Gillespie, Dick Jones, Jim Kimball, Ted Kyle, Darren Pennington, Christine Roth, Scott Seibert, Elizabeth Tucker, Lori Waldo.

Members Absent: Kathy Henton, Ray Sherwood.

Also Present: Rex Burkholder, Metro Councilor; John Donovan, Council Communications Officer; Moji Momeni, MCCI Applicant; Camrynne Six, Auditor’s Administrative Assistant; Cary Stacey, MCCI Staff.

Chair Ganoe opened the meeting at 7:03 p.m.

Introductions

Chair Ganoe asked everyone to introduce themselves for the good of the group. Mr. Pennington volunteered to be timekeeper.

Approval of Agenda

Mr. Pennington asked to add an item regarding the urban growth boundary (UGB) public involvement plan (PIP) evaluation.

Approval of November 20, 2002, Minutes

Ms. Durtschi requested that on page 4, 3^rd full paragraph, the second-to-last sentence be changed from “there would be a Task 3 after periodic review” to “there would be a Task 3 for periodic review.”

Chair Report

Chair Ganoe spoke to his December 10, 2002 report to the Metro Council and asked if there were any concerns. There were none.

Chair Ganoe spoke to two concerns arising from the Steering Committee, with the first being Darren’s UGB PIP evaluation agenda item and the second being Councilor Atherton’s proposal that MCCI serve watchdog role during elections. He reported that he had responded to Councilor Atherton’s inquiry at the December 10, 2002 Metro Council meeting by saying that the councilor’s inquiry had been brought up in committee and MCCI was investigating the possibility of pursuing the watchdog role. Ms. Durtschi said she had not yet received an answer from Dan Cooper, Metro General Counsel, as to whether past draft legislation proposing that role for MCCI had progressed past the draft stage.

UGB PIP Evaluation

Mr. Pennington said he would like to evaluate public involvement in the UGB process. He asked if public involvement should be evaluated in regards to the PIP that the Community Planning Subcommittee had received. He asked if it was possible to evaluate what citizen testimony was appropriate or effective. Ms. Roth spoke to a pamphlet document called “Tips for Effective Testimony”, which could be very helpful if made readily available. Mr. Kyle said the best way to address this age-old problem might be a video portraying effective and ineffective testimony. He said people needed help testifying in a land-use setting and suggested that MCCI offer a tool to that effect. Mr. Kimball said that a more exhaustive review of the public involvement process was to look at how citizen input was considered. He wanted the committee to recommend to the auditor to take up this issue in the public involvement audit.

Ms. Waldo said that the Family Community Leadership program, through the Oregon State University (OSU) Extension Service, provided testimony sheets. She suggested working with the Portland State University (PSU) Urban Studies Department to educate people on how to get involved in the land-use process. Mr. Seibert said that during the process, MCCI had looked at what could be improved, such as including in the opening announcement information about how to be in standing and advising how many copies of materials were needed for councilors. He said it was disconcerting that public officials received more time to testify than others at the hearings. Mr. Momeni said the city of Beaverton was developing a pamphlet to help people be more effective in testifying.

Ms. Six said that in the latest list of audits, there was one to look at public involvement in planning issues, but that audit had not yet begun. She said Ms. Dow was considering the audit in the next set of assignments. Ms. Durtschi said the Community Planning committee would be reviewing the periodic review PIP to assess what citizen involvement was adequate. She said Ms. Dow had previously said the public involvement audit would be in conjunction with Coffee Talks and the Lets Talk conference. Mr. Andreen asked if notification to affected property owners could include information about effective testimony. Mr. Donovan said that there was so much information in the notification that it was necessary to make choices about what to include. Mr. Pennington asked what could be done to help those people who had followed the process provide testimony that would have merit in the discussion. Chair Ganoe directed Ms. Stacey to include UGB PIP Evaluation as an agenda item for the next Steering Committee meeting.

Review OCI Workplan Draft

Ms. Stacey distributed Draft 3 of the Office of Citizen Involvement (OCI) Workplan, a copy of which is included as part of this record. Mr. Donovan said enough changes had been made to the Draft 2 OCI Workplan that the OCI Task Force would need to meet again. He said that the strikeouts and underlines in Draft 3 reflected changes received from Councilor Burkholder and that the shaded areas reflected strategies identified by him and Ms. Stacey that might need to be handed off to other staff in the agency. He asked the committee to consider Draft 3 and said their comments would be taken into account by the OCI Task Force at their next meeting. He asked that wordsmithing comments be sent to Ms. Stacey after the meeting. Chair Ganoe said that since Draft 3 was a document heretofore unseen by the members, there would be no vote on Draft 3. Mr. Donovan said that the deadline for any written comments would be January 1, 2003.

Mr. Kimball asked that advisory committees be included in the list of audiences.

Councilor Burkholder said that in reviewing Draft 2 he wanted to know what critical tasks the OCI should be doing to further the mission and goals of improving citizen involvement. He said the Metro Council itself was considering whether to continue to have committees and was looking at reducing the amount of clerical work done by council staff. He said he looked at Draft 2 as a budget document to be presented to the Council President, who would also be the Budget Officer. He said the Council President-elect had specified that he wanted no add-packages in the budgets. Mr. Andreen suggested looking at what minimums were legally required for minutes at a public meeting. Mr. Donovan said the minimum standard in Oregon required the time the meeting was called to order and adjourned; the date, time and location of the meeting; a reference to the meeting agenda; and what actions were taken. He said that since the committee was interested in using minutes to track subcommittee work, other staff might be asked to contribute administrative time to that effect.

Mr. Donovan spoke to the workplan goal. Ms. Roth said that “people of the region” should be listed first.

Mr. Donovan spoke to the audiences and agreed to use Mr. Kimball’s suggestion to include advisory committees.

Mr. Donovan spoke to the strategies under Objective 1. Ms. Waldo asked about methods for approaching the third strategy and said that it could be costly to track evidence of cultural change in the agency. Mr. Donovan that staff would need to identify what could be accomplished in that area within the context of the overall work. Ms. Durtschi asked how there could be performance measures for that strategy. Chair Ganoe said that specific results of cultural change could be measured. Mr. Kimball asked for advisory committees to also be included in the second strategy.

Councilor Burkholder spoke to Objective 2 and said he wanted to generalize the objective by striking out the term “continually seeking to improve”. Chair Ganoe asked the group if they were happy with the general nature of the wording. There were no objections.

Mr. Donovan spoke to the rest of the changes. Councilor Burkholder referred to the sixth strategy under Objective 4, saying he had added the OCI as a clearinghouse for all advisory committee applications because he saw the OCI as a designee of the Council President, who would be appointing nominees.

There was discussion about the workplan referring to an audience alternately as “citizen(s)” and “people of the region.” Chair Ganoe asked for the issue to be taken to a vote.

Chair Ganoe said that performance measures and the shaded areas of Draft 3 would be addressed at a later meeting.

Discuss Regular Meeting Education Element

Chair Ganoe said that there was a proposal to have time set aside at each meeting for an educational element that would help MCCI members become better MCCI members. Ms. Henton had suggested having Richard Ross, retiring planner from Gresham, participate. Mr. Donovan said that there should be a short presentation on public meeting and public record law. Ms. Stacey said Ms. Henton had suggested functional plan and comprehensive plan overview as educational items. Mr. Donovan suggested using the MCCI retreat as a venue for an educational element. Mr. Pennington suggested having the educational element on a quarterly basis. Councilor Burkholder suggested inviting someone from another government body to talk about effective citizen involvement. Chair Ganoe suggested turning the issue over to the Steering Committee with a quarterly recommendation until ideas ran out.

Subcommittee Reports

Mr. Andreen reported that the Regional Environmental Management (REM) subcommittee had been cancelled. He said there would be a meeting in January.

Ms. Tucker reported that the Membership committee had interviewed Mr. Momeni and agreed to send their recommendation for Mr. Momeni’s appointment to the appointing officer. She said that other issues were deferred until the next meeting.

Ms. Durtschi reported for the Community Planning Subcommittee. She displayed a map of the proposed commuter rail from Wilsonville to Beaverton, and said there would be an in-depth study in January 2003. She said the South Corridor Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement (SDEIS) was on its way to the federal register and that a delay with the federal register entry process had put Metro ahead of the notification schedule. She said there was an Executive Summary and full report of the SDEIS available to those interested. She displayed the brochure asking residents of the South Corridor area to imagine their transportation options and said that brochure included a schedule of public hearings. Chair Ganoe said that the South Corridor information was also available on metro’s website. She said the final UGB map was available. She spoke to the transportation survey on the website and said the survey’s subject matter had been submitted by local jurisdictions. If people had any questions about projects in their own area, Ms. Stacey had the statistics on survey responses. She said there had been several articles in local newspapers about widening Sunset Highway going west. She said the subcommittee had received an Economic Social Environmental Energy (ESEE) update for the Fish and Wildlife Habitat Protection Program. She said MCCI would be involved in helping with outreach regarding the social aspect of ESEE.

Ms. Gillespie reported that the Parks Subcommittee would be looking at the parks budget, customer service programs and parks’ best practices around the country, and would want to meet with council members to assess their expectations regarding parks. The subcommittee discussed developing a Public Involvement Plan Outline (PIPO) about working with other jurisdictions in Metro. She said each project would fit into a timeframe.

Council Liaison Report

Councilor Burkholder said that the council had listened to hundreds of people testify during the UGB process. He said he didn’t anticipate as much confusion in the future since the Executive Officer’s recommendation would be a step eliminated from the process. He said there were critical differences between the Damascus area, which had already been engaged in discussions about the expansion, and areas like Stafford or Beavercreek, which were highly resistant to the idea of expansion. Mr. Andreen said that Clackamas County had done a tremendous amount of work with Damascus that had defused a lot of problems. Councilor Burkholder said that major public involvement pieces ahead for Metro’s land-use planning in 2003 included meeting industrial land needs and making centers work.

He spoke to the transition and said the Council was continuing work based on current assignments. He said Metro was charged with being more efficient and using less resources to provide similar services to people. He didn’t know how outreach and communications efforts would be affected and said a lot of that work was up to the Council President who managed the Chief Operating Officer (COO). He said Council President Bragdon had recruited people from the community for insights on how to improve public involvement. He believed there would be a public element to the recruitment process for the permanent COO. Since the structure was in flux, he was unsure as to how Council staff would be affected.

He said all MCCI members were invited to the Inauguration on January 6, 2003. He said that Council meeting would include an organizing resolution.

There was discussion about the UGB process. Councilor Burkholder said staff information had been very important to his decision-making process, but was not necessarily as important to other councilors. Mr. Seibert asked if Metro would direct staff to address public involvement in future high-target areas for UGB expansion. Councilor Burkholder said that elected officials in those jurisdictions recognized that the discussion was warranted.

Mr. Momeni asked about the 20-year land need. Councilor Burkholder said that state law required that Metro predict exactly what the land-use need would be in 20 years. He said that the decision was based on modeling, which was always subject to interpretation. He said the council had had split votes as to which data could be trusted.

Mr. Andreen asked how people could enter into the Metro jurisdictional boundary. Councilor Burkholder said 50% of the people in an area could either vote to be annexed or that the state legislature could be approached regarding expanding the Metro boundary to include an area.

Staff Report

Ms. Stacey reminded members to be courteous with items found in the Council refrigerator. She asked the committee if they were comfortable meeting in Room 370A. The committee agreed. She informed the committee that Mr. Donovan’s office and her desk would be moving into the old Executive Office area.

Public Comment

Roundtable

Ms. Durtschi said she had the voting abstract from the 2002 election for all of Metro if people were interested in information regarding their precinct. She displayed a brochure listing most-used phone numbers for a jurisdiction and suggested Metro create something similar.

Ms. Gillespie said the Rose City Park Neighborhood Association would not be meeting in December. She displayed an article about a recent Multnomah County audit report on the county’s citizen involvement committee (CIC).

Mr. Jones said his community was experiencing challenges with its special service district, which was unwilling to divulge its agenda. The district claimed that the agenda was not official until its adoption, so the agenda wouldn’t be mailed or emailed to the public. He said the Mayor of Oregon City gave a state of city address expressing concern that process not impede progress.

Ms. Roth said that an elected partisan nominee had been elected to the Clackamas CCI.

Mr. Seibert recommended reading a Portland Mercury article about neighborhood groups and who they really represented.

Mr. Kyle said that at the end of June he would not be renewing his MCCI membership. He said his workplace had reorganized and he was now in charge of all wastewater operations and capital. In addition, he had other volunteer commitments.

Ms. Tucker said the Roseway Neighborhood Association was redesigned its website. She said the Sim Project group would be meeting again in January 2003.

Mr. Pennington said CPO 5 did not meet because of the Thanksgiving holiday.

Chair Ganoe said that he would take the vacant seat in District 2 left by Mr. Kyle.

Ms. Tucker said she would apply for at-large membership in January because she would be moving and District 5 would be full.

Adjourn

There being no further business before the committee, Chair Ganoe adjourned the meeting at 8:53 p.m.

Prepared by,

Cary Stacey

Outreach Assistant